SDS9 – S4E19: "Hard Time" (Patreon)

This episode was recorded on August 22, 2024.

CW: The episode and our recap have discussions of self-harm

Sam and Scott recap "Hard Time" and discuss the US settler-colonial prison system, the Western biomedical diagnostic model, and the trauma-informed lens to mental health.

SDS9 seasons 1, 2, and 3 can be found wherever you stream Southpaw. Season 4 is only available to paid subscribers.

You can also listen to this episode directly from your favorite podcast player by following these instructions: https://support.patreon.com/hc/en-us/articles/212055866-Subscribe-to-your-Audio-RSS-link-on-the-Patreon-app

(Note: Many phone plans come with Paramount+ for free. It can also come with your cable package, credit card, or in a bundle, so make sure to double-check. There are also other ways to watch DS9 that we're sure you internet space explorers can figure out. Otherwise, since Scott does such an excellent job with the play-by-play, you don't have to watch the episodes to enjoy our breakdowns.)

Transcript

[Note: Transcripts are autogenerated and may contain errors.]

We are back with Southpaw Deep Space Nine Season 4. If you don't know what SDS9 is, it's Southpaw's completionist DS9 watch-along show where we watch every episode, recap it, and analyze it. We are your hosts, Scott and Sam. Today, we are discussing Hard Time. If you haven't yet watched the episode, I should warn you,

the episode gets pretty intense with physical and psychological abuse, as well as dealing with the subject of unaliving yourself. These things will come up in our recap and discussion, so use your own discretion. Scott, can you recap this episode?

An elderly man is drawing in the sand. He seems to be in a prison. He is in an Argrathi jail cell, spending 20 years for espionage, we find out. And it is Miles going through something painful again. He screams and he wakes up looking regular. And Keir is there and these Agrathi wardens greet him.

Miles experienced a virtual reality simulation prison experience. Memories of incarceration. They deem that this is a more effective and efficient way of dealing with crime on their planet through Mind manipulation. Basically, he was implanted with the memory of 20-year sentence. Miles has only been under for hours, but it's clear that it was very real to him.

Ben explains to Keiko that while on a mission to Argratha, Miles was falsely accused of espionage and sentenced to 20 years in prison. The Argrathi, they use advanced technology where they mine and alter you and make you experience 20 years in a couple hours.

By the time Deep Space Nine received word, the sentence was already over and Miles was free to come back. Keiko wants to see Miles and he is en route. Miles and Kira get to the station and Bashir meets them. Miles really wants to see Keiko,

but Bashir assures him he's going to check him and make sure he's okay and get him back to his family. Bashir asks if O'Brien was alone in his cell and O'Brien says he was. Flashbacks suggest something else. He had a cellmate who fed and helped him. He's friendly and just happy to have someone to talk to.

He was there for sedition, and Miles was there for espionage. Ichar. Is his name? Welcomes Miles to hell. However, in present time, Miles keeps on saying he was alone. Curious. Bashir tries to help fix Miles' brain, but realizes that the many maladies Miles has suffered is just part of it. And there's nothing that what they can do.

His memory is real. It's just experienced at an accelerated rate. The memories can't be erased. So Miles just has to do what he does, which is suffer. Miles is trying to we see miles trying to replicate one of the fruits that he ate that was offered by HR.

Um, and he's hallucinating HR and he's just so confused and he embraces Keiko. And remember for him, it's been 20 years. So he forgot that Keiko is pregnant. Miles is trying to adjust to be, to being back like many previously incarcerated people and, he's having trouble doing that. He has to see a therapist three days a week.

Keiko notices that when they're eating, Miles is making two plates of food to save. He explains it was a habit while he was in prison that you would ration your food and make sure that you had some left over. And in the flashback, Ichar is showing Miles the rope, including the food-saving trick we just saw.

Ichar also explains that he exercises and draws patterns to keep himself busy. The patterns are his sikahs. There are geometric patterns drawn on the floor. This is what old Miles was doing at the beginning of the episode. An Asika is an Argrati geometric art form.

It is created by drawing a circle and concentrating on it until the mind is fully immersed, allowing the art to flow naturally from within. Ichar and Miles joke while making the Asika and... Echar explains that he prefers to laugh over being miserable, and Miles is just getting older.

Later at night, Keiko looks for Miles and he is sleeping on the floor. I'm afraid our friend Miles has been systemized, a member of the Cyber Prison Industrial Complex. At Quarks, Worf and Miles play darts, but Miles doesn't really feel like doing anything. Miles continues to see Echar, and he goes to look for him, but no dice.

