DS9 - Rejoined

[GreyICE]

I still really like the original iron Man film, Downey's take on Stark and the character arc he had and the experienting stuff was all great. Iron Man 2 and 3, not so much.

The Marvel films are all of varying quality, but whatever you think of Captain Marvel being middle of the road quality... The second Spiderman film required, as an actual plot point, for Nick Fury to be an idiot that was nowhere near as competent as he usually is, so that the plot could work.

Not just bad writing or being out of character, it was an actual explicit plot point reveal at the end that they knew he'd been dumb to whole movie to excuse him being so off his game. When a movie has THAT large a hole in its entire script and they have to make a gag out of it to try and patch the hole... I feel like that's an issue.

Eh, that just requires Nick Fury to be less hypercompetent. His character was internally consistent, even if it's not consistent with external media.

Now, lets talk about what a piece of shit the Captain Marvel movie was. It was about a third in I realized it was going to be oh my fucking god. So, framing and action scenes! Every good action scene needs to establish stakes and goals - what both parties want, and what is at stake. The first matrix does this for all but two action scenes, the second matrix movie does this for... heh.

So! Captain Marvel has blown up the Skrull ship after being captured and tortured. She now lands on earth. Her goal - locate a transmitter and get a signal to the Kree as fast as possible (she is alone, outgunned, and the earth is in danger). A skrull spots her! Skrull goals - presumably capture/kill her. The Skrull runs! In a competent movie, this now starts a timer. Captain Marvel has to get a transmitter working with the Skrulls on her tail. This movie (this fucking movie): Captain Marvel chases the Skrull. Okay. Now you're wasting valuable time, and giving your position away by using your power freely (since we established the power is hyper unique).

Oh no wait, maybe it's a different scene, where Fury asks her how he knows she's not a Skrull and she says "Skrulls can't do this" and blows up a jukebox. Nick Fury has no idea what Skrulls can or can't do, and no reason for that to be convincing.

Oh no wait, maybe it's the main climax of the movie where Captain Marvel proceeds to make the EXACT SAME MISTAKE WE STARTED THE MOVIE WITH and this is presented as heroic because fuck character development, set the speed to full retard. It's simply inexcusable. Any movie where the hero starts by making a giant mistake and ends by making the identical mistake is a tragedy, not a fucking hero movie. And yet the entire thing is played heroically. And to tie it all together, there's this meaningless personal growth fight where the first time she wins with her powers, and the second time she wins with her powers, thus demonstrating... fuck all, the movie is bad.

We could add in wooden acting, meaningless plot points, Nick Fury's eye loss being a joke, but goddamn it, who the fuck cares? When the movie is that goddamn stupid, there's no salvaging it.

I know we wanted a woman-lead marvel superhero movie. That one was just godawful though.

[Freeverse]

PS I am calling the J'naii ''sexless'' instead of ''genderless'' like the episode does because we have to account for 30 years of terminology advancement. The words were interchangeable back then. However, with modern eyes, they clearly do have gender its just that their authoritarian government was oppressing it. Sexless would definitely fit them better. Of course, we are also dealing with what is a very badly written episode so to this day I still cannot work out why a species that only has one sex would ever have a concept of gender in the first place. There are no males and females so having a male or female gender identity is nonsensical.

The J'naii are likely a majority intersex species by our reckoning, and also, gender being based on sexual characteristics is just a convenient way for human societies to simplify things that are actually kinda complex. Ask a scientist who specializes in human biology and they'll be able to tell you way more than I can about the nuance of human sexes. Also, just for fun, ask a mycologist about fungi sexes. It's wild.

Gender is something that we, as a society, have certain ideas about which are pretty arbitrary, one could even say nonsensical. Most of the "common sense" about gender that people tend to believe is actually a post-hoc justification for what is, essentially, just made up. Like, yeah, there are some physical differences between the sexes, but "pink is for girls" is just wackadoo flapdoodle. See also clothing, hairstyles, posture, language, hobbies and interests that are gender segregated.

Why do some J'naii have gender if there's only one sex? I dunno. Maybe they just like it. It's as good a reason as any. Also, didn't they used to have distinct sexes? I think I recall one character saying that they did, or at least that they may have, in the past.

