Do we like George Takei?
Our score: 8 out of 10. Decades of public advocacy for LGBTQ+ people and migrants, one apologised-for slur, and one denied allegation that his accuser later softened.
Born in Los Angeles in 1937, Takei spent his childhood behind barbed wire. His family was removed to the Rohwer camp in Arkansas after 1942, then moved to Tule Lake in California, where they stayed until 1946. He later became Mr Sulu in the original Star Trek and in six films.
On the harm check, he comes out well. In 2016 he wore a You Can Pee Next to Me shirt against North Carolina's HB 2 and interviewed two trans people on Facebook Live. Proceeds from the shirt went to Equality North Carolina. He has also compared today's immigration enforcement to the internment he lived through.
His worst moment on record was in 2015. Furious about Justice Clarence Thomas's dissent in the same-sex marriage case, he called Thomas a clown in blackface. Within days he apologised, calling the language ad hominem and uncivil. That's a real stain, but one angry remark that he took back himself.
In November 2017, a former model accused him of sexually assaulting him in 1981, as the Hollywood Reporter first reported. Takei said he was shocked and bewildered and denied it. By 2018 the accuser's account had shifted, and he said he could not recall being touched inappropriately. Nothing was ever charged, and Takei said he bore the man no ill will. Where you land is up to you, but the record stops there.
The good stuff is long and public. He is a founding member, trustee and chair emeritus of the Japanese American National Museum. His graphic memoir They Called Us Enemy won a 2020 American Book Award. In 2024 LA Pride made him its Icon Grand Marshal.
Now 89, he is still on the panels and the page. At Comic-Con in 2025 he pushed his graphic memoir It Rhymes with Takei and tied past incarceration to present politics. He keeps telling people their history is worth knowing.