Jessie Earl
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What Conservatives Get So Wrong About Star Trek
🕑 Added 2024-12-06 01:56:21 +0000 UTCHey all – I started writing this as a casual piece, but it turned into something much longer about how conservatives are misusing Star Trek, specifically Deep Space Nine, to push their narratives, and why that’s so wrong. It’s a topic that got me fired up, especially as a Trekkie, but also because I think it’s about more than just fandom. I’d love your thoughts! Not sure if I’ll film it yet as it dovetails a lot with stuff I've written and filmed already, but I’m excited to share and hear your feedback."
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Hello, interwebs! I hope you’re ready for some history rewriting—sadly, not the fun kind with an overstimulated Q sending you back to play Robin Hood in the 12th century. Nope, this one’s the usual culprit: a conservative grift. But this one’s got me fired up because it’s targeting Star Trek history. And we all know only Janeway gets to mess with the timeline.
Specifically, I want to dive into a recent conservative grifter’s attempt to erase key moments of Deep Space Nine history. Not just to break down why it’s pure BS, but also to explore why conservatives love rewriting history like this. Oh, and let’s be honest—this is just a thinly veiled excuse for me to gush about why Deep Space Nine is the best Star Trek show. I know, some of you out there were pulling for Short Treks —but I have to be honest.
So a few days ago, actor Clifton Duncan made this tweet that went viral that says “30 years ago a black man was the lead in a Star Trek show that ran 7 seasons, got 31 Emmy nominations, and was one of the most acclaimed series in the franchise. No one was outrated. No one boycotted. No one cared. People who loved this show back then are called “toxic fans” today.”
There’s a lot to unpack here—like who Clifton Duncan even is. But first things first: this tweet is just plain wrong. First off, he’s wrong about basic facts - the show had 32 Emmy nominations, not 31 - but that's beside the point.
Much more important to note is that almost all of its nominations were for things like makeup and art direction, not best series or acting - which it VERY much should have by the way. But it highlights how sci-fi, especially back then, wasn’t seen as “prestigious” enough—a bias that still lingers today, though less so. So already, Duncan is erasing the systemic factors that have historically marginalized sci-fi as a genre.
While it might seem like I’m nitpicking, this framing matters because it sets the stage for the meat of his tweet—ugh, “tweet meat,” I immediately regret saying that. Anyways - “No one was outraged, no one boycotted, no one cared.” The implication here? That Deep Space Nine, despite having a Black lead, somehow existed in a vacuum of acceptance and harmony in the 1990s.
On the surface, it's a nice thought. As a Star Trek fan, I’d love to believe the franchise’s vision of a future embracing infinite diversity in infinite combinations inspires its fandom to live those values today. I even have that phrase tattooed on my arms because it means so much to me. And for the most part, Star Trek fandom is a beautiful, positive force. But sadly, that’s not universally true, and it’s important not to ignore that.
Let’s get the facts straight: plenty of people cared enough to hate Deep Space Nine when it first aired. Many fans saw it as a betrayal of Gene Roddenberry’s vision—a darker show that didn’t boldly go anywhere and was terribly written—and they didn’t keep those feelings to themselves. The excellent documentary What We Leave Behind even opens with the cast reading hate mail from Trekkies, a recurring theme throughout the film. Showrunner Ira Steven Behr himself reflects on how vocal the backlash was. [clip] Fans ensured their disdain was heard, often directly by those working on the show.
To be clear, not everyone had to like Deep Space Nine’s direction. It’s completely fine to prefer TNG’s vision and to share that opinion—that’s not toxic. Toxicity comes when you send hate directly to the people on the show or insult others for enjoying it.
But let’s be even clearer: while most backlash focused on the show’s darker tone and shift in style, there was also a lot of racist backlash. It was less visible because the internet was just a wee lad back then, but dive into old Usenet threads -dear God it’s like I’m back in Radioshack- and you’ll find complaints about Sisko—and Voyager’s Janeway—being “politically correct” casting decisions. For the younger folks here, “PC” was basically the old-school version of what conservatives now call DEI—a buzzword used to vilify any attempt at inclusivity as a political agenda.
If this all sounds familiar, that’s because it is—it’s the same playbook used against Star Trek: Discovery in recent years. Oh look, Sonequa Martin-Green—the franchise’s first Black female lead—or the show’s queer characters were labeled as “forced diversity.” These complaints were often buried under claims about the show’s “forced darker tone” or “bad writing ruining Gene Roddenberry’s vision,” but they frequently targeted minorities both in and who enjoyed the show.
