Is it Logical for Vulcans to be prejudice?

[CaptainMatt]

There is no logic behind the Vulcans personal bias against humans. If they hate them so much and think themselves superior, they should not have a treaty or alliance with them now should they? Plus they can be seen as hypocrites in their behavior.

 

[Sci]

There is no logic behind the Vulcans personal bias against humans. If they hate them so much and think themselves superior, they should not have a treaty or alliance with them now should they?

There is just as little logic in assuming that a few prejudiced assholes somehow represent the entirety of the Vulcan people and their government.

(Besides, nit-pick: Vulcan doesn't have a treaty or alliance with Earth, so far as we know, any more than Massachusetts has a treaty or alliance with Virginia. Vulcan and Earth are both members of the larger sovereign state known as the United Federation of Planets.)

 

[UFO]

There is no logic behind the Vulcans personal bias against humans. If they hate them so much and think themselves superior, they should not have a treaty or alliance with them now should they?

There is just as little logic in assuming that a few prejudiced assholes somehow represent the entirety of the Vulcan people and their government.

But the only "good" ones we see have been "corrupted" by contact with human beings. The rest are generally portrayed as assholes. Twice in STXI alone even if you don't include nuSpock.

Maybe its human authors who are the prejudiced ones? When Vulcans finally discover us, be prepared for one hell of a lawsuit!

Good point about Vulcans joining the Federation. Why would isolationists do that? Even a treaty would be unlikely. However thinking themselves superior doesn't necessarily mean hating us. Its just the concept of being prejudiced or biased tends to imply that. But they may not be either.

 

[Psion]

The average Vulcan is stronger than the average human, smarter, has greater endurance, greater self-discipline, and will live about three times longer. They are reliably telepathic and have been at peace with their own kind for two thousand years.

False. ENT established quite clearly that Vulcan spent 1800 years rebuilding from a devastating nuclear war that threw them back to a pre-industrial level, and had only within the last few centuries become a major space power. This strongly implies that during much of that time, Vulcan was not unified and/or not at peace with their own kind.

Further, Romulans and Vulcans are the same species. (They have to be -- 2,000 years isn't enough time for speciation t occur.) Yet Vulcans and Romulans fought a century-long war at one point according to Q in "Death Wish," and Vulcans and Romulans have fought numerous times as part of Federation-Romulan conflicts.

You are conflating "species" and "kind". Vulcans have been at peace with their own kind -- that is, those who follow Surak -- for two thousand years. The total species, which includes the Romulans, have not. Further, Romulans may well have experienced speciation from Vulcans as a result to prolonged exposure to radiation during their flight from Vulcan and as a result of deliberate genetic modifications that either group conducted subsequent to Romulan exile.

Thinking they are superior to humans isn't prejudice, it is a simple acknowledgement of empirical fact.

Only if you have an arbitrary definition of "superior" that's rigged to favor populations with one trait rather than another. One could just as easily argue that Vulcans are "inferior" because their culture is built on emotional repression -- "This species can't even survive if it acts out its true nature, but must instead essentially traumatize all its members from childhood into a form of emotionless autism." Certainly one might argue that Vulcan lacks the kinds of cultural and political freedom one might expect from a civilized world, given their strong desire for conformity and tendency to exile those who don't subscribe to the ruling religion-philosophy of emotional suppression. But that would be just as biased an argument as the idea that they're "superior."

Vulcans are not superior -- they are different. Different, and equal.

The assessment was hardly rigged to favor a single trait. I listed several obvious and significant ways in which Vulcans are clearly superior to humans.

 

[Sci]

There is no logic behind the Vulcans personal bias against humans. If they hate them so much and think themselves superior, they should not have a treaty or alliance with them now should they?

There is just as little logic in assuming that a few prejudiced assholes somehow represent the entirety of the Vulcan people and their government.

But the only "good" ones we see have been "corrupted" by contact with human beings. The rest are generally portrayed as assholes.

