Was TNG less progressive than TOS?

[jaime]

It's alot of little things out together that make Code look wrong. For instance if you gave the Ligonians the Edo planet and Edo clothes it would look an awful lot less like "TNG goes to Africa planet"

What about the Ligonians, other than them being Black, looked remotely like something specifically African? At worst it looked vaguely orientalist fantasy, but all the Trek planets look like that (but with shiny fabrics) going back to The Cage. They wore Turbans and silly trousers. And it was pre-MC Hammer, so we can’t blame the trousers on that. People have some really weird ideas about what Africa and Africans look like. In all of Trek, the closest I have seen to an ‘African’ looking outfit was Neelix, and that’s only because some of his gear looked what like little old ladies wore to church on a Sunday.

 

[TimeIsAPredator]

The idea that the Ligonians in any way resemble African Tribes is based entirely on skin colour, from a culture whose main source of information on Africa was an Eddie Murphy film (itself with more than a few problems.) I think overall it says more to the associations hardwired by Hollywood

Well yes this is exactly the problem. It falls back on racial stereotypes and looks like some white people sitting down and trying to design an "exotic Africa planet"

And you are right it's not the only episode. I don't know about in the US but " up the long ladder" got plenty of talk in Ireland. It's full of lazy stereotypes and Darby O'Gill accents and despite loving the episode myself would happily defend any Irish person right to be offended by it

 

[TimeIsAPredator]

People have some really weird ideas about what Africa and Africans look like

The point is people don't think that what Africans look like but rather think that's what some guy with no clue about Africa thinks Africa looks like probably due to watching some other misinformed shows.

One of the reasons people liked Black Panther was because it felt like black people creating a black universe rather than white people trying to imagine one

 

[jaime]

Well yes this is exactly the problem. It falls back on racial stereotypes and looks like some white people sitting down and trying to design an "exotic Africa planet"

And you are right it's not the only episode. I don't know about in the US but " up the long ladder" got plenty of talk in Ireland. It's full of lazy stereotypes and Darby O'Gill accents and despite loving the episode myself would happily defend any Irish person right to be offended by it

Trek and nineties SF is full of diddly dee ‘plastic paddy’ shite. No argument there.
I genuinely don’t think it’s true in code of Honor, it’s just become a sort of self perpetuating legend. I mean, they wear turbans FFS. Yareena is basically in a catsuit that covers neck to ankle/wrist, (the fellas...arent) and her hair looks more like classical Mediterranean stuff (though also North Africa) than anything. I just..don’t see it.

 

[TimeIsAPredator]

TNG had both black people and Irish working on the show and I wonder if any were consulted as to the depictions in those episodes personally I doubt they were. I'm not black or African so I don't know exactly how racist Code is or isn't but I can certainly see someones point if they are offended by it.
As for ladder a few quick script and design changes by someone actually Irish could have made the exact same episode without any of the controversy and I'm sure the same goes for all the other episodes with ethnic groups in Trek

 

[jaime]

TNG had both black people and Irish working on the show and I wonder if any were consulted as to the depictions in those episodes personally I doubt they were. I'm not black or African so I don't know exactly how racist Code is or isn't but I can certainly see someones point if they are offended by it.
As for ladder a few quick script and design changes by someone actually Irish could have made the exact same episode without any of the controversy and I'm sure the same goes for all the other episodes with ethnic groups in Trek

I think that’s one of the other things that gives me a giggle...Hollywood, but Trek as well, couldn’t get *anyone* right. At least not on purpose. Julian Bashir only becomes close to real once we find out his dad is a bit of a wheeler dealer, and *even then* we are still in stereotype central. The main reason Bashir and O’Brien work is because of the actors.
They even stereotype *other americans* and it’s quite astonishing. In many ways that’s something in American culture...I mean I suppose it’s so damn big that the rest of the world seems like an alien planet anyway. You need only look at Picard...a Frenchman they then try to write as stereotypically British *and still get that wrong* (why, in all those years, did he never take milk in his tea? Why, beyond some weird Anglophile obsession with titled gentry, did they even go with Earl Grey?) The Irish thing in particular seems closely related to a lot of the romanticised Ireland stuff at the time, that has its roots in people who came from Irish families so far back that they didn’t notice things had changed in the auld country. (We see the same in the Anglophile population of Hollywood producers. Fog, phone box, red bus, cor blimey guv’nor strike a light.)
It’s why they could hire that advisor for Chakotay character on Voyager, they just genuinely didn’t have a clue.