This isn’t to say there’s no valid criticism of Discovery. Believe me, I’ve got my own issues with it. But Sonequa Martin-Green—like Avery Brooks before her—is far from the problem. In fact, she’s one of the best things to happen to Star Trek in the modern era.
And the echoes don’t stop there. One of the biggest racist backlashes back in the day targeted Star Trek: Voyager because—get this—people were upset that a Vulcan could be Black. (Whisper: the reason was racism.) Sound familiar? It should—I seem to recall similar nonsense about how Elves couldn’t be Black in recent years. Yeah, racist then, racist now. And honestly, it’s wild because Tim Russ was the perfect Vulcan. Star Trek has been blessed with some of the best Vulcan actors—shoutout to Tim Russ, Jolene Blalock, Mark Lenard, and of course Gia Sandhu. And yes, obviously, Leonard Nimoy. Obviously.
But it doesn’t stop there—it’s important to recognize that while toxic fan backlash existed, it wasn’t the main obstacle. Much of the racism faced by Black actors and other marginalized folks on Star Trek came from within the industry itself. Hollywood has always been riddled with barriers, and Star Trek was no exception.
Take Deep Space Nine. When Avery Brooks was cast, he was told he couldn’t have his iconic goatee and bald head. Officially, it was because they didn’t want him resembling Hawk, his famous character from Spencer for Hire. But the real reason was uglier—they thought it made him look “too threatening.” In the documentary What We Left Behind, an executive outright admits they thought it made him look “too street”—a clear code for “too Black.” [Insert clip.] Brooks was furious, as Ira Steven Behr recalls, and it took three years of pushing to get his goatee in Season 3 and his bald head in Season 4.
This dynamic even bled into the story itself. Sisko starts the series as a commander, only earning the rank of captain later. While there’s an argument that this was to differentiate from Picard’s TNG captainship, it also reflects a subtle, likely unconscious bias: Black characters needing to “earn” the respect and authority white leads are simply given. It’s not overtly racist, but it’s a critique worth noting.
Not to mention, most of the Emmys Deep Space Nine did get nominated for were for white artists. By mentioning the show’s Black lead alongside its Emmy nominations, Duncan subtly implies that the nominations had nothing to do with, or were even because of, Avery Brooks—who, notably, never received a nomination. Avery Brooks 100% deserved an Emmy win for his work as Sisko, he's by far my favorite Trek captain actor and his work in so many episodes is fantastic. So did many Black and marginalized actors on DS9, in particular the recently passed Tony Todd for his work in the episode The Visitor. This reflects a broader pattern in Hollywood, especially back then, where Black and marginalized performers were often sidelined in favor of celebrating white performers, particularly when their roles reinforced rather than challenged white norms.
Still, there were even more noticeable racist events that occurred on Deep Space Nine’s production. A sex scene between Sisko and her love interest Casidy Yates in an episode directed by LeVar Burton was cut - disappointing both actors for its lack of showcasing Black sexuality despite Trek often showcasing it for other interracial or white couples. Also, Cirroc Lofton, who played Sisko’s son Jake, shared how a security guard once assumed he’d snuck onto the lot. Brooks had to leave filming to set the guard straight—because Avery Brooks is the best. But he shouldn’t have had to fight these battles. Still, it’s essential to remember that he did—and his perseverance mattered.
Brooks’ advocacy built on the foundation laid by trailblazers like Nichelle Nichols, who, despite being tokenized, remained visible in Star Trek and used that visibility to advocate for Black women in space exploration. Her efforts not only inspired Black astronauts but also, along with Brooks, paved the way for actors like Sonequa Martin-Green, Tawny Newsome, Celia Rose-Gooding, and countless other marginalized performers to find representation in Star Trek and beyond. Martin-Green has faced her own challenges, from the depiction of her hair as a Black woman to her storyline mirroring Sisko’s, where she also had to “earn” the rank of captain.
These struggles echo simultaneous fights faced by other marginalized figures in the franchise’s history, such as Grace Lee Whitney, who was sexually assaulted by a producer on The Original Series, or actors like Jeri Ryan, Jolene Blalock, and Terry Farrell, who were hypersexualized under producer Rick Berman. Similarly, Gates McFadden was fired and later reinstated after the first season of The Next Generation for standing up for herself as a woman, while numerous attempts to include queer representation were shot down by figures like Berman. These individual stories highlight the systemic biases of Hollywood, where even groundbreaking representation often comes with significant personal and professional battles.
