Star Trek's Accidental Transgender Episode
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- Опубліковано 20 лип 2024
- Did you know Star Trek actually had a transgender focused episode... all the way back in 1992? It talked about gender identity, the distinction of gender and sex, gender roles, pronouns, and many other trans and gender related issues years before it became popular. And what’s more-it was all by accident. I break down how in my latest Nerd Out.
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This video original posted on pride.com. Reposted with permission.
Hey, I first realized I was trans in 1992, shortly after I saw this episode :)
Lol I’m so sure you did
I always thought the ending was _supposed_ to be bad. Like, “Hey look at how fucked up this is, don’t do this. It’s not good. They aren’t saved. They aren’t cured.”
@Sunday Girl well maybe J'nail and human psychology is just different
Same here. Pretty sure was was intended to be a bad thing at the end.
I both love and hate this episode. It’s paradoxically one of my favorites-it speaks to me in a way no other episode can-and at the same time is very painful to sit through.
What about that episode where Dr. Crusher falls in love with a person temporarily in a man's body who then transfers to a woman's body, then Crusher decides to jettison true love because it didnt have a schlong?
Tami Wolff yeah I remember that episode. Many consider that and any Trill episodes (such as with Dax in DS9) to be trans themed episodes. But overall, this is the only explicit trans episodes, even if the trans part was supposed to be a metaphor but stumbled into explicit
Great example, Tami. TNG did a good job of expressing things that Gene probably wanted to say in TOS but could NEVER get past NBC's standards and practices. Think of how George must have felt back then.
Herb Bluntman indeed! Gene also didn’t even get to say everything he wanted with TNG. There was a TNG episode that was written as an HIV metaphor, but the network wouldn’t allow it to be made. It was eventually made as a fan film for Star Trek New Voyages, and HIV was tackled an episode in Star Trek Enterprise
@@JessieGender1 I"ll have to look for that ep of New Voyages, I don't recall having seen it yet. So many good fan films to check out, so little time. Is the Enterprise episode the one where Harry unwittingly "copulates" with an alien female? I can't recall the title but I do remember seeing that episode.
Herb Bluntman indeed. I believe it’s the New Voyages episode called “blood and fire” but I might be misremembering, it’s been a bit. And the Enterprise episode is called “Stigma”, the one where TPol contracts a disease from a mind meld, and Vulcans won’t treat her because, at that time, they view mindmelding as a deplorable act.
This episode was actually the first place where baby-me was introduced to the idea if nonbinary as a gender identity. It was an absolute lightbulb moment...
Good on Jonathan Frakes for demanding to get to kiss a male actor for the cause, bi the way ;-)
Lol that’s not why he did it. Also no it didn’t! It’s just an ‘alien thing’
Who was the male actor? Soren was played by Melinda Culea.
The non-binary society that suppressed and even outlawed gender for everyone. It’s not a good look. In fact it shows the horrors of the non-binary ideology for everyone who refuses to conform to it.
I think Curzon Dax and Jadzia Dax work pretty well as a transgender analog. Of course, it's not a perfect analogy, since Curzon and Jadzia have significant differences, but the continuity between the male and female bodies housing the Dax symbiont is a useful jumping off point.
DISCLAIMER: Its been at least 2-3 years since I really watched "The Outcast". Also, I identify as cisgender.
Anyway, I would hesitate to call the J'naii asexual. While definitely agender/androgynous, and somewhat emotionally reserved and lacking in observed passion (which you rightly point out as a flaw in the characterization of genderless persons), and I agree that Soren was the only one displayed as having sexual desire, I don't recall there being a specific mention that they lacked sexual desires as a species. I do, however, vaguely recall Soren mentioning that J'naii mating was highly ritualized, so I could be in error.
Otherwise I totally agree. "The Outcast" as a commentary on homosexuality? Not so much. Commentary on being transgender? Abso-friggin-lutely.
Great episode, and I dig the set! :D
What if gender identity is such a non issue that it is incredibly easy to transition in the Federation. With genetic therapies and major cosmetic surgery being an outpatient procedure, it may be possible characters may have transitioned without anyone knowing.
Well it is a post scarcity, post poverty, post disease, post racism utopian society so why not.........
You _would_ still think that it would come up at some point, or nonbinary people outside of an explicitly nonbinary species would come up.
@@christopherb501 There's a DS9 episode where Quark biologically swaps genders for a deal he needs to make so it appears it is not a difficult thing to do. Especially of you can go back and forth pretty easily.
I completely forgot about this episode when I was taking my wife through TNG and by the time it was done I was in floods of tears. Hadn't seen it since realising I was trans, and seeing it now it breaks me every time.
I'm cleaning up dinner in the kitchen while my partner watches TNG in the living room with our daughter. I overhear the premise about an androgynous alien race, and decide to sit in and share a laugh at what I expect to be a dated, tired expression of gender identity, but in outer space. The first third of the episode does not disappoint in this regard.