Then we see Jake and Miles are hanging out, and Miles is showing off and testing his engineering skills. He is slowly relearning everything, but he is perfect and remembers it all. Remember, Miles is nothing if not a good engineer. Jake says Miles may be rusty, but he's still the chief. And Miles smiles.

Which is also a great Miles Davis album. Miles is working on science stuff and is back to normal work-wise. Colmini really captures despair well in this episode, I must say. Bashir checks in on Miles. Miles has been skipping therapy. He finds talking about his trauma to be unpleasant and daunting. Miles just wants to forget everything.

Just wants to be left alone and then he threatens Bashir. He is not okay. Miles goes to the promenade and we have a flashback. A now older Miles and Echar are hanging out and Echar is doing an esika. Miles lashes out at Echar, has an outburst and creates such uproar he almost gets penalized.

But Echar grabs Miles and tries to calm him down. Back at Quark's, Miles goes there to try to drink his troubles away. Quark is very busy. He asks for a drink. He asks for a drink. He asks for a drink. And Quark can't get to him right away. So he attacks Quark, grabs his arm,

puts him in an uncomfortable position, and he sees Ichar again and, you know, He understands that Echar was never real, but is still his friend. It's complex. Echar says that Miles needs him now more than ever. Because Miles is going through it. Miles goes to work and Echar is there and says he's worried about him.

Miles said he is doing better than ever. Echar reminds him that he's still hallucinating, so maybe he's not so good. Ben asks to see Miles and asks about his outbursts and how he stopped seeing his therapist. Ben says that he will see the therapist immediately,

and Ben has relieved Miles of duty and orders Miles to seek help and see therapists until he is deemed medically fit. Otherwise, he's got no job. Ben warns Miles that he needs to tend to his problems. Miles is getting more and more upset.

He rushes past Jadzia and throws his comm badge and goes to Bashir and yells at him and explains that the Miles everyone knows is dead. Echar begs Miles to listen and implies Miles caused Echar to die and reminds Miles that he needs help more than ever. Back at his quarters, Miles screams at Molly and makes her cry.

Miles starts breaking things and he goes away. He leaves his quarters and starts breaking things and he sees a phaser station and grabs a phaser. Content warning, self-harm. Miles sets the phaser to a very high setting and puts it to his chest. Bashir finds Miles. Bashir promises Miles that things will get better.

Miles says that he's dangerous and feels dangerous and wants to save everyone from the monster he's become. Miles cries and finally tells Bashir of Ichar and explains that he lied about not having anyone while he was in prison. Miles had Ichar for most of his imprisonment. A few weeks before his release of the mental prison,

Miles and Ichar are starving, not being fed for some time. Miles wakes up in prison and sees Ichar has a hidden space and thinks Ichar is hiding food for himself. They have a fight, and Miles realizes that there was food, but it was rationed for both of them,

and he doesn't realize that in that rage he killed Ichar. all for naught as they were about to get fed the next day. Miles explains he was so mad, it felt real. The things that he did, he feels guilty of. You know, he says that humanity had evolved, mankind outgrew hate and rage,

but when Miles had a chance to show that he was an evolved man, he failed and repaid kindness with blood. And for this, Miles thinks he deserves to die. And Bashir points out that just the guilt that Miles has shows that he is still a good man and to not let the jailers win.

Miles finally allows Bashir to take the phaser, and Ichar departs. And Miles cries. Bashir prescribes some meds to help Miles and asks Miles to start therapy again. He can't forget, but he can heal. And Miles and Bashir are friends again. Miles goes home and hugs Molly and Keiko, and finally we see Miles smiling a little bit more.

This episode had criticisms of the prison system, but also explored how abuse, isolation, and ultimately trauma change a person and can perpetuate more violence. For us as radicals, it also tackles the complex matter of justice. It's complex, not just in policy or execution, but emotionally. In theory, radicals want transformative and restorative justice, but in practice,

often anything less than punitive justice is unjust. So we're not there yet. So even for radicals, we know punitive justice is wrong and doesn't work, but an alternative also doesn't sit well with us either. I get that. You can't undo the punishment people have already endured.

And for people who arm others, anything other than punishment seems like they're let off the hook. So if you just get rid of punishment starting tomorrow, well, then what about all the people in the past? And then maybe people who've never received punishment continue to never receive punishment. So it all seems unfair because the past matters.

