Star Trek vs. Star Wars
"If there was a moment when the culture of enlightened modernity [sic] in the United States gave way to the sickly culture of romantic primitivism [sic], it was when the movie 'Star Wars' premiered in 1977," blathers Michael Lind, star-struck by "the optimistic vision symbolized by 'Star Trek,' according to which planets, as they developed technologically and politically, graduated to membership in the United Federation of Planets, a sort of galactic League of Nations or UN," quoted here by Daniel Larison — George Lucas Destroyed Modernity.
"When I first watched 'Star Wars,' I was deeply shocked," moans Mr. Lind. "The representatives of the advanced, scientific, galaxy-spanning organization were now the bad guys, and the heroes were positively medieval — hereditary princes and princesses, wizards and ape-men. Aristocracy and tribalism were superior to bureaucracy. Technology was bad. Magic was good."
Click on the link for Mr. Larison's thorough debunking of this "technocrat’s utopian post-political fantasy run riot" as "a vision to appeal to a certain type of romantic idealists with no grasp of the corrupting nature of power or the limits of human nature" that ends up "sound[ing] a great deal like Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World."
"When I first watched 'Star Wars,' I was deeply shocked," moans Mr. Lind. "The representatives of the advanced, scientific, galaxy-spanning organization were now the bad guys, and the heroes were positively medieval — hereditary princes and princesses, wizards and ape-men. Aristocracy and tribalism were superior to bureaucracy. Technology was bad. Magic was good."
Click on the link for Mr. Larison's thorough debunking of this "technocrat’s utopian post-political fantasy run riot" as "a vision to appeal to a certain type of romantic idealists with no grasp of the corrupting nature of power or the limits of human nature" that ends up "sound[ing] a great deal like Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World."
Labels: Brave New World, Futurism, Left-Liberalism, Leviathan, Modernist Tomfoolery, Paleoconservatism, Paleolibertarianism, Paleoprogressivism, Retroprogressivism, The Seventh Art
3 Comments:
http://www.salon.com/entertainment/movies/feature/1999/06/15/brin_main/index.html
David Brin has been whining in similar ways since 1999.
+JMJ+
"Positively medieval," aye? What a way to redeem the series in my eyes. ;-)
And is this guy serious when he says that bureaucracy is to be preferred to aristocracy?!?!?
Joshua:
I liked both series (well OK the original star war series;) though I was often irritated by the Next generation series. I thought the series was a major lost opportunity to delve into the human condition without being so campy.
Deep space 9 was heading in the right direction, Voyager too but I thought the ship should've looked more dirty and beaten up than it was.
In any case, since when is bureaucracy better then non-bureaucratic forms of rule?
xavier
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