A good reason to hate Trek?

[ambelamba]

Yes, a GOOD reason.

I used to be a huge Star Trek fan until 2001, I think. I spent the first 3 years in Silicon Valley after I migrated to the state. Trek is huge there, you know. Being a fan of sci-fi I quickly became a fan of Trek. One major reason why I became a fan of Trek was that there has been absolutely no large-budget drama (in any genre) in my home country and the total lack of sci-fi shows over there. I loved Trek. I learned my English from watching TNG.

I used to be an idealist and a optimist. Not anymore. I became a generally negative person through a lot of life experiences.

I think the moment I stopped liking Trek is almost the same time period when I stopped being an optimist. Recently, I got interested in UFO phenomenon. Don't get me wrong. I am neither a believer nor a skeptic.

One conclusion I made from studying various UFO and alien lore is that there is absolutely no reason to feel idealistic or optimistic about them. It seems like survival of the fittest still applies in space, too.

In our history, the encounter between civilizations with vastly different technological level always ends up being catastrophic. I wonder if Roddenberry actually looked into world history before coming up with Trek. I just can't figure out why Roddenberry came up with rosy-colored view on alien contact.

Now, I simply can't swallow the idea of optimistic future. And I really hate the deus ex machina-type plot elements in TNG. So technology wins. Not my cup of tea ANYMORE. (I used to like the premise of TNG, though...)

 

[Nedersong]

It's a socialist utopia.

But the thing is, within any utopia there is always some sort of fascist price to pay. And that means keepiong the unwanted people out.

That's one of the things I find highly unrealistic about Trek, is that humanity is incapable of overcoming it's petty jealousies and xenophobia.

 

[sbk1234]

Actually, although your arguments are articulate and well thought out, the only reason one needs to give for hating Trek, or anything else, for that matter, is because it gives you no pleasure to watch it.

 

[zenophite]

Star Trek especially that of the TNG era onward is flawed in that basically humans have become almost perfect little pod people. It promotes the idea that humanity has to "unify" in the sense that individual cultural identities are relegated to some sentimental historical musings. The weakness and handwaving about the federation is obvious in the simlple stuff like the "do they or don't they" thing about money that is still debated from time to time.
It also assumes that we somehow figure out how to simply advance advance advance without any back steps.
That said trek is sort of the darling of the intelligentsia with it's sort of socialistic "one people one world" leanings.

 

[The Boy Who Cried Worf]

There is much to criticize and nitpick in Roddenberry's too rosy view of humanity and the communist utopia they build, but I think the most important element in Roddenberry's vision is that humanity wouldn't destroy itself but instead advance enough to join the other civilizations in the stars. Much of pre-Trek sci-fi pictured humans as passive victims of advanced alien invaders. In Trek humans went out and met aliens on their own terms with their own advanced technology.

 

[JiNX-01]

Because of boards like this one and conventions it has taken over my life and my money!

The trouble is, I'm happy about it!

 

[Cyke101]

One of the few things that I liked about Enterprise is that humans, when encountering races and states that are now common Trek lore, had a pretty difficult time getting along with, well, anyone. Even with the Vulcans, Earth's greatest ally, there was a bit of antagonism going on with both sides. And it follows Trek lore as well, as first contact with a lot of species in TNG, DS9, and VOY had a tendency of becoming violent.

However, I understand the OP's argument, I think. Perhaps even in Enterprise, first contacts were too rosy? Who knows. I think a fault of Trek, and also a fault of the OP, is applying human (or perhaps Earthen) characteristics to races that would otherwise have nothing in common with humanity. Roddenberry perhaps made the fault of making aliens to be simply humans with one human personality trait at a time, perhaps those who believe that UFOs would be devastating make the fault of assuming those cultures would be similiar to Earth's cultures of the past and present.

 

[Lynx]

It's a socialist utopia.

But the thing is, within any utopia there is always some sort of fascist price to pay. And that means keepiong the unwanted people out.

That's one of the things I find highly unrealistic about Trek, is that humanity is incapable of overcoming it's petty jealousies and xenophobia.

