DIS - The Red Angel

[Dargaron]

The way that season 1 goes out of its way to show that Burnham is right. The Klingons really ARE universally thuggish and violent savages who hate us because we love our freedom. The only way to stop these fanatical, religious-terrorist foreign filth from slaughtering our women and children is for our brave military to heroically install a puppet dictator and threaten to slaughter them in droves if they ever step out of line. This is good because we showed enough restraint to not commit genocide and wipe out these barbaric scum!

Hail Space America! MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!

Basically, season 1 is marinated in the most toxic kind of racist, xenophobic neoconservative ultranationalism. It makes Bush, Cheney, and Jack Bauer look like hippies. PACIFIST hippies.

That's the thing: you're describing how Klingons have always behaved, from ToS onward, barring individual exceptions like Worf (who was raised human).

Go back to Errand of Mercy where Klingons were introduced: the Organians had done nothing to harm any Klingon anywhere, yet Kor and his occupying force felt perfectly content murdering any number as they pleased. Kor promised a thousand dead Organians for any dead Klingon: later, he orders two hundred arbitrary Organians for every hour until Kirk is captured and brought to him. These are clearly common, accepted practices: the second even has a numbered designation, with a wiki page! (Special Occupation Order 4). We are given no reason to assume that Kor was bluffing, or that his warriors wouldn't hesitate in the slightest to carry out these orders.

The fact that the war was ended by the godlike Organians literally neutralizing both sides doesn't change Kor's actions. And his actions are clearly not those of some renegade Klingon cowboy cop going above and beyond his mandate: we see more of the Klingon military in Deep Space 9, and it shows that Kor is just your average Klingon. Way of the Warrior gives us the unprovoked invasion of Cardassia, where Worf gives us this gem: "If the Klingon Empire has reverted to the old practices, they will occupy the Cardassian homeworld, execute all government officials, and install an imperial overseer to put down any further resistance."

This isn't just a mindset restricted to the upper levels of the Klingon military: Cut to Nor The Battle To The Strong, and we see that there's virtually no self-control in the entire the Klingon military. Everyone just accepts the fact that Klingon warriors will butcher the medics and patients at the med post Bashir visits, and the location is repeatedly bombed. Jake and Bashir, one of whom is a uniformed medic, are repeatedly shelled. We also get this: "Medical personnel are fair game as far as Klingons are concerned. They'll even kill wounded right in their beds. They think they're giving them an honourable death"

The only difference between Discovery and previous incarnations of the Klingons is that we actually get to see their barbarism first-hand. We get to see the torture, the executions and the unprovoked murders. Their culture has always been built around unrepentant destruction of everything that's not strong enough to resist them: it's just that we, the viewers, go the nice, sanitized version so that nerds could play with their bat-leths without realizing "Hey, I'm dressing up as a war criminal!"

Heck, things get a lot darker when you think about what we don't see in the series: when was the last time we saw a non-Klingon from the Empire? They occupy an area of space roughly similar to the Federation, and there are a lot of species in the Federation. The charitable answer is that the non-Klingons are enslaved, like the prisoners we saw in Rura Penthe or the Arin-sen refugees we see in "Judgment" on Enterprise. The uncharitable answer is that they were killed off, possibly 200 at a time.

It's not racism if there is, in fact, a deep-rooted genocidal impulse that drives Klingon culture and that simply by existing, the Empire represents a threat to all free life forms everywhere. I can multiply the examples above: those are just the ones that come to mind easily.

[CharlesPhipps]

And yet Burnham's "peace" is an ostensibly friendly dictator holding the Klingons to ransom with the threat of annihilation. Her "peace" and "tolerance" are predicated on the threat of genocide. That's not peace, or tolerance. That's mindless xenophobic hate. "We must control all foreign filth, they must quiver in terror under our guns for all time, because they are incapable of our superior civilization."

Fuck that.

You know what would've actually worked? Burnham realizing that her racism was wrong for a reason other than "oh right, I fucked a disguised Klingon, didn't I?", mutinying, refusing to even threaten the Klingons, and performing some gesture or service that brought the Klingons to the negotiating table and reaching a truce of mutual understanding.

Isn't that an endorsement of dictatorial regimes? The thing about the Klingons as envisioned by Roddenberry are the fact that they are a group that challenges the Federation's morality by glorifying war, nationalism, racism, and other matters. The Klingons in the show are shown as a group that are going to war because they want it. It is the peace on the end of a gun but it is one that comes on the Klingon's own terms.

