I hate all the racially correct places Trek visits

[Temis the Vorta]

They're not supposed to be black, white, or anything. They're supposed to be aliens. The differences in color within one village where everyone is presumably related to each other could be explained by the fact that alien DNA (and the genes that code for skin color) work differently in aliens than they do in humans. Why assume it works the same? These are critters more alien to us than a pine tree.

Maybe you can fault them for not disguising the fact that they were played by human actors better. I was disappointed at all the boring humanoid aliens. Would it have killed them to come across a planetful of Hortas every now and then? (And if some Hortas were different shades than others, I suppose we could complain about that.)

But if you wanna bitch about political correctness, the scripts were far worse offenders. "Starfleet captain flies in, lectures Obviously Wrongheaded Aliens about their obvious wrongheadeness, flies away." That schitck got OLD.

 

[misskim86]

I honestly don't mind the politicly correctness, it's more the logistical error I mind. But yes I suppose the alien of the week with some minor ridges on their forehead simply has DNA that once in a while accidently gives birth to a child which doesn't look like their parents at all. I guess Earth must be unique with different races and all -.-

 

[ancient]

Remember the 'Scottish' planet from TNG? Ach, mine eyes!


As for the mix of skin colors, remember that we're pretending these people are supposed to be aliens, so who knows? maybe a 'white' alien pair can have a 'black' child, the way two brown-eyed humans can have a blue-eyed child. Or maybe they switch skin colors when they turn 50. Anything's possible!

 

[starburst]

I remember an Irish colony but there was a Scottish one?

 

[Alidar Jarok]

Sub Rosa. Crusher has sex with a candle ghost

 

[Red Ranger]

Misskim86, et al.,

Well, this is a fascinating discussion. I do want to thank you, misskim86, for bringing it up. Let's keep in mind that the concept of "race" is a human conceit and concept. And it's a false one, because pretty much all the credible scientific evidence points to the idea that every human being on earth is part of one species, with relatively minor differences in skin/eye color and hair texture.

I think the idea that alien DNA works differently from human DNA is probably the most elegant sci-fi explanation we can come up with to explain the seemingly great differences in skin color among primitive populations.

Now, I'd love to see a red-headed Vulcan!

Red Ranger

 

[misskim86]

Hmm there are clear differences between earth's races besides eye color and hair texture, if you go beyond the clear difference in looks between blacks, asians and white people, there are several medicines that are produced specifically towards certain races, I know of atleast one heart medicine that is aimed toward blacks.

Now I'm willing to buy the whole "aliens gives births to politicly correct amount of different races" but then the questions that arise are:

A: Howcome almost every alien race has this distinct genetic feauture, even though most of them are spread out through the galaxy and are in no way related?

B: Why is Earth so special when we don't possess the politically correct gene?

C: Are Vulcans and Bajorans divided in races like on Earth, or in politically correct genetics like the rest of the universe?

Stay tuned!

 

[Venardhi]

I think we can safely assume that most humanoid alien species reproduce in much the same way we do, with very alike use of DNA. If they didn't there wouldn't be any half-klingons, half-betazoids, half-vulcans, etc. out there. Having people that look asian, african, european and american all in the same psuedo-european village is indeed silly and makes no evolutionary sense unless some wide-spread cataclysmic event drove all the peoples of the world into one small area (somehow peacefully) a short enough time ago that they haven't all mixed in to form a really tan medium between them.

I have little problem with colorblind casting for the most part, but I would have liked to see more effort to disguise the obvious features that readily identify someone as a human ethnicity, and in their stead try to build up varying alien ethnicities within the species. An alien of the week species might have raised and colored spots on their forehead to go with cheek and nose appliances. On some of the aliens we see large dark spots to go with slightly greenish colored skin and a blunt nose. On another group of the same aliens their skin is more blue, with small light dots and larger hooked noses. Same species, the differences never mentioned in the episode, just a couple different dominant phenotypes amongst the population.

 

[Elder Knight]

In Trek, DNA is all about foreheads.

