Star Trek: Deep Space Nine

‘To Be Takei’: Ohhh Myyy

Jennifer M. Kroot’s documentary ‘To Be Takei’ centers around the life, career, and activism of George Takei, the much beloved ‘Star Trek’ original series veteran helmsman Sulu. The real meat of Takei’s story, though, is his youthful imprisonment in a Japanese American internment camp during World War II and his coming out as a gay man, followed by his gay rights activism.

Written by Amanda Rodriguez.

Jennifer M. Kroot‘s documentary To Be Takei centers around the life, career, and activism of George Takei, the much beloved Star Trek original series veteran helmsman (turned Captain) Hiraku Sulu. The film has a lot for Trekkies in it with its cast interviews: Nichelle Nichols (Black communications officer Nyota Uhura), Walter Koenig (Pavel Chekov with his ridiculous Russian accent), and William Shatner (infamous ham Captain James T. Kirk). The real meat of Takei’s story, though, is his youthful imprisonment in a Japanese American internment camp during World War II and his coming out as a gay man, followed by his gay rights activism.

“The Naked Time”: Takei’s all-time favorite Star Trek episode

A pioneer for Asian American representation on television, George Takei is best known for his 1966 role as Star Trek‘s Mr. Sulu aboard the USS Enterprise. Though Takei has had a prolific acting career since, he still attends conventions and speaks with fondness about his Star Trek days. Believing in the “multi-ethnic” cast and boundary-pushing themes of the classic sci-fi series, Takei even confesses that he suggested to show creator Gene Roddenberry that the cast be expanded to include a gay officer. Alas, that didn’t happen, but it’s some consolation that many years later, the Star Trek franchise dealt with questions surrounding sexuality and same-sex marriage and equality, most notably in Deep Space Nine with its character Jadzia Dax.

To Be Takei payed a great deal of attention to the ongoing feud between George Takei and William Shatner, as I’m sure fans have always been curious about it. The film even suggests that Shatner may be homophobic but never outright says it. Despite the discord between captain and helmsman, we see that Takei has formed life-long friendships with fellow cast members Nichelle Nichols and Walter Koenig who even attend and participate in his wedding to long-time love Brad Altman (now Brad Takei).

The Takei wedding ceremony

Throughout his life, George Takei has always been an activist. Now he spends much of his time at speaking engagements where he educates audiences on his experiences as a Japanese American prisoner of the US internment camps, explaining the harsh conditions and the stripping of rights and humanity that went on at the camps. Takei spent four years of his childhood in internment camps. He’s spent many years fighting for recognition and reparation for survivors. He’s even collaborated on a musical Allegiance that he refers to as his “legacy project,” which details the lives of survivors and life-long trauma caused by internment.

A quote from George Takei’s father about his family’s internment used in the play Allegiance

Decades after his most popular film and television role as Mr. Sulu ended, George Takei has managed to become a pop culture icon. He’s become a radio and internet sensation, best known for his wildly popular Facebook page, which at present has nearly 7.5 million fans. Takei wields his online fanbase and notoriety, building and communicating with an activist base, to promote with humor the issues about which he cares. Most notably, Takei is ever more present and vocal about the gay rights movement, in particular, same-sex marriage equality. However, Takei uses his infamous humor to humanize LGBTQI people who are bullied, persecuted, and discriminated against. In fact, one of his most hilarious and impactful uses of social media to spark anti-hate activism, was his “It’s OK to be Takei” campaign:

[youtube_sc url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dRkIWB3HIEs”]

Um…So. Much. Awesome.

To Be Takei also reveals some less shining examples of George Takei’s life. Though director Jennifer M. Kroot refers to George and Brad’s marriage as “charmingly functional-dysfunctional,” it’s safe to say Takei’s marriage may not be the healthiest relationship in the Alpha Quadrant. Not only that, but we see Takei’s unforgiving weightism, wherein he tells fellow Star Trek actor Wil Wheaton (Wesley Crusher) that he’s got to lose that weight he put on. Takei then mocks his husband Brad’s weight gain over the years, despite Brad’s insistence that he feels “sensitive about it.”

I, like so many others, am still enamored of this ever-rising ex-Star Trek actor. With his deep voiced oh my‘s and his dedication to humor and social progress, it’s hard not to overlook Takei’s faults. In spite of his very human shortcomings, George Takei is an amazingly energetic human being, using his growing fame to create real change in the world.

Read also at Bitch Flicks:

Trill Gender and Sexuality Metaphors in Star Trek

Bitch Flicks writer and editor Amanda Rodriguez is an environmental activist living in Asheville, North Carolina. She holds a BA from Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio and an MFA in fiction writing from Queens University in Charlotte, NC. Her short story “The Woman Who Fell in Love with a Mermaid” was published in Germ Magazine. She writes all about food and drinking games on her blog Booze and Baking. Fun fact: while living in Kyoto, Japan, her house was attacked by monkeys.

