Fictions

In discussion with Evan, and inspired by Nora, I've decided to do some alternate history short stories. Speculative fiction, historical imaginings, that sort of a thing. It doesn't fit the tone of this blog, so I'm putting them elsewhere.

My fiction blog is Battles of Isonzo. Besides always thinking that "Battles of Isonzo" is a pretty kick-ass band name, it's one of those incredibly pointless parts of history. Twelve battles were fought on the river in WWI, with between 500,000 and 700,000 soldiers dying there. It seems like an appropriate title for futile reminagings.

If you don't mind speculative fiction that concerns war, have yourself a look! And if you do, know that this blgo won't be changing any.

Firefly Post Exchange - Kittens for Jesus

Today, Evan of Kittens for Jesus and I are doing a blog-exchange with posts on Firefly. If you like what he says here, I strongly encourage you to check out his blog, and the underground newspaper he edits. Also, if you like the Firefly post, go ahead and check out my post at his blog, here.

Part I: Firefly and history

I discovered Firefly less than a month ago. It is such a compelling series, however, that I'm already hooked and I am planning on buying the Blu-ray edition of Firefly when it comes out in November, despite my qualms with the BD format.

Firefly, for those unaware of it, is a television show that aired on FOX a few years back, and really didn't do very well. It was canceled after only one season (probably because FOX didn't air the first episode, which established the entire premise), but the response from fans was so great that Universal Studios bought the movie rights and in 2005, a film extending the story, Serenity, came out.

Perhaps the most fascinating aspect of Firefly for me is the deep connection that the show has to history. Although it is set more than 500 years in the future, in a galaxy where humans have spread out from "Earth-that-was" to many terraformed planets, Firefly has a profound feeling of familiarity about it. Many have described the show as a "sci-fi western." I believe that that description of it is quite apt.

The first episode of Firefly begins with the Battle of Serenity and Malcolm Reynolds, a Sergent in the army of the Independent Faction, or the browncoats, fighting against a consortium of "core worlds" (rich, industrialized planets in the center of the galaxy) called the Union of Allied Planets or the Alliance. Joss Wheedon, the show's creator, drew upon the history of the American Civil War for the backstory of Firefly. A group of rural rebels, wishing to maintain their independence, are crushed by a technically superior industrialized force. Sound familiar?

This basis in history fascinates me, and I think that the show is an excellent lens through which we can view the struggles of those defeated and forced to live under a government that they fought against. It doesn't legitimize the confederate cause during the Civil War in my eyes, but it certainly humanizes it.

The way Firefly describes the border planets, the outer limits of the Alliance, is also reminiscent of the American West during the territorial years. Laws exist as only vague guidelines, and those whose job it is to enforce the laws are few and far between. The Alliance, of course, is tyrannical and corrupt on the border planets, just as the North was seen by the Southerners in the conquered South after the Civil War. The Northern authorities, or rather, the Eastern authorities, were seen as similarly corrupt in the American West during the settlement of that area in the 19th century.

I'm a history fan, so I just drink this stuff up, but Firefly is an amazing show even without considering all the history in it. The character development is some of the best I have ever seen in a television show, and the writing is very good, with an excellent blend of humor, action, and drama.

Part II: The Sino-American Alliance

The Union of Allied Planets in Firefly was formed out of an earlier alliance, one that emerged through the merger of the last two superpowers on Earth when humans left the planet: China and the United States. This kind of alliance may not seem plausible given the average American's thoughts on the Chinese, as exemplified by my English teacher's husband's cry during the recent Beijing Olympics: "you rat-assed commie bastards!"

A lot can change in 500 years, though. Currently, the US and China are the major spacefaring nations (excepting, of course, Russia, which in 500 years could be a province of China, just like we could be a province of Canada) and English and Chinese are two of the most popular languages in the world. Everything points to an alliance between the two if the world suddenly got its act together and created a unified world government. However, how effective would such a unified Sino-American government be? Are the cultural gaps just too wide, the mountainous language barrier too high?

More plausible than an alliance, I think, is a war and then a mass exodus of the losing side (or the winning side, depending on the condition of Earth after the war) into space. I think that, rather than rallying around political similarities or geographical proximity, the two sides would be formed by confederacies of states based upon language. Tone language versus tone-neutral language. English versus Chinese. I am probably over-simplifying the situation, but one cannot underestimate the effects of globalization over 500 years.

