The Psychology of Fan Outrage or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Accept Ben Affleck

The internet was the forum for global fan outrage this week when Warner Brothers announced Ben Affleck will star as the Dark Knight opposite Henry Cavill's Man of Steel in 2015's Batman Versus Superman movie.

Fans have been complaining about two things.

1. "Ben Affleck has been in really crappy movies, including his last superhero movie – Daredevil." Check out exhibit A:

Really looking forward to seeing Affleck bring the depth and gravitas to Batman that he brought to Daredevil and Gigli.

— Wil Wheaton (@wilw) August 23, 2013

2. "Ben Affleck can't pull off Bruce Wayne/Batman." Exhibit B:

Affleck gonna be like "It's the Jokah! Or the Riddlah! Rahbin! Call Commissionah Gahden!"

— D'Brickashaw (@DragonflyJonez) August 23, 2013

Rough stuff (and there's plenty more of it out there). At least one person stood up for Affleck:

Affleck'll crush it. He's got the chops, he's got the chin -- just needs the material. Affleck & Cavill toe to toe -- I'm in.

— Joss Whedon (@josswhedon) August 24, 2013

I was also surprised by this announcement and texted my Batman friends to vent. They eventually calmed me down and when I really thought about it, this whole debate didn't make much sense. We have nothing to judge Affleck's portrayal as Batman (they haven't even started filming yet). We also can't go by his past performances because they've been inconsistent (Gigli was stupid but Argo rocked).

But what we can dive into is the psychology of the Batfleck backlash, which was pretty much summed up in this tweet:

I love how the internet works. 1. Outrage. 2. Outrage over others' outrage. 3. Everyone forgets and buys the comic/watches the movie anyway.

— Chris (@CapSteveRogers) August 23, 2013

Patterns of fan outrage like this happen all the time – people get invested in something, feel betrayed by changes, and eventually come to terms with it. It's all because of the anonymity of the internet and a psychological safety mechanism called cognitive dissonance.

All This Has Happened Before and Will Happen Again

We've seen this type of outrage before – critics didn't like Michael Keaton's casting as Batman. "A comedian can't play the cape crusader!". Yet he did a pretty good job and (along with Christopher Reeve's Superman) paved the way for our modern age of superhero movies.

Fans were also pissed when they heard Heath Ledger, star of the teen flick 10 Things I Hate About You, was cast as the Joker. They loved Jack Nicholson's portrayal of the same character and doubted Ledger had the talent to bring to life Batman's archenemy. He went on to win a posthumous Oscar for that role.

Fan outrage isn't unique to Batman. Many longtime Trekkies hated Star Trek Into Darkness, despite its critical acclaim and blockbuster success. People were hostile when the new Battlestar Galactica reimagined the cigar smoking Starbuck into a female character. We see this when video game sequels make big departures from their predecessors (which has led to a wave of discrimination against game developers). Similar stuff happens in sports. Patriots fans mocked Tim Tebow when he was signed on to the team. Even Facebook users ballyhoo each and every interface change the social networking website makes.

(Anger + Anonymity) - Eye Contact = Internet Trolls

Regardless of the product, fans spend a lot of time, energy, and money investing in the way things are. For a lot of people, anger is a natural reaction when we think something we love is changing for the worse.

While there are a lot of reasons why people get mad, it all comes down to feeling wronged – something has happened that was not okay (like having your foot stepped on in the subway, someone cutting in front of you in a line, or having your wallet stolen). Anger warps our thoughts, jumpstarts our body, and makes us want to break something. Whether or not we act on our aggressive urges depends on the circumstances of our anger.

Me and my favorite Bruce Wayne - Kevin Conroy from Batman: The Animated Series  & Arkham City.

Batman fans have invested a lot in the superhero. Take me for example. I fell in love with the character after seeing Batman: The Animated Series. Batman gave me hope that I too could grow from difficult experiences and develop the skills I needed to overcome my own super-villains. I own all of the movies on Blu-ray, have met my favorite Batman (Kevin Conroy), and nearly wet my pants when I saw the epic San Diego Comic-Con reveal of the Batman VS. Superman movie. I've been waiting my whole life to see Batman and Superman appear together on the big screen. The Affleck casting made me question if Warner Brothers was taking the movie as seriously as I was (yes, fans feel like they have a personal ownership over this kind of stuff).

