The Allure of Orions?
- Thread starter Bry_Sinclair
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The "ghost" in TNG's "Sub Rosa" quickly gets Beverly to change completely although she does finally resist in the end. Most would call it at least one of the series' worst episodes and I thought it was (along with the original series' "That Which Survives" featuring women as deadly) one of the franchise's most sexist.
"One of the most sexist" because women are deadly? So let's remake "That Which Survives" so that it's the muscular and well-hung Losiro there who kills all the sidekicks. Is that still sexist?
In my experience, fan complaints of sexism are the most sexist phenomenon associated with Star Trek... And the "women can't be shown doing this" and "women must be that in order to be treated right" crowd the most misogynist demographic group in the lot. All that they are lacking is the whip with which to enforce their demands.
Timo Saloniemi
In my experience, fan complaints of sexism are the most sexist phenomenon associated with Star Trek... And the "women can't be shown doing this" and "women must be that in order to be treated right" crowd the most misogynist demographic group in the lot. All that they are lacking is the whip with which to enforce their demands.
Timo Saloniemi
It wasn't just that a woman was a killer but that just touching her was deadly and that she was dedicated to getting men to touch her, that seemed to reflect a very negative view/stereotypes of women generally.
Yes. Because clearly saying that something is sexist because it reinforces male supremacy in some manner is absolutely the same thing as using violence to enforce their "demands." (What "demands" are those, by the way?) Because talking is totally the same thing as coercion.
At a certain level, which I feel has been reached aeons ago, all the talk talk talk will amount to mental violence to which a few healthy knocks in the head would be vastly preferable...
Don't try and hide behind intellectualism, is all I say. The urge to domineer can take many forms, and all of them are ugly. Even if they sometimes can be playfully applied to mutual pleasure.
Timo saloniemi
Don't try and hide behind intellectualism, is all I say. The urge to domineer can take many forms, and all of them are ugly. Even if they sometimes can be playfully applied to mutual pleasure.
Timo saloniemi
Few things are as hysterical as a perpetrator of misogynistic concepts claiming he is the victim of violence and oppression because someone called him on his sexist bullshit.
You really do want to kick a hornet's nest, don't you?
The fact of the matter is that all storytelling is about conflict. And gender conflict is one of the oldest there is, and no amount of good intentions and political correctness will ever change that, because men and women, by and large, have different ways of thinking and different objectives when they connect to the other. They can, on the one hand, be perfectly kind and empathetic creatures, and then fall into toxic drama in their love life.
This has been fertile ground forever and I see nothing wrong with exploring it. Both men and women can be used and abused by the opposite sex in some fashion. Unhealthy attitudes exist on both sides of the aisle. I mean, isn't the premise behind most rom coms the woman who is in love with the ladies man and wants to change him? And usually a RICH ladies man. Guess what? That kind of story really resonates for women, and it's not necessarily because they've been programmed by a patriarchal society. It's because at the heart of everyone is a reptilian brain-stem that isn't particularly evolved and gets us into tons of trouble when it comes to the opposite sex. Men chase sex objects and women chase success objects.
To deny this is equivalent to Spock denying his emotional half. It is against the very nature of humanity. Human nature is just messy, and if you expunge all this from storytelling, you wind up with very boring stories, like when all the inter-crew conflict was deemed verboten in early TNG.
(As for "That Which Survives" in particular witness the entire Lifetime channel that casts the entire male gender as a horror-movie boogieman.)
I'm thinking more specifically of "Space Seed" and "Who Mourns for Adonais?"
But Losira in "That Which Survives" wasn't a real woman. She was a projection or a hologram or something.
All this talk of sexism and misogyny is interesting( or not). But I think it would be completely unrealistic to represent a universe where all species conform to early 2000's Western ideas of tolerance and feminism. The fact is that the world and the universe are incredibly diverse places. Not every group of people or "aliens" in the fiction, are going conform to one's views. There are going to be misogynistic and patriarchal groups out there in the world and the fictional universe. I don't think we should avoid depicting this just because it makes some people uncomfortable. To do so presents a very narrow minded view of the diversity of the universe.