These struggles remind us that authentic representation in media isn’t just a guarantee—it’s the result of generations of work, often in the face of tokenization, erasure, and resistance. It underscores the ongoing need to not only include marginalized voices but to honor their cultural specificity and ensure they’re heard and valued without compromise.
This brings us back to ol’ Clifton Duncan's tweet, where he concludes with: "people who liked the show today would be called toxic." On its face, this seems nonsensical—no one is labeling Deep Space Nine fans as toxic. Even among those who disliked the show, toxicity was reserved for those spewing racism and vitriol toward the series and its supporters. However, this statement makes more sense when considering who Clifton Duncan is and, more importantly, his audience.
Duncan, at a glance, is an actor with bit parts in your favorite copaganda procedurals—well, maybe not all of them. I have no idea what Bluff City Law is. But he’s got an NCIS credit and even played Uniform #1 on Elementary. Oh, and Malcolm X on The Good Fight, which I’m sure CBS handled with, uh, great care.
Jokes aside, every actor’s got to eat, and cop shows are solid for building a résumé and paying the bills. His focus seems more on theater, with Broadway appearances and even funding a play he’s performing in—more on that later. But most notably, in his own words, he’s become famous for talking politics on Twitter. Here’s him on everyone's favorite podcast that was not at all in part funded by Russian propaganda, the Timcast [clip].
In recent years, Duncan has shifted his platform toward conservative media appearances and his own podcast, The Clifton Duncan Podcast—joining the ranks of creatively titled podcasts that are just someone’s name. His content parrots familiar conservative talking points, railing against vaccine mandates in 2022, DEI initiatives in 2024, and, notably, the state of Western art and culture all the time. He’s hosted guests like Nerdrotic, The Critical Drinker, Gina Carano, and Chris Gore—all figures known for reactionary (and often vitriolicly bigoted) takes on inclusivity in media, dismissing diversity as “forced.” Gore, for example, recently complained about the possibility of gay parents in the Star Wars series Skeleton Crew, ready to label it “woke” if it strayed from his nostalgic ideal of 1980s films like The Goonies.
This aligns Duncan with the type of modern toxic fandom that targets sci-fi franchises like Star Trek and Star Wars as well as harassing the minority artists who make them. His writings and videos on his Substack and elsewhere frequently echo the argument that such efforts, as well as DEI initiatives generally, promote unqualified candidates based on race or gender, while ignoring the systemic racism and exclusion that have historically denied minorities access to those same “qualifications.” Duncan instead promotes the idea that we’ve reached a meritocracy and casts leftist efforts to address inequality as the real racism.
He’s argued that our civilization neglects the arts, allowing “people who want to subvert it” (meaning leftists) to dominate, and he frequently idealizes Greek and Roman art, holding it up as evidence of a lost cultural golden age. This framing feeds into his broader conservative narrative of societal and cultural decay, often tied to notions of “lost manhood”. Speaking of, Clifton, even cites Malcolm X as teaching him about manhood while conveniently sidestepping and ignoring Malcolm X’s radical anti-establishment views - stripping Malcom of his context and history as well to use his legacy to reenforce the same systems he railed against. [clip] This is a common theme with Duncan as we’ll see - removing Black men from thier more radical contexts for conservative purposes.
Duncan also utilizes right wing populist narratives as he frames the "elite class," as leftists weaponizing identity politics to undermine meritocracy and guilt society into addressing false inequalities that he argues only amplify racism - all while misappropriating the Marxist term “bourgeois” to make himself sound smart like one of his heroes we’ll get to in a minute. By doing so, he positions efforts to address systemic bias as the real source of division, deflecting attention from the structural inequities that perpetuate racism in the first place. By positioning establishment Democrats as pseudo-socialists, he deliberately ignores their active role in maintaining capitalist power structures—a tactic that aligns with a broader conservative effort to dismiss systemic critiques as baseless. This framing not only obscures the absence of any true socialist, communist, or anarchist influence in American power but also reinforces the myth of a sinister, monolithic “leftist agenda” seeking cultural domination, stoking fear and division for political gain.