About halfway through I'm sitting in shock, "Wait, is this a trans episode?!" and I am absolutely hooked. I'm getting emotional at Soren's expression of pain towards having to hide who she is, and her speech during her trial has me openly weeping. Most of all, I always crave seeing transpositive relationships in media, because too often transpeople are ridiculed and shunned when it comes to romance. Believing I could never find a partner if I transitioned was a huge hurdle for me to overcome and I think the negative portrayal of transpeople in media is a big part of that. Soren and Riker's relationship was short but beautiful, and I cannot even imagine what seeing it in 1992 would have done for my self image.
Thank you for the breakdown of this episode, I've literally seen it for the first time today and now I'm scouring the internet for trivia about it's creation and as many opinions as I can find about what this episode means to people.
Through most of my watch time, I was considering asking my father to watch this episode when he had the chance, as he is both a huge Trekkie and still struggling with me having come out as transgender last year. That terrible ending has me thinking otherwise, as I'm afraid that he'll miss the point and think that the conversion therapy ending is a happy one :(
I remember the first time I watched this episode. I really loved Soren's monologue in the court at the very end of the episode. Couldn't be more pertinent than now.
I personally interpret the lack of trans people in Star Trek as the result of it being corrected easily and early in one's life. Medical science is so advance by that point that correcting one's sex is as easy as laser eye surgery to correct one's vision. It's even evident in that one DS9 episode when Dr Bashir was able to turn Quark into a fully biological female.
So, for all we know, there could be plenty of trans people, even among the main cast of characters.
Still needs to come up explicitly at some point to count.
While possible, I don't think it quite works. Trans people don't always want to physically transition, and that reluctance is not due solely to current medical technology lacking the ability to keep someone fertile with the other genitals. A trans woman may simply want to keep her penis (or a trans man, his vagina), and express their gender without regard for what the doctor said at birth.
And it also doesn't account for non-binary identities. What do the 24th century doctors do there, in your interpretation?
@@OriginalPiMan
All excellent, valid points. I honestly hadn't given these things any thought but I would assume that people in Star Trek's future can present themselves in any way they want, and have as much or as little medical intervention.
Im 55, been trans all my life that i can recall - you do appreciate that all this was known and experienced by people before it "went mainstream" though, right? It may have been the intent of the episode to be about gay relationships, but whoever actually wrote it knew very well what they were doing
Actually the writer has stated he didn’t know about trans identities when he wrote it
They thought they were making a gay episode but I knew exactly what it was really about all along......
Ohh, come on. The episode where picard gets a lifetime of memories in a few mins was not a bad episode. That was one of my fav episodes. That clip you showed was at the beginning.
It's a wonderful one. Picard's not really wife won him over with that tasty soup.
That was another great episode.
The entire point of it ending badly is to reflect reality.
This episode reminds me a lot of the 1970s Monty Python sketch that, in trying to lampoon how society talked about homosexuality, used the "absurd" allegory of fursuits.
Ignorance around non-normative identity and allegory are a heck of a combination.
it was not an accident- jonathan frakes said he wishes they had made soren more obviously trans.
I like how Star Trek has a long history of introducing provocative ideas without getting too preachy. They do this well by introducing the ideas and cultures of alien worlds so that the point is made without getting too personal. An example of this was during the sixties when they wanted to bring across alternative views about the Vietnam war without getting the sensors upset. I just wonder how interspecies dating would work with space aliens. I kind of understand how humans and Vulcans would have sex because their physiologies I guess are similar but what about species that are less similar? An example of that is on Galaxy Quest when that actor fell in love with that alien lady who turned out to have tentacles or something? I understand that this particular Star Trek episode was making a point about alternative lifestyles and not interspecies dating but if we are all honest with ourselves......everyone and I mean everyone have limits to what they will agree with. This is part of the human condition. Just a part of understanding and rationalizing the world in which we all live in. Just one example of this is politics. Can I be friends with someone who has different political views than myself? Or am I so limited that I shun anyone who might have a political thought different from my own? Am I rational enough to deal with and handle different philosophies and beliefs? Or do I become so petty that I block them from my facebook page? What does this say about me as a person? What does this say about my overcoming past trauma that has scarred me? Can both liberals and conservatives be civil to one another? Or is the polarization of ideologies the wave of the future?
Just on that first point: who says you _have_ to have sex? You can be a functionally asexual couple, and/or get sexual needs by people outside the immediate relationship. It's not always going to work, but it's far from impossible. People just need to stop being so damn rigid in narrow definitions of relationships.
