Talk:Great Britain

On-Screen Reference?
When is it referenced that Great Britain is still a major world power on-screen? I don't remember ever hearing about it, or there ever being an episode set in Britain. zsingaya 14:45, 2 Aug 2005 (UTC)


 * In "Our Man Bashir" Julian Bashir said "I work for one of the nation states of this era - Great Britain." --Tough Little Ship 14:48, 2 Aug 2005 (UTC)

Yeah, but I'm sure that the reference was meant to mean Great Britain of the past, not Star Trek present. I think this page could do with some references to characters who've been from GB, like Miles O'Brien, Beverly Crusher's ancestors, Malcolm Reed to name a few... in fact, why does Doctor Bashir sound so English? His father seems to sound like he's from London, with his odd cockney accent, but Julian speaks very proper English! zsingaya 14:50, 2 Aug 2005 (UTC)


 * This page seems a bit isolated really, as any links from Reed will go to England, and links from Crusher will go to Scotland. Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland are also not in GB, so I'll revert the edits. Tough Little Ship 14:53, 2 Aug 2005 (UTC)

Indeed, this page seems a bit useless... couldn't we simply move the reference to the holoprogram to the United Kingdom page? zsingaya 14:55, 2 Aug 2005 (UTC)


 * Now let me post too :p : Shouldn't this be rather a redirect to United Kingdom, because Great Britain actually refers to the island not the state, and the star-trek-canon source points obviously to the state and not the island -- Kobi - (   ) 14:56, 2 Aug 2005 (UTC)


 * Yeah, a redirect would be better. Tough Little Ship 14:57, 2 Aug 2005 (UTC)

We'd need to adjust the UK page, to include something about it being called Great Britain, in the past. Does the UK page have links to the countries in the UK? zsingaya 15:02, 2 Aug 2005 (UTC)


 * This page is obsolete. The other article under the same title is much more accurate.

Content
Oh come on man, nobody is letting me add even the tinyest tidbits of info, even saying that Wales is part of Great Britain (unlike the other reverts I'm getting on N.I, wales is physically part of the island). I mean have a thought for Welsh trekkies. They'll come on here and see "among the countries..." and their nation relegated to the background material! Who am I hurting by stating that Wales is part of Great Britain? So much hair splitting on here, I'm just tring to add things I know about (since I live in the UK) and nobody is letting them stick for god's sake. Saying Wales is part of Great Britain is hardly a heinous crime. Yrksvillan 17:12, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
 * It is not splitting hairs, it is sticking to a strict canon policy. --OuroborosCobra talk |undefined  17:13, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

So can you please, just for my benefit since clearly I don't understand, tell me where in the Canon it says that we should not mention Wales? Wales is part of the UK. Unless it is specifically mentioned somewhere in Star Trek that it isn't, then what's the problem?? Yrksvillan 17:16, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Canon does not have to say "do not mention Wales". Our policy is that if Wales is not mentioned in canon, and it is not, then we do not add it to the canon portion of our articles. Don't like it? Fine, you are entitled to your own opinion, but you still have to follow the rules here. Wales is mentioned in the background section of the article, just not the canon section. --OuroborosCobra talk |undefined  17:18, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Jesus man, why are you so hostile? I don't know who has changed my Great Britain article, but canon or not, there are innaccuracies. For example, you've added in the BACKGROUND section that other countries that comprise Great Britain are Wales and Northern Ireland. This is exactly the sort of misconception I was clearing up and you've reverted it. Northern Ireland was not, is not, never had been a part of Great Britain. It is part of the United Kingdom. I changed the article to say that Wales England and Scotland are part of the GEOGRAPHICAL island of Great Britain. Wether or not they are part of the political entity of the United Kingdom is a different matter, but please, my information was not incorrect. Yrksvillan 17:23, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I am not being hostile, I am trying to explain to you a policy that many, not all, of your edits are ignoring. --OuroborosCobra talk |undefined  17:26, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Ok well will you now allow me to re-add the fact that Great Britain is in fact the largest of the British isles, not a political entity. Yrksvillan 17:29, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Sadly, no. This is one area where the writers screwed up, and therefore we have as canon the screw up. From the episode :
 * BASHIR: "Yes. I work for one of the nation-states of this era -- Great Britain"
 * He specifically calls it a nation-state, therefore it is a political entity in canon Star Trek. --OuroborosCobra talk |undefined  17:38, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Right, but what we don't know is if the UK has transition to a new Great Britain entity, or wether it is simply a continuation of a common misconception. If we assume that the UK is officially name Great Britain in the 24th Century, as per Bashir, we can assume (since he's English) that it includes England and at least one other country, or the nations would simply keep their individual names. Man this is a complicated one. Can I assume, since Scotland is mentioned on the Great Britain page, that there is a mention of Scotland as part of the now POLITICAL entity of Great Britain somewhere in canon? Yrksvillan 17:41, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Furthermore, Welsh Rarebit (I've never EVER heard it referred to as Welsh Rabbit) is described as being a 'British' dish. If this is sourced from an actual episode, is that suggesting that Wales remains in 'Great Britain' as I shall refer to it from now on? Yrksvillan 17:49, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

