Boz
Ragtag, fugitive fleeter
Live the dream!!!
Posts: 160
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Post by Boz on Jan 19, 2005 15:13:45 GMT -5
;D
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Post by OoohFrac on Jan 19, 2005 15:23:18 GMT -5
You guys are gonna make this right-winger lock this thread, ain'tcha?  We have an off-topic forum where you guys can play Turd Sandwich & Giant Douche all day... All anyone did was make a joke about Star Trek being socialist, which was funny, IMHO, as Roddenberry's utopia could use a nice swift boot to the ass of reality once in a while, much as I love the old show. Nobody insulted anyones values, unless they are a conservative Trek writer or a lousy Commie  Star Trek was not Socialist or Communist. The Federation economy was so wealthy that it could afford to give away the basic needs like basic shelter and replicators to it's citizens without breaking a sweat. A society that is so wealthy that it prefers to give away basic needs to it's citizens is not by definition socialist. It's just so wealthy that providing such needs to it's citizens is not a burden on the population. The Federation doesn't own Capt. Sisko's father's restaurant. Capt. Sisko father owns it. It's not socialism/communism if individuals own property by definition Also... yes, in case you didn't know this, the whole socialist/commie thing does get old and insulting. Look up the definition of real socialism or real communism. The only socialist/communist societies are ones in which the state owns ALL property. There's two places in the world it exists. Cuba and North Korea. Thats' it. If someone is advocating a system in which anyone owns anything, it's not socialism/communism. |
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Post by Xenu on Jan 19, 2005 15:30:24 GMT -5
No, Trek is not truly socialist or communist...but it is really annoyingly cheerful & optimistic, so poking fun at it is ok by me.
As far as the other stuff goes, I can assure you that I have political views every bit as strong as yours, however I manage to stifle them as this is not the place for them. Feel free to talk Trek here or politics on the off-topic forum all you like, but any farther off track & I'm-a gonna have to lock this thread.
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Post by OoohFrac on Jan 19, 2005 15:40:12 GMT -5
No, Trek is not truly socialist or communist...but it is really annoyingly cheerful & optimistic, so poking fun at it is ok by me. As far as the other stuff goes, I can assure you that I have political views every bit as strong as yours, however I manage to stifle them as this is not the place for them. Feel free to talk Trek here or politics on the off-topic forum all you like, but any farther off track & I'm-a gonna have to lock this thread. It went off track with "just a commie joke" Would you think it's "just an Abu Ghraib" joke? If it's okay to throw in the occasional political reference, fine. You need to make a decision whether the occasional one-liner is alright. If it's alright, it has to be alright for both sides. If it's not okay for both sides, then you need to keep the "just a commie" jokes off the board, too. |
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Boz
Ragtag, fugitive fleeter
Live the dream!!!
Posts: 160
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Post by Boz on Jan 19, 2005 15:52:43 GMT -5
Handbags at 20 paces girls.....
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Post by Xenu on Jan 19, 2005 15:55:12 GMT -5
An abu gharib joke is light years from a poke at socialism (which is what the poster said...I'm the one who said the word 'commie'), and having to explain the reasons why is one of the reasons I changed my major from PoliSci. In fact, make all the capitalist jokes you want...just FYI, nobody is protected in my book; there's not a single culture, religion, or philosophy out there that doesn't deserve a good deconstructive ridiculing once in a while, so have at it.....but if you do it here, just put it in the proper forum. The original post in question seemed more like a joke about Star Trek, anyway; had it been a blatant attempt to incite a political upheavel, I would have taken more issue with it.... |
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Post by OoohFrac on Jan 19, 2005 15:56:07 GMT -5
Handbags at 20 paces girls..... You're not helping. |
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Post by OoohFrac on Jan 19, 2005 16:09:11 GMT -5
An abu gharib joke is light years from a poke at socialism, and having to explain the reasons why is one of the reasons I changed my major from PoliSci. In fact, make all the capitalist jokes you want...just FYI, nobody is protected in my book; there's not a single culture, religion, or philosophy out there that doesn't deserve a good deconstructive ridiculing once in a while, so have at it.....but if you do it here, just put it in the proper forum. The original post in question seemed more like a joke about Star Trek, anyway; had it been a blatant attempt to incite a political upheavel, I would have taken more issue with it.... Episode 3 is about political prisoners. Without going into the topic of Pelican Bay, Gitmo, San Quentin, Abu Gharib, or any other prison, there are definitely relevant comparisons and contrasts to be made that have to do with this show. If anything that even smells even a little like politics goes into the other forum, fine. I have no problems with that. But that means the "commie" jokes go in the other forum, too. It has to be equally enforced. |
