Vacation in Afghanistan, honey moon in Congo
- Thread starter Wadjda
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Interesting question. I had a little trepidation opening this thread since all I could see of the title was "Vacation in Afghanistan". I spent almost a year there and the thought of going there on a vacation is so antithetic to me. Just reading the title evoked emotion in me. While it would likely take me out of the story, I'm now wondering what it would be like a couple hundred years in the future. Likely no change to what it's like now, tribal wars, oppression of females, etc - BUT - if we follow the history as laid out in the Trek universe I wonder if things would change. I just don't know if it's realistic. I guess anything is possible, especially in the hands of our Trek writers.
Why would it?
Somalia was mentioned in a novel a few years back and there are always references to the States and the like.
I would think not, in the future these places will not be dangerous or poor.
I'm not sure I get the question. What does modern-day Afghanistan have to do with the 23rd Century? I'm not sure why I'd need to mention Afghanistan in a Trek novel, but I certainly wouldn't hesitate to do so if the occasion arose. It's not like they're set in a parallel universe in which nothing bad ever happened in Earth's history.
If we can have Martian colonies in the future, I think we can have vacations in the Congo . . . .
If we can have Martian colonies in the future, I think we can have vacations in the Congo . . . .
Mentioned? Geordi was born in Somalia, and that was shown on screen.
I always found it a shame how many people were born in the USA in trek, probably about 50% of the characters.pst of the rest were born off world.
Bingo. If we accept that there are flying cars and transporter terminals in future San Francisco, why not assume the same for Afghanistan or wherever?
I guess for similar reasons why they introduced a Russian navigator. Concrete examples of the world being at peace in the future.
Works for me.
Absolutely. I think that's been very much the assumption since Day One. There may well be hot spots and border skirmishes and badlands out on the Final Frontier, but I don't think it's ever been implied that there are still impoverished, war-torn regions on Earth.
Hmm. Now I'm tempted to work a reference to Afghan theme parks and luxury resorts into the next book . . . .
In Losing the Peace Somalia's basically portrayed as being another urbanized area of Earth, pretty Americanized at that.
Every time I see this thread title, I hear "Holiday in Cambodia" by The Dead Kennedys in my head.
I understood the question somewhat differently. I thought the OP was suggesting that, because such places are trouble spots now, they might not even exist by the time we get to the 23rd/24th centuries. And therefore the authors might not want to mention them on the off chance of creating an inconsistency between the "real" world and "Star Trek" world. That if Afghanistan gets wiped off the face of the Earth in the next couple of years, any books that mention Afghanistan as a thriving centre of culture and commerce in Earth's future would immediately become incongruous.
I could be totally misunderstanding the OP there, but if I'm not, I don't think there's anything to be worried about on that score. A place being damaged now doesn't mean it can't be rebuilt over the centuries. Look at New Orleans. And no writer has ever been worried about being slightly inconsistent with the real world if it makes the story better.
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I could be totally misunderstanding the OP there, but if I'm not, I don't think there's anything to be worried about on that score. A place being damaged now doesn't mean it can't be rebuilt over the centuries. Look at New Orleans. And no writer has ever been worried about being slightly inconsistent with the real world if it makes the story better.
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It might be interesting to examine precisely which countries and nations exist within United Earth as of the 23rd or 24th Centuries. Which have official political status and which are just holdover names for certain regions (to the extent that any nation is more than a symbolic holdout, of course)? The United States of America, United States of Africa and African Confederation are established; the European Hegemony existed for a time but no longer does, replaced by the European Alliance. The Muslim Bloc formed in the 2030s or there about; does it still exist?
We saw in Tales From the Dominion War that the office of President of the United States still exists - he or she tours the devastated San Francisco alongside the United Earth Prime Minister and Federation President Zife (a nice little representation of staggered authority, there).
We saw in Tales From the Dominion War that the office of President of the United States still exists - he or she tours the devastated San Francisco alongside the United Earth Prime Minister and Federation President Zife (a nice little representation of staggered authority, there).
You can't let yourself worry too much about that in writing science fiction, because then you'll be too paralyzed to write anything predictive. It's just an occupational hazard that real science and history will eventually contradict your work. Heck, it's already happened in Trek plenty of times. Remember Chekov in "I, Mudd"? "This place is even better than Leningrad!" Umm, you mean St. Petersburg...? Plus we had no Eugenics Wars, and there's no sign of that manned Earth-Saturn probe anytime soon. And Marla McGivers said that sleeper ships were used for interplanetary travel until faster drives came along... in 2018.
So at this point, there's no sense pretending that Trek's future is in any way a direct outgrowth of our own. That sleeper ship sailed decades ago.
You say that now, but just wait until the Bell Riots come along in 2024. Then you'll be sorry . . . .
I'm pretty sure there were also references to the USSR still existing after it fell in the real world in an early TNG episode. I can't remember which one though.
Yes, DN, I think that would be very interesting, indeed.
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