this post was submitted on 18 Dec 2023
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Asklemmy

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Every single large server in this federation has at least one Star Trek community. There is even an entire server dedicated to Star Trek.

Not only that, these communities are some of the most active I've ever seen. There is no other franchise I know of that dominates the federation as much as Star Trek does.

So, what's the correlation with Lemmy and Star Trek? Why not other sci-fi series? Please, are there any connections?? Is this all coincidental?

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[โ€“] [email protected] 389 points 10 months ago (2 children)

dominates the federation

Well there you have it.

[โ€“] [email protected] 87 points 10 months ago (1 children)

federates the Dominion

FTFY

[โ€“] [email protected] 65 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Federate the Dominion? Are you joking?

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[โ€“] [email protected] 176 points 10 months ago (4 children)

I think it's nerds. /s

I think a lot of the lemmy userbase are at least somewhat techy (also see the Linux communities), and a lot of techy people like Star Trek.

[โ€“] [email protected] 59 points 10 months ago (13 children)
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[โ€“] [email protected] 147 points 10 months ago (3 children)

The Star Trek community has been going strong for nearly 60 years for a reason - Star Trek rocks.

When it started in the 60s (and continued especially strong with TNG in the 80s), it was unique in depicting a hopeful look at how things could be rather than a reflection of how things are, differing from how most shows do social commentary. It's refreshing.

Star Trek is attractive to people who want to see a world where people work together toward great things in a post-scarcity utopia, with current day conversations of race, nationality, sex, gender, etc. being so far in the rear-view mirror that they're non-issues. Plus cool technology. I think that appeals to the Lemmy crowd.

[โ€“] [email protected] 39 points 10 months ago (8 children)

Another key point I feel is often overlooked about Star Trek is the "Gulliver's Travels" component of (at least pre-Kelvin) Star Trek. Every show, every race was secretly a fun-house-like caricature of humanity's worst traits, with the humans of the show demonstrating growth past that point. You laugh at or shirk away from them, but really it's modern humanity that is being depicted (Ferengi as capitalists, Klingons as warmongers, Romulans as subversives, etc.) And then we see what we could be, the hope that you talked about, in future humanity

[โ€“] [email protected] 34 points 10 months ago (8 children)

It seems like such a creative way to do social commentary. We get to see our present failings in aliens, and then contrast it with how the crew (future humanity) carries themselves. Sometimes it's very clunky and heavy handed (like that TOS episode with the half-white/half-black aliens), but it's still good. My favorites are every time Picard monologues about their values to an alien race in TNG.

Even if you already share the values, it's fascinating to hear them laid out so clearly.

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[โ€“] [email protected] 33 points 10 months ago (1 children)

To me, Trek is a mash of three great communities, each nerdy in their own way:

  • Science-fiction, specifically optimistic mid-century science fiction.
  • Theatre / Drama
  • Revolutionary Socialism

This article scratches the surface of it.

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[โ€“] [email protected] 121 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Well, you see, Lemmy is full of nerds and communists.

[โ€“] [email protected] 36 points 10 months ago (5 children)

"Workers of the world unite! You have nothing to loose but your chains!"

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[โ€“] [email protected] 112 points 10 months ago (3 children)

So others have already talked about how great Star Trek is. I agree with them, but I think that literally everyone has missed the point of your question:

https://startrek.website

It's its own lemmy instance. It was spawned from the migration away from reddit, and it's stayed alive since. So combine an active former-reddit community with lemmy and a good reason to all rally around, and finally the final ingredient of federation, and the Star Trek related rooms will always be on every server, and they'll always be populated.

[โ€“] [email protected] 70 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, I think this is a big part of it. The Star Trek sub's total abandonment of Reddit and conversion to a standalone Lemmy instance during the Blackout was a big deal and a big driver of traffic in those days and beyond.

Star Trek is big in the Threadiverse for the same reason that Earth is big in the Federation. They were a massive force in the early days.

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[โ€“] [email protected] 104 points 10 months ago (16 children)

Why is the show about gay space communism popular on the gay space communism network?

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[โ€“] [email protected] 100 points 10 months ago (3 children)
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[โ€“] [email protected] 99 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Asking why Star Trek dominates the Federation? tsk tsk tsk

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[โ€“] [email protected] 93 points 10 months ago (3 children)

Most of the internet was started with Star Trek boards. If I recall correctly, one of the first emails ever sent was about Star Trek

[โ€“] [email protected] 41 points 10 months ago (6 children)

Also credited with the first widespread fanfics of a TV show, I believe.

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[โ€“] [email protected] 89 points 10 months ago

no other franchise I know of that dominates the federation as much as Star Trek does.

You answered your own question, brother.

[โ€“] [email protected] 89 points 10 months ago (1 children)

We may never have a good answer for why the gay nerdy communists love the colorful scifi communist space adventures

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[โ€“] [email protected] 80 points 10 months ago (3 children)

Because Trek fans were the first to organize conventions. They started out small in the late 60s. Now every single weekend, somewhere on this planet, there's a Trek convention being held. The conventions also raise massive money for charity. They are the nerds other nerds want to be, in terms of organization. I'm here for the memes.

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[โ€“] [email protected] 77 points 10 months ago (6 children)

Ah yes, the nostalgic leftist scifi show that defined generations is popular amongst the left leaning members of the nostalgia generation.

