A More Realistic Federation

[General Mung Beans]

What if the government policy of the Federation was more realistic?

-No Prime Directive. Primitive worlds are instead probed to see if for instance Federation personnel will accidentally spread disease and so on and appropriate measures taken. Once that stage is complete, Federation personnel will make contact with all the major planetary governments if a civilization exists. Federation personnel than will help uplift technology and neutralize threats that egregriously threaten sentinent rights. Once the planet is fully developed they will given the option of joining the Federation or remaining independent.

-An economy with some forms of capitalism intact. Either a social democracy or American neoliberalism.

-Foreign policy without the "no first strike" rule. If its obvious the enemy is threatening an attack the Federation will strike first.

-Maintaining ground forces and equipment. Actually have an army that could stand up to or be more advanced than real life ones.

[Nephtys]

They claim to have no currency, but there's indications of rationing or some exchange taking place. When Sisko was reminescing about his Academy Days, he mentioned that he blew most of his savings worth of energy credits so that he could transport back home from San Francisco to New Orleans often and eat dinner with the family.

DS9's darker tones needed to be explored more. I loved Sisko's statement that Earth is a paradise... but tell that to colonists struggling to get by. I can see that too. Earth and the core worlds (Vulcan, Andor, Betazed, etc) are relatively affluent, comfortable places to live for the majority of it's inhabitants, but the colonies are a lot rougher.

The weird socialist-militarist UFP could itself be a kind of odd dystopia, with radical elements that don't fit in with the established order being allowed freely to acquire a ship and fly out to colonize somewhere to live relatively independently, but in a manner similar to a protectorate, where they rely entirely on the Feds for their military and interstellar policy. Then, once the colony world has developed sufficiently, the UFP reabsorbs them.

[Uraniun235]

What if the government policy of the Federation was more realistic?

-No Prime Directive. Primitive worlds are instead probed to see if for instance Federation personnel will accidentally spread disease and so on and appropriate measures taken. Once that stage is complete, Federation personnel will make contact with all the major planetary governments if a civilization exists. Federation personnel than will help uplift technology and neutralize threats that egregriously threaten sentinent rights. Once the planet is fully developed they will given the option of joining the Federation or remaining independent.

How is this more realistic? There are several known tribes of humans on Earth today who have no modern technology, who live mostly in isolation, and who we are not attempting to "uplift".

-An economy with some forms of capitalism intact. Either a social democracy or American neoliberalism.

I fail to see why this is classified as "more realistic" and not "more like being a future analogue of America". Handwaving away issues of scarcity by claiming humans had matured beyond avarice was one of the more strikingly hamhanded aspects of TNG, but positing a spacefaring society with vast material resources that could have different social values is not inherently unrealistic.

-Foreign policy without the "no first strike" rule. If its obvious the enemy is threatening an attack the Federation will strike first.

Would that be like the time Captain Picard flew the Enterprise-D into the Neutral Zone in order to seize control of advanced alien technology before the Romulans could get it? Or maybe more like the time Captain Picard ordered the Enterprise into the Neutral Zone to attack what they believed to be a Romulan base being constructed there.

-Maintaining ground forces and equipment. Actually have an army that could stand up to or be more advanced than real life ones.

The only thing this changes is that it now becomes plausible for internet nerds to write fanfiction about the Federation Army and to concoct bullshit versus arguments about future tanks.

DS9's darker tones needed to be explored more. I loved Sisko's statement that Earth is a paradise... but tell that to colonists struggling to get by. I can see that too. Earth and the core worlds (Vulcan, Andor, Betazed, etc) are relatively affluent, comfortable places to live for the majority of it's inhabitants, but the colonies are a lot rougher.

Hey, yeah, let's push Trek towards being more like a generic shitty-future setting! That'll set the series apart. Maybe we can also introduce some big corporations that own a lot of shit, wield too much power, and basically exploit the common people for the enrichment of the elite. That should open up exciting new story opportunities!

[Ghost Rider]

Quiet, Uraniun235! He needs that the future to be America of now for it to be more realistic! Fuck actually thinking of how this makes it no more realistic then Turtledove, nor having it follow in the slightest of Star Trek's purported baseline notions and ideals...AMERICA HO!

And oh yes, you tween idiot. Use the goddamn Search Function. This thing has been done before and each time the answers are usually in the same vein.