Which is to say that it is cynical enough that it acknowledges that ignoring the crimes of countries like China, North Korea, and Russia isn't enough and that a stand must be taken against them. Perhaps not perfect but I also don't think progressive politics benefits from saying we should ignore their human rights abuses and aggressive tendencies.

Gene Roddenberry actually had his dying objections to the Undiscovered Country being, "I like the idea of the movie but the objections by the Federation are to the fact it's a totalitarian dictatorship. Not racism."

[Link8909]

Really? Because that's the exact opposite lesson I took from it to the point of eye-rolling disgust. Burnham selflessly beats herself up repeatedly and tortures herself over her decision to "mutiny" (that lasted 5 seconds and did nothing) as well as blames herself for the war. She then makes a speech at the end of the series that says, "I was wrong. Peace is the only thing that the Federation should ever stand for and while I mutineed for war before, I mutiny now for peace."

T'Kuvma and his House stand for rapid nationalist racism and xenophobia as well as religious support of war. They're the Bush, Cheney, and Trump of the Klingon Empire that hide behind morality when really embodying white supremacy. Apparently, it's WRONG to resist this kind of toxicity and that we should just accept their intolerance as well as desire to destroy democracy in order to benefit their racial agenda.

Agreed, It's honestly head-scratching when people complain about Michael Burnham's mutiny because the series deliberately frames her actions as wrong, and that she herself regrets her own actions, as she said in her Court Martial:

"From my youth on Vulcan, I was raised to believe that service was my purpose. And I carried that conviction to Starfleet. I dreamed of a day when I would command my own vessel, and further the noble objectives of this great institution. That dream is over. The only ship I know in ruins, my crew gone, my captain – my friend – dead. I wanted to protect them from war... from the enemy. And now we are at war... and I am the enemy."

It's honestly very similar to when people say Captain Picard was never effected by the Borg and that his actions in First Contact was "out of character", even though that most people you say that properly are just quoting the Red Letter Media review which deliberately cuts out all the moments that showed Picard being "bothered", and don't even take into account things like PTSD or the trauma of being assimilated and striped of all free will as your body and experience is used to cause more harm and destruction, and with Burnham people tend to ignore the fact she watched her parents get murdered by Klingons and was too young and powerless to do anything, which led to her developing survivors-guilt and her overall mentality of taking responsibility for thing that are out of her control, which I think is very interesting that she has this kind of trauma that isn't actually racist, that unlike Captain Kirk or Captain Picard who harboured hatred for the races that respectfully killed their son or assimilated them and used them to destroy all that they stood for, Burnham just didn't want history to repeat itself with her new family on the USS Shenzhou, even later trying to find a peaceful solution with the Klingons in the Mirror Universe Arc.

And again I agree with your observation of the Klingons, and as Dargaron points out, is very much in character for the Klingons, it honestly makes sense that culture that takes pride in itself and its way of life would feel threatened by the Federations "harmonizing" and is even something bought up previously in the franchise like in The Undiscovered Country:

"Human rights. Why the very name is racist. The Federation is no more than a homo sapiens only club."

I especially agree with his observation here:

The only difference between Discovery and previous incarnations of the Klingons is that we actually get to see their barbarism first-hand. We get to see the torture, the executions and the unprovoked murders. Their culture has always been built around unrepentant destruction of everything that's not strong enough to resist them: it's just that we, the viewers, go the nice, sanitized version so that nerds could play with their bat-leths without realizing "Hey, I'm dressing up as a war criminal!"

I'd honestly talk more about it, but I would just be repeating what Dargaron, BridgeConsoleMasher and you've said.

I think the thing I'm glade the most about is that the reason for the Klingon war wasn't the usual "They are without honor!" spiel and actually had purpose with uniting the divided Houses with T'Kuvma's ideology, while still in-keeping with the Klingon mentality.

[CharlesPhipps]

These Klingons are the Klingons of TOS - ones completely without honor.

[Worffan101]

And yet Burnham's "peace" is an ostensibly friendly dictator holding the Klingons to ransom with the threat of annihilation. Her "peace" and "tolerance" are predicated on the threat of genocide. That's not peace, or tolerance. That's mindless xenophobic hate. "We must control all foreign filth, they must quiver in terror under our guns for all time, because they are incapable of our superior civilization."

Fuck that.

You know what would've actually worked? Burnham realizing that her racism was wrong for a reason other than "oh right, I fucked a disguised Klingon, didn't I?", mutinying, refusing to even threaten the Klingons, and performing some gesture or service that brought the Klingons to the negotiating table and reaching a truce of mutual understanding.