Women with Disabilities Week: The Roundup

Crazy Bitches Versus Indulgent Little Girls: The Binary of Mad Women in Girl, Interrupted by Sarah Domet

At its core, Girl, Interrupted strives to be a feminist film. However, I find the film’s representations of “mad women” problematic, particularly the ways in which mental illness becomes so closely linked with eroticized otherness. And here is where the film’s deep ambivalence comes into play: it attempts to dispel the myth of what it means to be a mentally ill woman, while at the same time reinforcing cultural stereotypes that portray mentally ill women as hypersexual, dangerous, amoral, or inherently unfeminine. In the end, Girl, Interrupted posits mental illness as a choice from which one, like Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz, can always return.

Glee‘s Not So Gleeful Representation of Disabled Women by Erin Tatum

So to sum up, women with disabilities are constantly compelled to address the elephant in the room that is their presumably absent sexuality. You are allowed two modes: sad, stoic, and sexless; or cruel, bitchy, and promiscuous. Both are media stereotypes that women have faced before, but it becomes especially problematic when disability is thrown into the mix. No matter how sexually active a given character is, trying to achieve and maintain healthy sexuality is seen as a futile pursuit because disabled people and especially disabled women can never hope to have the “real thing.” Unfortunately, Glee happily perpetuates the myth that the sexuality of ladies with disabilities is either tragic or hilarious for cheap pity or laughs where appropriate.

The Patronizingly “Adorable” Side of Schizophrenia in Benny & Joon by Carleen Tibbetts

Benny agrees not to put Joon in a group home but have her live in her own apartment (conveniently managed by his now-girlfriend, Ruthie) with Sam. EVERYTHING IS SUPER AWESOME FUN TIME! LOOK HOW ADORABLE SCHIZOPHRENIA CAN BE! The credits roll with Sam and Joon making little grilled cheese sandwiches with an iron! Yes! They’re going to make it on his video store wages and illiteracy, and she’s presumed jobless and in the care of another male authority figure! She doesn’t need professional treatment! She just needs a boyfriend!

Blindness, Race and Love in A Patch of Blue by Leigh Kolb

A Patch of Blue portrays disability as a part of a woman’s life that only defines her because she’s grown up with an abusive and neglectful family. As soon as she gets access to a world (literally and figuratively) outside of their little apartment, she thrives, and we know she’s just going to continue to grow. She’s beginning her life–a life that won’t be defined by her blindness.

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Explores Disability in “Melora” by Jarrah Hodge

I think the motivation behind “Melora” was great, but overall I thought the messages were a little unclear. I saw that Melora doesn’t have to change her disability, but she does have to change her attitude. Ultimately, that personal transformation to being more “dependent” was what tied the story together more than a reaffirmation of her uniqueness…

But ultimately, no matter what happened in this episode, you’re always going to have problems using a single character as a stand-in for an entire group of people. To really do justice to the diverse experiences of people with disabilities, we need more people with disabilities in TV shows generally (actors and characters), playing a range of parts, including recurring roles that give us a chance to see more complete and complex identities.

One Woman Holds the Breakthrough Key in The Miracle Worker by Janyce Denise Glasper

It is easy to place an incomprehensible diagnosis inside a box and throw away logic. Back in the turn of 19th century, people of Helen’s delicate condition would have been sentenced inside “madhouses” because no one knew how to communicate with them or even try. Jimmy is oblivious in seeing that Helen’s manic outbursts are not signs of mental disorder. Helen’s incoherent mumbles, cries, and physical punches stem from frustrations of an isolated mind desiring to learn how to address humankind–not doctors, needles, and shock therapy. It doesn’t help that Kate wants to keep Helen just to baby her and Captain Keller simply obliges Kate’s wishes to have their daughter close. They love her, but none of them realize what Helen sincerely needs.

‘Star Trek: Deep Space Nine’ Explores Disability in "Melora"

This is a guest review by Jarrah Hodge. An earlier version appeared at her Tumblr, Trekkie Feminist.

“Melora” is one of many Star Trek episodes that uses an allegory about an alien to comment on an issue in our human society. In this case, Ensign Melora Pazlar comes to Deep Space Nine. She is unable to walk unassisted because she comes from a planet with very low gravity.

There are some great moments in this episode, which was written by Evan Carlos Somers (and re-written by others), who himself uses a wheelchair. Somers has said:

“I always thought it would be nice to create a disabled character who’s accepted for what she is and doesn’t have to change…The best way to do that on Deep Space Nine was to have Bashir find a cure for the disability, and for the character to turn it down. That was the real driving force behind my wanting to do this episode.”

So how successful was it? I want to focus on a few key scenes featuring Melora and look at what they say about people with disabilities and expectations about their relationships with non-disabled people.

1. Bashir Can’t Wait to Meet Melora!

Still from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine

“Just think what she’s gone through to get here, Jadzia. What it must be like to adjust to our gravity after growing up on a planet with such low surface gravity,” Doctor Bashir effuses to Lieutenant Dax, who will be accompanying Melora on her surveying mission.