This i always loved about star trek. But now pic and dis just hammer it into your head, its like watching a show parody of a christian tv
That's one of my main difficulties with older versus newer Trek. I feel like older Trek showed me things and trusted me enough to let me decide on my own, while newer Trek (and 13 Doctor Who) wants to preach at me and force me to believe what they say, or else they think I'm a terrible person. That's maybe exaggerating, but it's too often how I feel about it. Lower Decks, however, is fine, and I hope Prodigy will be fine. I'm trying to live and let live and get over my divisive reaction, because I want Trek fandom to be back together again. Anyway, I love that Star Trek has mostly let people decide for themselves. I also love that Star Trek explores issues through metaphor and through showing moe than telling.
new fan, just wanted to say how much I love your show!!! keep it up!!!
I was totally confused before your video. Now i'm gay I can't wait to tell my husband he will be thrilled!!! I am so excited!!! O_o (seriously this is one of my fave episodes) I like how the end of the episode makes you sit with a bad feeling. Watch Sense8 for a trans happy ending.
I always wondered how this episode was perceived by members of the lgbtq community. There was still plenty of heat on the lgbtq community back in 1992 (There is still heat I would imagine --- but I hope you don't run the real risk of physical assault and emotional torment faced by those in '92 and years previous for being your true self these days? Err, i really hope there is less risk). For it's time I would say it pushed pretty far on prime time network. I like Rikers idea of having Saren be a male who identifies as female and falls for him. That would have taken a big set in '92 to go that way. If you are a fan of Babylon 5 I have an interesting early proposed story nugget that was scraped that you might find interesting.
A big set...of ovaries? 😂
How non-straight folks are perceived now and what we have to face in life now can vary widely. There's more freedom to be ourselves and more people who are supportive, allies. But there's still a lot of prejudice and real risk of discrimination and verbal or physical harm. Much like we've seen lately that there's still racial prejudice and ethnic and religious prejudice, that homophobia and transphobia haven't gone away either. I wasn't out in 1992; I was gay and in the closet, and I grew up in the 70's and 80's so a time and place (and family) where being gay (or any kind of not-straight) was not OK, even dangerous. It is somewhat better now, but we have a long way to go. I still hear adults and teens and kids say and do phobic things, not even at me, just at random or towards each other. So it's still a problem for kids/teens now and adults. The take-away pint? Be a good ally. Be open and approachable and vocal enough so that people can know you're not a hater. My own parents were not good about this, but one of my aunts was far worse (and if any of her grandkids are not straight, I'd feel bad for them when she was alive). I know how I felt and what I saw directed towards some friends and classmates in junior high and high school, and it was even there in college in the late 80's. So being an ally is a good, needed thing.
less now maybe but still a very real risk
Star Trek always addressed cultural issues. This one is way overdue. It is so good to see that the creators of Star Trek sees us as a ligitimate race and as a part of society. Thank you.
Dude...I’ve got transgender friends that are gonna lose their minds when I tell them about this episode!
sounds like they already have lost them
1:43 Psychotectic Therapy
Psychokinetic is an advanced form of telekinetic
Just watched the episode. Glad I found this recap!
I was just watching this and thought: "Wait a minute, this sounds familiar. Is this supposed to be a trans allegory?"
Yeah. Star Trek was actually more willing to deal with gender identity, then gay people or same-sex couples. The original intent/script for the Outcast made it clearer that issue was sexual orientation based discrimination. But, people (the suits) got nervous and so the episode is a gay rights episode that largely avoids sexual identity issues, in favor of gender identity issues.
It's coded for homosexuality. Gender identity wasn't even much of a public issue in the 1990's, people transitioned quielty and went stealth as much as possible.
The original cut of the episode had an extensive discussion of dominance versus submissiveness. Soren's cultural sin was wanting to be dominated by Riker and taking the "submissive" role to him.
I hadn't realized they had recut the episode to remove all those references until seeing the remastered edition twenty plus years later.
I wish I had saved my off-air video tapes so I could have posted that version on UA-cam so people could see how creepy it really was...
Great set!
Excellent parsing of this episode. And I'm so glad you explained it like you did.
I am an LGBTQ+ ally. And I also hope you all will take time to self - care, decompress, and rejuvenate. I lost my sister who was Lesbian to suicide, and miss her so much. I want everyone to be able to come into themselves safely and with love.
Much love to you all.
One reason I love ST is because the morality taught in TNG, can easily be expanded to adjacent groups who are affected by the problem presented.
Even TOS had a species divided by races who were literally black&white, and white&black, and the racism was just because which side the colors are on, are opposite.
…Oh, you cut to a clip that shows that episode.
Of course you did. You’re a trekkie. You know your stuff!
Wow, I'm going to have to go back through star trek, cause completely forgot this episode. While even i'd like the ending were Riker wins and helps her or that finally deaf ears would hear and listen, maybe and hopefully that anger will cause those in the real world to take that anger and do something positive with it. But, please, let us win our battles. But, please be an ally and sport us like Riker tried to do when we need you and in turn we will help you when you call on us to do right by what is best for every person and that every person wants, love and respect for the unique person they are as an individual human being.
thanks for reminding me about this wonderful episode. :)
Well I'll preface this by saying I'm a straight cis man, so obviously I may not have the whole picture. But I think it did a solid job as a commentary on homosexuality.
