Star Trek is an iconic and enduring television series because of its ability to be an allegory for present social and political dilemmas contextualized within future space exploration. The Star Trek Universe is immersive and endless, allowing for infinite possibilities of plots and characters. Despite the vastness and dynamism of the new world, it still feels familiar enough for the viewer so that one does not get lost. Previous editions have anchored themselves with the morality of their time of production, one because they are a product of a certain time but also to deal with lingering questions of the time.

The new iteration of the Star Trek world, Star Trek: Discovery is no different, and being a product of present time, it depicts the current moral morass that America finds itself in. The dubious ethics followed by the characters of this show point to an abandonment of the principles previous captains and Starfleet crew members have gone to great length to follow.

Reflecting the zeitgeist of their respective times, Star Trek with the hard charging Captain Kirk and Star Trek: The Next Generation and the thoughtful Captain Picard both attempted to digest the central questions of their time. In Kirk’s time, it was struggling in a cold war with an aggressive foreign adversary who spoke a strange language, had strange customs, and who respected power above all else. This matches the reading of many in America about the Soviet Union in the 1970s. The Vulcans share an Asian aesthetic resembling Japanese culture in their industriousness, philosophy of meditation, and alliance with Starfleet, namely the United States. The Klingons would later lose the war due to internal economic issues and would have to make an uncomfortable peace, as seen in Star Trek: An Undiscovered Country.

Captain Jean Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation depicted the “End of History” moment of western victory and liberal world order. The conflict in this series was about struggling to maintain the high standards and principles of Starfleet against unfamiliar new foes. The new enemy, The Borg, personified the fears of the loss of individuality in face of technological development. The crew struggled with bioethics questions and technological dilemmas posed by Data and the holodeck. Picard was an honorable captain and constantly made uncomfortable decisions in order to maintain the moral and ethical standard they lived by in the Federation.

The spirit and philosophy of Star Trek is at odds with contemporary thinking. Informed by the utopian views of the series creator Gene Rodenberry. Rodenberry would be a called a globalist multiculturalist in today’s political environment. In the film Star Trek: First Contact a character from the 21st century asks Picard how much it cost to build the Enterprise. Captain Picard answers “The economics of the future is somewhat different. You see, money doesn’t exist in the 24th century…The acquisition of wealth is no longer the driving force in our lives. We work to better ourselves and the rest of humanity.”

Yet, Star Trek: Discovery shows the abandonment of those principles. This world does not feel like it has an ethical compass at all. In the first seven episodes aired, the audience has witnessed a series of nebulous and highly questionable decisions. The protagonist, Michael Burnham mutinies and gets her captain killed. She then begins to experiment on a living creature in order to power the ship’s engines. When that does not work, they hook up one of the crewmembers to the engine. The captain of Discovery, Gabriel Lorca, lives in the shadows both metaphorically and literally, since his eyes were damaged in a previous battle. Lorca sends an admiral into a trap to once she threatens to take his ship away. He also abandons a human at Klingon prison to be tortured. The two classic captains, Kirk and Picard, would never undertake such actions. The only rule that matters in Star Trek: Discovery is winning. Lorca wants to win the war against the Klingons at any cost.

This new crew is fighting the same enemy, the Klingons, yet they are depicted quite differently. The Klingons have inexplicably become lizard people who share very little with humanity. The war against them is not meant to be fought within the boundaries of a normal war, this is a covert war. The spore drive that Discovery is developing is designed to allow a surprise attack and a quick retreat. When done defensively it seems like a great idea, but in the hands of questionable character like Lorca, one wonders what ends this ship could be used to.

This is where America finds itself in the “return of history” phase of world events. How do we see ourselves ethically and morally? Leaderships all around the world are throwing out the old rules of world order, yet Americans are no longer interested in defending the world order. A captain who tells his crew “I don’t care, get it done” has replaced Picard’s certainty and lecturing defense of the goodness of humanity. We have replaced Presidents who call for universal rights with a President who says “What, you think we’re so innocent?” Today we fight covert wars around the world because we lack the moral clarity to authorize the use of force. Soldiers are ambushed in Niger without half of Congress knowing they are even there. The American people like to pretend these wars aren’t happening, and turn a blind eye to ethnic cleansing in Myanmar.

I hope that America and Starfleet can both regain the belief that their ethical principles and moral compass are worth fighting for. Short cuts to winning are not worth it. All of us must defend that the ends do not justify the means.