Right. And also, I believe most people, and obviously there are people that have different views than mine, but most people that believe in prison abolition, which I unabashedly believe in, aren't saying that there shouldn't be a process for certain behaviors and certain crimes, right? It's that, at least from my vantage point, it's the argument that

the method in which the American carceral system treats people is inhumane, does not create recidivism, and doesn't end crime. And we're starting to get more and more things that show recidivism, that reduce recidivism, and that is almost all treating prisoners better. So... I truly believe in restorative justice. I don't even believe in fully canceling people.

I believe in giving people a chance. I believe in the redemption of the human soul. That is how restorative justice works for me, meaning that to give people a chance to come back. Obviously, there are certain behaviors that are way more difficult to deal with than others, but

Sometimes I have to look at if restorative justice from a leftist lens is doing the right thing and not also contributing to a punitive culture, which I just think is not where we should head. But then another part of me, while... watching this episode, which is a banger of a mythology episode.

Let's just be, let's just keep it a buck, right? This, this episode is, is a banger. Um, it's so good. And a lot of that is the brilliance of Colmini. But, you know, if there was something like this, that was a harm reduction or an alternative to incarceration, um,

I bet a lot of people would choose this to 20 minutes over 20 years, but it doesn't, it doesn't fix any of the problems and it's not, it's not, um, preventative. I just think like, like, I think this is, I think this type of punishment is actually incredibly cruel. though I think most carceral punishment is cruel.

I mean, the book Carceral Capitalism is a must-read, and the way that America uses people for very cheap labor and to fund many of the things that people have in their house is a whole other story. This is the kind of Star Trek show we are,

You made some great points. And to clarify what I was saying, this isn't one of those where I'm trying to put words in the mouth of people who want abolition of prisons or anything like that. Right. Instead, what I'm saying is that we're human. And so there's how we think about things in theory,

but how we feel about them in practice or as human beings. Right. We're not like as Ben Shapiro podists. It's not possible to be completely rational. And if you are, you'd be like one of those people who are standing in front of a menu for two hours weighing all the pros and cons.

And that's not actually rational either, right? Because then trying to go through the work of deducing every little option and the pros and cons, that just rationally takes up too much time and it's not worth it, right?

If you're that pedantic about something, then you're actually no longer rational.

Yes.

We're focusing on the middle path, my friend.

So that's not human. So I think what I'm talking about is the truth of what we want in theory, but the emotional side is different. Yeah. There's been so many times people have been exposed where they're talking about abolition and, you know, maybe on Twitter, they'll post something about how they want abolition of prisons.

They want restorative justice. But then maybe a year later or a month later, they feel some kind of way about it and they sound like a completely different person, right? That dichotomy is what I'm talking about here, right? Like how we think about it when we're completely cool headed and there's no

emotional stakes and how we feel about it when there are emotional stakes. This is what makes people even afraid to start an organization because then what if there's a problem? When you're coming up with an organization and talking about how to deal with problems, before they arise, everybody's like, yeah, yeah, yeah, we can agree with that.

And then when the problem actually arises and people are affected and there's emotions and people, those same things you agreed upon doesn't sound right anymore, right? So there's no way to reconcile that yet. And I'm wondering when or if it's even possible to reconcile because of the past,

because the past matters and because of how you feel like, well, it's inequity because like, you know, marginalized people who had a history of doing it this one way, how come you get stopped that right before you ever get punished in that way, right?

I get this other ways better, but like, how come you never got a taste of that medicine, right? So... It's complex. And I think the nice thing about fiction is it also gets to explore that emotional side, that emotional truth. So this episode was a thought experiment. And since in this U.S. settler society, punishment already exists,

the thought experiment was, wouldn't it be more efficient to just give people the consequences of the punishment without taking up so much time or robbing them of time and resources? Biohacking. Yeah. And this episode also makes clear how pointless punishment is because then you just have a damaged person going back to society.

So even if you save time, what was the point anyway? O'Brien can't stand who he's become and how incarceration changed them, but also what he did as an imprisoned person. There's nothing natural about our behaviors in an oppressive environment. There's also a decolonial lens that looks at psychology and criticizes the Western diagnostic model.

So this episode wasn't just about imprisonment. For me, it was also an episode about psychology and mental health. Rather than diagnosing and thinking of these behaviors as diseases of the mind, the decolonial lens instead looks at these behaviors as symptoms and adaptations to trauma while also looking at societal and biological factors.