We also have London being referred to as the capital of the UK. Though this was true for a large part of ST history, given Bashir refers to Great Britain as now being a nation state, that too either needs changing, or an addition that states that although we don't know exactly what happened, we know that it would be in GB by the 24th C and not the UK. Yrksvillan 17:58, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

United Kingdom
Is there a canonical source that suggests the UK was part of the European Alliance? Those familiar with 20th century Earth history are aware of the hesitant relationship the UK has with the then European Union. Tfleming 00:24, 27 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Wales weep not?
I can't think of one, so I wouldn't be surprised if there isn't, but is there a canon reference to Wales or Welsh people/places? I doubt it, but it's a case of national pride! Igotbit 17:52, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
 * As far as I know, there was no canon reference to Wales in Trek. If there was, a citation is needed. -- Renegade54 21:31, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Welsh rarebit is the closest we come, but that's really really stretching it. --Alan del Beccio 21:34, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
 * heh... yep, really stretching it for sure. Kinda like the only mention of France being French fries. :) -- Renegade54 21:37, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Also, and this comes directly from the Star Trek Concordance, Scotty is heard singing in Welsh in two episodes of TAS:


 * "Welsh ballad: Scotty dreamily sings in Welsh when he is supposed to be commanding the ship . Scotty hums the same tune when under the influence of Mudd's love potion ."


 * That's the exact paragraph from the Concordance. --Jörg 11:32, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Irish
This was removed by 81.108.91.90: I put him with the UK citizens as he belonged to Ireland that at the time was entirely part of UK (1801-1922). So can't we consider him as a UK citizen ? - Philoust123 10:40, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
 * " Joyce, James "

United Kingdom not canon?
Without wanting to open up a can of worms, but the terms "United Kingdom" or "UK" were never used in Star Trek. The characters always speak of Great Britain and British. I know they actually mean the UK (at least when it comes to references to Great Britain before 2024) but what if nomenclature changes in the future? Dunno, someone please find a reference to the UK somewhere. --Jörg 17:12, 24 October 2006 (UTC)


 * This is likely due to, as is being talked about since people are reverting my edits, a misconception. The United Kingdom is/was a political entity comprising many of the British Isles, and the Northern part of the island of Ireland. Great Britain is a GEOGRAPHICAL term used to refer to the largest of the British Isles. Northern Ireland has never been in Great Britian, it's part of the GEOGRAPHICAL island of Ireland. Yrksvillan 17:28, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
 * That is fine, and all correct, but again, sorry to sound like a broken record here, if the United Kingdom was never named in canon, it would not get its own article. I am not trying to be hostile, just pointing out the issue that Jörg was bringing up. --OuroborosCobra talk |undefined  17:30, 24 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Ok that's fine. Can we then explain why in the United Kingdom article it refers to it as being, among other things, comprised of "Northern Ireland" until the reunification in 2025 (which is also wrong since it was 2024 wasn't it). This is clearly an issue that needs resolving, because we have this article stating historical type things, but as Jorg says, the UK was never mentioned in canon, only Great Britain. We could assume that this was a misconception that simply carried on til the 24th C or, well, not, but either way, there are serious inconsitencies in the way the UK, Ireland and Great Britain are covered. Can we agree on that? Yrksvillan 17:33, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Yes, it definitely needs resovling, but the article itself may be soon deleted anyways. --OuroborosCobra talk |undefined  17:36, 24 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Ok, so how can I help to contribute to this without incurring anyone's wrath? Which version of events are we to use? Yrksvillan 17:37, 24 October 2006 (UTC)


