I'm watching TOS again. I never finished it back in the day. Not because I didn't enjoy it, it's just that TV shows, especially long episode length ones are easy for me to get bored of.
But TOS is the only Star Trek I like. I forced myself to watch all of Next generation and didn't care for it. Haven't seen the others, but with Deep Space Nine not being as much about self contained stories but long archs, I see myself hating that even more.
But this is about TOS.
I hear all the time "Star Trek was always a woke show...it's not for you right wingers, yadda yadda yadda".
Well after I watch an episode, I check out the review for it on Jammers reviews and I read the comments.
I swear about 90% of the comments for the original series are pointing out all the stuff they find "problematic".
"I love the plot in this episode, but I hate the portrayal of "insert woman character"
or
"Wow this episode basically took a pro-colonialism stance, that did not age well"
To me, if you have to constantly dodge landmines of things that irritate you in a show, then you're not the target audience.
It would be like me claiming that Marvel movies are right wing entertainment because of things like law and order, justice, etc. Then I'd have to go "but I hate this feminism inserted here, and this race pandering here" and on and on. It would be absurd for me to claim that Marvel movies are conservative if I'm having to constantly express my frustration with woke elements.
Likewise, while there are some philosophical underpinnings to the writers of Star Trek that are subversive and leftist, 98% of what comes through in practice is stuff that's refreshing to me as an old school Conservative Christian.
The very stuff they gripe about is some of the most appealing aspects to me about the show. The Star Trek writers essentially understood the nature of women and wrote them accordingly and realistically to reality as just one example.
And while they did have some left leaning tendencies that sometimes comes through, the thing people don't talk about is how influenced in Christian Conservative thinking even atheists were in their thinking back then by virtue of having grown up and lived in a Christian culture.
Modern Star Trek is an example of how post-Christian thinking has worked it's way into writing.
Well the original 60s Star Trek has so much thinking and viewpoint that was right in line with how normal people viewed things. Yes some liberal stuff got through, and they probably would have gotten away with more if they could have, but there are just generally character attitudes rooted in how men are supposed to be, and how women are supposed to be, and values rooted in at least the concept of objective morality, which they unknowingly are getting from the Christian society.
So I wouldn't claim that Star Trek is a Conservative show, but my point is that when I watch it, it's like a breath of fresh air, while the so called die hard Star Trek fans, have to scrape through with a fine tooth comb to extract the few things they like while having to give caveats about all the "problematic" things.
When there's a show with as much wokeness as the so-called "bigotry" that these Star Trek fans are finding in TOS, then I stop watching that show, I don't claim that I like it, and I certainly don't claim it for my side.
If Star Trek TOS was as "progressive" and "woke" as they claim, I'd be having a hard time watching it, instead of it being like a refreshing gulp of crisp water contrasted with the sewage that is modern day ideology and these "fan" comments wouldn't be filled with statements about how much this and that element are "tough to stomach" and "a product of its time".
You needed a very specific definition to create this differentiation. There are more metrics to immorality than inherent or biblical evil.
Pedos don't inherently have to hurt children. But we know that will happen to such an overwhelming amount of time we don't need to split the hairs on it.
Heck, black people existing in a country doesn't have to inherently increase crime and violence, but it always does and most of our "race politics" debates rest on this fact. Its one of the reasons why that scene is so Progressive and Woke to this day.
This is a foolish comparison. We are assessing it by both how big of a shakeup it was and the agenda that it is attempting to push. The interracial kiss was meant to be a statement reflecting the real world Civil Rights movement, which is why Shatner forcefully ruined every take to make sure it got on air, whereas a toilet flushing is not trying to make a message on Leftist Political positions.
Even if it did, its purely on a neutral action against censorship. We can squabble on the degeneration of American culture by allowing gross things on TV like that, but that's a whole much larger and less Left/Right definable discussion.
A white man giving in to his lust constantly with women to whom he is not married is objectively immoral thing regardless of who its with, based on "biblicaly inherently immoral" standards. Heck most times the bible refers to these acts it calls it "sexual immorality" specifically. This is your standard, so it fails before it even reaches the "black woman" part.
You've created a super specific metric to define things to defend a property you like from being criticized by the same standard you hold many other things to.
It was a Leftist political message shoved into a network television show to push a very controversial position onto the populace via media manipulation and social pressure. That makes it no different than the vast amount of gay and tranny stuff is right now, regardless of how you want to split the hair.
Its fine if you like Star Trek, heck its fine if you think the tarring of it goes too far in some ways. Literally everyone here has some Woke property we like anyway.