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Re: In Defense of Star Wars
(#40770)
by Aeon J. Skoble on August 28, 2004 at 8:31 AM
by Aeon J. Skoble on August 28, 2004 at 8:31 AM
I agree that Star Wars deserves kudos for groundbreaking FX, but on my more cynical days I think that may have been a net bad for sci-fi. Now, FX trumps plot considerations, acting, etc. in the minds of studio heads, and intelligent, non-FX-oriented sci fi (think Day The Earth Stood Still) is rare. Plus, it's largely Star Wars (and moronic responses to it from film critics) that produced the false synonymy between "sci fi" and "laser battles in space." Lucas himself bears responsibility, since the sequels have been progressively worse and worse.
Re: In Defense of Star Wars
(#40789)
by Steven Horwitz on August 28, 2004 at 11:49 AM
by Steven Horwitz on August 28, 2004 at 11:49 AM
Three comments, and I hate myself for finally breaking down and posting in this thread :)
1. I thought Empire Strikes Back was better than the first one, and a bit more thoughtful. Otherwise, I largely agree with both the benefits and costs of Star Wars.
2. 2001 does not get the credit it deserves for its FX. Some look cheesy today, but most still look great. And Kubrick did it all "low-tech." A woman walking upside down in a spacecraft would be easy to do with computers today, but to have thought to fix the camera to the set, and then rotate the set while she walked in place, was pure genius.
3. I may get hammered for this from many quarters, but I think some of the most intelligent, thoughtful sci-fi ever done is Star Trek: The Next Generation. There are several episodes of that show that rank among the best, most intellgient TV ever and can reasonably be compared to the best sci-fi films we've all been talking about.
1. I thought Empire Strikes Back was better than the first one, and a bit more thoughtful. Otherwise, I largely agree with both the benefits and costs of Star Wars.
2. 2001 does not get the credit it deserves for its FX. Some look cheesy today, but most still look great. And Kubrick did it all "low-tech." A woman walking upside down in a spacecraft would be easy to do with computers today, but to have thought to fix the camera to the set, and then rotate the set while she walked in place, was pure genius.
3. I may get hammered for this from many quarters, but I think some of the most intelligent, thoughtful sci-fi ever done is Star Trek: The Next Generation. There are several episodes of that show that rank among the best, most intellgient TV ever and can reasonably be compared to the best sci-fi films we've all been talking about.
Re: In Defense of Star Wars
(#40796)
by Aeon J. Skoble on August 28, 2004 at 12:27 PM
by Aeon J. Skoble on August 28, 2004 at 12:27 PM
Steve, I have a long rant about why Empire is not an improvement, which I'll be happy to share with you on request.
RE point 2, I agree entirely. Note that that did _not_ have the same dumbing down effect as the FX in Star Wars did.
RE ST:TNG - don't get me started! ;-)
RE point 2, I agree entirely. Note that that did _not_ have the same dumbing down effect as the FX in Star Wars did.
RE ST:TNG - don't get me started! ;-)
Re: In Defense of Star Wars
(#40805)
by Jonathan Dresner on August 28, 2004 at 3:08 PM
by Jonathan Dresner on August 28, 2004 at 3:08 PM
Star Wars wasn't the first "laser battles in space" movie (think of the old Flash Armstrong stuff) by a long shot, so I can't, in good conscience, place the blame on Lucas for that genre.
2001 definitely deserves credit it doesn't usually get for the realism of its spaceflight, which set a standard rarely matched since.
And though Aeon might indeed get started when I say this, I agree that ST:TNG did a fantastic job of raising and examining a myriad of real scientific/moral issues. Was it fantastic television, in a technical sense? No. But it was very much in the thriving F/SF short-story tradition, where ideas can be played with on a small scale that might not work on a large scale.
2001 definitely deserves credit it doesn't usually get for the realism of its spaceflight, which set a standard rarely matched since.
