“A matter of internal security: the age-old cry of the oppressor.” - Picard (The Hunter)
“The past is written, but the future is left for us to write. And we have powerful tools, openness, optimism, and the spirit of curiosity. All they have is secrecy and fear. And fear is the great destroyer.” - Picard (Broken Pieces)
It's given me a new appreciation for how important it is for children to grow up with truly idealistic visions in their cultural surroundings. It's terrible that in these times, there's no TNG equivalent that I'm aware of.
By the way, one TNGie to another: try to hold off on that disappointment. As a species we're just starting to get the hang of rationality, the scientific mindset, and self-governance. We're babies. It'll take a long time, we just need to try not to do any irreversible damage before we get where we're going.
May you live in interesting times...
While I understand the world view and it's utopian appeal. I believe what your youth might have been missing is an incentive to critically think and search for information that is not curated for you.
In the last decades there has been not much (imo) implying we are anywhere even heading towards such a society. I believe it can only be perceived that way if you omit the large parts of society and especially the world as a whole. Local things like changes in living standard for most of the population, crime rates, organized crime. International things like piracy, human trafficking, corruption in different parts of the world. If you look beyond a local bubble, there doesnt seem to be much implying much was heading towards a society you refer to.
I do not wish to imply you don't think critically, just that there are too many topics for anyone to inform themselves about all of them. At best we are aware of what we know more about and what we know less about.
Regarding critical thought:
While I believe it is important to teach youth about independant thought and critical thinking, I also want for young people to have a somewhat sheltered youth and not to worry about all the horrible things in the world. As so many things it's complicated.
Despite all our progress, our greed and petty squabbling make me feel like the future that star trek pointed us towards is slipping further into the future. I'm sure now that even in a post scarcity world, humans would still find ways to fight, burn, waste, and regress. Sorry, Gene.