generoddenberryssexfetish:
AND ANOTHER THING about the wire is how the fandom often visualizes bashir’s neutralization of the implant as a literal removal of the device, when that isn’t actually how it happens. Garak makes a point of explaining that it is not something that can easily be removed, and he’s right. Bashir spends most of the episode trying to help garak through the withdrawal, and I don’t think he ever actually even considers removing it as a valid or practical option for very long. the actual shutdown of the implant takes about two seconds; garak tells him where the remote control is and bashir turns it off. The end.
Except NOT the end at all bc the genuine root of the problem was never the titular wire, but that garak was forced into a dependency upon it. this episode was never solely about a Drug MetaphorTM, it’s about garak, and specifically about asking the question of why exactly he (or anyone else for that matter) would end up in a situation where a coping mechanism transforms into an addiction to a punishment device. and it does such a great job of asking this question imho, and it’s why I think this episode has aged so excellently. I’m by no means an expert on drug addiction or harm reduction or anything of the sort, but I’ve lived at the heart of the opioid epidemic for some time now and I’ve spoken to people who work in harm reduction organizations, to people who have worked in abstinence-based treatment, to people who have lost loved ones to ODs, to people recovering from addiction themselves, and I gotta say!!! the way this episode describes drug use NOT as a the result of a character flaw, but as a means—and the only available means, really—of coping with an environment that is physically, socially, and politically hostile is alarmingly familiar and relevant.
and it’s bc of that factor that I can never bring myself to see this episode as outdated or antithetical to harm reduction ideologies, even though it kinda engages in that trope that’s so often used in the Drug Addiction Episode of tv shows (especially in the 90s when ds9 aired), where there’s a fictionalized version of a drug (or drug metaphor) that is so addictive and deadly that there is no POSSIBLE WAY for people to use it safely and still remain a Productive Member of Society—a trope often utilized as a means of shame-based, pro-abstinence (and only abstinence) propaganda. and the wire never does this. it never shames garak for his supposed misuse of the implant as a coping mechanism. it makes a point of showing that it is clearly unhealthy and that garak will have to find a new means of survival, but he comes to that conclusion on his own; he’s never forced or shamed into it by someone else. garak begins to heal on his own terms, with bashir there to support him, regardless of whether or not garak is a “good” person, of whether or not he “deserves” help.
that’s what sets the wire apart from the crowd. plenty of media trying to tackle addiction makes a point of depicting addicts as victims of a disease, as sympathetic, as mere humans who have made mistakes like anyone else, and that’s all well and good, but personally, I am always going to take issue with the way these media depict the pain of withdrawal as deserved and necessary suffering, as a fit punishment for the crime of using drugs. the wire shows garak riding out his withdrawal (and from what I’ve heard from those who know, it shows it very realistically), but it never says, “this is good. he needs this suffering. it will fix him.” because it DOESN’T fix him. suffering doesn’t fix anything; empathy, solidarity, and compassion does. and (unfortunately) that is a really radical thesis statement for an episode about drug addiction by today’s standards, much less the 90s