Why?

I find it realistic that humanity can develope to what it is portrayed as in Star Trek even if it will take a long time.

I mean, we have come so far that we are actually trying to do something about the bad things on Earth. 200 years ago, no one bothered about wars, genoscide, slavery, starvation and such. Today we at least care. We are developing, even if it is in a slow pace.

Personally I also think that we must find a new ideology and way of thinking if we will continue to develope. The Soviet communism didn't work because it became a repressive dictatorship. But capitalism doesn't work either because what we got is poverty, exploitation, wars and social problems. We have to find something new and different and I think that what we do see in Star Trek would be a possible solution. And no, I see no "fascist price" to pay in the Trek scenario.

Besides that, fascism was an Italian political movement rather close to socialism. What is labeled as "fascism" today is more the kind of repressive systems we see in certain military dictatorships who are built on a capitalistic economy.

 

[Lightbulb Sun]

Maybe it's just me, but that's the thing that I love about Star Trek.

Sure, it's unrealistic because humanity probably will never become that open-armed about new cultures and new ideas... but isn't that the point? If I wanted to watch a TV show about how incompetent, negative, xenophobic, unaccepting, intolerant and unequal the universe is, I'd watch Fox News. But here is a show that, in an realistically unrealistic way, has said, "look, things will get better over time, there's a future to look forward to." That's what makes Trek great. It's a TV show, not a prophecy.

Couldn't it also be argued that the idea of tolerance displayed in mass media forms (such as Star Trek) could be one of the first steeping stones in the actual spread of such an idea? Without the dreamers of society, would anything change?

 

[Rhaenys]

That's one of the things I find highly unrealistic about Trek, is that humanity is incapable of overcoming it's petty jealousies and xenophobia.

I agree with that.
But that is not the reason to hate Trek for me. I doesn't have to be realistic. I mean, it's sci fi, I don't want it to be realistic. There are so many more realistic series that I can watch (and I do some of them). Or I can just go out on the street if I want something realistic.

I agree with Lightbulb Sun in some points. Although I don't have really much hope that people will get better in future. But ST shows that if they would, world could be a much better place, and that is one of the reasons I love it. Sadly, I don't really believe that will ever happen.

 

[Sector 7]

There is much to criticize and nitpick in Roddenberry's too rosy view of humanity and the communist utopia they build, but I think the most important element in Roddenberry's vision is that humanity wouldn't destroy itself but instead advance enough to join the other civilizations in the stars. Much of pre-Trek sci-fi pictured humans as passive victims of advanced alien invaders. In Trek humans went out and met aliens on their own terms with their own advanced technology.

Star Trek's optimism gave me hope at a time when I didn't see any hope for the future. With all it's faults, ST's optimism is what we HOPE we WILL become in the future.

Maybe it's just me, but that's the thing that I love about Star Trek.

Sure, it's unrealistic because humanity probably will never become that open-armed about new cultures and new ideas... but isn't that the point? If I wanted to watch a TV show about how incompetent, negative, xenophobic, unaccepting, intolerant and unequal the universe is, I'd watch Fox News. But here is a show that, in an realistically unrealistic way, has said, "look, things will get better over time, there's a future to look forward to." That's what makes Trek great. It's a TV show, not a prophecy.

Couldn't it also be argued that the idea of tolerance displayed in mass media forms (such as Star Trek) could be one of the first steeping stones in the actual spread of such an idea? Without the dreamers of society, would anything change?

I agree. I choose to dream.

Later Trek's only real disappointment came in 2 areas:
- Religion, or more importantly FAITH, became looked at as foolishness. I take my faith seriously, although religion... not so much.
- The later shows (post-TNG) became soap operas in space. Hence, boring and unwatchable. They traded the sense of wonder and adventure for techno-babble and formulas.

 

[K'Ehleyr]

Yes, a GOOD reason.

