Vulcan society is really horrifying when you think about it

[Citiprime]

In the era of The Original Series, there is a nobility to the Vulcans, with the culture seeming to be one of disciplined stoic intellectuals, and they help express Gene Roddenberry’s ideas about a Utopian future where humanity is at the center of an accepting society based around scientific knowledge and cultural diversity. However, newer iterations of Trek tend to take a much dimmer view of Vulcans. They’re usually portrayed as arrogant elitists who cloak their bigotry of anything different in a belief of the superiority of their ideology.

Some fans might chalk up this shift in characterization as a failure to truly “get” Star Trek by the people in charge of continuing its legacy. But another way of looking at this is that if someone accepts the characterization as it has been presented over the past five decades, Vulcan society is actually horrifying.

The Vulcans are a culture where from birth to death the entire planet is indoctrinated to suppress their emotions, passions, and desires in adherence to an ideology, and anyone who doesn’t is made to be an outcast. It’s a fictional culture that seems all too relevant to present day churches in its conformity, since it’s rooted around fundamentalism toward an idea, to the exclusion of an individual’s feelings, as an article of faith in how to live.

In its own way, the Vulcans can basically serve as a Star Trek-ian allegory for religious conversion therapy where people are encouraged through various means to "pray-the-gay/logic-the-feels away" (even beyond the more explicit one from The Next Generation). The Vulcans are a people where at least some members carry around a lifetime of regrets about their inability to say “I love you” to the ones they down deep feel it toward.

Sarek: (His thoughts flowing through Captian Picard) Pe- Perrin ... Amanda ... I wanted to give you so much more. I wanted to show you such ... t-t-tenderness. But that is not our way ... Spock ... Amanda ... Did you know? Can you know ... how much I love you? I do … (shouting and sobbing) LOVE YOU!

 

[cooleddie74]

Given that their civilization almost nuked itself into oblivion barely 2,000 years before TOS and as late as ENT was still dealing with the absence of Surak's full teachings until the discovery of the Kir'Shara in 2154(thus still displaying some very retrograde and at times violent behavior to outsiders) I'm sort of glad they adopted the stoicism of logic and used it to turn their world into a harbor for scientific exploration and monastic studies.

We know what Vulcans before the time of Surak were like (Spock's regression in "All Our Yesterdays(TOS)" and the way the Romulans typically behave) so it's probably in the best interests of the Vulcan people that they found a way to channel their aggressive behavioral patterns into things more constructive and peaceful, even if that meant many Vulcans never fully expressed their love for those they cared deeply about.

 

[BillJ]

They’re usually portrayed as arrogant elitists who cloak their bigotry of anything different in a belief of the superiority of their ideology.

"Are thee Vulcan or are thee Human?" - T'Pau in "Amok Time"

They've always been bigoted dicks.

 

[cooleddie74]

Vulcans aren't all that much better in DSC and TOS. They're just a lot quieter and less prone to call humans smelly barbarians.

 

[fireproof78]

However, newer iterations of Trek tend to take a much dimmer view of Vulcans. They’re usually portrayed as arrogant elitists who cloak their bigotry of anything different in a belief of the superiority of their ideology.

This is not new.

 

[BillJ]

Vulcans aren't all that much better in DSC and TOS. They're just a lot quieter and less prone to call humans smelly barbarians.

They showed they were just as nasty as what came later in episodes like "Amok Time" (child brides, fights to the death for possession of women), "Journey to Babel" and "Yesteryear".

 

[cooleddie74]

And let's not forget that in DSC Sarek was perfectly willing to allow the Federation to commit planetary genocide by setting off a bomb inside the Klingon Homeworld, so where were his vaunted Vulcan ideals then? We can chalk part of that up to DSC being written as edgier for the sake of shock value but now that it's canon why did Sarek back such a plan?

 

[fireproof78]

for the sake of shock value but now that it's canon why did Sarek back such a plan?

Because Vulcans still are driven by emotions and not always perfectly logical like they want to be.

 

[Nerys Myk]

In the era of The Original Series, there is a nobility to the Vulcans, with the culture seeming to be one of disciplined stoic intellectuals, and they help express Gene Roddenberry’s ideas about a Utopian future where humanity is at the center of an accepting society based around scientific knowledge and cultural diversity. However, newer iterations of Trek tend to take a much dimmer view of Vulcans. They’re usually portrayed as arrogant elitists who cloak their bigotry of anything different in a belief of the superiority of their ideology.

