The Federation is a militarist, fascist, mostly fascist government. They have an elected government, but it has virtually no real power. The elected government in the Star Trek universe has about as much power as the Queen has in Britain. And it s a world where, while they call it a post-scarcity society, there is not one instance in all of Star Trek canon of a character not associated with the Federation military saying that the Federation is "Post-Scarcity society."
00:00:00.000Hello, Simone. I'm excited to be here with you today. Today, we are going to be doing an analysis of the Star Trek universe, and we will be exploring, because this is something I long thought. When I watched Star Trek stuff, historically, and I've watched a lot of it, I had this feeling in the background which is like, this seems very dystopian and dark to me, but because I could never watch it all or search it all without AI, I thought maybe there's some counter examples against this.
00:00:26.580I decided to dig very deep today, and I am going to be bringing receipts that the Federation in the Star Trek universe is a militarist, fascist, mostly dictatorship.
00:00:43.700They have an elected government, but it has virtually no real power. The elected government in the Star Trek world has about as much power as the Queen has in Britain.
00:00:57.200Worse, it is a world where they, while they call it post-scarcity, there actually is not a single instance in all of Star Trek canon of a character that is not associated with the Federation military saying that the Federation is a post-scarcity society.
00:01:17.660So if you're in the military, it feels post-scarcity.
00:01:20.860Well, not it feels. If it's a military dictatorship, it's like in North Korea, where you ask somebody in the military, is North Korea a prosperous society?
00:01:28.480And somebody in the military is going to be like, North Korea is the most prosperous society.
00:01:33.320Everyone has three meals a day and they're happy as a clam.
00:01:37.260But, and we will go over that this military is not a meritocracy. It's incredibly nepotistic.
00:01:43.220We will go over instances that show that the military within the Star Trek universe is more nepotistic than literally any military on Earth today, except for some, like, African dictatorships.
00:01:57.940Like, the degree, just, just to give you an example of what I mean here, we have an instance of a mother assigning a daughter to directly under her command on her ship.
00:02:09.860We are going to be a decent number of nepo babies in Star Trek.
00:02:22.300He can then rush through Starfleet Academy when we know a Ferengi wasn't even allowed to apply without a separate, so it's a systematically racist system as well.
00:02:34.100In the latest season of Lower Deck, there was a really chilling episode in which a species had just been given replicators by the Federation, and they were celebrating what they called post-scarcity day, where they were, and I kid you not,
00:02:48.980having all of their gold and jewels taken by the Federation because they wouldn't, quote-unquote, need them anymore, and the Federation used all of that stuff to, all their currency as well, despite the fact that the Federation does use currency.
00:03:02.060And so then the Federation takes all this planet's gold and jewels and gives them to another species to fix a problem that they are having with them.
00:03:10.140And you can say, well, the Federation's original plan was to melt it down or destroy it, and I'm like, if that was the case, then why?
00:03:17.420Why was the planet forced to give all of this to the Federation?
00:03:21.100Why not put it in a museum or something?
00:03:23.640Why did the Federation take all of the planet's valuables?
00:03:27.260There is no explainable reason unless they were trying to prevent the planet from being able to trade with other species now that the planet was dependent on them for the means of production.
00:03:37.000And what is really, like, ghoulish about this is we see this planet celebrating like they're going to have free access to the replicators that were given to them, and yet we know the Federation maintains strict control of the replicators, so clearly the Federation has misled them.
00:03:51.040What this scene has strong vibes of is the Ashen from SG-1, which is this species that comes and offers Earth and other planets the opportunity to have longer lives, to stay young longer, to not get sick.
00:04:05.460But what they really do at the same time is sterilize them so that they can replace them and use their planets any way they see fit, which is what the Federation is doing here.
00:04:16.200By giving them replicators and getting rid of every other way that they can produce things, but by maintaining control of what can be produced and how much of it can be produced on the replicators, they have completely seized the means of production within this planet.
00:04:27.300And I would remind you, it is not the Federation civilian government that seized the means of production on the planet, it is their military, Starfleet, because it is Starfleet that controls who can use replicators for what and when.
