Star wars vs Star Trek

I have been watching Star Trek since it started on TV in 1966, yes,
I am that old…

and I was in high school when Star Wars came out…

and there have been quite of few “discussions” about the two…

I wish to engage in one aspect of the two…

I have been watching the recent additions to both,
“the Mandalorian” and Star Trek “Discovery”

and one theme that I have often being trying to work out is present in both,
as they have been present since the beginning of both…
the moral ambiguity of the characters…

Star Wars tends to have a much stronger belief in the 'GOODNESS"
and “evil” of the Characters… in other words, there is far less working
out of ambiguity in the characters… if you are good, then you are good,
and if you are “evil” you are evil… there is no suggestion in Star Wars
about the moral ambiguity of any character… you are either good or you are
evil… and may the two never meet in Star Wars…

and in Star Trek… Every series has had questions about the moral
ambiguity of every single character…

from the original series to the latest series, the moral ambiguity has
been the central question of Star Trek…every single character has
done morally dubious, questionable actions and then they somehow
try to justify or explain away the morally dubious actions…

Star Trek is far closer to real life in its determination to explore
what it means to be human in light of what is “right” and what is “wrong”

in Star Trek, practically every single episode is a case study in
the question of moral ambiguity in human beings…

what is “right” and what is “wrong” and why… is the great
question of Star Trek…

the single dominant article of Star Trek is the first rule of
federation…the prime Directive, “Starfleet general order 1”

the non-interference directive… which prohibits its members
from interfering with the internal and natural development of alien
civilizations…

and yet, every single captain has violated that rule,
repeatedly and is the basis of virtual every single episode…
and how do they explain away and justify each case of violating
the “prime directive”…

it is this case of moral ambiguity that give Star Trek the edge
over Star Wars, for me anyway…

I prefer Star Star Trek over Star Wars because it calls into question,
virtually in every single episode, what is the morally right thing to do?

it is its moral ambiguity that makes Star Trek the better series…

Kropotkin

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Star Trek DS9… the new Discovery series is a bit too PC/feministic, for my taste…
I caught one episode of it, and could only watch a few minutes of it, before I heaved.

I liked the rich array of characters in DS9, and their weird and wonderful array of cray.

I basically agree in regard to the subject of ambiguity. That’s why after watching the first Star Wars with my daughter, I had no interest in watching any of the others.

With Star Trek each episode tended to revolve around one or an other philosophical or political theme. They actually encouraged viewers to think at least to some degree below the surface. And the characters were much more interesting because they were far less like the Good and Evil cartoon characters that populated Star Wars.

Still, in one respect Star Trek did divide the world up between the good guys and the bad guys. And that revolved around the clash between “I” and “we”. The bad guys were often little more than brutish fascist or [especially] communists. Might makes right thuggery. The Federation, on the other hand, stood for individual freedom and the heroic struggle to prevail against the “dark forces” that were “out there”.

To me, it was like reconfiguring American foreign policy from the brute facticity embedded in the real world reality of securing cheap labor, natural resources and markets into the MSM/civics text version – the pursuit of democracy, freedom and human rights.

The Federation was like what we were supposed to think that America was while the Klingons – the might makes right collectivist thugs – was analogous to the USSR.

Also, the part where the collectivists were not thugs but merely brainwashed zombies: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/This_Side … nal_Series

Only in the end when they started to experience turbulent passions and anger and even punched each other out did they become truly human again.

Oh, and, as well. the whole Spock/Kirk thing. Spock being mostly Vulcan and thus obsessed with being “logical” and Kirk, fully human and thus confronted in turn with his more primordial id.

K: both Star Wars and Star Trek were born of their era…you can see that in their basic
premise is what was going on at the time… The 60’s were times of moral ambiguity,
what was right and wrong was highly disputed… and in the 70’s, the age of Star Wars,
and just a few years before uncle ronnie became president, the age was more of
this is right and this is wrong…Uncle Ronnie made moral ambiguity an enemy
and this is reflected in Star Wars…

each is a child of their times…
as we all are…

Kropotkin

I thought you were much older.

Star Trek makes me think of women in a Tarantino movie.

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The original Star Trek was very kitsch and Russ Meyer-ish…
a’la sexploitational…

K: and that criticism is from our current frame of mind…
at the time, it was groundbreaking and very ahead of its time…
we can look backwards and find fault with everything ever done,
but that is simply looking at everything in hindsight… you could say
that the original framers of the American experiment, the founding fathers,
were sexist and racist and bigots and you will get no argument from me…

but that is seeing them from our current mindset… in their time,
they were daring and imaginative thinkers… who sought to solve a
real problem that existed in their day…

that they failed in large parts, will still get no argument from me but
they failed in a sense of our current viewpoints… we will get pounded
by the future for our failures in insight and wisdom… a well deserved pounding
from the future about our many failures of today…

the future will say, what the hell were you thinking when YOU did this?

and we will not be able to answer them outside of, it seemed like a good
idea at the time…

as is the defense of the founding fathers… it seemed like a good idea at
the time…

I often look to my past and ask myself, what the hell was I thinking doing this or that?

and my only answer…you know…

hindsight is a cruel bastard because it makes everything look really, really wrong…

Kropotkin

Oh no! I absolutely adored the first Star Trek series and it’s cray storylines and characters…
also Logan’s Run, Flash Gordon, and the many other Shows similar to the Star Trek genre.

I’ve watched every Star Trek film, or almost all… the last few ones especially, and for me…
they out-class Star Wars, e-very time… but I might be biased.

I grew up with Star Trek TNG, and DS9.

Star Trek is science fiction, Star Wars is a fantasy that happens to be set in outerspace.

Other than their names and they’re both set in space, the two couldn’t be more different.

Star Trek is more serious, Star Wars is sheer entertainment.

I prefer Star Trek, but both were great in their own right.

The contemporary renditions of them however, are absolutely terrible, full of woke garbage, stay clear.

Comparing what was a series originally to a movie franchise is apples against donuts. Star Trek had way more character development and time for back story exploration. Star Wars IV, V, and VI made crowds cheer at the movie’s beginning and the end and stand in lines for hours. Fond memories. Star Wars made me feel like part of their family. Star Trek, I felt more like an outside observer, although the original Star Trek movies became more adventurous fun as they progressed. Star Trek Voyager is my favorite of any Trek series though.