The memories of a man in his old age are the deeds of a man in his prime. You shuffle in the gloom of the sick room and talk to yourself as you die.” From Free Four, written by Roger Waters.
“Woke, woke, woke. WOKE, woke, woke, WOKE, WOKE!”
The death chant of the Trumpaloon.
There’s a very loud gaggle of incels out there on the internet who truly loathe nearly all of Paramount’s steaming Star Trek programs. Most of them seem to have two things in common. First, the new shows reject canon. Second, the new shows are horribly, horribly woke.
OK. If they saw the shows, they are entitled to their opinion. I must state for the record: the phrase “I’m entitled to my opinion” is complete bullshit. You are only entitled to an informed opinion. I can’t simply accuse you of being, say, a pederast without something to back it up. Babbling like a crazy, stupid fool remains the sole providence of our current President.
Having labored in the comic book fields for a half-century, I can state from experience that “canon” and “continuity” must be a bit fluid. There is dissension between well-versed experts on a great many issues. You could not remake Star Trek TOS today with those 1960s cardboard sets, the characterizations, and the other limits of that time. So I don’t give a damn about canonical feuds.
However, as for being “woke,” what ever the fuck that is, well, Star Trek always has been woke. TOS was so woke if they changed the Klingons name to “LBJ” they would have been The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour. Peace, understanding, dedication to science and to not interfering with (most) unique cultures today would get you kicked out of your Proud Boys unit.
So these people are full of shit, but lucky for us their endless, mindless, egotistical poppycock can be ignored. But they’re in known company among their peers and heroes. Former Homeland Security director Kristi Noem, also well known for her murdering her puppy and her horsy, denounced Starfleet Academy for being too woke. So did fascist Elon Musk, the DOGE charlatan who needlessly and stupidly fired tens of thousands of Americans last year.
A couple days ago, Tim Russ, the actor who had played and continues to plow the Trek fields, told TrekCulture “It isn’t so much a question of it just going woke, it’s just a question of who took over and doesn’t like it. That’s the difference. And I got a feeling, I honestly do think that might have been a factor.” William Shatner, the major-domo of Trekdom, said much the same thing, and I read it in James Kirk’s voice. His last words on the matter; “Get a life.”
Russ noted the close relationship between Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison and Donald Trump might have factored into these decisions. Right after he bought Paramount, he turned 60 Minutes into a bowl of soggy macaroni, a joke in an already severely weakened newsmarket. Then he proceeded to do the same thing to the rest of CBS Evening News.
I don’t need to remind you what happened to Stephen Colbert, the most popular individual on CBS who did not lose anywhere near the $14 million Ellison said he lost. The one man Trump hates more than Jimmy Kimmel.
Why are the dead defining what is woke? Why is anybody? It was never a real thing until the Right picked it up to try to bludgeon the non-fascists among us. That latter group, by the way, is now far stronger than at any time in the past eleven years.
Of course there’s another reason Trek is sagging. This whole streaming thing is a flop. People do not seem happy about paying a couple hundred dollars a year on outlets that many offer as little as an hour or two a week in programming that any one individual might squeeze out of their box… multiplied by the number of streamers to which you are subscribed. They’ve kind of figured out that doesn’t work, and everybody has been making massive cuts in their budgets and services.
These capitalists should give capitalism a try. It’s less cumbersome than Trumpism.
NOTE: The author of this rant will be joining Pop Culture Squad’s Bob Harrison and Ed Catto at the annual Ithacon this coming weekend — the one in New York. It’s a great show, I’ve been their a great many times and I love it every way allowed by law.
