Number of Star Fleet officers on DS9

[Kobayshi Maru]

Simple: we should beware of people who make us feel guilty for remembering the injustices of the past, the people who suffered, and the fight against those injustices.

Again, what's that got to do with anything? Are you running for something and using this site as a dry run for your future campaign?

I believe you are feigning ignorance. You've made plenty of statements attempting to read racism where none exists. Conversely, you argue that the existence of identity in the future is the result of racism on the part of people who have historically suffered from racism. Should various identities exist in the future, perhaps some that exist now, it is not the obligation of people who have been oppressed to turn over and disappear. To do so would be willful amnesia. To insist that someone do so means asking them to commit cultural suicide.

I believe you are ignoring the point that there won't be any pure blacks left by the 24th century on purpose. You think if you just keep ignoring it and pretending that it isn't there then it will just go away. Even now, most of the marriages I witness are mixed marriages, these kids live now and yet they can no longer say "my people" when talking about either one of the ethnic groups. Sisko is an aberration, an anachronism. that "our people" crap is the product of an obtuse short sighted mind. I am getting tired of your demagoguery. That part of the show is not ony racist, it also ignores the premise of the show itself that by the 24th century prejudice and discrimination will be long gone. Sisko getting all worked up is indecent and an insult to our intelligence.

 

[Kobayshi Maru]

This is supposed to be the 24th century, the odds are that by then there won't be any people left without a mixed ancestry

Yet Star Trek definitely doesn't show that. They could do that with make-up if they wanted to. But they instead include people from various races instead of showing humans all as mixed.

Yes, that's one of my main peeves about the show. That it ignores one of life's realities, that people tend to intermarriage when there are no prejudices and discriminations getting in the way. I see it happening now in my country. There are plenty of people here that are half Asian, half Caucasian, one of our ministers is btw. Only racism and discrimination could keep races apart as seems to be the case on DS9, when sisko still can say "Our people" without someone asking him, "who the hell are our people?"
Some Americans are deliberately ignoring that their own president is only half black. I've seen it plenty of times. People talk about him as if he had no white ancestry.

I call that racism.

Sisko as portrayed in some episodes IS a racist. "Our people" should mean the people of Earth or of the federation. Not some obsolete notion of the past.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

Again, what's that got to do with anything? Are you running for something and using this site as a dry run for your future campaign?

I believe you are feigning ignorance. You've made plenty of statements attempting to read racism where none exists. Conversely, you argue that the existence of identity in the future is the result of racism on the part of people who have historically suffered from racism. Should various identities exist in the future, perhaps some that exist now, it is not the obligation of people who have been oppressed to turn over and disappear. To do so would be willful amnesia. To insist that someone do so means asking them to commit cultural suicide.

I believe you are ignoring the point that there won't be any pure blacks left by the 24th century on purpose. You think if you just keep ignoring it and pretending that it isn't there then it will just go away. Even now, most of the marriages I witness are mixed marriages, these kids live now and yet they can no longer say "my people" when talking about either one of the ethnic groups. Sisko is an aberration, an anachronism. that "our people" crap is the product of an obtuse short sighted mind. I am getting tired of your demagoguery. That part of the show is not ony racist, it also ignores the premise of the show itself that by the 24th century prejudice and discrimination will be long gone. Sisko getting all worked up is indecent and an insult to our intelligence.

The fact that you are inserting blood purity into the discussion reveals your anexieties, your biases, your agendas. Every African American I know would find the notion that they could preserve some pure blackness absolutely laughable--it's something that was made impossible 2-3 centuries ago. And you don't know how identities will fall out in the next ten years, let alone the next four centuries. Indeed, we already gave good data about how people with small amounts of African heritage are perceived by American and European societies: they are African. Slowly, those perceptions are being more nuanced. Nonetheless, even if African or African-American or some other current identity ceases to be useful, other identities may well take their place. What you aren't admitting is that you are, by yourself, requiring the person in the minority to abandon their identity. You are putting the onus of resolving racial issues on the people who suffer from them.