And though Aeon might indeed get started when I say this, I agree that ST:TNG did a fantastic job of raising and examining a myriad of real scientific/moral issues. Was it fantastic television, in a technical sense? No. But it was very much in the thriving F/SF short-story tradition, where ideas can be played with on a small scale that might not work on a large scale.
Re: In Defense of Star Wars
(#40810)
by Jonathan Dresner on August 28, 2004 at 10:01 PM
by Jonathan Dresner on August 28, 2004 at 10:01 PM
Sorry, Flash Gordon....
Re: In Defense of Star Wars
(#40819)
by Roderick T. Long on August 29, 2004 at 10:20 AM
by Roderick T. Long on August 29, 2004 at 10:20 AM
As long as we're geeking, I'll add another $0.02:
I think that ST:DS9 was better than ST:TNG, and that Babylon 5 was better than both.
On Star Wars: the connection between the Republic-to-Empire transition in Star Wars and the Republic-to-Empire transition in Roman history has often been noted, but as a result of reading a lot of French history lately I think the transition from the 1848 Republic to the 1852 Empire may be an even closer analogy. The conservatives in the legislature embraced Louis Bonaparte's presidency because they saw him as the only figure who could quell the radicals. They thought he was safe because he had sworn a solemn oath to uphold the Constitution. Once he seized power and declared himself Emperor, he quelled the radicals all right, and the conservatives too, with mass arrests and mass murder. He had most of the legislature arrested. Napoleon III seems a closer model for Palpatine than does either Julius or Augustus Caesar.
PALPATINE: "It is with great reluctance that I have agreed to this calling. I love democracy, I love the Republic. The power you give me I will lay down when this crisis has abated. And as my first act with this new authority, I will create a grand army of the Republic to counter the increasing threats of the separatists." (Threats that Palpy himself has of course been secretly orchestrating.) You gotta cut some slack to any movie that contains that line ....
I think that ST:DS9 was better than ST:TNG, and that Babylon 5 was better than both.
On Star Wars: the connection between the Republic-to-Empire transition in Star Wars and the Republic-to-Empire transition in Roman history has often been noted, but as a result of reading a lot of French history lately I think the transition from the 1848 Republic to the 1852 Empire may be an even closer analogy. The conservatives in the legislature embraced Louis Bonaparte's presidency because they saw him as the only figure who could quell the radicals. They thought he was safe because he had sworn a solemn oath to uphold the Constitution. Once he seized power and declared himself Emperor, he quelled the radicals all right, and the conservatives too, with mass arrests and mass murder. He had most of the legislature arrested. Napoleon III seems a closer model for Palpatine than does either Julius or Augustus Caesar.
PALPATINE: "It is with great reluctance that I have agreed to this calling. I love democracy, I love the Republic. The power you give me I will lay down when this crisis has abated. And as my first act with this new authority, I will create a grand army of the Republic to counter the increasing threats of the separatists." (Threats that Palpy himself has of course been secretly orchestrating.) You gotta cut some slack to any movie that contains that line ....
Re: In Defense of Star Wars
(#40820)
by Roderick T. Long on August 29, 2004 at 10:23 AM
by Roderick T. Long on August 29, 2004 at 10:23 AM
P.S. - Despite having a certain fondness for Star Wars, I think Babylon 5's portrayal of Londo's fall to the "dark side" is far more compelling and insightful than Star Wars' portrayal of Anakin's similar trajectory.
Re: In Defense of Star Wars
(#40833)
by Jonathan Dresner on August 29, 2004 at 4:09 PM
by Jonathan Dresner on August 29, 2004 at 4:09 PM
Babylon 5 is the reason I stopped enjoying the ST series, to be honest. It was so much better.... As an historian, I particularly appreciated the care and attention which went into the backstory, future, and forces active in the present, not to mention contemporary analogies. And the characters..... G'Kar and Londo's parallel development ranks up there with some of the finest novelistic writing.