Not really. Tuvok was a good guy; Taurik was fine, and so was Vaurik. (The one time he was an asshole was when he was suffering from Pon farr and not in his right state of mind.) Solok might have been an asshole, but his crew seemed to have no problem with socializing with non-Vulcans in a friendly (for Vulcans) manner. The Vulcans of the ENT era had a lot of anti-Human prejudices, but the Humans of that era had a lot of anti-Vulcan prejudices, too -- and once both sides started learning to appreciate one-another instead of resenting one-another, they generally got along well. T'Pol, Soval, and T'Pau are just a few of the Vulcan characters who learned to appreciate Humans.

Twice in STXI alone even if you don't include nuSpock.

Actually, one of the most interesting things about ST09 is that nuSarek is much less of an asshole than Sarek Prime was. Where Mark Lenard's Sarek was a prideful man disappointed in Spock's humanity who constantly held grudges against his son, Ben Cross portrayed Sarek as a restrained yet affectionate father who understood his son much better than Lenard's. When talking to Little Spock after the school fight, for instance, he didn't offer condemnation -- he reminded Spock of his commitment to the Vulcan way and of the importance of control, but he clearly wasn't angry. And at no point did he show disapproval of Spock in the 2258 scenes -- indeed, he even encourages Spock in his emotional side. NuSarek is a much better father than Sarek Prime was, and he seems to have much less of a chip on his shoulder about Humans.

Good point about Vulcans joining the Federation. Why would isolationists do that?

Because they're not, in general, isolationists.

However thinking themselves superior doesn't necessarily mean hating us. Its just the concept of being prejudiced or biased tends to imply that. But they may not be either.

True. Prejudice and bigotry can take many forms, not just flat-out hatred.

The average Vulcan is stronger than the average human, smarter, has greater endurance, greater self-discipline, and will live about three times longer. They are reliably telepathic and have been at peace with their own kind for two thousand years.

False. ENT established quite clearly that Vulcan spent 1800 years rebuilding from a devastating nuclear war that threw them back to a pre-industrial level, and had only within the last few centuries become a major space power. This strongly implies that during much of that time, Vulcan was not unified and/or not at peace with their own kind.

Further, Romulans and Vulcans are the same species. (They have to be -- 2,000 years isn't enough time for speciation t occur.) Yet Vulcans and Romulans fought a century-long war at one point according to Q in "Death Wish," and Vulcans and Romulans have fought numerous times as part of Federation-Romulan conflicts.

You are conflating "species" and "kind".

Yes, I am -- because they're the same thing.

Vulcans have been at peace with their own kind -- that is, those who follow Surak -- for two thousand years.

Even excluding the Romulans, this has never been established. We do not know when the Vulcans finally unified under one world government and achieved lasting peace amongst themselves. What we know is that there was a devastating nuclear war on Vulcan circa 300 C.E., and that Vulcan spent more than a millennium and a half recovering from that war -- a feat Humans achieve in roughly a century, which, Soval noted in ENT: "The Forge," unnerved the leaders of the Vulcan High Command in 2154. Indeed, the very fact that it took Vulcan almost twenty times as long to recover from their nuclear holocaust as it did Earth strongly implies that they were not at peace amongst themselves for much of that time.

(And, indeed, your definition of "being at peace with themselves" seems to require ignoring what ENT established about them -- their history of oppressing mind melders, their government attempting to violently suppress religious minorities like the Syrannites, the growing attempts to stifle dissent against the government spoken of in episodes like "Home." Vulcans seem to have been at "peace" with themselves only insofar as most dissidents were willing to acquiesce to the guns pointed at their heads. Vulcan society looks like it was filled with violence before the Federation.)

Thinking they are superior to humans isn't prejudice, it is a simple acknowledgement of empirical fact.

Only if you have an arbitrary definition of "superior" that's rigged to favor populations with one trait rather than another. One could just as easily argue that Vulcans are "inferior" because their culture is built on emotional repression -- "This species can't even survive if it acts out its true nature, but must instead essentially traumatize all its members from childhood into a form of emotionless autism." Certainly one might argue that Vulcan lacks the kinds of cultural and political freedom one might expect from a civilized world, given their strong desire for conformity and tendency to exile those who don't subscribe to the ruling religion-philosophy of emotional suppression. But that would be just as biased an argument as the idea that they're "superior."