00:04:40.880Apparently they just didn't tell anyone on this planet that.
00:04:43.600Do not underestimate what we offer. We can put an end to disease, double the human lifespan, provide the means to cross entire continents in a single step.
00:04:53.820But we offer Earth membership within the Ashen Confederation.
00:05:04.740Now, if I'm right, these are newspapers.
00:05:10.720By the way, Borenth, would you read this aloud for me? I couldn't quite translate it.
00:05:36.420And we'll be contrasting it to the Ferengi, who are not racist in this way.
00:05:43.860And they'll be like, well, the Ferengi are sexist.
00:05:45.800And I'll be like, actually, we'll be challenging that as well.
00:05:48.900If you actually dig in to what is canon within the world, the Federation is incredibly sexist.
00:05:57.200You have multiple instances of commanders forcing themselves on subordinates and facing no repercussions, forcing women within their crew to dress in skimpy outfits and women disproportionately only really serving traditionally feminine roles, except in a few instances where they're commanders and they mostly F stuff up.
00:06:18.020And then, as a cherry on the cake to all of this, and keep in mind, all of this is happening with a genetic underclass.
00:06:23.900The Federation has a genetic underclass where some people are born essentially illegal citizens.
00:06:29.900Anyone who has had any genetic alteration done to themselves or their ancestors.
00:06:34.080Sorry, this may not be obvious to people, but if you give somebody genetic modifications within one generation, those modifications will be inherited by their descendants.
00:06:41.920So it doesn't just make an underclass of the individual, but anyone who is born to that family, which means that the only real solution to these individuals from the Federation's perspective is to forcibly sterilize them.
00:06:52.540I'd also note here, and I think it's very telling, that in very progressive coded shows like Star Trek, genetic enhancement and trying to make humans better is seen very negatively.
00:07:03.980The obsession with genetic purity is really exclusive to progressive movements.
00:07:09.600Whereas in conservative coded futures, like say Warhammer 40K, it's seen very positively, which I think shows where these two sides actually sit on this.
00:07:19.760Progressives worship humanity's weakness and stagnation, whereas most conservative groups want humanity to continue to improve.
00:07:27.800And the Federation has been shown to actively treat these people as second-class citizens and constantly be hunting for them.
00:07:34.440So they have strict controls of how you can have kids, who can have kids.
00:07:37.320You can't genetically modify yourself in the Star Trek Federation?
00:07:47.580But the worst part about all of this is we're also going to get into how this structure is controlled.
00:07:54.120Specifically, the military regulates replicators.
00:07:58.960And people can say, well, they need to replicate replicators because of the power use of replicators.
00:08:03.800But we will be showing, actually, the power use of replicators is largely minimum.
00:08:08.320So it appears that they are regulating access to replicators purely as a means of creating artificial scarcity to maintain economic control over the masses.
00:08:19.780I should note that this isn't just speculation.
00:08:22.920You can see this within Quark's bar where he has replicators, but he still has to regularly import ingredients.
00:08:29.080The reason why he would need to import ingredients, which would almost certainly cost more energy to import ingredients to a deep space station than using a local replicator,
00:08:40.060which is just a simplified transporter transporting something in its memory buff.
00:08:44.180The only reason you would have that is if access to the replicators was restricted to create artificial scarcity.
00:08:50.940There is no way the energy economy needs of transporting food to a deep space station are less than just using a replicator.
00:08:58.780And I note here, if you are a fan and are going to say, well, some people say that replicated food doesn't taste as good as real food in-universe.
00:09:05.820Yes, some people say that in the same way some people in our universe say that they don't like AI art as much as non-AI art, but when they don't know there's AI art, they like it more.
00:09:15.360Given that we know how replicators work, that they are just simplified transporters, no one in-universe, if they really genuinely believed that the food that came out of a replicator tasted nothing like real food, would ever, ever use a transporter.
00:09:28.660And yet we see the very people who make these claims using transporters regularly, because it would mean that whatever was coming out of the transporter wasn't the same as the thing that went into it.
