1. Welcome! Please take a few seconds to create your free account to post threads, make some friends, remove a few ads while surfing and much more. ClutchFans has been bringing fans together to talk Houston Sports since 1996. Join us!

Woke National Review upset that Star Trek made Stacey Abrams "President of Earth"

Discussion in 'BBS Hangout: Debate & Discussion' started by Sweet Lou 4 2, Apr 19, 2022.

  1. FranchiseBlade

    Supporting Member

    Joined:
    Jan 14, 2002
    Messages:
    51,813
    Likes Received:
    20,473
    Hardly ever.

    This is no exception. They were progressive, not perfect. They were ahead of the times and moving in the right direction.

    You are trying to hold mid 20th century enlightenment to modern day enlightenment.

    In context of the times they were absolutely woke.
     
    Nook and Invisible Fan like this.
  2. JayGoogle

    JayGoogle Member

    Joined:
    Nov 3, 2007
    Messages:
    52,323
    Likes Received:
    45,190
    Nice try, I didn't say the person that wrote the episode. The idea didn't come from her, it came from Mayberry who WAS fired for that.

    According to who?
    https://redshirtsalwaysdie.com/2020...generation-code-honor-director-fired-filming/
    So your best example is an episode Gene and the cast and everyone hates and an episode that wasn't even meant to have african themed aliens?

    Gene being buddies with Hubbard doesn't erase anything I've said. That he didn't like capitalism, that he was anti-religion, that he was anti-racist, and that he was by and by a full on social progressive. Even his views today would be left of Joe Biden. Doesn't matter who he was friends with, those were HIS views.

    Doesn't matter if he was a drunk either, that's completely irrelevant to his views lol.
     
    Nook likes this.
  3. tinman

    tinman 999999999
    Supporting Member

    Joined:
    May 9, 1999
    Messages:
    104,451
    Likes Received:
    47,364
    Khan would put worms in these non contributing members ears

    @rocketsjudoka
     
  4. Invisible Fan

    Invisible Fan Member

    Joined:
    Dec 5, 2001
    Messages:
    45,954
    Likes Received:
    28,050
    I don't know why woke has become synonymous with progressive. Maybe woke is on a strong end of progressive, where people empathize and are compassionate with the African American experience (this goes beyond acknowledging slavery and Jim Crow as holding back Black Americans), but I can't say for sure that Roddenberry was like that.

    Roddenberry's utopia was way different than the TNG Treks. Some of the writers and producers of TNG said the show went in a completely better direction when Gene left the show after the 2nd season. There's no way DS9 would be the same show if he were still alive at that time.

    If you look past the terrible bloated writing (10 episodes vs 26...), the new Treks has a different perspective of a future utopian ideal than the old TNG series where the later seasons of Discovery emphasize on personal journeys and emotional/mental well being.

    It's like that other thread with DD claiming "minorities who benefitted" should be woke and those minorities who aren't should be called out for it.

    In no way is DD woke. He might have some progressive values though.
     
    rocketsjudoka and FranchiseBlade like this.
  5. FranchiseBlade

    Supporting Member

    Joined:
    Jan 14, 2002
    Messages:
    51,813
    Likes Received:
    20,473
    I mean woke in that they recognized problems and addressed them in the context of the show.

    I didn't mean any charged definition of the term.
     
    Nook and Invisible Fan like this.
  6. tinman

    tinman 999999999
    Supporting Member

    Joined:
    May 9, 1999
    Messages:
    104,451
    Likes Received:
    47,364
    Is there a movie where they went back in time to save chickens to save the universe?

    @Bandwagoner @J.R.

    oh wait that was blue whales

    I guess in the 90s we cared about animals that weren’t on the menu at Popeyes
     
  7. JayGoogle

    JayGoogle Member

    Joined:
    Nov 3, 2007
    Messages:
    52,323
    Likes Received:
    45,190
    If you can blame anyone for that blame conservatives.

    Being woke includes emphasizing with ANY civil rights, be they LGBTQ+ or any minority group. It also includes giving women major roles in action movies. It also includes apologizing for what could be offensive jokes. Woke means maybe making ONE Disney movie that features a homosexual relationship...

    I mean just look at all the 'woke' threads that are started in this forum. While the member who creates them is obsessed with being anti-woke he's latching on to things that conservatives are whining about and targeting for being 'woke'.