Vulcans are not superior -- they are different. Different, and equal.

The assessment was hardly rigged to favor a single trait. I listed several obvious and significant ways in which Vulcans are clearly superior to humans.

Being "stronger" is not the same as being "better." Having more physical endurance is also not the same thing as being "better." Those are traits that may give survival advantages in some environments, and may be useless in other environments.

We don't actually know that Vulcans are smarter on average -- in fact, we know that Valeris was the first Vulcan to graduate from Starfleet Academy at the top of her class, well over 130 years after the founding of the Federation. All we know is that they seem better at math and at route memorization. But that's not the same thing as having higher average intelligence. Further, a man who is intelligent, for instance, often has trouble contextualizing his own errors--how many brilliant graduates of America's finest schools got us into Vietnam and thought they were smart enough to win? Intelligence is not the same thing as wisdom.

Then there's their society's failure of intellectual curiosity and creativity. They're not explorers, according to ENT -- and apparently they don't innovate, since it took them hundreds of years to go from Warp 1 to Warp 2, a feat Humans accomplished in less than a century. They've been major space powers since at least the 19th Century, but apparently they never invented things like the transporter -- something Humans and Andorians both invented.

Self-discipline? Arguable. How often were Vulcans in ENT complaining about how hard it was to just live amongst Humans because they couldn't stand the smell? How many times have Vulcans succumbed to irrational prejudices against their own telepaths? How many times did Sarek get into decades-long spates with his son? They go sex-crazy every seven years but refuse to speak publicly about basic biological functions, and they even preserve horrible things like fights to the death and arranged marriages. They spend all their lives trying to suppress their emotions because they apparently can't control themselves if they don't bury everything completely. Hardly the act of minds with greater discipline than Humans.

Longer lifespan? Maybe. Seems that the average Human lifespan in the Trekverse is around 150 years; for Vulcans, it seems to be about 250. That's approximately 1.66 times longer than Humans, not three times longer.

Reliably telepathic? Well, that seems unclear. We know that in the ENT era, Vulcan telepaths were considered a despised minority. And we know from "Where No Man Has Gone Before" that a minority of Humans are telepathic. It's entirely plausible that the percentage of telepathic Vulcans per generation is on average higher than with Humans, but that doesn't mean it's 100%. Meanwhile, Vulcan telepathy is limited to physical touch -- does that mean that Betazoids are somehow "superior" because their telepathy is apparently not limited by much of anything?

And then there's their decades-long history of jingoism with the Andorians and neo-imperialistic tendencies -- letting its military take over its government, propping up puppet governments on less-powerful worlds in order to secure resources like dilithium for themselves, oppressing religious minorities like the Syrannites, violating treaties, attempting to launch wars of aggression against foreign worlds on the basis of false evidence. Hardly the actions of a "superior" race -- really the actions of a political culture driven by fear and lust for power.

Vulcans have no claim to being especially better or worse than any other species. They have their advantages and their disadvantages. Vulcans and Humans are equal.

 

[UFO]

But the only "good" ones we see have been "corrupted" by contact with human beings. The rest are generally portrayed as assholes.

Not really. Tuvok was a good guy; Taurik was fine, and so was Vaurik. (The one time he was an asshole was when he was suffering from Pon farr and not in his right state of mind.) Solok might have been an asshole, but his crew seemed to have no problem with socializing with non-Vulcans in a friendly (for Vulcans) manner. The Vulcans of the ENT era had a lot of anti-Human prejudices, but the Humans of that era had a lot of anti-Vulcan prejudices, too -- and once both sides started learning to appreciate one-another instead of resenting one-another, they generally got along well.

To be honest I haven't made a systematic study of their "assholery" but they don't seem to have a good reputation. Personally I would be happy to believe they are better behaved than many seem to think. But either way my qualification seems to hold for most of your examples. Perhaps vulcans who choose to serve with humans could be at least a bit atypical.