Now back to the women. I prefer the depiction of these creatures in "The Cage." There they are referred to as "green animal women slaves." Also reading the cut scenes from "the Cage" show that these creatures were meant to have a strong animal streak and only a few men could "tame" them.
In the conversation between Pike and the doctor, Pike talks about going to business on Regulus or even the Orion Colony(ies). I find that from these descriptions most other depictions are incorrect. It would seem that because Orion is referenced to as a Colony(ies) by a human, then it would probably be a human one. Meaning that the "an Orion" or at least an "Orion slaver trader" would be a human. At least the bulk of them.
It is also clear for the cut scene that there are two types of Orion slaves: "the natives" and "the green one."
Based on the photos of the scenes you can see both male and female native slaves.
The so-called "green ones" are said to be dangerous with razor claws; and they attract a man "like a sensation of irresistible hunger." In this scene Vina's hair was suppose to suggest a "wild animal mane." Her eyes are suppose dto be wild and she's supposed to appear larger and immensely strong. She blocks a native female slave from leaving with a cat-like vocalization and snarling.
This presents a vastly different picture than what is commonly assumed. But not that much different than what is presented in "the Cage" we have today. these green slaves were essentially supposed to be wild animals. They were fierce and dangerous. Probably if you were a male and you encountered one in the woods they would lure you in with an attraction like an irresistible hunger and then kill you with their razor claws, they might even eat you. This both the allure and the danger.
Only rare men can tame them. But it seems that they can temporarily be "charmed" by the flute, similar to snake charmers. This is how we get the provocative dance out of her during "the Cage."
Now what about Marta in "Whom God's Destroy"? Is there any evidence that he is one of these animal woman slaves from "the Cage." Yes she looks similar green skin, black hair, she dances; but so many other aliens look and act human too. I don't think it is explicitly states that she is a green animal woman slave. Perhaps they are a related species or completely different species. It seems that classifying her in the same category as what Vina appeared to be is just supposition.
As for the depiction of these women in Enterprise I wont go into that because I disregard it completely.
I realize a lot of this comes from a deleted scene, but I think it presents a much more interesting picture of these green skinned creatures than the way they are presented as simple sex objects. Sure they're still sex objects in a way, but they are much more than that.
Now back to the women. I prefer the depiction of these creatures in "The Cage." There they are referred to as "green animal women slaves." Also reading the cut scenes from "the Cage" show that these creatures were meant to have a strong animal streak and only a few men could "tame" them.
In the conversation between Pike and the doctor, Pike talks about going to business on Regulus or even the Orion Colony(ies). I find that from these descriptions most other depictions are incorrect. It would seem that because Orion is referenced to as a Colony(ies) by a human, then it would probably be a human one. Meaning that the "an Orion" or at least an "Orion slaver trader" would be a human. At least the bulk of them.
It is also clear for the cut scene that there are two types of Orion slaves: "the natives" and "the green one
Based on the photos of the scenes you can see both male and female native slaves.
The so-called "green ones" are said to be dangerous with razor claws; and they attract a man "like a sensation of irresistible hunger." In this scene Vina's hair was suppose to suggest a "wild animal mane." Her eyes are suppose dto be wild and she's supposed to appear larger and immensely strong. She blocks a native female slave from leaving with a cat-like vocalization and snarling.
This presents a vastly different picture than what is commonly assumed. But not that much different than what is presented in "the Cage" we have today. these green slaves were essentially supposed to be wild animals. They were fierce and dangerous. Probably if you were a male and you encountered one in the woods they would lure you in with an attraction like an irresistible hunger and then kill you with their razor claws, they might even eat you. This both the allure and the danger.
Only rare men can tame them. But it seems that they can temporarily be "charmed" by the flute, similar to snake charmers. This is how we get the provocative dance out of her during "the Cage."
Now what about Marta in "Whom God's Destroy"? Is there any evidence that he is one of these animal woman slaves from "the Cage." Yes she looks similar green skin, black hair, she dances; but so many other aliens look and act human too. I don't think it is explicitly states that she is a green animal woman slave. Perhaps they are a related species or completely different species. It seems that classifying her in the same category as what Vina appeared to be is just supposition.
