Some professional writing

[lizbee]

Usually I have opinions about Star Trek and fandom for free, but when my friend Alex invited me to contribute to her new journal and offered to pay me, I said yes, and proceeded to go on a very long rant about bigotry among Trekkies. Then I went back and cut some of the more vibes-based tangents, double checked all my sources, and here we are: 

The Diversity Paradox - Star Trek, Star Trek fandom, and the limits of fandom as progressivism

If I may toot my own horn a little louder, I'm particularly proud of this section: 

You might say, “Don’t read the comments.” And that’s fair—but fandom is the comments section.

We’re all here because we looked at a creative work and went, “I love that/I hate that/I have complex feelings I need to explore/I need to know what happens next and I want to discuss all the possibilities/I need to find out minute details about every single starship that appeared on screen/I will actually die if these fictional characters don’t kiss/a combination of some or all of these feelings.” Fandom is more than the act of consumption. Fandom is in the creation that follows, whether that’s through a fan fiction or art, or reviews, or essays, or the conversations between strangers that take place online.

In “Balance of Terror”, Kirk tells a prejudiced crewman to keep his bigotry in his quarters. It’s a snappy line that fits neatly into a single animated gif, so it’s frequently rolled out by fans as a “solution” to the problem of bigotry in fandom. But very few people identify as a bigot, especially in Star Trek fandom. Karen Q. Fangirl isn’t going, “I have a terrible problem with misogynoir, I really hate Black women,” she’s saying, “Look, I just think Michael Burnham and Raffi Musiker and Beckett Mariner don’t belong in Starfleet.” Just as her mother, thirty years ago, complained that Benjamin Sisko was there to serve political correctness, and anyway, isn’t he just too angry to be a good leader? And just as her grandmother wrote Kirk/Spock stories in which Uhura simply did not appear.

“Don’t read the comments/don’t engage with the bigots/keep your bigotry in your quarters” just cedes the room to the noisiest and worst people in fandom. As a solution to the problem, it’s as intellectually and morally lazy as the multiple episodes of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds which posit that the torture of children of colour is a necessary sacrifice to maintain a thriving utopia.
 

Comments

[kore]

"And that’s fair—but fandom is the comments section."

Nice!

[sabotabby]

co-signed. Awesome post.

[kore]

"Did I have to stop and think about how I instinctively give trust and grace to terrible men when they’re played by Jason Isaacs? Yes. Is my absolute loathing for Anson Mount’s Pike potentially an overreaction to my initial mistake? You don’t know me!"

Does this not speak for us all

[lizbee]

In my defence, I also hate Anson Mount's Pike because he's bad at his job and he gives me the ick.

[makamu]

Thirded!

Though to be fair, I liked all of it, and as a newbie Trekkie (SNW is my first dive), I nodded along with a lot of points

[laurenthemself]

It's such a good essay!! I'm half dreading Continuum because I'll be coming out with these comparisons between Red Dwarf and Lower Decks in particular (Red Dwarf was basically Lower Decks before Lower Decks was Lower Decks is the central notion) and you have Textual Analysis and Fandom Knowledge and I have theories on why Dr T'Ana is transfeminine, but the other half of me is not dreading Continuum because I know we are both experiencing fandom in our own ways and they're both valid.

[lizbee]

They are both EXTREMELY valid, and I've never seen Red Dwarf so I'm very excited to hear your theories.