When you take that type of anger and combine it with the internet, very bad things can happen. The internet loosens our inhibitions (kinda like alcohol) because we feel anonymous. A recent experimental study supported this idea and found that lack of eye contact with other people is one of the most important predictors of crazy online troll behavior. In other words, the things that keep us civil towards each other (like looking at someone face-to-face) are often stripped away on the internet.

Anger doesn't last forever — it comes and goes (just like all emotions). But we feel impulsive when we're angry and the internet gives us a way to quickly act on our impulses. Without face-to-face contact, we feel like we can say heinous things and get away with it.

We Want to be Consistent

Psychological science has demonstrated time and again that humans aren't rational beings. We feel first, think and act later. That's why we do things that don't make logical sense like smoking when we know it's bad for our health, procrastinating on our work even though it'll make things harder later on, and avoiding difficult conversations which end up prolonging our stress.

Sometimes our emotions lead us to do things that conflict with our beliefs. We might think we're generous people but then we avoid beggars on the street. That's where cognitive dissonance comes in. Our mind strives for consistency between our beliefs and actions. When there's an inconsistency ("I'm a good person but I didn't give money to that poor person"), our mind either changes our behavior ("I'll volunteer at a soup chicken") or modifies our beliefs ("If I gave that beggar money, they'd just spend it on beer or drugs"). These types of mental gymnastics happens all the time without any conscious awareness.

What does this have to do with Batfleck outrage? Cognitive dissonance helps us understand what's been going on inside the minds of fans after their initial anger has worn off. Here's an example:

Belief 1: I love Batman.
Belief 2: I hate Ben Affleck.
Dissonance: Ben Affleck is the new Batman!

We want to be consistent and these two beliefs just don't mesh with each other. To reduce our conflict, we might change the first belief and say "Affleck will never be my Batman" or "This isn't a serious Batman movie with Zack Snyder at the helm." Others will change their second belief – "Ben Affleck isn't that bad" or "Far worse actors have played Batman". Again, this is a stealthy process that happens without us even realizing it.

I wish the conversation about our new Batman was more civil, but with the way most of the internet works (no face time), that’s not going to happen. Knowing what we do about cognitive dissonance, Cap. Steve Rogers is right — people will get used to this news and see the movie anyway.

At the end of the day, it's good that people are reacting so strongly. Emotional reactions mean people care about Batman and are invested in the franchise. The moment fans stop caring is when a franchise dies (Exhibit C: George Clooney's Batman & Robin). Will Batman VS. Superman go down the path of Batman & Robin or Batman Begins? It’s just too early to tell.

November 21st 2013 Update: Listen to Geek Therapist Josué Cardona and I discuss Ben Affleck and Nerd Rage on the Geek Therapy Podcast. 

December 22nd 2014 Update: Watch the Nerd Nite version of this article.

Elysium is a Big Lost Opportunity (Non-Spoiler Film Review)

After Star Trek Into Darkness, the only other science fiction summer blockbuster I was anticipating was Neill Blomkamp's Elysium. I loved Blomkamp's first film, District 9. It was massively entertaining and delivered a heavy dose of social commentary. After a summer of prequels, sequels, reboots, and homages, I was looking forward to cleansing my palate with a smart, fun, socially conscious, standalone science fiction film. Sadly, Elysium is not that movie. Elysium is a big lost opportunity.

The film starts well. From a space station based on a real NASA concept to planetary scenes that were filmed in a massive landfill, Elysium is grounded in reality. I loved the worn-in aesthetic of Elysium. It minimized cartoonish CGI and reminded me of visuals from 2001: A Space Odyssey, Star Wars, Alien, and Blade Runner.  

The NASA inspired look of Elysium's space station is beautiful.

There's also reality in the psychology of Elysium. I loved the scene in which a CEO is disgusted when one of his employees breathes on him. That type of revulsion actually happens. Using survey, experimental, and neuroimaging research, psychologist Susan Fiske has concluded that most people see the poor as disgusting, having no redeeming qualities, and incompetent. There's an exception to this – individuals who are seen as working hard to get out of poverty are rated much more positively (something we don’t see in Elysium).