[Srelex]

Of course! In the GRIM FUTURE of the Roddenburryverse there is only GRIM! Humanity is ruled by a rotting William Shatner sitting atop a porcelean throne, who sends out his armies of genetically engineered Wesley Crushers in POWAH ARMOR with NUKES and RAILGUNS and KILLFUCKBLADES! Humanity must brave the GRIM DANGERS of SUBSPACE, where the JANEWAY DEMONS lurk to rend apart the souls of anyone unfortunate to meet them while braving the dangers of warp travel! And because we are GRIM and REALISTIC, we use WIRED TELEPHONES to prevent hacking, and our crewmen are all DANGEROUS EMOS! Now that the BORG have NUKED THE TWELVE COLONIES, the survivors must head to a mythical destination known as...BERMAN!

[Temujin]

Per the OP, I always thought that TOS was a good basis. But to flesh it out more I would rather model some elements on what we saw of the Earth Alliance in Babylon 5; a much better extrapolation of our current society then the happy, sappy (and obviously false based on DS9) SoCal version we got from Next Gen.

[Jeremy]

known as...BERMAN!

THE HORROR!!! It gnaws at my mind! Festers at my soul!

[Uraniun235]

Per the OP, I always thought that TOS was a good basis. But to flesh it out more I would rather model some elements on what we saw of the Earth Alliance in Babylon 5; a much better extrapolation of our current society then the happy, sappy (and obviously false based on DS9) SoCal version we got from Next Gen.

TOS doesn't really present much basis at all; the series was explicitly forbidden from exploring or discussing the Earth government of the 23rd century. We know there's money, private entrepreneurs, regulations governing space travel within the boundaries of the Federation, and that starship captains possess enormous authority... beyond that we know very little about how TOS Earth society, government, and culture works. You could fit a very wide range of settings within those parameters.

Making future-Earth a mere analogue of our own is also somewhat contrary to the whole notion of Star Trek - that despite whatever we faced today, we'd eventually build a better tomorrow. (And that said, even despite such optimism, TNG still assumed that we would eventually have a nuclear war - that things would get much worse before they got better.)

So if we made the Federation more like future-America, I have to ask: what would actually set Star Trek significantly apart from other American television space opera settings? I suppose I shouldn't assume; is the convergence of space opera towards a generally-similar look and feel actually desirable? I wouldn't think so, but maybe I'm in a minority here.

[Temujin]

TOS doesn't really present much basis at all; the series was explicitly forbidden from exploring or discussing the Earth government of the 23rd century. We know there's money, private entrepreneurs, regulations governing space travel within the boundaries of the Federation, and that starship captains possess enormous authority... beyond that we know very little about how TOS Earth society, government, and culture works. You could fit a very wide range of settings within those parameters.

Making future-Earth a mere analogue of our own is also somewhat contrary to the whole notion of Star Trek - that despite whatever we faced today, we'd eventually build a better tomorrow. (And that said, even despite such optimism, TNG still assumed that we would eventually have a nuclear war - that things would get much worse before they got better.)

So if we made the Federation more like future-America, I have to ask: what would actually set Star Trek significantly apart from other American television space opera settings? I suppose I shouldn't assume; is the convergence of space opera towards a generally-similar look and feel actually desirable? I wouldn't think so, but maybe I'm in a minority here.

Your right, TOS really doesn't give us much. But what little it does give us is better than TNG.

My idea is to take the more utopian elements we do see in TOS (including the movies), and combine them with a something grounded in reality. I don't mean for it to be as dark as B5 could be politically speaking, just take some of the more functional elements of the way the government and society is set up; i.e., have a functional economy, but also show that no one need go without food, education, work, etc.

TNG showed too much of a leap into utopian territory, but as was hinted at in DS9, its more smoke and mirrors than reality. Kind of akin to the first world (Earth and other major planets), living an extravagant consumer lifestyle at the expense of the less developed and developing nations (the colonies). That flies in the face of any real enlightened society, and is thus contrary to what the Federation is supposed to be about.

[Stofsk]

What if the government policy of the Federation was more realistic?

-No Prime Directive.

Stop. The Prime Directive which we see in TOS is an ethical principle to not colonise or fuck up an alien world and civilisation. This is because in real life, explorers weren't all a bunch of happy-go-lucky nice guys, but fuckers who came, saw, and conquered in the name of king and country.

It mutated into an abomination in TNG, but as it was conceived I have no problem with it and I think it's a great idea.

Primitive worlds are instead probed to see if for instance Federation personnel will accidentally spread disease and so on and appropriate measures taken. Once that stage is complete, Federation personnel will make contact with all the major planetary governments if a civilization exists. Federation personnel than will help uplift technology and neutralize threats that egregriously threaten sentinent rights. Once the planet is fully developed they will given the option of joining the Federation or remaining independent.

