Dwight Schultz On Conservative Talk

Discussion in 'Star Trek: The Next Generation' started by acappellasaurus, Aug 21, 2010.

  1. Beyerstein

    Beyerstein Captain Captain

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    I believe it could be argued that being conservative is in a way anti-roddenberry, anti-star trek.
     
  2. Finn

    Finn Bad Batch of TrekBBS Admiral

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    ^Prime Pike didn't want women on the bridge :lol:

    I didn't realize this was a zombie thread until I saw a Red Ranger post


    I was thinking this was old news


    Anyway, I don't really care either way. I know individuals who lean either way and were still wonderful individuals.
     
  3. RAMA

    RAMA Admiral Admiral

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    Blah
     
  4. Smellincoffee

    Smellincoffee Commodore Commodore

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    Oh, I doubt it. I've a friend who refers to himself as an arch-conservative and swears by Rush Limbaugh, but he loves ST TNG. People are always more interesting than we give credit for, especially when we're distracted by labels. Conservative prudence has its place. (You won't find many 'prudent' conservatives on TV admittedly, but the medium itself isn't one amicable to measured thought.)
     
  5. Amaris

    Amaris Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Amen, Smellincoffee.
     
  6. Forbin

    Forbin Admiral Admiral

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    I said out, dammit!
    Bullshit.
     
  7. Amaris

    Amaris Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Yeah, I can't agree with that, either. Lots of people have dreams, and Star Trek is a hopeful vision of the future for humanity. That's something a lot of people, regardless of political affiliation, can get behind.

    Plus, starships. Starships are cool.
     
  8. Forbin

    Forbin Admiral Admiral

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    I said out, dammit!
    People are too complex to say "because this person believes in X, then they must hate this unrelated Y."

    I'm a moderate republican agnostic with a gun collection and an insatiable science fiction habit. I Love Trek's hopeful message. Don't even try to pigeonhole me.
     
  9. varek

    varek Commander Red Shirt

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    I agree. Everyone should be entitled to their opinion, as long as they can keep the starships on an even keel.

    Starships are really cool!
     
  10. E-DUB

    E-DUB Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    I regard myself as left of center but still mainstream, because every stream has a left bank and a right bank. The problem is that so much of our public discourse is dominated by people who have left the stream and are off in the weeds somewhere.
     
  11. Hober Mallow

    Hober Mallow Commodore Commodore

    People who adopt ideology have labeled themselves.
     
  12. JarodRussell

    JarodRussell Vice Admiral Admiral

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    I got the impression that mainstream science fiction got more and more conservative in recent years. In the previous decades, science fiction stories were further "out there", but now I read stuff like "Earth needs to be in danger so audiences can relate", etc... Just look at the conceptual differences between original Battlestar Galactica and the reboot, for example.

    Same thing happened with Trek. No money, utopian society, etc... All that got reduced more and more to the point where Uhura orders Budweiser in a bar. At some point in Trek, future humans were supposed to appear alien to us in the audience. But now it's a trend to make things look like nothing will change in 300 years, and that the only difference is the technology, but not the state of society.
     
  13. JarodRussell

    JarodRussell Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Labels require consistency and causality. Which in humans isn't there. That's why sometimes discussions are a hopeless failure, because someone goes "you have a neo conservative opinion on issue A, so your neo liberal opinion on issue B is nonsense" They require and treat people like they have to fit the label they gave them.
     
  14. Forbin

    Forbin Admiral Admiral

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    I said out, dammit!
    Oh I love that, I'm stealing it for a facebook meme.
     
  15. JarodRussell

    JarodRussell Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Eh, there used to be a post between my two.
     
  16. Forbin

    Forbin Admiral Admiral

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    I said out, dammit!
    :)

    [​IMG]

    (adjusted for my own political bent).
     
  17. RainKing

    RainKing Lieutenant Red Shirt

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    This is only my second post on this website, so I don't know if I properly quoted this individual, but I just wanted to say that I wish this forum had a "Like" feature... because I like the hell out of that quote.
     
  18. Smellincoffee

    Smellincoffee Commodore Commodore

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    I don't know that I would call that conservative, so much as unimaginative or overly cautious. It's easy to deride conservatives as that, but those who call themselves conservative would do it with a mind of what they are intending to conserve; there are values they have in mind. But whereas Star Trek was full of values, the action-adventure JJ-trek doesn't really have them. You can wring some out -- the importance of friendship, maybe -- but you could wring the same meager offerings out of any movie.