And more alarming: you insist that someone should be silent about an injustice.

 

[Kobayshi Maru]

I believe you are feigning ignorance. You've made plenty of statements attempting to read racism where none exists. Conversely, you argue that the existence of identity in the future is the result of racism on the part of people who have historically suffered from racism. Should various identities exist in the future, perhaps some that exist now, it is not the obligation of people who have been oppressed to turn over and disappear. To do so would be willful amnesia. To insist that someone do so means asking them to commit cultural suicide.

I believe you are ignoring the point that there won't be any pure blacks left by the 24th century on purpose. You think if you just keep ignoring it and pretending that it isn't there then it will just go away. Even now, most of the marriages I witness are mixed marriages, these kids live now and yet they can no longer say "my people" when talking about either one of the ethnic groups. Sisko is an aberration, an anachronism. that "our people" crap is the product of an obtuse short sighted mind. I am getting tired of your demagoguery. That part of the show is not ony racist, it also ignores the premise of the show itself that by the 24th century prejudice and discrimination will be long gone. Sisko getting all worked up is indecent and an insult to our intelligence.

The fact that you are inserting blood purity into the discussion reveals your anexieties, your biases, your agendas. Every African American I know would find the notion that they could preserve some pure blackness absolutely laughable--it's something that was made impossible 2-3 centuries ago. And you don't know how identities will fall out in the next ten years, let alone the next four centuries. Indeed, we already gave good data about how people with small amounts of African heritage are perceived by American and European societies: they are African. Slowly, those perceptions are being more nuanced. Nonetheless, even if African or African-American or some other current identity ceases to be useful, other identities may well take their place. What you aren't admitting is that you are, by yourself, requiring the person in the minority to abandon their identity. You are putting the onus of resolving racial issues on the people who suffer from them.

And more alarming: you insist that someone should be silent about an injustice.

The irony is that you've lived in a country that has practiced discrimination and segregation for so long that you are convinced that it is the only way to live. So convinced in fact that you think it'll still be the way our descendants will live in four hundred years. and that you think it is your duty to stir up hatred and resentment among people toward each other for things that happened hundred of years before. Resentment and hatred that you are now directing toward me.


I on the other hand live in a country where the normal way of life is integration, people of different cultures mingle and when they say "our people" it includes people that are Asian, Caucasian, and African all alike. in various dosages.

I don't like the idea of people still evoking racial purity in four hundred years because it will mean that something has gone seriously wrong with this world.

I'd like to think that if someone, anyone says "my people" in the 24th century, that expression will include every human being in the entire quadrant without distinction of physical traits or skin color.

If that idea turns someone like you into a seething ball of hate then it's a small price to pay in my opinion. I can live with that.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

The irony is that you've lived in a country that has practiced discrimination and segregation for so long that you are convinced that it is the only way to live. So convinced in fact that you think it'll still be the way our descendants will live in four hundred years. and that you think it is your duty to stir up hatred and resentment among people toward each other for things that happened hundred of years before. Resentment and hatred that you are now directing toward me.

Apparently you keep missing the parts where I say that neither you nor I know what identity will be like 400 years from now. On the other hand, you are convinced that it someone has a minority identity, it is their fault. That is dangerous.

Moreover, the only way that you can "prove" that I cannot see beyond the current racial struggles is by inserting your own definition of what a society without racism would look like: one in which it is the fault of the minority for preserving something of an identity.

I on the other hand live in a country where the normal way of life is integration, people of different cultures mingle and when they say "our people" it includes people that are Asian, Caucasian, and African all alike. in various dosages.

You live in a country where all your political symbols reference the struggle of only a segment of the population's ancestors against serfdom and feudalism. Your anthem was written to inspire the soldiers of the Army of the Rhine to fight against the aristocratic, counterrevolutionary armies that would restore the Ancein Regime. Your flag was designed to show that the nation existed in what had been the Tiers Etat. The Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen, which is recognized as legal by the constitution of the Fifth Republic, both literally and implicitly references the problems of the Ancien Regime and seeks to address them. Marianne, liberte-egalite-fraternite, etc., are all symbols of a struggle against everything the Old Regime represented and how the ordinary person was treated by it. Your political culture is a monument to that struggle. Yet you, sir, want to deny the ability to others to remember their struggles, their oppression, and their victories?

