That’s a good take and that’s also why I reject “sure the Torment Nexus is tormenting people in a nexus right now but in a fantastically different society it might actually be a pleasant and nice thing” takes on contemporary horrors such as cryptocurrency, microplastics, and data mining software.
Okay but let’s not do the part where a military tribunal has the power to decide if a being sentient enough to hold senior officer rank is also property that can be disassembled for science.
I still have hope in my little Posadist heart that the drastic addition of CO2 to our atmosphere, detectable at interstellar distances, will lead us to first contact with an advanced socialist species.
And my little conspiracy theorist heart believes that's why they've kept UAPs hidden for decades.
Our Modern times in star trek are more like the Roman empire, slowly crumbling and about to collapse, which then leads to the actual dark age (I.e., WW3, eugenics wars)