Isn't that an endorsement of dictatorial regimes? The thing about the Klingons as envisioned by Roddenberry are the fact that they are a group that challenges the Federation's morality by glorifying war, nationalism, racism, and other matters. The Klingons in the show are shown as a group that are going to war because they want it. It is the peace on the end of a gun but it is one that comes on the Klingon's own terms.

Which is to say that it is cynical enough that it acknowledges that ignoring the crimes of countries like China, North Korea, and Russia isn't enough and that a stand must be taken against them. Perhaps not perfect but I also don't think progressive politics benefits from saying we should ignore their human rights abuses and aggressive tendencies.

Gene Roddenberry actually had his dying objections to the Undiscovered Country being, "I like the idea of the movie but the objections by the Federation are to the fact it's a totalitarian dictatorship. Not racism."

In that case, we should have put nukes under Berlin, and Kabul, and Baghdad, and threatened to set them off if Germany and Afghanistan and Pakistan didn't accept our puppet dictators. Because clearly Germans and Afghans and Iraqis are mindless savages who lust only for violence because they were led by assholes once.

This isn't about ignoring human rights abuses, this is about writing off an entire species as incapable of reasoned discourse because they were once led by a religious fanatic, and patting ourselves on the back for being enlightened enough to not casually exterminate these vermin.

That makes us no better than the villainous regime we fought. And not even the real-life USA stooped QUITE that low.

[Worffan101]

This kind of authoritarian pseudoliberal bullshit set back the left-wing cause by DECADES during the Bush era. You can't just write off entire cultures, species, ethnic groups, whatever, as being incapable of peace and democracy because they were once led by a monster. Berman-era Trek often (not always: see DS9) fell into this trap, too, and reinforced it with its planet of the hats storytelling.

Some things--torture, propping up a puppet dictator out of blatant paternalistic racism, threatening to nuke somebody's capital if they don't march in lockstep with what you want--are just plain WRONG, no matter what. And STD is too stupid and racist and obsessed with being "edgy" to realize that.

[CharlesPhipps]

In that case, we should have put nukes under Berlin, and Kabul, and Baghdad, and threatened to set them off if Germany and Afghanistan and Pakistan didn't accept our puppet dictators. Because clearly Germans and Afghans and Iraqis are mindless savages who lust only for violence because they were led by assholes once.

I'm sorry, the argument you're putting forward lost me a bit somewhere.

WW2 was how the Nazis were beaten and it was through the use of massive campaigns of bombing as well as use of military force. The atomic bomb was something that was effectively far less than the conventional military force that was dispatched against them. You're making a distinction between the threat of force vs. use of force that bluntly does not exist.

What exactly IS the difference between de-Nazification after the invasion of Berlin vs. Installing L'rell and trusting her to help build a better Klingon Empire?

Some things--torture, propping up a puppet dictator out of blatant paternalistic racism, threatening to nuke somebody's capital if they don't march in lockstep with what you want--are just plain WRONG, no matter what. And STD is too stupid and racist and obsessed with being "edgy" to realize that.

I thought the issue of the Iraq War was that it was built on blatant false pretenses, was designed to enforce a larger agenda in the region, was waged with blatant incompetence that ignored WW2's lessons (neither rebuilding the region as well as refusal to work with local allies--Patton would be appalled at dissolving the Iraqi Army), and was filled with massive amounts of war profiteering as well as corruption. Not to mention the disgusting use of torture.

The circumstances of DISCOVERY are created by writers but the Klingons actually did attack the Federation first, making it a defensive war, and were never waged with either bigotry or torture. Indeed, one of the things I appreciated was the numerous attempts to negotiate a peaceful settlement by the protagonists.

FYI - I'm a pacifist anarchist in RL but all of this seems to be caricature of what's on screen.

[Worffan101]

I'm sorry, the argument you're putting forward lost me a bit somewhere.

In that case, we should have put nukes under Berlin, and Kabul, and Baghdad, and threatened to set them off if Germany and Afghanistan and Pakistan didn't accept our puppet dictators. Because clearly Germans and Afghans and Iraqis are mindless savages who lust only for violence because they were led by assholes once.

WW2 was how the Nazis were beaten and it was through the use of massive campaigns of bombing as well as use of military force. The atomic bomb was something that was effectively far less than the conventional military force that was dispatched against them. You're making a distinction between the threat of force vs. use of force that bluntly does not exist.

