The thing I don’t understand here is just - do you expect Trump to go pass BBB, forgive student loans etc? In the primaries, sure, go out and vote for more progressive candidates. But if I’m asked if I want a tooth filling or a root canal, I don’t bitch about the filling material and hope to go get a root canal.
Like, practically, what do you expect to get better if Biden loses?
Biden isn’t the one saying he wants to be dictator, that seems to be Trump. As far as I am aware, we needed to run a different candidate in the primary, that’s where you push people to come more to the left. Going hard right because Biden wasn’t left enough for you is kind of insane to me. That’s all.
Do I love what the Biden admin does 100%? No.
But you seem to be saying you’re rather have Trump than Biden, which is a position someone can take, but a very strange one for someone who’s left of Biden. To me it’s like saying It’s 70 degrees in here and I’m cold. One person says I will set the thermostat to 72 degrees, the other says I’ll set it to 60 degrees, and you would like it to be 75 degrees. Because the 72 degrees isn’t hot enough, you’d prefer the 60 degrees. Weird way to express your preferences to me.
I don’t think I understand your questions to be honest. I’d strongly prefer to keep democracy, and to reverse the course of our system so it’s getting more democratic. I’d prefer not trying to make the point being cruel to outgroups or anyone.
Specifically I would never make the case that we’d lose democracy from trying to do any of the things you listed as “or”. The “Might lose democracy” is about Trump’s actual statements about wanting to be a dictator, and the republican party that seems to be all for that.
The first 3 questions are to congress or maybe the supreme court - Biden tried to do loan forgiveness, it wouldn’t pass congress, and the supreme court struck down his ability to do it in an executive order. This is not something that Biden can change, it’s something that needs more people to vote in democratic congressional representatives. So these questions seem completely irrelevant to me in terms of the presidential election. I’m in NY, we vote in democratic senators and a lot of democratic representatives. I’m not sure what else you’re asking me to do.
The last 3 questions are more salient to Biden, and I personally would not have done any of that. I don’t know how the government can actually block a strike if the people were really serious they could all quit and let the companies deal with that.
If I was president knowing only what I currently know now - I’d have told the companies to fricken pay up, not say the strike can’t happen. I’d channel that FDR meme where he hauled the one company away from the person not coming to an agreement so stuff kept running.
I would tout federal workers working remotely as both something good for labor, and good for the environment with less car pollution, and potential for a broader recruiting base. If I was feeling snarky I might also try and throw in it might let the government recruit more people from low cost of living areas and save money.
On the Israel issue I’d probably throw it to congress at this point. I just don’t really know what the stance to take is because I don’t know enough about our alliance terms, the strategic goals, etc.
I have to point out - theres presumably a lot the President / Government knows that I do not about each issue. There may be things that if I knew it, I’d change my position. One thing I think Biden needs to do is get on TV or whatever and explain to people why he’s sending arms to Israel at this point, and why he’s not strongly pressuring Israel to get out of Gaza and stop this war.
Given the above - I’m not really sure what compromise you’re talking about that I’m “not willing to make”? I didn’t choose Biden - no one else was running in the primaries that I’m aware of. It’s not that people didn’t hear that no one was excited about Biden running again, it’s that whoever makes the political decisions didn’t choose anyone else even hearing that. And TBH, politically, other than maybe John Stewart (as I’ve said elsewhere, and who they obviously didn’t get), I don’t know anyone who’s even as well known as Biden on the Democratic side that also would have any chance in a general election. The swing voters who decide elections seem to be very resistant to anyone who’s not an old white man. I wish we didn’t have the electoral college that even makes swing states TBH, but it’s what we have to go by. Pretending that it’s not is not engaging with reality.
Honestly I’m constantly amazed it was on this long. I think not having ratings or traditional competition lets streaming shows go longer than they should.
It was never that good, and it just started declining from the pilot. I slogged through S3 due to “giving it a fair chance”, and I regret that every time I think about S3, which I’ve mostly forgotten. ANY other sci fi show and I would have dropped it probably in the first episode, or at my most tenacious in the first season.
I would generally suggest if you’re at all budget limited to consider not going full frame, even used the good lenses tend to be a lot more money. The second thing is from what I can tell, almost all cameras from the last 10 years or so can output the same color science and tones via editing the RAWs. Depending on your OS and RAW editor there are even some third party tools (for like 200 bucks or less) that can bulk emulate just about any other camera defaults for any camera. So again, if you want to save money, bang for buck is going to be getting better at editing and maybe buying specific software tools.
