Is Star Trek's Federation Actually Vegan?
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- Опубліковано 30 вер 2024
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Riker does say "we no longer enslave animals for food purposes" which could mean vegan or could mean free-range, hunted food.
It it could mean they lab grow animals without a conscience. Can't enslave something without a brain. Who really knows.
Yes I swore I remember a TNG episode where Riker gives a diplomat basically the same speech as T’Pol.
I was waiting for that line in this video.
TNG S1E7 ”Lonely Among Us” - was hoping to see this referenced…
For reference that line is from the TNG 1st season episode "Lonely Among Us". I also remembered it and looked up the details.
In my Star Trek headcanon the “real meat” is all manufactured, ie. lab grown, and they also figured out how to lab grow “real” eggs.
The eggs could be from free roaming chickens
I forget which episode it was that has Miles and Keiko O'Brien in a dinner table converation during which Miles fondly reminisces about the dishes of his childhood and Keiko mildly scandalized that Miles' mother used to buy actual meat from actual animals prepared by an actual butcher in actual Dublin. I reckon in the Star Trek future, meat eating (as in: meat from animals, not replicators) is as rare as veganism is today, if only because it's prolly logistically easier to have replicators on spaceships and interstellar colonies than live animals. Edit: That'll teach me to comment before I finish watching the video LOL!
I don't know about "buy", they probably either raised their own animals or they knew someone who provided the local meat.
a touch off topic, but it always bugged me in that episode that they didn't just both order their own meals. If he didn't like something, put it back in the replicator. It's as easy as breathing.
@@dawn8293 It's a social nicety issue. Doing that would be rude.
@@mutopis The Federation doesn't enslave animals for purposes of food, so that's unlikely. Either they were running an illegal operation, or the meat was acquired from hunters. Hunting doesn't seem to be illegal.
@@TheSuperRatt grilled black and red fish, caught fresh from the bayou :)
The scene that sprung to mind about how food synthesizers or whatever they are called in The Original Series work is when in the episode "Charlie X" Kirk gives orders to the galley that “On Earth today, it’s Thanksgiving. If the crew has to eat synthetic meat loaf, I want it to look like turkey.” Suggesting that the meat is in some sense synthetic and so probably not rendered from a live animal.
Charlie X of course turns the meat loaf into turkeys with his powers.
I always thought of the examples of traditional cooking in Star Trek as a cultural thing.
Now I think about it, there’s a lot of examples of people in Star Trek embracing traditional cultures and living out older lifestyles than you’d think would be in a Utopia.
I’m thinking about the season 1 TNG episode where dogfaced ambassador aliens scoff at Picard explaining their meat replication and called the federation barbaric for not eating slaughtered meat.
It was a nice tongue in cheek moment.
One thing which has always stood out to me about replicators is the possibility for foods to outlive the ingredients used to produce them.
I remember when I first learned the story of why artificial banana flavouring doesn't taste like bananas, at least, not any banana I have ever tasted. All because of how its invention predates the primary cultivated bananas of that era being wiped out by disease.
It's a quite interesting thought that say, Book could have scanned a freshly prepared Kwejian fruit salad into the replicators on Discovery, and the replicators could then produce that meal, identically, infinite times, even after every last tree producing the ingredients has gone extinct.
There's an episode of voyager where the captain of the Krenim time ship serves dishes from civilisations that never existed because of their temporal incursions. I always found that scene very haunting
@@ryane3703 and the She-ra reboot has a similar scene, where the fascist god-king proudly states he’s exterminated all the worlds his guests’ meals come from, and is surprised when they’re bothered by it. (That show does a really good job outlining how fascism is self-exterminatory, I honestly think it tops ATLA in that regard)
I've always assumed that meat eating in the Federation, at least by humans, to be very different from how we think of it today. Whenever they refer to 'real' meat, they generally mean meat that is neither replicated nor 'synthesized'. This does not mean that meat is literally taken from the slaughtering of animals. Instead it is derived through some other process. I've always imagined these animal products are actually "grown". We are currently in the very early stages of developing lab grown meat, so just imagine what a few hundred years could allow.
With how common replicators are, I think most would just eat replicated or grown meat.
Riker said that they dont "enslave animal for food" anymore, so I assume any meat from actual living animal must come from a hunter shooting a deer with plasma rifle.
With trillions of population across thousands of stars and no more animal husbandry, there is no way hunting can feed even a tiny fraction of them.
When discussing the "enlightened philosophy" of the federation, I think there's an argument to be made that the vast majority of its citizens are "enlightened" by default, not because they've thought about it and questioned it.
Supposing the federation is vegan and it's population relies on replicators, then what would a circumstantial vegan, like (say, as a hypothetical example) Riker do after he's been practising eating replicated dead Gagh when he's confronted by Klingons who expect him to eat live Gagh?
Well he wouldn't think about the ethics. He's a circumstantial vegan at best.
He'd just yum those wrigglers down. Qapla'!
Well in that paticular case refusing the Gahg would be both insulting to the Klingons and a loss of face for Riker in front of his new crew
@@jamesskelton3488 If he were anything more than a circumstantial vegan, he still wouldn't eat it, not even to save face.
@@jamesskelton3488 and on the other hand, he had to violate the purported moral principles of the Federation to do it.
@@AV57 If their morals are so compromised by eating worms - a practice some human cultures partake in - then perhaps the Federation should stay at home and keep its moralizing to itself. What is the point of Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations if you deem only one version to be acceptable?
New headcanon!
Livingston the fish is a crewmember (Yeoman? I don't know much about ranks) and is tasked with maintaining the Ready Room. They do so via a water-safe control panel that can be summoned inside the tank (an office AND an accommodation to their environmental needs... they have quarters, elsewhere) similarly to the holodeck arch.
Sure, its contrived, but Livingston feels the call to serve. They are good at thier job, and enjoy it. It suits their introverted personality. They even take great pride in being unobtrusive to the ship's more dynamic operations. Waiting dutifully in the background. Just part of the scenery.
Lol wonderful headcanon.
He has little tunnels that connect to cetacean ops
Good one we never do get to see picards yeoman
@@adamlytle2615 The rest of the ship has Jefferies Tubes; he has Livingston Tubes...
Now I want a show about O'Brian's mother's illegal livestock operation, she'd probably the antagonist there
Law and order: star base.
I imagined she told little Miles that it's "real" meat as a joke, unaware that he would hold onto that belief into adulthood.
@@pyRoy6 Seems like a parental thing to do, tbh.
Steve, are you forgetting Trip's love of catfish? They mentioned it so much, it was like one of his only personality traits.
But that's pre-Federation
Two words: bunnicorn sausage.
Or three words: bunny corn sausage?
Whatever.
The pizza Riker made on Nepenthe.
(I'll watch the rest of the video later, just wanted to engage with the old Algorithm x)
Actually vegan, no. Less shitty than we are in this regard? Totally.
Glad you mentioned the oysters and clams at Joseph Sisko's restauarant. I have to think those are real animals, because why would you replicate food that you had to shuck the shell off of? Also, I believe Joseph grew his own vegetables, which implies a desire to avoid replicated ingredients
Joseph also tells Jake he has a bucket of crawfish that need cleaning in the back with his name on them, something I'm assuming would be unnecessary if they were replicated. And he has that dead alligator hanging from his ceiling.