Re: In Defense of Star Wars
(#40856)
by Aeon J. Skoble on August 30, 2004 at 9:01 AM
by Aeon J. Skoble on August 30, 2004 at 9:01 AM
I've never watched Babylon 5, so I can't comment on it's qualities. I was not, however, impressed with ST:TNG, but to be fair, it's possible I missed something, as I only watched regularly for the first, oh, year and a half before tuing out, and some say it did get better. I though it (a) was derivative, sometimes to the point of plagiarism, (b) was too PC, (c) was more poorly acted than old Trek (with the exception of Patrick Stewart, who is terrific, and LeVar Burton, who is quite good also), (d) had worse FX than the original show, the lame CGI actually looking worse than the old models/blue screen technology, (e) suffered too much from anything-goes-itis, what with the Q and the Borg, the souped-up replicators, the souped-up holodeck, etc., (f) implicitly disrespected the old show by instantiating the Gerrold critique, which was wrong to begin with, and perhaps worst of all, (g) traded on the worst anti-semitic caricatures to bash capitalism in the form of the avaricious, money-grubbing, deceitful jews, I mean Ferengi. Even if I'm off-base on points a-f above, no lover of Jews or capitalism should tolerate a show that is so blatanly anti-semitic and anti-capitalism.
Economics and Semitics
(#40885)
by Jonathan Dresner on August 30, 2004 at 3:49 PM
by Jonathan Dresner on August 30, 2004 at 3:49 PM
I would agree that the economics of Star Trek is sloppy, contradictory, undeveloped (also that Stewart and Burton were the best of the ensemble and that the technology 'start-value' promoted an escalation of problems and conflicts that was detrimental to drama). It's not entirely clear that capitalism is unappreciated, as there is a great deal of exchange and trade going on. It's just not explained well. I would argue that members of a paramilitary organization like StarFleet, much as members of our own military, are not trained in, responsible for or particularly interested in economic matters, and that their needs are sufficiently provided for by the institution (and the overboard technology) that it just didn't come up much.
I would also point out that the entire concept of race and culture in the ST system is highly essentialized, stereotyped, shallow.
The Ferengi are no different. They are given a culture with a single dimension, from which only very, very rare individuals diverge. But, and I'm as sensitive to anti-Semitic portrayal as any Jew, I've never been sufficiently convinced that that the Ferengi were intended to be Jewish Capitalists (certainly not to the extent that I think the early DS9 Cardassians are intended to be Israelis; and by extension, the Bajorans are clearly Palestinian analogues) to be more bothered by the Ferengi than by the absurdly shallow racial formulations of the nerdy Vulcans, primitivist Klingons, prideful Romulans, or any of the other monocultural societies they encounter.
By the way, I'm not familiar with the 'Gerrold Critique': could you clarify?
I would also point out that the entire concept of race and culture in the ST system is highly essentialized, stereotyped, shallow.
The Ferengi are no different. They are given a culture with a single dimension, from which only very, very rare individuals diverge. But, and I'm as sensitive to anti-Semitic portrayal as any Jew, I've never been sufficiently convinced that that the Ferengi were intended to be Jewish Capitalists (certainly not to the extent that I think the early DS9 Cardassians are intended to be Israelis; and by extension, the Bajorans are clearly Palestinian analogues) to be more bothered by the Ferengi than by the absurdly shallow racial formulations of the nerdy Vulcans, primitivist Klingons, prideful Romulans, or any of the other monocultural societies they encounter.
By the way, I'm not familiar with the 'Gerrold Critique': could you clarify?
Re: Economics and Semitics
(#40928)
by Roderick T. Long on August 31, 2004 at 7:43 AM
by Roderick T. Long on August 31, 2004 at 7:43 AM
Early on in ST:TNG, Picard mentions that the Federation no longer uses money. I guess they solved that calculation problem somehow ....
