tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26974492.post9067664860590554775..comments2024-03-28T10:48:15.246-04:00Comments on alien romances: Presidential Politics Alien StyleRowena Cherryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11839386556697211986noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26974492.post-36957353665815373182007-05-15T14:02:00.000-04:002007-05-15T14:02:00.000-04:00Margaret:Good observation -- for a couple decades ...Margaret:<BR/><BR/>Good observation -- for a couple decades the precursors of Al Qeda were treated as criminals and criminally insane because their acts appeared insane to the Western eye.<BR/><BR/>They would blow up things at random that didn't much matter and made no difference after repairs. <BR/><BR/>Why would any idiot do such a worthless thing?<BR/><BR/>Obviously, they're insane.<BR/><BR/>HOWEVER what was really happening was that the beginners trying to drag in ordinary Moslems had to demonstrate they could actually perform a military operation, however small (and they got bigger and bigger). <BR/><BR/>They weren't trying to hurt us or stop us. They were bent on presenting proof of prowess to their peers. <BR/><BR/>With every hit on us they recruited hundreds - then thousands, and now they're big enough to hurt us. <BR/><BR/>Their physical acts were not acts of destruction but rather of philosophical argument.<BR/><BR/>Our mistake, as you point out, was failing to understand that and failing to respond with a philosophical COUNTER-argument that spoke TO THE MOSLEM WORLD not to ourselves. <BR/><BR/>And that's the kind of inter-cultural failure to think that SF should now be addressing head on.<BR/><BR/>Jacqueline Lichtenberg<BR/>http://www.simegen.com/jl/Jacqueline Lichtenberghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01613040740264804278noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26974492.post-49596732247991431072007-05-10T13:08:00.000-04:002007-05-10T13:08:00.000-04:00"Fight for Galactic Peace" -- wonderfully ironic p..."Fight for Galactic Peace" -- wonderfully ironic phrase. Metaphors matter, esp. when they trip off the tongue so facilely that we hardly recognize them as metaphors. As Suzette Haden Elgin (who's a pacifist as well as a linguist and SF writer) often points out, hymns such as "Onward Christian Soldiers" evoke an image that's directly at odds with the essence of Christianity as a religion of peace. Likewise, a metaphor such as "War on Poverty" (or "War on Drugs," which has led us into a quagmire of building more and more revolving-door prisons instead of addressing the problem by treating it as a medical and social issue) channels our thinking into grooves that are often counterproductive. Speaking of presidential elections, I wonder whether the framing image of a "war on terror" was a mistake from the beginning, imputing more dignity to terrorists than they deserve. What if the conflict had been framed as a matter of criminal justice, rounding up and punishing malefactors, instead?Margaret Carterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08293021955480708191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26974492.post-5203495437331632872007-05-08T22:49:00.000-04:002007-05-08T22:49:00.000-04:00Excellent, as usual. No matter how wonderful the ...Excellent, as usual. No matter how wonderful the story, if the author falls into the Mars Housewife Syndrome the reader is going to chuck the book out the window. Nailing world-building can make the difference between a good book and a truly great novel readers will absolutely love.Kimber Lihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03982239712083114488noreply@blogger.com