Once this war had been won by one side or another, the loser or the winner, depending on whether or not Earth had been destroyed by the war, would travel into space and establish colonies, space stations, new Earths. Thus, the process of colonization and expansion, complete, probably, with the concept of manifest destiny, would begin anew. New factions and subgroups would emerge and the endless recursiveness of life would extend into the limitless void. It almost sounds like a premise for a sci-fi show.

Reconciling Worldviews

I've had a lot of frustration this week (and will undoubtedly still have this frustration for weeks to come) with political perspectives that I see as dangerous and alien. So it's comforting to have psychologists looking at morality and coming up with conclusions. Here's the article, which I recommend in full. Below are my two favorite parts so far.

They want more prayer and spanking in schools, and less sex education and access to abortion? I didn't think those steps would reduce AIDS and teen pregnancy, but I could see why the religious right wanted to "thicken up" the moral climate of schools and discourage the view that children should be as free as possible to act on their desires. Conservatives think that welfare programs and feminism increase rates of single motherhood and weaken the traditional social structures that compel men to support their own children? Hmm, that may be true, even if there are also many good effects of liberating women from dependence on men. I had escaped from my prior partisan mindset (reject first, ask rhetorical questions later), and began to think about liberal and conservative policies as manifestations of deeply conflicting but equally heartfelt visions of the good society.

and

[M]orality is not just about how we treat each other (as most liberals think); it is also about binding groups together, supporting essential institutions, and living in a sanctified and noble way. When Republicans say that Democrats "just don't get it," this is the "it" to which they refer. Conservative positions on gays, guns, god, and immigration must be understood as means to achieve one kind of morally ordered society. When Democrats try to explain away these positions using pop psychology they err, they alienate, and they earn the label "elitist." But how can Democrats learn to see—let alone respect—a moral order they regard as narrow-minded, racist, and dumb? (Ed - emphasis in bold is mine).

I'm not yet done with the article, but it is challenging in interesting ways, stretching the tolerance of an open mind. If you're ready to considers others views as valid, give it a shot.

Edit: I've finished reading the article, and I'll have commentary up later. Right now the thing worth mentioning is pair of quotes:

"Religion and political leadership are so intertwined across eras and cultures because they are about the same thing: performing the miracle of converting unrelated individuals into a group."

and

The Democrats would lose their souls if they ever abandoned their commitment to social justice, but social justice is about getting fair relationships among the parts of the nation. This often divisive struggle among the parts must be balanced by a clear and oft-repeated commitment to guarding the precious coherence of the whole.

The key moral underpinning of politics on the left is, I think, reemerging after a several decades of hibernation under utopian secular notions. I think this change (which the author of the article sees as needed) is happening, and I think it's a good thing.

More on White Privilege

When last I posted here, my post was little more than a glorified cut-and-paste of someone else's thoughts. I'm comfortable with that, because the someone in question is Tim Wise, and he's far more competent than I am at understanding white privilege.

The article of his I quoted (in it's entirety) was focused on white privilege as it concerns the presidential election. The article is good and poignant, but it assumes some basic understanding of the mechanics of privilege. That's tricky stuff, so his follow-up is an incredibly helpful rundown of what white privilege is. His whole post can be found here.

In addition, there are two points worth highlighting:

That's the point: privilege is the flipside of discrimination. If people of color face discrimination, in housing, employment and elsewhere, then the rest of us are receiving a de facto subsidy, a privilege, an advantage in those realms of daily life. There can be no down without an up, in other words.

The above is white privilege in three sentences, which I don't think I've seen done anywhere as effectively or concise.

The below is the requisite call to action:

One way is by fighting for a society in which those privileges will no longer exist, and in which we will be able to stand on our own two feet, without the artificial crutch of racial advantage to prop us up. We need to commit to fighting for racial equity and challenging injustice at every turn, not only because it harms others, but because it diminishes us as well (even as it pays dividends), and because it squanders the promise of fairness and equity to which we claim to adhere as Americans.

It's about responsibility, not guilt.

Filling out the Blogroll

I've been meaning to add a few more blogs to my sidebar. These are blogs I get ideas from over and over again, blogs I will delve into with commentary, and blogs that are just good. I can't say they're worth a read every day, but they are worth a glance more often than I link to them.

Stuff White People Do: This is fantastic, and part of that is how the blog is still struggling to understand what it is about. I've written about the blog before, and rather recently. I've been reading it for much longer, when I saw it buried in a comment thread at Stuff White People Like. The blog then was rough, and a little glib. Now it's matured into something that is still rough, but does an excellent job of showcasing the uncomfortable discussions of race and privilege. The unspoken last part of the title is "Stuff White People Do (with privilege that enables them to ignore race and to affirm white identity while paying lip service to racial equality)". That's a lot of subtext, and the blog bears it in a properly uncomfortable way. And it does that in a really good way. It's hard to recommend something that sounds so unpleasant, but the experience is worth it, and it isn't as bad as it first seems. It's the learning kind of uncomfortable, not the terror kind.