The film also highlights health disparities, albeit in a blatant way. Citizens of Earth don't have access to the magical healing beds that every Elysium resident owns. This makes the upper class immune to most diseases while the poor go largely untreated. That is similar to how health disparities work right now - because of a number of factors, including lack of health insurance, poor food quality, stereotypes that healthcare providers have about minority groups, language barriers, and being far away from hospitals, diseases and illnesses affect minority groups, rural populations, and persons with disabilities differently than the middle and upper classes.

People can only access good healthcare on Elysium.

Elysium accurately shows xenophobia. We briefly hear about a fear from the space station’s citizens that undocumented immigrants could ruin their way of life. A similar anti-immigrant fear exists in America right now. Americans worry immigrants will take our jobs and change our culture. There is also evidence that despite the many contributions of immigrants, this population continues to be discriminated in workplaces, communities, and schools.  

This foundation sets up Elysium with a compelling and timely premise. But the film doesn't do anything with these ideas besides saying "the rich are disgusted by the poor, health disparities make people sick, and Americans don't like immigration". It's not enough to say social inequalities are bad — science fiction can challenge our beliefs and force us to entertain ideas we wouldn’t otherwise consider. Instead, Elysium gives us simple messages about complex issues. 

The same problem exists with the film's heroes and villains. They are painfully shallow, unsympathetic, and have no arc whatsoever. Each character ends in the same place where they began. Even though Matt Damon's character had the power to change the course of the world, I rarely cared about what was happening to him.

Jodie Foster's character was one of the most boring villains of the summer.

Some call Elysium "one of the better action films of the year". I couldn't disagree more. The glorified violence combined with the realistic look of the movie made it hard for me to enjoy the action. This type of violence worked in District 9 because it was necessary to tell the story of humanity's oppression of aliens. Here, it was gratuitous.    

This film has an agenda — develop empathy for the poor, increase support for universal healthcare, and promote immigration reform. That’s probably not going to happen. Without any complexity to the story or characters, most people will walk away from Elysium having a stronger belief in their existing attitudes towards these issues. That's the biggest lost opportunity of Elysium — the chance for us to reflect upon the social issues of our time outside of our political biases.

Rating: 5/10

I usually find Slate to be too critical, but this time they were right on by calling Elysium "a waste of a perfectly good dystopia". The most positive review I could find comes from io9.  

Brain Knows Better Live at Nerd Nite NYC

I am honored to be kicking off the sixth season of NYC's Nerd Nite!

What's Nerd Nite?

Here's how the lovely folks at Nerd Nite HQ describe it: 

Nerd Nite is a monthly event held in more than 50 cities across the globe during which several folks give 18-21-minute fun-yet-informative presentations across all disciplines – while the audience drinks along. And there are often bands, acrobats, trivia, and other shenanigans as well.  Imagine learning about everything from math feuds or the science of the Simpsons, to the genealogy of Godzilla or debunking beer myths. Fun, right? As nerds and non-nerds like to say, Nerd Nite Is Like the Discovery Channel™…with Beer!

What Am I Presenting? 

The three easy steps to create Star Trek's utopian future! Here's a sneak peak:

On April 5th, 2063, humans make first contact with Vulcans and usher in an era of peace. Poverty, disease, and war are eliminated and humanity commits to peaceful exploration of the stars. So, with less than 50 years to go, what would it take to make Star Trek’s utopian future a reality? It’s simple – all we have to do is end prejudice, foster global cooperation, and develop empathy for aliens. This presentation will outline how we can make it so.

Be There and Be Square!

Join me and boldly go where many nerdlings have gone before! 

Friday September 13, 2013
Presentations begin at 8pm ($15 – doors at 6:30pm)
Galapagos Art Space
16 Main Street, DUMBO Brooklyn
A/C train to High Street or F train to York Street

For more details, visit Nerd Nite.

