LogoK

I am writing this is response to  rydra_wong's suggestion that people write about their favourite Character of Colour.  I have spend some time thinking about this and trying ot work out who my favourite is.  There are a few to choose from:- Dayna from Blake's 7 who I loved as a child;  Zoe from Firefly and arguably River from Firefly as well;  Mohinder from Heroes who is in my icon;  the wonderful Dr Martha Jones of Dr Who;  or maybe the more obscure Omar (and his Dad and Tania) from My Beautiful Laundrette. 

I finally settled on Julian Bashir.   Not because I loved him best ( though I love him very well) but because I loved him longest (7 years - 173 episodes). 

From the very first episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine he was tied with Kira for my favourite character.  I loved them for different reasons - her because she was absolutely kickass and him mostly because he was hot (I am a tad shallow) but also because he was a smarty-pants and I totally identify with smarty-pants characters. 

As time went on I also loved him for flirting with Garak (and Garak, of course, became another favourite character).  I loved his compassion and his passion and his sense of humour.   I loved that he played at being James Bond.  I loved that he still had his teddy bear and that he grieved when Leeta nicked it.    I loved that he always tried to do the right thing .  I loved that he continued to refer to the prophets as wormhole aliens. 

And then the creators of DS9 did something amazing.  They did a total character retcon on him that not only worked it made him better.  It made things about him that previously had seemed inconsistent suddenly start to make sense.    I am referring of course to genetic enhancements plotline.  

The episode in which this was revealed was Doctor Bashir, I Presume  The episode contains the most amazing speech about being closeted.  He calls himself "unnatural" and "a freak."  The authors are clearly drawing on the discourse of homophobia and closeting.   
But that is not the only discourse they draw on.  For me, and I will admit it might be a very obscure reference, it reminded me of Jewish people lieing about their race to join the army in the 19th century.   The script also draws, more obliquely, on the discourse of immigration and ambitious immigrants when Julian says to his father, "You're going to lose your only real accomplishment in this life: me"  And, I think, it brings in class issues (of the Stella Dallas variety) given the difference between Richard Bashir's working class accent and Julian's upper class accent.   In later episode the genetic enhancements are also used to comment on issues of disability. 

Once Bashir's enhancements are revealed the character became even more fun.  His sense of humour became more sardonic and every now and then he would do something really cool - like diagnose an illness just by looking at someone. 

Interestingly, in the one episode the DS9 overtly dealt with the topic of 20th century racism - Bashir plays a character marked by ethnicity (English) but not race. 
All in all - Julian Bashir was a truly wonderful character of colour.