I think everyone in the comments is deeping it a bit too much, especially once you take ds9 into account. it’s just variations from writers rooms from show to show. it was important for the writers that joseph was a creole (?) chef, so he needed to be able to cook meat. there are other references to eating meat in ds9, and imo more so than in others such as tng. it just wasn’t top of the agenda for ds9 writers to incorporate veganism/vegetarianism into their stories.
@@nerysellis2433
That's the fun of media discussion and interpretation, though. The writers don't have to have cared about details like that for us to derive joy from thinking about them. 😊
"I shall try some of your burned replicated bird meat!" is all I can think of when the merits of replicators are discussed.
And speaking of Saru and preparing meals, remember when Empress Georgiou was regularly eating sapient creatures but became a fun part of season 2? That was nice.
tbh you can't rly mention her
the view on things, live, other creature and so on in that alternate reality arent rly .... the same to say the least xD
Interesting that you didn't mention the season one TNG episode, "Lonely Among Us." In which Riker says, "We no longer enslave animals for food purposes." Notably it's Tasha (who comes from a very backward colony) who is most confused by the idea of the aliens wanting to slaughter animals for food. Granted, the ship was willing to accommodate them and even planned butcher the animals for them but the whole thing is presented as being a fairly strange concept. This all leads me to think that among humans real meat has become a novelty, a specialty item which most people wouldn't go out of their way to obtain. Based on his comment about not enslaving the animals this would also suggest that anyone who is raising animals for food is doing so humanely, probably free range and under strict rules. And that Yar reacts as she does, coming from where she does, it suggests that this is not limited to Earth but includes many of the colonies.
I loved how Tasha has established that even on the planet of marauding rape gangs, the idea of eating animals is disturbing.
I also love how Lower Decks follows up on "Lonely Among Us" with Mariner liberating the "food animals."
I always found that “Lonely Among Us” scene weird, because Riker does not hesitate to tell Yar to get the animals for slaughter in the same breath that he just explained they no longer enslave animals for food. Ok? So where are these soon-to-be-slaughtered animals coming from? And how are these animals not going to be considered slaves in the end? Imagine any other moral taboo the Federation has, stating it to an alien race, then immediately going against it without a hint of hesitation. That’s this scene.
Also, I disagree with your assumption of there being humane animal farms that don’t enslave any animals. To be farmed is to be enslaved. There’s not really a way to classify an animal as your legal property that you intend to exploit for resources that’s not in every practical way a slave.
@@AV57 The impression I got was that they no longer enslave animals for meat less out of any moral objection and more out of the fact that its not as convenient.. Synthetic meat is quicker and easier to produce and most people see no qualitative difference. They seem to view eating meat in the same way that most people view hunting today. There are people who do it but a lot of people think it's unnecessarily cruel and it's definitely not the most practical way for most people to get meat. Sticking with the analogy their reaction is similar to finding out that your house guest refuses to eat store bought meat and insists on going out to the woods every night to shoot his own dinner. Even if you sometimes hunt it would come off as pretty weird and very impractical. When Riker said that they no longer enslave animals, he was likely only referring to large scale farming and not even thinking about small specialty farms that cater to the few people willing to inconvenience themselves to get real meat.
@@ermixonscraziesttheories I’m fairly confident Riker’s line about no longer enslaving animals for meat was a stated moral conviction. He was letting the diplomats know that the Federation no longer saw slavery as a viable ethical model. Keep in mind, the maximization of liberty is often spouted by Picard when they encounter confusing moral situations dealing with strange beings they only just met. It would be odd if in this instance, Riker talked about moving away from a slavery practice but didn’t see it as a moral issue. If Riker only meant to point out that the federation finds replication easier, then I think he would have said something more specific to that end.
Yeah, I don’t know where you got the implication that the slavery of animals on a smaller farm wouldn’t/shouldn’t be considered slaves. They’re owned and classified as pieces of property and denied liberty. That is a slave, even if their treatment is better than the worst examples we can think of. This was actually a massive debate between abolitionists and anti-abolitionists in the Antebellum Period. The abolitionists insisted that slavery in every form was immoral, while most others argued slavery could be moral if done a certain way. I sincerely hope the Federation would be on the abolitionists’ side here, rather than reverting back to talking points from Confederate slavemasters.
Sisko's father does cook shrimp capture from the Louisiana rivers, if not mistaken... but the recycled material that is used in replicators for food, odds are... is mostly vegan. Even if disassembled and reassembled fecal and otherwise discarded matter. If meat from molecular reconstruction isn't vegan, I don't know. If you could make beef from reassembled atoms from a piece of timber or a rock... well... it's still beef, but it didn't come from an animal source. And if it did, let's assume it's recycled from sources most people would flinch if they did think about it, but it's still meat. So... with exceptions such as Sisko's father... mostly yeah.
Don't replicators have to replicate from a pre-existing pattern? I've always thought it was much more likely that finished dishes would be scanned and stored on replicators - meaning the creation of new dishes requires a certain minimum amount of animals being slaughtered.
Some vegans will eat scallops and mussels since they aren't sophisticated enough to experience suffering. Shrimp and crawdads aren't too far away from that level, so maybe Star Trek vegans are cool with it.
@@PuckNutty no vegans will. Idk who told you that. If you eat seafood that is pescatarian. Honey is one of the few animal by products some vegans might intentionally eat.
@@mikebrant4615 Many eat manure grown foods which is far more common than honey in my experience.
As for meat in star trek, they seem to still have a low predator count in most planets shown so it's likely they have to do periodic culls (and I assume with phasor stun it would be painless), or in something like Shrimp's case that's more numerous and smaller allow limited capture as a population control method; personally I assumed that's how they got all their real meat in the show given it has been stated they don't enslave animals for food.
@@mikebrant4615 honey, and eggs, if it can be guaranteed the chickens and bees are looked after and kept properly (so just from ones they keep or people they personally know). I knew a ton of ppl with pet chickens and the eggs just… happen whether you want them or not lol. And you know you’re treating them right
Big oversight to skip the incident on TNG season 1 episode ”Lonely Among Us”
TASHA: Sorry to call you, sir. Not strictly security. It's about the dietary requirements of the Antican delegates. RIKER: I thought that had been taken care of in advance, Tasha. TASHA: So did we, sir. Their live animals were beamed aboard. We were going to preserve the meat for them, but they say we must bring it to them alive. RIKER: Then do so. Lieutenant Yar was confused. We no longer enslave animals for food purposes. ANTICAN: But we have seen humans eat meat. RIKER: You've seen something as fresh and tasty as meat, but inorganically materialised out of patterns used by our transporters. ANTICAN: This is sickening. It's barbaric.
Oh! Also! There was the Voyager two parter where another federation ship trapped in the Delta Quadrant (like every second episode they run into federation?) which was harvesting some creatures as fuel… And like ”I wonder why they keep attacking us????”
@@prettyhuman there’s also a time Neelix made “marsupial surprise” stew from traded pouches, so I imagine Voyager had to leave behind any vegetarianism concerns as part of Neelix’s scavenging and trading stuff
One of the things that makes Star Trek interesting is that the characters in it don't always live up to their own standards. That is perhaps the most human thing there is. I know I rarely fully succeed to live the way I know I should. Whether it's treating members of groups I disagree with badly, forgetting the lessons I've learned and falling into old bad ways of thinking or eating something I shouldn't it's never as easy as I'd like it to be. Perhaps part of the enlightenment of Star Trek is understanding that not everyone can live up to those ideals all the time and encouraging them towards self improvement rather than attacking them for failing.
