For example, the Federation’s founding members (Tellarites, Andorians, Vulcans, Humans) were the subject of fan theories and “fanon” for many years before the ENT writers made it official. One of the interesting (and fun) aspects of this recent wave of series has been seeing the writers increasingly add nods to fan theories and pieces of fanon lore over the years. What are some good examples of this?
And relatedly: what’s a fan theory, or piece of fanon, that you suspect the current writers believe, even if they haven’t explicitly stated it on-screen?
Although there is a point to be made that the word is only comfortable to people now that it has been sufficiently diluted to mean “government welfare” or “being nice to minorities” instead of having the entirety of Marxist philosophy, historical & dialectical materialism, revolutionary efforts for another economic system attached to it.
Since we do not see “Federation corporations”, we can still assume it might be a socialist society, but it definitely does not follow the traditional socialist structures like democratic centralism or having any kind of workers’ control over what is happening. It’s still a representative presidential democracy modeled after the US out of all things, with no regional, local or economic councils to speak of.