Love sometimes expresses itself in sacrifice. — Kirk, “Metamorphosis”, stardate 3220.3

Sorry… Trek is a great show and all, but for all my wishes for world peace I still find the series to be a little unrealistic. I just can’t believe that, if there happen to be like seventeen bazillion alien species out there in outer space, they’ll all end up coming together in universal harmony (even with just a few exceptions like the Klingons). I mean, we as human beings can’t even do it, and we at least remotely resemble one another. There’s next to no chance of making a connection there. Try discussing gun control with a six-eyed blue-skinned reptile who’s taller than you and you’ll see what I mean.

In a way it would be kinda cool, though, meeting beings from other worlds. I just don’t see it as very likely that we’ll get along with them. Great for movies and stories, but not so much real life. Let’s face it, the average Outworlder will probably not be a three-foot-tall brown football-headed critter with huge eyes and a penchant for Reese’s Pieces. Nor will he be a furry orangish two-legged aardvark who eats cats. (Don’t get me wrong: I’ve always enjoyed both the movie E.T. and the TV series ALF, and a host of other similar lost-friendly-spaceman stories from Hollywood and from literature.) Human beings are just not that lucky.

No, we will get that bastard-thing that burrows its way out of Sigourney Weaver’s stomach. Or the trio from Krypton who showed up in Superman II and wreaked havoc on Metropolis. Or salt-shaker-shaped metal Daleks from Doctor Who. That’s our luck. I hope I’m wrong… actually, they probably won’t want anything to do with us because they’ll be too mind-bogglingly intelligent for us to comprehend a word they say.

Either way, I know that if they ever show up I’m not counting on William Shatner to negotiate with the spaceman. Unless maybe he could reduce them to hysterical laughter with his excessive overacting.