[Freeverse]

Oh no wait, maybe it's a different scene, where Fury asks her how he knows she's not a Skrull and she says "Skrulls can't do this" and blows up a jukebox. Nick Fury has no idea what Skrulls can or can't do, and no reason for that to be convincing.

The idea of Nick, who is just a regular FBI agent at this point, seeing a woman do a laser punch on a jukebox, and thinking "Yeah, but that doesn't prove she's not a Skrull! How do I know Skrull's can't do that?", is absolutely hilarious to me. Like, maybe he's just playing along so he doesn't get laser punched?

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

I believe that's the point. Granted it's not a move many people outside of Samuel L Jackson can play. Jive turkey.

[Beastro]

Honestly reading this discussion is immensely entertaining and educating. I don't want to put down Chuck's wonderful and witty humor - because it's really good but watching the English speaking Westerners throw around words like "bigot" and "homophobia'" like it's candy - it gives you an appreciation of a time when people treated accusations like this seriously. When you thought hard and long before you dared accuse a fellow man of anything.

I remember growing up in a post-Soviet country with a great deal respect for USA and their culture. I remember my parents watching TNG and DS9 with us when me and my siblings were kids and showing us captain Picard, Data, Commander Sisko as examples of virtue and maturity. I remember Picard defending Barclay when Riker and Geordi wanted him thrown off the Enterprise and being told by my dad - "See that? He didn't know the guy personally. He had no idea who Barclay was but he was a reasonable Captain and so he was willing to search for the other guy's side of the story. He reminded everyone that Barclay has signed up to the same dangers and responsibilities they have and so - even if he was failing some of them - deserved the same respect and just treatment that everyone else got." When we came to this episode - Rejoined - even though "being gay" just a year ago stopped being a crime for which you legally faced incarceration - they let us watch the episode and see the possibility of a same-sex relationship being an acceptable thing "in the future" Because they respected the show. Because Star Trek - for all it's faults - presented their "topics" and "message-of-the-week" with respect. Not all of the time but enough of the time. And so I grew up loving Star Trek and looking with respect at America where the ideas and freedoms we could only dream of one day achieving were common everyday occurrence.

30 years later I tried to show my parents Star Trek: Picard. They couldn't stand it after the first episode and wouldn't watch any more of it. I remember what my dad said about what's happening in USA nowadays "Yeah I remember when I couldn't say some words publicly because I was facing a risk of loosing my job, my opportunity for an education or risk going to jail for it. We called it "Communist Dictatorship" Why are the Americans nowadays doing the same thing to themselves? That's madness!" Honestly I couldn't explain to him why.

When I'm seeing stuff like - Netflix not interested in Picard - but quite enthusiastically streaming (and even publicly defending) a movie 365 Days that very clearly by "modern definition" romanticizes and advocates for kidnapping of the girl you're interested and keeping her until she falls in love with you, when I learn that Lower Decks won't be distributed world-wide because no company is interested in buying the rights because it wouldn't be profitable and people outside USA wouldn't watch it (even though they are happily re-watching TNG) - I have to ask an honest and serious question to all of you living in the USA. Can you even entertain the possibility that " It is that perhaps Delen is wrong and the World is right?" That the USA's ideas of "equality" be it about racial issues or gender are wrong? Or are you 100% sure that "If the World says otherwise then the World is wrong!" when you don't seem to be able to even convince your own country as a whole of that truth - as clearly illustrated by your current legally voted-in President?

SF Debris's server has so far proven to be a place of reason with people able to discuss things in a civilized way which is why I'm asking here. I'm not asking out of malice - simply out of curiosity. I would love to get an answer from Chuck as well but I do understand I have no right to demand anything off him least of all his free time and I also understand that giving any answer at all could be detrimental to his business and as such - don't expect it.

One of the more interesting posts in this thread.

One all the more interesting given that its been completely ignored.

[tyrteg]

Thanks for the mention Beastro but I feel like I already got the answer to my questions. The silence was shocking to me at first by it's unanimity and I was wondering if my post was unintelligible due to me not being an English native speaker and having difficulty in getting the message across.

