No female captains in Star Trek

[pokerfan]

in the 23rd century? In Turnabout Intruder, Janice Lester stated, "Your world of starship captains doesn't admit women." Yet in both ST:ENT (22nd century) and ST:TNG et al (24th centuries), they clearly existed. Did Star Fleet go through a century of male chauvinism before returning to more enlightened mores?

[LeftyMom]

1. Uhm,

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0112178/

[rcrush]

4. Star Trek Voyager takes place in the 24th Century

Turnabout Intruder was TOS era in the 23rd century. But for some reason during Star Trek ENT in the 22nd? Century they have Female captains. So for some reason in the 23rd century Starfleet didnt like Women captains but they did in the 22nd and 24th century.

[Deja Q]

5. A better reference

http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Madge_Sinclair

[pokerfan]

7. and back to the 22nd century

http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Erika_Hernandez

So Star Fleet did allow female captains before not allowing them.

[Deja Q]

8. They never weren't allowed. Only Lester made the fruitloop comment;

Kirk is the one who said she lacked training and temperament.

Unless there's another episode that goes out of its way to directly say, and by a character that wasn't declared insane. :)

[GreenPartyVoter]

15. Hey, the timeline has been altered so many times, who knows what really happened when? LOL

[JTG of the PRB]

2. Did you watch last night too?

Maybe there was just a time when there weren't many women studying command in Starfleet, or not many interested in command of a starship. Certainly they would be some, but maybe their male counterparts were just more qualified during that era. :shrug:

[pokerfan]

6. It's on right now

[Deja Q]

3. Janice was also insane. It can be successfully argued she had an inferiority complex, based

in part of her failure to pass the required tests.

We never saw female captains until "Star Trek IV" (1986). Since that took place in the 23rd century, that directly contradict Ms. Frootloop Lester's claims.

[pokerfan]

9. OK, not the entire 23rd century apparently

Granted, she was insane but nothing in episode disabused us of her claim. Kirk even agreed and sympathized with her:

"Your world of starship captains doesn't admit women. It isn't fair."
"No, it isn't."

[Orsino]

10. The world of sixties television didn't admit female captains.

I give Roddenberry props for including a female first officer in the original pilot of Star Trek, though we had to wait another twenty years to see female captains on TNG.

[Hippo_Tron]

11. It's interesting when a fictional world changes alongside the real one

Most of the 23rd century material was written in the 1960's and 1970's and most of the 24th century material written in the 1990's.

[GreenPartyVoter]

16. Yep, and that, I think is the most promising part of ST. Which influenced

which? I think maybe it ran both ways at times. :)

[Captain Hilts]

46. Yet, in the 2009 movie, women are not depicted in any leadership roles. They always

make a point of showing blacks in leadership roles, but not women. There were some opportunities they chose not to take.

[Hippo_Tron]

55. The 2009 movie is the same characters from the original series

[Captain Hilts]

67. The primary characters, yes. The Starfleet court judges, no. The captain of the

starship that gets destroyed in the beginning is a black man as is the chief justice of the board of review.

So, black men got a pretty good representation in the flick. That's a good thing.

Women did not. That's a bad thing.

[Hippo_Tron]

68. Well, maybe they want to show that the 2200's were sexist like in Mad Men

But we're talking about two supporting characters and they both happened to be men so that's not a huge sample. Captain Pike wasn't variable either because they picked that character for a reason.

I think we should wait until they make sequels to see if they have more female characters.

[deucemagnet]

12. I think it speaks to our chauvinism more than Star Fleet's.

Majel Barret was Captain Pike's Number One long before she was Nurse Chapel and long before William Frakes was Captain Picard's Number One.



(And she was pretty hot back then, too! :evilgrin:)

[pokerfan]

17. And she wore pants!

When the pilot was shown to NBC executives, who in turn approved more work to produce the series, they ordered that Number One be cut from the format. According to a behind-the-scenes look at Star Trek hosted by Leonard Nimoy that was produced a few years back, their rationale was that the audience would not be able to identify with a woman in such a powerful authority position on board a starship (Nimoy). Unfortunately, the sexism of the 1960's was preventing the establishment of a progressive character because of traditional attitudes. Along with Number One went her costume design that differed very little from the costumes for the male characters. Throughout the rest of the series after the two pilots (The second pilot, the one finally accepted by NBC, was titled "Where No Man Has Gone Before"), all the female members of the crew were dressed in short, skimpy skirts instead of the trousers that Number One and other female characters wore during the pilots. (Although her character was cut, Ms. Barrett returned to the series to play Nurse Christine Chapel, a character more in line with what the network executives had in mind.)