It is the struggle itself that is most important. We must strive to be more than we are. It does not matter that we will never reach our ultimate goal. The effort yields its own rewards.
- Lt. Cmdr. Data
I always thought that fish in picard's office was holographic or something just a decoration but not an actual living fish I still choose to believe that whether it's Canon or not because it makes more sense with his personality
Yeah, as Stewart himself said it’s a bit out of character for it to be a real fish, definitely head canon that it’s a hologram or sophisticated robot fish or something.
> «When the Enterprise underwent a baryon sweep at Arkaria Base in late 2369, Livingston and his tank were removed from the ready room. (TNG: "Starship Mine")» (Memory Alpha's article for Livingston.)
I would assume that if Livinston were merely holographic, it wouldn't have been necessary to remove it from the ship though.
Also, in TNG's episode "Genesis", the de-evolution one with spider-Barclay, the fish also got (d)evolved into a jellyfish.
I've going believe that Picard put in a mini holodeck for Livingston. It also would have spent some time in cetacean ops.
Also maybe it secretly a sentient alien that agreed to live in picard's ready room for reasons.
@@captainjefferies9047 Depends on the species and size of the tank.
Picard had a larger fish tank in his quarters once in S1, then never again. So I always assumed the one in his office was real. But hopefully has a larger internal area than just the viewing area implies.
Never thought I’d see a vegan trek vid… this is awesome. I’ve been vegan ~5 years (vegetarian longer than that) and always admired the vulcans and how they abstained from meat. (also their mindfulness overall)
Star Trek is fiction! Reality is that my WF omnivore lunch comprised a small steak + 3 scrambled eggs on toast.. for health.🤣"Pinocchio" Dan Buettner confirms my choice, as his charts show that the longest-living men (Sardinia) eat 31% - 33% animal products.🤔Don't get me started on Okinawa!🥴
@@Unmasking_Viandalisme lol ok mr alpha male. Plant-based diets significantly reduce the risk of heart disease, one of the most prevalent killers in the US. Look it up. If you have enough energy to do so with that super manly diet of yours bro. 💯💪🏻 I am way healthier than I was as an omnivore, and I get regular blood work to prove that. Cheers!
@@Unmasking_Viandalisme the secret to Sardinian men living so long is the wine they drink on very regular basis that has much more antioxidants than most any other wine. Antioxidants are the key to long life. That is a scientifically proven fact. In fact THE ONLY reason antioxidants can be found in any meat is to preserve the meat. You cant find them in meat naturally.
Also I love that you wave around the 30% value of meat intake as if 70% of their diet ISNT meat. And the average American diet is 45%. And the longest living population of Americans are 7th day Adventists.... who are vegetarian.
You can argue all you'd like but at the end of the day the more plants you eat the longer you live. And of any meat the healthiest meat is fish.
@@Beowulf0510 I will argue, thanks, as the "science" supporting PB diets is laughably poor.
If the scientific age of the Universe were compressed into a single year, an ~86yr life would last ~0.2s. As a Christian, I'm accepting God's offer of eternal life, so if your human-phase "blip" outlasts mine, I really don't give a rat's ass!😄🤣😎
@@jschaetz I don't need (regular) blood work to prove that I feel great; physically, mentally & emotionally.🙄
I've never claimed to be an alpha male but have more than enough energy to dismantle the PB nonsense.🤔You do you, if an entirely PB diet is working out.👍💛
There's also the "Space Orish" from TNG Season 2. They beam up to the Enterprise with livestock and Captain Sisko's father is a chef - I can't believe you can lay claim to that title by standing by a magic food hole and asking it to produce what your customer has asked for, and it's mentioned in the show about Jake working in the kitchen which means food is being prepared
Joseph might just have the replicator create a bunch of raw meat for him, and cook from there, with the non-animal products coming from a farm
We see Sisko cleaning some kind of shellfish, oysters or clams.
Nog goes to their restaurant specifically because it’s the only place he can get live tube grubs. So they definitely have at least some real meat on the menu.
Maybe the menu is split, and Sisko’s is a restaurant where you can pay for the luxury of real meat/vegetables but also serves as a free replimat, cause it’s 24th century Earth.
Either way the magic of the family recipe is being honored. For example, Miles is still preparing his mother’s recipe for Keiko even if he’s using the replicator to do it… wether it needs more ox tail, more salt, or a little more time on the hot-plate. Replicators only give you exactly what you want, so if you wanna actually cook with replicated shit you can absolutely do that.
@@LuciferBalor I remember that scene. It was at the very beginning of a season (don't know which) and it was a remarkable insight into the mood and feelings of the Sisko.
@@chazblank2717 Or tube grubs may be the protein base the restaurant's replicator uses to create ingredients and Nog was just ordering off menu
I suspect at least some of the animal-based ingredients used in cooking are replicated - there's a bit in Picard where Jurati watches a video she shot of Bruce Maddox where he's baking cookies, but he replicated the ingredients instead of sourcing flour, butter, choclocate chips and so on. Early in TNG series 1 Riker tells the Anticans that humans no longer raise animals for food and use replicators as well - but the vehemence he uses there is at odds with the egg scene you cited from series 2, or the level with which he relished eating live Klingon food, also in series 2, or him being fine with his daughter hunting bunnicorn and butchering them for pizza in Picard.
Riker says "we no longer enslave animals for food purposes" which isn't the same as saying they don't raise animals for food.
the Klingon food thing was mainly to not back down in front of Klingons. He did it to gain their respect, or at least not immediately become their laughing stock.
@@AndrewD8Red Unless they genetically engineered a pig that likes to be eaten like in Hitchhiker's guide, or they only get meat from animals that die of natural causes, then by the vegan standards talked about in the video, it's enslaving animals for food purposes.
Janeway once tried to harvest a living nebula to get energy to make her coffee. She's definitely not vegan...she would feed Neelix into the replicator rather than miss out on her caffeine fix.
She murdered Tuvix to replicate a fresh replacement Tuvok and Neelix, after all.
I'm not a Janeway stan, but didn't she quit when she realized it was alive?
there's alot of people who would kill neelix after a week without coffee...
@@gutshtuff or just because he is a damn pest.
@@Falconman1121 Yes. The line "there's coffee in that nebula" is uttered during an energy shortage (not an excuse but important latter) with no knowledge that the nebula is a living creature. Once they come to understand that the nebula is alive they actually spend more energy from their limited supply to undo the damage they did (told you it was important, while they would scavenge when necessary they put humanitarian aid before their need.)
One aspect I think is unrepresented here is the exploitation of animals through factory farming.
Many vegetarians and vegans specifically avoid meat because of the way animals are harmed during the production of meat and not just the actual slaughter.
I always imagined that in Star Trek "genuine" meat and animal products are created in a much more traditional and sustainable way by people who are as passionate about their livestock as cooks like Joseph Sisko are about their meals.
And depending on your personal viewpoint that makes this form of farming as animal friendly as strict veganism.