In 1992, transgenderism was not something that was in the general public consciousness. Yes the episode features a heterosexual relationship, but since, in this situation, the hetero relationship is as stigmatized as a gay one would be in our world, it totally makes sense as an allegory, and as a way of putting the mostly straight audience in the shoes of someone being persecuted and other-ed.
Though ending the episode by showing that conversation therapy is a viable "solution".... Yeah that's bad.
It’s still hard for me to watch this episode as a survivor of conversion therapy. While I’m always happy to see more LGBT representation in shows this one always brought me down with the ending.
@King Peppy Is that movie actually any good? I know nothing else about it aside from a generally tepid mood when people speak of it.
Although there is no canon representation for those of us transgender in Trek, the best is the ENT ep "Cogenitor". There is also the Hermat (the name for a species that is hermaphrodite) character Burgyone 172 from Peter David's "New Frontier" novels. There is also a fan project here on UA-cam that has a transgender crew member. Lastly and most importantly, the actor that portrayed ensign Russell on TNG and DS9 respectively, is now Debbie David. Then there is Lora Johnson, who wrote "Mr. Scotts Guide to the Enterprise".
You had me until you dissed the best STNG episode ever, The Inner Light. The romance between Kamin (Picard) and Eline is one of the deepest, most touching relationships ever.
Given the cultural context in which it aired, it's not really about transsexualism but about homosexuality or queerness in general. Compare this episode to the OS "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield", which was also a coded reference to a contemporary social issue at the time.
I think "The Outcast" is one of the better episodes and was brave at the time (despite what some activist detractors have to say about it), forcing people to confront the arbitrariness of anti-gay politics and social norms.
What about Season1 Episode 5, the shot with the guy with a skirt
They ran out of uniforms but went ahead anyway.
You realize that The Orville has a gender swapped version of this race as a founding member of its Federation clone, right?
hows does that have any bearing on star trek though?
@@brandencunningham1421 Probably bringing it up more for an amusing anecdote.
I legit always saw it as a trans episode
If it's anyone's first time hearing about this, don't be surprised, they made a rather good episode on suicide and depression the same year, which explains it extremely well in my opinion (5x16 "Ethics", coincidentally the episode right before the one mentioned here).
If being trans just means you identify as a gender other than that which you were assigned at birth...and the J'naii are assigned as agender at birth...then yes, this episode is ABSOLUTELY a trans allegory.
Had to use this over a post about Discovery. While I don't like the way they have screwed up the Star Trek canon, I had to point out that we Trekkies went where no person had gone before long ago.
I watched an English Language class teaching demonstration and the female teacher, wearing a head covering some sort, she was the most condescening sexist and woman-be-littling person I've ever seen, constantly running down the capabilities of a person because they're female and kept saying things like "asking a man to carry it" etc. It was so sickening to watch this teacher corrupt the minds of the class. My grandmother was a farm laborer and used to carry things for my grandfather.
I didn't know what to do with this episode when it aired. Oh, I got the idea, all right. An androgynous race, non-sexual might be the best way to put it. Liking boys or girls, thinking you were a boy or a girl, was not allowed in their alien society. Well, I was gay but still(!) not out, and I was still(!) not dealing with it well, even though I knew what my feelings were. I was a mess and holding it all in. My parents watched this episode in their room, I watched it in my room, not unusual then, and I had this sinking feeling, wondering what they were thinking of it. Of course, the whole episode, the alien society siapproves of anyone thinking they are gendered or love someone who is gendered, and in the end, the "fix" the alien who's fallen in love with Riker. (And hmm, Riker falls in love with the alien, but the episode had it coded that the alien person wanted to be female, so it was kinda-sorta straight and not gay? Except it was androgynous?) Yeah, this did not help me too much to feel good about myself as a gay, cis guy. (I don't think I'd heard transgender back then, but I'd heard the word transsexual and knew what transvestism / cross-dressing was, and those weren't me.) But I did get that the episode was about being not straight, wanting to be a different gender, loving a different gender than society would accept. So the gay, bi, lesbian, trans, queer, etc. was getting through to me. I knew of intersex by the old term hermaphrodite. (And by a word local guys/boys used to make fun of it, "morphodites.") But I hadn't quite fully thought about what being intersex implied for the rest of the LGBT spectrum, which later would help me. So...I have had mixed feelings about this episode since it first aired. It only made me feel like I'd gotten yet another negative message about being gay or any kind of not-straight. I just wasn't seeing it any other way. If I had had any gay friends (or otherwise not straight) to reach in and pull me out of my shell, or uh, positive experiences (yes, that too) it really might've helped me. But at the time, I ws oh so isolated and not doing well with it. I do not know what would have gotten to me during my preteens, teens, and young adulthood to give me a good gay life. But I look back on that and it frustrates me that I didn't do better at accepting myself and getting out of that and into a good, positive mindset. But given what I was living with for home, church, work, college at the time, maybe it's not surprising. I needed positive gay / not straight people in my life, and gay love as well as straight allies. However, all that said, It was a first step for Star Trek to openly tackle the non-straight issue, gender and sexuaity. (Oh, hah, I had no idea cisgender was even a word.) -- I am not sure what I would have thought if I'd met someone trans back then and got to know them. I would like to think I would have been OK with them. I do know I'd liked friends in high school who were rumored to be gay, and one guy, I felt comfortable around, maybe because he was coming across as gay. At that time, America was still very homophobic. This was after the AIDS crisis had hit in the 80's and Ryan White, but some years before Matthew Shepard's case. So that was the world I lived in. I am glad we had this episode. Even if it was only a partial first step.
