This, 100%. It is difficult to come up with a definition of what is offensive that everyone will agree on, as not everyone has the same sensibilities or sensitivities. Case in point, I am not nearly as bothered by "Who Watches the Watchers" as Berat is, or for that matter, by many of the examples that Worffan posted. On the flip side, that does not necessarily invalidate the opinion of those who are offended by these episodes. You have the right to take offense, though not everyone will share your opinion.
Note that I did put down a list of what qualifies as offensive for this discussion, and I posted reasons for why I nominated episodes, and took suggestions before the troll brigade came to town.
I'm not just saying "I didn't like this therefore it was bad", I'm saying "these episodes had extremely negative implications due to their mishandling of serious issues, and these other episodes were insultingly stupid".
This, 100%. It is difficult to come up with a definition of what is offensive that everyone will agree on, as not everyone has the same sensibilities or sensitivities. Case in point, I am not nearly as bothered by "Who Watches the Watchers" as Berat is, or for that matter, by many of the examples that Worffan posted. On the flip side, that does not necessarily invalidate the opinion of those who are offended by these episodes. You have the right to take offense, though not everyone will share your opinion.
Yes, indeed. There is also the possibility that your voicing your opinion at something for being offensive will be offensive to others in and of itself. :P
Bluegeek, I'm not pointing towards characters being racist and being called out on it as a character flaw, I'm talking about episodes that give racist, sexist, or otherwise harmful messages.
I've got to put that down as bad writing. Not so much as being intentionally racist, sexist, or name-your-prejudice. Just not thinking hard enough about how the audience might react to those particular episodes.
TOS aired at a time when people's attitudes toward those things were still changing in the wake of the 60's. There was still segregation going on. And even today we're still dealing with people who stereotype and discriminate against other people just because of what they look like. Some of them don't even think about it. If they did, they might treat others differently.
I find it hard to believe that the producers of any modern Star Trek series would intentionally endorse any sort of racism. Sexism, perhaps, because sex sells and titillation goes over well with some of the target demographic. Even then, I doubt the main goal is necessarily to objectify women. That's an unfortunate by-product when they try to make steamy love scenes or exclusively cast attractive women and men for screen appeal.
Take the Betazoid wedding ceremony. You can take the offered explanation that nudity is supposed to symbolize openness. Or you can understand it as "sex sells". And they might very well both be true.
On the flip side of that, there's "Moogie". Where the Ferengi customs are obviously intended to be portrayed offensively and the message is actually anti-sexist. Go on, feel free to bleach your eyes now. I'm going to. You can thank me later.
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I would point out that Q, to his credit, has never actually called himself a god. I think he mentioned once that other people have called him the God of Lies, but he never actually tried to claim the title, unlike whatever Apollo was.
I'm somewhat new to SG-1 being that I'm halfway through the second season but are you referring to
the episode "Emancipation"? If so, I didn't really find that one really offensive to the audience being that we as the viewers were supposed to side with Carter's views to establish that the chief was some big bad, if you get what I mean. It wasn't a very good episode to begin with though. The only bright side was that SG-1 didn't almost destroy the world through sheer incompetence as they do every other episode in season 2:rolleyes:.
And in a positive comparison to "Code of Honor", which "Emancipation" was pretty much a rewrite of by the same scriptwriter, O'Neill was fully willing to just shoot Turghan and the rest of his tribe if he had to in order to retrieve Carter, which Picard apparently wasn't for Yar. (There's a prominent shot during the Turghan/Carter fight of O'Neill's finger itching towards the safety on his MP5.)
I'm not saying it wasn't a sh*tty episode overall (for one thing you'd think Daniel would be a lot angrier about the whole thing considering his own wife was kidnapped for a similar purpose just two episodes earlier), but I'd pick Jack O'Neill as my CO over Picard any day.
"Great War! / And I cannot take more! / Great tour! / I keep on marching on / I play the great score / There will be no encore / Great War! / The War to End All Wars"
— Sabaton, "Great War"
I would point out that Q, to his credit, has never actually called himself a god. I think he mentioned once that other people have called him the God of Lies, but he never actually tried to claim the title, unlike whatever Apollo was.
not true; he literally called himself God in 'Tapestry', as shown below
"Q, what is going on?"