Also can we talk about how super weird that scene between O'Brien and Keiko is?
You guys are married, why are you so surprised by eachothers eating habits!
Well, a traditional farm is still imposing human will on an animal. It's still a prison even if its a nice one, and at the end of the day they're still slaughtered at only a fraction of their potential lifespan.
I mean.. 'depending on your personal view point' is doing a lot of work there. it only works for omnis. Absolutely no ethical vegan would ever consider any form of farming that involves the needless slaughter of animals 'as animal friendly as strict veganism'. It doesn't matter how well the animals are treated prior to their slaughter, or how 'humane' the slaughter is, or how passionate and charming the farmer is when he talks about his trade. If you can eat something else and be healthy, then it is never ethical under any circumstances.
I've always cringed at Joesph Sisko's love for 'real' meat. It doesn't chime with the spirit of the federation at all.
Lol more "traditional and sustainable". Factory farming is the prevailing method _because_ it's the most sustainable and land efficient way of producing animal products. Factory farming is how billions are fed flesh. In order to feed the demand for meat that there is now on nice big deforested pastures you'd need 3 planets worth of land. Ain't gonna happen. You're inadvertently advocating for most of the population going vegan 😂.
@@AlexLoveLizard Not all forms of meat-eating involve farming, and why would it be ethically dubious to consume meat from an animal near or at the end of its life? Unless we're presuming the Federation has artificially changed animal life on planet Earth in significant ways, there would still be a number of animals on Earth living with and being raised by humans, whether they explicitly farm them or not. If a cow lives out its entire natural life and dies or is euthanized for health reasons, I don't see the issue with making use of the products left over. Unless mainstream veganism argues we should rewild domesticated animals, something I'm not even sure is possible for domesticated prey species like cattle.
You’re referring to the divide between animal welfarists and animal rights supporters. Animal rights is about ending the exploitation/enslavement of animals by humans. Animal welfare is about reducing the harm caused by humans to animals.
Yes, some vegans are only interested in reducing harm. They view veganism as way to turn harm-knob down 2 notches. Other vegans see the exploitation of animals as inherently immoral and unacceptable behavior for a healthy, mature human with the means to do otherwise.
Vegetarianism isn't necessarily healthier (it largely depends on how the food is prepared) but it is measurably more environmentally friendly.
Vegan food is generally less fatty, has less wasted calories.
But you need to eat more vegan food to get the same benefit, due to the lower energy density.
By and large though, all effects considered, I'd still say that a vegan diet is healthier, but there probably isn't much in it.
x
Flexitarian is more in line with our natural omnivorous physiology. It's also environmentally beneficial.
I'm vegetarian because I've never liked the taste of meat
Depends on where the farming is happening too, irrigation takes a *lot* of water
@@AndrewD8Red vegan food is less fatty if you make it less fatty, additional fat isn't inherently bad. Nuts and seeds (and even olives) are generally fatty, but a good part of a balanced diet. Junk food is unhealthy highly processed junk food, no matter if it's vegan or what.
Unsweetened chia seed pudding with coconut milk and raspberries is plenty fatty, but I'd argue quite healthy for the average person in moderation. Yet drowning the pudding in refined sugar is a quick way to make it way less healthy because while you still have all the nutrients and fibers, suddenly you have an excess of empty calories. Sugar isn't inherently bad, but we hit excess amounts in empty calories way too fast in modern times.
It always bothered me that Riker had no problem cooking real eggs (with a "practiced hand" no less), when in the previous season, he very arrogantly declared that "humans no longer enslave animals" or eat non-replicated meat ("Lonely Among Us").
I think of this as just one example of one writer thinking this would make a good scene, and another writer thinking this would make a good scene, without really comparing notes. Kind of like how the holodeck is explained as "photons and force fields" in one episode, but "converting energy into matter" in a different episode.
Well, to be fair, Riker never enslaved a chicken as far as we know. 😉
@@TrumbullComic Off screen he actually went scavenging for weeks to get the finest wild eggs he could find.
I think about this dumb shit all the time when it comes to Star Trek. I’ve brought this idea up more than once in a conversation with my Husband. (Granted it’s usually a shower conversation.) But I want them to explain all the mundane shit to me via a tube straight to my brain.
I get the feeling real food would be like the change from horses to cars. Horses are still used for transportation today but probably less than 0.1% of how it used to be (now mainly recreation and racing). In Star Trek's future less than 0.1% of animals maybe enough to fill the demand and like how someone owning a horse today for recreation isn't looked down on, maybe owning a small fishing/farm business is looked at the same way and also keeping old traditions/history alive.
Vegan in Star Trek's future may not even exist on earth now, as no large exploitation of animals would be happening, so the idea might fade away as people just think eat replicated is the norm and animals being slaughter wouldn't even be on people's minds as that's a thing of the past. Replicated food would be everyone's go to and real food would be the once a week or once a month delicacy. Vulcans were Vegan and that was a moral choice because of their logic and that idea could certainly spread to other species.
I like your thinking. Counterpoint: if I grew up in a society that used to eat meat but doesn't anymore, I think most kids growing up would be horrified by the slaughter of animals. Rather than "Oh, I didn't know some people still eat meat. How odd!" I imagine most people would be within the range of mildly to severely repulsed by the idea of consuming a carcass. I think probably raising chickens for eggs, or sheep for wool, if done with care for the animals, would probably not be a distasteful hobby to the federation, if it were real, but it probably wouldn't be commonplace.
You mention Tripp but not the catfish test
I always wanted to try those brightly coloured food cubes.
I always thought they looked like jello. So likely you have and didn't realize
@@gutshtuff I assumed they were coloured marzipan
Being both, a vegan and a star trek fan, i would have really liked to participate in that video ☺I Think the topic is really interesting to explore and debate.
The thing I never understood about the way the Vulcan's are portrayed in Enterprise is the whole "we don't touch our food" thing. It's framed as if it's somehow a function of their logical existence, but the way they present it, is more just silly, and completely illogical. What is the "logical" reason to not touch your food? Especially if the type of food is awkward for utensils, like the example they use in the episode they present it (sorry I forget the name, didn't like Enterprise at all). But, seriously, what logical being would think it's better to fumble around with a fork for 30 seconds to try and spear a slippery vegetable, than just pick it up with their fingers, and calmly consume it. Takes less time, exerts less energy, and I'm pretty sure their hands are fairly sanitary at that point in history. Seriously this bit just baffles me.
good points. And apropos points, how about use a spoon to scoop it up instead of stubbornly insisting on piercing it on a fork?! Nobody nowadays is eating their peas by the fistful (unless it's a deliberate choice), so it can be done...
There's 2 scenes like that, actually. The first one is that dinner that Steve mentions in the video, where T'Pol uses fork and knife to eat a breadstick. The other one is in a later episode where she eats with Phlox, tries to use utensils to eat celery. That scene in particular is actually very interesting, because I think it's meant to represent T'Pol's stubbornness about sticking to her Vulcan customs and prejudiced attitude, rather than embracing the fact she is serving on a human vessel and using the opportunity to learn and grow from it. He mentions the IDIC line, basically telling her that she is not adhering to that philosophy. Conversely, Phlox nicks one stick of celery from T'Pol's plate and ends up using it as utensil for his own food, as well, to emphasize his point. I think that particular scene is incredibly smart. The breadstick one I think was more meant as an exploration as to different attitudes towards certain things such as food an alien like a Vulcan would have compared to a human, but also to indicate that T'Pol is gonna be a bit thickheaded.