    So I think that is why it's become synonymous with progressive. They've overused the word to have no meaning and now it means "Anything I don't like." but I am fairly confident if Gene was making Star Trek today it would be labeled as woke SJW trash.
     
  8. tinman

    tinman 999999999
    Supporting Member

    Joined:
    May 9, 1999
    Messages:
    104,451
    Likes Received:
    47,364
  9. rocketsjudoka

    rocketsjudoka Member

    Joined:
    Jul 24, 2007
    Messages:
    58,169
    Likes Received:
    48,342
    The thing is many sci-fi, especially sci-fi on the TV or movie screen wouldn't have done those things unless Trek did it first. You're ignoring the ground breaking nature of even having Uhuru or a black computer genius because you're looking at what came after.

    This is why the DS9 episode "Far Beyond the Stars" was good. Besides being just a well written episode it directly addresses the biases that were in Golden Age sci-fi and why it was revolutionary many of the things that were in Star Trek.

    Also for someone that's criticizing others for not knowing much about Trek I find it interesting that you don't seem to be aware of the controversy around Spock and having an alien as not just a regular cast but also as a bridge officer.
    https://www.startrek.com/article/creating-star-treks-first-alien-mr-spock
    "As the series began production, the use of Spock’s pointed ears was cause of great controversy between the Star Trek production team and the television network. “In 1965, the NBC Sales Department was concerned,” recalled Herb Solow, Desilu executive in charge of Star Trek at the time. “It was as if they believed that, after Satan had been cast out the the Garden of Eden, he was reincarnated as actor Leonard Nimoy and cast into Star Trek as science officer Spock, a pointed eared, arched eyebrowed ‘satanic’ Vulcan alien.” NBC feared its advertisers and local stations would be targets of a religious backlash protesting this “devil incarnate.”

    “It took several weeks for us to learn the extent to which NBC Sales had gone to disguise Spock’s ‘satanic’ pointed ears,” says Solow."

    NBC had sent a very attractive Star Trek sales brochure to its station affiliates and advertisers. Close scrutiny showed, however, that an artist working for the NBC Sales Department had airbrushed Spock’s pointy ears round in all the photographs."
    [​IMG]
     
    Nook, JayGoogle and FranchiseBlade like this.
  10. rocketsjudoka

    rocketsjudoka Member

    Joined:
    Jul 24, 2007
    Messages:
    58,169
    Likes Received:
    48,342
    Certainly not every episode of TOS was "woke" but we have to understand this was still the 1960's and TOS was on a major network that had to keep an audience and fight for ratings. Roddenberry understood that but very much had a vision of inclusion that in our terms would be considered woke.

    I will also say again that the first two season of TNG there were problems that they got too woke and preachy at times.

    One thing that many who don't pay attention closely to Trek not realize is that TOS was very much bound by 60's fashion sense. In the original pilot though they tried to take it on by having a female first officer who wore the same uniform as the men. That along with the idea of a female first officer was dropped because it was too revolutionary for the time. In the the first season of TNG while they had Deanna Troi wearing a miniskirt uniform they also had men wearing miniskirts too.
    [​IMG]
    Roddenberry and the producers wanted to make a statement that the miniskirts weren't a sexist fashion but just an alternate uniform and there was even talk of having Riker or another bridge officer wearing one. In the meantime Tasha Yar and other female officers wore the same uniform as the male officers. It was later decided to drop the miniskirts all together (except as a joke in DS9 time travel episode) and for every Trek show since men and women members of Star Fleet have worn essentially the same uniform. Even in shows that in the timeline predate TOS.
     
    Nook, JayGoogle and FranchiseBlade like this.
  11. Bandwagoner

    Bandwagoner Member

    Joined:
    Jan 26, 2006
    Messages:
    27,105
    Likes Received:
    3,757
    You think I don't know because I don't copy and past large sections of text.

    You hand wave away all the underlying fundamental parts of the examples you brought up. This is my problem with this entire argument. Surface level understanding. It was a show from the 60's where race was a bigger social issue than it is now. Heavy handed half black/half white aliens doesn't make up for my problems with your examples.
     
