Star Trek, WH40k and Right Wing fans.

[Ford Prefect]

I thought the Holocaust was more comparable to the Imperium's policy towards xenos, as the Nazis apparently declared Jews as non-humans to justify the mass murders.

I'm not the sort of person that believes that 'The Holocaust' should solely apply to the Jewish deaths in World War II, but the genocide commited against the Poles, Roma and other ethnicities and minorities the Nazis believed were fit for nothing more than total erasure.

[Sidewinder]

I'm not the sort of person that believes that 'The Holocaust' should solely apply to the Jewish deaths in World War II, but the genocide commited against the Poles, Roma and other ethnicities and minorities the Nazis believed were fit for nothing more than total erasure.

That's why I thought Action T4 is more similar to the Imperium policy towards mutants than the Holocaust.

In December 1946, an American military tribunal (commonly called the Doctors' Trial) tried 23 doctors and administrators for their roles in war crimes and crimes against humanity. These crimes included the systematic killing of those deemed "unworthy of life," including the mentally retarded, the institutionalized mentally ill, and the physically impaired. After 140 days of proceedings, including the testimony of 85 witnesses and the submission of 1,500 documents, in August 1947 the court pronounced 16 of the defendants guilty. Seven were sentenced to death and executed on 2 June 1948. They included Dr Karl Brandt and Viktor Brack.

The indictment read in part:

14. Between September 1939 and April 1945 the defendants Karl Brandt, Blome, Brack, and Hoven unlawfully, willfully, and knowingly committed crimes against humanity, as defined by Article II of Control Council Law No. 10, in that they were principals in, accessories to, ordered, abetted, took a consenting part in, and were connected with plans and enterprises involving the execution of the so called "euthanasia" program of the German Reich, in the course of which the defendants herein murdered hundreds of thousands of human beings, including German civilians, as well as civilians of other nations. The particulars concerning such murders are set forth in paragraph 9 of count two of this indictment and are incorporated herein by reference.[66]

Also in 1945, seven staff members of the Hadamar institute were tried for the killing of Soviet and Polish nationals, but not for the large-scale killing of German nationals at the institute. Alfons Klein, Karl Ruoff and Wilhelm Willig were sentenced to death and executed, the other four were given long prison sentences.[67]

Note that Action T4 targeted Aryans suffering from deformities and mental health problems IN ADDITION TO the Jews, Gypsies, Slavs, etc.

[Feil]

The right-winger Star Trek fans seem to be able to accept that the Federation is atheist. I would think they would find that more offensive than the blind fanatical obedience to a space zombie.

'Deep Space Nine' has BENEVOLENT godlike figures (the Prophets) and a BENEVOLENT Christ figure (Sisko as "the Emissary"). The Christ figure in 'Warhammer 40,000' advocates the culling of mutants (with the exception of psykers) so mankind may be stronger and able to take their rightful place as the dominant race in the galaxy; Hitler ALSO advocated euthanasia for those with disabilities, and the (relatively) sane right-wingers are understandably reluctant to be seen aping the Fuehrer.

Mutants are not disabilities. They aren't even mutations in the classical sense. They are (or they are indistinguishable from) the result of the infringement of the Warp on reality. If the Imperium didn't murder mutants en masse, Chaos would gain a foothold. The Imperium doesn't have any problems with (clearly) evolutionary mutations, as evidenced by their tolerance of abhumans (ratlings, ogryn), and their outright embrace of death-worlders, void-borns, and so on.

That's the real catching point about the Imperium. While there's plenty of room for senseless waste and unnecessary evil on the smaller scale, almost every large-scale institutional policy is utterly necessary to ensure the survival of the human race. Even the simplification that occurs when mitigating nuances are dismissed to make for easily-inculcated propaganda is necessary to accomplish the mass mobilization of the general populace.

[Rye]

40k's society is incredibly unpleasant and the fiction itself is relatively obscure and borne from 80s british counterculture like Judge Dredd and similar "dark" depictions of human nature and society. 40k isn't so much "left" or "right" as it is ultimately anti-authoritarian and pro-big explosions and "anti-Tolkien" dark fantasy with tanks and shit. Hardcore right wingers may on some level desire a highly militarised society and soforth (see Starship Troopers for a treatment of this they do tend to like), but 40k is full of fuckups who would leave you and your mates out to die in barbed wire if it meant they could get home to watch their soap operas in time.