"I told you. You're dead, this is the afterlife, and I'm God."
"You are not God!"
"Blasphemy! You're lucky I don't cast you out or smite you or something."
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch." "We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Passion and Serenity are one.
I gain power by understanding both.
In the chaos of their battle, I bring order.
I am a shadow, darkness born from light.
The Force is united within me.
not true; he literally called himself God in 'Tapestry', as shown below
Yeah, I'm not counting trolling. Maybe I should've said "never unironically called himself God".
"Great War! / And I cannot take more! / Great tour! / I keep on marching on / I play the great score / There will be no encore / Great War! / The War to End All Wars"
— Sabaton, "Great War"
About Russians--definitely not a "race." Russia is home to a very large number of ethnicities, who identify as being of Russian nationality. Heck, my character Alyosha (though not actually human) reflects in his human form a multiethnic origin, which includes both Caucasian and native Siberian.
(I actually did not recognize the Siberian aspect for what it was until someone from Eastern Europe saw his design and told me that was what it was.)
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Anything that could potentially be seen as offensive in ST was probably either designed to highlight discrimnitory attitudes to shine light on them, or didn't reflect major concerns at the time the episodes were written (and I'm sure a healthy dose of bad writing can be added to the equation). I don't really see the merit of picking through each episode with the fine-tooth comb looking for offense, because regardless of the show, there will always be something unintentional to take offense to: Spongebob, for example.
:eek: My God, I never thought I'd wind up agreeing with nabreeki.
Wow.... just wow... Seems to me that the OP is actually looking for things to be offended about.
Because a lot of those are some the most backwards and twisted ways of looking at them. :rolleyes:
Honestly of that list only 2 or 3 at most can be considered genuinely offensive.
I would call Irish a nationality and/or an ethnicity. Lolz on you turning around and using the term 'Russian Race' right after declaring that Irish isn't a race.
I can also see someone using the term 'race' in a figurative sense in regard to any specific group of people with a shared genealogy. In which case, the 'Irish race' might apply in a non-scientific way.
As to Koenig's Chekov accent, you might as well be offended that Scarlett Johansson's Black Widow doesn't have a Russian accent. They're actors playing a part. If you have to be offended at anybody, be offended at the casting director for not finding actors with real accents.
Try as I might, my wife tells me I have a horrible parody of a British accent whenever I try it. I just can't seem to get it right. I'm sure I'd offend anybody from the U.K. who heard me, too. It's not intentional. It's just an unexplainable inability to pick it up, coupled with an irrational urge to try it because I like the sound of it.
Personally, while it isn't contained within Dragon's Teeth itself, the fact that "Vaadwaur" is a Talaxian racial slur (rather than the language that these people call themselves) makes all your interactions with them in STO very offensive.
My mom, my dad, my grandparents, my uncle, my aunt, my two stepsisters, my stepmother, my dad's neighbors, my grandparents' neighbors, my uncle-we're-not-actually-related-but-I-call-him-my-uncle-anyway...
My entire family is Irish. And I don't mean in the sense of "descended from the Irish," I mean "my parents only moved to America in 1986, I was the first member of my family born in America, my dad moved back to Ireland in 2003, my great-grandfather fought in both the Irish War of Independence and the Irish Civil War, and the great majority of my relatives still live in Ireland, mostly in and around the Dublin area, though my dad lives in Kilkenny. I have visited Ireland at least once a year since I was two, went to Kindergarten there, nearly destroyed the Book of Kells when I threw up on its case as a baby (and am probably the reason why no one is allowed to get closer than 10 feet to it anymore), and yet despite all this I can't do an Irish accent to save my life except when singing a song by The Pogues, Flogging Molley, or Thin Lizzy."
I can safely say that unless there's someone in this thread that actually lives there, I know more about Ireland and the Irish than anyone here.
That episode portrays Irish people as violent, stupid drunks. Which is offensive.
My father, on the Irish:
"The Irish are a race of thieves."
"The Irish are like the French in that they have delusions of relevancy."
