Star Trek Online Pulls "Dixie" Emote From Summer Festival

As PWE and Cryptic prepared to kick off Star Trek Online's annual summer event, they ended up on the receiving end of criticism from players regarding the decision to include a clip from the song "Dixie" as an audio emote. For those unfamiliar with the tune, it's widely associated with the US South, particularly the Confederacy, and racism.

Not surprisingly, some members of the Star Trek Online community took some issue with the song's inclusion, with one Reddit post noting that it doesn't fit with a franchise "built around an ethos of tolerance and diversity." Links to Wikipedia in the thread also noted the association with blackface. Of course, the thread kicked off some debate about whether or not the song should be excluded based on its history or if everyone should move on. But debate aside, the outcome is that the developers have decided to nix the emote from the summer event content.

We are deeply sorry for any hurt we may have caused. pic.twitter.com/hhC1r0CC7F

— Star Trek Online (@trekonlinegame) June 25, 2019

Actual historical associations aside, the song does seem like a weird addition for a universe in which baseball is even a novelty. I can't imagine many members of the Federation being familiar with Dixie or even the Dukes of Hazard which the clip reportedly seemed to be imitating.