Posted on 07/07/2022 1:43:22 PM PDT by TigerClaws
Star Trek Has Always Advocated For Choice
Much like the title of this essay says, Star Trek has always advocated for choice. Much of the best of Star Trek demonstrates that we have to continue to make personal choices to strive for the utopian ideals that are present in the show. A world like the Federation’s doesn’t just happen and then remains static; the characters have to choose, over and over again, to make the right choice or the hard choice, to continue to uphold their values and succeed.
But it goes beyond that. Star Trek is also about personal choice with regards to one’s well-being and bodily autonomy. The franchise advocates that everyone deserves the chance to decide for themselves what to do with their bodies and health, and that message is as timely as ever.
Consider the classic TNG episode “The Measure of a Man.” In it, Dr. Bruce Maddox orders Data, who he views as an object, to be transferred to his command. Maddox, determined to recreate the work of Dr. Soong, intends to take him apart to better understand how Data works, and he doesn’t care that Data is a being with feelings and opinions on what happens to him. Data respectfully declines to undergo the procedure, and even attempts to resign from his position to avoid it. Maddox, however, doesn’t take no for an answer, prompting a hearing to discuss the matter and decide Data’s fate.
Star Trek: The Next Generation - "The Measure of a Man"
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When it comes to looking to Star Trek for inspiration, we can look here for hope that someday, everyone will have full bodily autonomy. We can also look to it for inspiration that no matter what the cause, someone will stand up and fight for a person’s right to choose. We don’t always have Captain Picard on our side, but we can stand up for ourselves and hope to inspire others to join us. This is a time for those who believe that every person deserves to have the right to choose what happens to them as individuals, and to stand together and say, in a unified voice, that all beings should have bodily autonomy.
Now is the time to speak up. Now is the time to act in defense of those groups who are facing oppression. And now is the time to advocate for their ability to live their lives in peace, with inalienable rights everyone deserves. Just as Picard used his privilege to advocate for his friend who needed him, so should we all be standing up for those who need it. Now is the time to make the choice to embody the values that Star Trek teaches. If not now, when?
K.S. McKenzie (they/them) is a writer and a Trek devotee. Their favorite Star Trek series is Deep Space Nine.
Posted as Vanity as not yet a sourced news story.
Measure of a Man was fantastic.
So fantasy loving libs cannot conceive of humans finding a better way than aborting their young in the future. I thought they think of themselves as Progressives.
*One of the most-controversial "Voyager" episodes.
But in "Threshold,"** they didn't kill the polliwogs (equivalent to "fetuses") which Janeway and Paris had spawned while in amphibious form.
**One of the most-bizarre "Voyager" episodes.
In conclusion: I don't look to Star Trek for moral guidance.
Regards,
My favorite ones were the ones that had themes from real navy stories. Like when the day is saved because the good guys’ repair crews (engineering) can repair faster than the enemy (which happened often in the real US navy even as far back as the 19th century). Or in the one where Picard is captured by the Borg, I get chills when the Enterprise arrives at the battle too late and the crewmen stare in awe at all the destruction of ships and deaths. I often wonder what it was like for the WW2 USS Enterprise to arrive at Pearl Harbor hours after the attack was over. Every time a fictional Enterprise crewman gets captured and sends a message that only his crewmates can recognize, I think of Captain Bainbridge of the USS Philadelphia sending messages in 1803 and 1804 after he and his crew were captured (which wound up being helpful in the first marine expedition led by William Eaton against Tripoli that freed the ).
Where were all these “bodily autonomy” rants during covid? Hmmm?
Funny they bring up TNG episode “The Measure of a Man.” In it, Dr. Bruce Maddox orders Data, who he views as an object ...as a pro abortion point
That our pro life point... you are choosing to view a self evident human being as an object to disposal of at whim
It’s really the whole debate.
It is 20 flippin’ 22 fer gawds sake. We all know what causes pregnancy.
The answer about how to prevent unwanted babies in your life; You simply defer pleasure for responsibilty and the problem goes away. Wear a condom EVERY TIME, double sack it even. If the guy doesn’t like it, let him walk away.
For you weak willed and wanton women out there, who just want to be the “jungle gym” for the males? get on the pill. Better yet, get a job, a life and find a real man who will want to have sex with you, but marry you to boot.
Something was lost in the 1960’s it was the morals of women that were destroyed. They wanted to be just like the men in the stories boys told to each others, which BTW were not true. Hook up, break up. While you are breaking up, go to a strip club and maybe hook up guy...thanks “Friends”.
Face it, guys are “Dogs” and the girls are their “whores” in our modern society. Neither cares about being faithful, let alone loving and caring for another adult OR a new child. Of course it is never all. It is just the majority of people who are like that.
My grandmother, born in 1893, once told me something about morals. She said that the first child in any family, seems to be born premature every time. This was in the 1920’s - 1960. It was about 7 months from marriage to birth. She told me with a twinkle in her eye. People had sex, they just didn’t have it commonly with a lot of people. There had to be a real connection, a possibility of long time love, and the guys KNEW BETTER than to shame a lady. They would flat out risk a beating, or something worse.
It is women who civilize society and the men in it. Being a male, I blame the females for being so willing to “give it up” for a dinner at Dominos. They broke the social contract, it is up to them to fix it.
I’m a big a fan of Star Trek as about anyone you would find, but come on people, it’s a fictional television show, i.e. “entertainment”.
It’s just leftist Trekkies seeing what they want to see in order to “own” the franchise.
I caught that one recently on Roku.
TZ, Outer Limits, and One Step Beyond were good.
Once in a while The Alfred Hitchcock Hour may as well have been a Twilight Zone.
“So fantasy loving libs cannot conceive of humans finding a better way than aborting their young in the future. I thought they think of themselves as Progressives.” == PERFECT RESPONSE!! They value every life heavily on ST. No way would they advocate abortion of a baby.
Look for them to lobby a scene in one of the Star Trek tv shows where the doc performs an abortion by beaming the fetus out of the womb.
You’re just now recognising Star Trek’s progressive politics?
During a Star Trek Enterprise episode, the chief engineer (male) gets knocked up by an alien. They eventually transfer the fetus to an alien recipient, the Klingons who were involved in the plot, found the engineer’s predicament hilarious.
See? A man can get pregnant, albeit by interfacing with aliens.
I don't agree, it's up to both to fix it.
After decades of watching men capitulate even to the point of refusing to defend their own sons against a biased school system just to avoid ticking off whoever has the vagina they want to stick it into, I couldn't care less what happens to men. If they want to treat women as receptacles while refusing to see the women who are using them as sperm banks and child support, that's their problem. I'm tired of caring.
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