I hate all the racially correct places Trek visits
- Thread starter misskim86
- Start date
Doesn't Chakotay fit this role? granted, not the best example of a well rounded character
but he is most certainly a native American Latino regular cast member playing a native American Latino, if we're talking race here rather than cultural descent. After all, non-European latinos are surely by definition native Americans by ancestry? I know in Trek lore Chakotay's from a 'native American planet' (there's another non-white planet, btw - Journey's End) but then Tuvok's technically from Vulcan and i think most people would refer to him as black. (using American throughout to mean the combined continents, not the USA, btw)
Hogan's Heros? Geez. There were no giant spider machines in 1890 either. Starbuck is a woman.
Trek depicted a future from a utopian perspective. It came onto the air when the US and Soviet Union had the Cold War at its coldest. They used to test the air raid sirens regularly in Washington, DC. Kids did duck and cover drills in schools.
Part of this utopian vision was having a Russian crewmember on the ship.
Another part was promoting racial harmony. Hence, the presence of Lt. Uhura and several shows with racial themes - such as the one with people with their faces painted black on one side and white on the other.
Such "PC" approaches to story-telling - and you've complained about PCism in other threads - is all part of Trek's heritage: a world where races live in harmony. Someonetimes it's more subtly done, other times it is more heavy-handed, such as in the TOS episode just described. But uptopianism is part of Trek and always has been.
Part of this utopian vision was having a Russian crewmember on the ship.
Another part was promoting racial harmony. Hence, the presence of Lt. Uhura and several shows with racial themes - such as the one with people with their faces painted black on one side and white on the other.
Such "PC" approaches to story-telling - and you've complained about PCism in other threads - is all part of Trek's heritage: a world where races live in harmony. Someonetimes it's more subtly done, other times it is more heavy-handed, such as in the TOS episode just described. But uptopianism is part of Trek and always has been.
What are the demographics of this, really?
Of those "logistically untenable" pseudo-medieval villages, I remember only perhaps two or three. There's one in VOY "False Profits", but that was a trade hub, of planetwide importance because of the two Trade Gods residing there. You'd see such diversity in old Timbuktu or Chang'an or Rome, too.
Then there's one in VOY "Blink of an Eye", but I don't remember if it was racially diverse. Since it sat beneath the Skyship, though, it would be a religious center and target of pilgrimage. VOY "Muse" had one more, but the blatantly racially diverse element there was the theater troupé - quite possible even in the pseudo-Renaissance setting of the episode.
Any others? I really cannot remember any TNG medieval villages, let alone ones with racial diversity. Okay, "Thine Own Self" might qualify as medieval, but the crowds there were perfectly monoracial.
As for DS9, "Shadowplay" had some diversity, but the village was not primitive by any standards: it was the result of space travel, and an anomalious piece of fakery overall.
So, I really can't come up with even a single example that would truly meet the criteria of the error hated by the OP.
Timo Saloniemi
Of those "logistically untenable" pseudo-medieval villages, I remember only perhaps two or three. There's one in VOY "False Profits", but that was a trade hub, of planetwide importance because of the two Trade Gods residing there. You'd see such diversity in old Timbuktu or Chang'an or Rome, too.
Then there's one in VOY "Blink of an Eye", but I don't remember if it was racially diverse. Since it sat beneath the Skyship, though, it would be a religious center and target of pilgrimage. VOY "Muse" had one more, but the blatantly racially diverse element there was the theater troupé - quite possible even in the pseudo-Renaissance setting of the episode.
Any others? I really cannot remember any TNG medieval villages, let alone ones with racial diversity. Okay, "Thine Own Self" might qualify as medieval, but the crowds there were perfectly monoracial.
As for DS9, "Shadowplay" had some diversity, but the village was not primitive by any standards: it was the result of space travel, and an anomalious piece of fakery overall.
So, I really can't come up with even a single example that would truly meet the criteria of the error hated by the OP.
Timo Saloniemi
More importantly, the Goa'uld weren't in the business of transplanting cultures. They were transplanting slaves, whom they harvested from all around Earth for several thousands of years. There would have been no rule of only employing Mongol slaves on planet A and only using Mycenean slaves on planet B.
So the Goa'uld would happily mix the populations. And once the masters abandoned their projects, the slaves would create their own cultures - quite plausibly with a bunch of Mongols deciding that the folks from Amazonas, Brittany, Lebanon and Zimbabwe had to learn to be nomadic riders or else.
No problem with racial diversity there, then. The big problems would be 1) why everybody speaks English, 2) why very modern cultures like Mongols are represented even though the Goa'uld supposedly ceased operations by the classic Greek era at the latest, and 3) why so many of the older cultures remain almost unchanged after all those millennia, even without Goa'uld oppression, while others (supposedly also beginning as humble communities of mere thousands of slaves) have achieved space travel.
Timo Saloniemi
So the Goa'uld would happily mix the populations. And once the masters abandoned their projects, the slaves would create their own cultures - quite plausibly with a bunch of Mongols deciding that the folks from Amazonas, Brittany, Lebanon and Zimbabwe had to learn to be nomadic riders or else.
No problem with racial diversity there, then. The big problems would be 1) why everybody speaks English, 2) why very modern cultures like Mongols are represented even though the Goa'uld supposedly ceased operations by the classic Greek era at the latest, and 3) why so many of the older cultures remain almost unchanged after all those millennia, even without Goa'uld oppression, while others (supposedly also beginning as humble communities of mere thousands of slaves) have achieved space travel.
Timo Saloniemi
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