Trek as commentary

[Penta]

Okay...I've got an hour and a half before class, I'm at school already, and I've got nothing to study productively.

So naturally my mind turns towards poking a hornet's nest.
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The "Trek's view of religion" thread on this board, and other threads throughout TrekBBS (including ones started by me), have me coming to a conclusion, which I propose knowing it'll probably get me strung up inside of a day.

It was said by someone here (I forget who) that Trek is basically "secular liberalism of the 1960s, in the form of Starfleet, conquering the universe".

The more I think about it, the more I look at the bigger picture, the more I see that (and by extension, Trek's proclivity for trying to present a very particular sociopolitical viewpoint, sometimes in a way that beats you over the head) as becoming an increasingly bad thing.

Why?

1. If you want to present a viewpoint, write a novel: TV, arguably Star Trek's "natural habitat", is not the best medium through which to do this sort of "teaching through entertainment". In fact, it is perhaps the worst. TV, whether on cable or broadcast or the Internet, basically has one function above all others - To sell ads (or, more and more often these days, ads *and* subscriptions). I find myself, as I grow older, more and more annoyed with people who try to use TV entertainment to push a particular viewpoint - I loved "The West Wing", but when it pushed liberal Democratic politics in a particularly unsubtle way, I gritted my teeth. I growl at the preachier episodes of Star Trek (all of the series), and I absolutely don't watch 24, for the same reasons (If it seems like I picked out more liberal examples than conservative, it's because 24 is the only really conservative-leaning show I can think of on TV). I really doubt I'm the only one - TV dramas are entertainment first, folks, or at least they should be in any rational universe. If you want to push a viewpoint, be it secular liberalism or religious conservatism or atheism uber alles or atheism must die, write a novel. It's a form of entertainment and storytelling that's much more congenial to such things.

2. You're limiting the stories: Sometimes horribly so. Star Trek, in my opinion, is such a wonderful milieu and universe because, when you allow yourself to decouple Trek from the viewpoints and inclinations of people (whether that person is Gene Roddenberry or whomever) projecting their politics and sociology onto the universe, you can tell a dizzying array of stories. It's why I cringe at the idea of the Federation not using money, for instance, or religion being explicitly absent among humans. Rather unnecessarily, I believe, those just limit the stories that the universe can tell.

3. You're dating things horribly: The politics of the 1960s are different from those of the 1980s, and bear little resemblance to those of the 2000s. To hogtie Star Trek into pushing a viewpoint of a particular era or particular politics risks what I think is becoming a problem for Trek now - eventually the believers in that politics or the people of that era get older. As Trek hits...nearly 45?, I see the nostalgia for the 1960s and I'm thinking to myself "Huh?" I'm 26 - it's not easy to see Trek as being anything other than a relic.

So how do you fix it?

I'm not sure the Abrams reboot did the job - but I think its bluntness that it was just trying to be a good movie (whether or not it did that is another question) is a good start. Just focus on being a good movie/TV/novel. Quit trying to be "relevant".

Why is it a problem?

Okay, this is personal, but.

The more I look at Trek, the less I find myself able to lose myself in it. Trek deserves to survive, I think - but to do so, it needs to give up (or have yanked from it) a lot of its pretensions.

That doesn't even require, I don't think, a reboot...Either into the Abramsverse or something else.

It just requires that Trek quit trying to be anything past good stories.

 

[CorporalClegg]

I didn't bother reading all that. You lost me here:

1. If you want to present a viewpoint, write a novel: TV, arguably Star Trek's "natural habitat", is not the best medium through which to do this sort of "teaching through entertainment". In fact, it is perhaps the worst.

Nonsense. Find me one piece of art (of any from) from the earliest cave drawings to AVATAR that isn't didactic in some way.

TV, whether on cable or broadcast or the Internet, basically has one function above all others - To sell ads

No. Dramatic TV is an art-form; it's purpose is to entertain (see above). Advertising is just an afterthought, in most cases, to fund said art. The business may be the primary concern of the studios but it isn't for the actors, directors, writers, etc. of the shows.

 

[T'Girl]

2. You're limiting the stories: Sometimes horribly so. Star Trek, in my opinion, is such a wonderful milieu and universe because, when you allow yourself to decouple Trek from the viewpoints and inclinations of people (whether that person is Gene Roddenberry or whomever) projecting their politics and sociology onto the universe, you can tell a dizzying array of stories. It's why I cringe at the idea of the Federation not using money, for instance, or religion being explicitly absent among humans. Rather unnecessarily, I believe, those just limit the stories that the universe can tell.

Canon and increasingly continuity in the novels do seem to narrow down a stories options. The fan fiction still seems to be more open to new ideas. I've never understood why one novel can't be placed in a completely non-religious Federation and the very next novel is on a starship with a Muslim captain who prays five times a day and a portion of the crew engages in evening vespers. Continuity would seem to prevent one of these novels.

One of the early novels (Black Fire?) refers to the Romulan war as lasting a century.

3. You're dating things horribly: The politics of the 1960s are different from those of the 1980s, and bear little resemblance to those of the 2000s. To hogtie Star Trek into pushing a viewpoint of a particular era or particular politics risks what I think is becoming a problem for Trek now - eventually the believers in that politics or the people of that era get older. As Trek hits...nearly 45?, I see the nostalgia for the 1960s and I'm thinking to myself "Huh?" I'm 26 - it's not easy to see Trek as being anything other than a relic.

I love science fiction from the 30's, 40's and 50's. Those authors put their own times ideas and cultures into their creations. Watching Star Trek from the 1960's you receive a feeling that you're seeing something different. Many people on this board comment negatively about the sexism displayed on the show, to me it gives Kirk's era a "sci-fi" aspect.

Human cultural, political and social progress over the next 250 years isn't going to be a straight line. Many of the societal advances we've made in American in the last century might be casually discarded by later generations.

When you look at TOS, you're not seeing the past, you're seeing the future.

So how do you fix it?

I'm not sure the Abrams reboot did the job

Abrams reboot did the job if you place nuStarTrek in an entirely new universe and not just in the original universe that started to change only when Nero emerged into the 23rd century. If it is in fact a whole cloth nuUniverse a author could create a new Romulan war sequence, a fresh first contact between Human and Vulcan, rewrite all of Human history from modern day to the time of their novel or script.