remade meme with higher quality image
this post was submitted on 04 Nov 2025
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As both a trekie and a leftie, I must say that the conservatives who complain about modern Trek are not 100% wrong. Yes, Trek was always about social justice, but the episodes were about exploring why something was right or ethical. The new Trek takes this for granted, while half the population is not in agreement, or in a state of confusion. Instead of showing WHY something is good and just and explore it within an episode, they just present it as fact, and then they go off to some random adventure. This rubs off badly half the population. Yes, you can go all out and say that it's the conservatives' fault, and it is, but the reality is, the delivery HAS changed. New trek is not the same as old trek.
The Orville was a much more old trek-style show, and people universally loved it more than the new trek, despite being progressive.
I'm an old school Trekkie and pretty leftist myself and I absolutely hated the Orville. I didn't see it as doing anything worthy of such praise. It had a lot of tired humor and (badly) recycled story lines from Star Trek. And I have thoroughly enjoyed just about every bit of new Trek that's come out.
I also don't agree with your point about them just presenting things instead of subtly insinuating. The only things they present without integrating it into the story are LGBTQ characters and their personal situations. And that's only because those things should be absolutely normal and unremarkable at this point. The fact that conservatives still have issues with this is entirely because conservatives are socially backwards. And they've been made that way by a constant stream of backward propaganda via Fox News and local media outlets that have been taken over by multibillion dollar corporations who have injected their conservative views onto local news outlets en masse.
In other words them not getting it or enjoying it isn't a problem for Star Trek it's a problem for conservatives.
Edit: I also find it hilarious that you think that old Trek was in any way subtle about their social commentary. Having the first interracial kiss on national TV on top of several story lines dealing directly with racism was far far from subtle.
You are not alone in feeling like that about The Orville. I hated that Seth MacFarlane just filed the serial numbers off of TNG and forced in enough lazy jokes about dicks and beer to make it lawyer-proof, and the masses called him some kind of TV scifi pioneer for it.
It doesn't have to be subtle to show why something is good or bad.
My favorite recent example was the TV adaptation of the Last of Us. The third episode makes it very clear that it's a statement that a gay couple can have a beautiful life together. I was watching through the show with my parents, who were incredibly homophobic. They got very upset when they realized that it was going to be about a gay couple, but by the end they had tears in their eyes.
There was zero subtlety, because the story was so beautiful it didn't need it.
You misunderstood my comment. I NEVER said that the old Trek was subtle. Your whole reply is hinging on that point, which is not true. I said that they made the focus of an episode to EXPLORE ethical issues, while on new trek, they take them for granted and then they go on to have a formal adventure.
This is an odd sentiment to me, because I feel like you’re describing what Star Trek always did, and is generally seen as one of its great strengths. We didn’t need to be told that black women and white men could serve together as equals, they just showed Uhura on the bridge functioning like any other officer as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
And this is one of the many respects in which I think Orville falls on its face. Topa never appears in any episode that isn’t about her oppression in one way or another. She’s not allowed to just be a character like any other, taking part in random stories about growing up aboard ship. That casual representation is missing.
That is a product of the change in television style and nothing else. These are the same stories being told just through a slightly different lens. Still progressive. Still pushes for equality. Still does all the things that you claimed. The only difference is that this time it isn't screaming at the top of its lungs and shove it down your throat thinking that you are going to be incapable of being able to pick it up on your own. Thing that baffles me is that so many people aren't able to pick it up on their own. They do, apparently, need it screamed at the top of their lungs with a really hacky speech.
It's not a product of conservatives. It's a product of the evolution of television. Everything people want from Star Trek is still there and still being screamed just in a slightly different accent. But calling old Star Trek subtle is one of the funniest things that I've ever fucking heard. Mainly because it's the dead opposite of what's actually happening. New Star Trek is subtle. Old Star Trek wasn't. New Star Trek is able to be subtle by telling a story over the course of an entire season and having each episode focus on a different part. Old Star Trek had the entire moral, entire story and everything wrapped up into 45 minutes. That immediately means that you cannot be subtle because you have to make it as obvious as humanly possible so that you can get the point across in 45 minutes. But saying that the half-white, half-black people and the half-black, half-white people are somehow a subtle representation of the racist things happening in the 60s is ridiculous.
I'll take "black characters as officers and equals in the 1960's" for $500, Alex.