Soccer Dad

Mirror, mirror

One of the remarkable aspect about Star Trek is how much its fans see in the franchise. The truth is, though, that they often see what they want to see and disregard the rest. So Star Trek is a kind of Rorschach test, from which you learn about the one watching it based on what how he interprets it.

So someone who's a fan of old movies, may dismiss it as recycling old movies. And a columnist may adopt Star Trek concepts as metaphors to explain the troubles of her industry.

And someone with an interest in political science may examine Star Trek for what kind of political economy exists in its time. Actually here's the main article asserting that the future of StarTrek is socialism.

On the one hand, the Federation seems to have a socialistic economy with a massive welfare state and no currency, which would require a high degree of centralization and planning incompatible with meaningful federalism. The Federation is not just "socialist" in the sense that some conservatives denounce any big-government policy as "socialistic." It's socialist in the classic sense of the word: government control of all or most major economic activity. In the absence of a currency and price system, central planning seems to be the only way to coordinate a complex economy to even a limited degree. Moreover, virtually all large-scale Federation enterprises in the Star Trek universe seem to be government-owned: from space stations to research facilities to mining operations.

But I thought, don't we learn about credits in "The Trouble with Tribbles?" Didn't we once see members of the TNG crew buying wedding gifts? Well, actually despite some rogue quotes about money, Gene Roddenberry was adamant that there was no money in the Star Trek future and the writers more or less stuck to the policy.

Though, if I remember correctly, Commander Sisko did want to encourage commerce on the promenade of DS9 as a means of maintaining order. But that wasn't the Federation. Arguably most of those using DS9 were from other planets. Still it was interesting that the insight that commerce could enhance social order would come from someone who represented socialism on a galactic scale.

Still I though that "The more complex the mind, the greater the need for the simplicity of play." All of these musings are interesting to a point. But sometimes, maybe, a movie is just a movie.

I hadn't been much interested in this movie as the trailer really bugged me. And while Mission Impossible III (also directed by JJ Abrams) was much better than the original Mission Impossible movie, it still missed the essence of Mission Impossible. (In Mission Impossible the impossible missions always end in triumph. Having the triumph occur midway through the movie only to unravel later is something else.)

So while Leonard Nimoy may mock those of us - (warning: spoilers at the end) who bitterly cling to the familiar Star Trek universe, I still get some enjoyment from that which is familiar. However the overwhelming number of positive reviews will probably get me back to the movie theater to see the new Star Trek movie. But about the only thing it will tell you about me is that I like adventure and things blowing up.