That all said, I also totally get it if you want to minimize editing and find another SooC jpeg engine more pleasing. Plenty of people get Fuji just because of that. However it’s pretty expensive to switch camera systems to change the jpeg output slightly so I would be pretty sure I really liked that output before switching. I would rent the system for a week and make sure it’s doing what I want, and compare the whole process of using the other system and make sure it works for me.
Of the listed Sony cameras, I think the only one I would consider worthwhile would be the A7Riii.
The Panasonic is rather video focused and the Fuji is completely different. For good SooC people do like Fuji, it’ll be lighter and smaller but probably not cheaper necessarily. It would help if I had some idea what you wanted the camera to do as the choices seem literally all over the map to me.
I’ve been watching the various Star Trek shows for a while now, and while not finished I saw most of them, I believe. And I cannot shake off the feeling that the messages given by these shows, especially (and almost exclusively) recent ones are pushing horrible morals that most people seem to not care about....
I don’t know if Star Trek ever had a really strong coherent overarching morality, but it certainly doesn’t now. The Disco and newer shows are such a mishmash of different people and a different time that they seem often the opposite of what people thought TOS and TNG might have been. DS9-Enterprise were kind of the “in-between” IMO. So there’s at LEAST 3 different sets of sort of framework for what the canon/story/morals even are that it’s kind of hard to discuss as a whole coherently.
Then there’s always the people who take stuff as “cool” that the show didn’t want to portray as “good”. There are plenty of media examples of “cool” bad guys. Look at all the Ducat lovers in DS9, he was pretty explicitly intended and they thought portrayed as a villain, but a complex one. The whole last season turning him into a moustache twirling caricature was to try and “fix” this “misunderstanding” by a troubling portion of the fans.
The whole Prime Directive waffling is well known to fans, and generally there to specifically create conversation about the colonial vs anti-colonial ideals starting in TNG and morphed over time to now. I don’t think the show in a meta sense promotes the prime directive as a good thing - the amount of character struggles and flat out breaking it makes me pretty sure it’s a “no obvious right rule” exemplar.
Disco and on is generally so poorly written that it’s hard to say if they have a message to push inside the show. Most of what we know is from Twitter posts and interviews cause it’s so hard to tell what’s supposed to be the point of the actual show in many cases. With Georgiou I think they’re trying to tell an anti-hero redemption story of some sort. Some idea that anyone can change and deserves a new chance (I think it’s beyond second here). Take out the extremes for the drama and being a show and this is about as obvious as the prime directive as an ideal. It’s not the worst, but I can’t say it’s always valid either IMO.
I think you get from Star Trek what you decide to take from it - it’s entertainment first, not moral education.
since it sort of still is Dax, it adds on top of Jadzia’s crap.
Is it though? Isn’t that one of the things they deal with a lot with Trill - are different hosts actually “the same person”? I’d argue it’s “partially at best” and is one of the interesting things about the concept of personhood over time sci-fi deals with. In a lot of ways, Ezri is at best like a 30 year time difference in the real world, but maybe even more like a sister/cousin at the more extreme side of being different.
There was also Sisko using bioweapons for a personal vendetta, Odo not fitting in and constantly trying to go with the changelings who are a group of fascist racist violent manipulators, etc.
I haven’t seen DS9 since the first run I don’t think, so my memory is hazy, but did the show make those things “good things” or were they flaws in the characters?
As the title says, I’m looking for some of the best Star Trek books to read. I’ve read both of The Eugenics Wars books and quite enjoyed them, so was looking for some other good ones. I don’t really care what time period they’re in, just as long as they’re Trek and pretty
The Wounded Sky (IMO better across the galaxy instant drive story than Discovery) My Enemy, My Ally Doctors Orders The Invasion series Uhuras Song Black Fire The Romulan Way Yesterday’s Son Time for Yesterday
LoglineWhen the USS Enterprise investigates an attack on a colony at the edge of Federation space, Captain Pike and his crew face the return of a formidable enemy....
For the number of ships, by TOS there are only 12 Constitution class ships, so there might not be more ships to send. We’re a year or so out from the Klingon war, and it doesn’t seem like the Federation is in a position to quickly replace ships. They already lost the Cayuga. Also the admiralty obviously isn’t interested in a Gorn war at all, and certainly not over this planet or the potential survivors.
