Federation of Socialist Planets?

[CrippledVulture]

Everything we can assume about the Empire and the Federation makes it an easy question.

The Federation: Described more than once as a paradise. Voice-operated device that assembles energy particles into whatever I want to eat, drink, or have. The freedom to go off on my own if I desire. (have we ever seen evidence of the Federation attempting to incorporate places like New Sydney and Farius Prime?) The best and brightest flying around in advanced space ships defending me from external threats.

The Empire: High taxes (how else did they fund not one but two space stations the size of small moons?) Possible compulsory military service (I know it flies in the face of high cannon evidence but I do not accept the fact that Stormtroopers are clones. Nor will I ever.) The only alternative is to live on the outskirts of civilization where the Empire's grasp is not as tight, but brutal local crime bosses fill the void, admittedly this is also true of many independent settlements in Star Trek. The Orion Syndicate seems to be at least as bad as the Hutts.

I'll take the Federation. I hear Risa is nice.

[GStone]

GStone wrote:

If you're an adrenaline junkie, you might go with the Empire.

Yup, the Klingon Empire.
I'd have all the adrenaline I need, and would still be able to go back to my confy Federation if I needed to... :)

And you'd miss out on the constant adrenaline from living in a totalitarian, tyranical society with probably very steep 'taxes', which had the standard rule of 'pay up or we're shooting you and we're aren't gonna give you a warning shot'.

[AFT]

GStone wrote:

If you're an adrenaline junkie, you might go with the Empire.

Yup, the Klingon Empire.
I'd have all the adrenaline I need, and would still be able to go back to my confy Federation if I needed to... :)

And you'd miss out on the constant adrenaline from living in a totalitarian, tyranical society with probably very steep 'taxes', which had the standard rule of 'pay up or we're shooting you and we're aren't gonna give you a warning shot'.

And somehow this totalitarian and oppressive Empire is better than the Federation just because it happens to be ultra-capitalistic, at least to some of our pro-Wars friends out there. And of course, Federation citizens just want to live there because the government is brainwashing them, like the Federation needs to do that. It’s all the freedoms and the general welfare that does the trick. I just hope that our Earth someday resembles UFP Earth, at least a little bit.

Edit: By the way, I’m no longer a redshirt! I finally made it to the bridge crew! Yes, no longer the expendable extra! I’m so glad….Ahem, as I was saying, finally a Bridge Officer.

[CrippledVulture]

And somehow this totalitarian and oppressive Empire is better than the Federation just because it happens to be ultra-capitalistic, at least to some of our pro-Wars friends out there. And of course, Federation citizens just want to live there because the government is brainwashing them, like the Federation needs to do that. It’s all the freedoms and the general welfare that does the trick. I just hope that our Earth someday resembles UFP Earth, at least a little bit.

I'm not sure it's about that. At least I haven't heard anyone explicitly say they would prefer to live under the Empire. Although it would fit the usual MO of some of these guys. Many of them have gone from pro-Wars to just anti-Trek. As I've stated before, it's nothing more than a shameless smear, a move right out of the Joe McCarthy playbook, really. The only other explanation is that they suffer from some misunderstandings about both communism and Star Trek, and have a severe lack of imagination.

The way I understand it, the whole debate is at a stalemate due to all that canon nonsense. Some folks see the need to try and smear Star Trek in other areas to compensate, and that's pretty sad.

Hey, I can understand that they might not enjoy Star Trek. That's fine. Both universes have had good and bad installments.

It's a shame it had to end up like this, really. Participating in something like this is the mark of a true uber-nerd and I've never been ashamed of my nerditude. It's fun, but it seems like it really brings out the worst in some people.

