Skibidi, When the Walls Fall: The Continuing Problem with Star Trek’s Contemporary Slang
By Chris Snellgrove | Published
Starfleet Academythe latest Star Trek spinoff, has proven to be controversial for many reasons. One of them is the use of modern profanity, all of which sounds strange coming from the mouths of the 32nd century. This is clearly Paramount’s biggest attempt to appeal to a modern audience, but die-hard fans and Trek icon Robert Picardo continue to go out of their way to excuse the inclusion of this profanity-laden language.
However, the simple fact is that the character’s use of modern language does no concept, and I can definitely prove it. What were the excuses the fans were giving, and why were they wrong? Why does the use of this language conflict with established theory, and why is it bad for Star Trek as a whole? Read on to find out!
Universal Translator Definition
Before we get too deep into the problem with modern language Starfleet AcademyI thought we would discuss the most common excuses fans have made about it. Perhaps the most common excuse is that Star Trek’s popular Universal Translator works for the benefit of the home viewing audience. That is, these characters are probably speaking some kind of unintelligible space slang to each other, and UT easily translates that into modern speech for the audience.
As excuses go, this is fun, and it gets full marks for incorporating the franchise’s most popular technology. But at its heart, this claim is more of an explanation than a justification. In other words, it explains why we may hear characters like Caleb casually chatting about “toilet wine,” but it doesn’t explain why that language in the exhibition.
That’s the crux of the matter here: Star Trek fans can spend all day awarding each other Missing Prizes for trying to explain why 32nd century Starfleet students talk like 21st century zoomers. But the main issue is that this is today’s language in the exhibition of the future by interrupting jarring, robbing the moving scenes of any real drama as it quickly begins the show.
The “Kids Will Be Kids” excuse.
Another big reason for that Starfleet Academy The argument for being too modern is that the characters are young and don’t speak like seasoned franchise veterans. Even Robert Picardo (who reprises his role as the Doctor for the show) cited this as an excuse in a recent interview with Collider. There, he noted that “students speak like children in today’s world and in their native languages” and that they will need to learn to shift to the kind of “space speech” needed to “resolve a conflict in an official setting.”
There are two basic problems with this argument: the most obvious is that Star Trek has many minor, non-Starfleet characters (including Wesley Crusher, Jake Sisko, the original Nog, and Naomi Wildman) who spoke almost exclusively in the slang of the time. If it were, we could have Jake describe his latest story as “all that and a bag of chips,” or Nog explain how Starfleet Academy is “the bomb.” Heck, how Voyager even making it seven seasons without anyone telling Captain Janeway, “Go, girl!”
You know how angry you were when you read that? That’s just a small taste of how contemporary slang can ruin Star Trek stories that are meant to be timeless. Now, just imagine how happy you will feel Starfleet Academy characters using phrases like “I’m a Khionian, b*tch!” and “nah, he chose the War College, bruh” in about 10 years.
Another problem with Picardo’s defense of contemporary language is that the actors are old in the show again speak like this. Chancellor Ake, for example, tells Nus Braka to “get your ** out,” and Cadet Master Lura Thok describes the situation as “a dump fire.” Heck, in the same episode, Picardo was helping with the speech, his character saying “speech and debate is not for chickensh*t.”
Long story short, isn’t it? The “kids will be kids” excuse doesn’t really apply to the modern language at Starfleet Academy when we see older characters using the exact same language, proving that age won’t magically cause Starfleet characters to stop talking like zoomers.
Why Profanity Should Be Extremely Rare in Star Trek
Now, it’s time to address the elephant in the room, which is the Star Trek characters be used foul language before. Starfleet Academy didn’t surprisingly put a curse on the franchise: Dr. McCoy is famous for his various “damn it, Jim” phrases, and Kirk memorably said “Let’s get the hell out of here” at the end of “The City on the Edge of Forever.” This level of minor cursing continued throughout the golden age of Star Trek, and even Captain Picard once said “sh*t” (albeit in French) on screen in an episode of Star Trek. The Next Generation.
However, Trek’s use of profanity often reminds me of something my favorite professor once said. It’s like Doctor Who Starfleet Academyhe was known for cursing in class, and like those hapless students, we asked him why he spoke like that in class. It was then that he said something simple that has always stuck with me: “A gentleman never insults without meaning to.”
His point was that people should not use foul language out of passion or anger but instead should use it to have a greater impact on the discussion. That’s why Star Trek saved its first “oh, sh*t” for data when the Enterprise was about to crash. Generations: the availability of profanity and the perfection of the situation undoubtedly deserve a four-letter word. While it was used to weaken the effect in NuTrek, profanity (including F-bombs) Adoption again Picard often circulated to increase their rhetorical impact.
InStarfleet Academycharacters always call each other b*tch, use words like “fish d*ck,” use “sh*t” as an adjective, and so on. The problem isn’t that Star Trek characters shouldn’t curse; rather, the problem is that if they do so all the time, four-letter words lose their meaning or real power. Just like that, the vulgar language used to make these young characters sound like adults makes them sound like bratty kids trying to show off!
Most Modern Profanity Should Be Completely Obscure in the Future
Perhaps the main reason that there is not so much profanity, is the modern languageStarfleet Academy returns to one of the most popular movies in the franchise:Star Trek IV: Voyage Home. One of the main plot twists in that film was that Kirk and Spock didn’t quite understand 20th century profanity. That’s why Kirk responds to someone calling him a “dumba**” with the memorable catchphrase “double dumb** for you!”
Later, Spock (who hilariously tries to use such language with words like “they don’t see the hell of your whales”) describes such language as “colorful metaphors,” and Kirk says profanity is “just the way they talk around here” (meaning 20th century). He sums up his thoughts on the matter by saying, in this ancient time that McCoy compares to the Dark Ages, “No one cares about you if you don’t curse every other word.”
It wasn’t that Kirk didn’t know what the words meant, really; anyone with an interest in the 20th century (like Captain Pike who enjoys old sci-fi films) would have a familiarity beyond the insult. But even minor variations on old slang (such as putting “dumb” before “a**”) completely baffled him. Furthermore, it was obvious that the habit of always cursing in an attempt to get someone’s attention was unusual for him, someone who was born a few centuries later.
That’s the big problem with swearing Starfleet Academy: instead of speaking like characters of the 32nd century who study to be the best, they curse all other words like characters of the 20th century. Kirk himself identified this as such primitive behavior that 23rd century visitors can’t understand the obscene phrases people say. But in Starfleet Academyliving organisms are about a a thousand years later on they always scare like sailors and often remind us how far this franchise has fallen.
Star Trek fans, it’s time to get real: the disturbingly modern dialogue is out of date Starfleet Academyand the constant curse we make there is no sense within the canon of the franchise. That’s not to say you can’t enjoy the show on its own merits, but it’s been a long time since the fandom stopped making excuses for poor writing. The bottom line is that this show doesn’t noise like Star Trek on any level, making it very difficult for anyone who has seen a single episode The Original Series or The Next Generation taking any of this seriously.
Or, to put it in a way that the writers of the newest Trek series would understand: “Kurtzman and Paramount at the Rizzing. Skibidi, where the subscribers fall!”