In the text, I don't remember if it was ever explicitly stated but it is reasonable to assume it is based on not contaminating food with your hands. That is the only 100% way to eliminate that vector, even if that is absurd overkill taken to the absolute (i.e. technically logical, but not rational).
I think the real reason might be a bit of the by prosuct of the time and culture (real life ones, that is) it was created from. Vulcans have a bit of posh/highbrown/stereotypical "intellectual" parody and critic to them, so the "logical" reason would be found outside the work i stead - it is not actually logical, they've just convinced themselves of it, and that is the point. They often do logical things (i.e. conclusion follows from the premises without contradiction) that have irrational or at least sub par conclusions (i.e. because the premises weren't all that accurate in the first place).
@@louisvictor3473 Even if the, in universe, reason had anything to do with potential cross contamination, it would still be illogical. A fork can be every bit as visibility clean whilst covered in communicable diseases as one's hands. And with your hands, you _know_ where they've been and how well you clean them.
I always saw it linked to them being touch telepathic and fingers touching seen as kissing
In the episode, lonely among us, Riker explicitly says that they no longer enslave animals for food. This means in all likelihood that the meat O'Brien's mother was cooking with was lab grown. I was really surprised to not see you mention this episode. It's perfectly explicit. Considering how easy growing organs is for federation science, lab grown meat must be a triviality, and this squares Riker and O'Brien's statements. Otherwise you just have to assume that one of them was lying or the writing is just inconsistent. Either way, lonely among us speaks to the meat consumption practices of the federation.
Possibly. But keep in mind that Riker is as hypocritical and snobbish as Picard in how he makes pompous speeches regarding the "enlightened" 24th century.
I would also say hunted, or at least culled. Earth does not seem to have more wolves or bears than now from what we see, so I assume they have the same issues we have now with animals overpopulating due to lack of pressures (some animals, that is, obviously we kill way more whales than is needed to keep natural levels of pressure); culling wild cows that have overpopulated and eating the meat is not vegan, but still lines up with not enslaving animals for food.
@@Shan_Dalamani I don't know why you would put enlightened in quotation marks. They seem by all means far more enlightened than we are now or than most people they run into. I see no reason to call Riker a liar.
Seen the video now! It's nice to see you give these commissions the same care and attention that you give to your own Trek, Actually videos.
You basically covered everything in this video that I would have said on the subject, so I don't have anything to say except thank you for another entertaining video! x
What about the Bunnycorn hunt in in the episode of Picard? I thought it was really weird that Riker and Trio's kid would kill and eat something. I mean isn't that kid a little bit empathic?
The greatest Arby's ad in history
I'd never considered it before, but...was there a chance of any microbes in that 20th-century seawater that might have had an adverse effect on the oceans of the 23rd?
The whales were transported, the transporter most likely do not transport microbes by design.
I fucking love Admiral Vance's comment about replicated food being shit. Its one of the single greatest comedy moments in the show's history as is its rather tamer precursor the Enterprise episode where they are answering questions from Kindergardeners.
We're probably gonna have lab-grown meats on our shelves within 10 years and I'm more excited than most. They will eventually have better flavor, nutrition, and variety than anything we have today.
Ethical carnivory.
I'm really looking forward to it.
There's also the Sisko family restaurant, pretty sure there's a handful of seafood dishes on the menu there. [Edit 16:14 Ha should've known better than to think you'd forget a Sisko reference]
When Sisko left DS9 and went to work at his dad's restaurant he is seen cleaning oysters in the last scene.
As with most ethical subjects broached by Star Trek I feel it’s meant to reflect the struggle with idealistic goals rather than perfection. The introduction to TNG with Encounter at Farpoint pretty much sums up this stance. A grappling with rather than a triumph over the subject is less preachy and perhaps more effective.
I disagree with Steve's take on not explaining how food synthesizers work. Well, I agree in spirit: don't take time out of an episode to randomly explain it, BUT! Let's say we have an episode about the ethical treatment of animals and the food synthesizers are a core plot point. Then it may be crucial to explain how they work to better understand the crux of the dilemma, or even just add a bit of flavor to a story to spark imagination. Just think how confused we'd be if exocomps were never explained, they just were around and became self-aware, sure the story could still work but the imagination from the story would be greatly diminished.
Actually I could see food/veganism exposition in an episode being rather interesting in a story which creates some dramatic tension around these Federation food choices. Maybe the Enterprise encounters aliens whose diet is so different from the norm that the "magic food holes" don't work for them or something... kinda like "Darmok," but set in the ship's galley somewhere. Just a thought...
You are talking about the (funny alien name) who hunted and skinned their prey on Voyager in the delta quadrant.
I enjoyed your non-vegan take on a vegan criticism of Star Trek, there are some issues there but for a non-vegan you really did a good job. I still think that you might have focused too much on the diet side even tho I get your point. Still think that you should have included the definition of veganism since the words "possible and practicable" are included and solves a lot of grey areas of indirect harm. The many examples of vegan values that exist in Star Trek should have been mentioned like for instance like Riker stating "we do not longer enslave animals for food purposes" or T'pol's response to Tucker in that scene or Janeway talking about how they do not do animal testing anymore. I came away satisfied with funding this video. If anyone wants to pay for a video, Steve is very professional and very open to listening to your ideas. As a non-vegan he stopped and listened to me explain things in detail. Great guy. Now about the comment section people, feel free to come over to my channel to shit on veganism as well because as Steve said, they should be vegan.
I think the running of the Sisko family creole restaurant in the DS9 era, and particularly the popularity with Starfleet personnel, suggests that the Federation isn't fully vegan at that point. It would seem that Joseph Sisko might be one of the few "buyers" (for want of a better term in a money-less society, maybe importer?) of live animals as Nog remarked that Joseph was the only person on earth that could get him live tube grubs (unless this is Ferengi hyperbole). Joseph even makes the comment that no son of his is going to eat that "replicated slop Starfleet calls food", suggesting they cook everything from scratch, including the meat (trout, crayfish, etc.) and so his restaurant is not vegan, using not replicated, traditionally sourced ingredients.
Maybe at this point in the timeline Starfleet is predominantly vegan, having to rely on replicators on their ships and facilities, but the wider Federation is not there yet, with the older generations (Joseph Sisko, O'Brien's mother, Maurice and Robert Picard, probably Riker's dad too because he acts like a steak and cigars man) being one of the last hold outs before replicators and thus veganism through convenience become the norm.
Great video, really makes you think.
Another thing that wasn't mentioned- The Enterprise D had cetacean crew- Bottlenose Dolphins. While humans and great apes are well adapted for a primarily plant based diet, dolphins are not. Would they be eating replicated dead fish, or would there be have to be some kind of aquaponics systems that raised fish to eat?
The dolphins show up again in Steve's favourite show the animated Lower Decks.
@@alanpennie8013 those were belugas.