A brighter moment: in ST:DS9, one time when one of the humans is off on the usual sanctimonious tirade against the greedy, profit-loving Ferengi, Quark (the show's main Ferengi character) responds by saying something like "Criticise us all you want, but at least there are no death camps in my planet's history; we prefer trading with people rather than killing them."
Trivia item: libertarian sf writer Melinda Snodgrass was chief story editor on ST:TNG for two seasons. I forget which two.
A brighter moment: in ST:DS9, one time when one of the humans is off on the usual sanctimonious tirade against the greedy, profit-loving Ferengi, Quark (the show's main Ferengi character) responds by saying something like "Criticise us all you want, but at least there are no death camps in my planet's history; we prefer trading with people rather than killing them."
Trivia item: libertarian sf writer Melinda Snodgrass was chief story editor on ST:TNG for two seasons. I forget which two.
Re: Economics and Semitics
(#40957)
by Steven Horwitz on August 31, 2004 at 4:14 PM
by Steven Horwitz on August 31, 2004 at 4:14 PM
Don't forget in ST IV, the original cast also talked about how "oh, they still use money" in 1980s San Francisco, so it was hardly just TNG. In any case, I am willing to forgive TNG these sorts of sins for the absolute beauty of episodes like "The Inner Light," or the thoughtfulness of "Whose Watching the Watchers?" or, yes, the libertarian themes of "The Offspring" where Picard's defense of Data's rights as a parent against the state/Starfleet is excellent.
Re: Economics and Semitics
(#41011)
by Aeon J. Skoble on September 1, 2004 at 1:37 PM
by Aeon J. Skoble on September 1, 2004 at 1:37 PM
>Early on in ST:TNG, Picard mentions that the Federation >no longer uses money
Whereas in TOS, they do use money. It's some undefined "credits" but it's clearly some manner of exchange. See, e.g., the episodes with Harry Mudd, or The Trouble with Tribbles.
>Don't forget in ST IV, the original cast also talked >about how "oh, they still use money" in 1980s San
>Francisco, so it was hardly just TNG.
But it's still all post-1969 rethinks. ST IV takes place in the TOS world, but was the product of different writers and a different mindset, one I would argue is _more_ hostile to libertarian ideas than the 66-69 mindset.
Whereas in TOS, they do use money. It's some undefined "credits" but it's clearly some manner of exchange. See, e.g., the episodes with Harry Mudd, or The Trouble with Tribbles.
>Don't forget in ST IV, the original cast also talked >about how "oh, they still use money" in 1980s San
>Francisco, so it was hardly just TNG.
But it's still all post-1969 rethinks. ST IV takes place in the TOS world, but was the product of different writers and a different mindset, one I would argue is _more_ hostile to libertarian ideas than the 66-69 mindset.
answering Jonathan Dresner's question; more
(#41009)
by Aeon J. Skoble on September 1, 2004 at 1:32 PM
by Aeon J. Skoble on September 1, 2004 at 1:32 PM
Sorry about that. David Gerrold's influential 1973 book _The World of Star Trek_ includes a lengthy discussion of what, in his view, was a stupidity in the show, viz., that Kirk and Spock were the main explorers. He argued that this is analogous to an Army colonel doing recon work, and therefore stupid. He's wrong about that; the better analogy is to age-of-exploration ship captains, not the captains of modern-day aircraf carriers. (Part of) Kirk's job _is_ to be the explorer. Anyway, Gerrold argues that what they should have done was have the Captain stay on the ship, and have some sort of "Away Team" do all the beaming down to strange new worlds. So when TNG first came on and made a big deal out of doing it that way, almost with a tone of superiority, I took it as a repudiation of the original vision of the show, which as a fan of the show, was off-putting. It was as if TNG was saying to fans of TOS "ok, grow up, we read Gerrold, now here's some _real_ sci-fi." They repudiated the old show in another off-putting way: the explicit mention of a nuclear holocaust on Earth in the pre-Starfleet days. In TOS they make it very clear that humans found the wisdom to avoid that. There's mention of a WWIII, but it was non-nuclear. This isn't just nit-picking geekery, it's thematically central -- finding the wisdom to avoid self-annihilation was a key element of Roddenberry's optimism about the human condition. Seeing out future as the result of "learning from" nuclear devastation (or worse, from paternalistic Vulcans) is a repudiation of the entire spirit of the old show. So there's that also.