Those are literally the most printable things that my father has ever said about his own race. Many Irish folk I have met have even less positive things to say about their own race. It's kind of like how most of the best Russian humor is based around making fun of Russians*, only the Irish aren't usually making jokes. This is leaving aside that the Irish are the most casually racist people I know of - well, them and the Japanese. Visiting Ireland is like taking a trip to every stereotypical version of the Deep South you have ever seen except it's freezing cold and pissing rain and folk speak with an Irish brogue rather than a Southern drawl. As near as I can tell the only thing the Irish find offensive is bringing up the Troubles in polite company, or speaking ill of the Pope. And not even all Irish folk on the latter.
Now, having said that, as mentioned, I am hereby unilaterally declaring myself as an expert on the Irish and will make some notes.
- The Irish actually don't consume that much alcohol...comparatively A significant portion of the island are actually teetotalers, and the French, Austrians, Estonians, and Germans all outrank the Irish in terms of per-capita alcohol consumption (according to the OECD - the WHO actually ranks them even lower). Having said that, though, 5th place in all of Europe is still rather immense.
- The Irish are fairly belligerent but rarely to the point of crime, because they expect belligerence from amongst each other and so don't take things as seriously. As long as no one is permanently hurt, then it's not worth reporting. Ireland ranks 50th in the world in terms of crime. Part of this, though, might be a result of how underpopulated the island is, meaning that people have plenty of space. Most of the population is concentrated around Dublin. The island could probably support 10 million people but has less than half that, and the population still isn't as large as it was before the Potato Famine (8.2 million in 1841, 4.5 million today).
- The above is not helped by the fact that until recently half of all Irish people born on the island would leave, emigrating to America or Europe rather than staying there. Ireland was just not a pleasant place to live until about the mid-90s - despite its allegiance to NATO it was for all intents and purposes a third world nation in terms of economy. This is not helped by...
- Massive, massive, massive, massive political corruption the likes of which you cannot even comprehend unless you've actually lived in the country and seen it in action. House of Cards is par for the course in Ireland.
- Finally, at the time that "Fair Haven" is supposed to be set - that is, the mid to late 19th century - Ireland really was like that. It was full of violent and stupid drunks - violent because of the famine and English oppression, stupid because of poor education due to English oppression, and drunk because it was better to drink than to contemplate the reality that was Ireland of the era, thanks to English oppression.
---
*My favorite Russian joke, told by Russians about Russians: An American, a Frenchman and a Russian are all captured by the TRIBBLE and sentenced to death. Each is allowed to choose the method of execution. The Frenchman goes first, and chooses a guillotine. But the guillotine is not working, so they set him free. As he passes by the American, he whispers: "The guillotine is broken," so the American also chooses the guillotine, and is also set free. As the American passes by the Russian, he whispers: "The guillotine is broken." "Well, since the guillotine is broken," says the Russian, "then give me the firing squad!"
TOS aired at a time when people's attitudes toward those things were still changing in the wake of the 60's. There was still segregation going on.
TOS aired from 1966 to 1969. My wife was born in 1973. Her skin is the color of semisweet chocolate, but her birth certificate read "white" until she paid to have it corrected because the hospital she was born at, in Atlanta, GA, was historically white, and the nurse just assumed any baby born there would be Caucasian.
It was apparently less than a year ago that my own eldest brother told my niece that her (black) boyfriend had to be kept working, "because otherwise those boys get into trouble." (Said niece didn't want to say anything until earlier today.) Things have gotten better, but they're not behind us yet.
I'm going to have to include all of TOS on the offensive list because Walter Koenig is NOT Russian and his accent is obviously an over exaggerated parody of real Russian speech in English. This is offensive to the Russian Race and to all English Language Learners.
Wait, what about in Season 1, before Koenig joined the cast?
Plus I always just assumed that, given some 300 years of language drift, Russian might actually just sound like that in the future. Our accents probably don't really match up to the accents spoken in the 1700s.
Is it just me or is "being offended' just an excuse to be intolerant of viewpoints that are simply more common?
It's not just you. These days "being offended" has become a way of life for some.
I had a youth group minister who told us that movies that had violent/sexual content should'nt be allowed because it corrupts people. I argued that hiding from the evils of life doesnt make you a pure/clean person, just sheltered and untested. The person that is exposed/tested to the world and doesn't waiver is the stronger/pure/clean individual. Of course, I got kickd out.
