saw a very interesting take today about snw being conservative and less radical than tos that hinged around the spock/chapel relationship being regressive (sorta agree lol) and uhura being the romantic choice that “makes sense” for spock. it rubbed me the wrong way because despite its framing as a criticism of snw’s lack of radical politics in comparison to tos, it’s still centered uhura’s value as both a character and as representation for black women around her ability to land a male lead and be part of a romance that gets a lot of screen time.
while i agree that snw could be a lot more radical and progressive, i also don’t understand why for some, the most important marker of that radicalism would be a relationship between spock and uhura. applauding tos for depicting elements of interracial romance during the 60s is one thing, but believing that the peak of representation and radical storytelling in 2023 would be an interracial relationship feels like it completely ignores both uhura’s value as a character independent from romance and the other well written interracial relationships that have appeared on nutrek.
i’m very firm in my belief that uhura’s character is much more interesting without a long term romantic plot. in my opinion, although i’m not black so i can’t truly speak on the impact of uhura as representation, i feel like her character is one of the most dynamic, interesting, and well written characters in all of snw, and the majority of nutrek. she has interests, hobbies, doubts and worries, as well as a prodigious intellect that the show never tries to downplay or conveniently ignore in favor of letting a white male character take the spotlight. while snw could certainly take things further in terms of radicalism, i don’t really think uhura is the place to start changing things up.
anyways i welcome any other opinions u guys have about uhura, snw, and nutrek radicalism just don’t be mean to me lol
After making this post I received a couple of very insightful critiques from @pancake-sexuality (they’re in the comments if you’d like to read directly!) relating to the relationship between black women in media and romance, specifically how black female characters are treated when the possibility of a romantic storyline emerges for them.
In my haste to defend uhura against what i still believe to be anti feminist and reductive rhetoric, i completely overlooked the historical relationship that non black trek fans (although this is much more broadly applicable) have with the prospect of uhura being romantically involved with characters from the rest of the main cast. this fandom has a history of either bashing uhura for “getting in the way” of spirk, or framing their disapproval of spock/uhura as the less obviously anti black “oh i just don’t understand why women always need to be in a relationship she was much better alone” commentary that only ever seems to crop up when black women are involved.
unintentionally, my post falls into that second category. i still stand by the majority of my points in the original post, however, i can also recognize that although i do not consider myself to be among the camp of people who try to quash every single romantic relationship that involves a black woman and a desirable male lead, in this situation, my words still reflect that mentality. intentions are obviously less important than the impacts of our actions, and i am disappointed in my own inability to look beyond the surface level feminism that encourages the “she’s better off alone” mentality ESPECIALLY involving black women.
anyways, i want to leave the original post up, despite its ignorance, as i believe the comments and this reblog might be a valuable learning experience for anyone else who finds themselves falling into the same surface level analysis that i did. black women deserve heartfelt and well written romantic storylines, and that should never be a topic of debate. although i still believe it to be disrespectful and reductive to CENTER uhura’s value as a character around a romantic relationship, i now understand that doing the opposite and denying the importance of a romantic storyline for her can be just as harmful.