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Post by Xenu on Jan 19, 2005 16:20:13 GMT -5
Understandable, but the topic in question...even if in jest, was about the politics portrayed on the TV show being discussed; your reply to & Conundrums to that seemed to indicate you guys intending to expand the discussion into real-world matters, which is why I put the brakes on it. If thats not the case then I apologize, but just trying to keep things in some semblance of order. So how bout those Bears, eh? |
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Post by OoohFrac on Jan 19, 2005 16:43:11 GMT -5
Understandable, but the topic in question...even if in jest, was about the politics portrayed on the TV show being discussed; your reply to & Conundrums to that seemed to indicate you guys intending to expand the discussion into real-world matters, which is why I put the brakes on it. If thats not the case then I apologize, but just trying to keep things in some semblance of order. So how bout those Bears, eh? I can live with that. Screw the Bears. How 'bout that RP forum  Note: side benefit of RP forum... politically active forum folks don't know crud about Earth politics IC. They only know what Cmdr. Adama told them at the Memorial Service. |
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Post by Xenu on Jan 19, 2005 16:49:17 GMT -5
Done. Check the 'other media' section & hop to it |
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Post by Big Brother on Jan 20, 2005 2:15:02 GMT -5
The Trek universe is not truly socialist. I always got annoyed with the whole "we don't use money any more" thing, but DS9 quietly did away with that concept. I always interpreted the utopian/socialist bent of Trek as meaning that, with access to the almost limitless raw material and energy resources of a truly advanced space-faring civilization, the whole economic question of scarcity ceased to have meaning any more. When the most extravagent material wants of individuals can be satisfied by replicators and holodecks, shortages of things like food, clothing, and shelter ceased to exist. The innate human drive to dominate each other seemed to have been dealt with by strong cultural taboos against oppression, coupled by easy immigration elsewhere if any local authorities got too uppity. Yes, it's unreasonably utopian, but as utopias go, it ain't that bad.
I'm hoping future episodes of BSG go deeper into the economic and political structures needed to cope with the unique situation of a refugee caravan where industrial production is a thing of the past. Official rationing and some form of centrally-planned economy is almost inevitable in such a situation, while a truly lassiez-faire capitalist system would lead to the sort of abuses that Marx and Lenin rightly railed against. Roslin and Adama seem to be philosophically opposed to to the sort of abuses that Lenin and Stalin committed, wheras from what I hear of Tom Zarek, he probably isn't. It will be interesting to see how Roslin and Adama deal with these problems, and I hope the writers let us see the sort of structual systems they institute to deal with them.
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Post by MHall on Jan 20, 2005 5:31:14 GMT -5
You know Enterprise is in trouble when I, a big fan of Enterprise, had trouble deciding between watching a new episode of Enterprise (4x10) versus rewatching the last episode (12) of Battlestar Galactica. I finally forced myself to watch Enterprise first. This episode of Enterprise was so slow, boring, awful, and cliched/worn-out: "the transporter accident." I was just wishing it to be over, so I could rewatch Battlestar Galactica. Torture over, I started Battlestar Galactica, and I was almost moved to tears within the introductory segment, even though this was my second viewing. This five minutes of BSG had much more emotion, surprise, thrill, and sex  than a whole episode of Enterprise. I mean like, a hundred times more would be an understatement. To be somewhat fair, I'm speaking about the very best five minutes of the very best Battlestar Galactica episode to date. I'm sure awards will rain down upon it. And the Enterprise episode was a real stinker, ranked #80 out of 86 on tvtome.com, though I didn't know that before I saw it. |
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Post by Blade Runner on Jan 20, 2005 7:26:42 GMT -5
I think BSG has finished off all that we thought was good
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than a whole episode of Enterprise. I mean like, a hundred times more would be an understatement.