I also don't know how open they are to suspending disbelief when it comes to religion in the setting; it's quite clearly there to parody christianity, which is something that has died and faded from common memory for the characters. It's very rarely touched upon in Star Trek, though the implication is they're all commies (though some episodes have Picard being all intelligent designy).

I think for the most part, political ideology and artistic tradition takes part in the creation of these various fictions, but only when it gets really overt (like in the later seasons of 24) does it actually bother people. I would expect most of them are just there for the narrative, they won't really notice the political influence most of the time. An example would be Transformers, I doubt many people here noticed the point of them all being American cars (with Bumblebee trashing his prior existence as a bug) and the big advert for joining the American army. Or how Star Wars is basically a Western archetype based around the journey and triumph of the individual over an evil government or cabal. I don't put much stock in the average person watching films for the sake of their own political proclivities, though for wider trends (like watching FOXNEWS, listening to nazi punk music, etc) you can certainly make predictions.

[Todeswind]

I'm not sure where the heck this schtick about Reps being trekkies comes from but I know for a fact that there was a Trekkies for Obama booth at fleetcon.

[Crom]

Well, I believe part of the confusion is that I was misleading in my OP. I apologize about that.

I'm not trying to say that all Trek fans are hard core right wingers, I read a post in the Star Trek forum (and I'm still having trouble tracking it down) where someone commented about how the diehard Star Trek fans that clash with Darth Wong often share traits with the most diehard right wingers. That's what got me thinking, that if there are people out there drawn to this idea of authoritarian/militant governments promoting their religion and killing the outsiders, WH40k should have been a the top of their list.

[Shroom Man 777]

Star Trek can get preachy, with Picard monologuing on moralities and such, and the Prime Directive. I can see how that appeals to people with holier-than-thou self-righteous attitudes, a lot of whom are right wingers.

[Todeswind]

Then there is that whole issue of Star Trek being a show about space communists. Frankly what I'm getting from this thread is that there are two things that the users on this forum don't like, neoconservatives and trekkies, and that there are a number of connections that you are drawing between the two bodies of thought that don't really seem apt.

The GOP is (at least in theory) the party of economic conservatisim and capitolisim. Star Trek's main example of capitolists, the Ferengi (probably misspelled), are a society of vile self-interested trogladites with a society totally controlled by the guy with the most assets. The show has in bright neon letters "capitalisim bad, space communists good."

Even coming at it from the POV of the religious side of the GOP the overtly secular atmosphere of Star Trek, which insofar as I can tell is a world where the cherokee manage to keep their holidays but christians do not, is not conducive of a republican friendly show. Hell a number of the evangelical christian groups BAN star trek as a heathen show.

The entire liberal, we can all get along if we work together schtick is more traditionally modern day democrat than republican. Ignoring the virual benaton ad worth of ethnic groups that they apply to all the leadership positions that Gene "I forbid more than one of every eithnic background" Roddenberry (missepelled) The "everyone working to the best of their ability" is the calling card of socialsim not meritocracy and capitalisim.

On a less serious note lets not lie to ourselves. No self-respecting republican is going to put a frenchman in charge of the most sophisticated warship known to mankind.

I apoligize for my poor spelling, I am typing this on a cell phone.

[Todeswind]

That's what got me thinking, that if there are people out there drawn to this idea of authoritarian/militant governments promoting their religion and killing the outsiders, WH40k should have been a the top of their list.

As would the Empire in Star Wars, though admittedly to a lesser extent.

The fundamental issue with looking at something like the genocidal destruction of entire worlds and making generalizations to modern politics is that the two things aren't comprable. While most conservatives believe that there are situations in which extreme interrogation techniques must be employed one would be hard pressed to find one that will look at 40k and seriously think about employing a process of arco-flagellants as part of the penal system.

40k's whole grimdark apocalypse schtick is not really something that people look at as desirable in RL.