I know, it’s ironic that I would argue that TNG was both progressive but also loaded up to the eyeballs with stereotypes for everyone, but I say what I see. It was terrible at dealing with real Earth stuff, but then...it was a few hundred years in the future as a setting. In terms of other stuff? It deserves more credit than people are willing to give, and it’s easy to do down with selective readings. (Troi is always getting kidnapped/sexually/ physically assaulted...but then...so is Riker. And they are both heavily sexualised characters, at least until the actors get some weight on. Etc.) It’s a bit more...nuanced.

 

[TimeIsAPredator]

You need only look at Picard...a Frenchman they then try to write as stereotypically British *and still get that wrong* (why, in all those years, did he never take milk in his tea?

Its more of this is needed not less. Some French people like English culture and tea and this helps make him real as opposed to a baguette eating garlic wearing french man also 400 years in the future these cultures would be more muddled anyway.

As for milk in tea not every English person does that and some don't even like tea so now you are the one trying to promote stereotypes

 

[jaime]

Its more of this is needed not less. Some French people like English culture and tea and this helps make him real as opposed to a baguette eating garlic wearing french man also 400 years in the future these cultures would be more muddled anyway.

As for milk in tea not every English person does that and some don't even like tea so now you are the one trying to promote stereotypes

Oh, I am really not. (For a start, I’m and Englishman...pretty much...and I don’t really like Tea at all. I prefer Coffee, but only if there’s no red bull around...) The problem with Picard is apart from wine, his name, and an inexplicable desire to burst into frere Jacque, everything else loaded onto him is ‘English Stereotype’. I like to imagine there’s a bit of Trek history where some kind of Anglo-French unification happened after WW3 because that would be interesting.

My questioning the milk is based on the fact it clearly looks like ‘English people (and lets be honest, sometimes that’s shorthand for British, and it’s probably an improvement on ‘European’ which also happened back then. Hello Alan Rickman.) like tea, what’s an English Tea? Earl Grey sounds posh’ .... and that’s as far as it got. My point is they aren’t even getting the stereotype right. Lazy stereotypes. In this case ‘landed English gentry’. This is of course because of Stewart’s general niche as an actor. It would have been amusing if he was playing it in Yorkshireman, but it would have been season 3 before the production team realised he wasn’t doing a French accent. XD

Which comes back to Bashir as the happy accident. His parents made him seem real, and part of that is because of the accent used by the actor playing his father. I would like to give them more credit, but it’s always felt like an accident rather than listening to Sid.

 

[TimeIsAPredator]

I like to imagine there’s a bit of Trek history where some kind of Anglo-French unification happened after WW3 because that would be interesting.

Well the whole planet United after WW3 and first contact. Also France and the UK have alot of shared history for instance the UK line of kings goes back to the Plantagenet who were Vikings settled in North France so both countries laid claim to each other and swapped culture for many centuries. Maybe the Picards are like the Hennessys of the famous brandy who were Irish settlers who became a huge french industry

I'm not sure I get your point about Bashir. Are you saying he was a stereotype early on or not enough of one?

 

[TimeIsAPredator]

Just on O'Brien I always thought he was one of the best depictions of an Irish character I ever saw on US TV and I can only assume this is down to Meaney being allowed to be himself. In DS9 in particular he can show that he likes a pint and some darts down the pub without it looking like a forced drunken Irish stereotype, he shows an interest in history without it going down a banshee and leprechaun shillelagh place and it might sound odd to some but even the fact that he was with Keiko and not some good Irish gerl made him an actual human. He was stereotypically Irish without being an Irish stereotype if you get me

 

[jaime]