 * I'd suggest to merge this with Great Britain; by my (admittedly non-British) logic a United Kingdom without Northern Ireland is Great Britain.
 * Edit: I'm now putting this up for merge. I just watched for example, and Bashir specifically says he works for the nationstate called Great Britain; for all we know the United Kingdom never existed, or to be precise Great Britain (the nationstate which was created in 1707) never renamed itself to United Kingdom in 1801.Kennelly 02:15, 23 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Okay, I have merged the histories and information of UK and GB, but now it's up to somebody else to correct the information presented on the page. There's a difference between GB and the UK, but I'm not a geographical/political/historical expert – even less so where foreign countries are concerned – so someone else has to go through and weed out what's meant for GB and what's meant for the UK, etc. or whatever. Good luck! --From Andoria with Love 11:41, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
 * For some reason has UK linked in it's "references" section. Any idea why? --Alan del Beccio 09:38, 9 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Firstly, clarifies the proper meanings of the various names.  Secondly, since Ireland was unified in 2024 the  essentially ceases to exist, going back to being the Kingdom of Great Britain at that time.  So when a Star Trek character uses the term Great Britain for the nation, they are not using a colloquialism, but the proper name since 2024. —MJBurrage •  TALK  • 01:12, 11 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Great Britain isn't the islands! Great Britain is the MAIN island. a better term would be the "British Isles". Which includes parts of Island and Manx (AKA isle of Man) which arn't counted as part of Great Britain cos that's the island. it's true. The IslandS would be the British Isles.
 * PS. The US ALWAYS says Britain + British.Forerunner 13:50, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Canon and Reality
I think it's odd not to admit that reality informs our view of canon. Is it ever actually stated that Cambridge University is in Great Britain, or that Mary Shelley was British? Are we sure that Dover isn't on the French side of the English Channel? I suspect that we could basically dismember this article, and many like it, if we took a very literal view.

Alternatively, we could accept that Star Trek is a show aimed at a human audience, with certain references to our reality. So when Data tells us that Ireland was reunified by force in 2024, I think it's acceptable to infer that part of Ireland was British-ruled until that time. Bashir's "Great Britain" is obviously a common name, not a profound comment on the UK. I don't insist on using the term "United Kingdom" in the article, but I dislike how the text goes out of its way to say that Ireland was never part of the same political structure as England and Scotland. Mars Defense Perimeter 06:09, February 17, 2011 (UTC)

Links
These pages have a mention to the UK in universe. Since the practice is that there is no UK in the Star Trek universe, since it was never mentioned directly on screen, all of these should be changed to either Great Britain or England. Since I'm not sure which ones should point to where, I've temporary recreated the redirect "United Kingdom" so as to create the list. - 06:10, December 19, 2011 (UTC)

Island
Great Britain is not a country, it is an island, which simply forms the main part of the United Kingdom. Rob Elkton (talk) 09:24, May 26, 2013 (UTC)


 * This issue has been discussed above, and a brief explanation is given in the Background section, but to put it quickly, both "Great Britain" and "Old Britain" were used in canon, (Bashir said in "I work for one of the nation states of this era - Great Britain.") while "United Kingdom" was not. 31dot (talk) 11:56, May 26, 2013 (UTC)

OK, so what about other articles, then? For example, the article on 'Gestapo' gives their full name as Geheime Staatspolizei, but I can't think of anywhere where that's mentioned in canon. If that fact is allowed to be part of the main article, then why should it be any different for this one?Rob Elkton (talk) 09:21, May 30, 2013 (UTC)


