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What is the minimum standard of living on Earth? (startrek.website)

submitted 1 year ago by maplealmond@startrek.website to c/daystrominstitute@startrek.website

9 comments fedilink hide all child comments

In Star Trek Picard we see Raffi living at rock bottom for a while. She has no job after her discharge from Starfleet, and is clearly not doing as well. She describes her life as humiliation and rage.

And yet by modern standards she has a home, food, and power. Her drug usage isn't condoned but she's left largely alone to do it. By modern 21st century standards its a very soft landing.

Does it get worse than this? What is the worst possible economic outcome someone living on 24th Century Earth is likely to face.

The events of DS9: Past Tense imply that things aren't as bad as sanctuary districts and mass homelessness, but there's a lot of range between that and where Raffi landed. So what evidence do we have about how bad it can get?

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[–] ValueSubtracted@startrek.website 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It seems to me that citizens have free access to the necessities of life - food, water, shelter, medical treatment, education, and the like, but they also have a wide degree of latitude in terms of how they choose to live their lives.

Raffi wasn't happy with her situation, but as you noted, she has her necessities. I think it's apparent that she's punishing herself, choosing to live in conditions she dislikes, because on some level, she believes she deserves it.

It also appears that people are free to refuse medical treatment, or mental health support in the case of Yvette Picard, which can create some gaps in the system, and the merits of which can be debated at length.

[–] LibraryLass@startrek.website 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Not only does she have her necessities, her pissant trailer is bigger than any house I've ever lived in and is smack dab in the middle of a state park.

[–] ValueSubtracted@startrek.website 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I've never been able to decide whether Vasquez Rocks is meant to be standing in for itself in that episode.

[–] LibraryLass@startrek.website 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Memory Alpha seems to think that Vasquez Rocks is playing itself in that instance

[–] majicwalrus@startrek.website 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)

My assumption was that Vasquez Rocks was playing itself and that it was no longer a state park because there was no longer a state. Most of the Earth outside of cities has probably largely been left to the wilderness and as such parking your RV in any place is probably allowed if not unusual.

[–] constantokra@lemmy.one 3 points 1 year ago

Here and now, you can camp in plenty of locations, as long as you leave after a certain period. It may be that her trailer, or whatever it is, can just pop up and move, so she's just moving around. What does it really matter when you can transport anywhere?

[–] LibraryLass@startrek.website 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Probably, though one would presume protections would be in place for notable natural features.

[–] majicwalrus@startrek.website 2 points 1 year ago

Yes this is likely a consideration, but I also wonder if the ability for humans to live both without interference and in harmony with natural surroundings is now taken as a given such that no one is expecting anyone to deface or damage the redwoods even if they had set up their camp there to complete their research.

[–] majicwalrus@startrek.website 6 points 1 year ago

Earth is a functional paradise. It doesn't alleviate people from all suffering, especially emotional suffering, but there is nothing that Raffi could not have if she wanted it including a different house in a different part of the world. She is self-isolating, but she doesn't have to.

There is no "bad" economic outcomes on Earth anyway. I suspect that economic stratification comes in the form of human diaspora. Once you leave Earth to live on a colony or even just to live off-world, you might find that the world you move to doesn't have bustling cities yet and so there are no tickets to the opera.

But these are choices that we assume are more freely available.