Just on O'Brien I always thought he was one of the best depictions of an Irish character I ever saw on US TV and I can only assume this is down to Meaney being allowed to be himself. In DS9 in particular he can show that he likes a pint and some darts down the pub without it looking like a forced drunken Irish stereotype, he shows an interest in history without it going down a banshee and leprechaun shillelagh place and it might sound odd to some but even the fact that he was with Keiko and not some good Irish gerl made him an actual human. He was stereotypically Irish without being an Irish stereotype if you get me

I totally agree. And it’s the same for Bashir (to answer your other question) ironically. (Literally the same things in some cases...those pint glasses earned a lot of respect XD) He was an absolute Hugh Grant fop stereotype, right down to the Tennis. But suddenly ‘posh boy’ Julian became Jules. His dad was ‘working class’ as far as accent was concerned and suddenly everything about Bashir became very different. He didn’t even become ‘goes to university, develops airs and graces’ stereotype, because it turns out his parents were pushing him to achieve. He becomes a lot more recognisable (though in later years, the ‘pushy Asian parents’ became a thing, I don’t think it particularly was at this point) a lot more accurate to *people I see around me* through that and his relationship with Miles. Miles and Bashir work well together, precisely because they suddenly become absolutely ‘brits’ in the ‘America’ of Treks world. Which to be honest was pretty brave when a lot of Hollywood would have felt a need to have them hate each other to reflect some element of The Troubles. Whereas what we got was much more true to life...even though they began with some echo of that and class warfare that very sensible changed theme as the series went on.

As I say, I do wonder how much of that was by luck, design, or the actors getting some input. I think the books carry something similar with Troi, making her of British Descent, largely because by the films Marina isn’t going so ‘deaf accent’ on her portrayal (which was bloody genius when she did that before Majel blew the whole shebang) and sounds like what she is...a London Girl. Because the actor/character is more relaxed, things like stereotypes melt away because it becomes believable.

Picard though? I think the writers would be hard pressed to decide which side his family fought on at Waterloo when they were busy laying down the Shakespeare stuff.

 

[Timewalker]

The tight clothing was a Roddenberryism, as not only was this show his own personal baby, he was also responsible for a number of rewrites and indulgences in early season one. Ever since "Inside Star Trek" from 1976 where he discusses freely using people as objects (to the applause of the audience.)

All that's common knowledge but here's one of the sources, countless making-of books define the rest:

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(the fun starts about 20 seconds in... like Riker, he boasts about his bedroom life too - to the applause of the audience but at least he relegates himself as an object too... I guess. )

I listened to the entire video and there are some very thoughtful comments from Deforest Kelley and Isaac Asimov.

Also when they tried to go even more edgy it backfired in Dr Pulaski who nobody liked.

I liked Pulaski.

Look up “whitewashing”. There isn’t enough room here to explain it. As a Hispanic myself I don’t appreciate how few roles Hispanic actors get outside drug dealers and maids and that good roles could go to “anyone who can play Hispanic”.

There are times when it's necessary if you want to tell a story at all. I spent over a dozen years working backstage in musical theatre in my city, and there were plays we did where we had to use Caucasian actors, singers, and dancers because there were simply not enough people from Puerto Rico or Thailand available to play those roles in West Side Story or The King and I. We were also short on actors, singers, and dancers from the Middle East when we did Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat and Jesus Christ Superstar. Should the theatre company not have done those productions? They were all very well received (if it helps, the actor who played the King of Siam is from India).

It could have been interesting if Sarah MacDougal as chief of engineering had appeared more often in and after season 1, also interesting to think what Geordi's role could have been with him not becoming chief engineer.

MacDougal had a perpetually sour expression, with an equally sour way of expressing herself. Thank goodness they didn't keep her.

That said, Geordi's suddenly becoming Chief Engineer came out of nowhere.

We also saw her sister and what she thought of her and what Picard told her about Tasha. Thank you Denise for quitting, that led to some great stories.

That episode with Tasha's sister just annoyed me. It's not that Tasha had a sister, but the actress was one who had played Carter MacKay's daughter on Dallas, in another attempt at a "Romeo & Juliet" romance with Bobby (the MacKays and the Ewings were fighting a range war at the time, as well as being rival oil families). She couldn't act worth a damn on Dallas, either.

