Star Trek Factions

Star Trek built its aliens as arguments. The Vulcans are a violent people who chose logic, following Surak, and have to keep choosing it — their IDIC symbol stands for Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations. The Klingons made honour into law and then had to live inside it. The Borg are efficiency with the reason removed.

Klingons had smooth foreheads throughout The Original Series because prosthetics were beyond the budget; the ridges arrived with the first film, and Enterprise eventually explained the discrepancy in-universe rather than ignoring it. Their language is real work, built by the linguist Marc Okrand for Star Trek III with a full grammar and a dictionary.

The Romulans split from the Vulcans rather than evolving apart from them, which makes their history a schism instead of a first contact — and the Treaty of Algeron is the reason Starfleet spent a century without a cloaking device. The Cardassian Union ran a fifty-year occupation of Bajor before withdrawing and leaving the station behind. The United Federation of Planets was founded in 2161, the same year as Starfleet Academy.

Then there is the Terran Empire, which is the Federation with the argument lost: the same people, the same ships, an emblem of a sword driven through Earth.

Pick a side, or at least a shirt that says you have opinions about the Treaty of Algeron.

Officially licensed Star Trek Factions t-shirts printed on heavyweight cotton, with womens tees, long sleeves, hoodies, tank tops and youth sizes across the range.