What a great episode of TNG! Although i think your title is disingenuous this TNG episode wasn't by accident but the writers knew how to tackle this subject and many others to near perfection.
I can't wait to get to this episode
I noticed something. Soren's voice almost sounds robotic after she was "cured". She also seemed somewhat robotic before she started talking more about her identity.
That might be something to consider, like even though she was "cured" it's still very forced, and the real Soren is in there still.
What I like about this video is the Wonder Woman drawing.
Strange isn't it, how Transgender are so often literally 'ALIENated'... Soren IS one us!
Oh, I can't stop laughing... "You're watching this video, so you're totally gay now" Nope! I'm Lesbian 🤣
Where did you find this shirt???
I got it at LA Comic Con actually! It's one of my favs
I'm so jealous!!!
Lolz Love your little comedic tidbits, they tickle me silly. :)
OH MY GOD! Look at baby Jessie! You've grown so much in two years!
Ok Jessie, we got a problem. I agree with you on most things but I can't keep quiet anymore!! You and I definitely do not have the same feelings about the sexiness of Jonathan Frakes.... 😄 (I'm kidding about it being a problem if that's not obvious...)
So yeah, I roll my eyes and laugh at your lusty moments for Number One, and I'm laughing cuz I love how fascinated with his beard you are!!!! Love you Jessie! Thank you for all your wonderful vids!!!💜🖖🏼🤟🏼👊🏼🎶🫂
P.S. We agree on Janeway, Seven, and Picard though!! Whew!!! Hot!!!
I was 32 when it aired. Star Trek Phase New Voyages here on UA-cam has gay character.
Lol wait ! I know I'm late but "The inner light" is a very good episode XD. Outcast is also one of my favorite episode and of the many exemples of why TNG is one of the best series.
Honestly I think that "The Outcast" could have been improved if some minor changes were made.
They should have made the planet J'naii be a member of the Federation located near the borders of some other power like Romulan or Cardassian, but have the fact that they pretty much brainwash the people of their species version to the LGBTQ community unknown to the federation. Durring the trial have that secret be known and since oppression is a big no no for members of the Federation they are pretty much given the the choice to eather cut that shit out or leave and since their planet is located so close to hostile forces they begrudgingly agree to stop.
However, even if people like Soren are now allowed to be themselves without fear of being hunted down by their goverment, discrimination against them is still a thing, so Soren decides to stay back to start a movement along with other people like her in order to educate the rest of her people.
This way you can still have an ending that is bitter sweet but also hepeful and giving the message that even tho things are bad now they will get better from here and the future ultimately will be brighter
.
This episode is one of my favorites. It's so tragic and heartbreaking.
The main issue I had with this episode, besides it being a transgender allegory vs a homosexual allegory, is that we have had gender neutral pronouns for as long as civilization has existed, so there is no way that in the 24th century, they wouldn't know that "they" is the pronoun that obviously fits in this situation, and not "it" as Riker suggests. That issue just wouldn't be something he (Riker) and the crew would struggle with. Also, if they knew the J'naii were coming, this issue would have been discussed prior to their arrival on the ship. Even when this episode first aired and I watched it as an 11-year-old, this bugged me, though at the time it was more because my mom was an English teacher and I was always gifted in spelling and grammar, and I knew full well that "they" was the proper pronoun in this situation.
uhh what? That’s not even a LITTLE bit true since “they” would be also rude as being plural
The heck! How old are you
@@mattybrunolucaszeneresalas9072 No, “they” is not only used as plural. It’s used when gender is unknown or just as a catch all substitute. I know why you think this, it’s been incorrectly viewed as an incorrect use of the English language for a long time but it’s actually not.
@@antoniocasias5545 I’m 39, why?
@@Stardust_7273 I didn’t learn English for the past 12 years to fall for that. The grammar y and “are” conjugation of Germanic origin makes it plural therefore inherently gender neutral. How ever it’s use for 1 people is incorrect. In hypothetical situations it tends to replace people which is a grammatically singular word but refers to more that 1 person,being it’s plural.