As for the depiction of these women in Enterprise I wont go into that because I disregard it completely.
I realize a lot of this comes from a deleted scene, but I think it presents a much more interesting picture of these green skinned creatures than the way they are presented as simple sex objects. Sure they're still sex objects in a way, but they are much more than that.
Yeah, sexism would really go away like instantly if we would just stop complaining about it.
Now let's get back to the fun stories of Evil Women Who Destroy Men's Minds With Their Dangerous Sex Beams That The Women-Folk Just Can't Help Shooting Out.
This sounds vaguely like the other thread asking why we should believe M'Ress was actually an alien rather than a mutated human.
Everyone has their own personal head-canon, I guess, but I don't think there's much of a debate that Marta isn't meant to be an Orion slavegirl and the main point of division is whether Enterprise messed up canon with its retcon or not. (The Cage was a pilot and naturally canon shifted when it went to series.) I part company with Enterprise and stick with the bread and butter idea that Orions are sex slaves but that they don't need (nor do Deltans need) a lame technical explanation for their allure.
I also think that no matter how women are presented, some people will feel offended by the portrayal or read something into the writer's motives that may or may not be there. It's like, what if Number One had made it to series? Maybe people would complain that it wasn't progressive to have to render a woman an ice-princess in order to allow her to be in a position of authority. It's no longer possible to present diverse characters anymore when every portrayal is expected to be an ideal.
Anyway, I didn't like the Alice Eve underwear scene. It didn't "offend" me, though. It just made the film feel schlockier to go for the cheesecake in such an obvious way.
It doesn't surprise me that some Trek fans grade their entertainment on how well it seems to project a social progressive agenda. I know how vehement some people were in a Dr. Who thread that there MUST be a female Doctor, for instance, or a black 007. I think this scorekeeping can go too far, though, and people get very selectively upset about some things, only to give other things a free pass, because they are waving the flag for one team for the satisfaction of shaming the other rather than to really get beyond all this.
The way I hear Dr. Boyce's line (and the way it appears in the transcript) is: "You, an Orion trader, dealing in green animal women, slaves -- ?" Meaning that the Orions deal in other types of slaves, probably both male and female, in addition to the green animal-women.
We do get a hint of the deleted dialogue in the two-part "Menagerie" episode, in which Commodore Mendez says: "They're like animals -- vicious, seductive. They say no human male can resist them."
No. I'm just tired of misogynistic narratives.
Sure. There's nothing wrong with a narrative that features gender conflict, or which even features alien societies that are sexist. But there is something wrong with a narrative which is itself sexist.
This is an absurdly reductionist argument, built around some very questionable premises about human sexuality which ignore people whose sexualities do not fit within its binary paradigm -- such as transgendered people, gays and lesbians, non-cisgendered people, or, y'know, heterosexual men who want something other than a hot body and heterosexual women who are not attracted to power.
Your argument also conveniently ignores how poorly traditional romantic comedies of the sort you are describing have been doing at the box office. The most successful romantic comedies these days in fact often feature nothing of the sort -- not a single storyline in the modern rom-com classic Love Actually matches that description. The rom-com I can think of which most immediately matches that description, The Ugly Truth, was a box office bomb.
Personally, I think homosexuals would still be affected by pheromones, since it is a bio-chemical process that would be similar to being drugged. It just won't be as easy to succumb, but succumb they would (think "roofies").
...The unfortunate side effect of this is that anybody attempting self-empowerment by deciding to be a mega-slut or a dangerous siren is automatically declared a traitor of all womankind.
First off, I object to your use of the term "slut."
Secondly, very few psychologically healthy people would ever seek to either become a mindless sex object who lives to fulfill men's sexual pleasure, nor a dangerous siren who uses her sexuality to dominate men in all areas of life.
And, no, neither role is one that helps women achieve equality. Both roles are, frankly, signs of severe psychological imbalance. And when these tropes appear in fiction, the narratives that are constructed around these tropes are narratives used to justify patriarchy.
And in either case, such narratives are misogynistic.
Looks like we have someone who doesn't believe in "choice feminism", here.
