I wanted to mention another episode of the original "Star Trek" where Roddenberry missed the mark on bringing intergenerational attraction acceptably into the late 23rd century, albeit in a different fashion. That would be the excellent and compelling episode, "Charlie X." The titular Charlie, having been given god-like powers by an advanced race of beings, finds himself attracted to the adult Yeoman Janice Rand. She was, of course, not reciprocating and Charlie's lack of social graces due to a lifetime of not interacting with fellow humans helped make him look equal parts awkward and creepy, so that did the topic at hand no favors. And likely on purpose.

Rand asked Kirk to talk to Charlie about his behavior. And Kirk made it clear that intergenerational attraction did not make it into Roddenberry's imagined positive future. Regarding Charlie's attraction to the adult Rand, Kirk said, "First of all, the years are all wrong." Rand later tried to deter Charlie's interest in her the way someone would in this era: She introduced him to a teen girl intern who was on the ship She figured someone his own age would be perfect for Charlie! Of course, Charlie wasn't having it, and rudely rebuked the girl while getting all the more frustrated with Rand. That, of course, is reminiscent how the friends of many MAPs will try to deter them from even dating younger women of legal age by trying to introduce them to older people (of the gender they're attracted to, in our case older women).

And of course, the plot requirements of Charlie being sociopathically unstable and entitled due to a combination of his great matter-manipulating powers and lack of experience of living with fellow humans who lack those powers led to a built in requirement of a possible mesophile being treated as inherently unstable and predatory - much like Alicia Silverstone in the 1993 film "The Crush". And giving Kirk, Rand, and Roddenberry the opportunity to enforce modern day norms regarding people under 18 and older/younger romantic attraction in the 23rd century.

Of course, this was in the still-modern era, but during a chunk of the era where homosexuality and miscegenation was also apparently not present in that 23rd century of apparent social (as well as technological) advancement for humanity. In fact, the episode "Plato's Stepchildren", where Kirk kissed Uhura and famously provided television with its first interracial kiss (unless you include Ricky and Lucy Ricardo, but maybe the were given a free pass for being a married couple both on and off the show) was considered more controversial at the time as depictions of Kirk having a serious make-out session with a green-skinned alien Orion woman. Or of having Spock be a product of human and Vulcan romantic interaction, and human nurse Christine Chapel lusting after the part-alien Spock, who looked and acted like a typical resident of Vulcan. And let's keep in mind that Kirk only kissed Uhura in that episode because his telekinetic captors forced him to.

Strange how exceptions and free passes are given, which future underscores the odd hypocrisy of these social mores sometimes backed up by law.