[GStone]

The strong desire for being in a capitalist society is to make money and lots of it to pay for goods, services and entertainment. Food, housing and medical care is freely given, as is education and probably job placement. The Federation uses a credit/debit card type system that would need some authorization code, either a string of digits/words and/or a thumb print. Once that happens, you'd be more free to replicate things you'd want, such as additional replicators/transporters and parts to build a ship/shuttle. With the free education, you can learn how to build and repair things like this and you can become more independent and you'd probably have better access to entertainment and other items with more credits, very similar to a capitalist society.

In a capitalist society, you really need to work hard for money. Wages are often low, most stuff isn't free and most people are stuck in dead end jobs that they hate, much like it is today.

If it really came down to working hard, there are other ways than being in a cubicle on a space station with poor ventilation, no natural light and high stress from performing high volumes of work in a short time span.

I'm begining to think it might be less anti-trek and more masochism.

Being rich and being in the military are the 2 most often used reasons for choosing SW to live in. They say the free health care is nice, but they act like you gotta become Stepford in the end to live there.

Many that choose this view are often ones that say that they want stories that are 'gritty' or 'real', often saying they liked that version of Trek (and referencing DS9 a lot). They say they like the harshness and tough balancing acts to get through everyday life in Trek. But, these comments come from those that aren't really experiencing the 'grittiness' or 'realness' they'd like to see. 99% of the time, these comments are coming from low middle class to middle middle class people. The extent of gritty and real that they go through is being stuck behind a desk with limited contact with people 50 hours a week, breathing in foul air and having a bad boss before running into rush hour traffic. Most people that experience actual grittiness and realness everyday don't want that in their entertainment. They look at these people and can't fathom how they find it entertaining. Relatively constant struggling is not a fun thing to go through.

Grittiness and realness only gives you so few stories. Eventually, it's no longer gritty and real and just becomes 'all right, everybody dies and everything gets blown up' because they keep defining both as being the tougher things in life. Negative things are not the only gritty and real things that exist, but the obsession of misguided perceptions makes them think that the only way to be gritty and real is to be cruel and difficult and sad and to feel despair.

Just go join a death cult already. I don't mind seeing something sad or difficult, but I hate things that are constantly downers. If I want that, I'll move to a major metropolitan city and live on the streets.

[SailorSaturn13]

Mike had a fairly straightforward method in his essay: see if the Federation fulfilled the basic goals of the Communist Manifesto. If the answer was fundamentally "yes", then the Federation was communistic.

Communist Manifesto was a critique of capitalism, it listed problems with it. Those appear to be solved in ST. But socialism is a METHOD of solving those problems, and its biggest problem is: it doesn't work. Therefore Communist Manifesto and socialism are VERY far from each other.

I think the most telling point he brought up was the people in the Federation, including Starfleet Captain Jean-Luc Picard, didn't even understand the concept of investment. DS9 hammered the point home with Jake tryinbg to explain the Federation's economic system to Nog, while Nog had to teach the most basic concepts of
investment and trade to Jake.

Which understanding did Legolas have of investments? Or Frodo? All you prove is that system on Earth(not even in whole federation) is not a capitalism. That doesn't mean its communism. Like I said: new production means call for different society, which we today cannot understand. Claiming "socialism" is useless.

You can argue trivialities like "the Picard vineyard" or "the Sisko Cajun restaurant" as much as you want, but those are outliers at best.

Huh? The only restrictions to we see are regarding military equipment, which is obvious. We see mostly State-owned property, true, but this is normal given the role of Starfleet. Today biggest ships also belong to military - everywhere. And the SW situation where a private organization can occupy a planet(Naboo) isn't a sign of capitalism, but of decay and disgrace.

Note also: "Federation" and "Earth" differ. Many federation worlds are more capitalistic.

The only thing that seems outlawed a BIG concerns, and given SW, we know why.

[SailorSaturn13]

The starwars goverment works. Works at keeping midlevel do nothing goverment officals employed. Think about it, just about every one of the starwars goverments both in film and EU has corruption, disorgansation/or endless bureaucracy, and very uncaring attitude. Then when complaints of thier corruptness and ineffeciny get to high they just have a coup and start the whole mess over with a new sheet. They function perfectly for the goverment users, just not the populace that has to live under it. :)
Yes the above was a joke.