    #91 Bandwagoner, Apr 25, 2022
    Last edited: Apr 25, 2022
  12. rocketsjudoka

    rocketsjudoka Member

    Joined:
    Jul 24, 2007
    Messages:
    58,169
    Likes Received:
    48,342
    Here is a key scene from "Far Beyond the Stars" that shows how revolutionary it was to even have black or women bridge officers at that time. Considering even acknowledging that there were black and women writers doing popular sci-fi.


    The character played by Nana Visitor / Major Kira is loosely based on DC Fontana who was a female writer who wrote some of the TOS episodes. She had to write under a pseudonym because publishers didn't want it known that a woman was writing for them.
     
    Nook and JayGoogle like this.
  13. rocketsjudoka

    rocketsjudoka Member

    Joined:
    Jul 24, 2007
    Messages:
    58,169
    Likes Received:
    48,342
    Really "hand wave". I find that pretty funny.

    I'm providing the evidence and delving into the issues. You're just bringing up a couple of counter examples.
     
    Nook, JayGoogle and Andre0087 like this.
  14. Bandwagoner

    Bandwagoner Member

    Joined:
    Jan 26, 2006
    Messages:
    27,105
    Likes Received:
    3,757
    Defend having the black man's lack of self control "infect" the computer. That's super racist and your example of star trek progressivism. It's a show from the 60's. A guy 230 years in the future can't get over a woman in the workplace.
     
    #94 Bandwagoner, Apr 25, 2022
    Last edited: Apr 25, 2022
  15. tinman

    tinman 999999999
    Supporting Member

    Joined:
    May 9, 1999
    Messages:
    104,451
    Likes Received:
    47,364
    Spock’s voice was used in information society’s song back in the day
    Pure energy
    Pure pure energy

    you know the 99ers know about Star Trek
    All these other losers here failed the kobayashi maru scenario

    These suckers are serving us ale at quarks bar
     
  16. JayGoogle

    JayGoogle Member

    Joined:
    Nov 3, 2007
    Messages:
    52,323
    Likes Received:
    45,190
    You talk about hand waving then hand-wave his post away for having large sections of text.

    Surface level? You realize that if you're writing for a character that your views are not represented by that character, right? You seem to confuse this in many of your examples. Like that Kirk had to be hypnotized to kiss a black woman or the comment about women on the bridge. These don't represent Gene's views or overall Trek's views on women.

    So your best examples are an episode that everyone hates and certainly didn't have Gene's stamp of approval...and a pilot episode.

    The 'Ultimate Computer' episode honestly man that's the first time I've ever seen someone take that from that episode. You're talking about Daystrom who in the Trek universe was a genius, correct? That had an institute named after him? Because I took from that episode that he was going crazy and that seemed the take away since he was taken to rehab after. That a black character has a character flaw is not racist. It would be racist if only all the black characters were extremely flawed and none of the white ones were in comparison but since everyone on the crew had flaws that were highlighted it's hard to call this racist.

    Also...giving the fact taht the actor stated this wasn't even a role written for a black man.
    "The part had been written originally for a white actor. Maybe they weren’t able to get that and my agent, who they had contacted, put forth my name to Gene Roddenberry, who said, ‘My God, I never thought of it,’ he said. ‘It would just be great.’ That’s what happened."

    I feel like you're really stretching here to try and imagine that Trek wasn't socially progressive, it was.
     
  17. tinman

    tinman 999999999
    Supporting Member

    Joined:
    May 9, 1999
    Messages:
    104,451
    Likes Received:
    47,364

    This is when Star Trek was real
     
  18. Nook

    Nook Member

    Joined:
    Jun 27, 2008
    Messages:
    60,086
    Likes Received:
    133,536
    I was very confused. I thought that they had figured out a way to CG Patrice O'Neal into the episode of Star Trek and made him President of Earth. I thought it was really cool....

    [​IMG]

    Then I read the article and was devastated to learn it was Stacey Abrams......

    [​IMG]
     
    FranchiseBlade likes this.
  19. tinman

    tinman 999999999
    Supporting Member

    Joined:
    May 9, 1999
    Messages:
    104,451
    Likes Received:
    47,364
    Remember when they could afford actors to be president of earth

    @Os Trigonum
     
    Nook likes this.
  20. Os Trigonum

    Os Trigonum Member
    Supporting Member

    Joined:
    May 2, 2014
    Messages:
    81,573
    Likes Received:
    121,986
    surely there's got to be a way to rein this thread in and get it back on topic about Stacey

     

Share This Page