10 Times Star Trek Went Woke

Plato's Stepchildren is an infamous episode. It contains 'The Kiss' - a moniker that audiences will immediately associate with William Shatner and Nichelle Nichols embracing. Though theirs was not the first interracial kiss on television, nor even the first interracial kiss in Star Trek, it has become the legacy of the show.

However, a far superior moment of 'woke' storytelling, when one remembers that Kirk and Uhura are forced into this kiss, occurs in the discussions around Alexander. He is the lone Platonian without psychokinetic powers thanks to his genetic dwarfism, thus leaving him a servant to his peers.

The episode displays Kirk assuring Alexander that in Starfleet, no one is judged based on their size, shape, or colour. The episode depicts the Platonians' abilities stemming from ingesting a rare substance. This substance is processed by the pituitary hormones, while Alexander's hormones are unable to do the same. 

Those Platonians who subjected Alexander to torment did nothing to earn their powers; they are no better than him. This is the crux of the story. Kirk and Spock both ingest the kironide and meet the Platonians on their playing field. 

Alexander leaves with the Enterprise by the episode's end, presumably to live a long and productive life in the Federation. While there again remains elements of 'the grass is greener' when it comes to Starfleet, here Alexander's story is one of the more successful attempts to discuss 'there but for the grace of'.