I have to admit, I am still chewing over that speech. Because it seems to speak to a lot of the Doctor's inherent conflicts with privilege. On the one hand, he actively throws in with the primitive people he spends his time among—on the other hand, he's always got his "sahib-ness" hovering in the back of his mind, whether he really wants it or not. (And quite a lot of the time, he does want it; he wants the ability to command people in an emergency, no questions asked. Ten's first major moral judgment call was, "I have the right to tell you where to point your guns;" he might get to kill an attacker with a satsuma, but you don't get to kill a possible future attacker with a death ray.)
So, when you think about it, Missy really did come up with the perfect twisted birthday gift. But what intrigues me right now is that, in turning away from it, the Doctor made a speech that I sort of parsed as, "I am . . . a TOURIST!"
Because, on the one hand, tourists can be a very destructive force. But on the other hand, if the emphasis is on learning, where the Doctor put it, it can be a good thing. Travel really does broaden the mind. People who travel and interact start to see other people, rather than the "natives" or "exotics" that more insular thinkers want to believe in. And I think we'd all agree that countries with a good understanding of other people make much better choices than countries which, as a group, believe in natives and exotics. Tourism, at its best, improves the tourist, and perhaps even the tourist's society . . .
So I suppose what I'm saying is, is this possibly setting the Doctor up to be some sort of force for social change on Gallifrey?
Not sure. I'm sort of thinking as I type, here. Obviously the Doctor can't return full-time, or the show is over, but in the Classic era, there were some pretty fascinating serials dealing with Gallifreyan screw-ups politics . . . and, of course, there is precedent for having a young, brilliant, and arrogant Gallifreyan companion out learning about the universe with the Doctor . . .
no subject
I have to admit, I am still chewing over that speech. Because it seems to speak to a lot of the Doctor's inherent conflicts with privilege. On the one hand, he actively throws in with the primitive people he spends his time among—on the other hand, he's always got his "sahib-ness" hovering in the back of his mind, whether he really wants it or not. (And quite a lot of the time, he does want it; he wants the ability to command people in an emergency, no questions asked. Ten's first major moral judgment call was, "I have the right to tell you where to point your guns;" he might get to kill an attacker with a satsuma, but you don't get to kill a possible future attacker with a death ray.)
So, when you think about it, Missy really did come up with the perfect twisted birthday gift. But what intrigues me right now is that, in turning away from it, the Doctor made a speech that I sort of parsed as, "I am . . . a TOURIST!"
Because, on the one hand, tourists can be a very destructive force. But on the other hand, if the emphasis is on learning, where the Doctor put it, it can be a good thing. Travel really does broaden the mind. People who travel and interact start to see other people, rather than the "natives" or "exotics" that more insular thinkers want to believe in. And I think we'd all agree that countries with a good understanding of other people make much better choices than countries which, as a group, believe in natives and exotics. Tourism, at its best, improves the tourist, and perhaps even the tourist's society . . .
So I suppose what I'm saying is, is this possibly setting the Doctor up to be some sort of force for social change on Gallifrey?
Not sure. I'm sort of thinking as I type, here. Obviously the Doctor can't return full-time, or the show is over, but in the Classic era, there were some pretty fascinating serials dealing with Gallifreyan
screw-upspolitics . . . and, of course, there is precedent for having a young, brilliant, and arrogant Gallifreyan companion out learning about the universe with the Doctor . . .