The Wolverine Searches for Meaning, Avoids Fun (Non-Spoiler Film Review)

I was first introduced to Wolverine through the early 1990s X-Men: The Animated Series. I thought he had the coolest mutant power and loved how he always did what he thought was best (even if Cyclopes hated the idea). The first comic book I bought was Wolverine (issue #67, "Valley O'Death!"). When X-Men: Children of the Atom came out in arcades, I spent countless hours (and quarters) mastering Wolverine’s “berserker barrage”. Looking back, Wolverine was an essential ingredient in my origin story as a geek.

Did my nostalgia for Wolvie set me up for unrealistic expectations for his new movie, The Wolverine? Nope, his last solo adventure, X-Men Origins: Wolverine, was so bad that it completely destroyed any hope I had of seeing a good Wolverine story on the big screen. I went into this film expecting nothing.

Logan travels to Japan in The Wolverine.

To my surprise, I enjoyed a lot of The Wolverine. It was refreshing to see a movie take place entirely in Japan (with a little bit of Canada) and feature a predominantly Asian cast. Compared to the rest of this summer’s genre films, The Wolverine has better representation of women (3 female leads who speak to each other and kick ass). It met the needs of fans by including major threads from the comics while also making the movie accessible to anyone who hasn't seen a X-Men film.

What I enjoyed most was Logan’s internal struggle. His mutant power is superhuman healing. Combine that with an adamantium reinforced skeleton and our hero is nearly indestructible. The film explores how such abilities impact Wolverine’s psychology. Since pain and fear have no consequences for him, we see Logan habituate to these feelings. This leads Logan to become impulsive, quickly reacting to threats without any concern about what might happen to him (because nothing ever happens to him). Since Wolverine is constantly losing those he loves (because he outlives them), his only source of meaning is his quest for enduring justice. This film challenges Logan by stripping him of his purpose in life. Seeing Wolverine go through this as a psychological ronin gave the film surprising depth and reminded me of some of the ideas raised in Viktor Frankl’s seminal work - Man’s Search for Meaning . 

Yukio stole almost every scene she was in.

Unfortunately, the rest of the film is shallow. The villains bored me (I've been spoiled by Benedict Cumberbatch’s John Harrison from Star Trek Into Darkness). Besides one fight on a train, the action was uninspired. Remember that epic Wolverine/samurai battle you played out in your head as a kid? Yeah, it never happens.

It's sad that this film will be mostly remembered for its post-credits setup for next year’s X-Men: Days of Future Past. Wolverine consumed my imagination as a kid and I'd like to see him done with the same attention to detail as my adult obsession - Batman. That probably won't happen anytime soon. I'll just wait for the next X-Men movie, for which I now have enormously inflated fanboy expectations.

Rating: 6.5/10

AV Club had a nice take on the film, calling it the only standalone superhero movie of the season. However, I agreed most with NPR's more critical review (but watch out for minor spoilers). 

The Psychology of Star Trek VS. Star Wars: Episode II at San Diego Comic Con 2013 (Recap)

Last week, Dr. Andrea Letamendi and I brought our popular intergalactic scifi battle, The Psychology of Star Trek Versus Star Wars, to San Diego Comic Con. We were joined by special guest panelists John Champion (Mission Log: A Roddenberry Star Trek Podcast) and Bryan Young (StarWars.com) with Brian Ward once again serving as referee.

While Episode I of the debate focused on heroes, villains, and androids, for Episode II we expanded to broader themes of emotions, humanity, morality, inclusion, and galactic governments.

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If you couldn’t make it, watch to the full panel and check out some of the highlights below. Thank you Patricia Bailey for the fantastic photographs and Brian Ward for the awesome video!

Round 1: Vulcans VS. Jedi

Vulcan and Jedi culture both harness emotions. Which path leads to a healthier way of life?

Andrea: The Jedi are doing it right...they’re regulating their emotions. They’re using their ability to cultivate and embrace positive emotions for pro-social reasons. They do experience negative emotions like anger, hate, fear...if you operate on those negative emotions it leads to the dark side which could be antisocial behavior. They manage negative emotions, they don’t totally avoid them. They recognize them, identify them, and then manage them. Whereas the Vulcan folk…Vulcans? The Vulcan folk…

Ali: They’re a species, Andrea, they’re not a folk.

