supersquirrel

No, you can't call Star Trek idealistic, or at least you can't contrast it to Star Wars as more idealistic.

Star Trek is VERY cynical about the capacity of humans and other sentient species to do evil.

1992

The Eugenics Wars (WWIII) begin.[14] At the height of his influence, the genetically augmented tyrant Khan Noonien Singh is said to be the absolute ruler of more than one-quarter of Earth's population. (WWIII is retconned to be in the 2050s by TNG's Encounter at Farpoint and Star Trek First Contact and to being a conflict separate from the Eugenics Wars; SNW's "Strange New World" retcons it to taking place in the 21st century, prior to WWIII.)

2026

World War III begins on Earth. Colonel Phillip Green and a group of eco-terrorists commit genocide that claimed the lives of thirty-seven million people. (ENT "In A Mirror Darkly, Part Two") (In TOS, WWIII took place in the 1990s and is established as an alternate name for the Eugenics Wars[14] while DS9's "Doctor Bashir, I Presume?" had the Eugenics Wars in the 22nd century. SNW's "Strange New World" retcons the Eugenics Wars to the 21st century, but prior to the outbreak of WWIII.)

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_Star_Trek

Star Wars is far more idealistic, evil is about power and a cynical leaders that do anything to get more power... Star Trek has a consistently much more unnerving portrayal of evil as a much more nuanced force that is often irrational and difficult to resolve into pure pursuit of power that it is always attracted to it.

Yes... or is it that Israel is a looking glass into the US or South Africa 20 years ago? Is it not a technology-supercharged return to the parts of the 20th century where colonial powers committed, sustained and exploited genocide for profit?

Or rather is this not the cynical fulcrum the blazen bigotry of Netanyahu and similar Israeli leaders are trying to secure their future across? That is, if they tie the colonialism and genocide of Palestinians to the US.. then US society will naturally be forced to invisiblize the Palestinian Genocide the same way it has invisiblized the other ongoing genocides in the US.

Netanyahu and conservative leaders like him in Israeli society are absolutely counting on the shakey liberalism of the US and other western powers not being able to survive this degree of self-reckoning, and so far they are absolutely right. Everything is perfectly on schedule for the west to arrive as the savior to Palestinians right at the moment that the genocide nearly fully completes.... enabled the whole time by US weapons and diplomatic cover.

US police have trained heavily with the IDF, the connection between the Israeli society becoming genocidal and the US struggling to avoid drowning to the same fate goes back to the origins of the US, the systems of violence and exploitation it festered and the ideologies of eugenics and white supremacy it has consistently pursued.

This is why I get so upset about the Palestinian Genocide vs the multitude of other heinous crimes occuring as we speak on earth, it doesn't matter that Gaza is across the world from me and it isn't just that the scale of suffering is incomprehensible, it is that the actions of the US government make what happens there directly relevant to my ability to sleep at night here in the US.

Ok fair I meant only the main movies and tv shows, I am not comparing the full universe of Star Wars to the full universe of Star Trek, especially because didn't Disney make all of that non-canon?

Also noted, Knights Of The Old Republic II is good, I mean it was peak Bioware so definitely I will take that note.

There is a DNA that is fundamentally different to Star Trek though, an ability to be both epic and everyday, big existential war and small micro story, philosophical and then action packed. There is plenty of awful Star Trek... ooof plenty of it.. but there is also a spirit to Star Trek that I think makes it different than Star Wars which isn't to say there isn't good Scifi within the Star Wars universe.

in a world menaced by the climate crisis, nuclear weapons, *artificial intelligence and killer robots.

*delusion that we have created artificial intelligence

“History is best told as a story of organised crime,” Kemp says. “It is one group creating a monopoly on resources through the use of violence over a certain territory and population.”

In terms of what kind of history you can make a living covering in a "pop-science" fashion yes, but this is a MASSIVE claim to make without serious conclusive evidence proving this is what motivates the trajectory of history primarily.

Why isn't History best told as a story of lawmakers attempting to create a sustainable coherent body of laws that don't collapse inwards eventually?

Why isn't History best told as a story of revolutions in domestic labor technology? The pottery wheel, the loom, the dishwasher... etc...

Why isn't History best told as a story of different meals and culinary traditions?

