{"id":39957,"date":"2017-08-28T05:00:08","date_gmt":"2017-08-28T09:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/?p=39957"},"modified":"2017-08-27T19:01:27","modified_gmt":"2017-08-27T23:01:27","slug":"sexism-in-the-original-star-trek","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/2017\/08\/28\/sexism-in-the-original-star-trek\/","title":{"rendered":"Sexism in the original Star Trek<\/em>"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dave Leigh<\/a> stands up for Gene Roddenberry:<\/p>\n

… the most infamous case is in part a running gag throughout the series. It’s dictated in the Guide<\/em>, runs the length of the series, and culminates in the final episode. And I’m pretty sure that very few people other than Gene Roddenberry himself knew that it was a running gag.<\/p>\n

It’s sexism.<\/p>\n

First… history. And this part is well-known. When the first pilot (“The Cage”) was delivered, Roddenberry cast his future wife, Majel Barrett, as “Number One”, the coldly logical second-in-command of the Enterprise. When the studio rejected that pilot and commissioned a second one, they made a few demands. They wanted to “get rid of the guy with the ears” (as Roddenberry told it). They also wanted to axe Number One, because they claimed that their test audiences didn’t like a woman as executive officer. For decades, Roddenberry told the joke that he kept the alien and married the woman because the other way ’round wouldn’t be legal. He also transferred Number One’s coldly logical nature to Mister Spock.<\/p>\n

In the years that followed, many fans and critics completely forgot this story when examining the rest of the series. For instance, there’s the fact that the captain’s yeoman is always a pretty female. This is by decree. In fact, the Guide describes the character as follows:<\/p>\n