Andrea: Their culture avoids and represses all emotion. We know as psychologists when you repress emotion and inhibit emotions they can build up. It makes sense that after a long time that can lead to distress. This whole Pon Far business is an example of how crazy things can get if you don’t allow yourself to experience emotions.

John: Don’t knock Pon Far until you’ve tried it! We have to understand that Vulcans are seething with emotions. They learned a long time ago to work actively to keep their emotions repressed or it would lead to their undoing. Look at all they’ve accomplished – Vulcan has never been conquered and they have advanced in sciences. And this is a theme I’m going to keep coming back to – science is greater than magic. There is some voluntary aspect to [the Vulcan way] – we know that Spock decided not to go through Kolinahr, found out it wasn’t for him, he had a more balanced life when he embraced his emotional side.

Bryan: When you look at Jedi versus Vulcan because they are completely different species they’re not a very good model for people to try to glean lessons from because we’re not built biologically or physiologically like they are. Jedi are human, presumably, but anybody can be a Jedi of any species. They’re much more inclusive. That line of thought is much better.

Ali: Let’s back up a second – why do we even have emotions? Emotions give us information, very quickly. Anger tells you you’ve been wronged, anxiety warns you about danger, sadness tells you that there’s been some type of loss. Here, Dr. Letamendi, is my issue with the Jedi. You just said repression is a very bad thing we shouldn’t do this. Who said this - “Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering”? One of the biggest problems we see with our patients is an intolerance of emotions, intolerance of thoughts that are aversive. The Jedi come out and say “yes, be mindful, be in the present moment, but not when it comes to negative emotions.” Vulcans have very powerful emotions. They use a logic based meditation to manage their emotions. What does that mean? I really don’t know…But here’s the thing – mindfulness, being fully in the present moment, being able to tolerate whatever thoughts and feelings you’re having good or bad is the best way to handle your emotions. There is one character in both franchises who is the embodiment of mindfulness – it’s not a Jedi, it’s not a Vulcan, his name is Captain Jean-Luc Picard.

Round 2: Borg VS. Sith

The Borg and Sith – which villain is a greater threat to humanity?

Ali: A threat, anxiety, or danger tells us two things – there’s uncertainty somewhere and our lives are in danger. No one represents that better than the Borg. They’re complete uncertainty. We don’t know what they’re going to adapt to, you don’t know where they're going to come from, what they’re going to be doing. We’ve seen Borg in real life – losing all sense of identity and independence, we’ve done it to ourselves. They were called lobotomies. We thought you take people with extreme mental illness, you cut off part of their frontal lobe, and now suddenly they’re behaving fine – but they were complete zombies, they weren’t able to do anything.  There’s nothing more terrifying than that, taking away our sense of humanity, the very part of ourselves that is so different and unique from every other animal species.

John: The Borg are relentless. There is no stopping them. If you stop some, they will make more and come after you. They will come after you in different guise because they can assimilate any species with any characteristics. That is terrifying. It doesn’t matter who you are, what you’ve got, they’re going to assimilate you. No matter what, they’re coming after you. In the process they strip away your humanity, your individuality, everything that makes you you in order to become a cog in a machine. I’ll finalize this again by saying science…greater than magic.  

Bryan: How many movies ended with the Borg winning? As a species, we’re very very excellent with dealing with acute threats to our society. The Star Trek movie is a good example of how we meet the threat of the Borg. The problem with the Sith is they are absolutely insidious and from behind the scenes are decaying our society or any society they are involved in from within. When you have them making these moves we can’t see, making slow incrementally steps toward our doom, when they finally react with order #66 no one is prepared whatsoever. It’s a much more insidious threat and I say that with no pun intended whatsoever.

John: Tell that to the guys from Wolf 359.

Bryan: Oh you mean like Sisko? He seemed to come out of that okay. And the force, just because we don’t have an explanation for it doesn’t mean it’s magic.

Ali: Isn’t the explanation…midichlorians?

Bryan: Midichlorians are a microscopic life form that allows the Jedi or people attuned to them to better communicate with the force.