I thought you wanted to talk 'realism'? Just how the fuck is it 'realistic' to invest heaps of resources - time, energy, money, people - into uplifting a primitive pre-warp alien civilisation with technology to bring them into a golden age, complete with the social training they need to advance as well (people seem to forget that our social development has changed just as drastically as our technology has over the last couple of thousand years), and then at the end of it going 'lol we're gonna give you a choice to join us or go your own way'. Yeah right.

After spending that much time and resources on a project you're not going to leave anything up to chance or choice, particularly not if you're a capitalist and want to see a return on your investment.

-An economy with some forms of capitalism intact. Either a social democracy or American neoliberalism.

lol who cares

There will always be an economy in any society. Why must it be capitalist? I agree that TNG had a kind of skewed perspective on capitalism but I don't give a shit about this nearly as much as some trektards do. I actually like the idea that the Federation is communist. At last, something fucking different. Contrast this with B5's EarthAlliance, which is essentially America in the 23rd century. Yay. Three hundred years from now politicians will still be a bunch of bloodthirsty, incompetent, corrupt scumbags. Progress!

-Foreign policy without the "no first strike" rule. If its obvious the enemy is threatening an attack the Federation will strike first.

lol jesus

Uraniun pointed it out, they've already shown Picard (and Kirk!) taking the Enterprise into the neutral zone for preemptive reasons. They always had good reasons to do so and ended up being in the right regardless.

The only way your suggestion would be 'better' in terms of drama is to show an action like that ending up backfiring and being wrong. Incidentally... TNG did this too with 'The Wounded'.

-Maintaining ground forces and equipment. Actually have an army that could stand up to or be more advanced than real life ones.

Uraniun's reply to this was the best. All this will do is give fatty nerds fodder for bad fanfic.

[Stofsk]

Your right, TOS really doesn't give us much. But what little it does give us is better than TNG.

My idea is to take the more utopian elements we do see in TOS (including the movies), and combine them with a something grounded in reality. I don't mean for it to be as dark as B5 could be politically speaking, just take some of the more functional elements of the way the government and society is set up; i.e., have a functional economy, but also show that no one need go without food, education, work, etc.

TNG showed too much of a leap into utopian territory, but as was hinted at in DS9, its more smoke and mirrors than reality. Kind of akin to the first world (Earth and other major planets), living an extravagant consumer lifestyle at the expense of the less developed and developing nations (the colonies). That flies in the face of any real enlightened society, and is thus contrary to what the Federation is supposed to be about.

No it isn't. I said it before but in TOS, the underlying theme is that humanity isn't perfect, but is striving to improve itself. In TNG, the theme is we are now perfect, with some bad apples that are thrown in (and once identified, cast out). The TNG 'enlightened society' is anything but, which if intentional is wonderfully subversive, but more likely than not was accidental and the writers not understanding their own hidden themes. That is the problem.

TOS was clear on how the Federation wasn't a utopia, but it was - to its own estimation - a better option than, say, the Klingons. Look how quickly Kirk leaps into action, ready to fight and die in a war against the Klingons in 'Errand of Mercy', until Ayelborne tells him 'Look at what you are defending - the right to go to war and murder countless lives.' And Kirk realises how foolish he was. There are examples like that in all of TOS - 'Arena', where Kirk argues to chase down the Gorn ship and kill it in revenge, only to relent later in the episode when he has the Gorn captain at his mercy; in 'Balance of Terror', when Kirk agonises over the decision to enter the Neutral Zone to chase down the Bird of Prey, which might start a war; in 'A Taste of Armageddon' where Kirk threatens to wipe out Eminar VII in order to show them the true face of war they had forgotten with their monstrous computerised suicide booths; and not a war analogy, but in 'Devil in the Dark' Kirk was adamant the creature had to be found and killed, despite his First Officer's views that wiping out the last of a species would be a tragic event, only to change his mind when he realised the creature was intelligent and only defending itself. The point isn't that the Federation is some great society, but that Kirk - who is only one man, despite being a very talented man - comes to represent and epitomise the idea that humanity isn't there yet, it isn't perfect, but that shouldn't stop us from doing the best we can.

[Nephtys]

TNG showed too much of a leap into utopian territory

I really like the idea behind it though. In TOS, we weren't there yet, but we were moving in the right direction. In the next generation, mankind achieved that dream; Kirk's children really did live in that better world he was striving for. It isn't often that you see a message saying "yes, we really can do this".

Any revision that takes that away is stupid.

A revision that reinforces that in a less artificial way is not. I liked the idea that DS9 pursued that 'You know, things are good for most. Not all. And sometimes, protecting that requires people like Sisko or others who have to do the wrong thing, to protect the right thing'. As well as showing others who are trying to defend the Federation using wrong methods, for wrong reasons too (Admiral Coup-Guy, Section 31).