 * Gestapo is an abbreviation; Great Britain is not an abbreviation. Further, as I already stated, we have a line from canon stating that "Great Britain" was the name of the nation. 31dot (talk) 09:36, May 30, 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia link to Wales
How is adding a Wikipedia link to Wales to the canon portion of the article (thus stating that in canon Wales was stated to be part of the UK, or even mentioned), a compromise that at all meets MA canon policies? I'm really tempted to remove it. --OuroborosCobra talk 05:49, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Because something was not mentioned means it does not exist, it just means we don't create a link or page for it. --Alan del Beccio 05:56, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Funny, I thought we catalouged what was in canon, and left a Wikipedia link to the subject (not sub-subjects) to tell the rest of the real world. How about we add something about Typhoid fever to Osama Bin Laden? --OuroborosCobra talk 05:59, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Actually, I kinda have an issue with this, too... in it's current state, it says, matter-of-factly, that Wales and Northern Ireland are part of GB, although no such thing was ever expressed in canon, nor were those countries mentioned. Linking them off-site only solves part of the problem; we're still mentioning them as though they were mentioned in canon. --From Andoria with Love 06:37, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
 * It's funny, I'm not even back a whole week and I am already a contestant in America's favorite show, the harassing talk page game of sarcasm. Quite frankly, Memory Alpha shouldn't be the encyclopedia of stupid ignorance, especially in the case of one little link which is hardly some cumbersome, off topic, or referencing irrelevant information that I would otherwise expect to have set a discussion of this proportion off. It is merely acknowledging one part of the larger chunk, rather than leaving the reader to ponder what's in that big black void of nothingness between England and Scotland. --Alan del Beccio 06:38, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Scotland and Wales don't even border each other, so there would be no "big black void of nothingness". The purpose of MA is not to catalog real life, it is to catalog what was in Trek. Wales was not in Trek. --OuroborosCobra talk 06:56, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Nice with the false accusation of harassment, by the way. I was merely giving an example of why we DON'T do this. --OuroborosCobra talk 06:58, 20 September 2007 (UTC)


 * I would just like to point out that Great Britain is not the only article to treat links in this way. Watt, USA, and Samoa (among many others, I'm sure) all use (or used, in the latter case) terms not used in canon; in the case of Watt and Samoa, the terms are (or were) linking to their pages on Wikipedia. In addition, there are many articles which give brief definitions which are not necessarily mentioned in canon. This is no different, really; the definition of Great Britain is an island nation-state comprised of England, Scotland, and Wales. Granted, the edit made to this article did strike me as odd, but since it's been pointed out that it has been the practice all along, perhaps it should be brought up in a forum whether or not to allow such terms? I personally don't see a problem with them, so long as there's some way to identify them as not having been mentioned in canon (like linking them to WP... or not linking them at all). --From Andoria with Love 14:06, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Let's, for a moment, ignore the Wikipedia link, and focus on the inclusion of the word "Wales" itself. Nowhere in our policies does it state that we should make MA read as ignorant as we possibly can.
 * In fact, our goal is to make articles useful for readers: "The most important goal, however, is to make the article readable and informative. Towards that end, you should do whatever you feel is necessary to make the article meet those standards."
 * How is it even close to useful to completely make an article devoid of one of the most important features of its composition? No red links were made, no frivolous articles were created in support of the link, so what's the issue? (Please note that following is written as an apt, yet figurative example or interpretation that can very easily be true, as it seems that the "black void of nothingness" reference was quickly misinterpreted and subsequently overlooked.) In a non-evasive way, linking Wales to WP completes the circuit without a three paragraph background note at the other end of the article explaining why something is not here.
 * It's not as if I've included the breakdown of the islands entire geographic make-up, population census, and history for the past 10,000 years; I just added 1 simple little word, a pertinent fact if you will, along with a useful link and suddenly MA is under the duress of a whole new fish stink issue.
 * Whether one chooses to believe it or not, as stated above, it is necessary (and sometimes easier) to use a WP link to a term that defines the basics of a subject, as part of establishing context, without making our site look as if it was devoid of any natural intelligence. It is not "creating canon," it is diverting the topic off to someplace else that can explain what canon does not allow, without making the reader have to sift through multiple links to get from point A to point B.
 * If one's argument is "well it's not canon." Then what is? It's fool's logic to believe that this is "creating canon", anymore than it is to use internal articles to supplement each other when it was never established that those two terms go together. We certainly don't have any problem coming out from behind ignorance when it comes to abusing that.
 * Since throwing the example of Typhoid Fever and Osama Bin Laden into this conversation is completely irrelevant to this discussion, and certainly not apples to apples, let's instead look at Scandinavia, as it is essentially comprised of topic and link usage comparable to those used in the above discussion.
 * Just because we conveniently have links to other references mentioned on that page, Europe, Norway, Iceland, Sweden, Denmark, it is somehow OK to use them to establish context, even if it was never established in dialog, nay, canon, that all of terms went together, like they do in the "real world". If the "issue" here truly about "creating canon," then I should be able to click on any of those above mentioned links and find the same episode cited to those articles as I should to Scandinavia. But as many of you can see, that is not the case, nor should be the case for even referencing Wales here. --Alan del Beccio 19:26, 20 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Compromise, people. I agree with the statement that we shouldn't be more ignorant than necessary. Mentioning Wales if we know that it is a part of Great Britain right now doesn't seem like non-canonical overkill to me (unless it turns out to be because some clown starts to add that sort of information to every paragraph of every article we have in the next five minutes. Don't even think about that).
 * However, I absolutely don't see the necessity of having an off-site link about that topic, and even less if it is an inline link. Anyone who is interested in real-life Wales while reading an article about Trek Great Britain (for whatever reasons that I don't quite see at the moment), will surely be able to either find that article through the external GB link at the bottom of the page, or use a search engine of his choice for that purpose.
 * Add to that the fact that this external link is not recognizable as such and takes readers off-site that we probably want to keep here, and I see even less reason for keeping it. In fact, didn't we discuss not using that sort of links in the main article text already? I'm going to remove that link, but keep the mentioning of "Wales" itself. -- Cid Highwind 10:12, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Crikey. I can't help but feel a little responsable, and all I did was almost ask about cheese on toast? Igotbit 23:44, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