@@Decipher13 which are dolphins yes
"While vegans don't directly harm animals by using them as a food source, many of the agricultural practices used to maintain plant-based food sources can and do harm animals by altering and destroying their habitats." - Video Author just before 14:19
What you're neglecting to mention there in your criticism of veganism is that the meats and animal products non-vegans eat were also fed those "plant-based food sources" you are complaining about. Thus, there is more alteration and destruction of wildlife and animal habitats to produce animal food products than to produce plant-food products.
Fact: it is more energy efficient for humans to consume plant foods directly as opposed to growing plant foods and feeding them to animals, then consuming the animals. This is because of the laws of thermodynamics you learn about in chemistry or physics...
So while veganism may not be entirely ethically "pure," it is the most ethical way for the average person in a modern & developed first world society to eat.
great video! i think one important thing to note about star trek in terms of vegetarianism/veganism is that Spock was the first recurring vegetarian character on western television! i know some people who’ve said Spock first showed them that vegetarianism was a possible lifestyle. just a cool fact about trek’s history with veganism
I think in the same way that the Federation has become retroactively an increasingly more progressive society to keep up with our own modern aspirations, I think it will find a way to retroactively represent a more vegan attitude as well.
If I remember correctly, Bajoran society is described as primarily vegetarian, if not vegan. I can't recall any mentions of livestock or food animals, and a lot of talk about different crops.
Also interesting to think about how Klingon cuisine is portrayed as almost carnivorous, but they still end up Federation aligned and their cuisine is quite popular among Starfleet members, with no evidence of ethical issues.
Just another piece of wood on the fire, I'm pretty sure the soup they ate in The City on the Edge of Forever wasn't vegan, and Kirk does consume an Italian dinner in Star Trek IV.
Well, Starfleet crew often act as field agents who expect to have to eat non-vegan food.
I never understood how they justified horseback riding. Picard, Kirk and now Pike are all seen riding.
Seems like a "return to simpler times" activity.
We already knew that Pike rode horses. He had one named Tango, as we saw in "The Menagerie."
I think horseback riding falls more into the pet category of ethics than the factory meat category.
@@grandsome1 horse riding falls into the slavery category. They’re typically viewed as servants, hence the moniker: beast of burden.
@@grandsome1
I agree.
Horseback riding ranges from companionship and teamwork between rider and horse to straight up exploitation. There are tons of examples of it being exploitation and it almost always falls on the business side or gambling side. As an equestrian, I've seen a lot of the horrors of it. There are unfortunately lots of people who have no business working with horses or people involved.
I can imagine that a replicated steak would be considered 'veganesque' because it was never part of a living animal (and that the steak would be replicated with no cholesterol in it).
Meat has a much bigger carbon footprint than veg. I really like modern vegetarian junk-food. Basically things like "chicken" nuggets etc.
"Tastes like a bite out of an angels ass" omg... I'm sooooooooo using that! I'm a 99%veggie too. Love your videos and I'm subscribed now
We also know that some characters like Jadzia and Melora are willing to eat live meat like gagh or racht, Melora even specifically asks for live racht in her episode. And Joseph Sisko was willing to serve live tube grubs to Nog.
And on a side note, can I just how boring they made T'Pol's dishes. Like there are a lot of great vegetarian food from all over the world.
They were Vulcan dishes, they are meant to be nutritious first, convenient to make second, and taste or presentation come in at a veeeeeeeery distant third, if at all.
I'm moving towards a vegetarian diet, but instead of having different days with different rules, I've stopped eating mammals and it's fine
Flexitarian is personally my optimum balance.
Soft pawed critters are off my menu.
In The Trouble with Edward short trek, Lieutenant Edward Larkin admits to having removed the fur from tribbles and eaten their meat and suggests them as a food source for the Calations.
The episode also specifically deals with Federation scientists discussing whether they're intelligent or not (and Edward suggesting he engineer them all to be brain damaged to get around this). The clear implication is that it is ok (pre-TOS era) to eat an animal if it is not "intelligent" (whatever metric that represents).
I love you Steve, never change.
The thing is, when you have multiple writers on a show, you're going to get different ideas of what an enlightened utopian society looks like. For some, how we treat animals isn't a consideration, for others it's very emblematic of how we view life as a whole, and everything in-between. So short of a franchise bible addressing it directly, you're always likely to find contradictions from episode to episode.
The treatment of the tardigrade was one of the main reasons I rage quit Discovery the first time.
A ton of interesting things to think about from this video! Thanks for another great one! Replicators can replicate prepared and raw animal products without any animal life having been destroyed. The important thing is ensuring that the pattern buffers are initialized and clean and that there's plenty of energy. I don't think there's any specific moment in Trek that writes that out into the Universe and makes it so, but I've never seen anything to contradict the ability to synthesize any kind of food once it's pattern is known. In this way, everyone can be truly vegan and still enjoy the foods from all over the galaxy.
I like to think the animal products are self produced or gotten from something closer to a farmers market. I not a vegan but I try to be conscious of animal products I use.
When I had pet chickens I didn't feel bad about eating their eggs. And I don't think most vegans would either. They had probably the best life they could've had.
The problem with backyard hens is that it still requires massive inputs to produce at the scale of our current consumption, and is still supports the brutal realities of hatcheries, including the manipulation of the species as a whole to produce so many eggs.
So, in theory, a vegan could find backyard egg production and consumption to be ethically permissible...but there are many, many real-world hurdles to overcome before we get there.
Let’s not forget Worf… at the slightest hint of being stranded on a planet, literally the first thing he does is go kill something.
I'm going to disagree with a pretty basic premise here. I don't think Star Trek actually presents a future where humans individually are better people. I think it presents a better society.
I think an important message throughout Star Trek is saying as flawed as humans are, we can make our society so much better, make the collective human society better, without having to change who we fundamentally who we are.
In the 24th century you have the default, lazy behaviour of being vegan, where being an omnivore taking a similar commitment then that being a vegan in the US takes today. But it's not saying that the people themselves are individually more moral.
I agree with most of what your saying but what is lazy of being vegan? I'm flexitarian myself so not at all a proponent of veganism, but what an odd thing to say.
@@bloodink9508 Because in the given situation, vegan options are more available than other options, making veganism the easiest diet to keep without much commitment.
@@bloodink9508 I think he just meant in the context of a future utopia where all food available is by default vegan, they aren't doing anything in particular to achieve this "enlightened" stance on animals/food.
A complication is surely that people rationalize what they actually do and in doing so may engage in moral compromises to their character (their tendency to act subsequently). So people who never eat "real" meat (meat derived from a living autonomous animal rather than vat grown or replicated etc.) do not need to come up with mental justification for eating meat which would (I suspect) blunt their tendency and intent to apply compassion or allied moral feeling/intent with full force.
Even if we don't take how moral someone is as a sum of their moral and immoral acts, but rather a judgement of how well their character leads them to be moral or immoral in given situations it seems like ending up performing a bunch of immoral acts would still blunt your moral character and make you more prone to immoral acts and so still effect how moral you are.
Also some attitudes are no doubt heavily dependent on one's upbringing etc. but still to my mind reflect your moral character. For example even if a sense that we should respect basic fairness is heavily determined by upbringing, I still think people who respect basic fairness are morally better (have morally better character) than those who do not. It seems like Federation society brings up people to be aware of and recognize basic values like respecting life (consider O'Brian's confession to a Cardascian about how before the war with the Cardascians he worried about swatting insects etc.) and so on and that alone would make them better people likewise (assuming there are societies that don't teach values of respecting life, freedom, equality etc. which as far as I can tell is the case).