00:09:38.120And keep in mind, it's not even like they treat the people well.
00:09:41.520We know from lower decks that while replicators can, for a trivial difference in terms of energy costs, replicate real food, lower status military members are forced to eat nutrition cubes.
00:09:51.820And they do not gain access to real food until they work their way up within the military hierarchy.
00:09:57.160That makes sense, because even people at higher ranks talk about using their replicator credits for the week.
00:10:03.900Yeah, so not a post-care city society and a military dictatorship and very evil, especially when contrasted with like the Ferengi, and we'll also contrast them with the government in Starship Troopers, which is just endlessly more ethical, more gender egalitarian, more everything.
00:10:20.280When I talk about the military as basically an interplanetary dictatorship, it's important to understand what the military controls in the Star Trek universe.
00:10:30.940Because when you begin to think about it, you're like, it is weird how rare it is to see anybody who's not in the military was in Star Trek.
00:10:38.600And that is because within the Federation space, the military controls all exploration.
00:10:45.160So basically, they control what everyone knows exists and doesn't exist.
00:10:49.540They control pretty much all negotiations.
00:10:52.920So in a country like ours, that would be controlled by the political class.
00:10:57.620You wouldn't send military commanders to handle the negotiation during a war.
00:11:40.780And they are in charge of law enforcement.
00:11:43.540And on top of all that, we will later explore that they are also above civilian law and legal system.
00:11:51.620Whenever it is shown that the military, even within a civilian context, like Kirk, we'll go into it, but it was on a doc, so it was not in a military context, ends up doing something that is illegal.
00:12:02.020And he is tried by a military and not a civilian court.
00:12:04.800That, when you're looking for dictatorships, is a very big sign that you're looking at a dictatorship.
00:12:09.360So, going into that, they also control the most prestigious academic institution in Federation space, Starfleet Academy.
00:12:19.420And it is an institution that has been shown to be extremely nepotistic for the children of people within the military.
00:12:32.860So, it gives you sort of your status within society, but, you know, you don't get this if you're not doing the right, you're not saying the right shibboleths and you're not born into the right family.
00:12:44.140In terms of economic control of the military, keep in mind that they control all trade within Federation space, all planet-to-planet trade.
00:12:53.400That is an amazing amount for a military to control, as well as replicators, which is also really important because that is key to the way that trade works within this universe.
00:13:05.780They also control most labs, star bases, medical innovations, planetary logistics, etc.
00:13:10.160And civilian operations rarely operate independently on starships unless they are traitors, criminals, or fringe settlers.
00:13:17.360The civil government is incredibly weak.
00:13:19.220The Federation president is rarely mentioned and has almost no real authority in most episodes.
00:13:24.540Civilian institutions like the Federation Council are rarely shown making important decisions.
00:13:28.480Key constitutional decisions are done by military tribunals.
00:13:31.980We see this in the drumhead and measure of a man.
00:13:35.760Then you have Section 31, and people will be like, well, Section 31 is framed as bad guys.
00:13:40.280If you're not familiar with them, they are a shadowy, extrajudicial, starfleet intelligence group.
00:13:44.660They have no democratic oversight, and they operate with impunity in Federation space, and they try to advance the Federation interests.
00:13:52.260They have tried to commit genocide before.
00:13:53.760They have done murders without trial before, etc.
00:13:57.060And you can be like, well, they're not officially condoned.
00:13:59.680And I'm like, actually, the official stance of the Starfleet is Section 31 doesn't exist.
00:14:04.000Now, given the copious evidence they do exist, to say they don't exist means we are covering for them and condone their continued existence.
00:14:13.820So they have a basically off-the-books group that can go around murder people and advance their interests, even to the point of committing genocide.
00:15:02.540Which, by the way, like, strongly contrasts with something like Starship Troopers, where the military and the government are one, and you vote for who runs the military.
00:15:51.580Yeah, he received treatment for heart problems from Starfleet doctors, which implies that even as somebody who owned a restaurant and was of middle class, he would not have been able to afford this procedure without military connections, which, again, implies you do not have a lot of autonomy outside of this.