It’s important to note that Duncan himself is a Black man, which adds a layer of complexity and perceived credibility to his arguments. Duncan’s perspective carries weight within conservative circles because of his identity, a dynamic often used in right-wing movements to amplify marginalized voices that reinforce their ideology. By rejecting systemic critiques and promoting self-reliance, Duncan mirrors figures like Candace Owens, who argue that systemic racism is a myth designed to foster dependency - dismissing structural barriers as divisive and unnecessary while reinforcing the myth of meritocracy.
Central to Duncan’s worldview is his admiration for Thomas Sowell, a former academic turned conservative pundit. Like literally, Ducan idealizes Sowell - citing him repeatedly as a hero [clip], constantly tweeting quotes from the man, and even running a successful 100k Kickstarter so he can star in a play about Sowell. Sowell is known for promoting discredited “culture of poverty” theories that blame socioeconomic disparities on cultural failings rather than systemic racism. He often constructs a nostalgic vision of the past for the Black community, attributing its perceived decline to the welfare state and other systemic, albeit flawed, attempts to provide aid. This aligns with longstanding conservative critiques and attacks of such programs - and Sowell’s framing of these issues has made him a prominent figure in conservative circles exemplified by a recent PragerU video celebrating his ideas and legacy literally just a few weeks ago. These ideas, though widely debunked, are a cornerstone of right-wing rhetoric because they shift the focus from structural inequality to personal responsibility - and they love that a Black man is saying it as it allows them to mask their racism.
By venerating Sowell, Duncan frames inequality as a matter of personal or cultural failings, perpetuating conservative propaganda that devalues Black communities - and other marginalized communities - by implicitly reinforcing the racist notion that their struggles are self-inflicted rather than the result of systemic barriers. This narrative upholds establishment notions of meritocracy while erasing the historical and ongoing racial biases that have systematically denied Black people and other marginalized groups access to opportunities and resources. For a deeper exploration of this dynamic, I highly recommend FD Signifier’s excellent video, The REAL Faces of Black Conservatism, which delves into these issues in much greater detail. He also has a great B Sides video about Thomas Sowell specifically.
The reason I bring all this up is to hammer home why and how Duncan uses Star Trek—it’s a calculated move to push a broader reactionary conservative narrative that aligns with toxic fandoms. His claim that “people who liked Deep Space Nine are called toxic today” isn’t just absurd—it’s insidious. Just like root beer. It deliberately erases the very real and systemic racism that Deep Space Nine and Avery Brooks faced to sell a fantasy that America was somehow less racist in the past, that it was “greater,” and that today’s focus on identity politics is the real problem. It’s the same hollow rhetoric Thomas Sowell peddles, rebranded for fandom culture instead of the welfare state.
Duncan relies on his audience’s ignorance—on people either too young or too uninformed to know the battles fought around Deep Space Nine. To them, it’s just a show with a Black lead that lasted seven seasons, so racism couldn’t have been an issue, right? Wrong. What makes this worse is that these same people turn around and spew the same tired, bigoted arguments about “forced diversity” at actors like Sonequa Martin-Green or Black and queer characters in modern Star Trek or Star Wars or pick your fandom. It’s the same racist garbage Avery Brooks faced, but now it’s supercharged by social media algorithms that amplify outrage and turn it into a profitable spectacle.
What’s almost ironic is that you can see Duncan’s audience teetering on the edge of self-awareness. One commenter on his tweet writes, “White guy here. I watched this as a teenager and had no questions about the actor playing Sisko. It was perfect. 20 years later, after hyper-divisive attention to this topic, I’ve been trained to initially ask if this is a DEI hire and question what agenda this show will push onto my family. Is this show good entertainment and good for my children? Nothing sets off parental alarms like ulterior motives. Just focus on making a great movie and flush the DEI nonsense.”
That “concern for the children” rhetoric ties neatly back into broader conservative “protect the kids” narratives, often used to mask bigotry behind a veneer of moral guardianship. The tragic self-awareness they almost reach lies in their admission that they’ve been trained—actively conditioned—to view Black and marginalized characters as part of an agenda imposed by the so-called “bourgeois elite class.” This framing, by the way, echoes antisemitic conspiracy theories about Jewish control of Hollywood pushing queer and Black representation to corrupt traditional values. Duncan’s grift plays directly into this, offering a convenient scapegoat for audiences eager to preserve their biases while avoiding the actual work of reckoning with systemic inequality.