And that's on top of the anti-semitism thing, and the capitalism-bashing, both of which I address elsewhere.
And that's on top of the anti-semitism thing, and the capitalism-bashing, both of which I address elsewhere.
What's wrong with ST:TNG?
(#41017)
by Dan Schmutter on September 1, 2004 at 2:08 PM
by Dan Schmutter on September 1, 2004 at 2:08 PM
Aeon omits possibly one of the most significant objections to ST:TNG, which is the elevation of techno-babble script writing to an art form at the expense of actual drama.
It's amazing how easily a catasptrophic threat from a temporal anomaly can be resolved by a simple phase reversal on the holodeck's plasma calibration receptors. ;-)
Dan
It's amazing how easily a catasptrophic threat from a temporal anomaly can be resolved by a simple phase reversal on the holodeck's plasma calibration receptors. ;-)
Dan
Re: Economics and Semitics
(#42832)
by Bret Feinblatt on September 25, 2004 at 11:54 AM
by Bret Feinblatt on September 25, 2004 at 11:54 AM
<<"I've never been sufficiently convinced that that the Ferengi were intended to be Jewish Capitalists (certainly not to the extent that I think the early DS9 Cardassians are intended to be Israelis; and by extension, the Bajorans are clearly Palestinian analogues) to be more bothered by the Ferengi than by the absurdly shallow racial formulations of the nerdy Vulcans, primitivist Klingons, prideful Romulans, or any of the other monocultural societies they encounter.">>
Funny how different people see things. I never saw the Cardassian/Bajoran thing as Israel/Palestine; more Soviets/Afghanistan in the 80s.
Funny how different people see things. I never saw the Cardassian/Bajoran thing as Israel/Palestine; more Soviets/Afghanistan in the 80s.
Re: In Defense of Star Wars
(#40806)
by Chris Matthew Sciabarra on August 28, 2004 at 6:55 PM
by Chris Matthew Sciabarra on August 28, 2004 at 6:55 PM
Well, let me add one more cent to this. I genuinely enjoyed the original "Star Wars" trilogy, whatever philosophical problems it had. As pure entertainment, the films were a thrilling romp. And, yes, the quality has deteriorated since then---but there is still much to enjoy in the series. That scene with Yoda taking on Christopher Lee in the last film is just classic beyond words.
And, believe it or not, I even find points of intersection between Yoda and... (drum roll): Ayn Rand. See here on the shared notion that there are reciprocal relationships among fear, anger, and hatred.
Okay, now let me go duck for cover.
And, believe it or not, I even find points of intersection between Yoda and... (drum roll): Ayn Rand. See here on the shared notion that there are reciprocal relationships among fear, anger, and hatred.
Okay, now let me go duck for cover.
