“What’s that, sir?” I humbly say before his big giant head in the sky, “Uhhhh… may I ask, what does God want with a starship?”

Courtesy of Murray Spiegel, one of the authors.

Because if he does, it must simply be an observance of cultural heritage for him rather than a belief system, because over the years Shatner has made no secret of the fact that he’s an agnostic — he does not know or believe for a fact that God exists and whether or not there is an afterlife.

Star Trek V and his novel Believe both reflect this personal quest/quandary.

While your points are well-taken, Posts 14, 21, 29 are just the rantings of yet another snarky pseudointellectual snob that are best ignored.

Peace. Live long and prosper.
The Vulcanista }:-|

“I’m not saying that the poster #14/19 is mean-spirited.”

So, Mary Jane, you are telling everyone else it doesn’t matter what you say, only how you say it. This, in a nutshell, is Political Correctness. It doesn’t matter that Poster 14 may not have been a mean-spirited racist. It only matters that Poster 14 didn’t attend Linguistic Semiotics 101 in a university classroom or in the context of a (very late) night course taught by blogosphere snarks.

I imagine Star Trek writers didn’t translate “p’taq” because it is a unique word from the Klingon language, the defining nuances of which would be lost in translation to English, indicating the lowliness of the person to whom it is directed. Much like Poster 14 didn’t translate “shmegegge” because it is a unique word from the Yiddish language, the defining nuances of which would be lost in translation to English, indicating the person to whom it is directed is “an unadmirable, ***petty*** person” (1st definition listed under the entry “shmegegge” in Leo Rosten’s _The_Joys_of_Yiddish_, added asterisks mine).

BTW, what’s the reference to William Shatner’s Jewish practices being “cultic”? All the sudden Moses isn’t leading the Jews from Egyptian slavery; rather, he’s leading them in drinking the special Kool-Aid mix in South America? How charitably modern of you. You know, you could have said “religious” and dispensed with the condescension.

Also, what’s with the periods after every disgust-laden word?

“I know the vocabulary. I hear it regularly. In many disguises. Contrastive. Derisive. Exclusive.”

Are you trying to *appropriate* Captain Kirk’s way of speaking?

I guess you’re right, a scan is wrong. But a quote is fine, as far as I know, if not for the whole 4, maybe for one. Or something like that…