Spoilers The real reason (spoiler) fled Hysperian society

Queen Paolana, textually, seems to object to Billups's abdication of royal responsibility by focusing on the fact that he chooses to be, not a prince, but ("...ughuhhh...") an "engineer," working for Starfleet. However, it's clear from the evidence presented that he has fled Hysperian culture not to embrace his love of engineering, but rather specifically to avoid the hypersexual norms and expectations of that society.

"Engineering" is the text, Asexuality is the subtext.

Consider:
-The Monaveen is a very nice, desirable, and impressive warp-capable ship. Rutherford is excited to work on it. ("I got to work on an expensive ship!" And "seeing how the other half channels their antimatter.")
-There are Hysperian engineers, they're just called "Blacksmiths." Monaveen's chief engineer is called the "Chief Blacksmith." There is no absence of engineering in Hysperian society.
-Billups defaults to referring to the Monaveen's "Dragon's blood flame," *before* correcting himself to say "primary fusion reactor" to help Rutherford understand. Billups clearly learned, and practiced, engineering within the context of Hysperian society before he left to join Starfleet.

Conclude:
-Billups could have been an engineer and worked on his beloved engines as much as he wanted, inside Hysperian society. That he chose to leave, therefore, implies he had other reasons.

"Hysperian culture can be a bit, uhh, distracting."

It is clear Hysperia was a human colony, but unclear whether it was established pre- or post- Federation. But I would think it is probably post-Federation, due to the timing around T'pol's skepticism about the existence of Berengarian dragons in 2154 and Federation Day being in 2161, versus the fact that presence of dragons on Hysperia was apparently well known and established at the time the colony was founded by "Renaissance Faire-types," which seem like events that would take longer than 7 years to happen.

Also, it is unclear whether Hysperia is a Federation member world as of 2381. Although they clearly can and do call upon the Federation for aid, as a (constitutional??) hereditary monarchy, they may or may not qualify to be an actual member world.

Hysperians, clearly, want some fuk. We have seen several examples of cultures that often want some fuk, Risa in particular. But where Risans evidently put an appropriate emphasis on consent (even ritualizing it, in the form of the horga'hn), Hysperians in their pursuit of their libidiny have rather institutionally romanticized an "earlier," unrealistically fantastical form of society, which (in, at least, the Royal context of Paolana Billups's family and royal court) not only expects, but constantly pressures and demands the physical expression of sexuality and sexual desire. (Although, notably, without apparent restriction on gender.)

Enter Andy Billups.

He not want some fuk.

In fact, he feels threatened by constant expressions of sexuality around and towards him.

"Billups loves his virginity!"

"...Will it hurt?"

And then, perhaps most tellingly, he can't get it up, even when he does "want" to.

Also, he does not want to.

"I needed more time to warm up." And finally, in celebratory exuberance, "This Prince remains dry!"

My friends, I submit to you that Starfleet Lieutenant Commander Andarithio "Andy" Billups is, and always has been, an Asexual man. A human man, whose existence on the human spectrum of sexuality is more toward the end of "no thanks." What we in the 21st century refer to, culturally, as Asexual or "Ace."

Why do they pretend he left Hysperia over engine stuff instead of sex stuff? I dunno -- Shame? Privacy? Narrative preference for allegorical subtext versus embarassing text? One thing is for sure. That man don't want some fuk.

Which is a shame, because both of those royal guards were cute af

(Source: Am a very sexual, polyamorous bisexual woman, currently on track to marry an Asexual lesbian woman who does not wish to make love regularly, and am consistently learning to live with the implications of that)

 

I completely agree that Billups is probably our first onscreen Star Trek asexual.

HOWEVER, I would also state that there's another reason for his subtext: Billups would not be allowed to be an engineer on Hysperia.

If he had sex, he would be KING.

And even if he wasn't King, he would be a Prince.

Starfleet is the only location where he's allowed to succeed or fail on his own merits.

 

That's a really good point!

I don't agree that a prince couldn't be the engineer on his own (no-doubt, fancy) starship. But...

While Hysperia would offer him FTL engines, in a trade-off for constant unwanted pressure from his weird mom and those two hotties, clearly Starfleet offers him the chance to just be himself and do starship things. Good nuance!

 

Glad Trek's got some ace representation at last. They have characters basically made that way (Data, Odo etc) but of course they had to be made to conform to expectations. Saru was pretty ace until the Ni'Var president came along.

 

It's probably a combination of factors. While Billups obviously isn't comfortable in the hypersexualized Hysperian society and has no interest in a royal life, he may also genuinely want to be an engineer, a job he wouldn't be permitted to do in Hysperian society as it may be deemed "too common" for a royal to partake in. Starfleet was the best option for him to flourish as the engineer he wanted to be and live as asexually as he wants, with no one forcing him to have sex just so he can inherit a throne he doesn't want.

 

I accede to the superiority of your arguments re: Engineer Billups.

Also, good point about Hysperia not being a UFP member star-nation. If they had joined, they'd likely have had to tone some of their more...controversial aspects down considerably.

 

As in all of life, what they say they do and what they actually do, are two different things.

As long as they abide by Federation Laws between worlds, then what they do at home probably isn't something that is pursued by the Fed Council.

Also, it's pretty obvious that Billups just didn't want to be the King.
No matter what his actual sexual preferences are.

I don't think he would find sex objectional if it didn't involve having to assume the throne.
Once he thought his mother was dead, he was only hesitant toward doing it, not adamant against it.

 

I think they're absolutely 100% UFP members. I also think that the Queen is pushing her diplomatic immunity to manipulate Billups. Mind you, I think of the UFP as an idealized United Nations and not the United States. It is meant to incorporate a lot of groups together with various legal systems and ideologies with a minimum standard of rights. Not all be identical democracies.