Ali: What does that mean?!?

Bryan: Do you want to know what a symbiotic life form is, Doctor?

Andrea: Let me piggyback on what everyone is saying. Of course the Borg are a major threat by assimilating entire cultures and societies. When it comes to humanity, that is the biggest threat. However, the Sith not only are operating on anger and hate but it consumes the individual. You have this individual destruction of humanity. If someone were to say the destruction of an individual does not impact humanity well it can because as you can see Anakin can wipe out an entire Tusken raider village just based on anger.

Round 3: "Let them die" VS. "Wipe them out"

A direct order to kill all the Jedi versus a passive suggestion to let the Klingons die - what are these two guys going through and what’s the difference between them?

Andrea: Some can argue that there isn’t really a difference whether it’s active or passive. It’s still genocide. Is [letting the Klingons die] really any different from order 66 or destroying Alderaan? If you want to talk about morality, that decision-making sounds the same to me and makes me wonder about this character Kirk, it’s an inconsistency with someone who is supposed to be a hero.

Bryan: With Kirk and the death of the Klingons, he’s obviously a very damaged individual. Sidious is after power, we understand that, but Kirk has a petty vendetta for the death of a son that he didn’t even care about or know about until six months before his death. For that he wants to avenge himself against all Klingons. He’s not a balanced individual at all.

John: There’s an important piece of context here that we’re missing – Sidious, the angry old emperor who goes around being angry (that is he job), we can pretty much say that’s the expected reaction out of him. If he wants somebody to die he will kill them. Most of you remember the scene of the emperor at the end of Return of the Jedi when he’s just shooting lighting out of his hands because that’s what he’s good at. But here’s the important thing about Kirk - Kirk has not only spent a lifetime chasing Klingons around the galaxy because they were the threat at a certain time but they also killed his son. Of course that’s going to damage his perspective of the Klingons. But Kirk learns from experiences. Kirk has a team around him, particularly with McCoy and Spock and the rest of the crew, opinions that he trusts. Even though he says, “Let them die” it’s immediately Spock who puts him back in line and says, “Only Nixon could go to China”. If anyone here can make a difference it has to be you. [Kirk] makes the idea of galactic peace his single driving point in that movie - that’s admirable.

Ali: A lot of this is in how we see the situation. When you’re driving down the freeway and someone cuts you off you’re like, “oh that guy is a bastard” right? But when you do the exact same thing you’re like, “oh I’m so sorry, I’m in a hurry”. It’s a concept in psychology called the self-serving bias. When it’s stuff about us or people we like we make situational explanations – I cut someone off because I’m in a hurry. When someone else does something, we say it’s that person’s fault. A lot of what we’re seeing here has to do with how we see these characters and whether we like them or not. We all like Kirk so we’re making a situational observation – it’s not really genocide. It’s like Batman– “I’m not going to kill you, but I don’t have to save you”. It’s kinda the same thing. We’re rationalizing in our head and not seeing it as murder or genocide. And just like [John] said, Kirk actually goes and tries to save [the Klingons].

Bryan: I think this is totally slanted toward Kirk – you guys need to defend Kirk and you guys need to defend the actions of Darth Sidious.

Round 4: Quark's Bar VS. Mos Eisley Cantina

Which of these franchises dealt with inclusion and diversity better?

Ali: We’ve got this idea in Star Trek – “infinite diversity in infinite combinations”. This idea pervades all of Star Trek. What’s the psychology of infinite diversity in infinite combinations? We know exactly how you overcome prejudice. There was a great meta-analysis which basically means a big study of a bunch of studies that have been done, about 500 to be specific. What they found is overcoming prejudice comes down to three things: 1) learning information about another group of people; 2) having exposure to another group of people; 3) developing empathy for other people. We saw this happen in America with desegregation and there are fantastic Star Trek episodes about this. There’s a Next Generation episode called “The Enemy” where Geordi and a Romulan are trapped on a planet. They’re supposed to be these enemies but they learn about each other and develop empathy for each other and overcome their prejudice. There are so many episodes that go on and on about this. That’s strike number one against Star Wars. Strike two comes in representation. What we see in Star Trek is breaking these barriers of inclusion. Star Trek had an African-American female and an Asian-American male, characters that wouldn’t be seen on other shows, doing important things. Going on to Star Trek: The Next Generation you have Beverly Crusher serving as the doctor, Deep Space Nine has the first African-American Captain, and Voyager with the first female Captain. However, here is a strike against Star Trek. I don’t normally debate against Trek but I have to do this. Here is where Star Trek has failed. Where is the LGBT Star Trek character? We're about 30 years too late on this. That’s an absolute failure. I don’t hold Star Wars to the standards because they only have six movies while we have over 500 hours of produced Star Trek. The time has come, a long time ago, for a LGBT character on Star Trek – it’s the final frontier of inclusion that we have to cross.