http://startrekdom.blogspot.com/2007/08/sexism-and-feminism-in-star-trek.html">Sexism and Feminism in the Star Trek Universe

[deucemagnet]

18. Exactly!

:thumbsup:

[laconicsax]

13. Star Trek is full of sexism.

-Yeoman Rand's job was to get Kirk his morning coffee and she fretted about whether he noticed her legs.
-Not a single woman in Star Trek who didn't take her husband's name on marriage.
-Tasha Yar was a strong woman and she got killed off before the end of TNG's first season.
-Just about every episode of TOS has something pretty overt.

[GreenPartyVoter]

14. Denise Crosby wanted off the show. Yar's death was never about

killing off the strong woman.

You raised an interesting point about the marriage and name thing, though. Keiko took Miles O'Brien's name. I don't think B'Elanna Torres took Tom Paris' name, but their daughter did. I don't think Jadzia Dax took Worf's name literally, but she did join the family House of Martok.

[rcrush]

19. How would she have taken Worfs name?

Would she be Dax Worf? Jadiza Dax-Worf?

[GreenPartyVoter]

21. Jadzia Dax, wife of Worf son of Mogh of the House of Martok? Can you imagine having to

introduce yourself at parties like that? :P (It's as bad as Lwaxana Troi's introductions!)

[laconicsax]

20. I didn't know that.

[GreenPartyVoter]

22. She regretted the choice, which is why you see her return later on as

Yar in an alternate time-line, and as her own half-Romulan daughter.

And here's something I always thought was interesting. Originally Denise read for the part of Deanna Troi and Marina Sirtis read for Tasha Yar, but the producers decided they would be better off switched around. (And I agree. I liked their final casting choice. :) )

[TommyO]

25. Dr Carol Marcus didn't take the name Kirk

nor did she raise their son as a Kirk.

[rcrush]

28. Was she ever married to Kirk?

[TommyO]

29. I may be mis-remembering, but wasn't there a marriage contract that wasn't renewed?

Great, now I have to watch TWOK again :D

[rcrush]

31. Hmm I dont remember that

I always thought Kirk just got her pregnant and then warped out of town.

[TommyO]

32. Like I said, I could very well be wrong

I'm going on 45, and the gray hairs are starting to impeded the functioning of my gray matter.

[pokerfan]

56. the trek wiki

http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Carol_Marcus

... no mention of any kind of union.

[TommyO]

62. I was actually researching this, and found the same sites

I can't believe that I actually took the time to research this, but I did, and found I was wrong. I'll still watch the movies again, in fact I've added the first six Trek movies to my Netflix queue.

[laconicsax]

35. Marcus and Kirk were never married.

David was the product of a fling. I guess they didn't have birth control in the mid-23rd century.

[Sebastian Doyle]

70. There was almost a paternity suit, but Kirk's lawyer got him out of it.

His lawyer????




Denny Crane, of course!

[laconicsax]

82. Practicing in the 23rd century and still hasn't lost a case!

[WildEyedLiberal]

38. Most of those examples are from the 60s - of course it was "sexist"

60s pop culture is extremely sexist compared to current times. And someone else already explained the Tasha Yar thing. I like how you totally gloss over Beverly Crusher, who was the CMO - I guess being the chief doctor and a qualified bridge officer on the flagship is not "strong" enough? (Bridge officer - she took command of the Enterprise in the episode "Descent")

As far as the marriage-names thing, frankly, I don't give a shit. Should everyone in Trek have a hyphenated name? What happens when two people with hyphenated names marry and have kids? Do the names just keep building upon each other like some horrendous role call? "Susie Johnson-Smith-King-Sanchez"

[Captain Hilts]

48. Very true. But some of it has persisted, only in a different format. nt

[laconicsax]

63. Dr. Crusher is a shining example of institutionalized sexism

Practically everything about her character is about her being feminine with her professional achievements as a plot necessity. She is made to be a feminine woman first, and a professional second. We first meet her buying fabric in a marketplace and she isn't characterized as a first-rate doctor until much later. Also, her son, Wesley, was originally envisioned as a daughter, Leslie, who at 15 became an acting ensign on the Federation flagship. Roddenberry changed Leslie to Wesley because he felt that a teenage girl would limit the story possibilities.