Duncan’s alignment as an art fellow with the group FAIR—the Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism—further highlights the contradictions and dangers of his rhetoric. FAIR claims to promote a “common culture” of fairness, understanding, and humanity while supporting “diversity without division.” On the surface, that sounds noble, but a closer look reveals its true agenda. FAIR routinely pushes against trans women’s rights, platforms transmedicalists like Buck Angel, and vilifies DEI programs under the guise of promoting meritocracy. They even weaponize Martin Luther King Jr.’s words, repeatedly invoking his principle of judging people by the content of their character, not the color of their skin, to argue against systemic efforts to address racial inequality. This isn’t just disingenuous—it’s part of a broader conservative grift. Groups like FAIR aren’t promoting diversity; they’re homogenizing culture under the guise of “common culture.” They push a sanitized vision of meritocracy while erasing the systemic barriers that prevent marginalized communities from even entering the so-called playing field. Their rhetoric isn’t about inclusivity; it’s about maintaining existing power structures while co-opting the language of civil rights leaders like MLK to appear progressive. And of course, there’s the ever-present “Donate” button—because at the end of the day, it’s also about making money off fear and division.
It’s infuriating because Duncan’s videos come so close to addressing real issues, only to deliberately steer them into bad-faith arguments. He has guests discuss how Hollywood’s shallow representation often feels performative—reduced to surface-level gestures like token "big gay moments" [clip]. They’re not entirely wrong. Modern Hollywood often commodifies identity - stripping it of actual nuanced depth to say they have a Black or a gay or a woman character in it to make it sell to a progressive audience. But Duncan uses this as a launching pad to vilify the presence of queerness itself, sidestepping the real issue: the systemic barriers that prevent queer and marginalized artists from telling their own stories authentically and without corporate interference.
Hell, Duncan forgets that DS9 had its own "big gay moment" in the episode Rejoined, where the woman Jadzia Dax kisses another woman in an episode metaphorically about stigma against homosexual relationships—a scene that earned the episode a higher maturity rating despite its nonsexual nature and triggered significant toxic backlash at the time. Duncan’s rhetoric not only erases this history but also ignores how DS9 pushed these boundaries in the same way long before today’s discourse about performative representation. It reduces the show to a sanitized version that fits his narrative, erasing its history of fighting for representation.
What makes Duncan’s approach even more insidious is that it mirrors the rhetoric of figures like Nerdrotic or The Critical Drinker, who profit off stoking outrage against “forced diversity,” correctly identifying how marginalized identities challenge narratives centered on white male protagonists and Western values, but weaponizing that hollowness to frame it as an attack on their mostly cis, mostly male, mostly white audiences. Duncan, however, uses his identity as a Black man to lend credibility to these reactionary narratives, tokenizing himself as a “good Black conservative” to appeal to an audience eager for validation of their biases. In doing so, he erases the shared struggles of Black, queer and similarly marginalized artists by setting them against each other rather than in parallel while pulling up the ladder behind him for other Black artists - all so he can fund nonsense like his Thomas Sowell play.
And now, as mainstream culture bends toward normalizing conservatism talking points, we’re seeing fewer of even the shallow commodified representations or corporate inclusivity efforts Duncan criticizes. Companies like Walmart are removing DEI initiatives, and Hollywood is forming “fan councils” to placate toxic backlash from fans railing against “wokeness.” Meanwhile, authentic marginalized representation that centers our voices and perspectives continues to be sidelined—recently seen with Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur, which featured an episode about a trans character fighting systemic bigotry to play in women’s sports. The episode was pulled before it even aired. Instead of pushing for authentic, inclusive storytelling - figures like Duncan are only fueling the regression away from even the hollowest of efforts.
This isn’t ignorance; it’s a grift. By sidestepping the systemic issues and erasing the progress DS9 already achieved, Duncan profits off division, reinforcing the status quo while presenting himself as a tokenized voice of reason. His narrative comforts his audience rather than challenging them, perpetuating the very commodification he claims to critique, all while exploiting his identity to shield regressive ideologies from scrutiny.
But the real reason I wanted to make this video—the thing that made me so angry—is how Ducan is actively insulting Deep Space Nine, and specifically Avery Brooks’ work within it, which actively fought back against the kind of insidious erasure of racism that nostalgia enables. Nostalgia, especially the kind pushed in Duncan’s rhetoric, isn’t harmless—it lays the groundwork for fascism as we’ve seen politically in the last few years and especially in recent months. By idealizing a past stripped of its struggles and systemic injustices, it erases the traumas of marginalized communities while suggesting that our current pain can be solved by returning to those same oppressive norms. This is exactly what Deep Space Nine rejects.