Andrea: In the Federation flagship, where are all the aliens? Most of them are human. You’ve got one Vulcan who can pass as a human, and they’ve covered his ears up to pass him as human. Whereas in Star Wars you have a lot of different aliens and species in positions of power and influence. You have Yoda, Yaddle, Mon Mothma, Admiral Ackbar. In the context of the Star Wars universe you have fantastic diversity across aliens and planets. What I like about that it doesn’t stop to tell you a story [about people with] half a face painted white and half a face painted black, it shows you that these different types of people are actually coexisting and doesn’t have an explanation for it. Maybe that’s what the future is like.

John: Producing TV is very different than producing movies. When you get into movies you have more truly alien characters. There are Federation ships based on Earth that have primarily human crews, there are Federation ships from Vulcan with primarily Vulcan crews, there is crossover and we don’t always get to see all of that. Let me point out something about these images you’ve chose Brian – like a lot of different bars and restaurants Quark’s looks very inviting on Deep Space Nine with all kinds of species and creatures from everywhere. I’m a little worried that on the Cantina I run a very high risk of losing a limb or being shot. And I believe if I could quote directly from that scene – “He doesn’t like you. I don’t like you either”. This is not the most welcoming way to bring people into a bar. Star Trek is about diversity, about humans and any other species growing beyond their limitations and embracing diversity.

Bryan: One thing I would say about the bars is that you’re looking at two very different classes of clientele that come into these bars. You’ve got Tatooine which is at the ass end of space. It’s literally the worst place in the galaxy. Obi-Wan tells Luke before he goes in, “this place is awful, we really have to go here but we shouldn’t be going here.” Quark’s is an affluent bar with clientele full of well educated science officers which isn’t terribly representative of the general populous in the United States whatsoever. The cantina is a ruff and tumble blue-collar hangout. It’s more charming. I mean look at the bar McCoy went into in Star Trek: III - that’s the epitome of terrible bars.

Brian: Why are we arguing about bars?

Ali: It’s late on a Friday.

John: Yeah.

Ali: I will say that DS9 is on the new frontier. Julian Bashir went there because he wanted to practice frontier medicine. It is out there, no one wants to be there.

Bryan: Except for all those Starfleet officers like Bashir.

Ali: Yes, besides him no one wants to be there.

Round 5: Federation VS. Empire

The United Federation of Planets versus the Galactic Empire – what is the psychology of each government?

Andrea: Do we have two hours for this question?!? Psychologically speaking, there are some important reasons why the Empire would be more realistic. So if you’re sitting here thinking how would they be able to execute order 66, how are these people able to blow up an entire planet, what is the psychology behind that? Has anyone heard of the Stanford Prison Experiment? So I don’t have to go through all that but you know there is this idea in psychology of deindividuation – masks and helmets that influence the ability for others to recognize you. When you have anonymity you are more likely to engage in transgressions, abnormal behavior, and sometimes aggressive behavior. It’s not just anonymity but also being in an organized group [versus] a weaker alliance of those who cannot protect themselves.

Bryan: Both series are really good at showing us something that we need to learn. Star Trek is really good at showing us how we can be our best when we put aside greed and capitalism and pursue what’s highest among us as a species. I think that’s admirable. But I think it’s a little pie in the sky. The Empire illustrates something that is much darker but more realistic. The Empire maneuvers with moneyed interests, with lobbying efforts, with all of these horrible things that we’re watching playing out in the news day after day. Regardless of who is in power, there is a giant machine working behind the scenes to benefit them and to harm us. The lessons learned there with how the Empire is portrayed and how you watch the best of intentions of someone like Anakin Skywalker turning into the evil Darth Vader is a much more valuable lesson. It’s nice to see what we can achieve but it’s also important to learn how we can [avoid] the path to evil.

