Quick Star Trek question that pops into my head occasionally:

[conuly]

Is there an in-universe explanation as to why, exactly, so many (human) Starfleet officers are fans of Earth history, specifically the history and culture of the mid-to-late 20th century USA? And why so very few of them are invested in, say, the history and culture of Joseon-period Korea, pre-Sarek Vulcan, mid-whateverth-era Betazed, etc?

(Seriously, I would absolutely love it if a random go-back-to-earth-time-travel episode ever landed them somewhere other than the USA.)

Comments

[conuly]

...haven't the Eugenics Wars been retconned considerably due to history marching on and overtaking them?

But you are right, seeing other perspectives and times would be interesting... Heck, finding a human fascinated by pre-Surak Vulcan history would be a change, and might lead to some amusing moments when their Vulcan shipmate finds out that the human knows more about their history than they do!

That'd be hilarious.

[siliconshaman]

sigh

The timeline in star trek is a mess ... but the Eugenics wars still happened, somewhat varying in when they kick off. As far as I can tell, broadly they remain the same. That is, ignoring the Abrams-verse since that's a separate alternate timeline. They still happened, since Khan still exists in that 'verse, but I think they might have been somewhat more European centric and who knows what happened in detail.. but that's just based on their choice of actor for Khan.

[conuly]

Yeah, they happened, but maybe they didn't happen exactly the way they first happened.

And for things like this, by the way, including the entire existence of the Abrams-verse, I like to say "Thank God for Enterprise and the Temporal Cold War", because I can just cheerfully say "Welp, the weirdness around this subject must be the result of shenanigans!" and move on.

[siliconshaman]

Agreed... there were some pretty major continuity glitches and weirdness even before the Temporal cold war was introduced, and indeed, it's allowed for a hand-waving explanation for it. Especially seeing as Temporal revisions don't propagate uniformly apparently.

History isn't what it used to be, apparently.