I don't like the idea of people still evoking racial purity in four hundred years because it will mean that something has gone seriously wrong with this world.

There is no racial purity to be found in any of Sisko's words. Accept it.

If that idea turns someone like you into a seething ball of hate then it's a small price to pay in my opinion. I can live with that.

I didn't make Sisko's speech about "blood purity." You did. I've declared to hate no one. You can find no hate in my writing, only criticism of misguided notions that would institutionalize racism.

 

[Kobayshi Maru]

...There is no racial purity to be found in any of Sisko's words. Accept it...

NO, I won't accept it, because it is a lie. Why would you want me to accept a lie?

The expression "our people" is meaningless without racial purity in mind. By saying "our people" Sisko is setting himself apart not only from the likes of bashir and O'Brien but also the ones that don't feel it is legitimate to use that expression in that society.

In fact by saying "our people" he's nothing short of calling Bashir and O'brien racists for using that program instead of deleting it.

And he's affirming his purity as African-American which is ironic since people were supposed to have traveled all over the world for two hundred years. Siko's ancestors even if we discount the prophets should be all over the globe.

 

[Ithekro]

"Our people" would have no racial purity behind it. In Sisko's case it is factual. Humans with dark skin were quite discriminated against in 1960 Las Vegas. This is fact. Sisko has dark skin. This is also fact.

Uhura is considered to be from Africa rather than America. Sisko is from New Orleans. They still have some identity from their pasts based on their skin color. Uhura and Kirk point out that in the present (23rd century) that such things don't effect humanity anymore. However it is also clear that historical accuracy is a trend for a lot of Starfleet officers and several are historians of some era or culture. Sisko, judging by his style of casual clothing and decorations, has studied African cultures and has a working understanding of their history in the 20th century.

Regardless of anyone's ideas of how mixing races will turn humanity into more or less a single whole with little to no differences and few if no "pure" ethnic groups anymore, Sisko's skin is dark. That is an African trait for the most part. Thus it is logical that he might identify with that much like Riker seems to identify as American as he was born in Alaska.

Picard is the one that fits and doesn't fit the idea that everyone is mixed together. He identifies as French yet seems quite English in most cases.

People today still identify themselves by places their ancestors came from centuries ago. Things that happened hundreds of years ago are still brought up in people's cultures. People still trace their family trees as far back as they can. It seems people in the 23rd and 24th centuries still do some of this as well. Riker recognized a picture of an ancestor from the American Civil War. Picard knows of ancestors that fought in the days of colonialism. Sulu's family has been in San Francisco for centuries. Stiles was tracking his family in the Romulan War. Reed's family has been serving in the Royal Navy for centuries. There are several instances of Starfleet officers knowing were they came from with some detail and knowing at least a bit of their historical cultural roots.

Cultural identity seems to still be a thing in the 23rd and 24th centuries. What does not seems to exist anymore is the need to make the differences in those cultures an issue between humans. All are accepted as where people are from. But they are Federation citizens and modern humans. The past is the past, but forgetting the past means they might repeat the mistakes of old. Humans do not forget their past, they just make sure they don't repeat their mistakes.

Sisko's issue with the holodeck was that the program was from an era that was unkind to those with dark skin. Cassidy points out to him that this is fiction (rather than historical) and thus can be made to be how it could have been. Sisko accepts this and decides to play.

 

[Kobayshi Maru]

"Our people" would have no racial purity behind it. In Sisko's case it is factual. Humans with dark skin were quite discriminated against in 1960 Las Vegas. This is fact. Sisko has dark skin. This is also fact.

