Re: [Marxism] Fantasy and SF for socialists.

[David Picón Álvarez <david@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

From: <n.fredman.11@xxxxxxxxxx>
> Thanks, I've missed that one entirely. Looking around I find that there's 
> a whole sub-genre, "steampunk", which I was vaguely aware of (apart from 
> the name) via the alternative histories of Michael Moorcock, an anarchist. 
> Also maybe of interest here is Moorcock's marvellously nasty 1978 polemic 
> against right-wing SF and fantasy, 'Starship Stormtroopers' 
> http://flag.blackened.net/liberty/moorcock.html


In this respect, both Ken McLeod and Charles Stross have been known to say 
that science fiction, in its mainstream tropes, has been the agitprop wing 
of the technocratic movement. To some extent I think they are right, as it 
is plain from reading certain of the seminal texts of the genre. From lists 
like the one on this thread though it's clear that a lot of SF has a 
different thrust.

Of late, SF has become lesss technocratic and more "libertarian", I think. 
Some of it in a very deeply reactionary way, like Caliphate, by Thomas P. 
Kratman.

Another interesting essay on the line of the nature of SF/fantasy would be 
this article on the Lord of the Rings, which rather debunks fantasy tropes 
like Starship Stormtroopers does to SF: http://www.davidbrin.com/tolkien.htm

This latter article is full of "liberal common sense" but it is certainly 
preferable to the usual pro-feudalist leanings encoded in a lot of fantastic 
literature.

--David.


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