If you’re active on social media you’ve probably heard the news about Fox News host Emily Compagno proudly declaring that Star Wars is too woke and that’s why she’s a Trekkie. Here’s a youtube video of the whole segment with Emily Compagno’s comment at the end. It’s unclear what led her to this conclusion but today, let’s break down what exactly she was talking about. 

This all started with Disney announcing Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, a two-time Oscar-winning Pakistani-born woman, will be heading the newest installment of the Star Wars franchise. Some people were already pretty upset about this complaining about her lack of experience with Star Wars and science fiction as a whole.

After her role as director was announced Obaid-Chinoy made a comment saying that it’s about time a woman directed a Star Wars movie. This of course angered many of the more conservative Star Wars fans, however what really got people riled up was a quote of hers that Matt Walsh dug up. He posted the below clip on his X account of her saying that one of the goals of her movies is to “make men uncomfortable.”

For context, Obaid-Chinoy’s entire career as an activist and filmmaker has focused on gender inequality in her home country, Pakistan. The two Academy Awards she won were for short documentaries she made about women in Pakistan facing acid attacks and honor killings at the hands of men. The clip Matt Walsh dug up is from 8 years ago where she is talking about one of her documentaries.

All that is to say, some Star Wars fans were livid about all of this, some calling this the death of Star Wars. Of course, Fox News show Outnumbered had to get in on all the action. For the most part they repeated a lot of the things that have been said on social media, also speaking about how Star Wars is “a franchise geared towards men.”

The segment ended with Compagno, a woman on the Outnumbered panel, saying, “And that’s why I’m a Trekkie and not Star Wars,” and then proceeding to do a BACKWARDS Vulcan salute.

While I could spend this article talking about how Star Trek has been “woke” from its beginning, with the Prime Directive being a direct commentary on the Vietnam War, or the fact that Star Trek featured the first ever interracial kiss, I’ll let Fox News do that for you, as just last year they released an op-ed about how Star Trek is too woke.

Star Trek has always been, and always will be, a progressive franchise. The very foundation of the Federation is inherently socialist, with the abolition of currency and universal basic rights (theoretically) provided to all citizens. To remove the “wokeness” from Star Trek is to remove the foundations of the Federation itself. Anyone who says classic Trek was never progressive, at least for its time, serves as evidence for the death of media literacy.