The Stargate Connection

War is a common theme in many modern television programs. Science fiction shows especially those that involve extra-terrestrial beings give us a completely new perspective on the concept of war because they enlarge the battlefield to no just anthropocentric matters but also intersteller conflicts. New standards and morality questions undoubedly arise. Specifically, the series Stargate sg1 and Stargate Atlantis offer many good insights into both diplomacy and armed conflict between different races living on different planets. As a brief overview, the stargate universe is based heavily on Earth's mythology. A member of the parasitic race (a major antagonist) called the Goa'uld, Ra arrives in Ancient Egypt and abducts many primitive humans for slave labor on other worlds. The Goa'uld are in possession of an Ancient(another race) device called the stargate, which enables the instanteous travel both matter and energy through an established wormhole between two locations in the Milkyway Galaxy. There is a rebellion on earth and the Ra is banished from the planet. As ar result there are many humans living on other worlds in the galaxy who are in various stages of technological development in the present day. In the series Stargate sg1, colonel Jack Oneill portrayed by Richard Deal Anderson has a tendency to try to impose the ways of earth on the people from other worlds. He even goes as far to try to break thousand year old rituals held by the Jaffa (genetically engineered humans). Acting as his foil, Daniel Jackson, a civilian archeologist, usually respects the traditions of other races and their sovereignty. This showcases a sharp contrast in methodologies of approaching both diplomatic relations and war in space. In the series Stargate Atlantis, diplomacy and the war between humans and the Wraith (a hostile alien race that needs to feed on the human life force to survive) is even more pressing than in sg1 because the plot takes place in a completely different galaxy. Aspects of human wartime and peaceful diplomacy are used such as the Geneva Convention. Major John sheppard, the chief military officer of Atlantis (the base of operations in the Pegasus galaxy), tends to rejects earth laws in the war against the wraith. Once he sites that if the Wraith were present at the the Geneva Convention, they would start feeding on all the delegates.