So. As someone who’s first Star Trek was DS9, and is only now watching TNG, I find this interesting.
(I am currently starting season 4, and my god were the first 2 seasons a slog, but it’s good now)
I hate Riker as a character with a fiery passion, but I can’t deny that the show (past season 2) generally does a good job with showcasing what it means when it gets philosophical
So I’m torn, cus on one hand I imagine I’m going to hate this episode when I see it because it centers on riker seducing yet another random alien woman as a main plot point.
But on the other it sounds like it’ll be really fascinating from a metatextual perspective once I see it.
I think what bothers me with this episode is how they touch on the concept of gender abolitionism with the alien race, but paint it as if everybody has to look and be the same. Which isn’t what gender abolitionism is about at all! Gender abolitionism is about letting people present themselves however they want without the social categorization and baggage of gender. I appreciate how they wrote Soren to be empathetic but i just think the premise is a really clumsy analogy that creates contradictions with real world lgbt issues the more you think about it. But it was the 90s so i cant shit on them so much :/ i still love tng despite it
The aliens aren't gender abolitionists, as they believe there is only one gender, an androgynous gender.
Actually TV got more daring much earlier than ST:NG. Check it out 1975's "Medical Center" Season 7 episodes 1 & 2: "The Fourth Sex" parts 1 & 2. I saw these episodes when they aired. The topic was handled with realism, grace and sensitivity. Incidentally, the first well-known trans gendered individual was George Jorgenson later, Christine Jorgenson 1951. And sadly, a large portion of the population in America still sees it as a "sin" even when it's been shown to have a biological cause. We are who we are, even if the outer "package" doesn't agree. I applaud the courage of the individuals who have declared openly who they are and sympathize with those who are, for whatever reason, unable to do so.
This episode is my favorite of Star Trek TNG.
It's an odd experience to see the exact inverse of your reality as someone under the trans umbrella.
I have no idea how I ended up watching this episode as a kid/teen when I never watched much Trek back then hut somehow I did. I am agender but that wasn't something I was aware of then. I distinctly remember understanding the agender aliens And did not at all understand Soren's journey to rejecting that agender exostsance (what I now realize was my own identity, or lack there of, peaking through). However I understood that the ending conversion was wrong.
Also as someone who is very sexual, I completely overlooked the aromantic/sexual aspects of this story and just assumed anyone got with anyone and that was accepted. Such an interesting thing to pull from the depths of my memory. But also probably a pivitol one.
This episode would have been trashed harshly today
This episode was sad. But it certainly put the shoe on the other foot. I don't look at it as a negative attack on Agender people. It shows close-mindedness & intolerance that any majority can be guilty of. They did it right, instead of today where they seem to be trying to piss people off & sacrifice good writing. Anyway, I'm developing my story/potential series & I have this character idea for a Human Trans Woman who has a romance & eventual marriage. I hate to give spoilers but, let's be real, they will never give me my series. So I'll let fly & I will assign names to these characters & species just to tell you about them but I have not settled on names yet.
She (let's call her Jessie, LoL) befriends an alien female named Fae who becomes attracted to her although Jessie does not return the physical attraction because she likes men. But Faes species (lets call them Atarians) naturally changes gender according to need or desire, a characteristic present in many animal species as I'm sure you know. Although Atarians have more conscious control over it.
Fae begins to become masculine. Jessie notices & finally asks because it becomes obvious that Fae has become male. This is when Fae professes his attraction to her & Jessie reveals that she was born a male. This will be the first time the audience learns of this as well. Fae finds Jessies attachment to her gender strange but this is an incidental matter. Atarians are just not attached to one gender like that, a necessity for people who often change gender back & forth multiple times in their lives.
This is meant to be a Star Trek Faery Tale romance, a definite happy ending. Eventually they marry but are having trouble getting pregnant. Jessie is of course a fully functional Human female thanks to 24th century science but ironically they are having this problem due to species incompatibility. But the Doctor finds a solution & the first blending of Humans & Atarians occurs.
Now, I have a quest: To find the perfect actors that may fill these roles. The state of affairs right now, people will bitch if a Trans Actress does not play Jessie, even though the character is a legit female & any female Actress should do. But whatever. Fae, I think will be the most difficult casting.
I like to pick out actors when possible so I can visualize my story even though it will never actually be on screen.
For example best possible young Patrick Stewart I can find is K.J. Apa. Captain Picard has been rejuvenated to his 20's.
But I have found no actress yet who could pull off a believable Famke Janssen in her 20's.
I've been trying to reach out to Trek nerds about this stuff but no one wants to play. Sigh.
I mean seriously, what if I do get a TV deal? Don't folks want the bragging rights that they bounced ideas with me? LoL.
wait, do you make something "on" accident or "by" accident?
"By accident" is traditionally correct in English, but I've definitely seen "on accident" in use in colloquial language.
Both.