In any event we have:
Tuvok: corrupted by humans
Taurik: corrupted by humans
Vaurik: corrupted by humans

T'Pol, Soval, and T'Pau are just a few of the Vulcan characters who learned to appreciate [be corrupted by] Humans.

I rest my case.

Twice in STXI alone even if you don't include nuSpock.

Actually, one of the most interesting things about ST09 is that nuSarek is much less of an asshole than Sarek Prime was.

Well if you include nuSarek (which I wasn’t) that would be three. Though as you say he didn't seem so bad (Why didn't he seem so bad?! ). But then he was corrupted by humans. Prime Sarek was obviously much more Vulcan. Actually I was thinking of the kids [Yeah I know, bullies everwhere, but they were pretty cold about it] and the Science Academy. You could argue for NuSpock at Kirk’s inquiry (before he became corrupted by …).

True. Prejudice and bigotry can take many forms, not just flat-out hatred.

I had intended to suggest that they might not have been prejudiced or biased, just correct. Of course to us it would seem insulting etc. So really just a misunderstanding.

You have made a good case that they have their faults but it still seems unlikely that every race in the ST universe is "equal" which appears to be what you are trying to imply when you say vulcans are equal to humans. Perhaps you are thinking equal from a moral perspective?

Because they're not, in general, isolationists.

OK, that does it. From now on I’m no longer going to believe anything I read on here!

 

[Timo]

Because prejudices are based upon the false notion that all members of a population are uniform, and upon the false notion that the traits ascribed to one population or anther are superior or inferior.

There is nothing particularly false about either of the assumptions. At least we have seen no evidence that Vulcans wouldn't be stronger, faster and mentally better disciplined than humans on the average, which covers the uniformity aspect. Minor fluctuations aren't relevant.

Humans of the military persuasion have perhaps been somewhat over-represented, giving a gilded picture of human physical performance, but when we see military Vulcans, the books are again balanced - explicitly so in "Take Me In The Holosuite" (or was it "Behind"?) where the plot rotates around Vulcans being objectively superior and the rest not caring.

ENT established quite clearly that Vulcan spent 1800 years rebuilding from a devastating nuclear war that threw them back to a pre-industrial level, and had only within the last few centuries become a major space power. This strongly implies that during much of that time, Vulcan was not unified and/or not at peace with their own kind.

Why would "pre-industrial" equate "not at peace"? Makes no obvious sense, but I guess you have a theory on this.

Although if it is this one

the very fact that it took Vulcan almost twenty times as long to recover from their nuclear holocaust as it did Earth strongly implies that they were not at peace amongst themselves for much of that time.

, it doesn't really explain anything. Why would speed of recovery correlate positively with unity? Surely internal competition would be an equally plausible factor in speedy recovery, and its lack a hindrance.

Only if you have an arbitrary definition of "superior" that's rigged to favor populations with one trait rather than another.

All definitions are arbitrary. You take what works. And in this case, defining Vulcan traits as superior certainly works, for Vulcans.

Which is the entire point of the argument about bigotry vs. non-bigotry. You can throw around positive and negative labels, but none of that makes bigotry an inherently negative thing, not in the sense of "supported worldview of inequality".

As for the "pre" part in "prejudice", all information is incomplete. It isn't really possible to decide that some idea would be based in fact, and it isn't easy to separate prejudice from simple "judice". Mere cry of "prejudice!" is almost automatically prejudiced itself, and serves no particular purpose beyond establishing that the criant's personal worldview favors equality. On which issue...

Different, and equal.

There is no equality other than that given to you. No two things in this universe are alike (save perhaps for leptons), and equality thus is arrived at through a system of compensations and handicaps.

Equality is not an automatically desirable goal by any means, and it shouldn't surprise anybody if the Vulcans don't bother. It's largely just wounded human pride that our heroes choose to interpret the Vulcan attitude as "hostile" when in fact it is merely (and justly) condescending and patronizing.

It's a subjective evaluation made, frankly, with the intent of justifying pre-existing anti-Human emotions. This is about justifying a bigoted power structure, not about a fair or reasonable evaluation of an individual. Because, if it were, the leader of the Science Academy would have to concede that Vulcans and Humans are equal.

