I had previously released a version of this short book, that got a lot of reads and downloads, but I took it down, corrected it, and added a few new posts. The new version is available on Internet Archive, Notes on Star Trek.
Category
Trauma
Memo: Star Trek is going to have to make an edit out of Discovery season one
In Star Trek: Discovery season one Elon Musk is mentioned as a great historical figure. We all realized that was a great risk as he was still alive and who knows what the future could be. Well, now we know. Star Trek has a responsibility to not just leave it there and say “oh well.”…
Trauma and Postmodern Subtext in Star Trek
B’Elanna Torres, martyrologies, the resolve of violence superstructures to persist as their own solutions – just as the competing martyrologies-imposed doctrines of violence, so, too, did Lt. Torres imposed violence upon herself in “Extreme Risk” as the solution to coming to terms with the holodeck grotesque imagery she created upon learning of the fate of…
“I know what is written”: Babylon 5’s “Believers” (Science Fiction and Charles W. Mills’s Critique of “Ideal Theory” Part II)
Just as Lieutenant Alara Kitan was successful in resisting the surrounding dominance of the realities of imposed Ideal Theory, there are occasions in which that resistance can be met with a loss. In the season one Babylon 5 episode, “Believers” (1994), Dr. Stephen Franklin is confronted with contentious dilemma. An Onteen child, Shon, is suffering…
Possible Model for Alternative Futurism: Responsibility to Leave (R2L)
Cross-posted Memo I have long been an advocate that we need to take care of Mother Earth before we become too overwhelmingly concerned with colonizing other planets. I have long been an advocate for aggressive education reform. I believe that the goal of any progressing society should navigating towards abolishing capitalism. I will not repeat…
Expansion of Utopian Struggle in the Motif of Entering a Room/Space(s) for Continuity
To quote Kim Stanley Robinson “utopia has gone from being a somewhat minor literary problem to a necessary survival strategy” (as quoted in “Guns Under the Table: Kim Stanley Robinson and the Transition to Utopia,” Utopian Studies, Oct. 2020, Andrew Miller, 389). To carry over this survival strategy for the sake of utopia from novelized…
“Extreme Risk” and “Invasive Procedures” as Symbols of Capitalist Internalization
What we have learned living in the capitalist society is that those who suffer the most as a consequence of global capitalism are equally locked out of securing relief. I return to what I have previously discussed as the Theory of Monetized Empathy, which states that people are more likely to be oppressed by other…
The Orville’s “Mad Idolatry” and Star Trek: Voyager’s “Sacred Ground” as a Lesson in Explanatory Ethics
In The Orville’s “Mad Idolatry” (2017) Kelly Grayson violates initial contact protocol with a lesser developed species to assist a girl who had hurt herself. Kelly heals the girl and before she becomes aware of the seriousness of the situation, villagers arrive behind her and witness the act. In time, Kelly becomes worshiped as a…
Gaius Baltar Escaping Freedom on Tau Cygna V
JANEWAY: Your new world is a prison. You are under his control.DA VINCI: When are we not in prison? Hmm? When are our lives free from the influence of those who have more power than us? If this New World is a cage, then it is a cage of gold, of marvels, of opportunities. If…
Identity and Captain Louanne “Kat” Katraine
Sasha was a drug trafficker before the Cylon invasion of the Twelve Colonies in Ronald D. Moore’s reboot of Battlestar Galactica. Sasha stole the identification papers from someone who had been killed in the attack. She wished not only to cover up her past crimes but take on a new identity altogether. The very method…