The crew sets up ramps for Melora to use, but there will still be places she can’t access in the wheelchair. Dax asks why they can’t just use the transporter.

O’Brien: It makes sense to me, but she sent word that it wouldn’t be acceptable to her.

Dax: I wonder why.

Bashir: I know exactly why. She went through the Academy the same way. Once her basic needs are met, she refuses any special assistance. She’s extraordinary.

There’s an implication here that people with disabilities are supposed to be self-reliant and avoid inconveniencing others …

2. But Not Too Self-reliant

Melora from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine

Turns out Melora has a big chip on her shoulder. She’s fed up with people treating her as less capable, which makes what she’s saying totally understandable. For example, when she meets Commander Sisko she’s upset because the senior officers were discussing her mission without her. Sisko explains that’s normal and she replies:

Melora: I’m sorry if I seem overly sensitive, but I’m used to being shut out of the Melora problem. The truth is, there is no Melora problem until people create one. This may sound ungrateful, because Doctor Bashir has been wonderfully helpful in the preparations for my arrival, but frankly, I wonder why a medical opinion is necessary in this discussion.

Dax: Julian [Bashir] knows more of your capabilities than any of us.

Melora: I don’t need a medical opinion to tell me my own capabilities.

This is a great call-out of the medical model, which treats disability as an illness that needs to be cured (by contrast, the social model sees society as not adequately accommodating people with disabilities’ needs).

Unfortunately, after all of her outbursts, all the main characters get this look that seems to say, “Whoa! This lady is totally overreacting. What’s with the attitude?” One commenter on my original post said she thought the flawed response of the crew was written deliberately to reflect what many people with disabilities encounter today. That might be true, but I would’ve liked it to be more obviously challenged.

3. The Doctor Finds a Way In

Bashir and Melora

Bashir tells Melora he’s no longer her doctor, but he’s still trying to fix her by drawing attention to the way she uses sarcasm and criticism to stay at a distance from others.

He softens her up a bit and asks her to dinner. At the Klingon restaurant on the promenade, Melora surprises him by ordering in Klingon, definitely a good attempt to add a bit more complexity to the character.

4. The “Cure”

Dax helps Melora after her fall

Melora falls attempting to get into a section of the station where there are no ramps. Dax finds and helps her to the infirmary.

There, Bashir (who’s now her doctor again, apparently) treats her and tells her she needs to let herself be dependent on others sometimes.

As he walks her back to her quarters, he says he thinks he might be able to adapt some previous work on “neuromuscular adaptation” that might be able to strengthen her muscles enough that she doesn’t have to use the chair.

She lets Bashir into her quarters and turns down the artificial gravity. Then they kiss and make out. My first thought was this is problematic because he’s her doctor again–he’s actually considering treating her disability!

On the other hand, the romance shows her as someone with sexual and romantic interests and desires, which helps counter the myth that all people with disabilities are uninterested in or incapable of sex.

5. Second Thoughts

Bashir tries to “cure” Melora

Even though the treatments are starting to work, Melora has second thoughts, and the way that she expresses them gets at the idea that what might be seen as a disability can be part of who someone is–not something that can and should be “cured.”

Melora realizes how valuable she really is when she and Dax are taken hostage by a thuggish alien (part of the B plot in this episode).

The bad guy zaps her with a phaser, with Bashir and the crew in Operations watching via viewscreen, but somehow she revives. She turns off the gravity on the runabout and launches herself into the bad guy, saving the day.

Melora stops the bad guy

It’s a neat little twist on what could’ve been a very damsel-in-distress-y scenario. It’s also cool that what had been seen as her disability was used in a powerful way. Unfortunately, it was kind of undermined by the explanation of why she survived the phaser blast: because of the neuro-stimulants she’d been receiving as part of her treatments to “fix” her mobility issues.

6. Melora and Bashir Part Ways

Melora and Bashir hold hands

Bashir and Melora have the final scene back in the Klingon restaurant. Bashir is disappointed that she won’t continue the treatment and Melora replies:

“I like being independent, but to give up everything that I am to walk on land…Well, I might be more independent, but I wouldn’t be Elaysian anymore. I’m not sure what I’d be. Besides, maybe independence isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. I kind of like how it feels to depend on someone for a change. And I’m glad you got me to unlock the doors to my quarters so I could finally let someone into my life.”

And then we never hear Bashir mention her again for the rest of the series.

There’s also the unfortunate fact that her relationship with Bashir can’t continue after she decides not to finish the treatments.

Jarrah Hodge is the founder of Gender Focus, a Canadian feminist blog. Jarrah also writes for Vancouver Observer and Huffington Post Canada and has been a guest blogger on “feminerd” culture for Bitch Magazine Blogs. Hailing from New Westminster, BC, she’s a fan of politics, crafts, boardgames, musical theatre, and brunch.