Your argument--and STD's--is that the Germans, like the Klingons, are an inherently savage and violent breed of mindless vermin who slavishly follow their Dear Leader and are racially incapable of anything else. Therefore, it is morally justified to put a superbomb under their capital and demand that they accept the rule of a US/UFP -sponsored dictator or be subject to summary genocide, and our noble and civilized willingness to give the barbarians a chance to submit to our enlightened hegemony makes us peaceful and just while proving our racial superiority to their barbaric culture and primitive race. We are so kind and just, we won't even shoot their children and exterminate them like the nits and lice they are! A shame, because Chivington had the right idea, but we're such pacifist people that we won't do that even though he was totally justified in using babies for target practice because they had the wrong skin color.

That's what STD's argument boils down to. "We would be justified in wiping out these culturally inferior vermin, but we're not racist it's just their culture, and also violence is wrong so we'll give them the chance to submit unconditionally to us BEFORE we kill them all, that makes us good."

Putting Rapist Klingon Lady in charge under threat of blowing up Qo'noS is like America putting thermonuclear weapons under Kabul and threatening to detonate them unless the Afghan people unanimously and unconditionally accept a US-appointed Cultural Overseer to ensure that their violent society and disgusting race of cave-dwelling fanatic primitives can never again threaten the USA. It is blatantly racist, paternalistic, tyrannical, imperialistic, and inherently violent. It is also intellectually and morally lazy--if the UFP wanted to actually make peace after somehow achieving a total and unconditional victory over the Klingons, they'd work to support domestic democratic organization, rather than propping up a dictator under threat of genocide.

This is why I hate STD so much. It's so intellectually and morally LAZY that it becomes a horrifyingly racist pile of drek.

[Fianna]

It seems like the issue is that, at the end of Season 1, the giant bomb at Qo'nos is treated like it will be a permanent state of affairs, to be left there in perpetuity to keep the Klingon Empire in line, rather than a temporary measure until the current regime can be removed.

[CharlesPhipps]

Your argument--and STD's--is that the Germans, like the Klingons, are an inherently savage and violent breed of mindless vermin who slavishly follow their Dear Leader and are racially incapable of anything else.

My argument is that it's a totalitarian fascist government. Your argument is saying, essentially, "All Germans are Nazis" rather than "Germany was taken over by an evil government."

Therefore, it is morally justified to put a superbomb under their capital and demand that they accept the rule of a US/UFP -sponsored dictator or be subject to summary genocide, and our noble and civilized willingness to give the barbarians a chance to submit to our enlightened hegemony makes us peaceful and just while proving our racial superiority to their barbaric culture and primitive race.

This argument falls down in that it gives a superbomb to a Klingon finger. It is supporting the peace faction in an internal conflict. The fact that the current hostile anti-Federation government remains in place is actually the biggest cynical display in all of this as it shows that the DISCO people are unwilling to try to engage in overthrow.

They just want to end the conflict. Even if it means the Klingon Empire remains under Saddam's regime.

(It's just Saddam's daughter now has the nuke)

That's what STD's argument boils down to. "We would be justified in wiping out these culturally inferior vermin, but we're not racist it's just their culture, and also violence is wrong so we'll give them the chance to submit unconditionally to us BEFORE we kill them all, that makes us good."

Aside from thinking all of that is nonsense, I am curious what you feel would be a proper depiction of the war's resolution.

Putting Rapist Klingon Lady in charge under threat of blowing up Qo'noS is like America putting thermonuclear weapons under Kabul and threatening to detonate them unless the Afghan people unanimously and unconditionally accept a US-appointed Cultural Overseer to ensure that their violent society and disgusting race of cave-dwelling fanatic primitives can never again threaten the USA.

1. She's not a rapist. Her relationship with Voq was consensual. He just remembers it wrong.

2. She's a cultural fanatic of the Klingon race. Far more so than the Council.

3. She's not the Federation's puppet. She's actually been its enemy for years.

It is blatantly racist, paternalistic, tyrannical, imperialistic, and inherently violent.

Your depiction of the Klingons is kind of horrifying. You're determined to portray their race as identical to their leadership. The Klingons are victims of the High Council and your unwillingness to draw a distinction is kind of vile.

Trump is not America. Nor is T'Kuvma the Klingons.

This is why I hate STD so much. It's so intellectually and morally LAZY that it becomes a horrifyingly racist pile of drek.

You have yet to state what exactly is the victory condition you would want to be shown.

It seems like the issue is that, at the end of Season 1, the giant bomb at Qo'nos is treated like it will be a permanent state of affairs, to be left there in perpetuity to keep the Klingon Empire in line, rather than a temporary measure until the current regime can be removed.

Well as Season 2 shows, L'Rell's regime is doomed. The Klingon High Council hates and despise her for being kind to humans.