What are your controversial Star Trek opinions?

[Farscape One]

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You know, it occurs to me. A future series can revisit that world and we can see if the Valakians died out or if the Menk flourushed. There are multiple possibilities...

1. Archer and Phlox was right, and the Menk flourished.

2. They were partly right... Valakians died off, but so did the Menk. Either because they couldn't adapt or the Valakians decided if they were going to die, they'd take the Menk down with them.

3. The Valakians found a cure on their own. That could lead them to either keep the Menk subservient, or the Menk rise up and kill the Valakians.

4. They found a cure, but because the Menk helped them out throughout the entire crisis, they get more and more liberties to the point where they are equal in everything.


Personally, I'd like to see option 4 because not only does it send strong message that everyone CAN get along and be equal, but it would clear Archer and Phlox from all the people who called them perpetrators of genocide.

 

[Sci]

Star trek did a decent job of balancing left wing and right wing between Spock and Kirk with examples of how one doesn't succeed without the other. I'm not even sure that would be possible in the modern day.

I'm honestly not sure how Spock was particularly left-wing per se or how Kirk was particularly right-wing per se. Care to elaborate?

 

[Richard S. Ta]

I'm honestly not sure how Spock was particularly left-wing per se or how Kirk was particularly right-wing per se. Care to elaborate?

Indeed. I’m equally in the dark there. The closest I can get are the attitudes on display in The Way to Eden but even then it’s a stretch…

 

[Richard S. Ta]

Paul Wesley plays a great Kirk and I’m looking forward to seeing more.

 

[Lord Garth]

Indeed. I’m equally in the dark there. The closest I can get are the attitudes on display in The Way to Eden but even then it’s a stretch…

From what I understand, the average person didn't like hippies in 1969.

My maternal grandmother was a Republican and my maternal grandfather was a Democrat, but I can't see my grandfather as having been pro-hippie. And these hippies would've been protesting LBJ and the draft. I think the counter-culture was more on the fringes in the late-'60s before it bled into the mainstream during the early-'70s, basically undercutting the whole point of counter-culture.

So, yeah, making "The Way to Eden" sound political is a non-starter. Kirk wasn't a "conservative", he was more like, I'd say a John F. Kennedy type of Democrat. He'd sound Kennedy-esque during a lot of his speeches, and I refuse to believe that was a coincidence.

 

[Citiprime]

Kirk, Spock, and McCoy are a classic "Freudian Trio."

Basically, it's Sigmund Freud's structural model for the human psyche, which shares similarities with the "tripartite soul" in Plato's Republic. To grossly oversimplify things, the Id is emotion and instinctual drive, the Superego is reason and rationality, while Ego balances the two. Within a good number of stories, a "trinity" is created from characters who represent these attributes, and Kirk's ability to balance those two forces within the stories is how we see his leadership.

Kirk - Ego
Spock - Superego
McCoy - Id

Another example of this is Lord of the Flies, in which it's much more explicit: Ralph is the ego, Piggy the superego, Jack the id. The novel is basically an allegory of the human mind at war with itself. Stephen Fry has made the point that Star Trek has connections to Friedrich Nietzsche's belief that artistic tragedy is born out of the conflict between the Dionysian and Apollonian impulses from Greek mythology that arguably acts as a metaphor for the conflict of human existence.

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One way I could see Spock classified as "conservative" is that I've seen some reviews liken E.G. Marshall's Juror #4 in 12 Angry Men to Spock/Vulcans and a certain type of conservatism before. Marshall's character is coldly logical to the point of lacking empathy for most of the story. And that lack of empathy blinds him from certain things.

 

[Sci]

Kirk, Spock, and McCoy are a classic "Freudian Trio."

Basically, it's Sigmund Freud's structural model for the human psyche, which shares similarities with the "tripartite soul" in Plato's Republic. To grossly oversimplify things, the Id is emotion and instinctual drive, the Superego is reason and rationality, while Ego balances the two. Within a good number of stories, a "trinity" is created from characters who represent these attributes, and Kirk's ability to balance those two forces within the stories is how we see his leadership.