Why isn't History best told as a story of organized religion, friendship, communities, or ideologies?

We choose to see history this way and in doing so play right into the hands of the ruling class. The act of retelling History by necessity must challenge the primacy of authoritarian regimes in the human story because otherwise all History does is retell the propaganda of the past.

I don't think this poster is effective, I actually think it is unhelpful, my graphic design eye COMPLETELY focuses on the 7% of red people and ignores the rest of the information and worse this graphic doesn't contextualize how frequent violent crime offenses are when a random sample of US citizens are taken and examined.

If I was a bigot or even just a naive centrist I would see this poster, see the scary red people prominently displayed and conclude "7%!?! that is a LOT of criminals!" because NO context is given.

facepalm what is it with liberalism and unconciously undermining its own message?

One necessitates the other, the ballroom is a direct threat to the average person in the US to shut up and accept your quality of life collapsing in realtime.

If Trump "just" cut healthcare it would be violence without a threat attached which is a waste of effort for oligarchs usually and risks people overcoming their fear to find solidarity in resistance to said violence.

The function of the ballroom is to empower the cynical voices advocating for complete surrender so we remain shattered.

This horrifyingly big bubble needs to sustain the mystique around AI so desperately companies are willing to bribe the "experts" any amount of money to sustain the grift a little bit longer.

People will look back and bitterly laugh their asses off at how obviously devoid of reality the AI hype train was.

Mark Zuckerberg recently told investors that Meta plans to continue throwing money at AI talent "because we have conviction that superintelligence is going to improve every aspect of what we do." In a recent open letter, he described superintelligent AI as technology that would "begin an exciting new era of individual empowerment," despite declining to define what superintelligence actually is.

No better quote illustrates how the US economy is going to keep collapsing into a second great depression along with the nonsense AI bubble it has irrevocably chained itself too.

You can tell it not just from the fact that AI is really only useful as a way to obscure culpability in violence, but from the empty way all the "experts" and "cutting edge tech companies" have blindly lined up behind AI with zero critical thinking involved making it clear as day AI is the perfect empty promise for an intellectually bankrupt society.

AI is a match made in heaven with the catastrophic delusions of our day.

None of this bigotry would exist if it wasn't for European colonialism needing to create an actually successful reimagining of itself with bigotry further driven and cemented into its heart than even the US was able to sustain.

This mass violence is a direct result of the entrenched power structures of Europe and the US refusing to grapple with how intimately connected eugenics, genocide and dehumanization are in sustaining European and US culture.

This does not take the blame away from Israelis, but we are doomed to accelerate this process if we do not understand it.

We are transitioning back into a feudal system, aren't you jealous?

...and my country, the US, is as guilty as Israel for providing unlimited backing for the Palestinian Genocide by providing money, political backing and the vast majority of weapons (with active training on how to use them).

This is a direct necessary end product of western/european colonialism working to sustain its violence and control, which does not absolve the majority of Israelis from embracing the Palestinian Genocide but it does provide context for why Israel and why jews in Israel would undertake the single most heinous crime against humanity yet of the 21st century.

Do not be fooled into a negative exceptionalism about jews or Israelis, this is a decades long project that could have worked in your country too if the circumstances were right and there was a hopelessly more powerful foreign power with an invested interest in bigotry and dehumanization of people in the place your family has always called home.

The rightwing of the west will lovingly embrace antisemitism with renewed vigor when the Palestinian Genocide finally becomes undeniable in the halls of power as a way to dodge their direct enthusiastic culpability in the genocide, we must be ready.

Star Trek and Star Wars are fundamentally different in their worldbuilding, storytelling and overall narrative direction, the only thing they share are spaceships and spacewar.

Maybe try watching some of the more famous Star Trek episodes and try analyzing the plot and events with a more critical eye, you will find entire interesting conversations, ethical dilemmas and perspectives you never considered unfold from doing this with the best of Star Trek.

Star Wars? This is far less commonly a fruitful endeavor to undertake (with the glorious exception being Andor of course).

No, Aliens successfully genetically bioengineered our eyes to have "eye floaters" that look exactly like their interdimensional starships flying overhead so they can fly them around on Earth without anyone noticing. It is all part of their evil genius plan!