Uhura is considered to be from Africa rather than America. Sisko is from New Orleans. They still have some identity from their pasts based on their skin color. Uhura and Kirk point out that in the present (23rd century) that such things don't effect humanity anymore. However it is also clear that historical accuracy is a trend for a lot of Starfleet officers and several are historians of some era or culture. Sisko, judging by his style of casual clothing and decorations, has studied African cultures and has a working understanding of their history in the 20th century.

Regardless of anyone's ideas of how mixing races will turn humanity into more or less a single whole with little to no differences and few if no "pure" ethnic groups anymore, Sisko's skin is dark. That is an African trait for the most part. Thus it is logical that he might identify with that much like Riker seems to identify as American as he was born in Alaska.

Picard is the one that fits and doesn't fit the idea that everyone is mixed together. He identifies as French yet seems quite English in most cases.

People today still identify themselves by places their ancestors came from centuries ago. Things that happened hundreds of years ago are still brought up in people's cultures. People still trace their family trees as far back as they can. It seems people in the 23rd and 24th centuries still do some of this as well. Riker recognized a picture of an ancestor from the American Civil War. Picard knows of ancestors that fought in the days of colonialism. Sulu's family has been in San Francisco for centuries. Stiles was tracking his family in the Romulan War. Reed's family has been serving in the Royal Navy for centuries. There are several instances of Starfleet officers knowing were they came from with some detail and knowing at least a bit of their historical cultural roots.

Cultural identity seems to still be a thing in the 23rd and 24th centuries. What does not seems to exist anymore is the need to make the differences in those cultures an issue between humans. All are accepted as where people are from. But they are Federation citizens and modern humans. The past is the past, but forgetting the past means they might repeat the mistakes of old. Humans do not forget their past, they just make sure they don't repeat their mistakes.

Sisko's issue with the holodeck was that the program was from an era that was unkind to those with dark skin. Cassidy points out to him that this is fiction (rather than historical) and thus can be made to be how it could have been. Sisko accepts this and decides to play.

I really don't know what made Sisko change his mind in that episode. His prejudice seems as outrageous and absurd as its resolution seem to come out of left field. Nothing Cassidy said seemed so compelling that it should have changed a mind as entrenched in his prejudice as Sisko's appeared to be.

I don't agree with your explanation. In a supposed enlightened age as ST's 24th century is vaunted to be, a physical trait is no way to identify with someone. If anything, Sisko is the racist one.

Plus the show (with all the African art and the costumes and all that. Really makes it appear like Sisko is some Lock Ness monster of racial purity. The only Earthman left with a hundred percent of African-American ancestry. Which of course is imbecilically absurd when people living in New Orleans can go to New Zealand in the blink of an eye, it's like crossing the street so to speak. Something is just not right here. They are trying to graft twentieth century problems onto twenty fourth century Earth and it works about as well as a poultice on a wooden leg.

 

[Ithekro]

People can move around freely now to many places on the planet, yet many of them never leave their home city. Sometimes it is just because that is what is comfortable to them. They want what is familiar. People not intermarrying into different cultures can also be thought of in the same way. They want what is familiar.

 

[Kobayshi Maru]

People can move around freely now to many places on the planet, yet many of them never leave their home city. Sometimes it is just because that is what is comfortable to them. They want what is familiar. People not intermarrying into different cultures can also be thought of in the same way. They want what is familiar.

That's rather distorted. Moving around the planet, costs a lot of money, much more than most people can afford.

In Sisko's time they can just beam from one hemisphere to the other in one sec and it costs them nothing. As I said, if you live in New Orleans, going to New Zealand is like crossing the street.
Someone could have a home in the former and a job in the latter.

Commuting time is seconds.

If you can't see the difference with today then I find that worrisome.

 

[Ithekro]

I know people who make enough money to go on whatever trip they want. They just don't want to. They don't like to travel. There are people in San Francisco and New York that never leave. Not becaus they can't, but because they have no reason to leave. They have basically everything they want right there. They might go out of the city to the beach, but they just really don't leave the area. There are people on Long Island that have never been off the island aside to go to work in New York City.