The weird thing for a progressive show, is that even though the characters have shown disdain for past eras like the 20th century, they seem to enjoy holodeck playing set right in the middle of the worse aspects in human history like the early 20th century. Racism, genocide, war, sexism, bigotry poverty--Picard, Data, Riker, all of them.

But its all ignored and misses any chance for a progressive moment. They could have chose any other time period, or planet, but its mostly that time period. It kind looks bi-polar if you ask me.

Picard may have contempt for real 20th century people, but I think the Dixon Hill character appealed to him because it was a way to practise his problem-solving skills. I don't remember Data doing any specific 20th century holoprogram. On Voyager, the only one who liked 20th century stuff was Tom Paris, and his interests were specifically 1930s-1950s. He had a superficial knowledge of the rest of the century (getting the slang wrong when talking to Raine Robinson). The rest of them pursued programs from their own cultures for the most part, and Janeway spent a lot of time either in the 1800s or the late 1400s/early 1500s. And of course Naomi and her stupid "Flotter" garbage...

It’s 1987/88 and there’s a female character *in charge* of weapons, not just handing the boys their missions or holding their coats. On TV. There are action figures. I think for the time, and for its niche, it’s pretty good.

I hope you're not saying there were no female action figures prior to TNG. My Uhura one in her TOS uniform would disagree with you.

I once showed one of my grandparents a (different) episode with Vic in it. Because she enjoyed that style of music, and she had been in clubs (for hispanics) from that time period.

She commented on the absence of "the cloud." She said that the cigarette smoke would have been so dense that the stage would have been slightly obscured to people seated at the bar, only twenty some feet away.

I wonder what the DS9 people would have thought of the cloud if it were present.

Gah. I love the Vic Fontaine episodes because I like James Darren. But I would not have enjoyed the episodes if they'd depicted clouds of cigarette smoke.

It’s on,y just really popped into my head that Troi is basically in the Bones role when you think about it.Thats definitely a step up from answering the phone.

Others have explained better than I could how absurd it is to equate Troi with McCoy.

TOS actually goes out of its way to be actively sexist in nearly every episode. People bring up Turnabout Intruder a lot, but there's almost worse stuff in the rest of the series. Besides the main cast being nurses and secretaries, the guest stars were almost entirely damsels, vamps, and succubi.

Dr. Ann Mulhall was neither a damsel, a vamp, nor a succubus. Neither was Areel Shaw.

I mean shows like Bonanza resulted in the term "Cartwright curse" to describe their disposable love interests of the week.

Fanfic has provided many, many stories, both short and novel-length that provide wives, children, and even grandchildren for the Cartwrights. There's even one where Inger (Hoss' mother who was killed in an Indian attack) comes back (seems they only thought she was dead; someone found and cared for her and she didn't know how to find Ben and the boys so she made her own life until she and Adam accidentally ran across each other decades later). So even Ben gets a happy ending with the woman he loves.

Interesting early on in TNG's development Troi and Picard were supposed to have an even closer (and quite odd) relationship; the man Deanna was bonded to and supposed to marry in the earliest versions of Haven was Picards godson and Deanna was particularly interested in joining the crew of the Enterprise in order to serve under her future husband's "legendary" godfather.

This brings up a question that has bothered me ever since the first time I ever saw "Haven" in 1987: If Deanna had an arranged marriage with Wyatt Miller, why was she carrying on a romance with Will Riker?

 

[TimeIsAPredator]

Miles and Bashir work well together, precisely because they suddenly become absolutely ‘brits’ in the ‘America’ of Treks world

Except Miles isn't a Brit he's Irish

 

[jaime]

Except Miles isn't a Brit he's Irish

That’s why I put inverted commas around it. In this case I was thinking in sort of extended terms of ‘british isles’ and shared cultural ties. Kind of loose, but hey, that’s these isles for you. Didn’t want to spend ages clarifying (even now) just sort of hoped the inverted commas would do the work for me and you would figure the rest. XD

 

[jaime]

I listened to the entire video and there are some very thoughtful comments from Deforest Kelley and Isaac Asimov.


I liked Pulaski.