I do feel gay watching this video. As in... you know... happy. :D
Melinda Culea character was forced to have conversion therapy!😳 #transrights
Dammit I got MORE gay from watching this. Thanks for that 😂❤️
I just realized something as a writer... With the level of medical technology in the 23rd and 24th centuries, wouldn't it be rather difficult to distinguish any of us in transition. Plus, given the cultural mores, it would actually be less of a matter... we would be more accepted...
I have know idea what in the world this episode is about
Was it really an "accidental" transgender episode? Seems like they were overtly discussing TG and related issues with this episode...
Yep
It was definitely meant to be about homosexuality. The TNG staff had to make lots of compromises to get it on the air. But it was still close enough to speak powerfully to many of us at the time, especially its depiction of coming out. I still have trouble watching that scene.
“Sexual polarity “ is real.
Lal was a pretty good gender identity episode
I haven't thought about this episode in decades. Man, it was so confusing to me as a child. I did not get the homosexuality metaphor out of it at all. Well, I considered it and rejected it because Riker was a man, and she was a woman. I was just like, "So...unlike the rest of society, this particular person wants to get married and have a family...which is in fact exactly like everyone else but...she wants to do it in a 'female' way, and we are saying this is an 'abnormal' way." I was pretty offended by this and the "female traits" the show mentions, which are basically just unexamined negative stereotypes. I remember being bothered by Trek's putting women (and men) in a box for weeks when normally they were more progressive. I had never heard of a trans person or even drag back then. It makes so much more sense using that lens!
P.S.--I enjoyed this episode. It seems it is a few years old, but it showed up in my recommendations. Love to see someone passionate about examining the themes of Star Trek!
The J’Naii are NOT asexual! 🤣
What makes you think it was accidental?
... Oh my god. This is the reason I find men more attractive with hair on the face!? Because Riker's glorious beard!
Thank you, closing out that mystery frees up a lot of brain processing power. Huh. 🧔🍍
...I was going to follow up this comment with something about how it freed up so much brain processing power that it cured my ADHD, but then I slogged through a day of work without my meds and the thought of a fictional cure made me sad. 🤪🍍
90s ST had so many episodes where an oppressive alien culture won + a rebel was defeated, so that it becane what to expect every time, that it appeared to me an intentional conformist propaganda by conservative TV interests, an intentional discouragement of being a questioning character. Of "keeping up the fight", indeed.
Still, have to declare that I'm not an ST fan exactly because it's about a military society full of orders + obedience, before asking: why were ST fans of the period not troubled by those stories?
Interesting point.
I see it from a different view. They always make the "rebels" sympaphetic and the supressors evil. (Okay maybe a bit over simplified) but this was sadly the reality back then and even now. I think it's more about showing society what is wrong with it.
It's no more oppressive than Brokeback Mountain was. It's just meant to reflect a tragic reality, not to be cheap propaganda.
I'm gay now?! YAY!! This is the best day of my life!!! 😹😻🌈
4:30 flash forward a few years and we dont only get a trans character but a nonbinary character too!!
As for Worf's attitude... Just what is it that amorous Klingons do TO each other? Hypocrisy, thy name is Kahless...
I would have to re-watch it to be sure, but I do not remember her being assigned the wrong sex/gender at birth. I remember that it was hidden. Trekkies: I am I right or misremembering?
Basically all her species member are assigned something along the lines of agender at birth, but she is a woman, so it's the wrong sex.
The "hidding that she is a female" plot happens in the Orville though, so maybe that's what you're thinking about?
With what's-his-face, Bortus(?) child.
I don’t think it was accidental
As a Jew thanks for the solidarity Jessie ❤️
What’s she talking about? What was going on at the time?
It wasn't an accident
The story was about the issue of being persecuted for being "different" or in how one chooses to love another person. The alien being a girl and Riker being a guy made it more "appropriate" for TV at the time. So, it was a story about homosexuality.
Excep that it totally fails at being a story about homosexuality.
@@tesseractive4567 - But given the time the story was told, it was about as close to the issue as they could get. It was about a culture having strict rules about sexuality that seem ridiculous to other cultures, and that those who don't fit the norm are persecuted for not fitting in. That can apply to a wide variety of groups who don't fit what's deemed "normal."
Ok I was sorta meh about this untill you criticized the inner light.
Superiorer haha I love the inner light, the clip was just a funny pullout for the joke
@@JessieGender1 Oh. I thought you were serious about the single episode relationships.
I always loved old school Trek because they always did things tastefully but now it seems as though recently studios would rather force feed diversity at the cost of quality content.
In what way do you feel that newer shows have been “forcing” diversity? Could you provide an example?
@@rainbow_doglover8301 well let's start with Bat Woman. The majority of the marketing for that show, at least the marketing that I have seen anyway, revolved mainly around the title character's sexuality and/or skin color but the hair and makeup department's were too lazy to put a short red wig or dye the hair of Ruby Rose. Also the romantic sub plot wasn't exactly well written and probably would have been better executed if they had used Renee Montoya instead of Sophie.
