To be fair, though, Star Trek was ALWAYS a progressive show. Even the oldest episodes were still about an Earth that has largely gotten over its own conflicts and intolerances by coming together in a one-world utopian government, and their military is primarily focused on exploring, outreach, and other community services rather than fighting wars.
It pushed (and showed as best as it could for the time) absolute racial and gender equality. In fact, Roddenberry was planning on adding gay characters all the way back in the 90's before his death. I even recall an entire episode focusing on aliens who had no concept of gender and discussed an analog of conversion therapy.
I honestly didn't expect anything less from the new Star Trek. It's been pushing the envelope on the progressive front for decades. It might dress those issues up in alien make-up, but... that's kind of how science fiction works.
Oh, I didn't mean to imply that science fiction is typically liberal-leaning. I meant more that science fiction works by taking familiar stuff and dressing it up with lasers and tentacles.
There is plenty of conservative-leaning science fiction out there. Orson Scott Card (Ender's Game) is famously conservative. Brave New World is also a crazily conservative piece of fiction by Huxley. There's quite a few sci-fi classics out there from more right-leaning creatives.
Yeah, it's definitely a twist that's hard to keep secret after all this time, but definitely worth it if you are lucky enough to find someone who doesn't know it.
To be fair, though, Star Trek was ALWAYS a progressive show. Even the oldest episodes were still about an Earth that has largely gotten over its own conflicts and intolerances by coming together in a one-world utopian government, and their military is primarily focused on exploring, outreach, and other community services rather than fighting wars.
It pushed (and showed as best as it could for the time) absolute racial and gender equality. In fact, Roddenberry was planning on adding gay characters all the way back in the 90's before his death. I even recall an entire episode focusing on aliens who had no concept of gender and discussed an analog of conversion therapy.
I honestly didn't expect anything less from the new Star Trek. It's been pushing the envelope on the progressive front for decades. It might dress those issues up in alien make-up, but... that's kind of how science fiction works.
Remember the weirdness of TNG season 1 when they still had the minidress uniform and you occasionally saw a dude in the background wearing it?
Oh, I didn't mean to imply that science fiction is typically liberal-leaning. I meant more that science fiction works by taking familiar stuff and dressing it up with lasers and tentacles.
There is plenty of conservative-leaning science fiction out there. Orson Scott Card (Ender's Game) is famously conservative. Brave New World is also a crazily conservative piece of fiction by Huxley. There's quite a few sci-fi classics out there from more right-leaning creatives.
Man, I loved Ender's Game. I did not see that coming
Yeah, it's definitely a twist that's hard to keep secret after all this time, but definitely worth it if you are lucky enough to find someone who doesn't know it.