About the name thing:

Beverly Howard marries Jack Crusher and becomes Beverly Crusher.
Beverly Crusher marries Jean-Luc Picard and becomes Beverly Picard.

That she blithely did so is indicative of institutionalized sexism--in All Good Things... when it's revealed that she and Picard got married and later divorced, Picard's line of 'I see you kept the name' indicates an expectation that when a woman marries, she takes her husbands name and if they divorce, she changes back to her unmarried name.

In the episode Sub Rosa she talks about her pride in being a Howard. I guess that pride didn't extend far enough to inspire her to keep the name when she married Jack Crusher.

Who says that hyphenate names are the solution? It works pretty well for the woman to keep her name. It also works pretty well for parents to decide which last name a child will get. Suppose Beverly Howard married Jack Crusher and kept her name. When they had Wesley, they could decide to give him either last name. If they had another child, let's call her Leslie. They could give Leslie the same last name as Wesley or the other one. Works pretty well.

Some people say that doing so is just confusing because you can't tell who's related to whom, but it's no more confusing than having two parents with the same last name and two daughters with a completely different last names, and far less patriarchal.

[WildEyedLiberal]

64. Your problem isn't with Star Trek, it's with last friggin' names

Your only complaint with Beverly Crusher is that she took her husband's surname? Good Lord, as if Star Trek is the only TV show that features women taking their husband's surnames?

This argument has always been one of the prime examples of feminism not being able to see the forest for the trees. WHO FUCKING CARES whether a woman goes by her FATHER'S or her HUSBAND'S surname? It's STILL patrilineal, like it or not, and just deciding on a lark not to take your husband's surname doesn't change that. If that's your personal choice, that's totally fine, but please do not insult everyone else by implying that taking or not taking a husband's last name has anything to do with how feminist one is.

And oh, horrors, Dr. Crusher likes fabric! And dancing! She's *feminine*! As if those are bad things? Who's being sexist now?

[laconicsax]

65. No, it's with depicting a sexist society as utopian.

You seem to make the argument that since other shows have women taking their husband's names then it isn't a problem. That isn't the issue. The issue is that Star Trek depicts a future utopia that adheres to sexist traditions--implying that sexism is a utopian ideal.

The patriarchal tradition of a woman taking her husband's name is inherently sexist. It's a relic of the age when women were their father's property until they were sold and became their husband's property. (I maybe shouldn't say "relic of the age when" as this mindset is still prevalent in many areas.)

By insisting that a woman's last name is either her father's or her husband's you remove all possibility for a woman to have any ownership stake in the name. While I have my father's last name, I don't feel that it's his name and not mine. My partner feels the same way about her last name--it's her last name and something she shares with her father. Do you feel that your last name isn't your own?

Should a woman elect to take her husband's last name, that's her choice. I'm not arguing against women making that choice. I'm arguing against it being as shown as an implicit expectation in a utopian society.

This is different than the (also sexist) naming convention of designating all children as property of the father. Had you bothered to read what I had wrote, you would have noticed that my position is that there's no reason why a child must have its father's last name and I suggested how, in the example of Beverly Howard and Jack Crusher, they could have opted to give Wesley/Leslie either last name. Your 'either-or' argument of a woman's last name shows that you won't even consider this as a possibility--a woman must either have her father's last name or her husband's. That's institutionalized sexism right there.

I also never said there was anything wrong with being feminine. My problem is that Dr. Crusher is often defined by her femininity rather than her professional aptitude. She is depicted as a woman who happens to be a brilliant doctor rather than a brilliant doctor who happens to be a woman. I don't know about you, but I don't give a rat's ass what a professional's sex and gender are. Crusher's sex and gender shouldn't be the main factor in determining who she is but they are, just like with other characters in Star Trek. Trek's gender problems are a somewhat different issue, as with its race, ethnicity, and sexuality problems.

I do have other problems with what was done with Crusher's character, they just aren't relevant to this discussion.