The series, right from its pilot Emissary, roots its story in Sisko’s trauma—his wife’s death at the hands of the Borg, a tragedy in part caused by Starfleet’s supposed hero, Captain Picard as Locutus of Borg - literally the embodiment of the perfect white hero of Star Trek. Sisko, a Black man, doesn’t get to enter into the utopian Federation without scars like Picard got to in his pilot episode. But rather than letting Sisko’s pain be erased or ignored, the episode centers it, using his experience to show how humanity grows not by clinging to a sanitized past but by acknowledging pain and striving for a better future. Through Sisko’s dialogue explaining how linear time works to the aliens the Prophets he meets in the episode who see outside of time, the show constructs a vision of humanity that treasures exploration and discovery but never forgets the scars of its past. [clip] This duality—recognizing trauma while striving for hope—stands in stark contrast to the shallow, regressive vision of nostalgia that erases past pain that toxic fandoms thrive on and fascism weaponizes to deny human empathy to fuel the chasing of a fictional idealized past that reinforces institutional bigotry.
Deep Space Nine doesn’t just tell a story about the dangers of erasing the past—it actively interrogates them. One of my favorite examples is a scene where Sisko refuses to take part in a holosuite simulation of 1960s Las Vegas, pointing out that, as a Black man, he wouldn’t have been allowed in. [Show clip.] He’s not just critiquing the holosuite program; he’s critiquing Star Trek itself, especially The Original Series, which often depicted a contextless utopia that had supposedly eradicated racism without addressing what it took to get there.
Even the DS9 actors acknowledge this necessity. On The 7th Rule podcast, hosted by TNG and DS9 actors, they discussed The Next Generation episode “Code of Honor,” infamous for its racist tropes. Recently, TNG actor Jonathan Frakes—who I love, by the way, no hate—suggested that the episode should be taken off the air. However, Cirroc Lofton argued it should remain available, reasoning that you can’t know where you are if you forget where you were.
This, by the way, is why I worry about the nostalgia creeping into the Star Trek franchise as of late, and why conservatives like Nerdrotic and Critical Drinker were highly praising of Star Trek: Picard Season 3. Picard Season 3 leaned heavily on the aesthetics of The Next Generation—bringing back old characters and iconic starships—while actively ignoring the moral complexities and sociopolitical critiques that defined shows like Deep Space Nine. Literally—the show killed its main villain in its third-to-last episode, a character from a splinter group of DS9’s Dominion who was motivated by the Federation’s literal war crimes against her people. The series acknowledged her grievances briefly before dismissing them entirely and killing her, pivoting to a Borg storyline that abandoned nuance for nostalgia with the older TNG characters saving the Federation from the youth who had gotten taken over by a woke Borg mind virus and never really dealing with the whole… you know, Federation war crimes. This shift reinforces reactionary narratives that retreat to an imagined, "simpler" past rather than confronting the present, undermining Star Trek’s progressive ideals. Liking Picard Season 3 doesn’t make you a conservative - we all enjoy our nostalgic junk food occasionally - but calls for spin-offs like Star Trek: Legacy feel like reheating leftovers instead of boldly exploring new frontiers. Star Trek should inspire us to grow, not just replay the greatest hits. This contrast highlights how Star Trek is at its best when it confronts systemic injustices head-on, rather than retreating into nostalgic comfort that avoids difficult truths.
