Dealing with a certain segment of the Star Trek fandom these days feels like Russian Roulette (sorry, Chekov). When someone says they don’t like TOS/TNG/DS9 etc. it’s like oh whatever but if they say they don’t like one of the new shows I instinctively brace myself, because is it just gonna be a regular opinion or are they gonna follow up with an incomprehensible rant about “forced diversity”?
And to my followers / friends who don’t like ST Disco/Picard/whatever, this is not directed at you. I may love all Star Treks under the sun but that doesn’t mean everyone has to. I’m just mentally tired of dealing with grumpy Gen X-ers on Facebook who hate everything made after 9/11 because either a) their nostalgia goggles are strapped on too tight and are squeezing their brain or b) they’re a bigot and they aren’t very good at hiding it. I feel like the host of the worst game show in the world and it’s called Is This Racism Or Just White Straight Male Entitlement?
And this applies to all media, really. I wish people would appreciate a piece of fiction for what it is and not based on whether the characters are Black or gay or female or whatever. (And don’t forget, a piece of media having diverse rep doesn’t make it inherently good. It’s completely valid to enjoy a piece of fiction solely because of that, but it doesn’t make anyone who dislikes it categorically wrong.)
It’s interesting how guys who spent 20 years telling us it didn’t matter that most of the characters in popular media were mainly white, exclusively cisgender, heterosexual men, immediately shit themselves when a small fraction of pop culture starts focusing on women, or POC, or (gasp) daring to have a single LGBTQ character. It’s rampant political correctness gone mad, I tell you! Everything used to be about them, all the time, and now it’s only about them most of the time! And these people react with such outrage, as if the writers and producers broke into their home while they slept and held a knife to their throats.
The fact is, sometimes diversity has to be forced. When an iconic science fiction franchise has spent 50 years of its existence pretending gay people don’t exist, steps must be taken! When studios and writer’s rooms have spent decades, intentionally or otherwise, excluding female or POC voices from the creative process, a conscious effort must be made to balance the scales. And if we can counteract centuries of systemic racism, well, then maybe we can achieve this pie-in-the-sky social utopia these fanboys think we live in, where any person of any sexuality, race, gender, faith, or income level can just walk into a Hollywood studio and be hired as a writer / actor / whatever “based solely on talent”.
And also, let’s be real here. Two gay men and a pair of non-binary teenagers (one of whom is dead) hardly represents “pushing an agenda”. Two whole Black women in a ship of hundreds isn’t “forced diversity”. The only thing it represents is society, and it’s a poor representation at that. When you look at planet Earth as a whole, white people are the minority. If Starfleet purports to represent all of humanity, should it not reflect actual humanity? Anywhere between 5 and 10% of the population identifies as gay, bi, etcetera. Two gay characters out of the dozens and dozens we’ve seen over the years is barely even 1%. Now, if Lieutenant Stamets were to seize control of the U.S.S. Discovery and eject all straight crewmembers into space while his lover, Dr. Culber, concocted a virus to euthanize every filthy hetero in the Alpha Quadrant, and the show depicted this as being a good and correct decision, then you might be able to accuse the show of “pushing an agenda” (plus it would be hilarious). But having a crew of mostly white people in a future where Earth is one united world is not just culturally anachronistic, it’s downright inaccurate. Even if you’re one of those “diet racists” who claims not to actually wish ill on any of these groups in real life, you’re still contributing to the problem. Everybody just wants to be seen. And people who are different from you aren’t going anywhere, so why not let them in?
This post kind of got away from me, but I guess my main point is like what you like, but don’t ever tell me you dislike something because it’s got “too many” minorities in the cast or it’s “forcing a feminist/gay agenda down our throats”, or I will crack an egg on your forehead.
