Speaking of rants, Virginia, here's my latest -- posted to an RFF list in connection with a conversation about why SciFi isn't as popular as fantasy these days.

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I believe -- and tackle in my own writing -- that the important things
for SF to address are no longer techie ones. I purposefully create a
universe in which there exists a technology so destructive that those
human cultures that survived are the ones in which culture has adapted
to restrict human excesses in the area of all-out power struggles. (For
better or for worse, in terms of other good things, naturally.)

See
http://okalrel.org/contest/themes.htm

My feeling about "dark" sci fi and its nano-dismal relatives is that we
are like junkies looking for another "wow" hit of cool tech or mass
destruction. Writers are afraid to be meaningful. To say something as
unpopular as "gee, maybe it isn't cool to have an arms race". Or to make
human relationships more than a flickering gesture that detracts from
the ACTION-ACTION-ACTION. Writers are supposed to be original. But there
are rules Sci Fi writers seem to be locked into. Rules like. "break
every rule and destroy more of civilization for the kick of it." Maybe
we shouldn't just break every rule. We live in a world that is far more
permissive than the one in which "rule breakers" became cult heros. We
should cultivate more sense of mutual responsibility and common sense
survival of the species.

And we should let people come away feeling a bit better about being
humans beings, despite our limitations and stupidities.
posted by Lynda at 07:31   comment? e-mail lynda@okalrel.org 0 comments