I think the whole "offended" movement is a way to control speech and thought, akin to heresy crimes/punishment in the days of olde with less use of torture devises.
Is it just me or is "being offended' just an excuse to be intolerant of viewpoints that are simply more common?
I see it more as an excuse to violate the freedom of speech. In many cases it's little more than "I don't like that therefore you shouldn't do it." Thus trivializing the concept.
I'd just like to point out that I don't find any of the 'anti-religion' episodes offensive in any way. Every comment Picard made in 'Who watches the Watchers' were characteristics of terran religion at the Mintaakans' stage of evolution. Religion did contribute to fear and intolerance and stagnation in the dark ages - it was one of the main factors. Picard's comment is completely fair - at the Mintakkans' stage of society, a religion based around him would likely have led to their own dark age.
And I'm saying this as a Christian.
Besides, I think what offended him more wasn't the idea of a Mintaakan religion, but one with him as its deity - he refused to be responsible for starting a religion based on a misunderstanding.
As for what episodes I find offensive?
There is no particular episode, but that scene where Kirk tries to pass Spock off as Chinese in 'Guardian of Forever'. I let him off for the fact that he was put on the spot by a cop, and because Spock's reaction was hilarious, but still...
I facepalmed every time religion, faith, spirituality, and new age silliness were given any modicum of respect. But I wasn't offended. Why? Because as an adult, I know that my opinion is just that, an opinion.
Be offended when someone personally insults you. Be offended when someone deliberately endangers you or your loved ones. Be offended when someone is nasty without cause.
But to be offended because someone expressed an opinion that differs from yours. Please, for the sake of civil society, grow up.
I think you can be offended without taking it to an extreme. I did find the overreach of "Who Watches the Watchers" offensive. But at the same time, you don't see me engaging in some sort of pointless campaign to get it taken off the air, or even harassing others who don't share the same opinion to try to browbeat them until they either stop talking or cave to my opinion. I believe I have the right to speak my piece and explain what I think was wrong with it. I can put the idea out there. We can have a conversation about it. But civility means accepting that not everyone will be convinced and knowing when to let it go and not insulting people because they disagree.
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And "Tattoo". Seriously, who thought it was a good idea to give a character who was already a racist stereotype an episode wherein he found that his ancestors were half-animal savages before magic space white men taught them how to be human?
Yeah. I'm a straight white upper-middle-class male whose experience and knowledge comes almost entirely from books, and even I find that offensive.
I will say this for Code of Honor. It showed why I think Tasha was a better security officer than Worf at the start. She actually intercepted the container and checked it was safe before handing it to Picard, whereas Worf just lets the Captain take it. I just wished we got to see more of her. So...... yeah, that's one good thing about that episode. If that helps anyone.
*******************************************
A Romulan Strike Team, Missing Farmers and an ancient base on a Klingon Border world. But what connects them? Find out in my First Foundary mission: 'The Jeroan Farmer Escapade'
I'd say Patterns of Force from TOS, simply down to the fact It was made just 21-22 years after the end of WW2 with the crimes of TRIBBLE Germany still fresh in people's minds at the time.
"The meaning of victory is not to merely defeat your enemy but to destroy him, to completely eradicate him from living memory, to leave no remnant of his endeavours, to crush utterly his achievement and remove from all record his every trace of existence. From that defeat no enemy can ever recover. That is the meaning of victory."
-Lord Commander Solar Macharius
The only reason you think of Chakotay as a "racist stereotype" is because that's how you perceive the character. One of the good things about Star Trek is that it doesn't matter what race/color/species a character is.
As for the idea of "magic white space men", it's no more or no less as ridiculous an idea as evolution.
...I can't tell if you're trolling or serious.