However the more I watched the way this discussion was going the more I realized that it is less of a discussion and more of a battlefield that got rushed and quickly overtaken by the progressive "modern thinking" posters like GreyICE and mathewgsmith who stated their opinions and showed that they are ready to immediately engage any opposition with labels like "bigot" or "homophobe" therefor allowing themselves the opportunity to claim moral and ethical superiority and stopping any further discussion in it's tracks because nobody wants to argue with someone so detestable as a bigot. (Funny thing 400 years ago that label would've been "stinking Jew" and 50 years ago it would've been "commie fag")
Sadly although these tactics would've served them well on a battlefield they are not very conductive to open discussion and I feel like anyone who would've actually wanted to engage me in an open discussion on the topics I raised has at this point given up and moved on since they aren't willing to state an opinion for which they could be ridiculed and called names because it doesn't line up with the official party line about "racial and gender issues" that America has (if you go by the voices on the internet) seemingly united over.

Of course as I stated in my previous post - USA's legally voted-in president is a proof that it isn't as one sided as one might think and it would seem that those holding a differing opinion have simply decided to hold their tongue and keep their opinion to themselves. That was a tactic that worked quite well for the Europeans who were part of the Communist block in the 70's and 80's and I'm just slightly disappointed that the ideal of USA as the place of freedom - a nation that liberates other countries and guarantees their right of free speech - even if their culture and opinions are different from theirs - seems to have died sometime in the 90's and nowadays the America has become so rigid that even in an open forum like here on SFDebris the voice that asks for the examination of the trending view-point face to face with facts that seem to be pointing in a different direction - e.g. "Most of the planet Earth doesn't seem to agree with North America's view on gender and race" has to be shunned and ignored until it goes away. Still better than being prosecuted by the Communist Party I guess.

Just look at mathewgsmith who is so certain and so safe in his beliefs - so sure that "The World is wrong and Delen is right" that he's surprised that anyone uses a clearly defined term "extreme conservative" in any other way than as a label for somebody who should be ousted from the conversation and shunned for their differing opinion that is obviously and scientifically proven to be - the "wrong opinion."

Going by the "FFS" comment he used "extremely conservative" to describe them without it being meant as a polite euphemism for "bigot". I took it as a direct call-out (especially combined with the immigrants bit), which it's clear now wasn't the intent. I honestly haven't seen that phrase used to mean anything else in a decade or so, but there you go. Mea culpa.

Also thank you for demonstrating the point I was trying to make in this post Beastro - since even though you've stated your interest in what I was saying - you very clearly steered away from giving your own personal opinion

[GreyICE]

However the more I watched the way this discussion was going the more I realized that it is less of a discussion and more of a battlefield that got rushed and quickly overtaken by the progressive "modern thinking" posters like GreyICE and mathewgsmith who stated their opinions and showed that they are ready to immediately engage any opposition with labels like "bigot" or "homophobe" therefor allowing themselves the opportunity to claim moral and ethical superiority and stopping any further discussion in it's tracks because nobody wants to argue with someone so detestable as a bigot. (Funny thing 400 years ago that label would've been "stinking Jew" and 50 years ago it would've been "commie fag")

Honestly I read your post. I thought it was an interesting perspective. However it was mostly your opinion about your experiences watching Star Trek TNG 30 years ago, to your experiences watching Star Trek Picard today. That's a whole lot of personal opinion statements, and outside of finding your experience interesting, I don't know what you expect. Do you want someone to tell you "no, your experiences are invalid?" That seems offensive and unnecessary.

I doubt this is specific to English, so I'll be clear on the problem I see here - if you want other people to engage in discussion with you, you have to form a thesis and opinion, and offer ways to engage on neutral and equal terms. When the subject of discussion is your life experiences - which none of us have experienced or been part of - and you have no clear thesis outside of that, the best you can do is read the personal account and go "that's interesting."

If you want a gold star for writing a long post, here it is. One gold star. Congratulations. If you want to start a discussion, try having a clear thesis statement and topic for discussion.

It'd also help if you would try to understand me, rather than pretending you can read my mind. It makes me think that there's probably nothing worth discussing with you, because you are the sort of lazy intellect that assumes they've already read someone else's post before they even bother to read it.

[Thebestoftherest]

Will we ever get to 300 page thread?