There are times when it's necessary if you want to tell a story at all. I spent over a dozen years working backstage in musical theatre in my city, and there were plays we did where we had to use Caucasian actors, singers, and dancers because there were simply not enough people from Puerto Rico or Thailand available to play those roles in West Side Story or The King and I. We were also short on actors, singers, and dancers from the Middle East when we did Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat and Jesus Christ Superstar. Should the theatre company not have done those productions? They were all very well received (if it helps, the actor who played the King of Siam is from India).


MacDougal had a perpetually sour expression, with an equally sour way of expressing herself. Thank goodness they didn't keep her.

That said, Geordi's suddenly becoming Chief Engineer came out of nowhere.


That episode with Tasha's sister just annoyed me. It's not that Tasha had a sister, but the actress was one who had played Carter MacKay's daughter on Dallas, in another attempt at a "Romeo & Juliet" romance with Bobby (the MacKays and the Ewings were fighting a range war at the time, as well as being rival oil families). She couldn't act worth a damn on Dallas, either.


Picard may have contempt for real 20th century people, but I think the Dixon Hill character appealed to him because it was a way to practise his problem-solving skills. I don't remember Data doing any specific 20th century holoprogram. On Voyager, the only one who liked 20th century stuff was Tom Paris, and his interests were specifically 1930s-1950s. He had a superficial knowledge of the rest of the century (getting the slang wrong when talking to Raine Robinson). The rest of them pursued programs from their own cultures for the most part, and Janeway spent a lot of time either in the 1800s or the late 1400s/early 1500s. And of course Naomi and her stupid "Flotter" garbage...


I hope you're not saying there were no female action figures prior to TNG. My Uhura one in her TOS uniform would disagree with you.


Gah. I love the Vic Fontaine episodes because I like James Darren. But I would not have enjoyed the episodes if they'd depicted clouds of cigarette smoke.


Others have explained better than I could how absurd it is to equate Troi with McCoy.


Dr. Ann Mulhall was neither a damsel, a vamp, nor a succubus. Neither was Areel Shaw.


Fanfic has provided many, many stories, both short and novel-length that provide wives, children, and even grandchildren for the Cartwrights. There's even one where Inger (Hoss' mother who was killed in an Indian attack) comes back (seems they only thought she was dead; someone found and cared for her and she didn't know how to find Ben and the boys so she made her own life until she and Adam accidentally ran across each other decades later). So even Ben gets a happy ending with the woman he loves.


This brings up a question that has bothered me ever since the first time I ever saw "Haven" in 1987: If Deanna had an arranged marriage with Wyatt Miller, why was she carrying on a romance with Will Riker?

There’s a world of difference between action figures pre and post Star Wars, and indeed for television shows vs films at that time. So no, I am not arguing there were no female action figures at that time. That would be silly.

In terms of Troi/McCoy, gonna have to agree to disagree...I think it’s perfectly clear that the ‘state of the crew/voice of emotions/empathetic advisor’ role carries between the two, and one is clearly an extension of the other in intent; however much that changes...especially once Guinan shows up and brings the ‘old friend, have a drink’ aspect.

 

[TimeIsAPredator]

That’s why I put inverted commas around it. In this case I was thinking in sort of extended terms of ‘british isles’ and shared cultural ties. Kind of loose, but hey, that’s these isles for you. Didn’t want to spend ages clarifying (even now) just sort of hoped the inverted commas would do the work for me and you would figure the rest. XD

We tend not to refer them as that in Ireland or yourselves at Brits here in the Republic commas or not and Brits is a term which is recognised only to mean a person from GB and never used for someone from what you call the British isles. And considering that alot of those cultural ties included 800 yes of brutal occupation you could see why the term is wrong for an Irish person

But I bet you knew all this already but we're just trying to be a gowl

 

[jaime]

We tend not to refer them as that in Ireland or yourselves at Brits here in the Republic commas or not and Brits is a term which is recognised only to mean a person from GB and never used for someone from what you call the British isles. And considering that alot of those cultural ties included 800 yes of brutal occupation you could see why the term is wrong for an Irish person

