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Utopian Enterprises: Growing Up with Star Trek

2023; Penn State University Press; Volume: 34; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.5325/utopianstudies.34.2.0359

2154-9648

Mark Stephen Jendrysik,

Political Economy and Marxism

It might be hard to imagine today, when new Star Trek entertainment product seems to be everywhere, that there was once a time when Star Trek meant the seventy-nine episodes of the original series and nothing else. And it might be hard to imagine a time when episodes of a television series had to be watched at one particular time, with no guarantee those episodes would ever be seen again—before the VCR, before streaming, when you had to race home and not miss a moment of the program. When Star Trek came on at 4 p.m., I sat glued to the TV, hoping my mother wouldn’t call me to dinner until 5. You might also remember telling friends who missed the program about the plot and experiencing the Rashomon effect as debates raged about what happened or did not happen on the show the afternoon before.In this article, I try to reconstruct the experience of watching Star Trek (“the Original Series,” or TOS, not that we called it that) for the first time as a child in the mid-1970s. This will be a reconstruction in Margaret Atwood’s sense of the term. I cannot at this distance of time be certain that my recollections have not been modified with the knowledge of years, or by a desire to make the experience of Star Trek perhaps more central to my life than it was at the time. I will also reflect on Star Trek as a utopian and anti-utopian artifact. I do this because it seems to me that the Original Series has become the object of various caricatures that don’t do justice to the complexity and ambiguity of the program.I ask you, if you are old enough, to cast your mind back to a time when Star Trek was not a multiplatform cultural juggernaut. I was born in 1964 and, perhaps predictably, I was enthralled by the space program as a child. After all, I grew up in the waxing years of the space race, just after Alan Shepard made his orbit around Earth. I was five years old when Neil Armstrong made his famed walk on the moon. The moon landings and Skylab missions provided hours of respite for my mother, too, as I sat glued to the television listening to Walter Cronkite’s calm voice. I read issues of National Geographic about the space race until they fell apart. I read all the books in my school’s library about space. A picture book with an introduction by Werner Von Braun showing future space habitants seemed to present an obvious future path for humanity.1 My friends and I were firmly convinced that one day, and soon, we would go live and work in space!By the early 1970s I had become a big fan of science fiction. In that simpler time sci-fi meant my Uncle Tom’s collection of anthologies that he had left at my grandmother’s house. On many afternoons in her sunroom, I tried to work through stories that were more than a little above my reading level. Poul Anderson’s story “The Queen of Air and Darkness” (1971) made a particularly strong impression on me in its treatment of colonialism and resistance (not that I would have used those terms at the time). Isaac Asimov’s Y/A2 book series Lucky Starr: Space Ranger (1952–58) was another favorite. I was enthralled with the stories set on Mars, Venus, and across the solar system. When I met the author in 1974, he seemed embarrassed by my love of these fairly slight works that he had published under the pseudonym “Paul French.” When I asked him to sign one of my “Lucky Starr” books, he laughed and said something like “those were a long time ago.”Sci-fi also meant movies that showed up on our local independent television stations, often as part of programs with titles like “Sunday Adventure Theater.” My friends and I became quite the connoisseurs of various voyages to the Moon and Mars. Trips to Mars were particular favorites since the Red Planet was in the news with the Mariner flybys in the early ’70s and Viking landings in 1976. Angry Red Planet, a 1959 film in which Mars is filmed entirely in a red filter, and Robinson Crusoe on Mars, a 1964 film featuring heroic astronauts, a space monkey, and humans enslaved by aliens, inspired a lot of playground discussion. However, all of these experiences paled before Star Trek, our one true measure of sci-fi greatness.One thing to remember about those days is that, after an episode’s original airing, you never knew what episode would be shown and whether an episode you liked would ever come around again. Since I was only two years old when Star Trek premiered in 1966, and five years old when the series finale aired in 1969, most of the episodes I watched were in syndication. It became very confusing since the syndicated episodes were shown in no particular order with early first-season episodes and late third-seasons episodes following each other. This led to some interesting theories on the playground about just what was going on. Sometimes when my mother would call us to dinner during an episode, my brother and I would bolt down our food to not miss a moment, because who knew when or if you would ever see this episode again. There was always a thrill of recognition when a favorite episode such as “Balance of Terror,” “The Trouble with Tribbles,” or “Mirror, Mirror” came on. I remember the first time we saw “Journey to Babel” and wondered if the Tellerites were evolved pigs. (This led to some interesting pondering the next time I was served bacon.) At Valentine School the next day, we would discuss the episode and then draw starships with our rulers and protractors during our free time.The messages conveyed in several episodes made a very strong impression on me. One of them was “The Doomsday Machine.” Not only was it a great adventure story filled with tension, it was also a powerful mediation on honor and bravery. Commodore Decker’s suicidal sacrifice at the end of the episode is perhaps the proper thing to do for someone in his