Race in Star Trek: The Unspoken Ugly History

[Jedi Master Spock]

There is no doubt that although Star Trek tries to paint a utopian future where racial distinction is a myth, it falls short of reflecting the actual demographics of the current Earth in its casting.

But can we explain the casting demographics with in-universe explanations?

There are two commonly indicated demographic issues, race and gender. Gender can be at best explained through a continued preference of males for the "military" style of career within Starfleet, but race is a trickier issue to tackle.

The answer is actually fairly elegant, and relies on Star Trek's own version of history. According to Star Trek timelines, while the 23rd century begins to be a utopian vision of human harmony, the early era of space colonization falls in the pre-Enterprise era (late 21st to early 22nd century) notable as something of a dark age (see First Contact). It does not surprise us if in the bitter aftermath of World War III, early space colonists were typically drawn from the population of those with a combination of education and prosperity and countries with a history of space exploration.

Thus we largely draw from the US, the EU, and Russia, with smaller groups coming from other places with less developed space programs. Presumably China, or at least its space program, got the short end of the stick in WWIII - that or they decided to stick with the single-child policy another century, leaving them rather short of young restless people to send into space - and we're left with early spacers tending to look all pale and bulbous-eyed.

These early colonists settle planets and reproduce at an alarming rate. By the time Earth has gotten its act together as a planet (the 2160s), the colonies' population is significant relative to Earth's, and already in the habit of reproducing like rabbits and moving out to the next frontier.

A mostly European and American population blended with a certain amount of Chinese and Indian stock will look very "white" to us in the modern age.

The unspoken ugly history is that only the wealthy were able to start new colonies - and that in the Star Trek universe, wealth continued to have a relationship with physical appearance through the early stages of space colonization.

Even though it presumably has no more bearing on economic opportunities or even economic results - black admirals are hardly unusual in Trek, occurring about as often as black people period - the presence of such an ugly period would explain the apparent demographic shift of humanity to more closely match that of the demographics of American actors.

[Jedi Master Spock]

I supposed I shouldn't say that it's unspoken that the 21st century is considered a pretty ugly time in the Trek timeline. It is occasionally talked about, just not all that much.

[AnonymousRedShirtEnsign]

Sanctuary districts/ Bell riots, WWIII, Colonel Greene, yeah Star Trek has a pretty bleak 21st century.

[Mike DiCenso]

We actually have a fair bit of information now on the 21st century in the Trek universe.

Certainly the 600 million killed in the Third World War, and who knows how many died in Colonel Philip Green's post-WW3 genocidal and eugenicist holocaust, and what effects that may have had on the various ethnic groups. Even in the Trek's 20th century we have heard of "Whole populations bombed out of existance" in the Eugenics War of the mid-90's.
-Mike