Re: In Defense of Star Wars
(#40825)
by Joe C Maurone on August 29, 2004 at 12:34 PM
by Joe C Maurone on August 29, 2004 at 12:34 PM
I have read Chris's post on Yoda, fear, hate and the dark side years ago, but was recently reminded of it while recently reading James Hillman's THE DREAM AND THE UNDERWORLD. He brings up some very interesting relations between hate and the hero that I don't think Lucas was aware of (but maybe Yoda was?) but does certainly have some relation to what Yoda says:
"The convertability of underworld figures into upperworld actions nowhere shows better than in the image complex of Styx. The frigid river Styx (whose name, 'hateful,' or 'hatred,' derives from stygeo, 'to hate') is the deepest source of the God's morality, for on its water they swear their oaths, implying that hatred plays an essential part in the universal order of things. Besides such originating and ordering principles as Eros, and Strife…and Necessity…and Reason…we must also make a place for Hatred in the scheme of things. Styx's children are called Zellus (zeal), Nike (victory), Bia (force), and Cratos (strength). Their mother's cold hatefulness is converted by them into those implacable traits we have come to accept as virtues. Her children provide the prototypes for that crusading morality which accompanies the ego on its righteous task of destroying in order to maintain itself. (57-58)
"Hateful mother Styx and her hyperactive children did not escape the notice of Freud, who puts them into the conceptual language of hate and ego. First he distinguishes between hate and love, saying that hate is older than love (CP 5:82) and that they 'did not originate in a cleavage of any common primal element, but sprang from different sources' (ibid, p.81). Hate, in other words, derives from its own ground and serves a distinct purpose in 'the ego':'The ego hates, abhors, and pursues with intent to destroy all objects which are for it a source of painful feelings…the true prototypes of the hate-relation are derived not from the sexual life but from the struggle of the ego for self-preservation and self-maintenance.'
"Freud's fantasy that the ego must preserve itself by struggle (for which strength, force, zeal, and victory become requirements), and the moral justification with which these qualities support the fantasy, is a Stygian enactment in the upperworld. The ego has become Styx's instrument, a Child of Hatred, icily preserving itself against all enemies, the greatest of which will be warmth, hence our usual notion that hate and love are contraries. Actually, hate has the same objective as love, according to Freud. Both seek pleasure, for which hatred used the ego to destroy pain. Each of us becomes a child of Styx when we embark on the pain-killing course, justifying our victories and zeal in destruction in terms of 'self-preservation' and 'ego-development.'"(59-59)
"The dissolution of these attitudes would mean reconverting the zeal and force of our ego-strength back into the hatred that is its source. Then we would see the hatred in our heroics." (59)
"The convertability of underworld figures into upperworld actions nowhere shows better than in the image complex of Styx. The frigid river Styx (whose name, 'hateful,' or 'hatred,' derives from stygeo, 'to hate') is the deepest source of the God's morality, for on its water they swear their oaths, implying that hatred plays an essential part in the universal order of things. Besides such originating and ordering principles as Eros, and Strife…and Necessity…and Reason…we must also make a place for Hatred in the scheme of things. Styx's children are called Zellus (zeal), Nike (victory), Bia (force), and Cratos (strength). Their mother's cold hatefulness is converted by them into those implacable traits we have come to accept as virtues. Her children provide the prototypes for that crusading morality which accompanies the ego on its righteous task of destroying in order to maintain itself. (57-58)
"Hateful mother Styx and her hyperactive children did not escape the notice of Freud, who puts them into the conceptual language of hate and ego. First he distinguishes between hate and love, saying that hate is older than love (CP 5:82) and that they 'did not originate in a cleavage of any common primal element, but sprang from different sources' (ibid, p.81). Hate, in other words, derives from its own ground and serves a distinct purpose in 'the ego':'The ego hates, abhors, and pursues with intent to destroy all objects which are for it a source of painful feelings…the true prototypes of the hate-relation are derived not from the sexual life but from the struggle of the ego for self-preservation and self-maintenance.'
"Freud's fantasy that the ego must preserve itself by struggle (for which strength, force, zeal, and victory become requirements), and the moral justification with which these qualities support the fantasy, is a Stygian enactment in the upperworld. The ego has become Styx's instrument, a Child of Hatred, icily preserving itself against all enemies, the greatest of which will be warmth, hence our usual notion that hate and love are contraries. Actually, hate has the same objective as love, according to Freud. Both seek pleasure, for which hatred used the ego to destroy pain. Each of us becomes a child of Styx when we embark on the pain-killing course, justifying our victories and zeal in destruction in terms of 'self-preservation' and 'ego-development.'"(59-59)
"The dissolution of these attitudes would mean reconverting the zeal and force of our ego-strength back into the hatred that is its source. Then we would see the hatred in our heroics." (59)
Jewish Ferengi? I don't think so
(#42831)
by Bret Feinblatt on September 25, 2004 at 11:47 AM
by Bret Feinblatt on September 25, 2004 at 11:47 AM
I've heard the old "Ferengis are code for Jews" bull for a while. This is a ridiculous argument. As far as I can tell, they're not a slam against Jews or capitalism, but more against those whose greed outweighs any sense of ethics or good.
