Spoilers Demons of the Punjab grade and discussion thread
- Thread starter The Nth Doctor
- Start date
Were the Doctor, Ryan and Graham present when Yaz was seeing her grandma in the present?
I honestly couldn't remember the people I met once or twice at my wedding, that was 4 years ago, nor when I nearly died 9 years ago. Very few people i'd recognise from school. If I'd seen a family member grow up their entire life I certainly wouldn't think 'oh, aye, their the person who was around 60 years ago.' Especially when I had no idea time travel was real.
In today's political climate everything's racist, which is why you can't make a character like McCoy anymore these days, not if he's supposed to be one of the good guys at least.
In today's political climate everything's racist, which is why you can't make a character like McCoy anymore these days, not if he's supposed to be one of the good guys at least.
Everything is racist? I thought everything was sexist! Or is everything racist and sexist? Must be hard to leave the house.
But there’s a good reason you can’t make the same McCoy now that was made then... because times have changed. Replace McCoy’s barbs to Spock about Vulcans with being black or Christian. Is it really so friendly? Or is McCoy that asshole at work that just can’t stop pointing out how different you are for everyone else?
McCoy at his best wasn’t about being an asshole to Spock—it’s when he brought his cynicism and heart to the table. His humanity. Of course, his bias is also pretty human. But back then, it was played for laughs. And now, it’s not so funny.
You could very well do a character like McCoy nowadays. Wait. They have. Poor Karl Urban. Already forgotten.
Not necessarily for the better. Guess what, conflict is the essense of drama and saintly characters are boring. Seeing McCoy's character thrown under the bus as if he's some sort of Archie Bunker stereotype on a Trek board that is supposed to be for fans is rather disturbing.
I think not being harrased at work would be a good thing...
No? How is it not better? You think it was better when in the work place people could make racist and sexist jokes? You think it was better when it was ok for bosses to sexually harass employees? You think it was better when gay people had to remain in the closet or be fired? Or worse?
Sure. I never said it wasn't. And McCoy and Spock can still disagree without McCoy being all, "You stupid Vulcans! You half breed Vulcans!" They can still have conflict because they are coming at something with two different points of view without having to resort to backwards name calling.
Admittedly, it's a little bit in jest on my part. But, it certainly reveals a lot that you can't see McCoy WITHOUT his racist attacks on Spock. He can still be a cranky man. He can still be a compassionate man. He can still be the heart of the Enterprise. Look at what Karl Urban did.
The thing is all of those pokes and jokes from McCoy about Vulcans and their green blood and their whatever whatever are relics of the 60s. Relics of that time. But, yeah, unless the story calls for a character to come to realize they ARE being a racist, I wouldn't write a character that feels to make a joke about another's identity. And I could still have them in conflict.
But, speaking of it being a Trek board (and saintly characters), the whole POINT of the TNG was there wouldn't be conflicts WITHIN the crew, that was Roddenberry's vision for that show.
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McCoy is my favorite TOS character and one of my top three. He is also portrayed as being casually racist toward Spock and not all of it is good natured. It's also largely forgiven because he's a "Southern Gentlemen" and "Southern Gentlemen" in the 60s were ever so slightly clinging to the past stereotypes and that's "a-okay." (It wasn't and it's not.)
Please try inserting any grouping on Earth into "You're outta your Vulcan mind" and tell me it's not offensive.
Yeah just imagine substituting eye shape for ear shape, or different coloured skin for different coloured blood and see how McCoy sounds.
Well, yes, but we have to look at the character overall. Sherlock Holmes has his moments against "negroes", but is willing to admit Norbury (a case of an interracial marriage that Holmes completely misinterpreted) is his worst failure, and Watson himself is elated to see the new husband of the white mother willing to accept the mixed race child of her previous marriage. McCoy rails more against Vulcan logic than physiology. It's convenient to call Spock a "green-blooded son of a bitch" but what he really hates is cold logic that makes decisions about life and death without emotion. He'd call a human using the same logic a heartless SOB or worse.