British actors
The present list is quite scrappy, and there are some startling omissions. I'm sure that many more British actors have appeared, but these are the ones that I have noticed as missing from the current list:

John Abbott (Ayleborne, TOS: "Errand of Mercy") Joan Collins (Edith Keeler, TOS: "COTEOF"), Ben Cross (Sarek, Star Trek (2008)) John Franklyn-Robbins (Macias, TNG: "Preemptive Strike"), Tom Hardy (Shinzon, Star Trek: Nemesis), Stephen Hawking (himself, TNG: "Descent"), Barrie Ingham (Danilo Odell, TNG: "Up the Long Ladder"), Jill Ireland (Leila Kalomi, TOS: "This Side of Paradise"), Jeremy Kemp (Robert Picard, TNG: "Family"), Basil Langton (Caretaker, VOY: "Caretaker") Christopher Neame (Unferth, VOY: "Heroes and Demons"; ENT: "Storm Front") John Neville (Isaac Newton, TNG: "Descent"), Simon Pegg (Montgomery Scott, Star Trek (2008)), Olaf Pooley (Cleric, VOY: "Blink of an Eye"), Maurice Roeves (Romulan captain, TNG: "The Chase"), Alan Scarfe (Adm. Mendak, TNG: "Data's Day"; Tokath, TNG: "Birthright"; Angris, VOY: "Resistance"), Alexander Siddig (Julian Bashir, DS9), who is of English/Sudanese parentage but was brought up in Britain. Guy Siner (Stuart Reed, ENT: "Silent Enemy"), John Warburton (Centurion, TOS: "Balance of Terror") John Winston (Lt. Kyle, TOS).

Phew! Sorry to just list them, but I don't know how to add the links! catiline63 11:06, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Removed speculation
I removed the following speculation:


 * Given the Irish Unification of 2024 (established in ) it could be speculated that the UK would have returned to being called the Kingdom of Great Britain after that date, although more likely name would be the United Kingdom Of Great Britain.

– Cleanse ( talk 23:23, November 10, 2010 (UTC)