 

[ancient]

The 'forehead gene' will be the greatest discovery of the 22nd century!

 

[OldManDax]

misskim86 said:
Red Ranger that's a pretty good idea, the best explanation I can think of for the fact that every time they land the village has such a ethnic mix is that for some reason the away team happens to land in the most central village of the whole planet where different races just happens to be on exactly same medieval technological level and all meet in that exact village to trade etc.


Also I never saw a problem with Code of Honor until people brought up the problem, an asshole is an asshole, doesn't matter what color. It's more racist to say that an episode is racist just because the bad guys are all black, but yet I bet noone would have complained if they were all white. Code of Honor was a good episode in my opinion and the director had the logic sense to tell a story where atleast one race had not reached uber political correctness.

People complain that aliens aren't black, or asian but in a PC society apparently they can't be casted as villains only good guys, while for some reason there's absolutely no problem to showcase whites as villains in like 99% of the time.

miskim, I certainly have noticed this tendency, and on some level it seems patronizing and overly parochial, as if the casting people are trying too hard to make blacks feel safe, noble and heroic, etc.

However, I would argue that the main reason for this seeming dichotomy is not some deep-seated anti-white bias (PLEASE) but the fact that hundreds of years in most American media, the archetypes in which blacks were allowed to exist have been notably limited. If you look at a lot of the way that much American literature (especially things like newspapers and periodicals), film and television has portrayed blacks over the decades, you'll find a lot of ugly, insulting intimations about black intelligence, creativity, depth, collective values and their capacity to think outside the box. All of this tends to preclude the type of deeply motivated, three-dimensional, interesting characters that would constitute interesting and worthwhile villains on Trek, that perhaps even gives an insight (!)into the human soul.

Heck, other than Diahann Carroll's run on Dynasty some years ago, very few daytime or primetime soaps have bothered to create a viable, believable African-American villain who WASN'T a variation of the ne'er do well, just-one-step-from-the-hood archetype.

Of course, the fact that Trek, along with other sci-fi shows, has no shortage of black actors portraying members of the often obviously hostile, often two-dimensional warrior/hunter/soldier races like the Klingons (Gabrielle Union?! ), Jem Hadar, and Kazon raises some questions unto its own, no?

 

[misskim86]

OldManDax said:


Of course, the fact that Trek, along with other sci-fi shows, has no shortage of black actors portraying members of the often obviously hostile, often two-dimensional warrior/hunter/soldier races like the Klingons (Gabrielle Union?! ), Jem Hadar, and Kazon raises some questions unto its own, no?

i don't know, when I see Klingons or Jem'Hadar I hardly think of them as black, they have so distinct feautures they are Klingons or Jem'Hadar not "alien with ridges on their head pity casted by a black person"

I guess black people simply are easier to make into a klingon since klingons are bit dark, but in no way did I ever think "why is every klingon black". I see a klingon as a klingon. By the way, wonder if they have different races?

Maybe they killed the other klingon races like the Centauri did in B5

 

[HRHTheKING]

I've got no problem with racial diversity among aliens.

 

[misskim86]

HRHTheKING said:
I've got no problem with racial diversity among aliens.

I don't think anyone has

 

[Apogeal Alpha01]

BTW, in a similar thread addressing race or ethnic casting in Star Trek, the most often cast ethnicity outside white, was determined to be Latino, or Hispanic.

 

[misskim86]

Really? among the real roles or just extras? Last hispanic person I can really remember was that doofus ensign in Q Who.

As far as I can tell the 2nd most casted race after whites is black

 

[Red Ranger]

misskim86 said:
Really? among the real roles or just extras? Last hispanic person I can really remember was that doofus ensign in Q Who.

As far as I can tell the 2nd most casted race after whites is black

I agree with you, misskim86. As a Latino myself, I'm quite sensitive to the lack of Latinos cast in ST over the years as compared with Caucasians and African-Americans.

