By sheer coincidence I ended up watching Stargate 1, Season 1 last month; not thoroughly, but my daughter’s nanny, Yacine Diouf, got really into it. Which allowed me to appreciate it differently, seeing how she really enjoyed it.

Also, I’m in Senegal, and Yacine is Senegalese. She’s not caught into all the racial paranoia that’s almost second nature in the United States. It’s good to remember that sometimes—all the time actually—a show is there to be enjoyed before it is dissected.

With that said ...

Part I looked at the most evident imbalance in SG1 S01—its overreliance on colonial and racialized stereotypes. Yet, a number of cultures are depicted throughout the first season, some alien and some human. Part II proposes to look at a select few and how they further colonial and neocolonial propaganda. I propose to look at the Mongols, Carthaginians, and Mayans, and take a larger look at the diversity within the Go’Auld.

Episode 4—“Emancipation”—furthers the white savior trope but from an Asian perspective, Mongol in particular. The team arrives on planet Simarka and encounters an earth descendant population calling itself the Shavadai or People of the Steppe. Jackson quickly identifies them with the Chaggatai Khanate, the Central Asian portion of the Mongol empire run by Genghis Khan’s second-born son, Chaggatai[1].

Jackson refers to the Chaggatai Khanate as the Khanate that vanished. I’m not sure what is meant here, as the Chaggatai Khanate never vanished, although it is true that it was the least successful in terms of expansion, caught in the thirty-year war between Kaidu and Kublai Khan, and didn’t really shine until the rise to power of Tamerlane.

The Shavadai, like all the other human races of the universe, were transported by the Go’Auld. Theirs is a brutally misogynistic culture.

While in most societies of the time women occupied a lesser social status than men, the misogyny depicted in SG1 is somewhat exaggerated. Chengis Khan had outlawed the rape, barter, kidnapping, and selling of women. Mongol women ruled the empire during regency periods, longer than the reign of many Khans.

Anthropologist Jack Weatherford, in The Secret Histories of the Mongol Queens, contends that after he passed, his sons undid most of his laws, that The Secret History of the Mongols was redacted, and Genghis' edicts on women removed from the texts.

The Shavadai leader, Moughal, contends that the reason for their misogyny is to protect women from the Go’Auld. Moughal is no fool, he also sees how such logic works for men and tries to set an example by only having one wife, but lacks the will to openly defy tradition. He is a clear wink at Genghis. He’s somewhat of a revolutionary wishing to end tribal warfare and replace it with trade, just as Genghis had broken down tribal allegiances and opened Mongolia to the Silk Road.

Moughal is not a random name either. The Mughals, or Moghuls is derived from "Mongol" and refers specifically to the descendants of Timur who ruled over the Indian subcontinent from 1526 to 1857[2]. The English derivative is mogul.

Several things struck me about this episode. First, the anachronism. The Mongols rose to prominence in 1206 AD. There were no Mongols at the time of the first Stargate. Writers could have referenced the Xiongnu, the original steppe empire, or even further back to steppe nomads the Greeks called Scythians. I imagine the Mongols were chosen as the better-known names, and the cultures were vastly similar, but they lost an opportunity to use the show’s educative as well as entrainment potential in favor of an easy shortcut.

Second, the Shavadai speak perfect English. Besides another glaring anachronism, and the fact that they have their own language, the Shavadai are not othered in the way the Go’Auld servant worlds are arabicized. This is made all the more obvious as the team expect them to speak a “foreign” language when they arrive.

Finally, the long-standing cultural misogyny is not resolved internally, but by Samantha Carter, who defeats the enemy warlord, freeing Shavadai women who symbolically remove the veils hiding their faces as the episode ends. Culture and tradition are often impossible to shake, and it sometimes takes an outside eye to address the issue. I understand the episode as attempting to address sexism in our society through a conveniently alien culture. It is not an unlaudable effort but what remains, a western, white savior, delivering natives from their own cultural oppression, perpetuates the colonial cliches driving the show’s narrative.

In Episode 16—“Cor-Ai”—team SG1 visit a planet called Cartago, inhabited by the Byrsa people.

Cartago is the Latin (Roman) name for Carthage and Byrsa the name of a walled citadel above the harbor in ancient Carthage. We are thus clear as to what culture and time period are depicted here.

Here too, we’re faced with a glaring anachronism.