[WildEyedLiberal]

74. My surname is my father's - not my mother's

But even if it WERE hers, it'd be HER father's. So yes, it's still patrilineal. Which is really the only reason I think the surnames argument is a silly one - patrilineal naming has been going on for so long that no "female clan names" have survived. All that remains are male surnames. Of course the origin of it is sexist, incredibly so. But there is no way to reach back through time and reclaim something that never existed - specifically, female family names. So suddenly making an issue of it now strikes me as a waste of time, when there are so many other ways we could be tackling sexism that actually affects people's lives.

[laconicsax]

77. What on earth makes a surname inherently male?

Yes, tradition has passed surnames on through the male line, but that doesn't make the name exclusively male. Are you seriously arguing that it's a male name so long as you can trace a name back to a male ancestor? Does reductio ad absurdum mean anything to you?

Are we just supposed to resign ourselves to perpetuating a sexist tradition because it's been around for a while? Talk about defeatism.

If you don't believe that this form of sexism affects people's lives, talk to my partner's mom, whose husband demanded that she take his name or he wouldn't marry her. Talk to the DUers or DU spouses who have the same story--there was recent thread with some men bragging about demanding the same of their wives.

A person's name is an ingrained part of one's identity and if we stick to the notion that a woman has to give up part of her identity just because she gets married, then that's a pretty significant form of sexism. Saying that it doesn't matter because it's never a woman's name is basically saying that women are always defined by their fathers or husbands--that women are unable to define themselves.

What a classic anti-feminist line: forget about it--there are other more important problems. Guess what, I can walk and chew gum at the same time.

[WildEyedLiberal]

83. Name-wise, they ARE

It's a good thing I don't define myself by what my last name happens to be. :eyes:

You're right, I'm anti-feminist because I care more about equal opportunity than I do about magically reversing a 5000 year old trend that at the end of the day doesn't really matter. If someone "demands" anything of you, then why would you marry them anyway - name or not? Seems to me that the issue there is control, not surnames. But whatever; don't let me interrupt your crusade.

[laconicsax]

85. So you contend that a person's name isn't part of their identity?

I say that a person's name is "an ingrained part of one's identity," and you interpret that as me saying that I define myself by my last name? Of course I don't define myself by my last name. My name is a part of my identity. Part<Whole. Part+Part+Part+...+Part=Whole.

No one has ever demanded that I change my name as a condition of marriage. I can't speak for those who have been in that position. All I can say is that those people do exist and the few whom I know say that they felt like they had lost part of who they were. I also know women who felt the same way after voluntarily changing their name.

Family names have been around for less than 1000 years, not 5000. They originated from either a father's name (Johnson, inherently male), where a person lived (Cleveland), what their job was (Baker), or a nickname (Osborn). After the Nine Years' War, the English made the Irish change their last names. When French Canada started being settled in the 16th century, settlers would change their name to that of the region. I defy you to identify a surname that's been passed down patrilineally for 5000 years.

Do you honestly believe place names, occupational nouns, and nicknames are inherently male or are you just subjectively shifting goalposts to suit your needs.

[Captain Hilts]

47. There is always a female character who wears shrink wrap. nt

[TheMightyFavog]

66. Rand got Kirk's coffee?

I thought her job was to give Kirk his daily nookie when there were no scantily clad alien women around.

[Ivan Sputnik]

23. I suppose you could say...

That at the time she said that, there just didn't happen to be any female captains (of the --what-- 12 starships?), and she concluded that this was policy, not happenstance. Kirk humored her, because she was...nuts.... Of course, TOS is really about the 1960s, not the 2260s.

[datasuspect]

24. female drivers

nuff said

[edbermac]

26. Wrong. Captain Rachel Garrett of the Enterprise-C.

From ST:TNG in Yesterday's Enterprise.

[Captain Hilts]

52. Same hairdo that Jane Jetson and Kathryn Janeway had!

[pokerfan]

57. That's 24th century

Doesn't mitigate the blatant sexism of Star Fleet in the 23rd century.

[One_Life_To_Give]

27. 1960's Misogyny prevented it being shown

At that time the guys in power weren't about to let people know that in the future women would become Captains/Leaders/etc. Perhaps they secretly hoped that women in the future would remain as they were in the 60's.

And face it Janice Lester was a few bricks short of a full load, so I would take her comments with a grain of salt.

[Captain Hilts]

49. Wonder why no women were depicted in leadership roles in the 2009 movie.

Black men were depicted in such roles, but no women. Sigh...