But quality problems are not BECAUSE of diversity. Sometimes people just write badly, whether the characters are diverse or not.
@@johnshaffer3405
Forcing diversity? You mean like when a black woman and Asian man were always on the bridge-often in the same shot as the Captain?
I wouldn't say that this was accidental. In fact, it's hard to imagine them writing this without knowing exactly what they're doing. This was their way of getting a "trans rights" episode past the censors. Trans people were already known about in 92, especially in Hollywood and this is, very plainly, an episode about gender identity. It's not even subtle. But it is changed juuuust enough that it's not about humans being trans, so the episode wouldn't get cancelled by the moral police of the day.
"accidental"
i thought it was just literally a trans episode. weren't trans people lobotomized in real life?
"accidental" HAHAHHAAHAHHAAHHAHAHAHAHAHHA
There was nothing accidental about it. If you knew anything about Gene's creation, you would understand he always sought to bring topical social commentary to his show and thinly veil it with science fiction to slip it past the NBC censors. TNG carried on that tradition in this episode twenty years later. That is said based solely on the title of this video. Now I will hit "play" and see if I need to apologize.
Herb Bluntman in the video I make the point that the intention of the writers was to write a story about metaphorical sexuality discrimination and actually accidentally wrote literal transgender discrimination while trying to represent sexual discrimination by proxy. That’s the “accident”, not that they wrote social commentary, which is clearly always what Star Trek has been about, but the fact that the social commentary they better represented was not the one they initially intended. It’s not a critique of their writing however, as writing often comes to mean something that writers don’t always intend, especially years after it was written.
OK. You get it but I think you're being a little too hard on ST's ability to accelerate the pace of change on controversial social issues. Hang in there and keep on Trekkin' and we'll arrive at 24th century sensibilities regarding the full spectrum of Human sexuality. Peace and long life to you.
Herb Bluntman the same to you! And I agree, I think I may have come across as being too down on the episode, which i do love. It was also vastly ahead of its time, both in terms of sexuality and gender issues. But it’s also worth looking at it from a modern lens as well and see where it fails today, and where it still can be illuminating and, sadly, still ahead of its time.
@@JessieGender1 ST was always ahead of it's time...literally. LOL What are your thoughts on the Orville episode, "About a Girl"?
Herb Bluntman I liked “About a Girl” but found that it mixed ideas of gender, transgender issues and intersex issues in a way that made it somewhat hard to parse our exactly what the metaphor was meant to say. I also found that the humor they use to make jokes about women being better then men to be somewhat counterintuitive to the main message of the episode (not saying I hate Orville’s humor, just that I didn’t think it helped the message in that specific episode, which given that it was the shows 3rd episode, is understandable) That being said, I like that it ended the way it did (very similarly to The Outcast from the above video haha) and that it appears that those issues will continue to be explored, as Bortus child is growing up and season 2 showing that Bortus still harbors some emotional pain from forcing his child to be a boy. This continued consequence of story was something really lacking at times in TNG, though DS9, ENT and at times Disco have made that work better. And the TNG movie First Contact also worked well at continuing series consequences. Ironically considering I’m transgender myself, I think the Orville storyline from “about a girl” would work really better if they focused on the intersex part of it, then maybe introduce trans issues elsewhere or in this storyline later.
The problem with the episode was that the race had originally been a two gender species. (Gender and sex is the same thing, and both are built into our genes, by the Y chromosome.) If it had always been a one gender species, and the outcast was a gendered fluke, and not a throw back, then it would have been a better comparison. As it is, it's a warning for straights to not tolerate your kind, because if you get into power, CIS will be under threat of being exterminated. The only males that will be allowed are the ones that were born women or have become women.
You are hereby sentenced to 300 hundred cycles of semantic reconditioning
Worf is not sexist. WORF IS A KLINGON USING GUILE AT A GAME THEY ARE OUTNUMBERED AND OUTGUNNED AT.
ua-cam.com/video/2-WPlvZguZ4/v-deo.html
@@christopherb501 to articulate the words of Kahless, great people do not seek power. Power is thrusted upon them. You have no words to rebuttal with because you do not have the honor nor the courage to do so.
@@paulabiddaum3507 Huh...I think I used the first clip too soon...in any case, his words _were_ something sexist. Bringing sex/gender into anything as a judgment call, when neither physiology nor psychology matter for the issue, is fundamentally sexist.
I beg to differ by crushing your stance on the principle that one is defined by the total sum of their actions. One can say one thing as a trick with degrees to something else being communicated by the individual of focus (i.e. non-verbal communication and vocal cadence).
@@paulabiddaum3507 _I said his ACTION was sexist, you tosser, not that the totality of his character was sexist!_ For f***'s sake!!
Shits on episode the whole video and then mentions at the end it's one of their favs.
It was junk and was pandering to its audience. It was never an accident.