Chapter Text
Now, the United Federation of Planets practices equality, diversity, freedom, unity. This is the pinnacle of communism, or socialism, or Federationism, as one can put it. It is a form of communism.
While it may not be by the book, it certainly practices the values of communism…
People like to point out the fact that Federation citizens live on rough planets in harsh environments or experience scarcity… in the post-scarcity Federation.
However, the difference between communism and capitalism or any other economic or social philosophy is that the lifeforms living on those planets choose to be there for whatever reason they have… and it is extremely important that this is the choice of the individual. The people living on those planets can also choose to leave whenever they want to. They have the freedom to do that. Their class, their wealth, their prestige, what they do, if they do nothing, their race, their sex, any lifeform's characteristics do not dictate that they cannot exercise free will.
People, lifeforms will settle where they wish. Not everyone wants to live on a beach, not everyone wants to live in a forest, not everyone want to live on the same planet, not everyone can live in the same environment…
This is an example of how the Federation uses diversity to maintain equality, which, while it may not be a practice of communism or a by-the-book method, it is in the spirit of communism. Maintain equality, simply with the Federation's touch to it.
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Now, a simple distinction that people often miss with communism: Public vs private vs… personal property.
In these debates about the Federation, I see the first two mentioned, but never the third one.
Yet, this is an integral part of communism. The right to have personal property… for personal use.
People like to say: "Well, how is it communist if Sisko owns a restaurant? If Picard's family has a vineyard?"
And the answer is… that it is personal property. It has personal value. The people who own it use it for personal.. use. The government does not own it: They do not care about a vineyard or a restaurant or a house. The Federation is not authoritarian of totalitarian. They generally give free will to their citizens. It is not private property because none of the owners use it to make profit or exploit people.
They simply have it because it is sentimental to them. And, sentiment, emotions, are encouraged in the Federation. Personal things and stories are.
You may say that having a restaurant where other people can occupy it is not personal, however, that is simply wrong.
Sisko, by his own will, his own decision decides to cook for people, to host a restaurant with free food. This is something personal to him. He does it for personal reasons without making profit or exploiting.
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To the people bringing up the concept of the Federation credit, mentioned in TOS and TNG I believe, I only have one simple explanation: It was not yet canonized that there was no money in the Star Trek universe. It is the fault of the writers for not yet conceiving that idea.
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There is one area where the Federation deviates from the usual form of communism and most ideologies; the idea that one's life is defined by what one can do, the idea that someone must contribute something to be of worth…
This is something that Star Trek repeatedly disagrees with; preaching that life itself is inherently valuable, that no one deserves death or abandonment. I prefer this notion.
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As Steve Shives has stated in his video about the United Federation and money, I want to you take a second to imagine our world like the Federation's Earth…
Imagine if there was no money, if every person had their needs met, as is possible by the resources on this planet. We produce enough food to feed everyone, enough houses to give everyone homes, enough water to provide everyone with it. Imagine, now, if we did.
Imagine if you did not have to trade your labor, your time, simply to pay for the things that you should already have, that you can have.
Imagine if everyone else was able to have this as well.
The joy. The happiness. The thing that we need to do.
Conflict is not inevitable. We, each a valuable human, have complete and utter free will. We need not respect the "authorities" that do not respect us, treat us as beings.