When he told me he was doing this a few weeks ago, I was tempted to think that Tim Sandefur had too much time on his hands, but it’s actually an interesting essay.
[Saturday-morning update]
Megan Geuss binge watched the whole series in order for the first time. It’s an interesting take.
[Bumped]
If you read the entirety of it, you have too much time on your hands. Don’t disagree with the interesting, but after reading the first section, I found it starting to be a bit repetitive in making the point. I then skimmed over the rest of it. I then checked it, and no mention of Wrath of Khan’s “Needs of the many”.
That was unexpectedly lame. In Sandefur’s critique of “Star Trek VI” he makes too much of the Klingons’ point of view that the Federation is really by and for humans, and assumes without presenting any proof that the filmmakers agreed. Then in his very next section, on TNG, Sandefur himself describes the Klingons as “now humanity’s ally.” And he conveniently ignores Quark and Garak’s opinion that the Federation is suffused with human culture and attitudes.
The funniest part of TNG was the last episode of the run. (If you don’t count the season finale.) That was when Ensign Ro signs on with the Maquis.
All that idealism about the Prime Directive and the best of all possible worlds, that Picard bored us all with for seven years? It was all bullshit. At the (literal) end of the day, we need a society prepared to defend its citizens; and real men (and, in Ro’s case, women) will prefer that to yet more lectures beamed up from San Francisco. We will raise the battle-flag and start slitting throats.
There was one thread of TNG which was similar to the TOS: the Borg. And, in First Contact, Picard finally stopped pussyfooting around and stood up against the collectivists.
Otherwise, the only other TNG I can stomach, and actually enjoy, is the one where Picard, with the aid of Q, sees what his life would have been like if he hadn’t taken bold risks. Or, at least, that’s the only other one I’ve seen that I enjoyed. Others too corny and maudlin.
Star Trek was always a mirror of the culture in which in was produced. Remember the tag for the original pilot in order to sell it to network execs at the time, was “Wagon Train to the Stars…” Invoking an image of a very popular Western television series from the 1950s.
Roddenberry had definitive views about the “culture” of Star Trek. But in order to prevent alienating his audience, wisely kept the bulk of the politics in Space, where no one can hear you dictate. But for all the series, Original, Next Gen, etc. it’s as my friend Josh once remarked. It’s remarkable that only in Star Trek was a communistic economic system ultimately successful.
That TNG and subsequent ilk has run off the Kennedy-eque rails of the progressive, ethics-based liberalism of the 1960’s, means only that the tradition was continued within the leftist frameworks of its producers at and of their time. As has always been the case.
Well with the exception of JJ Abrams. Marketeer to the Stars…
The first STNG I watched was just after the Ollie North affair when Q shows up and rants in a Marine uniform. At that point I stopped watching as it was obvious that the show was going to be, as one later reviewer put it, a “slap in the face morality lesson”. I didn’t realize that a substantial fraction of news and entertainment from then on was going to be, at some level, fighting the Kulturkampf.
Um, I believe that WAS the first STNG episode… 😉
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Encounter_at_Farpoint
Generally, one just has to accept that there is going to be out-and-out sexism in a lot of old movies and TV, and you can either toss out the whole thing or watch it from afar like you’re in a museum, analyzing an ancient culture
Huh. I feel that way about our current “culture.”
Read the Megan Geuss one. Funny part: she gets all huffy about the miniskirts on TOS females. A commenter points out that, in the 60’s, the miniskirt was a symbol of feminine empowerment. No longer would they cower in fear of sexuality activated male aggression. No more would they hide their bodies to be considered a “good girl”.
It seems we’ve come full circle. Now, women need protecting again. On college campuses, they are getting the vapors from “microaggression”. Before long, they’ll probably begin wearing burkhas as a form of protest. Perhaps then, Megan will be happy.
Read the Megan Geuss one
You’ve got a stronger constitution than I have, I couldn’t get half-way through it. You’re right of course, what constitutes “feminine empowerment” has changed somewhat over the years. I doubt Megan special flower would be happy seeing woman in burkas as I doubt she is capable of happy. Possibly seeing men in burkas might do it.