Why the war for Star Trek is important

There is a war going on for the direction of Star Trek. It doesn't matter where you stand on it, if you want to make it a political platform, rather than a moral one, or if you want to make it flashier, more explody, or episodic and topical. What matters is that during 56 years, the show was always about mending things, solving conflict, bringing people together. The very fight for a single direction in which to trek is not very Star Trek.

I was watching the pilot for Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, by appearance an attempt to bridge the gap between the numerous trekkie factions, and it was never more clear to me that we need to heal this silly feud. In the episode, two warring factions are about to destroy their world in a planetary conflict, but the captain of the Federation ship comes over and shows them how we were and where that got us. The scene was perfect for exemplifying this conflict between the cerebral and the emotional, between the money and the principle, between the political and the rational. Because on one side it said: if we think a little bit further before we act, if we consider the consequences of what we do, we might change our path for a better outcome. Yet on the other it said: we have the answers to everything and if we arrogantly intervene and give a speech backed up by technology, power and a single limited perspective we can solve what you couldn't in centuries of strife.

It's the American hubris and superiority complex wrapping a hint of principled good intentions. And this was always Star Trek, always on the verge of something, part arrogance and part compassion, science directed by human nature at its best, exploration of the possible. And sure, I can personally spout bile and vinegar at Star Trek: Discovery for being a woke piece of crap that destroys decades of careful threading on the edge of showing off and trying to make people think while entertaining them, I can complain about Star Trek movies that wantonly create different timelines in which they can destroy planets and ships and use lens flares and motorcycles and big explosions that mean nothing or cry at the desecration of beloved characters by Star Trek: Picard, but in the end we must reach a dialog in the Star Trek universe, a balance not a consensus.

Star Trek is not about canon, it's not a religion, it is an exploration of the human. It's big enough to contain multitudes. They don't have to agree. Yes, it's a mark of incompetence and being an asshole when you decide to create Star Trek stories that disrespect or even contradict existing ones, but Star Trek can take it. The Star Trek war must be "resolved" by accepting and allowing all of these expansions of the initial concept. Star Wars used an epic introductory text referencing an entire galaxy, then only to restrict itself to the same context, the same characters, somehow always being related to each other. Trek can do better. Just think of every incarnation of Star Trek - be it canon or not, official or fan made, made by Bad Robot or by someone who understands Gene Roddenberry's vision - as a member of a Federation of Stories. Different, but united in the goal of bringing peace and knowledge to the universe.

As I see it, Star Trek is but a seed of what it could be, what is should be. When Star Trek: Next Generation - in my irrelevant opinion the best of them all - appeared, it had a different feel from original Star Trek, it had different characters, it was set in a different time. It built on the old and explored more. Let's do that! Let's explore it all! Just don't restrict it to something small and petty.