A Mayan from South America who believes in spirit animals, grew up in a tepee, uses hallucinogenic stuff for rituals, gives dream catchers as gifts to adults, has a Maori tattoo from New Zealand, and claims that all of the above is from his culture, is not a real Native American. For example, the dream catcher that he gives Seven in that one episode? Thats an artifact from the Ojibwa (also transliterated as Ojibwe or Chippewa) nation, used over childrens cribs. Mayans are from Central America, near the Yucatan Peninsula (theres a fairly large population in Guatemala that still uses native languages a lot and is generally abused by the local Spanish-speaking authorities. In fact, the disappearance of the Mayans was mostly cooked up by early Spanish-American thinkers trying to justify and/or cover up the massive abuses committed by their governments. IRL, the only collapse was of the classical, city-based Mayan nobles, while the common people survived without too much fuss). That tattoo Chakotay wears is most similar to Maori designs from Polynesian cultures in New Zealand, half a ****ing world away from Mexico. And thats BEFORE he finds out that his ancestors were half-animal savages until magic space white people taught them how to be human. Frankly, about the only offensive things he DIDNT do were say How, great sachem! or plenty wampum, open a casino, and/or smoke a peace pipe. And when you compare that to Tattoo...yeah. Offensive either way.
And seriously, you're going to call a tested, refined theory with literally centuries of evidence behind it as ridiculous as magic space white men?????
If you want to actually learn about Native Americans, I recommend the book 500 Nations and anything by Hank Adams.
I also think Chakotay is done very disrespectfully towards Native American culture.
I actually think the fix would have been very simple though...expressly have him not follow the ways of any current culture but have him follow a New Age religion that came into being in the 22nd century--something new kind of like some of the "new paganism" type movements or Wicca. It still might not be as good as doing proper cultural research for Native American culture but stating onscreen that he follows a new religion would remove the need to worry about authenticity (and IMO new religions coming into being would be more realistic than Roddenberry's enforced atheism).
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Comments
Note that I did put down a list of what qualifies as offensive for this discussion, and I posted reasons for why I nominated episodes, and took suggestions before the troll brigade came to town.
I'm not just saying "I didn't like this therefore it was bad", I'm saying "these episodes had extremely negative implications due to their mishandling of serious issues, and these other episodes were insultingly stupid".
Probably a wise decision.
My character Tsin'xing
I've got to put that down as bad writing. Not so much as being intentionally racist, sexist, or name-your-prejudice. Just not thinking hard enough about how the audience might react to those particular episodes.
TOS aired at a time when people's attitudes toward those things were still changing in the wake of the 60's. There was still segregation going on. And even today we're still dealing with people who stereotype and discriminate against other people just because of what they look like. Some of them don't even think about it. If they did, they might treat others differently.
I find it hard to believe that the producers of any modern Star Trek series would intentionally endorse any sort of racism. Sexism, perhaps, because sex sells and titillation goes over well with some of the target demographic. Even then, I doubt the main goal is necessarily to objectify women. That's an unfortunate by-product when they try to make steamy love scenes or exclusively cast attractive women and men for screen appeal.
Take the Betazoid wedding ceremony. You can take the offered explanation that nudity is supposed to symbolize openness. Or you can understand it as "sex sells". And they might very well both be true.
On the flip side of that, there's "Moogie". Where the Ferengi customs are obviously intended to be portrayed offensively and the message is actually anti-sexist. Go on, feel free to bleach your eyes now. I'm going to. You can thank me later.
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And in a positive comparison to "Code of Honor", which "Emancipation" was pretty much a rewrite of by the same scriptwriter, O'Neill was fully willing to just shoot Turghan and the rest of his tribe if he had to in order to retrieve Carter, which Picard apparently wasn't for Yar. (There's a prominent shot during the Turghan/Carter fight of O'Neill's finger itching towards the safety on his MP5.)
I'm not saying it wasn't a sh*tty episode overall (for one thing you'd think Daniel would be a lot angrier about the whole thing considering his own wife was kidnapped for a similar purpose just two episodes earlier), but I'd pick Jack O'Neill as my CO over Picard any day.
— Sabaton, "Great War"
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#LegalizeAwoo
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch."
"We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
...I dunno.
I'm kind of evenly split between Unexpected, Tattoo, and Code of Honor myself.
To be honest, I only popped in to get some attention 'cause I have no idea what you guys were talking about anyway.
Just go on with whatever you did here why I listen to some melancholic Rosenstolz Songs.
Yeah, I'm not counting trolling. Maybe I should've said "never unironically called himself God".
— Sabaton, "Great War"
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(I actually did not recognize the Siberian aspect for what it was until someone from Eastern Europe saw his design and told me that was what it was.)
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:eek: My God, I never thought I'd wind up agreeing with nabreeki.