Carthage is an offshoot of Phoenician civilization, which emerged around 1050 BC in the Levant and expanded throughout the Mediterranean, establishing colonies in what is today North Africa, southern Spain and various Mediterranean islands in ferocious competition with Greek expansionism.

Carthage itself, located in modern day Tunisia, rose to prominence around 815 BC, and is most renowned for the leading general Hannibal, who engaged and lost in the Punic Wars against the Roman Republic.

The Go’Auld had long fled the planet by then. SG1 does not expand on whether the Go’Auld returned to earth after the rebellion in Egypt, or whether there were further contacts between the Go’Auld and the Tauri on Earth; so, like the other civilizations explored in SG1, one has to wonder how the Byrsa ended on an alien planet.

Carthago is clearly a post-Roman planet, as the culture presented in SG1 incorporates aspects of Latin and Judaic culture.

While individuals speak perfect English, their language is identified as a combination of Greek and-Latin, and Teal’C finds himself at the center of a religious trial called Cor-Ai, giving the episode its title.

Teal’C is presumed guilty of the killing of a Byrsa, and asked for his “pecca-ve” in Byrsa language. This is a variant of Peccavi, an archaic term in English and French expressing one’s guilt before God, from the Latin peccare, for sin.

The trial begins amusingly, challenging assumptions of the US legal system, such as the objective impossibility of impartiality. As a Byrsa leader mentions: “Only the person who has suffered understands the pain which has been inflicted” (and is therefore fit to judge the trial and determine punishment). Jackson identifies this is as “rather Talmudic”, citing the principle that “Only he who is wronged can forgive.”

Furthermore the trial opens with the victim’s son, Hanno, asking forgiveness from Teal’C for pointing a weapon at him. Teal’C forgives him. This too refers to Jewish tradition, where forgiveness is not mandatory, unless the guilty expressly begs for forgiveness (in which case forgiveness is granted.

We find ourselves here with a Mediterranean civilization with its own traditions and pantheons, assimilated entirely into the Roman colonial world linguistically, and substituted for more familiar levantine cultural markers such as Judaism, another part of the Roman colonial world, which, as much of the non-european cultures examined, are interchangeable at will.

While Carthage here isn’t othered in the way Middle Eastern and Sub-Saharan elements are throughout the show, it is erased in its uniqueness, and indeed the formidable characters that marked its history.

These anachronisms are made even more jarring, as a second Stargate is discovered on earth. One would hope that it was more recent than the gate appearing in the original movie, thus explaining why so many younger cultures and languages are sprinkled throughout the season, but guess what? It’s actually older. A lot older apparently.

Mesoamerica is introduced twice in SG1 S01: in Episode 13—“Hathor” and episode 16—“Enigma”.

In “Hathor”, a team of archeologists uncover a sarcophagus and Egyptian hieroglyphics in a Mayan temple, hosting the Goddess of fertility, inebriety, and music, Hathor, wife and daughter of the late Ra.

In “Enigma” the team encounter a planet in the midst of a volcanic meltdown, and with dying humans whom they rescue against their will: planet Tollan and its people of the same name. This is an incredibly advanced civilization, even more so than the Go’Auld, yet peaceful, and fiercely protective of their technology and its misuse by earth born humans.

It took some research to find that the Tollan are Mesoamericans. Sources vary between Mayan and Aztec, but the Tollan are in fact the descendants of the empires and kingdoms of central America.

Mayan civilization here isn’t belittled or demeaned as such, but rather it is erased in favor of a crossover with Egypt and alien connections.

Mayan civilization also gets drawn into the colonial narrative detailed by Dr. Thais Rocha da Silva in relation to Battlestar Galactica, with its pyramids often attributed to ancient aliens. While SG1 S01 doesn’t make this connection, it has happened on film before. The cult classic Alien vs Predator does just that, for instance.

One does wonder: what is it about pyramids that screams aliens? I don’t know about you, but the idea of an advanced civilization, travelling millions of light years, just to make us pile stones into triangles redefines the meaning of a cosmic joke.

Mayan civilization, and by extension Mesoamerican civilizations, are erased to favor the show’s narrative. They are not caricatured or highlighted in Eurocentric ways; rather, they do not seem to matter at all.

Unlike the Mongol who are unmistakably Asian, and even Carthaginians, whose attire positions them on the human-historical timeline, the Tollan appear ethnically diverse, but their leadership and prominent characters are of European descent, not Mesoamerican in the slightest.