I used to be a huge Star Trek fan until 2001, I think. I spent the first 3 years in Silicon Valley after I migrated to the state. Trek is huge there, you know. Being a fan of sci-fi I quickly became a fan of Trek. One major reason why I became a fan of Trek was that there has been absolutely no large-budget drama (in any genre) in my home country and the total lack of sci-fi shows over there. I loved Trek. I learned my English from watching TNG.

I used to be an idealist and a optimist. Not anymore. I became a generally negative person through a lot of life experiences.

I think the moment I stopped liking Trek is almost the same time period when I stopped being an optimist. Recently, I got interested in UFO phenomenon. Don't get me wrong. I am neither a believer nor a skeptic.

One conclusion I made from studying various UFO and alien lore is that there is absolutely no reason to feel idealistic or optimistic about them. It seems like survival of the fittest still applies in space, too.

In our history, the encounter between civilizations with vastly different technological level always ends up being catastrophic. I wonder if Roddenberry actually looked into world history before coming up with Trek. I just can't figure out why Roddenberry came up with rosy-colored view on alien contact.

Now, I simply can't swallow the idea of optimistic future. And I really hate the deus ex machina-type plot elements in TNG. So technology wins. Not my cup of tea ANYMORE. (I used to like the premise of TNG, though...)

It does begger the question why you are still on the forum though?

 

[Temis the Vorta]

In our history, the encounter between civilizations with vastly different technological level always ends up being catastrophic.

That's what I wanted from ENT: to be the story of how backwards little planet Earth survives its first steps into a cosmos that, among other societies, includes aggressive empires vastly more technologically superior. Sure, the Vulcans are friendly (sorta) and advanced but really how powerful are they? Not very. They probably have their hands full just looking out for themselves.

But that's no reason to hate Star Trek. I would have really enjoyed that plotline, certainly far more than the more-of-the-same we got. I envision Earth surviving by courage and perseverance and the ability to use our innate capitalistic instincts to make alliances with more powerful entities and play one off the other. After all, in the 22nd C, humanity would have been more along the Ferengi model we know today. The commie stuff came later.

One of the few things that I liked about Enterprise is that humans, when encountering races and states that are now common Trek lore, had a pretty difficult time getting along with, well, anyone.

That's one of the things I hated about ENT! In the first place, humans couldn't afford to go pissing off more powerful aliens. They should have been cautious to the point of paranoia. Also, Archer pissed people off because he was stupid, which is never something you want to see in a main character.

 

[Mysterion]

I somewhat agree with the original poster on this issue.

I love pre-TNG Star Trek. But, most St from TNG onward (except for DS9) is so politically correct and bending over backward to present "Roddenberry's Vision" that they've forgotten (to a large extent) how to tell a good story with engaging/realistic characters who behave in realistic and engaging ways. It's gotten pretty tiresome when every other episode (or so it seemed at times) you had Picard or Janeway whinging and gnashing over how fucked-up huimans were back int he 20th century and how they are sooooo much more enlightened in the 24th and a half century. Bullshit. Kirk, Spock and the rest of them at least had the decency to be fallible. They were still human, admitted it, reveled in it. Sure they were trying to be better people (that was the fucking point of the series), but at the same time they were still recognizably human. Humanity is a condition that has been cured by the time TNG has started so that starships could be crewed by people with rods permanantly affixed up their third point of contact. Was overjoyed to see DSN start to poke at some of those conceits in it's latter seasons. But then those joys were again dashed when ENT sank right back to the party-line.

And to make matters worse, I've noticed what I perceive to be a sort of "Star Trek Revisionism" toward that pre-TNG Star Trek material where TOS is being reshaped/forced to fit into that PC/socialist box. I hope that the upcoming JJ Abrams retelling of TOS will be a step back to the ORIGINAL Star trek and all the things that made it great. Let Kirk be Kirk, I say.

I don't hate Star Trek by any stretch, but I seriously dislike a lot of what it has become in recent years.

 

[Rÿcher]

I used to be a card-carrying trekkie until I realized nearly all of the things above.

It was nice that Roddenberry saw the future through rose colored glasses but I prefer something a bit more realistic and gritty where people second guess themselves and have to take the low road sometimes for whatever reason.

