Growing Up "Star Trek" (Star Trek, Culture And Conservatism Alert)

National Review ^ | 09//28/2007 | Peter Suderman

[goldstategop]

A conservative's look at Star Trek and culture. This Star Trek fan is also a conservative. Did I mention I also love science fiction? Then do read on and let's boldly go where...

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

[Slapshot68]

I’m really bummed there are no Star Treks series on currently. The Star Trek series was always thought-provoking, intelligent storytelling. That just doesn’t fly in this current climate of lobotomizing reality shows.

[Psycho_Bunny]

The Star Trek series was always thought-provoking, intelligent storytelling.

Well.....occasionally, anyway.

[jjm2111]

I grew up watching ST:TNG and I liked it. Not everything has to be politicized. It’s a TV show. I like Farscape too. I don’t agree totally with the creators’ world view, but I like the show.

[Little Ray]

Star Trek the Neurotic Generation had better effects, better acting, and better scripting than “old” Star Trek.

But the old Star Trek had better stories and was a lot more fun. If I want to be preached at, I’ll go to church.

[saganite]

They were always pretty much aligned with the left in their social agenda. If you payed careful attention you would see that they didn’t like capitalism. Still, I watched it religiously and still catch the reruns. I can sift through the propaganda and still enjoy the show.

[Berlin_Freeper]

I recently finished watching the three seasons on dvd (one show per dinner) and I was surprised at how anti-Irish the first season was. I still enjoyed it though. lol

[DirtyPigpen]

A show on sci-fi comes on mondays @ 7pm. Enterprise, is a prequal to the very first ST series with Kirk & Bones. It has Scot Bakula playing the capt. It is pretty good but you would need to judge it for yourself.

[DesScorp]

Actually, if you examine ST:TNG, you’ll see that the period when the show started getting wildly popular...from about season 3 onwards...is when they started abandoning (or at least playing down) some of Roddenberry’s loopier liberal themes, and started playing up more of the Kirk-esque badass elements. Riker becaume more of a traditional authority figure, and less of an Alan Alda-meets-the horny lounge lizard kind of guy. Worf was the honor figure. The Ferengi, the capitalist bad guys, utterly flopped as villains, and so the anti-capitalist stuff was played down. The Romulans, inspired by Rome and modern day China, became the new villains, along with the Borg. Think about it; who typifies the “hive mind” better than liberals?

[CDHart]

I watch Star Trek: Voyager - it's on Spike TV, which could stand to improve its advertising, but I suffer through it to at least watch something Star Trek.

Carolyn

[Thrownatbirth]

I discovered girls about halfway through the first season.

It would have a whole lot cheaper to stick with Kirk and the crew. :-(

[George W. Bush]

Sulu: boldly going where no women are.
Uhura: Roddenbury's mistress, probably via casting couch, lots of good panty shots.
Nurse Chapel: love unrequited.
McCoy: Why? Even in the Sixties, WHY?
Scotty: an insult to the sobriety of Scotsmen.
Spock & Kirk: the closest thing the Sixties had to an Ambiguously Gay Duo.

In many ways, Star Trek: Enterprise was the best Trek show. More interesting writing and character development, I think.

[Sybeck1]

JJ Abrams is going to screw all of Trekdom up in his movie due out Christmas 2008.

Shatner is Kirk! Nimoy is Spock! Recasting those icons with MTV generation people will give the same results of replacing Clayton Moore as the Lone Ranger!

[Colonel_Flagg]

In some ways, it’s strange to think that so many conservatives — and, as evidenced here today, so many conservative pundits — are also science-fiction fans, and even stranger to find that they’re fans of a show as vigorously liberal as Star Trek.

Conservatism is about finding the best in ourselves and in others and freeing the human spirit from the shackles of oppression. There is no reason, therefore, that a conservative should not embrace the freedom offered by science fiction. However, the liberalism of Trek is highly annoying, which is why when push comes to shove I am a Stargate SG-1 fan. :)

[Politicalmom]

Ok. Spock’s Brain was DREADFUL.

[netmilsmom]

I LOVED the original series. Campy and fun. I still have a concordance somewhere.

TNG was just boring to me.

Now, Deep Space 9 was the best soap opera on tv!

[Politicalmom]

Voyager is my favorite, behind the Original.

I’d take Janeway as my Captain over ol’ Boiled Onion Head any day. :)

[BigEdLB]

Where Kirk-era Star Trek took what was essentially a Cold War liberal view of society, arguing for racial tolerance while wrestling (in Kirk’s case, often literally) with relations to foreign — or more accurately, alien — entities of overwhelming power, Star Trek: The Next Generation debuted as little more than an hour long commercial for socialism.

and I should add : athiesm, and moral relativism... I am glad I am not the only one who saw this and felt bad about it...

[Charlespg]

The show was almost Brechtian in its explicit endorsement of some of the wackiest tenets of the left. In the series pilot, “Encounter at Farpoint,” the crew is put on trial by Q, a sarcastic, temperamental, all-powerful being who reflects the show’s disdain for God-figures.

During the course of the trial, Lt. Riker proclaims that “Humanity is no longer a savage race!” Roughly translated, this comes out as, “Hey there God, not only are you a belligerent twit, but we don’t need you any more — nyah-nyah, nyah-nyah!” Somewhere, a cranky tenured professor is telling the same thing to his freshman lit class.

The writer missed the point,Q was a near omnipotent being that had all the negative qualities in himself that he hated in mankind,in other words a Super jerk.I never saw any anti religion or anti capitalism in that episode.some people just like grasping at straws

[colorado tanker]

Star Trek TNG was predicated on social Darwinism that allowed us to "evolve" into a society of Utopian socialism, but that stuff was pretty easy to spot and overlook.

As a science fiction geek I still loved it.