“E Plebnista.” Star Trek Episode 52.5 (1968)

The deck of the great star ship Enterprise heaved and bucked crazily as it was released from the time storm and dropped out of warp into an alien system.

Captain Kirk was hurled from his command chair by the sudden deceleration but managed to catch himself against a bulkhead covered with blinking emergency lights. He sustained a slight cut to the head which was bleeding onto his uniform shoulder.

“Spock!” he called to the Vulcan who was strapped into his science officer’s seat, “where the hell are we?”

The Vulcan answered calmly. “Unknown at this time, Captain. I am attempting to correlate star charts but the computer is presently offline due to the time storm. I am endeavoring to rectify these conditions.”

“Captain,” Ensign Sulu called out, “I’m picking up electromagnetic radiation from the surface of a planet—- number three. It appears to be a Class “M” civilization, almost Earth-type. There are cities everywhere, sir.”

“Working, Captain. Unknown how long this will take. I’m attempting to rebuild and reboot.”

Kirk wiped his face with the back of his hand and said, “Ensign Sulu, lay in a course for that third planet, one-half impulse power.

Soon the great star ship orbited the planet, whose surface was covered by clouds and dust.

Sulu said, “As you ordered—I have been studying this culture and I have arrived at some obvious conclusions.”

Kirk was almost immediately at Ensign Sulu’s console and said, “What have you got?”

Sulu briefly glanced at Kirk and noted the rushed tension. He said, “This planet is dominated by a media-based, world-propaganda machine under the command of several main, domineering forces—all under a flag of rainbow colors. They appear to worship homosexuals, and people—or “folks”—with dark skins. They appear to be an irrational culture that engages in the strangest, most impractical activities without regard to consequences, and are thereby well on their chosen way—at all costs—to self immolation.”

Sulu reddened and his forehead furrowed; he glanced at Kirk and said, “No, Captain; I’m not. And there’s more. Their culture is sub-based on flooding themselves with ruinous, illiterate, criminal elements and paying their way—letting the criminals live for free among the indigeous populace as conquering invaders. They also fight wars for profit. They worship entertainment and the worst pornography, as well as blood and human sacrifice. They sell the body parts of babies, Captain,” Sulu said, and glanced at Kirk.

Sulu’s voiuce broke slightly, “All right Captain.” He went on, “They also condone beheadings, demagoguery, the most impractical social and monetary systems. And they make obeissance to something envious, angry, cold, and relentless, called an ‘Obama.'”

Spock suddenly called out, “Wait, Captain—message comming up from the surface. Computers are back online.”

Without looking at the Vulcan, Kirk said, “Belay that, Mr. Spock. I’ve made a decision.”

“Give me all power to phasers and a full spread of photon torpeodoes! Let’s blow this planet to hell, and get out of here.”

But, the Vulcan was on his feet now, “Captain—wait, I have the transmission here, it says “E Plebnista.”

Without turning, Kirk said to Spock, “‘E Plebnista’? What the hell does that mean?” and, then, “Ensign Sulu-—FIRE!”

The planet erupted in sheets of radiation, photon detonations, and world-wide flames—it then exploded and vanished as if it were never there.

“Captain,” the Vulcan said, tears running down his face, “I have the translation. ‘E plebnista’—it means ‘We the People….‘”

Sulu had already hit full impulse and cleared the system. But the great ship suddenly vanished from it’s own future. With the destruction of the Earth, 2017, the suns and planets spun out of control.

Wednesday, July 4, 2012

"E Plebnista" vs "We the People"

The original Star Trek series occasionally went, more or less boldly, into politics--perhaps most notably in the “The Omega Glory” episode which first aired on March 1, 1968. In this episode, Kirk finds himself on a strange planet caught in the middle of a war between a tribe of Asiatic village dwellers called the “Khoms,” and a group of wild nomads called the “Yangs.” (“Yankees” and “Communists,” get it). The Yangs are mostly barbarians, but they do evidence a (surprisingly familiar) past culture in their use of talismanic “worship words” such as “Freedom,” “Liberty,” and “Justice for All.”
The greatest of all Yang worship words—known as the "E plebnista"—can only be spoken by a chief. In the dramatic climax (which does not explain why the Yangs speak English and carry around American flags), Kirk resolves the great conflict by recognizing that E plebnista is actually a corruption of “We the People” and giving the Yangs a good dose of high school civics.
YouTube: Captain Kirk Preamble
Gene Roddenberry’s here point is worth remembering: when the Constitution is made the subject of adoration, and when its key passages are converted into acontextualized proof texts, we end up with a ridiculous form of ancestor worship instead of a participatory democracy. We ignore the flesh-and-blood Founders by converting them into two-dimensional deities and their ideas about self-government into a prescriptive list of commandments. “We the people” becomes “E plebnista.”
For me, a sign that somebody has gone well down the E plebnista road to is the tendency to talk about the government as a “them” and the American people as an “us.” This is common on both sides of the political spectrum these days, depending on whose ox happens to be getting gored.
If we can learn only one single lesson from the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the lives of the Founding Fathers, it is that the government is an “us” not a “them.” But since we don’t always agree with each other, the “us” that is the government will sometimes act in ways we, as individuals, do not support. That’s how participatory democracy works in a large republic. When we insist on speaking of the government as something other than ourselves, we invalidate the right of people who disagree with us to take part in the democratic process.
We miss the point badly when we try to guess what Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton would have thought about the individual mandate or the top capital gains tax rate. That is “E plabnista” thinking, or lookin to the Constitution as a religious text designed to provide us with a list of commandments to run our lives by. But the whole point of “We the people” is that we are, well, the people. The Framers gave us a process that we can use to create the kind of society that we want to live in; they never meant to give us “worship words” to keep in a box.

extremely well written but i disagree

this a representative democrasy, not a participatory democrasy

the government has been-—and will always be-— a THEM, and the people are WE

the reason currently is that the entire system has been ravaged and destroyed and no longer works as intended

How?

by men

it’s always the same me

all thriough recorded history; nothing at all changes

you can look it up

the experiment is definitely over

once the senators were taken out of the state’s hands, it essentially ended. that, and the money from the god-cursed “mega donors” who now control the Country

i could go on but i actually am not in the mood

“Gene Roddenberry’s here point is worth remembering: when the Constitution is made the subject of adoration, and when its key passages are converted into acontextualized proof texts, we end up with a ridiculous form of ancestor worship instead of a participatory democracy.”

Unless I see a direct quote from gene I’m not buying that....The point I got was that the khoms had viturally wiped out the yangs with the help of a star fleet officer gone rogue....but in the end...the Yangs cound not be defeated because of their beserker approach to battle for their most sacred idea...”liberty”.

But yes the episode was campy as hell.

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Yangs	Colmes