The cultural diversity displayed on the show, raises the question: while the Go’Auld are presented as Egyptian gods early on (Ra, Apophis/Apep), who are the Go’Auld? Are they all this dichotomous?

Forty-nine Go’Auld are named in the Stargate Command Wiki, and ranked as either Minor (M), System Lords (SL), Supreme System Lord (SSL), Queen (Q), Planetary Lord (PL), Underlord (UL) and Unknown (U).

• 38% are Egyptian (19 total of which: 1 Supreme System Lord, 5 System Lords, 3 Queens, 5 Minor and 3 Unknown)
• 16% are Unknown[3] (8 total of which: 1 Planetary Lord, and 7 Minor)
• 10% are Sumerian (5 total of which: 2 System Lords, 1 Minor and 2 Unknown)
• 8% are Middle Eastern/North African (4 total of which: 1 System Lord, 3 Minor)
• 8% are Greek (4 total of which: 2 System Lords and 2 Minor)
• 6% are Celtic (3 total of which: 2 System Lords and 1 Minor)
• 4% are Indian (2 total of which 2 System Lords)
• 2% are Sub-saharan African (1 total of which 1 System Lord)
• 2% are Chinese (1 total of which 1 System Lord)
• 2% are Japanese (1 total of which 1 System Lord)
• 2% are Slavic (1 total of which 1 System Lord)
• 2% are Meso-American (1 total of which 1 Under Lord)

Most of those characters do not appear in Season 1, some are referred too, but I haven’t had the opportunity to see how they were represented.

I think that the writers’ intent was to showcase a wide spectrum of known and lesser-known deities and cultures, expanding on the Egyptian pantheon. It is still strikingly obvious that the Go’Auld are either nonwestern or pre-Christian divinities, occupying much of the colonized world. That their leadership is heavily Eastern, African and South American.

The irony in Stargate SG1, season 1 at the very least, is that despite what appear to be good intentions, the creators of the show have produced the epitome of a western colonial narrative.

But it isn’t ironic at all. It couldn’t have been otherwise.

I’m not claiming to be some kind of genius for seeing through the most obvious show ever. Plenty of people have already and if they’re still reading this, are wondering why would anyone even bother?

Well, the show is being rebooted from what I understand. I imagine that it being 2022, a lot of the above will be different. Not that it would make it a better show. And perhaps that’s the real point. I hope writers don’t course-correct to the point of losing what makes the show interesting. It is an amazing concept.

But looking at where we are now, where representation and authenticity are taking the forefront in the visual arts, and artists are put on trial retroactively, we need to go beyond the superficial, and not question the shows, but ourselves.

It is very easy to claim some kind of foresight in the rearview mirror twenty years later, and pass for enlightened. If you enjoyed a show that you find problematic today, then you played a role in its success, you supported its ideas and representations, problematic though they might be today.

This is not to say we shouldn’t be critical, but we owe it to ourselves and the creators to be honest, and not create a convenient bogeyman to alleviate our own moral failings. Our twenty-first century multicultural societies were never intended to be, they’re a biproduct of oppression, still carry the scars thereof and will for a long time. It is important they evolve towards more equality. It is important that those who were oppressors yesterday understand their privilege today, and that those who were oppressed yesterday don’t repeat the same patterns as their former oppressors. All we achieve otherwise is more suffering, and just because we do it for the right reasons doesn’t make it okay.

Before we point the finger and scream censorship, let’s take a long look in the mirror.

So, my hat is off to the creators of Stargate, all iterations I haven’t and will not watch. They created a show I’m not sure I could have done better with, or with better sensitivity, and were incredibly successful. But as we strive to balance art and sensitivity, let’s not bottle ourselves in, be afraid to take risks over the fear of offending someone, somewhere, because it’s impossible, but also because you are only offended by what matters to you, not what matters to others, and as such we are all hypocrites.

The best art is authentic, it’s a drumbeat from the heart. And it won’t make everybody happy. Let’s strive to make the best art we can, but never from the starting point of fear, but of personal honesty.

[1] This is a matter of historic contention. Chengis Khan’s first-born son, Jochi, may have been illegitimate which caused a rift among Chengis’ four sons but most particularly with Chaggatai.

[2] Mughal is not the name the Mughals chose for themselves but a Persian variation of Mongol. They favored their direct connection to Timur and referred to themselves as the Timurid Empire.

[3] I assume they were created by the writers, in some instances names may be inspired by actual divinities: Thanos/Thantos, but not clearly enough to be equated with them.