You may be joking, but its a joke that I would have to agree with compleatly ;) Or rather ask yourself the following question;
with all that you have seen and know about both Star Trek and Star Wars, which one would you feel the most comfortable living in as an ordinary person?
I know what my answer would be.

David Brin wrote an article about this:
"Star wars despots vs Star Trek populists"
http://www.salon.com/ent/movies/feature ... ndex.html

[watchdog]

I've read that, I even have the final follow up in the book "Star Wars on trial" where he defends his opinion in a mock trial as the prosecutor and Mathew Stover (author revenge of the sith) was the defence.

[CrippledVulture]

Wow, I had never seen that piece before.

As a student of Mythology and Folklore (My minor, if you can believe it), I've always given Star Wars' backwardness a pass because I saw it as equal parts exploration and exploitation of the work of Joseph Campbell. Lucas and Campbell were friends, after all.

Lucas's "good monarch" thinking really has me a little jazzed, though. I mean, Anakin says that very thing in Episode II, but knowing he'd fall from grace made me stop before ascribing these feelings to Lucas himself.

If Lucas hadn't already raped and murdered my inner child with those prequels, I'd feel even more violated now.

Ever since I switched sides in ninth grade, when I first started watching "the Trek", I had felt this way about Star Wars. It was also around this time that I started studying mythology.

That said, I think it's a little unfair to go after Star Wars like this. No matter how you feel about the implications of Campbell's findings, one cannot deny that they are fascinating to learn. It's like a new-age, science-like spirituality. Not to mention it's nice to think about the fact that people all over the world share this story, that we share these common themes in our collective consciousness. Star Wars, when viewed through this lens, is a fascinating take on the subject, a hugely successful modern exploration of the theme. A validation of that common thread. An area BSG is delving into lately (Something I expect them to deal with in an interesting manner. Because, with the exception of the whole New Caprica debacle, that show has yet to let me down).

It's always been clear to me that, despite its problems, Star Trek is having a far more interesting and engaging discussion with culture, politics, and human nature. Star Wars is a story we've heard before, it was written as such. Why else is it science fiction that's set "a long time ago?" Star Trek dares to try and blaze new territory. For that reason, unlike its rival, it transcends a lot of our own philosophy. It tries to at least.

[watchdog]

If you liked mr Brins little essay from a few years back I would encourage you to find this book;
http://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Trial-S ... 148&sr=8-1
also you can check out the online voting forum, be warned its become a spammers paradise now;
http://starwarsontrial.invisionzone.com ... hp?act=idx

[AFT]

I'm not sure it's about that. At least I haven't heard anyone explicitly say they would prefer to live under the Empire. Although it would fit the usual MO of some of these guys. Many of them have gone from pro-Wars to just anti-Trek. As I've stated before, it's nothing more than a shameless smear, a move right out of the Joe McCarthy playbook, really. The only other explanation is that they suffer from some misunderstandings about both communism and Star Trek, and have a severe lack of imagination.

The way I understand it, the whole debate is at a stalemate due to all that canon nonsense. Some folks see the need to try and smear Star Trek in other areas to compensate, and that's pretty sad.

Hey, I can understand that they might not enjoy Star Trek. That's fine. Both universes have had good and bad installments.

It's a shame it had to end up like this, really. Participating in something like this is the mark of a true uber-nerd and I've never been ashamed of my nerditude. It's fun, but it seems like it really brings out the worst in some people.

No, they haven’t…although I have the distinctive impression of reading just that somewhere, I can’t remember where, but you’re dead right about something: some of them doesn’t seem to be pro-Wars anymore but just anti-Trek and as such they invent or foment many of the infamous Trek myths around, if that suits their apparent objective of just attacking ST. As you said, its really sad.