00:16:08.700And we repeatedly see when individuals outside the military are shown.
00:16:12.420And the way I've always interpreted the Star Trek show is that his military propaganda was in-universe.
00:16:17.020Because, like, when you see people outside of the military, you see, like, Picard's brother or something, right?
00:16:22.560But, I mean, let's even take the case of Picard to get an understanding of what we mean by an intergenerational aristocratic class.
00:16:30.280So, Earth is a post-scarcity world, right?
00:16:33.340But Picard owns a very large vineyard.
00:16:36.400And not just a very large vineyard, but it's a very large vineyard that is a family vineyard.
00:16:59.640We know that there is an aristocratic, wealthy, land-owning caste that owns large tracts of land and also ends up with high-level positions within the military at disproportionate rates.
00:17:09.380Like, there's no other reason that he should have this military position.
00:17:13.040And this is something we'll see over and over again as we go into the data.
00:17:16.680By the way, if you're wondering what a system like this is called, Sheldon Wallen would have called it inverted totalitarianism or a statewide – where you have statewide democratic trappings exist, but the real power structure is opaque, unelected, and centralized.
00:17:39.760Well, they're forced to pretend it's not.
00:17:41.440How much this disseminates outside the military is unknown, but we'll also go into instances in which people criticize the military and are harshly punished.
00:17:48.440Okay, so it could be that people don't even realize it?
00:17:52.260No, my read, as I've said, if it was that people didn't realize it in-universe, we would have civilians saying, I live in a post-scarcity world and I love it.
00:18:02.600We don't have any civilians saying that in the entire – this is a giant canon in the entire Star Trek canon.
00:18:15.720You wouldn't expect to – like I mentioned with Cisco and stuff like that – you wouldn't expect to be seeing many civilians if it was military propaganda and if the military, from the perspective of the military, only their lives existed, only their lives mattered.
00:18:29.500And I really like it as, like, telling on progressives.
00:18:32.220Remember, I go into Starship Troopers as telling on progressives where they think this is an attack on conservatives, but it actually shows a utopia.
00:18:38.360And, you know, gender egalitarian, no racism, everyone gets along, actual responsibility, not a lot of nepotism.
00:18:45.900Whereas if you look at their, quote-unquote, utopia, which is Star Trek, which is what it's supposed to be, the progressive utopia, often framed that way, you see what they really want, which is a world where they have total military control and no one else's life matters.
00:19:19.560So augments like Khan Noonan's seeing led to a devastating war on Earth in the 20th to the 21st century.
00:19:27.160The Federation response was a total ban on genetic engineering of humans outside of medical necessity.
00:19:31.460Now, I'd point out here that I don't actually, like, to me, it is unclear whether this war was justified because we have mostly the Federation's reaccounts of this war to go on.
00:19:45.220But for whatever reason, the first gene-altered humans were basically crazy and megalomaniacal.
00:19:50.760There is no reason a gene-altered human would be that way if you understand gene-altering because the things you would be altering, like IQ, typically correlate really strongly with pro-sociality.
00:20:01.640Like, lower IQ is associated with higher degrees of rape.
00:20:04.180It's associated with higher degrees of—
00:20:05.820Yeah, so what we would expect is lower crime, lower violence, higher achievement, more helping people.
00:20:11.620So we know this is the way science actually works.
00:20:14.040So we're looking at a world where the first gene-altered humans were basically crazy, megalomaniacal individuals who almost took over Earth.
00:20:23.440I read false flag operation because there's no reason that should have been the case.
00:20:47.580Well, not really, because I think Khan was a false flag operation of somebody who was basically gene-altered to be crazy.
00:20:54.420And then when you look at how crazy he is, he never could have gained the power that he gained.
00:20:58.320So it then put in a position of power so that the Federation could crack down on this technology.
00:21:03.300The Federation response was a total ban on genetic engineering of humans.
00:21:06.000And what you see, the result of this, in Deep Space Nine, Dr. Julian Bashir had to hide his childhood gene modifications to avoid expulsion from Starfleet.