The Bedford Hillsian: I've linked to this one recently, and to be honest, I don't know all that much about it. It was hiding in my shelves of links for many months, and it was pleasant to stumble upon again. Specifically, posts by the unbeatable kid (it's a collective blog) are good, in my social-justice political-science-y way. The few weeks have seen the Ron paul video I linked to, the native american names of military helicopters and what the type of names selected means, and an Onion video that cuts to why many debates are poorly portrayed. I like it, enough to worry it might put me out of a job; fortunately, the posts are all short and to the point, keeping my monopoly one essay-length musings.

Blogroll!

Since this is a productive weekend for me, here is the third installment of "Kelsey lists a bunch of links and hopes you like some of them". This time, I'm explaining all the links on my blogroll, which you may have glanced at once or twice. Why I am doing this? Partly it's pure self-indulgence, and partly this is self-indulgence because this is the 100th post I've started to write. If you notice a numerical discrepancy, it's because I have 8 posts (including the fabled Youth Rights post) which are all in various places in development hell. So, empty milestone or not, here are the blogs I read, and reasons why you should like them:

At the top of the list (and breaking alphabetical order) we have UUlogy. This is where the YRUU steering committee posted their video about the death of YRUU, and where lots of righteous UU angst and impassioned outcry is taking place. Besides hosting the articulate and disenfranchised, it has lots of communications with the heads of the UUA, and so is the first stop for biased news on this issue. (Disclaimer: this may be meaningless if you aren't UU. Apologies)

AHS Foliage is Albuquerque High Schools' premier underground newspaper, in its second year of publication. I had more than a little role in its early days, but now it has its own staff. It's continuing the tradition of hyper-relevant social commentary through sarcasm in zines, and is good fun.

Terry Arnold was my late grandfather's best friend, and he posts intelligent essays that aim at putting reason back into the State Department, and serve as a critique of modern US policies from the perspective of the dignified old school. I have no idea why he posts on Rense, but his stuff merits consideration despite the setting.

Had I been the typical good little AHS-er, I would have probably had Scot Key as my favorite middle school teacher. I had a middle school experience that was not at Jefferson, however, and so instead I know him through his bitter, bitter commentary about Albuquerque Public Schools. He's smart, and there is a certain humor to his posts that I appreciate, but boy does it seem like the current system of schooling just will not do much good. Rather than actively dismantling it, however, he provides snark from the inside. Which, all told, is probably the better thing to do.

Ever read all the comics in the newspaper, get angry, and wonder why you keep putting up with this crap? The answer is Comics Curmudgeon, where like minded people analyze comics all the way through death and back to some form of zombified humor. Great, dorky fun.

No burqueno's internet experience would be complete without the occasional foray to the Fix, and the quality of the site is such that I check it almost daily, even 1,500+ miles from the city. The new social networking version is fun as well.

Nora's blog can be found under the in-joke moniker of Esther de Groot. Her blog is far more bloggy, the best aspects of which are summarized in this post. Or, perhaps, this one.

John Fleck is Albuquerque's local "understands science and explains it sensibly in the newspaper" guy, and for those inclined to seek out even more science-y fun, we have his blog. I comment here sometimes, when I am feeling smart but don't want to just take and repost what he said verbatim.

Fleen is my webcomics review of choice; others prefer websnark.

GamePolitics is a blog about the politics concerning video games, and comes from the standpoint of both consumer advocacy and thinking that people are responsible enough to be trusted with pixels. Biased, but good.

Indexed is so good, it's made me figure out hand gestures so I can quote Venn Diagrams in conversation. A great blog, a great way to interpret information.

iMinister is the blog of Christine Robinson, the minister from First Unitarian Church of Albuquerque. She's very well reasoned and compelling, and works from the sensible premise of gradual, lasting change. This contrasts nicely with the far-reaching "everything is wrong and must be fixed all at once now" attitude common among others whose opinions on social justice I trust. Her blog is far more accessible than some of the other Albuquerque blogs and UU blogs, and I would put this at the top of my list of recommendations, were the list not alphabetical.

Alright, that's it from the blogosphere for me for now. With luck, I'll get those eight posts in limbo fleshed out soon.