And the cuddly playing nice and making friends bullshit and the uber proper grammar they use. Who talks like that?

 

[Therin of Andor]

Sure, it's unrealistic because humanity probably will never become that open-armed about new cultures and new ideas... but isn't that the point?

Exactly. Why set the bar lower if you want people to try to reach the higher bar?

 

[ambelamba]

There is much to criticize and nitpick in Roddenberry's too rosy view of humanity and the communist utopia they build, but I think the most important element in Roddenberry's vision is that humanity wouldn't destroy itself but instead advance enough to join the other civilizations in the stars. Much of pre-Trek sci-fi pictured humans as passive victims of advanced alien invaders. In Trek humans went out and met aliens on their own terms with their own advanced technology.

I've read a lot of alleged alien encounters. My impression is that real contact with alien civilization will be more like Spielberg's WOTW, and it will never, ever be like Trek.

 

[Antihero]

Yes, a GOOD reason.

I used to be a huge Star Trek fan until 2001, I think. I spent the first 3 years in Silicon Valley after I migrated to the state. Trek is huge there, you know. Being a fan of sci-fi I quickly became a fan of Trek. One major reason why I became a fan of Trek was that there has been absolutely no large-budget drama (in any genre) in my home country and the total lack of sci-fi shows over there. I loved Trek. I learned my English from watching TNG.

I used to be an idealist and a optimist. Not anymore. I became a generally negative person through a lot of life experiences.

I think the moment I stopped liking Trek is almost the same time period when I stopped being an optimist. Recently, I got interested in UFO phenomenon. Don't get me wrong. I am neither a believer nor a skeptic.

One conclusion I made from studying various UFO and alien lore is that there is absolutely no reason to feel idealistic or optimistic about them. It seems like survival of the fittest still applies in space, too.

In our history, the encounter between civilizations with vastly different technological level always ends up being catastrophic. I wonder if Roddenberry actually looked into world history before coming up with Trek. I just can't figure out why Roddenberry came up with rosy-colored view on alien contact.

Now, I simply can't swallow the idea of optimistic future. And I really hate the deus ex machina-type plot elements in TNG. So technology wins. Not my cup of tea ANYMORE. (I used to like the premise of TNG, though...)

I feel much the same way. The only series that still holds my interest is DS9 and even the characters in that are a little goody-two-shoes sometimes.

I grew up on TNG, but 15 years later it is almost completely unwatchable to me anymore. I find most of the characters insipid and annoying now.

 

[PhoenixIreland]

It's a socialist utopia.

But the thing is, within any utopia there is always some sort of fascist price to pay. And that means keepiong the unwanted people out.

That's one of the things I find highly unrealistic about Trek, is that humanity is incapable of overcoming it's petty jealousies and xenophobia.

I hate when people trot this nugget out

As I've explained before, Utopianism is all relative, Europe would be a utopia compared to someone from Somalia, our time would be a utopia compared to the 15th century.
When dictators set out to create a utopia it usually ends in disaster, but it's not the goal that made them dictators, it's that they were already dictators.
Nowhere in the show did they show a historical figure saying they wanted to create a utopia, just that the current federation consider themselves a uptopia comapred to the nasty places humanity has been in the past, and they'd be right.

Even with all our problems today, we could make the same claim in relation to 400 years previously, theres nothing wrong with setting aspirations for ourselves.

As for us overcoming our problems, we've overcome dozens of others why not poverty and xenaphobia? If you told someone 500 years ago we'd have the internet, no slavery, social welfare, the internet, universal sufferage etc they'd have thought you were insane.

Try to zoom out people, don't look at our poitential future through the context of our own time.

 

[K'Ehleyr]

Antihero's Top 5 interests:
1. Deep Space Nine; 2. red meat; 3. beer; 4. porn;
and 5. Porn incorporating any combination of items 1, 2, and 3. (If this exists, I will gladly pay top dollar for a provided link.)
Honey, you really need to get out more!