What senatorvreenak said...
Blue, Nabreeki is just pulling chains again.
I mean, talk about starting on the wrong foot.
My mom, my dad, my grandparents, my uncle, my aunt, my two stepsisters, my stepmother, my dad's neighbors, my grandparents' neighbors, my uncle-we're-not-actually-related-but-I-call-him-my-uncle-anyway...
My entire family is Irish. And I don't mean in the sense of "descended from the Irish," I mean "my parents only moved to America in 1986, I was the first member of my family born in America, my dad moved back to Ireland in 2003, my great-grandfather fought in both the Irish War of Independence and the Irish Civil War, and the great majority of my relatives still live in Ireland, mostly in and around the Dublin area, though my dad lives in Kilkenny. I have visited Ireland at least once a year since I was two, went to Kindergarten there, nearly destroyed the Book of Kells when I threw up on its case as a baby (and am probably the reason why no one is allowed to get closer than 10 feet to it anymore), and yet despite all this I can't do an Irish accent to save my life except when singing a song by The Pogues, Flogging Molley, or Thin Lizzy."
I can safely say that unless there's someone in this thread that actually lives there, I know more about Ireland and the Irish than anyone here.
My father, on the Irish:
"The Irish are a race of thieves."
"The Irish are like the French in that they have delusions of relevancy."
Those are literally the most printable things that my father has ever said about his own race. Many Irish folk I have met have even less positive things to say about their own race. It's kind of like how most of the best Russian humor is based around making fun of Russians*, only the Irish aren't usually making jokes. This is leaving aside that the Irish are the most casually racist people I know of - well, them and the Japanese. Visiting Ireland is like taking a trip to every stereotypical version of the Deep South you have ever seen except it's freezing cold and pissing rain and folk speak with an Irish brogue rather than a Southern drawl. As near as I can tell the only thing the Irish find offensive is bringing up the Troubles in polite company, or speaking ill of the Pope. And not even all Irish folk on the latter.
Now, having said that, as mentioned, I am hereby unilaterally declaring myself as an expert on the Irish and will make some notes.
- The Irish actually don't consume that much alcohol...comparatively A significant portion of the island are actually teetotalers, and the French, Austrians, Estonians, and Germans all outrank the Irish in terms of per-capita alcohol consumption (according to the OECD - the WHO actually ranks them even lower). Having said that, though, 5th place in all of Europe is still rather immense.
- The Irish are fairly belligerent but rarely to the point of crime, because they expect belligerence from amongst each other and so don't take things as seriously. As long as no one is permanently hurt, then it's not worth reporting. Ireland ranks 50th in the world in terms of crime. Part of this, though, might be a result of how underpopulated the island is, meaning that people have plenty of space. Most of the population is concentrated around Dublin. The island could probably support 10 million people but has less than half that, and the population still isn't as large as it was before the Potato Famine (8.2 million in 1841, 4.5 million today).
- The above is not helped by the fact that until recently half of all Irish people born on the island would leave, emigrating to America or Europe rather than staying there. Ireland was just not a pleasant place to live until about the mid-90s - despite its allegiance to NATO it was for all intents and purposes a third world nation in terms of economy. This is not helped by...
- Massive, massive, massive, massive political corruption the likes of which you cannot even comprehend unless you've actually lived in the country and seen it in action. House of Cards is par for the course in Ireland.
- Finally, at the time that "Fair Haven" is supposed to be set - that is, the mid to late 19th century - Ireland really was like that. It was full of violent and stupid drunks - violent because of the famine and English oppression, stupid because of poor education due to English oppression, and drunk because it was better to drink than to contemplate the reality that was Ireland of the era, thanks to English oppression.
---
*My favorite Russian joke, told by Russians about Russians: An American, a Frenchman and a Russian are all captured by the TRIBBLE and sentenced to death. Each is allowed to choose the method of execution. The Frenchman goes first, and chooses a guillotine. But the guillotine is not working, so they set him free. As he passes by the American, he whispers: "The guillotine is broken," so the American also chooses the guillotine, and is also set free. As the American passes by the Russian, he whispers: "The guillotine is broken." "Well, since the guillotine is broken," says the Russian, "then give me the firing squad!"
