Logline
Commander Una Chin-Riley faces court-martial along with possible imprisonment and dishonorable dismissal from Starfleet, and her defense is in the hands of a lawyer who’s also a childhood friend with whom she had a terrible falling out.
Written by Dana Horgan
Directed by Valerie Weiss
I don’t know how well that metaphor works since Illyrians are aliens. The Federation is already full of aliens with biology and abilities different than humans. So what if Illyrians have modifications that make them different than humans? Vulcans have two sets of eyelids and are adapted to live in harsh deserts humans can’t survive in. They’re also telepathic, three times stronger, and have perfect memory.
Does that mean the Federation is a segregated society between all different races? If they split cities between Illyrians and non-Illyrians, wouldn’t they also be splitting cities between Andorians, Vulcans, Tellarties, etc.?
But this was looking at a group of people that had been othered, while the federation had accepted race they othered Illyrians. So it does bring in 50s America or South Africa due to that othering that was alive at those times and still is (BLM being needed). It does also include the modern othering that is going on now so absolutly it speaks to the trans community, but all the same arguments apply to others (one of the the reasons I despise LGBdroptheT is as a group that was othered, a minority of the LGB minority now attempts to join the majority so they can other Trans.)
Now I can just be dismissed as woke
But the Federation has no history with the Illyrians. The Illyrians weren’t forced to live in Federation society. Their ancestors weren’t enslaved by the Federation. Their planets weren’t conquered by the Federation. As far as we know, they’re not refugees who had to flee into Federation space.
It would be different if Illyrians had always been a group within the Federation. But they chose to go to the Federation with full knowledge of the Federation’s laws. They have the choice to reject Federation membership if they wanted.
Not being citizens of the Federation does not allow Federation citizens to harass the Illyrians nor to threaten them.
And since the Federation and also the Star Fleet have an ideal of tolerance, IMHO it was a wise decision to ban augmentation (against the background of the Eugenic Wars) but to judge wisely if a single person really is a threat or not.