In the Star Trek future, there are people that don't like transporters. Sisko's father seems to be one of those, plus he seems perfectly happy in New Orleans. He has no reason to travel to Little Rock, much less New Zealand.

 

[Kobayshi Maru]

I know people who make enough money to go on whatever trip they want. They just don't want to. They don't like to travel. There are people in San Francisco and New York that never leave. Not becaus they can't, but because they have no reason to leave. They have basically everything they want right there. They might go out of the city to the beach, but they just really don't leave the area. There are people on Long Island that have never been off the island aside to go to work in New York City.

In the Star Trek future, there are people that don't like transporters. Sisko's father seems to be one of those, plus he seems perfectly happy in New Orleans. He has no reason to travel to Little Rock, much less New Zealand.

This isn't about one person. This is about an entire planet. Seven billion people and counting. In my country, mixed marriages are more frequent when you're an immigrant than intra-ethnic marriages. It is a fact. People are integrated at warp speed. I for one am the grandson of an immigrant (which is why it makes me laugh when one poster here all but states that I am prejudiced.) Anyway, three quarters of the marriages that happened in my family since the time of my grandparents are mixed marriages. What does that tell you?

 

[Ithekro]

It tells me you have a perspective of a group that traveled into another culture and are adapting to it.

Other families stay in places and keep within their own culture. Some people are more comfortable having family that is more similar to those they grew up around. Thus you have comunities that are still more or less the same as they were a hundred years ago. Or communities that congrigate with what they consider their own and thus bred that way. Thus might change more with segrigation and other stigmas lifted, but sometime people just prefer what they know. Mom and Pop looked like this, therefore the mind thinks that is normal, thus what one is comfortable.

The entire planet might get really small by the 24th centuty, but as we've seen ethic groups that have survived even moving to other planets as humanity expanded from Earth. we also can't say what the results of the Post-World War III and Eugenics Wars on various human cultures. It might have made the survivors more conscious of their cultures.

It is clear that from what we see that Starfleet crewmembers and their familes identify with historical cultures of one kind or another. Miles O'Brian identifies as Irish. His wife identifies as Japanese if I recall. Chekov is extreme in his Russian roots. Plus there is no getting around genetic skin colorations of various officers. They could be mixed races, but we can't be sure of that. Sisko identifies with African cultural roots as well as his family history in New Orleans.

Another example is the probably millions of Jews that are definately mixed race yet identify with not only a religion but also with a small area of land around the Dead Sea as where their culture is from. Chinese can sometimes trance their own lines back two thousand years. Europeans can't trace their lineage farther back than the 400s at mos, with most only able to trace back to the 1500s due to poor record keeping, or religious wars.

 

[kkt]

It's not at all clear than transporters are free for unlimited use for the general population of earth. There is an energy cost and somebody has to maintain it so we don't end up with accidental transporter twins all over the place. In fact, Sisko once mentioned using up a month's worth of transporter credits the first few days he was attending Starfleet Academy and beaming home every night for dinner.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

People have been talking about the mixing of races and ethnicities for the last 120 years. Unfortunately, many of them were showing concern for half-assed, pseudo-scientific notions like degeneration. Thankfully, it is seen by more in a positive light. Unfortunately, many still see assimilation as a one sided exchange in which the minority surrenders to the majority.

If there is a positive outcome to social relations and identitiy politics, it will not be because differences between people will be erased. It will be because:

1. People will feel free to be whom they want to be, as individuals, as parts of groups, communities, and as part of a society.
2. Society won't hold it against them and won't try to disempower them because of their identity or shame them because they belong to one community or other.
3. Society will encourage people to share their experiences as individuals and members of groups and communitiies freely with one another.

For instance, no one should feel they must become more bisexual in order for homophobia and descrimination against LGTB individuals to disappear. Rather than me having same-sex experiences or someone who is gay having heterosexual experiences, we should be able to talk openly about our fears, hopes and loves. My life should be enriched by that conversation, and it should not require me to change my sexual identity. As much as the person to whom I am talking, I should be whom I want to be. That same dynamic should pervade all forms of social relations.