Your definition of Veganism is incorrect. You've strawmanned the position. Vegansim is not about the rejection of ALL animal exploitation, meaning it includes human exploitation as well. It's specifically the rejection of the commodification and exploitation of _non-human_ animals by man. Human exploitation is irrelevant. It's the same as saying "white lives matter too" to a BLM activist. Cringe.
You can't just casually go _"I can't stop cutting this groups heads off because this other group unrelated to them _*_might_*_ have to work harder",_ and expect that to pass for taking life. Bad logic.
Most people in the Federation are probably "pragmatically vegan": with replicators and a post-scarcity society you need to know a guy who knows a guy to get hooked up with real animal products (just like hand-crafted products, real alcohol, etc...). If they don't have such a contact, they will only eat replicated products. Momma O'Brien and the Siskos seem to have such contacts but someone like Raffi would have to dig deep into her network to get a real burger.
The Vulcans were vegetarian but made a big deal of it so obviously there were meat eating/animal eating species there to contrast with. If the Federation is Vegan I'm pretty sure Spock doesn't bring up that his people are vegetarian. The Andorians, Tellurites and the Humans were obvious meat eaters from the formation of the Federation. During the next generation there were the Anticans and Selayians both applying for federation membership and both obviously, aggressively meat eaters.
Nice example of Riker eating the live Gaghkh . Gahg? Gak? whatever its a live animal. Worf is a federation citizen hunting and eating pig.
I think that while replicators has probably caused a massive drop in harvested meat consumption in Federation, it's probably more out of sheer convenience rather than animal welfare for most people--they still eat meat dishes instead of replicating all plant diets.
Plus we've seen multiple colonies in Next Gen with humans who actively decide to live in less technical or more agrarian-style societies (e.g. The Bringlodi from "Up the Long Ladder" and Caldos IV from "Sub Rosa") so husbandry isn't totally dead. Even in "Sins of the Father," Picard has a can of Caspian Sea caviar because he prefers it over the replicated version. And canned caviar has a very short shelf-life so this isn't a can from a time long ago.
While the injustice of industrial-level animal slaughter is probably a thing of the past, there's still going to be a boutique market for the real thing but not to the massive degree of our time. I imagine you'll find smaller farms (possibly with more ethical treatment for animals through stiffer regulations and/or less pressure on farmers to meet massive production demands) or people raising their own livestock.
I find it interesting to see the ethical issues that get missed in the earlier series (likely due to those shows being products of their time) and how similar issue are treated with more self awareness in later series.
You do see similar thing in other very long running franchises, but I find it more apparent in Star Trek as they are attempting to depict an idealistic society.
A few things you missed, Steve. I don't know if this first one really matters, but in the Discovery season 4 episode "choose to live", Saru says to Tilly that it's unusual for a human to not like cheese. It may be that most cheese is replicated, or maybe even when it's not replicated, vegan cheese has become the norm and is just called cheese, but at any rate this is the only instance I know of where somebody in Star Trek comments on the dietary preferences of most humans in general, and the comment indicates that most humans apparently love cheese. Another incident; in the movie Insurrection, Troi exclaims "Oh my God, they're vegetarian!?" when the guests start to eat the flower arrangements. This is played as a joke, but if veganism or even vegetarianism was the norm in the federation, she might be surprised that they're eating flowers, but not that they're vegetarian. However, in an earlier scene, and this is my favorite- in the TNG season 1 episode "Lonely Among Us", Riker acts disgusted at the idea of using live animals for food, and says "we no longer enslave animals for food purposes." My conclusion is that humans don't consider veganism to be the norm, they still eat meat and dairy, usually replicated, sometimes not, but animal agriculture as an industry has been abandoned. To me this doesn't contradict O'brien's statement about his mother. His family probably had their own farm. Of course, it's a free society, some people are going to raise animals for food, but I think it's pretty certain that humans in the TNG era don't have large-scale industrial animal agriculture. Personally, I think that's pretty good. Trying to enforce veganism on the entire population would probably not go over well.
One thought I had is that by then the term vegan may offend the inhabitants of the star system Vega unless one is referring to them specifically. Pronounced differently, sure, but not spelled differently. When I first heard the term "vegan" I thought they were talking about Vega and just mispronouncing it (especially after having watched/read Contact). I can't be the only one.
There's a scene in DS9 where Eddington complains that replicated chicken "just isn't the same", which might imply that outside of replicators, chickens raised as livestock are still fairly commonplace.
One possible alternative here is that there are lab-grown meats that are considered more "real" than the replicator version because they are still at least grown, as opposed to created out of thin air, presumably with some amount of "compression" in order to store the molecular patterns.
An interesting side note here, in terms of whether eating lab grown or replicated meat is "more ethical" than exploiting living animals, is that if humanity essentially "cheats" our way out of an ethical dilemma using a technological "trick", have we really learned anything? A couple years back, I listened to a fascinating interview with Jenny Kleeman, author of the book "Sex Robots & Vegan Meat" that gets into this topic. Food or thought! Pardon the pun.
Interesting question. Certainly the Federation has to make fewer moral compromises thanks to their technology, another reason why the Prime Directive as presented is sometimes questionable.
we only have this moral dilemma now because of our technology too, there was never a vegan human civilization, the closer we got was civilizations that only eat fish, because in the past no one had access to every plant in the planet, or synthetic vitamins
most of the time we had one main vegetable like corn, potato ,rice, wheat and complimented it with eggs, fish or birds, even places like India were people don't eat beef they do that because they consider the milk a gift from god
we also relied on animals to make clothes for a long time, but know we can make artificial leather and fur, and plant cotton instead of using wool
it is not cheating, the fact that we have the capacity to stop using animals is the reason it is a moral dilemma in the first place, not a practical problem
@@devforfun5618 Ancient and classical literature is all over the place on humans and their relationships with other animals. I’ve always found it rather telling that the Old Testament bothers to answer the question of Can Man Eat Animals? That implies the question was being asked at the time. And if it was being asked, then presumably someone was not yet convinced by the answers they were receiving. And the answer from the Bible is as lazy as it gets: BECAUSE YAHWEH SAYS SO.
We also have Mahavira (6th century BCE) who led thousands of people to a lifestyle of avoiding even the most obscure forms of animal harm without the aid of advanced technology. From that point on, Jainism pressured Buddhism and Hinduism to deal with moral conundrum of animal sentience and eventually Greeks like Pythagoras learned of these teachings and brought it to Europe. And from there many pagans and Christian sects attempted to live life without exploiting animals to the best of their ability. For those people, it really was an issue and financial, political, or technological burdens were simply hurdles to overcome-not excuses to abandon their ideals.
Yeah, I think the easier the choice is, the less easy it is to tell if someone principally follows it. This is why the abolitionists prior to the American Civil War are so worthy of admiration. They held to an ideal during a time when that was considered extreme and dangerous, but did so despite the social penalties that came along with it.