position, someone whose entire crew had perished due to his mistakes, but Kirk is also correct that this sacrifice should not occur because it necessary for Decker to live and continue serving. It is a really interesting paradox. I was very impressed by the fact that they both were right and there was a situation where there was no single answer, no easy way out.3 This has informed my understanding of political life where quite often we are left with only bad choices.Like “The Doomsday Machine,” “Balance of Terror” is a great adventure story filled with danger and heroic actions (on both sides). One of the episode’s lessons that has stuck with me long-term is that bigotry is wrong and makes you stupid. Lieutenant Styles jumps to the conclusion that since Spock and the Romulans look alike, Spock must be in league with them. Holding such feelings is shameful and not acceptable. As Kirk says to Lieutenant Styles, “leave whatever bigotry you have in your quarters, there’s no place for it on the bridge.” In “Let That Be Your Last Battlefield,” the writers drive home this lesson as a whole planet is destroyed by racism. The madness and evil of racism are made unsubtly clear in the irrational actions of the two aliens whose mutual hatred is incomprehensible to our heroes.While no one would call “The Omega Glory” a particularly notable or high-quality episode, its final moments, when Kirk reads the preamble of the United States Constitution to the postapocalyptic survivors of a parallel Earth, made an enormous impression on me. He says these words are not just for “the chiefs or the kings or the warriors or the rich and powerful, but for all the people! . . . They must apply to everyone, or they mean nothing!” In retrospect, it’s corny and over the top. But, as a child, I was struck by the idea that even across the distance of light-years, the principles of equality still hold. I believed then and still believe now that universal ideas of human freedom are good, and we must strive to attain them, or be false to ourselves and to our posterity. I’ve even quoted Captain Kirk’s statement during a recent appearance on local radio. A caller was claiming certain people from other countries can never become Americans since they don’t believe and can’t learn our ideals. I responded, “Captain Kirk knew better.”The arrival of the animated series in the fall of 1973 was very exciting to our group of fans. But, while we were willing to accept the animated show’s obvious cheapness (the lame Hanna-Barbara school of animation), we were less willing to accept the weak plots. A few episodes stood out, but for the most part the show made very little impression on us. (I think the network also kept moving the show’s time around and our local station regularly pre-empted it for various regional programming.) I remained a strong Star Trek partisan even in the face of Star Wars mania. After seeing Star Wars in its original 1977 run, my dad asked me what I thought. Much to his dismay I replied, “It was OK, but it’s no Star Trek.”Was the original Star Trek series utopian? The conventional understanding of utopia posits a conflict-less “perfect” society, one in which all problems have been solved. As scholars of utopian studies know, this is an oversimplification, but it is certainly the pop-culture perception of utopia. The claim/belief/dogma that Star Trek (TOS) represents a realized utopia, however, is incorrect. I believe people conflate the self-satisfied Federation of the early seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation (TNG) with the rawer and ambiguously delineated Federation of TOS. The belief that TOS presents some sort of perfected utopia seems to have more to do with the first two, rather awful, seasons of TNG where creator Gene Roddenberry was allowed to enforce his views on the writers. Much like the cliché that Kirk was an unstoppable horndog, a caricatured version of TOS has arisen, one that allows people to dismiss the show in favor of their particular flavor of Trek.One of the most interesting things about TOS was that during the series the crew of the Enterprise never visit twenty-third-century Earth.4 The viewer really can’t be sure of the conditions there. While hints are dropped every now and then, we never really know what Earth is like, except that maybe it’s not a very interesting place, as Dr. Boyce suggests in the first pilot “The Cage.” Star Trek (TOS) takes place on the frontier, the last frontier of space.5 This frontier is rough and often lawless. There are criminals, dubious entrepreneurs, angry exploited miners, genocidal criminals on the run, and all manner of aliens who are less than thrilled to make the acquaintance of human beings. The Federation even has prisons and penal colonies. Utopia is not a place you can locate in the universe of TOS. It does not emerge on a single planet, nor can you locate utopia in the Federation itself.In fact, the Federation, as presented in the original series, seems to exist in the background, its methods and organization hinted at, but not explained. Kirk occasionally interacts with Federation bureaucrats, but we get no clear sense of just what the organization actually does. We receive some hints of dissatisfaction with apparent peace and order of society. The “space hippies” in the famously awful episode “The Way to Eden” find the Federation dull, controlling, and overly mechanized. Meanwhile, in “Space Seed,” Lieutenant McGivers appears to desire a heroic savior since life in the Federation is so safe. Dissident antitechnology Luddites exist and settle entire planets, as seen in “This Side of Paradise.” Genocide and massacres occur, even inside the Federation. The mass murderer Kodos hides among a troupe of actors until exposed by Kirk in “The Conscience of the King.”6 The crew of the Enterprise wipes out an entire race of parasitic aliens in “Operation: Annihilate!” Deadly plagues threaten whole planets. The Gorns slaughter the population of a Federation colony in “Arena.” This is not a particularly positive environment, much less a