Kirk - Ego
Spock - Superego
McCoy - Id

Another example of this is Lord of the Flies, in which it's much more explicit: Ralph is the ego, Piggy the superego, Jack the id. The novel is basically an allegory of the human mind at war with itself. Stephen Fry has made the point that Star Trek has connections to Friedrich Nietzsche's belief that artistic tragedy is born out of the conflict between the Dionysian and Apollonian impulses from Greek mythology that arguably acts as a metaphor for the conflict of human existence.

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One way I could see Spock classified as "conservative" is that I've seen some reviews liken E.G. Marshall's Juror #4 in 12 Angry Men to Spock/Vulcans and a certain type of conservatism before. Marshall's character is coldly logical to the point of lacking empathy for most of the story. And that lack of empathy blinds him from certain things.

I mean, I don't think conservatism is defined by a lack of empathy per se, though I do think there's often a strong correlation. Rather I would argue that conservatism is defined by its desire to maintain certain social hierarchies (particularly hierarchies of race, religion, gender, and wealth) and its tendency to feel threatened by egalitarianism. Certainly a lack of empathy can feed into that mindset, but one could be quite empathetic but still a believer in hierarchy (particularly if one finds egalitarianism threatening), and one could also believe strongly in egalitarianism yet be unempathetic to other people.

On that level, I can't particularly support the idea that conservatism or liberalism (or socialism or fascism or whatever) correlate to the Id, the Ego, or the Superego. Attempts to make such a correlation inevitably require associating one political philosophy with base selfish desires, another political philosophy with socialization, and a third with some sort of attempt to reconcile the other two, and I just don't think any of that applies to questions of how to organize social hierarchy.

From what I understand, the average person didn't like hippies in 1969.

My maternal grandmother was a Republican and my maternal grandfather was a Democrat, but I can't see my grandfather as having been pro-hippie. And these hippies would've been protesting LBJ and the draft. I think the counter-culture was more in the fringes on the late-'60s before it bled into the mainstream during the early-'70s, basically undercutting the whole point of counter-culture.

So, yeah, making "The Way to Eden" sound political is a non-starter. Kirk wasn't a "conservative", he was more like, I'd say a John F. Kennedy type of Democrat. He'd sound Kennedy-esque during a lot of his speeches, and I refuse to believe that was a coincidence.

I guess one could argue that Kirk is "coded" as a Kennedy liberal, but if that's the case, that just means TOS in general reflects Kennedy-era liberalism. Which, yeah, that checks out. In particular, it reflects both the strengths of Kennedy liberalism -- a willingness to boldly state that bigotry and prejudice are wrong, a willingness to accept that systems that produce poverty are unjust -- but also the flaws of Kennedy liberalism (the implicit misogyny present throughout the series, the justification for imperialistic wars like the Vietnam War ["A Private Little War," "The City on the Edge of Forever"], the tendency to feel threatened by oppressed peoples who go "too far" in their quest for liberation ["Let That Be Your Last Battlefield"]).

But even there, I don't think Kirk and Spock represent universal conceptions of conservatism vs. liberalism, or vice versa. In particular, the Space Hippies in "The Way to Eden" didn't exactly have a systematic critique of, say, the Federation's version of space colonialism or the way the Federation kept getting embroiled in conflicts with foreign states. Nor did they particularly represent a belief in radical egalitarianism. They were more about the aesthetics of the counter-culture than they were about its substantive critiques of American society.

 

[eschaton]

So, yeah, making "The Way to Eden" sound political is a non-starter. Kirk wasn't a "conservative", he was more like, I'd say a John F. Kennedy type of Democrat. He'd sound Kennedy-esque during a lot of his speeches, and I refuse to believe that was a coincidence.

Chekov did come across as a bit of a reactionary in that episode though.

 

[Lord Garth]

Chekov did come across as a bit of a reactionary in that episode though.

True. Likely trying a little too hard to distance himself from that circle he used to be in close proximity to.

 

[dmac]

From what I understand, the average person didn't like hippies in 1969.