Now that's just subjective ranting. You have no actual proof that the Vulcans wouldn't be fair and reasonable and still finding humans lacking. You just wish it weren't so, and therefore decide your worldview must be true. Talk about bigoted...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[lau03143]

One thing that baffled me about this movie is how the Vulcans where so racist to NuSpock and his human mother. I though Vulcans where supposed to be the intelligent ones, the race known for making perfect decision and being reasonable yet Spock was emotionally and physical abused because of his human heritage. How illogical is that?

Sarek did not even help matters either when he indirectly told Spock that he was not a product of love. Telling that to an already emotional unstable child is just not a logical decision.

I think it's all part of the Vulcan enigma. They should be logical and un-prejudiced, but as a result of their obsession to logic, they can be fundamentally flawed characters.

 

[Sector 7]

Q.- Is it Logical for Vulcans to be prejudice[d]?
A.- "It is not logical , but it is often true." -Spock

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Solok might have been an asshole, but his crew seemed to have no problem with socializing with non-Vulcans in a friendly (for Vulcans) manner.

Apparently they did have a problem with *serving* alongside humans, as - AFAIK - the T'Kumbra had an all-Vulcan crew.

I can see that happening in the earliest years of Starfleet, but this is 200 years later. During the Dominion War, no less, when it is rather likely that there'd be a high rate of personnel movement between ships (as crewmembers die or are promoted). I just attributed this to Solok's obvious dislike for humans, which spread to his entire crew as well. (And since the T'Kumbra was a Nebula-class ship, that's over 700 Vulcans who thought like him.)

OTOH, it could have also been the case that Solok and his crew would have been willing to have non-Vulcans serve on that ship, but none wanted to. Gee, I wonder why?

 

[TiberiusMaximus]

Apparently they did have a problem with *serving* alongside humans, as - AFAIK - the T'Kumbra had an all-Vulcan crew.

That doesn't mean every Vulcan on the crew had a problem with humans. It's not like Starfleet officers gets to choose where to be assigned, so you can't make assumptions about the attitudes of the crew-members we never saw onscreen.

On another note, I typed up a lengthy reply to this thread the other day, but somehow I lost it before posting. Darn, it was a good one, too.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Apparently they did have a problem with *serving* alongside humans, as - AFAIK - the T'Kumbra had an all-Vulcan crew.

That doesn't mean every Vulcan on the crew had a problem with humans. It's not like Starfleet officers gets to choose where to be assigned, so you can't make assumptions about the attitudes of the crew-members we never saw onscreen.

Perhaps not, but how else could the T'Kumbra have wound up with a crew of only Vulcans? Luck?

There's no reason why Starfleet would assign them that way, is there? I sure can't think of one.

 

[TiberiusMaximus]

I don't follow. Are you saying the Vulcans must have chosen to be on that crew? That doesn't make sense either.

I don't know, maybe some species don't play well with others and Starfleet keeps them together from time to time. Or maybe some high-up Vulcan admiral who is convinced of Vulcan superiority pulled some strings?

 

[shapeshifter]

That I can recall, Vulcan superiority complex has never been canonically explained unless you figure that Archer proving the ways of the Syrranites was true to Surak caused human resentment in all but the purist Vulcans.

In old Novels set in the Original Universe, one author wrote the issue was caused by Vulcan fears that Human emotion would, with prolonged contact, completely poison Vulcan society. Another author took the route of Spock choosing a Starfleet career over one in the VHC as partial reason for Vulcan snobbery towards Humans.

 

[UFO]

Apparently they did have a problem with *serving* alongside humans, as - AFAIK - the T'Kumbra had an all-Vulcan crew.

That doesn't mean every Vulcan on the crew had a problem with humans. It's not like Starfleet officers gets to choose where to be assigned ... .

[] nuUhura [/]

 

[7thsealord]

Q.- Is it Logical for Vulcans to be prejudice[d]?
A.- "It is not logical , but it is often true." -Spock

I'd pay that one. Amazing how often a prejudiced person can come up with perfectly "logical" justifications for their attitudes.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Logic is a lot like statistics.