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[โ€“] [email protected] 71 points 10 months ago

federated platform full of nerds

asks why there are Star Trek fans

Guess.

[โ€“] [email protected] 69 points 10 months ago (10 children)

Same reason Linux is popular on Lemmy. Lemmy is essentially an explicitly leftist community that appeals to people nerdy and techy enough to leave Reddit and join a smaller platform. Linux is a FOSS, ie leftist techy OS. Star Trek is leftist Sci-Fi.

Nerds, tech, and leftism all congregate on Lemmy.

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[โ€“] [email protected] 69 points 10 months ago (7 children)

there is also a lot of communities about programming and linux

there's only 1 common denominator here. we are all nerds

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[โ€“] [email protected] 68 points 10 months ago

Guys guys, they're talking about us!

[โ€“] [email protected] 67 points 10 months ago

Thr "federation" you say? ;)

[โ€“] [email protected] 63 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Almost like it's some kind of federation...

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[โ€“] [email protected] 60 points 10 months ago (5 children)

Because I want to see Fully Automated Luxury Gay Space Communism happen in my lifetime.

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[โ€“] [email protected] 59 points 10 months ago (15 children)

The Lemmy community is disproportionately made up of either computer nerds or queer people.

Star Trek is basically the most popular nerd IP that hasn't been successfully brought into the mainstream, and is known for being progressive.

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[โ€“] [email protected] 50 points 10 months ago (2 children)
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[โ€“] [email protected] 49 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Star Trek (esp 90s Trek and esp TNG) is extremely formative for most Gen Xers and Millennials. It's unapologetically nerdy and has themes of tolerance and empathy, and establishes a utopian vision for the future that (to most people) is unfathomable. When we're not on Lemmy, we're talking about Trek with people in person.

[โ€“] [email protected] 47 points 10 months ago (6 children)

because star trek has long been welcoming to gay and trans people for their inclusiveness and the fediverse is home to a lot of nerds and gay or trans (or both) people. ๐Ÿ’•

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[โ€“] [email protected] 46 points 10 months ago (3 children)

dominates the federation

Say it again so the kids in back can hear ye

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[โ€“] [email protected] 45 points 10 months ago (21 children)

Star Trek just kinda kicks ass.

What, you haven't seen Deep Space Nine?? Cmon what're you doing? Fix that!

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[โ€“] [email protected] 45 points 10 months ago

Two words.

Fully automatic gay space communism.

[โ€“] [email protected] 39 points 10 months ago (8 children)

star trek mods successfully moved their communities from reddit back then. afaik the only other community with similar success is the piracy community.

[โ€“] [email protected] 29 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Trek fully embraced the principals of piracy. "You wouldn't download a car"? Motherfucker, here's a replicator.

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[โ€“] [email protected] 37 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (25 children)

The fact that the biggest star trek sub on reddit has been censored to a degree that it drove away many trekkies might also be one of the reasons. I got a lifetime ban there simply for stating that I do not like DIS and PIC because in my opinion they oppose everything star trek stands for.

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[โ€“] [email protected] 35 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (5 children)

Because Babylon 5 ended in 1998 and the reboot isn't even in production yet. Also MGM doesn't have the faintest idea what it's supposed to do with Stargate.

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[โ€“] [email protected] 34 points 10 months ago

Are you telling me there aren't enough star trek communities?

[โ€“] [email protected] 34 points 10 months ago (1 children)

c'mon, it's right there

United Federation of Planets

Fediverse of Lemmy Instances

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[โ€“] [email protected] 34 points 10 months ago (5 children)

Star Trek has more historical weight behind it. It more or less created modern scifi fandom. It's probably so widely beloved because it's unlike most scifi in that it's hopeful. It sells you on the idea of a better future where everything could go right, where we can explore space and be chill with everyone. Other scifi franchises sell you on window dressing or a bad future full of the same problems we have now.

People like Star Trek because they want it to be reality in a way that other scifi stuff just doesn't do.

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[โ€“] [email protected] 34 points 10 months ago (6 children)

In an interview during the 90's, William Shatner told of a story of him being recognized in mid-perfomance by a sword dancer in a small Iranian village. The man stopped dead in his tracks and looked straight at him uttering with utter amazement; "Captain Kirk?!?" That should give us perspective as to how deep and far Star Trek reached people for the last 51 years.

Source: https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-approximate-number-of-Star-Trek-fans-worldwide

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[โ€“] [email protected] 33 points 10 months ago (10 children)

Federation. Star Trek. IT. Linux. Programming socks. Gay. Furries.

This sums up the vocal group here. There are others, but these seem to be the most common.

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[โ€“] [email protected] 33 points 10 months ago (21 children)

Lemmy is filled with leftists and geeks. They're the same demographic.

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[โ€“] [email protected] 32 points 10 months ago (7 children)

Lemmy is socialist by nature, and so is Trek, but also it's Trek, one of the two most iconic Sci-fi franchises available, Reddit was basically the same way but with Star Wars, but for some reason there seemed to be far too many people on the dark side and simping for the empire and Vader.

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[โ€“] [email protected] 30 points 10 months ago (3 children)

Anecdotally I have the impression a lot of North American Lemmy users are technology professionals and enthusiasts in their 40s and 50s and therefore many would also be Trekkies from the 20th century.

[โ€“] [email protected] 29 points 10 months ago (4 children)

Hey, some of us are in our 30's too!

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