User blog:Bookworm1138/Slavery in the Federation?

Anyone who has seen TOS' "The Menagerie" will recall the fact that Orion women were freely traded as slaves and that this was known in the Federation, as Christopher Pike considered going into the business (economy and commerce will be in a different blog).

In the United States of America, slavery is believed to be a thing ended in the 19th Century: now although certain forms of slavery do exist in the US, not to mention true slavery in other parts of the world, it is true that slavery as a legal, publicized practice in the US is dead.

According to all that is preached about the Federation, it is apparently the savior for all creatures...so why is there still slavery? Oh yes, people can assume that, by the time of TNG, slave trade is gone and Orions aren't ever sold or bought due to the "anti-monetary society" (once again, another blog for another time)...but this has never been addressed. Orions simply never appeared in any of the TNG episodes or its spin-offs. Why is that? Did the writers of TNG realize too late what had happened in TOS but, not wanting to alter the established canon, simply wrote-out the entire Orion race in order to serve their purposes?

True, one may say that, in the novels, the Orions were forced by the Federation to abolish slavery: however, this contradicts everything the Federation believes in about non-interference with alien cultures. Besides, forcing a society into conformity is one of the signs of a true tyranny... Bookworm1138 23:33, September 27, 2009 (UTC)