The Big Picture
- "The High Ground" episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation was banned in the UK due to its casual support for violence and references to the Irish Unification.
- The episode portrays the Ansata separatists sympathetically, even though they target civilians, highlighting American popular culture's tendency to portray insurgents sympathetically.
- The episode features the return of Dr. Crusher and attempts to maintain a balanced judgment towards both sides of the conflict, but the plot details make it artificial and lack nuance.
Stardate -332921.4 (1990 on Earth's calendar). The British Empire has long been on the wane, while its former colony, the United States of America, is near the height of its global dominance. American television is watched all over the world. Star Trek: The Next Generation, a more cerebral sequel to the original 1960s space opera, debuts in the United Kingdom on BBC2. During the show's original run, every episode will air in Britain, except for one — the Season 3 episode, titled "The High Ground."
Why was this episode singled out? Politics. In "The High Ground," crew members of the Enterprise are taken hostage by a guerrilla separatist movement known as the Ansata. Lieutenant Data (Brent Spiner) compares the violent methods of the Ansata to other political movements from Earth's history that successfully used terrorism to achieve their goals. The list includes the "Irish Unification of 2024," which the writers, of course, made up. Though it seems like a throwaway line, if you know anything about the historic conflict between the Irish and the English, you understand the subtext. In 2024, the British will lose control of Northern Ireland, which controversially remained a part of the United Kingdom even after the rest of the island gained its independence in 1922. And, if the prediction holds, it won't be peaceful.
Star Trek: The Next Generation
TV-PGActionAdventure Sci-FiDramaSet almost 100 years after Captain Kirk's 5-year mission, a new generation of Starfleet officers sets off in the U.S.S. Enterprise-D on its own mission to go where no one has gone before.
- Release Date
- September 26, 1987
- Cast
- Patrick Stewart , Jonathan Frakes , Brent Spiner , Marina Sirtis , LeVar Burton , Gates McFadden , michael dorn
- Seasons
- 7
Which Episode of 'Star Trek: The Next Generation' Was Banned?
The episode begins with the Enterprise arriving at Rutia IV, a planet that is not a member of the Federation (in this case, the Star Trek universe's version of NATO) but is a frequent trade partner. The Enterprise is bringing medical supplies because the planet is suffering from regular clashes between the Ansata separatist movement and Rutian security forces. While series stars Data, Lieutenant Worf (Michael Dorn), and Dr. Beverly Crusher (Gates McFadden) are in a Rutian café, an Ansata bomb goes off, injuring many. The bomb turns out to be a ruse meant to lure Dr. Crusher away from her crew, and the Ansata capture her both because they need a doctor to tend their wounded, and they want to use her as a bargaining chip. Over the rest of the episode, we see both sides of the conflict. The Ansata are portrayed sympathetically, even though it is often implied (but never made explicit) that they deliberately target civilians.
In America, it has rarely, if ever, been politically acceptable to support the use of any kind of political violence other than what is state-sanctioned and conducted by the military. Ironically, American popular culture has routinely drawn sympathetic portrayals of insurgents — even terrorists who target civilians — so long as they are sincere in their devotion to their cause. So, while conservative political commentator Bill Maher's show Politically Incorrect was canceled immediately after he argued that the terrorists who carried out 9/11 were "not cowardly," the even more conservative fictional TV show 24 regularly portrayed terrorists as fearless, and it was never considered controversial. As easy as it is to understand why British broadcasters would find Star Trek's casual support for violence in their country, "The High Ground" was well within the norm for American fictional representations of terrorism.
Dr. Crusher Comes Back for "The High Ground"
"The High Ground" is the first Star Trek: The Next Generation episode to feature Dr. Crusher since the character was cut from the show for the whole of Season 2, and Gates McFadden gets to be a badass here. The primary storyline is her ideological sparring with her captor, Kiryl Finn (Richard Cox), the leader of the Ansata separatists. Even though neither can allow themselves to get too close, there's an undeniable bond of mutual respect between the two. However, it's clearly not romantic on Crusher's part — when Captain Picard(Patrick Stewart) becomes a hostage with her, it's Finn who nearly confesses his feelings.
Meanwhile, Commander Riker (Jonathan Frakes) works with the head of the Rutian security forces to find and rescue Dr. Crusher. In both storylines, the writers try and maintain a balanced judgment towards both parties to the conflict, but it's not very effective. Rather than choose a side or find a middle ground, the show just uses a flood of plot details to muddy the waters. So, the Ansata did blow up a bus full of children, but only because they tragically mistook it for a military transport. The Rutians used to murder Ansata sympathizers in secret prisons, but their newest director of security is not as oppressive (although she does arrest children). These mutually exonerating plot details feel artificial, especially since we never even really find out what the root cause of the Ansata's desire for independence is, or why it was denied. When Picard tells Data that it's "only human" to be confused by the gray areas around asymmetrical warfare, it feels cowardly, rather than nuanced. (Data doesn't seem all that confused, to be honest.)
Nevertheless, despite the literal text, the show, in its heart, sympathizes with Kyril Finn. The character is layered and tragic, a man who clearly would not have resorted to a life of violence if he had any other options. His criticism of the Federation is surprisingly pointed, and the writers have no answer to it other than to cut to commercial.
'Star Trek: The Next Generation's Banned Episode Seems to Sympathize With the IRA
By no means did Star Trek: The Next Generation need to have Data use such a raw example of a country where terrorists would soon be successful in achieving their goals. The writers could have made up anything. It will never be clear if they were trying to be provocative or just weren't particularly culturally sensitive — in the American fashion. 1990 was still the period of time known as the Troubles, when groups like the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) were using violence to try and compel the British to withdraw from Northern Ireland, with a violent response from the British that has itself been called "state terrorism."
In 1989, a bomb planted by the IRA at the Royal Marines School of Music killed 11 people. Some have interpreted the entire Next Generation episode as a ham-fisted allegory for the Troubles, but this analysis does not feel quite right. It's more that, during the 1990s, the violence perpetrated by groups like the Irish Republican Army was the first thing an American audience associated with terrorism. The movies could not get enough of the conflict, from dramas like The Crying Game and In the Name of the Father to action movies like The Devil's Own and Patriot Games. But more often than not, these movies were just mining the conflict for an easy and familiar source of drama.
'Star Trek: The Next Generation's Biggest Cliffhanger Changed Television Forever
These three episodes dared to do something new, and it paid off.An edited version of the episode aired during the '90s, with the conversation between Data and Picard cut out. Meanwhile, the Troubles are considered to have ended with the Good Friday Agreement in 1998. In 2007, the unedited episode was aired on British television and screened as part of an Arts Festival in Belfast. Now, the original censorship is looked back on as a historical oddity. Meanwhile, the possibility of Irish unification being accomplished through a referendum is beginning to seem a little more likely. Betting sites, who allow wagering on political outcomes, currently have set the odds of Irish reunification happening before 2030 at 4 to 1, and in 2024 — the precise year of Data's prediction — at 100 to 1. Most would agree that if there is a vote for reunification, it will not have been achieved through terrorism, as apparently happened in the Star Trek timeline.
Star Trek: The Next Generation is available to stream on Paramount+ in the U.S.