I will say it’s been shown that Pike is just not a fighting captain. He’s not the person you want in a combat situation. It does make me wonder why he’s a Captain but idk. They really should send the Enterprise back on a deep space mission of exploration and have someone (who is not an evil mirror universe person) more like Lorca or Kirk running these border conflicts or something.
I worked hard at imitating the Leonard Nimoy Spock’s raised eyebrow for quite a while. I don’t regret the time spent practicing that in front of a mirror. I never mastered a fully raised eyebrow, but I can do a slight eyebrow raise....
As a kid i loved watching the next generation and deep space 9 with my dad. Ive always liked sci fi, more of a (stargate fan) and wanted to get back into star trek, but Im just so lost on timelines and whats going on. There are like 6 kirks and I have no idea how/where to get started with watching this again.
I would recommend skipping TOS as a show, and reading the James Blish adaptations of it and TAS. They’re great stories, but getting various production design and execution issues out of the way is IMHO a good idea. Maybe watch some of the classic episodes like Shore Leave City on the edge of forever The trouble with tribbles
Then watch the original 6 movies - these are pretty good and varied. (except ST V, which… you can skip, or watch if you’re a completest or take as an alternate story, or whatever.) TMP is a little slow, and unique, but I think if you’re into general sci fi, and are ok with it not exactly feeling like “Star Trek”, it’s quite good and sets up Spock a little.
Then TNG, DS9 are both quite good, though DS9 really ends up being arcs of arcs for the last few seasons, so you can’t dip in and out the same way you can with TNG or TOS.
TNG Movies are with hindsight and time … ~~~ average? OK?
Generations is generally panned, I think it was basically another episode of the series with a bigger budget, and a middling one at that. First Contact is fun, but don’t think too hard. Insurrection is like Generations - I enjoyed it as it was, but it kind of re-made an existing TNG episode, and meh. Nemisis sets up the Picard show, but both are generally so bad that I can’t really recommend it.
Honestly, Voyager is flip a coin. I watched it once - first run on air, never have been interested in going back for a rewatch, and doesn’t really set up anything for future shows / makes some parts of future shows worse because of how much they screw up in the future shows.
Hot Take, Enterprise is worth watching, and I think air order works better here. Again, they can’t help themselves but “ruin” some earlier episodes / stories from TOS / TNG because of fan easter eggs or whatever, so - watching it later as it aired makes it so you get what they’re winking about. It also helps answer some lingering questions from other shows (if you care for that) in the 4th season. I will warn you, it’s probably a straight average 5/10 so there’s some lows, and very few highs - most episodes are … OK. Then again, if you can get through TOS and TNG lows, you’ll be fine here.
I think you can skip the 09 reboot series of movies, unless you really like JJ Abrams, lens flare, or some of the actors (or are a completest). Looking back, they’re entirely forgettable and not that great sci fi action films.
Looking back, I’d take a hard pass on Discovery and S1 and S2 of Picard, unless you like pain and screaming at the TV (assuming you actually liked TNG and 90s trek). S3 of Picard is OK, IF you’re super jonesing for more TNG no matter what. But really, TNG should have ended with All Good Things and left it there - that was a PERFECT ending, and they keep trying, and failing, to improve on it IMHO. So far, you can skip S3 of Picard and not have it affect anything else.
Lower Decks is surprisingly really really really good. Watch it.
Strange New Worlds is actually decent - and feels a lot like TOS in terms of episodic, random ups and downs in both good and embarrassingly bad episodes. It’s another prequel, but again, I think watching in air order makes sense - especially as it’s still airing new episodes, you can’t watch it first really.
I took a pass on Prodigy - opinions are mixed, and future availability and new seasons seem up in the air. It’s also a kids show from what I gather. I tried the first episode and was like - nah, not for me.
“Star Trek” homages - watch Galaxy Quest - that’s amazing. The Orville S1 and S2 are really good TNG. S3 changed and I did not like it as much, and dropped it part way through. They started being “extra serious” and like 1+ hour episodes and it just was a drag to watch for me.
Fair enough. Too many times I’ve tried to watch a TOS episode and just found segments drawn out and boring - at least some of the podcasts reviewing think it was to reach 52 minutes and they just didn’t have the budget for that much content per episode or something. It was just OBVIOUS filler. The Corbomite Maneuver being one where they just keep cutting back to a counter over and over. The trouble with Tribbles had that 10 minute long bar fight - that’s how they fit Trials and Tribulations into it so well.
