[tekacs]

Star Trek in particular did put energy into handwaving/explaining away how their ships avoid this issue:

https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Navigational_deflector

I always thought it was a nice touch and hopefully a teaching moment when they talk about it in the show.

[sebringj]

At least Star Trek tries to answer this in some way even though bs but still cool for the effort, mainstream space is definitely dumbed down compared to that.