00:21:16.960Even when he would have been treated as an underclass, not even allowed in Starfleet.
00:21:20.840Do we know as viewers what the modifications were for?
00:21:24.440Yes. In first grade, Julia Bashir showed great difficulty learning and below average height and weight for his age.
00:21:31.320So I note here, the fact that he was dealt a bad hand of the dice by genetics and was slow and small for his age is a systemic form of unfairness within the Star Trek universe that the Federation works to maintain to maintain their existing power structure.
00:21:49.800They are maintaining systemic genetic inequality when they have the technology to address it.
00:21:55.840Shortly before his seventh birthday, his parents, Richard and Amashi Bashar, had him subjugated to genetic engineering.
00:22:02.520The procedure made him mentally superior to most humans and greatly enhanced his physical abilities.
00:22:06.960And we can also see from him that he is not evil.
00:22:10.420He is not. There's no reason that this is bad tech.
00:22:13.100You see, okay, maybe it made Khan evil back in the day.
00:22:15.620This guy is just like a generic, decent guy, right?
00:22:19.240So why is the technology still banned if it was able to help somebody like this?
00:22:23.260However, because of human genetic engineering had been declared illegal in the United Federation of Planets, except in cases concerning deaths and birth defects.
00:22:31.160So I'll note here, which is really interesting, is this shows the technology when not implemented under this false flag ideology, even in universe, doesn't make people crazy.
00:22:52.940But Bashar and his parents had to keep this procedure secret throughout most of his adult life.
00:22:57.520At the age of 15, he learned of what had been done and began using his first name, Julian, reasoning that the modifications had erased his original self from existence.
00:23:08.780Sorry, I say this as a crazy thing to believe because if you're not familiar with genetics,
00:23:12.360the way your genes express themselves change as you age and throughout your life, it appears that the genetic modifications he had done were fairly modest,
00:23:20.700to the extent that other people couldn't tell that they had been done to him if they knew him before.
00:23:24.800So that he had this level of internalized racism against genetically modified individuals that he saw himself as basically not the same human shows the degree to which people who live under the Federation's tyranny are brainwashed into the dehumanization of people with genetic modifications.
00:23:46.620To save Bashar from losing Starfleet commission and medical license, Richard agrees to plead guilty to illegal genetic engineering and serve two years in prison.
00:23:56.020So his parents underwent two years in prison for this.
00:26:07.200Almost all major scientific breakthroughs are shown as happening through Starfleet jurisdictions.
00:26:11.400Civilians or non-Starfleet experts are often portrayed as either rogue or reckless.
00:26:15.940Scientists in Galaxy's Child or the Pegasus.
00:26:18.420Or hopelessly outclassed by Starfleet solutions.
00:26:20.800Then you have the Relic Hunter arc from Lower Decks, which is an independent archaeologist, Petra Arbin arc, reveals that Federation civilians who pursued independent careers in exploration and artifact discovery operate under heavy scrutiny.
00:26:34.700So they're basically under constant military surveillance and they're portrayed as and thought of within the military as suspicious and possibly criminal.
00:26:42.120Specifically, you cannot easily rise in status outside of the military in this world.
00:26:45.780It does not even appear that you can earn wealth outside of the military in this world, which heavily contrasts with Star Trek troopers.
00:26:54.240We know that Rico's parents are non-citizens, i.e. they never served in the military, and they are extremely wealthy.
00:26:59.880Just to be clear so I'm not misunderstood here, I'm not saying there are not many counterexamples to this.
00:27:05.580I am saying there is literally none in all of Star Trek canon.
00:27:10.540There isn't a single example that shows that you, while living under Federation authority, can earn wealth and power outside of the military.
00:27:18.340If you want to see people who almost show this, you can look at, like, Joseph Sisko, but his son is a respected captain in the military,
00:27:26.440which could, under a military dictatorship, get him lots of abilities to skirt the rules.
00:27:31.580You have Vosch, but Vosch is a criminal and made wealth as a criminal.
00:27:36.900You have Luoxi Troi, but she's diplomatic aristocracy.