And a lot of the negative of TOS was the budget / tech of the 1960s for a sci fi show. Or places where the production or execution just failed badly. I never thought The Alternative Factor was a bad story in the novelization, but once I heard Mission Log and others pan it as “not even a TV show” and I tried to watch it - I saw what they were talking about. The thing just didn’t work IMO. Devil in the Dark worked amazing in a novel form, the Horta on TV was… I see where the jokes came from.
Kirk, Spock and McCoy worked really well on the show, that’s true, but I think a lot of the other parts make it a difficult place to start.
I saw someone on Reddit wondering why the community was so sure of Trek going dark again with Paramount not doing so well financially. Seeing the response was unfortunate as most people feel that it might be a bad time for Trek. And I guess it makes sense with the Hollywood strikes as well....
I haven’t rewatched any Enterprise except the mirror duology since first run, but I really never got the hate people had for it. I think I always thought it was pretty good. I don’t know if I’d say it was better than Voyager overall, I think my main ding was what I think is a stupid idea of a prequel. But take that out of it, and I’d think they were even. I used to think they were tied for the bottom two, but Discovery and Picard have really lowered my opinion of what bad Trek can be, so Voyager and Enterprise look a lot better by comparison lol.
It’s closer to Old Trek. But in the last episode of S1
spoilerwhere they take original TOS dialog for parts and mix it with modern dialog - man you really see the difference. Love it or hate it, the TOS dialog feels a lot more martial and IMO fits way better with having ranks on a ship.
There’s good stuff in it, but they also seem to really have a problem making any non-quippy character, to the extent that I actually think it affects characterization. To that end, Ortegas still
spoilerisn’t that well fleshed out IMHO even with the last episode being 1/3 about her. I think earlier Trek played tricks to make characters feel more different, but those worked.
Spock is certainly “in between” The Cage and TOS, but I think they’re going to have to re-do something like Kohlinar to explain his change in the last episode of SNW.
It’s reasonably good, but significantly different too.
I don’t disagree, and I suppose captains get a LOT of leeway with how they run their ships. What I’m actually talking about is
spoilerthe part where Spock has the TOS lines being jarring.
I think in that case they let “easter eggs” for fans get in the way of coherently telling the story they wanted to tell. At least with your (and my) take -
spoilerhow do you get that Spock? It seems like the divergence would have left Spock more like he is now with Pikes leadership style, vs the apparent changes to TOS with Kirks style.
Next Generation and the like was just crazy in that every dang away mission planet just so happened to have a gas mix of 70% N, 21% O2 and the rest CO2 and inert gases at like exctly 1atm (or at least a mixture within those norms)
That was just what TOS, TAS, the movies etc did - mostly for production cost reasons. It’s also why there were transporters, though I personally really like the idea and it’s not a Star Trek specific thing.
I don’t think Enterprise was more realistic per se, just set in a much lower tech level much closer to current day. Some parts of Sci Fi aren’t “realistic” in the way if you showed a 2023 cop show to someone from 1800, they’d say it was a bunch of flights of fancy in tech (modern cars, planes, smartphones, zoom meetings etc would probably seem as realistic to them as starships do to us).
Honestly, rankings have to be almost completely subjective at a certain point. IDK if you listen to any of the Star Trek review podcasts, but there’s always tension around how to rank a show. Do you try and be “objective” and take your personal enjoyment out of it as much as possible, and instead rank on production success (did the final show do what they were trying to do?), cultural impact?, Iconic level of an episode?, Number of Iconic episodes or well produced episodes or the average quality over a season or show?
Like, there are episodes that are a LOT of fun, say “Trials and Tribulations” from DS9, but it didn’t really have a strong unique plot or sci fi conceit or have anything to “say” in morals. It was Iconic solely to big existing fans, and the awesomeness of the production was entirely around the technical achievement of filming in the 90s using 60s techniques and near perfectly splicing together with existing footage. It’s one of the ?2? DS9 episodes I’m at all interested in re-watching frequently, and it’s really really fun for me as a huge Star Trek nerd. But is it a “great episode”?
Compare to “In the Pale Moon Light” or “Measure of a Man”, or “City on the Edge of Forever”. Those are Iconic for a reason, and most of them work pretty stand alone. They’re arguably “better” in context, but they have pretty good production - it seems to achieve what they set out to do, they have a message, they have a moral idea they’re playing with, and they throw in some Sci Fi too.
