Adam Reynolds wrote:
The Federation certainly isn't fascist in any real sense. Mike Wong's argument certainly never claimed it was fascist. Frankly calling someone fascist has no meaning any more.
Yeah. George Orwell once wrote an essay remarking on this process, that people began calling every political action they disliked "fascism." First the communists got into the game, then (in parts of the West) the right wing got into the game trying to redirect the term to point to the left of them, and then it got completely out of control.
Though it did have an interesting question about starships. Are starships too expensive for private ownership?
Apparently not, but they may be too expensive for most people to own one.
Like airplanes. It's not that you can't own an airplane, it's that even a small airplane is very expensive to own and operate, screwing up with the maintenance can kill you, and there are a fairly limited number of ways to make a small, individually owned airplane profitable for the owner. For all these reasons, airplanes are not common as items of property. The United States is a relatively rich country, and one that certainly supports individuals' right to own things. But while there are roughly two hundred thousand or so airplanes in the US, that's still less than one airplane per thousand citizens, meaning that no more than 0.1% of the population can possibly own their own plane. Bush pilots and so on who actually make a living flying their personal airplanes around are rare.
By analogy, owning a single-engine airplane would be like owning your own shuttlecraft, and owning a big heavy twin-engine or four-engine jet would be like owning your own large starship. Not many people can afford that, and the majority of the world's large airplanes are the property of some government or corporation. Because even among people who can afford to buy a fifty million dollar airplane or whatever, most people don't want to buy it purely as a status symbol.
FedRebel wrote:
Economically it seems to have achieved Marx's vision in the TNG era.
also it appears the "military/political bond is at a simmilar degree toa real communist state. Starfleet is very involved in Federation politics, Captain's being able to sway the Federation Council, and serving as diplomats at the behest of the Council.
And yet this is not so much because the military controls the government, as because the government has demilitarized the military. While Starfleet officers are aware they're in a fighting service (usually), they don't seem to think of themselves as soldiers or fighters. The paragon examples they hold up for emulation will usually try to resolve a situation without fighting if possible. Their standing orders and basic principles emphasize scientific research, exploration, and noninterference in the affairs of others.
The reason the Federation sends Picard around as a diplomat is that frankly, he's pretty good at it- arguably better than he is at fighting ship to ship battles.
So if we look at the Federation as being an example of the military influencing the civilian leadership, it is also an example of the civilian scientific and diplomatic communities having a lot of influence in the military.
Though it did have an interesting question about starships. Are starships too expensive for private ownership?
Mudd and Cassidy Yates appeared to own their own ships, we've seen too little of Federation life to be conclusive...but given the appearance that in TNG era it's "to each according to his need"...there is no "need"...because starfleet provides the ferrying of passengers.
Be a nice vision if civilian shuttlecraft exist, A Type 6 in every garage, Type 9's as 'sports' shuttles, all available in a rainbow of colors.
Eh, maybe- but then, I'm not a car-fetishist, and the idea of everyone owning their own 'hot rod' spaceship like some sort of science fiction version of a '50s movie with all the teenagers competing to have the best car... That doesn't really appeal to me.
Really the problem of settings like Star Trek is that they are designed for drama. This is also shared by Mass Effect or Star Wars. It means that you have things like foolish leaders outranking your heroes, allowing them to be correct in the face of adversity. Having military characters as viewpoint characters also means that we fail to fully see the civilian way of life and are thus left with an impression of the setting that is warped.
Star Trek's biggest issue is inconsistency...even within a single series there are a legion of writers each whom impart their own take. That creates unfortunate implications...like Janeway could be classified as an unstable psychopath because of inconsistent characterization.
And across the franchise things get foul because there's no firm governing, such as Voyager being equipped with Tricolbalt devices...which were later revealed in the movies to be illegal.
all this coupled with the "evil admiral" cliche don't paint a rosy picture of 24th century society.
Well, frankly, it doesn't paint ANY picture, or if it does, it paints such a surrealist, distorted picture that we can't make intelligible claims about the thing the picture represents.
Statistics: Posted by Simon_Jester — 2016-09-13 06:31am