TNG's depiction was too perfect to the point were you could barely identify with them as people at times. Nobody fought. Nobody had even the slightest qualm about each other. Political Officer Troi was always there, and always right.

[Temujin]

No it isn't.

You mean the TOS Federation not being a utopia. I never said that it was a utopia, but it did show that humanity had gotten their collective shit together enough to venture forth into space and put aside a lot of their petty prejudices. Compared to our current world, I would certainly call those utopian elements, limited as they are.

I said it before but in TOS, the underlying theme is that humanity isn't perfect, but is striving to improve itself. In TNG, the theme is we are now perfect, with some bad apples that are thrown in (and once identified, cast out). The TNG 'enlightened society' is anything but, which if intentional is wonderfully subversive, but more likely than not was accidental and the writers not understanding their own hidden themes. That is the problem.

And I agree. That's what I liked about TOS. The Federation was far from perfect and knew it, unlike preachy TNG. DS9 gives a peak behind the curtain, and more implies then actually shows that something is rotten in Denmark.

IIRC the Metrons implied that it would probably be thousands of years before the Federation rose from being more than half savage. That's what I want in the Federation, an optimistic progressivism that is grounded in reality.

[Stofsk]

No it isn't.

You mean the TOS Federation not being a utopia. I never said that it was a utopia, but it did show that humanity had gotten their collective shit together enough to venture forth into space and put aside a lot of their petty prejudices. Compared to our current world, I would certainly call those utopian elements, limited as they are.

Compared to the 60s, it was massively progressive.

I said it before but in TOS, the underlying theme is that humanity isn't perfect, but is striving to improve itself. In TNG, the theme is we are now perfect, with some bad apples that are thrown in (and once identified, cast out). The TNG 'enlightened society' is anything but, which if intentional is wonderfully subversive, but more likely than not was accidental and the writers not understanding their own hidden themes. That is the problem.

And I agree. That's what I liked about TOS. The Federation was far from perfect and knew it, unlike preachy TNG. DS9 gives a peak behind the curtain, and more implies then actually shows that something is rotten in Denmark.

You're mixing your metaphors - that's Wizard of Oz and Hamlet.

IIRC the Metrons implied that it would probably be thousands of years before the Federation rose from being more than half savage. That's what I want in the Federation, an optimistic progressivism that is grounded in reality.

Ok I can agree with that. Maybe the OP left a bad taste in my mouth when I was replying to you.

[Temujin]

TNG showed too much of a leap into utopian territory

I really like the idea behind it though. In TOS, we weren't there yet, but we were moving in the right direction. In the next generation, mankind achieved that dream; Kirk's children really did live in that better world he was striving for. It isn't often that you see a message saying "yes, we really can do this".

Any revision that takes that away is stupid.

A revision that reinforces that in a less artificial way is not. I liked the idea that DS9 pursued that 'You know, things are good for most. Not all. And sometimes, protecting that requires people like Sisko or others who have to do the wrong thing, to protect the right thing'. As well as showing others who are trying to defend the Federation using wrong methods, for wrong reasons too (Admiral Coup-Guy, Section 31).

TNG's depiction was too perfect to the point were you could barely identify with them as people at times. Nobody fought. Nobody had even the slightest qualm about each other. Political Officer Troi was always there, and always right.

That was the problem with TNG, the Federation acted more like the hyper moral lunatics you find in distopian futures movies like "Demolition Man" than actual human beings. DS9 helped to give it a more realistic slant, which was one of the show's better aspects.

[Gramzamber]

Though even in TNG you had stuff like Tasha Yar's colony which Earth simply washed it's hands of when things went south.
It seemed to imply that troublesome colonies that don't live up to the utopian ideal are simply cut off rather than any actual work put in.
I can't see that being the intention in Gene Roddenberry's utopian vision though but there it is.

[Stofsk]

Or Picard happily turning his back on a primitive world about to be extinguished by some cosmic calamity, and claiming to intervene would be against the Prime Directive.

Either the writers were intentional about this shit and were being subversive, or they were fucking idiots who didn't even understand the covert or even overt implications of what they were writing.

[Temujin]

Ok I can agree with that. Maybe the OP left a bad taste in my mouth when I was replying to you.

No problem.

Compared to the 60s, it was massively progressive.

Sadly, compared to some parts of America (coughArizonacough), it still is.

You're mixing your metaphors - that's Wizard of Oz and Hamlet.

Dorthy, get thee to a nunnery!

[General Mung Beans]

What if the government policy of the Federation was more realistic?

