The Golden Age of Strekdom
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| Title: | The Golden Age of Strekdom |
| Creator: | M.J. Fisher |
| Date(s): | May 1976 |
| Medium: | |
| Fandom: | Star Trek: TOS |
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| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
The Golden Age of Strekdom is a 1976 Star Trek: TOS essay by M.J. Fisher.
It was printed in Spectrum #25.
Fisher wrote many essays in "Spectrum." Some were part of a series loosely called "Fannish Thoughts," and some were standalone essays.
Some Topics Discussed
- fandom and profit, now that it was recognized that there was money to be made off of Star Trek fans, the big companies would muscle their way in
- interest in the actual television show (and possibly the then-upcoming movie: Star Trek: The Motion Picture) will invariably fade, and lose its appeal, but fanworks may keep the fandom alive
- sometime around 1990 or 1995, Star Trek fans will merge back into serious science fiction fandom where it will be come a sub cult populated by "experts and serious connoisseurs"
The Essay
One of the facts that tends to be pointedly ignored in STrekdom is that Star Trek fandom is a sort of freak, a phenomenon to be sure, but one that has only a limited lifespan. Despite the numbers of us, all we've accomplished, and our current power and status, we can only keep Star Trek alive for so long, after which STrekdom will slowly fade away. This may be beneficial to some people since we know where we'll eventually wind up. There may be factors to prolong the end, especially if the ST movie is successful and sparks a new series or set of movies-of-the-week. Even if we can keep Star Trek alive through the 1980's and survive a change in the cast with out losing the audience. Star Trek will begin to lose its appeal. By the time Star
Trek is that old, fandom will have developed to the point where it will routinely outperform the show's televised scripts. Since fandom is a democratic literary group of people and activities it will engender better and more diversified fanfic in the future. The Star Trek on the tube is held back by hundreds of network restrictions and censorship that can be totally ignored in most cases with fanfic. So, if Star Trek does, by some miracle, last into the 1980's, fandom will have far outstripped it in the race for quality.
The 1980's seems to be a reasonable estimate for the end-point of fandom. Star Trek won't carry much active enthusiasm by the end of that decade unless any new series spawned from the movie will continue to produce Hugo-quality scripts each year. The development of a new series is totally speculative however. For the purpose of examining fandom I will only go so far as to assume that the movie will be as far as we will go in getting ST back.
With this proviso a few generalities can be drawn about the future of fandom: 1) The ST movie and the large number of SF films to come out this and next year will swell fandom's ranks to their highest point ever. STW will have its work cut out for it, and the possibility of another nation-wide central fan club like S.T.A.R. is not unlikely. 2) Fannish activities will increase dramatically, more zines, more clubs, the number of professional ST books may range upwards of 40 or 50, the guest-star conventions will be almost totally run by professionals who will finally refine the stage-show con and use blitz advertising methods, and the fancons will become small, cloistered and exclusive conclaves for the meager few in fandom who can find out about them and attend. 3) The quality in fandom will reach new heights. Although there will be more dealers looking to make a fast buck, more procons raking in the $$,and more crudzines published, fandom itself will have developed enough to have tutored some truly great fanzines (of which Energize and Interphase are just the beginning) and some of the first epic pieces of fanfic. 4) Fandom will begin to diversify somewhat while at its height. Specialty areas, or sub cults in STrekdom may begin to form such as sercon groups. Kirk cults, Spock cults, Kraith cults, etc. 5)
Finally, perhaps 15-20 years beyond the death of the original series, STrekdom will begin to go downhill. Fringe and neofans will drift out completely and the remainder will merge back into SFdom from whence it originally sprung. As a sub-cult of SFdom, STrekdom will be composed of the experts and serious connoisseurs.
Lately in ST fandom there has been a preponderance of people crying gloom and doom which might lead one to suspect that fandom is becoming despotic and decaying from a corruption of morals and standards and an almost-intolerable influx of fan parasites who see the buck to be made off of the cult. In reality however this is unavoidable. Any area in which there is rapid upward growth there will also be entrepreneurs out for the $$, and fandom's own ability to educate the victims of the unscrupulous dealers can only become efficient if fandom was staying at a constant level instead of doubling every year. We will not be able to get the word out about the dealers and the procons effectively until the numbers in fandom is on the way down. By that time it may not matter much, so as bad of an image as they present of fandom to the press and as much damage as they can do, they seem an eventual part of STrekdom...something we'll have to bear.
Historians however don't always look at the evils an era produced, but more often they stress the good points, the advances made that were built upon by others at a later date. With this in mind I conclude that fandom is now entering its "golden age.' Fandom can't possibly go downhill until after the movie is out, and even if it is a flop it will continue uphill for sometime afterwards. Nothing, however, can stop us now. We have done what we set out to do and sit confidently, proudly, waiting for the turnout. Fandom will accomplish a lot in the next few years. Perhaps they will be the most fruitful years yet. Gather it all in, store it in your memory as tightly as you can. Those will be the years of fandom you'll want to remember most!