"The Omega Glory" is the twenty-third episode of the second season of the American science fiction television series Star Trek.
After a Yang attack, Spock investigates the field of battle and finds evidence that Tracey has been helping the Kohms, in violation of the Prime Directive.
Kirk tries to contact the Enterprise, but is prevented by Tracey, who tries to justify his violation by revealing that the planet’s natives are not only immune to the mysterious disease, but have also developed lifespans of over 1000 years.
Tracey orders McCoy to investigate the secret of their longevity and has Kirk and Spock locked up in a crude jail with two Yang prisoners, one male and one female.
Spock is reunited with McCoy, and modifies some medical equipment, turning it into a makeshift communicator, but Tracey discovers this and destroys it.
This hypothesis is confirmed when William produces a very old American flag, along with ancient documents from which he recites the Pledge of Allegiance in a garbled accent.
According to author Daniel Leonard Bernardi in his book, Star Trek and History: Race-ing Toward a White Future: "Like the Federation, the Comms [sic] have full command of the English language (although they speak with a homogenized 'Asian' accent).
In fact, the episode not only reveals an unwillingness to be critical of the hegemony of racist representations, but also systematically participates in the stereotyping of Asians.
This more hegemonic articulation of race is made evident when Kirk and Spock realize the extent to which the Yangs and Comms parallel Earth's civilizations.
[2]Allan W. Austin, Professor of History at Misericordia University, writes that this episode ... consciously and unconsciously reflected a number of deep American anxieties that grew out of more than two decades of the Cold War.
This unthinking patriotism had coalesced as part of a liberal consensus grounded in confidence in the essential soundness of American society as well as the assumption of a pervasive communist threat to the U.S. and its allies.
Many supporters of the liberal consensus believed that economic growth and development would solve any remaining social inequalities while damping class conflict.
"[4] In "The Omega Glory", a 2006 essay reflecting on stories that have tried to imagine the future, Michael Chabon says, "Eed plebnista, intoned the devolved Yankees, in the Star Trek episode 'The Omega Glory', who had somehow managed to hold on to and venerate as sacred gobbledygook the Preamble to the Constitution, norkon forden perfectunun.
[7] In 2015, Entertainment Weekly highlighted the scene where Kirk reads the United States Constitution, as one of the most important moments in that character's life.