But it doesn't go first to biology and biomedicalize someone. O'Brien would be an example of how the trauma-informed lens to mental health would be a better analysis of what he's going through beyond just PTSD. So this episode shows us all that trauma can do through the character of O'Brien

and makes it a permanent change because instead of a reset or a magic pill that makes this all be undone, which would have been cheap. Instead, O'Brien has to work through it because that's how it is in real life. There's no magic pill. Once the damage is done, the damage is already done.

Yes. In fact, it was really helpful because it kind of was like, showed you that a kind of realistic view of mental health medication, you know, like SSRIs or, you know, or antidepressants, anti-anxiety medication, what have you. It's like, it helps you heal. You can't forget but you can heal and you can learn to manage.

You can learn to slow down. I've heard people describe certain meds as they're still like the wick that gets them going, but it's a longer one. You know what I'm saying? So it just gives you tools that help your brain be kinder to yourself. It's true. It's amazing, you know,

what the leaps and bounds we've made with depression medication is, it's incredible.

And I think that's a great way to look at it. And it actually aligns with the lens that I'm speaking of, right? Instead of thinking of everything as a chemical imbalance, right? If it was just chemical imbalance and then you restore the chemicals, then everything

should go back to normal quote unquote or it actually is a magic pill but if you look at it from this trauma-informed lens then instead it's not just about chemicals in your brain and the chemicals might be actually a maladaptive attempt at survival based on trauma so these medications are tools to just help you manage

them but that's it it can't undo what's already happened no And so by making this change permanent and that's something that can be undone for O'Brien, it asks the question, how do we live with that and manage that? And that was O'Brien's struggle where he got to a point where he

decided he couldn't live with that and that behavior may emerge again i don't know what happens in future episode but at least in real life it can emerge again we've

already given content warnings but you know self-harm for the for the formerly incarcerated is not uncommon Obviously, we're all familiar with Kalief Browder, who was arrested in New York under the suspicion of stealing someone's backpack and was held in Rikers Island for years, much of it in solitary confinement, because he refused to do a plea deal.

Because in New York and in many other cities, the way that time works, you're supposed to only be waiting for a trial for a certain amount of days. But in certain jurisdictions, what is a day is not literally a day. And people can be held at Rikers Island for years. So he wasn't even convicted. Let's clarify, right?

Yeah. was just waiting for the trial correct he was waiting in rikers island for years because he refused to take a plea deal because in many cities that's what the plea deal most people will plea out but a lot of people don't want to plea out because once you plea out

You have something on your record that makes it harder to get a job in certain instances. It just is a way to get you into the system. And it has to do with the haves and the have-nots because people that have a little more access can get a lawyer and just be like, no,

I want to take it to trial. I want it to take it to trial knowing full well that most cases will get dropped on the way. So it is a brutal system that punishes people for not having money. Because if he just had money, he would have paid bail and he would have been out.

And when he got back, he was the star of an incredible New Yorker article and people were talking about him. But he took his life. You can only put people through so much. It's got to give at some point. And solitary confinement is torture. And it's just so messed up.

And there are so many people that, like Miles, come back from prison and can't find a reason to live. I mean, the 13th Amendment and this prison system is another sin that this country has to deal with.

So, I've talked about the themes of this episode, analyzed them. But did this episode execute the themes well? Is this a good episode? Did I like this episode? And I did like this episode. I do think it's a good episode. I probably don't like it as much as you, Scott. And I'll tell you why.

Because it also still felt to me like... O'Brien torture porn? Yes. They even make a joke about it. Yeah, so there is a bit of, like, these writers just really like fucking with O'Brien too much, too, for my taste. So that was the part that I didn't like.

If I did a rewatch of this entire series, would I watch this episode again or skip it? I'd skip it, but not because they like to pick on O'Brien or just torture porn him, but also because this episode is very intense. So, Scott, since you watched it again, what was it like the second time?

What's your review of this episode? How do you think they handled these sensitive subject matters? And does this episode matter?

So the episode doesn't matter. Oh, it doesn't. No, not really. If I was to design a watching guide of like episodes you could skip, this would be one that I would be like, you could skip, but it's a great episode. So I give this episode a four out of five for non-mythology.

Because I just thought it was a banger. I thought the acting was excellent. I thought the pacing was excellent. I thought you really were able to see someone having a major depressive episode, looks like. So yeah, that's where I stand.

So there was no hesitation for you watching this again, knowing what would come up in this episode? I haven't watched this episode in 30 years. Okay, okay. So the last rewatch then, you didn't watch it? Oh, none of the rewatches. I've watched this episode. It is intense. Can you tell us about the next episode?

Ben's wife is back?

Until then...