This theme reaches its peak in “Far Beyond the Stars,” an episode directed by Avery Brooks. In it, Sisko inhabits the life of Benny Russell, a Black science fiction writer in the 1950s who dreams up the concept for Deep Space Nine itself. Benny’s vision of a better future is dismissed and crushed by his editor simply because it features a Black lead. Star Trek itself, when envisioned by a Black man - is not allowed to exist because it is seen as radical. Not only that, the episode casts actors who, in other episodes, played the fascist Cardassian and Dominion enforcers as 1950s American police officers—highlighting the parallels between the show’s dystopian allegories and the systemic violence enacted by law enforcement against minorities in the real world. The police in Benny’s story are not just symbols of oppression; they embody the brutal enforcement of a racist status quo, showing how the tools of state power are often weaponized to suppress marginalized voices and stifle progress. Those same police officers in the episode kill a young Black boy, played by the same actor who portrays Sisko’s son, Jake. This choice is not only a poignant narrative decision but a deeply symbolic one, illustrating how systems of state-sanctioned violence aim to destroy both the lives of young Black men and the collective hope for a better future within Black communities. By casting Cirroc Lofton in this dual role, the episode draws a direct line between the personal and the systemic, his death embodies an attempt to extinguish the dreams and potential of an entire generation, a stark reminder of how oppression operates not just through physical harm but through the deliberate crushing of possibility and hope. That symbol is made even more poignant against the context that Avery Brooks fought to ensure Sisko and his son Jake portrayed a positive, nurturing, and emotionally close parental relationship throughout the series—a deliberate pushback against the stereotypical and often absent portrayals of Black fathers throughout TV history.
During a climactic scene of teh episode, Brooks, both acting and directing, broke down while filming, collapsing into the weight of Benny’s struggle to dream of a future for Black people. His anguish was so raw and authentic that it blurred the lines between character and actor, a moment that became one of the most visceral and powerful scenes in Star Trek history. The episode itself collapses the barriers between fiction and reality, with Sisko’s father telling him, “You are both the dreamer and the dream.” Brooks, too, embodies this duality—bearing the pain of the present while envisioning a better future, through his portrayal of Sisko, Benny Russel, his artistic contributions as a director, and his advocacy.
This is Deep Space Nine’s essence: reckoning with the scars of the past while striving for hope. It’s seen in the show’s confrontation of the realities of recovering settler colonialism using the indigenous Bajorans and the fascist imperialist Cardassians, it's consistent tackling of racial discussions not solely through scifi metaphor but also explicitly with its cast composed largely of Middle-Eastern, Jewish, Black, and women actors, and, most powerfully, in “Far Beyond the Stars,” where the cast appears out of makeup, embodying the marginalized identities they represent. The series is a living critique of the dangers of erasing history, showing that progress demands acknowledging the pain of the past to create a truly better future.
One of the most powerful aspects of Sisko’s character was his deep connection to his Creole heritage. We regularly saw him cooking Creole dishes, and his father’s restaurant in New Orleans became a meaningful setting. Unlike many other Star Trek characters, whose backgrounds were either generic, homogenized Western culture or broad, reductive pastiches—like the indigenous Chakotay or the “Frenchman” Picard played by a British actor—Sisko’s culture was vibrant, specific, and celebrated as part of the Federation’s tapestry. It wasn’t just a backdrop; it was something he actively shared with his crew, enriching their lives and showing how his heritage was central to Star Trek’s vision of the future. Sisko’s story reminds us that we can’t erase our past or ignore its scars—we have to confront them to grow. But it’s not just about the pain; it’s about honoring the battles those scars represent, preserving our cultures, and sharing them to build a future that embodies Star Trek’s ideal of infinite diversity in infinite combinations.
Look, I’m not Black, so I can’t speak to how people in that community feel about Duncan. But I am a Trekkie, and what I can say is this: Duncan’s attempts to erase the struggles and triumphs of Deep Space Nine are insidious. They insult not only Avery Brooks’ art but also his battles as an artist within the Star Trek franchise—a man who used his work to confront systemic racism and inspire hope. To distort that legacy is to undermine the very ideals Star Trek stands for.
Duncan’s narrative is more than a bad-faith misreading of Star Trek—it’s part of a much larger, insidious effort to normalize fascist ideologies under the guise of cultural critique. Right-wing grifters like Duncan are exploiting art and media to push a broader narrative of erasure and homogenization, framing authentic representation as an attack on tradition and claiming that diversity itself is divisive. This isn’t confined to fandom spaces; it’s the same rhetoric fueling the rollback of civil rights, the assault on LGBTQ+ communities, and the dismantling of DEI initiatives across industries. By weaponizing nostalgia and fear, they’re cultivating a culture that rejects progress in favor of a sanitized, exclusionary past. It’s not enough to call it out—we must actively push back, creating spaces for authentic, inclusive art and fostering a culture that celebrates diversity as essential to our shared humanity. And in doing so, we honor the legacy of Deep Space Nine, Sisko, and Avery Brooks, who showed us that the struggles we endure are the foundation for the futures we build together.
Comments
B F Monk
I’d love to see this as a video. It blends the two topics I watch you for.