utopian one.But while TOS does not present a realized utopia anywhere, I believe several key utopian principles lie at the heart of TOS. First, Star Trek is humanist. Machines are tools and must never supplant or control sentient creatures. Gods or godlike beings cannot provide humanity with true happiness. True human life requires struggle, conflict, and aspirations. Mere existence—even if it is pleasant and safe—means death. Kirk and his comrades defeat a computer that holds a society in a static, recurring pattern in “Return of the Archons,” a machine that creates a seeming Eden in “The Apple,” and plants that infect humans, producing total placidity and contentment, in “This Side of Paradise.”7 Kirk rejects the apparently utopian society of the “Platonians” (a telekinetic alien race who model their society after Plato’s Republic) in “Plato’s Stepchildren.” Kirk even refuses the offer of the “god” Apollo (another superhuman alien) of a contented and protected life in “Who Mourns from Adonis.” Those places and persons that suggest even a whiff of conventional tropes of utopian narratology aren’t just flawed but dangerous. For instance, in “The Ultimate Computer,” the M-5, a device we would now recognize as artificial intelligence, goes on a rampage of destruction until Kirk convinces it its actions are wrong and the machine must atone. Interestingly the M-5, when made to realize its murderous actions, decides the punishment must be death. I find this exchange fascinating since Kirk never actually says the M-5 deserves death, he only asks “What is the penalty for murder?” The AI answers, “This unit must die.” Clearly, artifical intelligence or other advanced technologies cannot create utopia.The second key lesson is that human beings must remain human. Only those advances achieved by people are truly good. Genetic manipulation or the attainment of superhuman powers taint achievements and ultimately all drive superhumans to see other people as mere things. In the episode “Space Seed,” Khan is driven by an insane desire to dominate those he sees as lesser. Meanwhile, in the second pilot, “Where No Man Has Gone Before,” Commander Gary Mitchell receives superpowers only to succumb to murderous megalomania. Humans have no need for gods or for godlike heroes. Power corrupts all such creatures. The more superpowered a being, the more malevolent. Star Trek stood for the principle that comfort cannot be obtained through the exploitation of our fellow beings. Utopia for a few cannot be purchased at the cost of exploitation and misery for others. For instance, in “The Cloud Minders,” the inhabitants of the floating city of Stratos live in luxury and pursue the “higher” goods of art and culture. Below them, the mining class lives in poverty and violence. Kirk must figure out a way to deal with this injustice while not violating the key principle of noninterference (the Prime Directive). It’s a tricky maneuver, but perhaps the pursuit of cooperation among communities is what makes Star Trek utopian. Whether or not the Federation achieves its goal of interplanetary harmony, it functions on the principle of partnership. Maybe Star Trek has always focused on lessons in interpersonal relationships rather than interplanetary governance.For me, the most utopian lesson in TOS is the principle that human liberation is not via technology but through overcoming our fears, especially our fears of “the other.” To live and work and thrive in space we must overcome this fear of the other, of persons and communities who appear different from us. For instance, in “The Devil in the Dark,” our heroes are confronted with the Horta, a totally alien creature composed of a material (silicon) that Federation science believed could not be the basis of life. Once they overcome their fear and revulsion, they come to understand that this creature acted and reacted in ways that could be understood, respected, and appreciated. Star Trek teaches us to put aside our differences, which is a lesson we are still learning today as we work to build a more just and inclusive world for all people, especially those who have been marginalized such as people of color, people with disabilities, and the queer community, among others.As I argue in my book Utopia (2020), when we think about utopia and judge the utopian nature and content of an artifact, we must consider several propositions.8 First, utopia is necessary. We die without the dreams of a better world. Like the characters in TOS, we are “homo utopicus.” Star Trek remains popular almost sixty years after first airing because it appeals to our desire to look to the future with hope and see it as something better and greater. Second, utopia has been realized. The people of Earth in the twenty-third century may live in what we might consider a utopic space. But the realization of utopia cannot be achieved at the price of others’ suffering. Third, utopia is humanist. Human beings, and for TOS all sentient life, cannot be treated as things or abstractions. Fourth, utopia is about harmony and unity. TOS operates from a position that humanity can attain harmony and unity while still defending the individuality and individual desires of people. TOS continually contrasts the struggle of its society to attain these often-conflictual goals with those societies that have chosen unity and harmony at the expense of the individual. Finally, utopia reshapes the limits of the possible. At its best, all versions of Star Trek discover the new as the characters challenge their assumptions and expand their horizons. We must learn to do the same. I believe that TOS rejects utopia as an achieved space and instead supports the vision of utopia as social dreaming. The fact that the human race goes on, that here is hope for a better future, might be the most utopian thing about all Star Trek series. In the face of endless tales of collapse, of the ongoing boom in end-of-days stories, Star Trek’s faith in humanity’s ability to survive and indeed thrive in the future remains the most utopian aspiration of all.