Oh sure, there are exceptions, like Ricardo Montalban as Khan, Robert Beltran as Chakotay, and Roxann Biggs-Dawson (yes, she is Latina) as B'Elanna Torres. But you'll notice none of the characters they played, with the exception of -- and only partly -- Torres -- none of the characters they played was Latino.

And yes, there have been some Latino characters, like Commodore Mendez, the ensign you mentioned in "Encounter at Farpoint," Captain Erika Hernandez from ENT, and the crewman in the DSN ep where the Feds had been holding out against a Jem'Hadar attack (Siege of something, I think), but no regular cast members.

It would be refreshing if a Latino actor played a Latino character as a regular cast member on a future ST series, if there ever is one again. Maybe we'll have a Latino chief of security finally in the new ST movie series. Would be nice!

Red Ranger

 

[Helmgirlie]

@Redranger, I wish it were possible that nobody would mind how many percent of people played a certain racial character and do the best job they can. I wish it didn't matter where people come from and what they would play as long as they play a character. I wish people could see eachother as people and not in ethnicities like caucasians or afro-americans or latino's. I am getting a bit tired over people who feel constantly discriminated because they feel their 'ethnicity' isn't 'used' as much as other 'ethnicities' Come on it's a tv-show and not a show where you constantly need to walk on egg-shells because a group could be feeling ignored. What a nonsense. Where I live, people thankfully are equal, no matter where they come from and they play a role on televsion and nobody is looking at or cares about where they come from originally. I hope that one day it will be this way everywhere.
Rant over

 

[Apogeal Alpha01]

Again, if I remember, the Latins weren't neccessarily playing an Hispanic character, but were cast as "characters," but were themselves, nevertheless, Latino. The ethnic range of Latinos is broad, and you'd wouldn't neccessarily notice them as different from yourself, or whites for that matter. Black people will stand out in contrast, or by contrasting, more than others.

I would grant you that there should be, by representation in the sciences if for no other reason, more Asian people. However, I think casting reflects to some degree the American landscape or viewership, and our understandable desire to see people like ourselves represented in the future.

 

[Red Ranger]

Helmgirdle, Apogeal,

You both raise some interesting views. Let me take helmgirdle's objections first.

You know it would be nice if casting could be more colorblind. But let me go into more detail about why I'm concerned with the lack of Latinos in ST, although I'm going a bit off-topic here. (In fact, I started a thread awhile back on this subject, and got quite a few harsh reactions, far more extreme than your little rant).

In the U.S., there has been discrimination, and continues to be, against people of Latino origin, due to the U.S.’s history of paternalistic relations with their neighbors south of the border. This has led, in some cases, to stereotyping of Latinos in mainstream media. Too often, the default types for Latinos are maids, custodians, and criminals. While changing, there aren’t enough such positive role models. So it would be nice to see a future where Latinos aren’t consigned to such roles.

And I hate to burst your bubble or your high horse, but I’ve heard that even in places like the Netherlands, as more folks emigrate to European countries who aren’t of European background, they’ve encountered intolerance even in places like your country. So please, spare me.

And Apogeal, when you say casting reflects a desire by people to see those who look like them, that’s exactly what I’m saying. I’d like to see a heroic young Latino officer, who wants to be a starship captain, serving as a junior officer. Or I’d like to actually see a Latino starship captain who is the star of the show.

While we’re on the subject of demographics, it isn’t that far-fetched that a show produced in the U.S. ought to have better representation of Latinos. After all, Latinos in 2005 surpassed African-Americans as the largest ethnic minority in the U.S.

You can argue you kind of have that with Edward James Olmos in Battlestar Galactica, but that’s more an example of what you’re talking about, a Latino playing a character. That’s fine. It’s just I’d like to see someone named Diaz in charge of a Galaxy-class starship sometime.

And I am grateful that you had two Latinos on VOY, Beltran and Biggs-Dawson, playing interesting characters who weren’t maids or thieves, thankfully, the ugly stereotypes unimaginative TV showrunners -– aided and abetted by short-sighted writers -- foist on the public.

Red Ranger