Star Trek certainly had moments back in its day that’d be considered politically incorrect now. But I’m talking about at the time.
“Matter of Honor” was ridiculous, but I never understood what the problem was with “Angel One”, other than that it was dull as dirt and not well written.
Political correctness is about being sensitives to the attitudes and cultures of underrepresented populations. People can put whatever bs interpretation of it if they want, but that’s what it is - treating people with respect. And that’s what Star Trek has always strived for, even if it didn’t always hit the mark.
Political correctness is not just treating people with respect. You had it mostly right with your first sentence, it’s the avoidance of topics and expressions that supposedly marginalize other people or underrepresented populations. The problem is that it assumes that all attitudes and cultures are worth being sensitive to, and it puts the onus on the person speaking to censor himself, even if he’s being completely reasonable, for the sake of possibly offending somebody that might not even be the person that the information is directed at. Star Trek was never politically correct like that. For example, there’s an episode of TNG where Worf kills that asshole Klingon that framed his father and murdered his girlfriend. Picard reprimands him and responds to Worf’s defense (that it was in line with his culture) by saying that he respects all of the different ways of life of his crew, but he does not tolerate deviations from Starfleet regulations, or Picard’s orders, for the sake of cultures. That is not politically correct by today’s standards because Picard expected Worf to essentially put aside his traditional way of life. That’s the difference between respect and political correctness.
Ex. They put a Russian on the Enterprise during the height of the Cold War. Now, the execution wasn’t perfect (pretty stereotypical portrayal, looking back), but the mere fact of the matter was a ballsy move to promote inclusion.
That was actually quite politically incorrect at the time and it was a ballsy move to promote inclusion.