Then there’s the same thing but over an entire show. I think TOS and TNG and DS9 had very high highs, but also some pretty low lows throughout the run. “The Alternative Factor” or “Code of Honor” don’t exactly stand up as “better” than Picard. By Voyager, I think they still had a bunch of 3/10s but mostly avoided 1/10s, and honestly Enterprise seemed to hit that middle 4-6/10 range very consistently. I haven’t “done the math” but I’d be willing to believe if you averaged ratings of every episode, Enterprise might well rate higher on that average than TNG. It’s just that if you’re selective you can watch probably 30 episodes of TNG that are 8-10/10 and there might be 2 in Enterprise.
I will say - if you like reading, and you like SNW a lot - I’d suggest trying the novelizations of TOS and TAS by James Blish. They fix all the production limitations of 60s tech and budgets, but keep the good stories and characterizations. It’s actually how I got into TOS originally, back before streaming or releases of the show on DVD. I think in many ways I wouldn’t love TOS as much as I do if my main exposure was actually the episodes. Balance of Terror as a case in point basically bored me to death in the middle where for the 52 minute runtime they just linger in a countdown set of scenes for way to long. Similar for The Trouble with Tribbles - the reason they could slice it up for the DS9 inserts is there was like 8 minutes of a bar fight you can mostly cut and lose NOTHING. For on screen - the TOS Movies really cemented them IMHO.
There’s something about the TNG theme (played during the opening credits) that seems unique and special to my ear. But I don’t know about music and orchestral production to make sense of it....
I thought it was weird at first, but actually liked it. I didn’t really get the hate - there’s plenty of shows I like a lot that I like the theme a lot less and especially today you can easily skip it.
'It was so scary': Trump fans at Missouri Caucus 'literally attacked fellow Republicans' ( www.rawstory.com )
Star Trek: Discovery | Final Season Exclusive Clip (CCXP 2023) | Paramount+ ( www.youtube.com )
Shown at the 2023 São Paulo Comic Con in Brazil
Opinions on used camera options
Might have as much as $1600, but the more saved the better. Also need a lens....
The horrible morals of a show supposed to teach them
I’ve been watching the various Star Trek shows for a while now, and while not finished I saw most of them, I believe. And I cannot shake off the feeling that the messages given by these shows, especially (and almost exclusively) recent ones are pushing horrible morals that most people seem to not care about....
Star Trek: very Short Treks | "Walk, Don't Run" ( www.startrek.com )
Direct YouTube link
Best Star Trek Books
As the title says, I’m looking for some of the best Star Trek books to read. I’ve read both of The Eugenics Wars books and quite enjoyed them, so was looking for some other good ones. I don’t really care what time period they’re in, just as long as they’re Trek and pretty
CamRanger 2
Anyone used the Cam Ranger 2?
Episode Discussion | Star Trek: Strange New Worlds | 2x10 "Hegemony"
LoglineWhen the USS Enterprise investigates an attack on a colony at the edge of Federation space, Captain Pike and his crew face the return of a formidable enemy....
What Star Trek Mannerism or Phrase Do You Often Use
I worked hard at imitating the Leonard Nimoy Spock’s raised eyebrow for quite a while. I don’t regret the time spent practicing that in front of a mirror. I never mastered a fully raised eyebrow, but I can do a slight eyebrow raise....
if something happened to the black hole at the center of our galaxy, could we know about that problem before it affected us?
We know that light and even gravitational waves propagate at the speed of light....
Can someone give me adivice on how/where to get back into star trek?
As a kid i loved watching the next generation and deep space 9 with my dad. Ive always liked sci fi, more of a (stargate fan) and wanted to get back into star trek, but Im just so lost on timelines and whats going on. There are like 6 kirks and I have no idea how/where to get started with watching this again.
Reddit seems all doom and gloom on the topic but what about Lemmy? And the future of Star Trek?
I saw someone on Reddit wondering why the community was so sure of Trek going dark again with Paramount not doing so well financially. Seeing the response was unfortunate as most people feel that it might be a bad time for Trek. And I guess it makes sense with the Hollywood strikes as well....
Manny Coto, The Showrunner Who Tried To Save 'Star Trek: Enterprise,' Dies ( subspacechatter.substack.com )
And he did it brilliantly!
Can any music experts explain to me why the TNG theme is so good?
There’s something about the TNG theme (played during the opening credits) that seems unique and special to my ear. But I don’t know about music and orchestral production to make sense of it....