Liberty (?) at the Movies: Star Trek Beyond

This year is the fiftieth anniversary of  the Star Trek franchise. Therefore, it is appropriate that Start Trek: Beyond, the third installment of the “new” Star Trek time line and the 13th Start Trek film, is the number-one film in America and a certified summer blockbuster.

Beyond is a fun, fast-paced action film that also has a political subtext. Beyond’s villain–a vicious alien named  Kruhl,, is motivated by a hatred of the federation’s (Star Trek;’s galactic government ) ethics of universal peace and brotherhood. Kruel believes that unity fosters division and that embraces an ethic of militarism and conquest.

Whether or not it was the filmmaker’s intent, the conflict between the militarist Kruel and Capetian Kirk could be seen a left-wing an allegory of the conflict between modern-day neoconservative, and the New Frontier-Great Society liberalism that inspired Star Trek’s creator, Gen Roddenberry.

Never mind that, when Roddenberry was creating Star Trek  the neoconservative’s founding fathers where New Frontier-Great Society liberals. And never mind that the first generation of neocons openly admitted that they moved to the right not becasue they wanted to save cold war liberalism from the new left by reshaping the conservative movement.

These inconvenient facts highlight naive of the notion, promoted by Star Trek, that  there can ever be a  global or  galactic government backed up by a powerful military force would respects individual rights, and not impose its will on weaker countries or planets.

Has there ever been a Empire that actuality protected rights, or do large governments inevitably turn tyrannical? And has there ever been an empire that followed anything close to Star Trek’s “prime directive” that forbids the Federation representatives from interfering with the “internal development” of a native culture?

And don’t even get me started on Star Trek;s absurd notion that a society could progress if it eliminated money.

The last Star Trek movie “Into Darkness”, dealt with some of the same issues that America faced post 9/11. The plot of Into Darkness centered around a Starfleet admiral’s plot to provoke a global war. He justified his actions by pointing to an act of  terror from the previous film that he thought justified preemptive war in order to protect peace.  This seems vaguely familiar…

Another Star Trek movie that questions whether the Federation was an unquestioned force for good was 1998 Insurrection,. In this movie, which featured the cast of the spin-off Next Generation, the crew of the Enterprise face a Starfleet admiral who is violating the prime directive. The admiral is displacing an indigenous people from their home planet in order to gain control of the people’s home planet’s  raw materials.

As much as I enjoyed Star Trek Beyond, I did wish they had developed Into Darkness’s 9/11 analogy instead of returning tot he simplistic and unrealistic utopianism that is the hallmark of most Star Trek offerings.

Still, I recommend Beyond and I appreciate Star Trek for giving us 50 years of both fun and thought-provoking movies and TV shows. Star Trek does celebrate respect for individual rights. It is a shame that the creators and writers do not understand  that we need free-markets and limited government in all areas if we are to truly live long and prosper.