Star Trek: Deep Space Nine’s R-rated Ferengi running joke always made me laugh, although I also get why other Star Trek fans disliked it. Originally conceived as the main villains of Star Trek: The Next Generation, the Ferengi initially underwhelmed, coming off as more comical than threatening. However, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine leaned into the comedic aspects of the greedy, profit-driven Ferengi, who were epitomized by the diversity of Quark (Armin Shimerman) and his family, Rom (Max Grodenchik) and Nog (Armin Shimerman).
The Ferengi were conceived as a reflection of the “greed is good” 1980s, and films like Wall Street, where making money was the highest goal of all. The capitalist Ferengi are a counterpoint to the socialist Utopia of the United Federation of Planets, where the acquisition of wealth is not the driving ambition of society. Smarmy, uncouth, and lascivious, the Ferengi were everything an enlightened 24th-century Starfleet Officer was not, and that especially goes for their sexist treatment of women. Before Rom became Grand Nagus, Ferengi culture dictated women stay at home, naked, and were unable to pursue profit. But Ferengi women – or any woman – had one way to control a Ferengi man: oo-mox.
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine’s Oo-Mox Scenes Always Make Me Laugh
I can’t believe DS9 kept getting away with oo-mox
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine was a TV-PG-rated show, and I’m always amused by how much they got away with the Ferengi receiving oo-mox. The ears of a Ferengi are erogenous zones, and Ferengi males are constantly coercing females to stroke their lobes. Ferengi receiving oo-mox was a running gag that happened startlingly often. Whether voluntarily or being tricked – like Nog fooling a human nurse in 1940s Rowell, New Mexico to stroke his lobes – women giving Ferengi oo-mox was a sex act performed in plain sight for laughs on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and I thought it was funny each time.
Ferengi are driven by their lobes, and they usually mean for profit. But more often than not, a Ferengi is driven by his desire for oo-mox. For a Ferengi, it was erotic act, but for just about everyone else – especially the audience – oo-mox is absurd. Regardless of how excited it made a Ferengi, oo-mox was regularly played for laughs, and it was an overt weakness of Ferengi that was commonly exploited. Meanwhile, in the Star Trek Deep Space Nine season 4 episode “Bar Association,” Rom confessed he had “too much oo-mox by himself,” which is a jaw-dropping reference to masturbation on Star Trek.
Would Oo-Mox Would Have Been More Interesting In Star Trek Didn’t Show It?
Oo-mox isn’t for everyone
Of course, it’s understandable that some Star Trek fans cringe at Star Trek: Deep Space Nine’s running joke of Ferengi receiving oo-mox. Perhaps oo-mox might have been better subtly referenced rather than overtly shown so often. It can be argued that DS9 went to the well of showing latex Ferengi ears massaged too much, and oo-mox may have been a more effective gag if it was something inferred but not seen, the same way Morn was supposedly the most loquacious regular at Quark’s Bar, but audiences never heard him say a word.
In the end, the Ferengi are meant to reflect our worst instincts and impulses, and I think it’s a credit to the excellent writing on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and the performances of Armin Shimerman, Max Grodenchik, Aron Eisenberg, et al as their Ferengi characters that they are ultimately so loveable. Star Trek: Deep Space Nine was the red-headed stepchild of Rick Berman’s era of Star Trek, but this was also a boon, as they were left alone to do things no other Star Trek had before. As for oo-mox deniers, as the Ferengi Rule of Acquisition #223 states: Beware the man who doesn’t take time for oo-mox.