[Bucky]

30. You do know that it was a tv show from 40 years ago, right?

Trekker, please... :eyes:



 

[pokerfan]

36. One of the (many) problems with creating a prequel series (ENT)

forty years after TOS was that it gave the appearance that society had regressed by the time of Kirk. Women relegated to fetching the captain his coffee and answering the telephone...

[rcrush]

33. Need Retcon now!

Actually Deja Q seems to have done it pretty well. Makes the most sense.

[LibertyLover]

34. In Star Trek IV

one of the starship captains reporting back to Star Fleet headquarters on the intruder's progress was a woman. It's been a long time since I watched STIV, but if I am remembering correctly, she was also from Indian sub-continent.

[WildEyedLiberal]

37. Because TOS was made in the chauvanist 60s and TNG, Voyager and Enterprise weren't

[krispos42]

39. IIRC, there were only 12 "starships", which seemed to be the Constitution-class ships

The implication is that those ships were a radically new and powerful design. Doubtless that Starfleet has hundreds or thousands of other ships of varying, lesser capabilities, captianed by a variety of genders and species.

It might well be that the 12 current captains of Constitution-class starships were all men.

[Parche]

40. fukin capt janeway

i cant stand her...:grr: :grr: :hi:

[pokerfan]

43. here ya go

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=105x8987229#8987241

:hi:

[Captain Hilts]

50. Love her. I like all the captains, actually. Except for on Enterprise, where Bakula was

miscast.

[GreenPartyVoter]

51. Not me. I love Bakula too. I'll happily take all the ST you can throw at me.

:hi:

[Captain Hilts]

53. I think the captains were all terrific. Sometimes they're the ONLY thing worth

watching on the show.

[GreenPartyVoter]

54. If someone could magically transport me into a TV/Movie world, I would

definitely pick Trek. (Although Eureka could be fun too if they could make me a genius while they zapped me over there. I wonder what my scientific specialties would be and how I would accidentally almost cause the destruction of the world? :P)

[Skip Intro]

69. Didn't like her or the show at the start, but came to love 'em both. And then, there was 7 of 9.

Zowie.

:evilgrin:

[Orrex]

41. It's because women are givers of pain and delight

Brain and brain! What is brain?!

[LostInAnomie]

42. It's because they change the seat adjustments and leave the side mirrors out of place.

That shit's against the prime directive!!!

[jobycom]

44. They must have elected a Republican who moved everything backwards for a while.

Every world has their Reagan.

[Captain Hilts]

45. Yes. nt

[baldguy]

58. Janice Lester was crazy.

[Captain Hilts]

60. Kirk and Sisko weren't?

[Posteritatis]

84. Sisko certainly *became* entertainingly crazy...

He was my favorite, in any case.

[MilesColtrane]

59. The lack of female starship captains was a direct result of the rise to power of...

...senior Fleet Admiral Zap Branigan to Starfleet Commander-in-Chief in 2247.

[NJmaverick]

61. LOL!

:spray:

[krispos42]

80. "The spirit is willing, but the flesh is spongy and bruised."

:-)

[omega minimo]

71. Okay ST Dork, since we know Janeway existed, answer your own question and clue us in, eh?

:crazy:

[pokerfan]

72. What does Janeway have to do with rampant 23rd century Star Fleet sexism?

[omega minimo]

73. WE don't know and the request was that you fill us in.

:spray:

[pokerfan]

75. If I knew, I wouldn't have posed a question

Obviously society regressed in the 23rd century for some reason. It had to happen just about the time Kirk was made captain because as we all know his immediate predecessor had a female XO, which would have been unthinkable during Kirk's era. Women who were once senior officers, captains and admirals reduced to fetching coffee, wearing miniskirts and answering the telephone errr... hailing frequencies. Then by the time of Enterprise C, everything was back to normal.

Maybe fundamentalist religious nuts somehow gained control of the Earth government for a brief time. Such are the vagaries of a democracy.

[omega minimo]

76. OIC

Maybe it was an error of convenience. So much easier to perpetuate the age old cliches than reflect an actual futuristic vision. :shrug:

[krispos42]

78. Nothing. Janeway was 24th Century Starfleet. n/t

[pokerfan]

79. Thank you

[krispos42]

81. No problem.

Trekkies gotta stick together.