John: What you just said reminded me of the opening crawl of [Star Wars:] Episode I and as soon as they started talking about taxation my eyes rolled into the back of my head. There is something about the Empire that is absolutely terrifying and appeals to a authoritarian streak so I guess if you totally devalue your individuality and really have an hankering for oppression then sign up for the Empire today - they have some lovely white armor. The Federation is modeled after the establishment of the United Nations. There can be a better future where we can celebrate diversity, we can maintain individuality and cultural identity, and we can also work together for the bigger things that are worth working towards.

Ali: I really loved what Bryan said – they’re both very complimentary to each other. They’re both in extremes but they’re both important messages and they’re two sides of the same coin. Who here has seen Trek Nation? Everyone go watch it on Netflix. Rod Roddenberry, the son of Gene Roddenberry, did this fantastic documentary. He interviews George Lucas and it’s a fantastic interview because George Lucas talks about how much he liked Star Trek until he got to the point where he couldn’t say he liked Star Trek because he did Star Wars. There’s also an interview with Gene Roddenberry talking about how much he liked Star Wars. These are two very complimentary stories about the Federation and the Empire. When you look at the Empire, just like Andrea was saying, obedience to authority and the Stanley Milgram’s shock experiment is definitely playing out here. You also have a lot of conformity – there is a reason why all the stormtroopers where white. Going back to Star Trek, one big psychological idea is superordinate goals. There is a classic study in psychology, the type of stuff we can’t do anymore because now we have institutional reviews boards that say this stuff unethical, but there was a psychologist who got kids and made them hate each other. And there was violence and aggression and all of that. Then, on of the later days, he made them work together on a goal that they couldn’t achieve separately. They had to collaborate. When they were forced to work on a superordinate goal, those problems of prejudice, violence, and conflict they all disappeared. That’s the United Federation of Planets. It’s focusing on these big goals that we need a lot of people to contribute to and work to achieve. That’s why the Vulcans, humans, Tellarites, and Andorians all came together to form the Federation. Both [stories] work together and are important.

Q & A

Photo by Patricia Bailey.

Since our panel was the last of the day, the convention staff were very generous and allowed us to go over our allotted time. This gave us an unprecedented 20 minutes for a dialogue with the audience on topics such as family relationships, why LGBT characters haven’t been included in Star Trek, racism via Ferengi and Jar Jar Binks (including an epic defense of Jar Jar by Bryan), the “magic” of Q, an obligatory evoking of Doctor Who, and the developmental psychology of Data. After our panel’s very own redshirt moment, the highlight of this discussion was the last question, from friend of the panel Lowen Baumgarten, which ended things on a wonderful note:

Lowen: One of my favorite moments in Star Wars is when Han Solo swivels around and says “Now I owe you one”. One of my favorite moments from Star Trek is when they all go camping together in Yosemite…and then the rest of the movie is awful. Which franchise do you think does friendship better?

[Panel is speechless]

Bryan: Luke Skywalker in the Empire Strikes Back. He’s training on Dagobah. He’s told that the entire fate of the galaxy is on his shoulders. If he leaves, because he sees a vision of his friends hurt, the entire galaxy will unravel almost undoubtedly. And he says, “You know what? My friends are more important.”

Ali: Captain Kirk is climbing a mountain. Spock has super-powered shoes. Kirk is falling and is caught by Spock. They’re reminiscing about it as they’re eating McCoy’s brandy beans and Kirk says, “I knew I wasn’t going to die today because I knew my friends were here.” And then he dies with Picard, and they’re not friends, so it holds up in continuity.

Episode III

Team Wars won this round, tying the series 1-1. We hope to continue the debate with Episode III at 2014's WonderCon or San Diego Comic Con. Got a topic you want to see us debate? Sound off in the comments below.