- The [Futurama] starship Nimbus displays the hull registry number NCC-1729, incidentally also a riff on the USS Enterprise's NCC-1701.
I am an english/math student and psuedo-trekkie somewhere between the "I'm very new at this" and the "I can't wait for my soul to be devoured" phases of trekkiedom in the People's Republic of California. I mostly do minor edits, but I have been known to do complete revamps of articles for the sake of organization, accuracy, and clarity.
The Suspension of Belief[]
While I can understand the positions of those that feel the Federation has a "Mostly Just Humans" policy, there are a number of defensible reasons for this.
The Real World Television Angle[]
- Five Million Dollars per Episode This is, after all, a TV show with a somewhat limited resources. There are a number of such limitations that one must realistically ignore in such a setting, especially when said limitations are a result of the budgetary concerns.
- The Alpha Quadrant: Where Everyone Speaks English Being that this is fiction, the suspension of belief is invoked and explains major qualms with the franchise. Most are for the effective and smooth telling of the story to the screen. How does every species speak english? Who cares? Do you really want to watch twenty minutes of slow-paced translation for more than one or two episodes at a time? The cause is not always realism, people.
- Fifty Irritated Actors While ideally the next series would involve a starship whose leading officer is of an alien race and the entire crew represents fifty different alien species, this is realistically impossible and not just because of the budget. The makeup department and the principal actors would go insane from the hours of daily makeup preparation.
- People On This Planet Are Human Not Andorian, not Klingon, not Vulcan, and, with the exception of governments, not feral blood-sucking vampires from Nigel IV. I maintain that each series merely concentrates on Terran-only starships for the sake of relating to the audience and common issues about the nature of Human existence. Think about all of the thematic issues that allow themselves when there is a heavy Human concentration. Now take away TNG: "All Good Things..." and add another sixth season of Voyager. Who wants that kind of lackluster and uninteresting story being told through everybody's favorite Gene Roddenberry-created franchise?
The Canonical Angle[]
- There are vessels without many Humans... There are indications of starships that have a larger proportion of alien officers showing that the ones most commonly featured on-screen are not indicative of the fleet as a whole. Think back to that one DS9 episode (DS9: "Take Me Out to the Holosuite"). Aren't there pretty much only non-Human members aboard that vessel? Yeah. Thought so.
- ...just not a fleet's worth. There were only four founding races of the federation. These are the four that have the head start in Starfleet. Humans and Vulcans are two of them. If you want to tell me that there should be more Benzites in officer positions, be my guest. Wait for another century's of canon, though.