L
Conservative Trekkies make me giggle like a lunatic because if I wasn’t laughing I’d be having a nervous breakdown over the mental dissonance they unironically are full of. 😭 can’t wait to see the whole video
Eric Cheung
They'd also want to ban that documentary for the whole section on the social issues DS9 tackled, including Behr giving the show an incomplete on LGBTQ+ issues. If you get the disc, look for me on the special feature More From the Fans, or check out my uncut comment here: https://youtu.be/V2S6f3olP5c
Jessie Earl
Yup! This is literally my thoughts on that season. For me, the thing that REALLY gets me is just them callously murdering the changing villain without any address of the trauma's she endured. Its really kinda gross TBH how Picard and Beverly dismiss her and the Federations culpability - even if her methods are terrible.
Eric Cheung
Agreed on PIC season three. The first half was fine, if a bit derivative, with a stellar scene between Picard and Crusher, Geordi's goodbye speech to Data (which is the only thing I found missing from season one), and Project Proteus (which is exactly the kind of consequence DS9 would have shown), but went off the rails once they started to resurrect Data. He already had a poetic death in season one "a butterfly that lives forever is really not a butterfly at all." But even worse was reducing the Changelings (portrayed in DS9 with nuance) and the Borg (portrayed with nuance in TNG, and both previous seasons of PIC) to cartoons to be blown up. It literally had Data say "I hate them" which is a line akin to Kirk's "Let them die," but without someone like Spock calling him out for it. Every single Trek series has ended with peace through communication (perhaps with the exception of VOY), and even the series-long arcs like the Xindi arc and DSC, PIC, and PRO's previous seasons ended that way. So, to have an ending that endorses genocide is about as anti-Trek as it gets, regardless of whether or not it's on familiar ships and has familiar LCARS interfaces and familiar characters. Nostalgia is not a substitute for Trek's themes. The ONLY time I truly don't like Trek is when its politics are bad. And PIC season three had bad politics on multiple fronts: * Glorifying the abuse of crews by someone who never got help with his PTSD. * Thinking two instances of using Seven's preferred name undoes a full year of deliberate deadnaming. * Downplaying the Raffi/Seven relationship to placate bigots. * Calling Jurati's peaceful overture to the Confederation Borg "weird." * Calling Nepenthe a place for "prairie hipsters," in a clear dig at Michael Chabon. * Completely flipping on Data's wise words "a butterfly that lives forever is really not a butterfly at all." * Turning Moriarty into a doorstop, after they'd made progress on sentient artificial life civil rights. * Exhuming Kirk's body without consent. * Having Boomers save Gen Z from themselves.
Taigan
Well written. Though I confess I giggled a bit at “It’s important to note that Duncan is a Black man.” You’d twice earlier referred to him as having played Malcolm X so I would *hope* he is. Then again, this is the industry that once considered casting Julia Roberts as Harriet Tubman, so…. 🤷♀️
Dr Martin Ward
"The excellent documentary What We Leave Behind even opens with the cast reading hate mail from Trekkies, a recurring theme throughout the film" Look for conservatives to ban this documentary next (if they haven't already!)
Karen Lawler
Excellent essay. Made me think about how, in many psychological theories, you have to acknowledge and accept pain (eg past trauma, difficult emotions, etc), rather than hide from it, in order to deal with it and move on. This feels counterintuitive, as we want to avoid painful things. As a society, we are utterly terrible at accepting pain and acknowledging difficult histories, and it’s our collective constant desire to avoid painful/difficult things that causes so many of our problems. Also I’d love more written essays btw - I love a video but have less time for watching than I used to, was nice to read this over breakfast.
Eric Cheung
Looking forward to reading this. I'd love to be able to share it, in any form it takes.
Sarah Sweny
I'm always down for a DS9 defense video
Jesse gartung
I know Conservative don’t understand Star Trek look at Midnight Edge Video about Star Trek discovery then they promote the Orville Because it has Seth McFarland in it. (And if you know family guy you’ll understand why)
Rick Sjolin (BearGriz72)
Bravo! 👏
Sylvie
This sounds like a great video, and I’d definitely be interested in it. I’m exhausted with the reactionary effort to claim hegemony over the past, and that includes Star Trek. I did notice one little error though. You called DS9 the best Trek, but I’m pretty sure this is based off of an outdated source that was written prior to the release of Lower Decks.