Incidentally, Roddenberry (you've heard of him, right?) was Jewish as I recall; so are Nimoy and either Shatner or Koenig, I forget which one. (So am I, BTW)
Either way, it's unlikely that Roddenberry would have created a character that was intended to slam Jews, given (1) his being Jewish and (2) the intended message of Star Trek about diversity and mutual acceptance. This sort of anti-semitism charge is at best specious, and at worst just another example of people seeing anti-semitism behind every other word. I don't deny it exists - a quick check for hate groups on the web will show that - but to point at anything and everything and claim anti-semitism is just stupid, and in my book dilutes accusations when it actually exists.
Reminds me of a scene from a Woody Allen flick where Allen's character thinks someone from a music store is anti-semitic because the guy asked him if he'd like some Wagner.
Oh, I happened to come across this page; you may find it interesting:
http://www.generationj.com/archive/politics/space.html
Have a look, then get a grip.
Incidentally, Roddenberry (you've heard of him, right?) was Jewish as I recall; so are Nimoy and either Shatner or Koenig, I forget which one. (So am I, BTW)
Either way, it's unlikely that Roddenberry would have created a character that was intended to slam Jews, given (1) his being Jewish and (2) the intended message of Star Trek about diversity and mutual acceptance. This sort of anti-semitism charge is at best specious, and at worst just another example of people seeing anti-semitism behind every other word. I don't deny it exists - a quick check for hate groups on the web will show that - but to point at anything and everything and claim anti-semitism is just stupid, and in my book dilutes accusations when it actually exists.
Reminds me of a scene from a Woody Allen flick where Allen's character thinks someone from a music store is anti-semitic because the guy asked him if he'd like some Wagner.
Oh, I happened to come across this page; you may find it interesting:
http://www.generationj.com/archive/politics/space.html
Have a look, then get a grip.
Re: Jewish Ferengi? I don't think so
(#42941)
by Aeon J. Skoble on September 27, 2004 at 11:49 AM
by Aeon J. Skoble on September 27, 2004 at 11:49 AM
It's not ridiculous - their physical appearance, right down to the hook nose, is classic caricature, centuries old, and to combine that with avaricious money-grubbing is too obvious to ignore. This doesn't necessarily mean that the writers were consciously expressing anti-semitism; hack writers often unconsciously fall into cliches and stereotypes.
Nice sarcasm RE Roddenberry, but perhaps you didn't realize that he wasn't writing much of the spin-off shows, and there were no Ferengi in the old show (and all the actors you mention were TOS actors).
That web page proves nothing. That the Ferengi are a classic antisemitic caricature doesn't mean that the whole show is deliberately anti-semitic, it just means it's offensive, and as I said, it's doubly offensive, in that besides the ancient anti-semitic tropes, it gets capitalism wrong too.
Nice sarcasm RE Roddenberry, but perhaps you didn't realize that he wasn't writing much of the spin-off shows, and there were no Ferengi in the old show (and all the actors you mention were TOS actors).
That web page proves nothing. That the Ferengi are a classic antisemitic caricature doesn't mean that the whole show is deliberately anti-semitic, it just means it's offensive, and as I said, it's doubly offensive, in that besides the ancient anti-semitic tropes, it gets capitalism wrong too.
Return to Let Him Through, He's A Scientist!
by Jonathan Dresner on August 27, 2004 at 4:04 PM