It was apparently less than a year ago that my own eldest brother told my niece that her (black) boyfriend had to be kept working, "because otherwise those boys get into trouble." (Said niece didn't want to say anything until earlier today.) Things have gotten better, but they're not behind us yet.
Wait, what about in Season 1, before Koenig joined the cast?
Plus I always just assumed that, given some 300 years of language drift, Russian might actually just sound like that in the future. Our accents probably don't really match up to the accents spoken in the 1700s.
http://oi13.tinypic.com/543v9j9.gif
It's not just you. These days "being offended" has become a way of life for some.
I had a youth group minister who told us that movies that had violent/sexual content should'nt be allowed because it corrupts people. I argued that hiding from the evils of life doesnt make you a pure/clean person, just sheltered and untested. The person that is exposed/tested to the world and doesn't waiver is the stronger/pure/clean individual. Of course, I got kickd out.
I think the whole "offended" movement is a way to control speech and thought, akin to heresy crimes/punishment in the days of olde with less use of torture devises.
My character Tsin'xing
And I'm saying this as a Christian.
Besides, I think what offended him more wasn't the idea of a Mintaakan religion, but one with him as its deity - he refused to be responsible for starting a religion based on a misunderstanding.
As for what episodes I find offensive?
There is no particular episode, but that scene where Kirk tries to pass Spock off as Chinese in 'Guardian of Forever'. I let him off for the fact that he was put on the spot by a cop, and because Spock's reaction was hilarious, but still...
Trials of Blood and Fire
Moving On Parts 1-3 - Part 4
In Cold Blood
Be offended when someone personally insults you. Be offended when someone deliberately endangers you or your loved ones. Be offended when someone is nasty without cause.
But to be offended because someone expressed an opinion that differs from yours. Please, for the sake of civil society, grow up.
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Code. Of. Honor.
And "Tattoo". Seriously, who thought it was a good idea to give a character who was already a racist stereotype an episode wherein he found that his ancestors were half-animal savages before magic space white men taught them how to be human?
Yeah. I'm a straight white upper-middle-class male whose experience and knowledge comes almost entirely from books, and even I find that offensive.
A Romulan Strike Team, Missing Farmers and an ancient base on a Klingon Border world. But what connects them? Find out in my First Foundary mission: 'The Jeroan Farmer Escapade'
-Lord Commander Solar Macharius
...I can't tell if you're trolling or serious.
A Mayan from South America who believes in spirit animals, grew up in a tepee, uses hallucinogenic stuff for rituals, gives dream catchers as gifts to adults, has a Maori tattoo from New Zealand, and claims that all of the above is from his culture, is not a real Native American. For example, the dream catcher that he gives Seven in that one episode? Thats an artifact from the Ojibwa (also transliterated as Ojibwe or Chippewa) nation, used over childrens cribs. Mayans are from Central America, near the Yucatan Peninsula (theres a fairly large population in Guatemala that still uses native languages a lot and is generally abused by the local Spanish-speaking authorities. In fact, the disappearance of the Mayans was mostly cooked up by early Spanish-American thinkers trying to justify and/or cover up the massive abuses committed by their governments. IRL, the only collapse was of the classical, city-based Mayan nobles, while the common people survived without too much fuss). That tattoo Chakotay wears is most similar to Maori designs from Polynesian cultures in New Zealand, half a ****ing world away from Mexico. And thats BEFORE he finds out that his ancestors were half-animal savages until magic space white people taught them how to be human. Frankly, about the only offensive things he DIDNT do were say How, great sachem! or plenty wampum, open a casino, and/or smoke a peace pipe. And when you compare that to Tattoo...yeah. Offensive either way.
And seriously, you're going to call a tested, refined theory with literally centuries of evidence behind it as ridiculous as magic space white men?????
If you want to actually learn about Native Americans, I recommend the book 500 Nations and anything by Hank Adams.
I actually think the fix would have been very simple though...expressly have him not follow the ways of any current culture but have him follow a New Age religion that came into being in the 22nd century--something new kind of like some of the "new paganism" type movements or Wicca. It still might not be as good as doing proper cultural research for Native American culture but stating onscreen that he follows a new religion would remove the need to worry about authenticity (and IMO new religions coming into being would be more realistic than Roddenberry's enforced atheism).
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