True, though plenty of asexuals I know tend to think of sex as "that thing my partner really likes I have no interest in."

 

Being a monarchy would not disqualify Hysperia from Federation membership.

Individual worlds are left to run their own local affairs pretty much however they want to. A Federation member can have whatever form of local government it chooses. The only qualifiers are, that government has to encompass the entire planet, and no caste-based discrimination is allowed.

Hysperia, from the look of things, fits both of those criteria. The fact that it's a monarchy is not the Federation's concern.

As for Billups, I agree, he doesn't necessarily dislike sex as such. Just the royal implications of it. Our own society is rather hypersexualized as it is; people IRL who don't have constant sex are looked down on, and assumed to be asexual, even if they're not. Some people just aren't in a hurry.

 

Yup - we have seen some extreme cases already.

That I doubt - these factors cropped up when the appropriate situation arose, and nothing would stop further qualifiers from emerging in different situations.

Monarchy is a situation that has not specifically arisen yet. We hear of all sorts of titles for high leaders, and conversely, we get almost no description of the systems that bring these to power; even the way the UFP President is elected is hidden from us (popular vote is never mentioned, say). Is representation a requirement? Not mentioned so far. Is a system of laws? Ditto. OTOH, even if we heard of a King or Queen in command of a UFP member world or other member entity, we couldn't really tell if his or her throne rested on representation, laws, or just a pile of skulls, not at the rate Trek is going.

Timo Saloniemi

 

Yeah, I am a Christian abstainer. I am a virgin, in fact, have never even dated. And this certainly doesn't mean that I'm ACE. I'm not. I just believe that sexual fulfilment is not the point of life.

That said, I really do hope that Billups is ACE. It would certainly be a change in representation for Star Trek, a franchise with a long history of being hypersexualised. That's one aspect where I feel Discovery is actually an improvement on the older shows.

 

People's mileage will vary, but I don't think Trek could really be described as "hypersexualised," at least by Hollywood standards.

Sure, it shows a lot of sexy women in catsuits and short skirts, and buff men in corresponding clothing.

But in terms of on-screen depiction of sex, there's not much going on.

For his rep as a ladies' man, Kirk probably only had sex in two episodes of the show and across all movies. Both were off-screen. In Wink of an Eye, he's shown in a bedroom putting his boots on after being with the babe of the week. And in the Paradise Syndrome, he lost his memory and impregnated a woman. One could read between the lines and choose to believe that he slept with Edith Keeler in City on the Edge of Forever, or that Spock had sex with his girlfriend in that episode where spores pacified the crew. But it's just as easy to believe these were chaste romances because that was what was on screen.

Enterprise I believe had only one reference to characters actually having sex during the series: Archer slept with his fellow captain.

TNG had several people undeniably having sex: Tasha and Data under the influence of the virus in the Naked Now, and presumably he had sex in his relationship try in Data's Day. Riker probably has had the most sex partners of any Trek character, with about a half-dozen situations that I can think of (Mistress Beata, the space Irish woman, Yuta, Ensign Ro, Sorin, the random nurse he slept with to escape the hospital), but almost all the sex he had was a kiss and then cutaway. Worf had sex with K'eyhlar, and presumably with the half-Klingon half-Romulan woman. Troi probably had sex with three people. Picard had two relationships as himself during the span of the series that presumably had sex (Vash and Lt. Darren) but may not. Geordi was portrayed as unlucky with women and had dated only one that we saw, Christi, and he may or may not have actually done it with her.

I could go on but my point is that having less than a sexual relationship a year doesn't strike me as hypersexualised.

 

If that's the standard then it won't be ever hit for Star Trek. But, the sexualization of characters is an ongoing aspect that I find completely unnecessary in a show that is about a space adventure crew. I mean, even the Cage started out with Pike in a zoo and having to choose a mate, including an "exotic" alien woman in a fantasy scene. But, the sexualization continued on with, as you note, tight clothes, and revealing costumes, and that is from TOS and going forward. Just because there isn't an on screen portrayal of them having sex doesn't make it less sexualized. Now, that may not be part of the focus of the show, and that's the benefit, and why episodes like this past LD one, are so irritating. Having a character's sexuality front and center is something completely of no interest to me. Sexualizing characters with costume choices and emphasis on romantic interludes in some episodes, are irritating. TNG, for all its down sides to me, was better for the limited romantic relationships presented in the stories. That's not to say that they cannot be used effectively, but, like other spices, it's use needs to be strategic, rather than characters either dressed sexualized, or focusing on romance.

 

Well, I would also argue by the standards of the closest real-world counterparts, Trek is not hypersexualised.

In the current real world, I would guess the average single adult with no religious dictates on remaining a virgin till marriage or what not has far more than one sexual partner/set of encounters per year, which is probably the max of the mainstream Trek characters in Riker.

 

Well, that's a fair point. But, I don't go to the show with rocket ships and ray guns for the real world. And I can get sex and sexuality in pretty much any ing show out there. I don't want it in Star Trek.

 

That boat sailed the day Uhura and Rand entered the bridge wearing miniskirts.
(actually it probably left the dock for good the day Gene got his first Trek script approved)

 

Hope springs eternal.

 

Among other things.

 

I suppose that will be the day that humankind completely unburdens itself of the need to physically procreate by conjoining the opposing sexes at the hips.

But I'm thinking that day is just a bit farther off in the future than either of us will ever see.

 

More like watching a show without wandering about the attractiveness or sexuality of the presented cast. Shallowness also springs eternal.