But I bet you knew all this already but we're just trying to be a gowl

Nah, I was genuinely just trying to reach for a decent catch all and missed. My great grandad was Irish, my nans near-as-sister (evacuated together grew up together etc, goes a bit beyond best mates) was married to an Irishman, and various friends and family have been going back and forth for years (mostly to the Republic at that, if the variety of Knick knacks handed down by my Nan is anything to go by...) so I was looking for a catch all there. In terms of ‘most of those cultural ties’ I think the relationship is lot more complex, especially when you consider the history before and since. I’m a Londoner, which has even closer ties at ground level. If you google my name ninety percent of my shared doppelgänger names are gonna be in Ireland. Even ignoring the EU there’s a freedom of movement between our two countries, so stuff can get fuzzy real fast. From my perpspective, an ‘American’ accent would be exotic in a way that Irish wouldn’t, let alone countries with a whole other mainstream language. Whatever history made that happen...which is long and complex, whether on a national level, or me a personal one... well, we are where we are.

Unfortunately we don’t have a handy catch all for that, so I am left with leaving off capitals and inverted commas. I probably shouldn’t have capitalised Americans, but my point was that even the Bajorans, Trill and Ferengi are ‘Americans’ in context.

If you can think of one, it would be handy. I might be of Celtic descent, but that doesn’t work for all of Britain/England, even if culturally it sort of does (at ground level anyway...the aristocracy is quite literally a law unto itself...)

 

[TimeIsAPredator]

Nah, I was genuinely just trying to reach for a decent catch all and missed. My great grandad was Irish, my nans near-as-sister (evacuated together grew up together etc, goes a bit beyond best mates) was married to an Irishman, and various friends and family have been going back and forth for years (mostly to the Republic at that, if the variety of Knick knacks handed down by my Nan is anything to go by...) so I was looking for a catch all there. In terms of ‘most of those cultural ties’ I think the relationship is lot more complex, especially when you consider the history before and since. I’m a Londoner, which has even closer ties at ground level. If you google my name ninety percent of my shared doppelgänger names are gonna be in Ireland. Even ignoring the EU there’s a freedom of movement between our two countries, so stuff can get fuzzy real fast. From my perpspective, an ‘American’ accent would be exotic in a way that Irish wouldn’t, let alone countries with a whole other mainstream language. Whatever history made that happen...which is long and complex, whether on a national level, or me a personal one... well, we are where we are.

Unfortunately we don’t have a handy catch all for that, so I am left with leaving off capitals and inverted commas. I probably shouldn’t have capitalised Americans, but my point was that even the Bajorans, Trill and Ferengi are ‘Americans’ in context.

If you can think of one, it would be handy. I might be of Celtic descent, but that doesn’t work for all of Britain/England, even if culturally it sort of does (at ground level anyway...the aristocracy is quite literally a law unto itself...)

I know the ties are more that just the occupation and there has been lots of good and bad exchange before and after it but calling someone from the Republic a "Brit" is offensive for 99% of the people from there no matter how many Irish granddad's you have. You wouldn't call someone from Cote d'Ivoire french or someone from the DRC Belgian so don't call the Irish by the name of their colonial occupiers either

 

[jaime]

I know the ties are more that just the occupation and there has been lots of good and bad exchange before and after it but calling someone from the Republic a "Brit" is offensive for 99% of the people from there no matter how many Irish granddad's you have. You wouldn't call someone from Cote d'Ivoire french or someone from the DRC Belgian so don't call the Irish by the name of their colonial occupiers either

Like I said, no offence was intended, I was scrabbling for a catch all, and thought keeping it in inverted commas would lead to it being read as ‘from the british isles’ which still hasn’t found a better name for itself and is so old as to predate much of the bad blood. So, I am sorry for my insensitivity, and like I say, should have either gone into a longer explanation for the concept I was trying to express, or reached for some phrase like ‘Anglo-celtic’ that (a) didn’t occur to me at the time because (b) it seems a bit clunky. Breton doesn’t really work either.

You can either take the apology, and see the honest mistake for what it is, or assume I am discussing in bad faith for some divisive reason which in this case simply doesn’t exist.

 

[TimeIsAPredator]

Im always happy to take an honest apology