-No Prime Directive. Primitive worlds are instead probed to see if for instance Federation personnel will accidentally spread disease and so on and appropriate measures taken. Once that stage is complete, Federation personnel will make contact with all the major planetary governments if a civilization exists. Federation personnel than will help uplift technology and neutralize threats that egregriously threaten sentinent rights. Once the planet is fully developed they will given the option of joining the Federation or remaining independent.

How is this more realistic? There are several known tribes of humans on Earth today who have no modern technology, who live mostly in isolation, and who we are not attempting to "uplift".

However anthropoligists and humanitarian efforts are allowed for such indigenous tribes in Brazil or Papua New Guinea.

-An economy with some forms of capitalism intact. Either a social democracy or American neoliberalism.

I fail to see why this is classified as "more realistic" and not "more like being a future analogue of America". Handwaving away issues of scarcity by claiming humans had matured beyond avarice was one of the more strikingly hamhanded aspects of TNG, but positing a spacefaring society with vast material resources that could have different social values is not inherently unrealistic.

I mentioned "social democracy" as an example so it isn't a future analogue of America. But even communist societies except maybe Pol Pot's Cambodia actually abolished currency.

[Cecelia5578]

I'm pretty sure somewhere in the archives there's an excellent series of fan fics written by Steve dealing with an alt Federation. Since the proximate cause of the post-TNG wussification of the Feds is commonly attributed to the de-militarization that takes place after TUC, his universe has the events of ST6 not happening quite the way they occured, allowing for a continuation of the TOS movie era Federation in the TNG era.

I've always had the view that a lot of the more objectionable elements of the Federation that fan bois and gals always object to are a consequence of the backlash against militarization that happened because of WW3 and the Eugenics Wars. It just took about a hundred and fifty years give or take till Khitomer for a faction to *really* put those ideals into power.

The thing I liked about DS9 wasn't just that it showed a darker side to the Feddies, but it showed that they could actually change, if only a little, from their TNG nadir into a more militaristic, pragmatic society if they were facing extinction.

[Temujin]

-No Prime Directive. Primitive worlds are instead probed to see if for instance Federation personnel will accidentally spread disease and so on and appropriate measures taken. Once that stage is complete, Federation personnel will make contact with all the major planetary governments if a civilization exists. Federation personnel than will help uplift technology and neutralize threats that egregriously threaten sentinent rights. Once the planet is fully developed they will given the option of joining the Federation or remaining independent.

I could see something like the Prime Directive existing as TOS originally utilized it; something to prevent a colonial style exploitation of less advanced cultures, not cowardly the non-interference policy utilized by Picard.

-An economy with some forms of capitalism intact. Either a social democracy or American neoliberalism.

Again while TOS did have some goofy comments about the 23rd century economy (from ST4, IIR), it had far more examples that some sort of basic free market economy continued to exist. But I also got the impression that a good social welfare program existed.

-Foreign policy without the "no first strike" rule. If its obvious the enemy is threatening an attack the Federation will strike first.

Yet again, this sounds like TOS.

-Maintaining ground forces and equipment. Actually have an army that could stand up to or be more advanced than real life ones.

I believe the current Trek Ground Forces thread covers this pretty well.

[OsirisLord]

Part of what's alway bugged me about Star Trek is that the main characters are always senior officers and bridge members. Always the best and brightest the Federation has to offer. Scientists, top engineers, and Star Fleet Academy stars. I like this idea of the core worlds of the Federation being a definite futuristic high-tech utopia, which is actual built on the backs of colonists who have to fend for themselves and are at the mercy of the unknown elements of space. Then we can have Picard's sanctimonious self-righteous preaching of the glorious Federation utopia in the first season as just being him living in the officer's bubble. Things are naturally great for Picard because he's basically near the top of Federation society. I think Star Trek needs more below deck characters, and characters from the colonies and not just Earth.

[Gramzamber]

DS9 did mix it up a little by making O'Brien a non-com (in TNG it's never explicitly mentioned), having Kira and Odo as non-Starfleet aliens and seeing Sisko earn his captain rank instead of having it from the start.

[Skylon]

I think Star Trek needs more below deck characters, and characters from the colonies and not just Earth.

Like....the Maquis on Voyager?

Tasha Yar is the big example from TNG. Beverly Crusher, according to a bio glimpsed in "Conundrum" was born on the Moon.

[Temujin]

That's been the problem with a lot of SciFi, through ST is one of the more egregious offenders (and probably the originator of that brain bug). They have to have the command staff, but than that leaves little room (and budget) for characters to handle the "away mission"; hence you end up with all or most of the senior staff putting themselves at undue risk on a regular basis.