[TGLS]

Only if we eventually argue about what viewing settings we're using.

[tyrteg]

Wonderful. So I did get an answer in the end. Thank you for taking the time to write it and let me answer your arguments point by point.

Honestly I read your post. I thought it was an interesting perspective. However it was mostly your opinion about your experiences watching Star Trek TNG 30 years ago, to your experiences watching Star Trek Picard today. That's a whole lot of personal opinion statements, and outside of finding your experience interesting, I don't know what you expect. Do you want someone to tell you "no, your experiences are invalid?" That seems offensive and unnecessary.

I doubt this is specific to English, so I'll be clear on the problem I see here - if you want other people to engage in discussion with you, you have to form a thesis and opinion, and offer ways to engage on neutral and equal terms. When the subject of discussion is your life experiences - which none of us have experienced or been part of - and you have no clear thesis outside of that, the best you can do is read the personal account and go "that's interesting."

Yes you are correct the first 2-3 paragraphs of my original post were: My confusion at how easily westerners throw around words like "bigot" or "homophobia" and - my personal experiences which form the basis of my worldview and the position from which I'm making the argument. If this was a scientific thesis I would've included my credentials and my historical publications concerning the subject but this is a fun chat on the internet and the main reason why I wrote about my personal experience was to a) show that I'm not coming to the discussion from the position of hostility and malice and b) to offer a historical perspective on how the general view of USA and it's media has shifted over the years - at least in post-soviet Europe. I'm not saying opinion of my friends relatives and acquaintances is universally true but it should at least warrant a short moment of reflection and going "huh that's interesting" - which seems to be both yours and Beastro's reaction and in that case it fulfilled it's purpose.

If you want a gold star for writing a long post, here it is. One gold star. Congratulations. If you want to start a discussion, try having a clear thesis statement and topic for discussion.

It'd also help if you would try to understand me, rather than pretending you can read my mind. It makes me think that there's probably nothing worth discussing with you, because you are the sort of lazy intellect that assumes they've already read someone else's post before they even bother to read it.

Ah here comes the unnecessary and unwarranted condescension "here it is. One gold star. Congratulations." and straw-manning accusations of "there is nothing worth discussing with you" because "you are the sort of lazy intellect that makes false assumptions." which allow you to quickly dismiss whatever I'm saying and move on with your victory march. Bravo.

But funny that you mention assumptions. Because I did not assume anything in my original post. Instead the second half of my post - which you either seem to have mis-understood or completely forgotten about was stating an opinion - based on verifiable facts - that it would seem people around the world are not interested in modern Star Trek and in fact much of the current media presenting "modern values" and seem to prefer the old TNG-era Trek which is happily streaming on Netflix and is beloved all around the world while Star Trek: Lower Decks still haven't found anyone willing to distribute it internationally.
I then asked if the current Americans are even willing to entertain the idea that their views and opinions about "equality" be it in relation to racial issues or gender - are wrong? And I used a direct quote from my favorite episode of Babylon 5 (starring my favorite Croatian actress Mira Furlan) because this is in fact an SF forum and the quote fit perfectly.

"Is it possible that perhaps Delen is wrong and the World is right?"
"Is it possible that the less than half of the American people (based on the empirical evidence of the last presidential elections) are wrong and the rest of the World is right?"

Are you willing to entertain the possibility that the truths that you are stating as absolute and immutable facts - are perhaps not so simply true for everyone - no matter how much you'd love them to be and that a Chinese citizen's idea about race - or Republic of India muslim's opinions about gender equality (which trust me - I can verify from personal experience are very different from the American ones) might hold value as well?

And here comes the kicker and the other reason why I included my personal experiences - can you see that the original Star Trek's opinions were viewed and celebrated around the world almost universally - even in post-Soviet countries that had every reason to decry it as hateful Capitalist propaganda? But they didn't. Because Star Trek 6 didn't say - Federation was 100% right and Klingons were pure evil and must be exterminated. Both sides had good people and bad. Nobody was perfect - while current Star Trek has a clear statement of - T'Kuvma's Klingons are nationalist extremists and are evil and must be fought by any means necessary - and is therefor viewed with disappointment and as signs of American extremism and straw-manning opponents?