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Futurist Agrees With Star Trek: DS9 On Job Destruction
Futurist Thomas Frey recently predicted that more than two billion jobs would disappear by 2030, inviting us to imagine the social disruption that would ensue. Fans of the 1999 episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine entitled Past Tense have already been shown this future, which the show predicted would happen by 2026.
(Star Trek DS9 Past Tense)
A transporter accident traps Sisko Bashir and Dax in the turbulent 21st century, where massive numbers of unemployed are warehoused in filthy crime ridden ghetto-detention camps called sanctuary Districts. Sisko must assume the identity of Gabriel Bell, a martyred historical figure who was prematurely slain by protecting Siko and Bashir in order to restore the timline.
SISKO - Ever hear of the Bell Riots?
BASHIR - Vaguely.
SISKO - It was one of the most violent civil disturbances in American history. And it happened right here. San Francisco, Sanctuary District "A," the first week of September, twenty-twenty-four.
BASHIR - That's only a few days from now.
SISKO - The Sanctuary residents will take over the District. Some of the guards will be taken hostage. In the end, the government will send in troops to restore order. Hundreds of Sanctuary residents will be killed.
BASHIR (shocked) - Hundreds.And there's nothing we can do to prevent it.
BASHIR (continues) - Starfleet's temporal displacement policy may sound good in a classroom. But to know that hundreds of people are going to die, and not to be allowed to even try to save them...
SISKO - I sympathize, Doctor. But if it makes you feel any better, the Riots will be one of the watershed events of the twenty-first century...SISKO - A bad one. By the early twenty-twenties there was a place like this in every major city in the United States.
BASHIR - But why are these people in here? Are they criminals?
SISKO - No. People with criminal records weren't allowed in the Sanctuary Districts.
BASHIR - Then what did they do to deserve this?
SISKO - Nothing. They're just people. People without jobs or places to live.
BASHIR - (shocked) So they get put in here?
SISKO - Welcome to the twenty-first century.
Via Futurist Speaker; special thanks to Moira for resubmitting this story and references.
Scroll down for more stories in the same category. (Story submitted 3/3/2012)
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