Did Sisko's speech contradict such an ethic of social relations? Throughout Star Trek, many characters have talked about "my people" and "our people." More often than not, it carries a connotation of a biological race rather than an ethnicity. It is not clear, in universe, why the usage should be denied to anyone. On the other hand, Sisko uses it in a context wherein the cultural amnesia and lack of information about the historical reality made him uncomfortable. Or to make it more simple: what was represented did not correspond to reality. Sisko imposed no requirement on any other person not to participate, even to Yates.

ETA: for full disclosure, I am the grandson of immigrants on one side, a member of a religious minority, and a member of non-immigrant, non-white, ethnic minority.

 

[Kobayshi Maru]

It tells me you have a perspective of a group that traveled into another culture and are adapting to it.

Other families stay in places and keep within their own culture. Some people are more comfortable having family that is more similar to those they grew up around. Thus you have comunities that are still more or less the same as they were a hundred years ago. Or communities that congrigate with what they consider their own and thus bred that way. Thus might change more with segrigation and other stigmas lifted, but sometime people just prefer what they know. Mom and Pop looked like this, therefore the mind thinks that is normal, thus what one is comfortable.

The entire planet might get really small by the 24th centuty, but as we've seen ethic groups that have survived even moving to other planets as humanity expanded from Earth. we also can't say what the results of the Post-World War III and Eugenics Wars on various human cultures. It might have made the survivors more conscious of their cultures.

It is clear that from what we see that Starfleet crewmembers and their familes identify with historical cultures of one kind or another. Miles O'Brian identifies as Irish. His wife identifies as Japanese if I recall. Chekov is extreme in his Russian roots. Plus there is no getting around genetic skin colorations of various officers. They could be mixed races, but we can't be sure of that. Sisko identifies with African cultural roots as well as his family history in New Orleans.

Another example is the probably millions of Jews that are definately mixed race yet identify with not only a religion but also with a small area of land around the Dead Sea as where their culture is from. Chinese can sometimes trance their own lines back two thousand years. Europeans can't trace their lineage farther back than the 400s at mos, with most only able to trace back to the 1500s due to poor record keeping, or religious wars.

Even as you write this you don't even realize that you overlook everything that goes against your theory. One glaring example is that you talk about Miles and Keiko and their ties to their respective cultures but then you forget to take into account that they are married to each other and that ALL their descendants will have a mixed Irish/Japanese cultural heritage, FOREVER! Because one thing is certain, culturally, you can't un-mix what's been mixed, even once.

 

[Kobayshi Maru]

It's not at all clear than transporters are free for unlimited use for the general population of earth. There is an energy cost and somebody has to maintain it so we don't end up with accidental transporter twins all over the place. In fact, Sisko once mentioned using up a month's worth of transporter credits the first few days he was attending Starfleet Academy and beaming home every night for dinner.

Sisko is kind of an odd bird in all this, he says a lot of things that come out of left field, to say the least.


But even if you take this at face value, it still seems that beaming thousands of miles away from where you are is very common and happens very often. Even to only one individual.

Sisko's father is complaining that Jake is spending all his time on Earth in New Zealand, BTW.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

^Should Molly sing a song of "her people, " maybe a rebel song about the Irish resistance to British imperialism, for the sake of argument, let's say "The Minstrel Boy," would you judge her as you Sisko?

 

[Kobayshi Maru]

^Should Molly sing a song of "her people, " maybe a rebel song about the Irish resistance to British imperialism, for the sake of argument, let's say "The Minstrel Boy," would you judge her as you Sisko?

I would judge her an idiot, since these conflicts are long gone in her time and it would be like me campaigning to have Napoleon reinstated, given that he died in exile and disgrace. Or some other way of wasting one's time. It would be made even more weird by the fact that I loathe pretty much everything that Napoleon represents.

But I am confident that she'll do nothing of the sort as I didn't see Keiko at any point make her smell lead paint.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

Allons enfants de la patrie, on chante eternellement de la Revolution!