No, to our modern sensibilities it isn't pleasant to hear. But Trek is renowned for making aliens all identical. If Vulcans weren't all ruled by logic, McCoy would be even more at fault for blaming Spock's colder decisions on his heritage. In fact, he's demonstrating faulty reverse logic - all Vulcans are logical. All Vulcans have green blood. Therefore, green blood underpins logical decision making.
I fail to see how "He's not actually racist, he's bigoted against their religion" is a way to support the complexity of the character. ;-)
Well, at the risk of digging myself a hole, it's the difference between being anti-Semitic and being against the Israeli policies regarding the Palestinians.
Sure, those policies might be "logical", from some points of view, but compassion would like a word with them.
Let's not forget - McCoy learnt a very painful personal lesson about logic AND emotion. All the medical evidence told him his father was incurable. He chose an emotional decision to spare his father suffering - compassion. But a cure was developed a few months later. The emotion of hope might have spared his father. But all he had to base his decision on was science - logic.
Now imagine how a Vulcan might react to those situations. I doubt McCoy's father would even be kept alive beyond the point his own body could maintain him, since the condition was "incurable". It would be a waste of time and resources.
This is something best left for the Neutral Zone, but suffice to say you're moving the goal posts of this argument to align with a nuanced story element introduced much later in the character's development to explain characterization we're discussing as borne of its era with a flimsy dodge to powerful divide that is just not borne out textually.
Gosh, Mr. Seapower, you use your tongue purdier than a $20 whore.
I'm sure there's an insult in here somewhere. You'll do better next time.
When did people ever think Archie Bunker didn't mean it? I think Archie being a racist was very much a core element of his character. The difference between Bunker and Spock is how it was presented. Archie Bunker got annoyed with what was becoming of society but McCoy's quips are pretty much directed at Spock. It would be like Saying Spock was racist because he would talk about how irrational humans can be or how logic is better. Spock gave as good as he got because they knew they loved each other.
Jason
Point... missed.
(Unrealistic theory)
Any Human, especially Scotty and Checkov, with a nonCalifornian accent is playing with the custom settings on their universal translator.
Casual racism is probably a flair setting attached to McCoys romantic idealization of an old country Doctor.
It's possible that what he is saying is not what we are hearing after his concepts and language is filtered by the ship's (or their personal) universal translator.
Or if this entire TV Series is from Spock's perspective, maybe because he thinks that all Humans are emotional monsters, he hears the racism (amplified nuance and enhanced subtext) he has always been taught to expect.
Any Human, especially Scotty and Checkov, with a nonCalifornian accent is playing with the custom settings on their universal translator.
Casual racism is probably a flair setting attached to McCoys romantic idealization of an old country Doctor.
It's possible that what he is saying is not what we are hearing after his concepts and language is filtered by the ship's (or their personal) universal translator.
Or if this entire TV Series is from Spock's perspective, maybe because he thinks that all Humans are emotional monsters, he hears the racism (amplified nuance and enhanced subtext) he has always been taught to expect.
What Silence? I don't remember any Silence. I'm sure I'd remember them if I'd seen them.
Well considering the drop off between the 1st and 2nd episodes I'm not surprised the show has only lasted 55 years. I'm sure it will be cancelled any day now. If that second episode had been better the show might have lasted much longer.
There was a clear amount of prejudice in his behaviour, especially during the original episodes. It gradually moved to more light hearted bantering but there were elements of racism (specisism?) that would have to be portrayed differently today. In a couple of the novels it was portrayed in a different manner - it was less about McCoy having an issue with Spock being Vulcan/logical and more a case that as Ship's Doctor, he realised that Spock, as half Human, needed to have some emotional release that he was denying himself in his quest to be the perfect Vulcan. So from that perspective the taunts were more about getting Spock to react in an emotional manner (for his own good) than being anything McCoy particularly believed. I do like that approach more. And then as their relationship developed into friendship, and Spock embraced his human half it became more of a two way good natured needling between two friends.