My maternal grandmother was a Republican and my maternal grandfather was a Democrat, but I can't see my grandfather as having been pro-hippie. And these hippies would've been protesting LBJ and the draft. I think the counter-culture was more on the fringes in the late-'60s before it bled into the mainstream during the early-'70s, basically undercutting the whole point of counter-culture.

So, yeah, making "The Way to Eden" sound political is a non-starter. Kirk wasn't a "conservative", he was more like, I'd say a John F. Kennedy type of Democrat. He'd sound Kennedy-esque during a lot of his speeches, and I refuse to believe that was a coincidence.

That goes to my point of. "I'm not even sure that would be possible in the modern day"
Today if you had one main character portraying a structured chain of command system and the other sighting Utilitarian theory everybody is upset. In the 60's it was a rather small group which would even notice.

 

[Macintosh]

Starships are my favourite thing ever, but we've gone straight from overusing the same few classes to there being far too many classes we know next to nothing about. What about all those "lost era" ships? New Orleans, Cheyenne, Springfield, Freedom, Niagara, Challenger... even Ambassador and to an extent Constellation. Not one of them shows up in Dominion War scenes even though every single one is more advanced than the endless Mirandas and Excelsiors that do. Lower Decks would have been a great way to redress this had the Cerritos been "cast" as a New Orleans or Cheyenne, but no, we've got yet another previously invisible but suddenly ubiquitous class of ship to worry about.

Similarly, Star Trek: Picard should not have used any of the Star Trek Online ships that are "redesigns" or "updates" of canon ships. Ross, Sutherland... they should have just used the established canon designs. There are both real world and in-universe examples of specific ships and specific ship classes serving for decades. Not everything needs to be retired and redesigned every decade. This isn't Logan's Run: Starship Edition.

 

[drt]

Starships are my favourite thing ever, but we've gone straight from overusing the same few classes to there being far too many classes we know next to nothing about.

A related issue is there are so many different classes, yet a lot of them seem to have essentially the same capabilities, so why are all of these classes even necessary?

 

[CorporalClegg]

so why are all of these classes even necessary?

Because Eaglemoss?

 

[Farscape One]

A related issue is there are so many different classes, yet a lot of them seem to have essentially the same capabilities, so why are all of these classes even necessary?

Not necessarily. Some have much better weapons and defensive capabilities. Others are quicker. Some have both strengths. I guess it depends on the mission profiles Starfleet wants to have in a given amount of time.

 

[drt]

Not necessarily. Some have much better weapons and defensive capabilities. Others are quicker. Some have both strengths. I guess it depends on the mission profiles Starfleet wants to have in a given amount of time.

That’s how it should be in universe, but in the actual shows (as presented) there’s seemingly little difference.

 

[cooleddie74]

Because Eaglemoss?

And just merchandising in general. You can be sure that if TOS had a much bigger budget in the late 1960s we'd have had more toys and model kits than just the Enterprise and the Klingon battle cruiser.

 

[Farscape One]

That’s how it should be in universe, but in the actual shows (as presented) there’s seemingly little difference.

The Defiant showed herself to be quicker and pack a bigger punch than a number of ships.

 

[Macintosh]

The Defiant showed herself to be quicker and pack a bigger punch than a number of ships.

She's manoeuvrable because she's very powerful for her size while being smaller than almost any other class of starship. She's not particularly fast, especially by the standards of 2370s starships.

 

[Farscape One]

She's manoeuvrable because she's very powerful for her size while being smaller than almost any other class of starship. She's not particularly fast, especially by the standards of 2370s starships.

That was my point, though. It has different capabilities than other Starfleet ships.

And when I said quicker, I meant better maneuverability. That was on me for not being more clear.

I thought that was the current discussion, how ships seem to have basically the same capabilities. I was using the Defiant as one example that there are differences.

 

[Macintosh]

I thought that was the current discussion, how ships seem to have basically the same capabilities. I was using the Defiant as one example that there are differences.

And yet is the Defiant-class that different from the Sabre-class? Both small post-Wolf 359 designs, both with nacelles directly attached to a oddly-shaped and somewhat angular saucer, both powerful for their size... the only real difference is that the Sabre-class seems to have better shuttlebay facilities and proper impulse engines.