a bunch of people were inspired to do a bunch of things because of star trek, and you’re profoundly ignorant if you think the inclusion of minoritized or demonized people in the optimistic future of original series and tng era was irrelevant.
hell, Dr. King personally asked Nichelle Nichols not to quit the show. Trek did it (mostly) right, don’t lump it in with a tom clancy movie’s black president.
Whoopi Goldberg has that anecdote she loves to tell of being a little girl, seeing Nichelle Nichols on TV, and Whoopi starts running around the house, screaming, “Mommy! Mommy! There’s a black lady on TV and she’s not a maid!”
I don’t think celebrating diversity genuinely is tokenism personally. If you have a respectable character being cool who is some underrepresented minority, it can be inspiring.
If you are doing things like rainbow military recruitment or you are Fox hosting specifically transphobic trans women or extreme rightwing black people to try to pretend you don’t have a problem with racism or transphobia or a company just trying to meet some quotas to avoid being sued, then it would be tokenism imo.
Anyways, I do personally think representation is important. Moreso in real life, but media is a place people look to for similar inspiration. Sometimes little things can mean a lot for some people.
Putting minorities in media and showing them as respectable equals is not tokenism, and is doubly important to do when real life doesn’t reflect that. Rodenberry did not have the power to fucking solve racial oppression, he incorporated all nationalities to showcase the importance and futurism of not being a racist fuck.
I think that’s why I always enjoy The Ultimate Computer when it pops up in TOS rewatches. Dr. Daystrom is treated as just another person, brilliant and flawed alike.
I think Trek did, and still does, have a sexism problem though. Even “should have known better” TNG writers did. Guess which two main cast members had sword training but were demoted to breaking pots over guards’ heads in Qpid?
“Representation matters” - does it tho? Putting oppressed minorities in media while oppressing them is tokenism
a bunch of people were inspired to do a bunch of things because of star trek, and you’re profoundly ignorant if you think the inclusion of minoritized or demonized people in the optimistic future of original series and tng era was irrelevant.
hell, Dr. King personally asked Nichelle Nichols not to quit the show. Trek did it (mostly) right, don’t lump it in with a tom clancy movie’s black president.
Whoopi Goldberg has that anecdote she loves to tell of being a little girl, seeing Nichelle Nichols on TV, and Whoopi starts running around the house, screaming, “Mommy! Mommy! There’s a black lady on TV and she’s not a maid!”
I don’t think celebrating diversity genuinely is tokenism personally. If you have a respectable character being cool who is some underrepresented minority, it can be inspiring.
If you are doing things like rainbow military recruitment or you are Fox hosting specifically transphobic trans women or extreme rightwing black people to try to pretend you don’t have a problem with racism or transphobia or a company just trying to meet some quotas to avoid being sued, then it would be tokenism imo.
Anyways, I do personally think representation is important. Moreso in real life, but media is a place people look to for similar inspiration. Sometimes little things can mean a lot for some people.
Yes, of course it does???
Putting minorities in media and showing them as respectable equals is not tokenism, and is doubly important to do when real life doesn’t reflect that. Rodenberry did not have the power to fucking solve racial oppression, he incorporated all nationalities to showcase the importance and futurism of not being a racist fuck.
I think that’s why I always enjoy The Ultimate Computer when it pops up in TOS rewatches. Dr. Daystrom is treated as just another person, brilliant and flawed alike.
I think Trek did, and still does, have a sexism problem though. Even “should have known better” TNG writers did. Guess which two main cast members had sword training but were demoted to breaking pots over guards’ heads in Qpid?
Yeah, that is cool. And I’m definitely not arguing Trek was perfect, just that it did good things in that regard.
OP reposted this from reddit
https://l.opnxng.com/r/startrekmemes/comments/1fcd1fa/representation_matters/
And?
Okay?
Also allowing some of the oppressed become oppressors too is not really meaningful progress.
like in this example