A while back I am also thinking of this question, which led me to think about Klingon Honor, which led me to think of the meta origin of Klingon's Honor comes from Samurai's honor... which resemble "face"
From there, I posted the version 1 of how Klingon Honor is a Mistranslation of Face in here: https://startrek.website/post/432321
Version 2 is at reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/DaystromInstitute/comments/158nyup/klingon_honor_itself_is_a_mistranslation_both_in/. It's far more refined.
TLDR: Klingon doesn't have Honor; they have "face" (due to meta reason of translating "face" to Honor). If you think about face, even cheating is allow; and if you consider cloaking is a type of cheating, then it's not against face. Oh, and a society that focus on face will inevitablely have a high level of corruption dominated by those in power, be it China, Korea, or Klingon.
He stepped down from CMO by 2265, and served under McCoy as "general physician"
I would like to correct Shangdi as "a term applied to the supreme deity in Chinese" for precision
While Shangdi has full prior history, if one encounter references to Shangdi outside of China mainland, including Taiwan, Hong Kong, as well as various Chinese dispora in the west, it refers to Christian God - even Catholics, despite officially Catholics use tianzhu. In fact, during my research on face, one article dated from 1926 actually refered Shangdi in manners that only make sense within Christianity.
I don't know how it is at SEA, however.
M'Benga's Demotion is due to something on Gorn
Considering that M'Benga is demoted, it's likely he did something that is consider attrocious, but not to drum out of Starfleet entirely.
Considering the Cliffhanger, what if M'Benga developed some kind of permannent genetic engineering that changed Gorn from reproducing with Paralystic Eggs being pregnant with their own paralystic eggs?
The reasoning I say is this: with Paralystic Eggs, they are consider direct threat to well being of the various Species within Federation due to nature. However, in Kelvinverse Gorn can get pregnant; and by the time Lower Decks come about Gorn is "friendly enough" for them to do business within Federation, something may have changed - voluntary or not voluntary. I will say not voluntary.
The technology exist: Klingon's smooth forehead is a combination of genetic manipulation with virus, leading to the spread of the geneitic engineering beyong those in the experiment.
Now, if M'Benga did it, it actually put Starfleet in a dilemma:
- On one hand, M'B
Predestination paradox. In fact the entire thing is likely a predestinaiton paradox. "Activated 120 years ago", which is caused by the imager at "now"; the reason why the two can go back home is because Tendi told them about the version according to Orion and mentioned her great-grandma being the discoverer, which is what let the past Orion to recognize the truth and probably themselves assigned it to Tendi's great-grandma?
For all I know, this could be inspired by your article. As stated, Daystorm had many explaination regarding the seemingly contradictory nature of Klingon Honor.
In fact, depends on how one see it, arguing that Klingon's Honor is either "faces" or similar to it, is merely narrowing the gap from the western/humanism idea of honor to "some aliens have different idea of honor", by placing it in something that is from Earth, and in a multicultural society, still influenced by them and not understanding it fully.
Regarding trusted and trustworthy: eveyr culture like trust, but different culture have different degree regarding that. How much will one sacrifice, whether that sacrifice is acceptable, etc.
Klingon “Honor” itself is a mistranslation (both in universe and meta)
小嘛小兒郎, 背著那書包上學堂 (Little, Little boy, carrying that bag to school)
不怕太陽曬, 也不怕那風雨狂 (fear not of burning sun, nor fear that crazy storm)
只怕先生罵我懶嗎, (but fear the teacher scold me lazy)
沒有學問 – 無臉見爹娘 (Being unlearned – no “lian”/face to face parents)
小嘛小兒郎, 背著那書包上學堂, (Little, Little boy, carrying that bag to school)
不是為做官, 也不是為面子光, (Not to be an official, or for one’s own “mianzi”/face)
只為做人要爭氣呀, (Just that a person must be determined not to fall short)
不受人欺負，也不做牛和羊 (Not to be bullied, nor to work like a draft animal)
(Classical children song “Du Shu Lang”/”Little School Boy”, Paula Tsui version)
富貴不歸故鄉，如衣繡夜行，誰知之者!
When one who made his wealth doesn’t return home, he may as well wear glamorous clothing in the middle of the night, who would notice that!
人言楚人沐猴而冠耳，果然
I heard the Lord of Chu is like an anxious monkey wearing a crown, and I was right.
– <Shi’ji, Record of Xiang’yu>
Introduction
One of the common argument and complaint regarding Klingon honor is that
"Time pushing back" as a valid explaination?
SNW S2E02 introduce a new quirk of the canon: The time "push back", such that there will be some events (let's just call it Canon Event) that will always come about in Prime Timeline, albeit in different actual time. Aside from the aforementioned Eugenic War, I can think of a few other so-called "inconsistency", such as how there are already Cloaking technology for both Romulans and Klingons before Kirk's mission, despite TOS dialogue implies that Romulan first got cloak during Kirk's mission, and then transfer technology to Klingon. (I think the current explaination is different cloaking technology, which have various quirks.)
So here's the question: Under what situation would you consider "Time Pushback" being an acceptable explaination for discrepancy??