So, you've never seen "Amok Time", " Journey To Babel" or "Yesteryear". Get back to us when you do.

 

[BillJ]

And let's not forget that in DSC Sarek was perfectly willing to allow the Federation to commit planetary genocide by setting off a bomb inside the Klingon Homeworld, so where were his vaunted Vulcan ideals then? We can chalk part of that up to DSC being written as edgier for the sake of shock value but now that it's canon why did Sarek back such a plan?

One of the reasons I treat Discovery as a different timeline, that type of action simply doesn't seem like Sarek in any of the other shows. Sometimes trying to be edgy hurts more than it helps in getting someone take your storyline seriously.

 

[Nerys Myk]

And let's not forget that in DSC Sarek was perfectly willing to allow the Federation to commit planetary genocide by setting off a bomb inside the Klingon Homeworld, so where were his vaunted Vulcan ideals then? We can chalk part of that up to DSC being written as edgier for the sake of shock value but now that it's canon why did Sarek back such a plan?

Logical doesn't mean morally right.

SPOCK: It is the only possible way to get Mitchell off this ship.
KIRK: If you mean strand Mitchell there, I won't do it. That station is fully automated. There's not a soul on the whole planet. Even the ore ships call only once every twenty years.
SPOCK: Then you have one other choice. Kill Mitchell while you still can.
KIRK: Get out of here.
SPOCK: It is your only other choice, assuming you make it while you still have time.

 

[cooleddie74]

Clearly. Although I'd have had Gary whacked, too.

 

[Citiprime]

So, you've never seen "Amok Time", " Journey To Babel" or "Yesteryear". Get back to us when you do.

I don't think the Vulcans come off that badly in "Journey To Babel" or "Amok Time." I think those episodes are colored to a degree in how I sympathize with Spock, and how he finds value in his culture. Both Sarek and T'Pau are uptight and ideological to a fault, but not necessarily bigoted (e.g., Sarek married a human woman and underneath a stoic veneer there's respect for Spock and his human friends, T'Pau is fair with Kirk and McCoy and not sneering at them).

 

[Nerys Myk]

Clearly. Although I'd have had Gary whacked, too.

 

[fireproof78]

That they come across as elitist at all gives room for more elitist behavior later. T'Pau is.

 

[cooleddie74]

Anyone with silver eyes and medical scrubs is trouble brewing.

 

[Greg Cox]

The Vulcans were NOT all that noble on TOS. The very first full Vulcan we ever met, T'Pring, plotted to get Kirk or Spock killed to escape an arranged marriage. Sarek, in "Journey to Babel," cut off his son for 18 years because Spock chose the "wrong" career path AND concealed a serious heart condition from his wife, while even Spock conceded that his father was capable of committing cold-blooded murder if he had a "logical" reason to do so. And both "Journey to Babel" and TAS's "Yesteryear" established that little Spock was teased and bullied by the other Vulcan children.

The idea that Vulcans were always portrayed in a positive light until ENTERPRISE is mistaken.

 

[Kor]

... They’re usually portrayed as arrogant elitists who cloak their bigotry of anything different in a belief of the superiority of their ideology. ...

We saw this a-plenty in TOS, with the few Vulcans we actually saw besides Spock. Spock himself was the idealized Vulcan, although he was of mixed parentage. Thinking all Vulcans at that time were as noble as Spock is looking at the past through rose-tinted glasses.

Kor

 

[Nerys Myk]

I don't think the Vulcans come off that badly in "Journey To Babel" or "Amok Time." I think those episodes are colored to a degree in how I sympathize with Spock, and how he finds value in his culture. Both Sarek and T'Pau are uptight and ideological to a fault, but not necessarily bigoted (e.g., Sarek married a human woman and underneath a stoic veneer there's respect for Spock and his human friends, T'Pau is fair with Kirk and McCoy and not sneering at them).

See post #3 above.

 

[cooleddie74]

And even Spock himself is prepared to let his father die just to adhere to some Vulcan idea of logic and duty. TOS Vulcans aren't even remotely utopian or clean.