We Love the Women That Fandom Hates: Gaila, day 1
What is Gaila’s history?
Well, that depends a lot on which series you take as canon. Is Orion society male dominated, with enslaved women? Are the women really in charge and using pheromones to control men of many species and reduce competition?
With the reboot, Word of God tells us that she could have escaped through some sort of “underground railroad,” suggesting that the writers were taking the view that Orion females were in fact slaves and not in control.
So we have a young woman who escapes a life of sexual slavery and makes her way to Starfleet Academy. Who knows what she’s seen or had done to her (and an edit, what she has done to other people, since I can't imagine a society based on sexual slavery for women is one where these women all cooperate and support each other all the time). And we know that she works with computers and has access to important systems, which is how Kirk hacked the Kobayashi Maru. And we know that she is not happy that she's been used in such a way.
There isn’t a ton there, which means that most of how fandom deals with Gaila is through our own inferences and imaginations. Which I’ll talk about tomorrow!
Well, that depends a lot on which series you take as canon. Is Orion society male dominated, with enslaved women? Are the women really in charge and using pheromones to control men of many species and reduce competition?
With the reboot, Word of God tells us that she could have escaped through some sort of “underground railroad,” suggesting that the writers were taking the view that Orion females were in fact slaves and not in control.
So we have a young woman who escapes a life of sexual slavery and makes her way to Starfleet Academy. Who knows what she’s seen or had done to her (and an edit, what she has done to other people, since I can't imagine a society based on sexual slavery for women is one where these women all cooperate and support each other all the time). And we know that she works with computers and has access to important systems, which is how Kirk hacked the Kobayashi Maru. And we know that she is not happy that she's been used in such a way.
There isn’t a ton there, which means that most of how fandom deals with Gaila is through our own inferences and imaginations. Which I’ll talk about tomorrow!