Do you think that believing in the Roddenberry vision of the future is required to be a fan?

No, one need not subscribe to "Gene's vision" to be a fan. Most of the Trek that does subscribe to "Gene's vision" is bad.

TOS doesn't subscribe to "Gene's vision." Fans of Trek prior to the 1980's did not subscribe to "Gene's vision," because it didn't exist.

"Gene's vision" is a concept that was fabricated in the 1980's with TNG (in my opinion, Gene was senile at this time), and a large reason as to why that show (and VOY too) is a terrible drama that is nothing like TOS.

No it's not. DS9 has almost exactly the same tone & vision as TOS. DS9 & TOS are quite different than TNG & VOY though (to TNG's and VOY's detriment).

 

The origins of "Gene's Vision," imho, lay in the 1970s, after Star Trek went off the air and into syndication. There was a confluence of things happening then -- Roddenberry was unable to sell the networks on anything beyond the occasional pilot movie, Star Trek conventions started and fandom grew, and Roddenberry began to be hailed by fandom as a "great thinker" (such as in books like Meaning in Star Trek and Star Trek LIves!). Roddenberry, who was, frankly, failing at his chosen career, latched on to the one career success he'd had and began to believe what was being said about it, that Star Trek was more than just a television show. And when Roddenberry was shown the door by Paramount after Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Roddenberry could use "Gene's Vision" as a cudgel, to say to convention audiences that Harve Bennett and Paramount just didn't "get" it, because he was the one with the vision, the one who knew how Star Trek should be done.

 

Common misconception about atheism.

Faith comes in many forms. Faith in a higher power is just one of them. Atheists reject the supernatural aspects of religion. That doesn't make them incapable of expressing faith.

Politics is a form of faith. Think of how many people voted for Trump because they had "faith" that he would "make america great again". Faith in that form is like a kind of prediction. If we all do X, we get Y. Nothing supernatural required, but it does require you to extrapolate into the unknown and then dig in your heels and defend your prediction, knowing you could be wrong.

We've never had a perfect socialist utopia so it's possible to have faith it would work and not have some fatal downside.

 

Not at all. There are plenty of elements in Star Trek to enjoy without having to accept a certain philosophy. I liked it when I was a Christian.

 

Ironically, the utopia we see or mentioned in Trek almost matches the religious utopia we often see in pictures or read . The plush greenery, people smiling, no war or bigotry, food and abundance for all everywhere. Which scene belong to which idea?

The main difference is Trek is saying that Trek (or Rodenberry) is sayin humans did it through scientific advancement. It's almost a faith in the concept-- the expectation is that alien cultures create their "paradises" when they reach a level of technology that can create their food clothing, cure disease, etc.

 

With the right technology, if your limit is how much energy you can collect, and you can begin collecting more than you can use for "everyday" needs from the sun or other nigh inexhaustible and pollution free sources, you do have to wonder how Humanity will spend its time when it's not constantly hunting and gathering and toiling in the fields just to feed, clothe, and shelter oneself.

Space has a lot of resources. Getting there and using them is the key. But Gene's vision is light on details as to how we achieve certain key abilities, like artificial gravity, or the ability to take things into orbit so effortlessly. But if one imagines they can do that, and basic needs are met, it's fun to imagine what else humanity might do with its time.

Exploration has always been one of Humanity's loftier goals. Cooperation with others is also quite laudable, and the Golden Rule one of our highest aspirations. Beyond the details, is there much more to the vision?

 

Not really, they just don't think that the future has to be 100% like the 20th century. Which is good, considering how it was the bloodiest one in Human History.

TOS has plenty of problems. It just has nostalgia backing it up so people don't bother pointing them out as often as they should.

Nah, TNG is just as good. It just doesn't think the future will be 100% like the 20th century, which some 20th Century people don't like. And it doesn't have the 50 years of nostalgia to cloud peoples' vision.

DS9 had it's problems as well. And no, it subscribed to the Utopianism as well. Just not as much. And before you bring up your usual nonsense about "Internal Conflict", no DS9 didn't really have a lot of that. Of course, TOS didn't have much of that either since most everything there relating to conflict came from external sources or one-episode stuff.

"Gene's Vision" was a future where people wouldn't be petty babies over everything, and considering how things are going today I agree with that vision. Some people just dislike the notion that the future isn't going to 100% be like today.