It’s not particularly hard to claim to hold the moral high ground when that high ground was built and defended by people 200 years before you were born. A question I often ask people when they accuse animal rights advocates of being extremists, rather than talking about the substance of the issue is: If you were alive in 1780, surrounded by people who preached slavery as the gospel of the natural world, and you had the opportunity to own slaves to your heart’s content with no social penalties, would you still be one of the very few people who opposed slavery? Would you take a moral stand when it meant that nearly everyone around you would call you extreme, ungrateful, unnatural, and/or naive for trying to undo a practice that was as old as anything humans had ever done? If you can confidently say YES, then kudos to you for having the backbone that very few do/did. And if you want to shame animal rights advocates, it probably won’t work because their moral principles mean more to them than social approval.
The reason why "replicated food just isn't the same" can't be completely dismissed in the star trek universe is because replicators cannot create living things. That includes microbes. This would affect things like alcoholic beverages, yoghurt, cheese. That's why gagh doesn't sit well with most Federation species - it still moving proves that it's still alive.
I’m going to admit as a person who does get why people follow a vegan lifestyle (as I am also adamantly opposed to animal cruelty) I also want to make the argument- as a person who grew up on a small family farm- that veganism in the presumably animal cruelty free future wouldn’t be necessary from the prospective of not participating in animal abuse. I actually have vegan friends who’ve accepted animal products from me (not food products but lotion and soap made with goats milk) because they trust that my animals weren’t abused- which they weren’t- and thus didn’t have the moral issue they had with normally avoiding animal products.
Vegetarianism I can still see since that requires the death of an animal, but veganism which can technically be achieved without animal exploitation I see less of a reason to aim for
No. The replicators make the food and drink by creating matter from the energy of the warp core. It's not really meat, or vegetables. But it is. It's an exact recreation of the genetic makeup of the dish you're eating. It's all the same. Energy is matter, matter is energy. Everything we eat and drink is just stardust.
I would assume that the Federation would reach a point of Ethical Consumption. Most people might feel comfortable with all their food coming from a replicator, but recognizing that some people might have a problem with food that is not naturally obtained. The various series go out of their way to demonstrate that there is no monolithic philosophy that dominates all people's thinking. I seem to recall a Voyager episode where Janeway replicates a roast and comments that it does not compare to the real thing. Even in Picard, Riker makes Pizza from scratch. Given that all the ingredients are grown, I would assume the cheese came from an actual animal. Treating animals ethically while they live does not preclude their being food.
I would hope Ben doesn't need to scrub replicated oysters (what kind of masochist would do that?!). you have the crates of Gagh that Ezri gets visibly sick discussing that Jadzia had ordered. there is a Klingon restaurant on the promenade, and it is a pretty safe bet that their food is not replicated considering both their diet and attitudes in other episodes. in "Carbon Creek" not only is killing and eating a deer considered (sure, there is still an element of disgust), but the Vulcan team subsists on at least some frozen dinners and things too.
The first season of Discovery also has that episode that clarifies that if a Starfleet ship encounters an endangered creature, the crew is to drop everything they're doing to engage in conservation efforts
A lot of people don't even consider Discovery to be legit Star Trek.
@@jasonmartin2182 because protecting endangered species is soo un-Trek right?
My understanding of the Star Trek universe is that the ability to transform matter to energy and back to matter has been mastered. That's the foundation of their ability to travel faster than light, beam to another location in an instant, make anything instantly, and produce food from pure energy w/o harming any living thing - even plants. These concepts were expressed by Roddenberry during the TOS time. Over the years I think the writers just didn't make this connection or attempts to address it were inconsistent at best.
I bet someone already mentioned this, but when Trip is joking about the spare ribs it's because Vulcan don't touch their food, not because she is vegan.
I really do think that our society, here in the USA, severely underestimates the intelligence of other animals.
Not just their intelligence, but their ability to care about what’s happening to them and around them.
Not just in the USA.
@@_Toffee_Hammer_ I know. I just didn’t want to speak for everyone since there are so many cultures that I haven’t experienced firsthand.
"A story that stops dead in its tracks to explain something...." Yes! Writers! Stop doing that! Just tell a good story. Leave the detailed world building to the wiki! Just explain what is absolutely necessary to keep the story going and let the audience fill in the gaps with our imaginations. Every sci-fi show needs to understand the importance of that tight rope.
I think the reason people dislike the replicated versions of food, is because it is exactly the same every time. There is no variation in taste or texture. It's like eating McDonalds or some other fast food. If you don't have it very often, it isn't bad and might even seem good, however if you have it too often, you begin to not like it, and crave something different.
You know I was thinking about Picard's Ready room after watching this video last night and it kind of makes sense that Picard would NOT in fact have a pet fish. UNLESS. Unless it were a fake fish. A robot fish. Or maybe the whole tank is a holographic simulation. Not a holograph as in the holodeck or the EMH, but a holograph in a more rudimentary sense. Just a 3D image of a simulated fish to look at.
Didn’t Kirk say something about a Tribble eating his chicken sandwich?
Honestly given the prevalence of replicator technology I think a person in The Federation could enjoy all the animal products they want and still be considered vegan because no actual animal had to be harmed in any way to get it.
I have been vegan (dietary) for 25+ yrs and one of a number of factors that helped me go vegan wass the fact that Vulcans are vegetarian :)
The Sisco's probably wouldn't need to clean replicated clams, and they clearly used a large number of them to joke about it at the end of DS9 S7E1. It's likely that the clams were raised/farmed in a controlled and regulated way. In a similar, but hopefully better, way than they are today. So it would appear that raising animals for food still exists. Hunting however is mentioned to not longer take place, or is very rare, in Enterprise S1E18. Although Riker has a photo with his Dad of a fish they caught. It doesn't say if they eat it, but some ppl believe that catch & release is cruel to the fish.
Just some additional points to think about when asking if the Federation is vegan
I'd love to see a vegan's reaction to the Klingon cuisine served on the Promenade of DS9.
Assuming they can replicate a beef steak, what would be the ethics of replicating human meat?
I believe this is discussed in an ensign's log episode. 😀
Do it. Long pig. I'd imagine it'd probably simply not thought of likely because humans make a lousy gamey meat. Many probably don't consider the animal being replicated so much as the end dish itself since the supply chain being broken makes the origin of the similitude becomes more and more abstract.
It probably wouldn’t add anything, but I wish you included an episode from _The Animated Series_ , “The Slaver Weapon”, in which Spock specifically mentions that he and Uhura are vegetarians and he then specifically instructs Sulu to think about eating vegetables as defense against a telepathic member of the carnivorous Kzinti, implying Sulu isn’t.
Arby’s sandwich “it tastes like a bite out of an angels ass” 🤣🤣🤣
"There's nothing worse than half-dead racht".
Maybe the meaning of the word Omelette has shifted
Think Steve is still mad about the Guinan Q wine thing
I’m a vegan and I’ve always wondered about the replicators.
Same.
I've been led to believe that they're like futuristic 3D printers. They don't create matter from energy but have a supply of various nutrient molecules. So they learned how to synthesize proteins identical to chicken or beef but made from raw atoms.
So I could walk up to a replicator and order a steak and it just prints a steak for me. Or I could ask for a banana and it uses the potassium, sugars, and vitamins on hand to create one.
I'm pescatarian thanks to an Alpha-GAL allergy. The longer I go without red meat and fowl, the more important it's become to consume free-range eggs, ethically raised milk, and ethically farmed fish.
Btw, Beyond and Impossible meats: what's your take?