From: jmann@vineland.pubs.stratus.com (Jim Mann)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written
Subject: Re: Political Correctness + Sci-fi
Date: 28 Dec 1992 14:24:08 GMT
Organization: Stratus Computer Inc, Marlboro MA
Distribution: usa
Reply-To: jmann@vineland.pubs.stratus.com
NNTP-Posting-Host: gondolin.pubs.stratus.com

In article <1992Dec27.204813.21098@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>  
mlabossi@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Michael C LaBossiere) writes:
>  Some brief notes on PC (politically correct, not personal  
computer):
>      1) The political views of an author are irrelevant to the  
merit of the 
> work. To believe otherwise is to fall prey to the ad hominem  
fallacy (the 
> fallacy is that x is false or bad, because x was said or written by  
A and A has
> a bad character, incorrect views, etc.). Of course, an authors  
political views 
> can color his/her/its work.

You are certainly correct here.  Richard Wagner was reprehensible,
but wrote great music. Tolstoy could be nasty to his family but
was an incredible writer.

>      2) Literature should be judged on its literary merits and not  
on the basis
> on how well it conforms to the political or moral ideology of the  
day. This 
> applies whether the oppressing ideology is the excessive moralizing  
of the 
> right wing or the excessive moralizing of the left wing. Arguments  
can be 
> provided for this position, upon request.

This is less right.  First of all, in some cases the moral or
political stance is part of the work of literature in such a way
that it is impossible to judge it without taking this stand into
account.

However, where I really disagree is with the latter part of your
paragraph. "Excessive moralize" to me, at least, implies the
Ayn Rand syndrome: stop everything for pages so that a character
can make a speach.  When an author does this, generally only
those who agree with the author can resist the temptation to
throw the book across the room.  Rand is the extreme example of
this, but Heinlein fell into this (though never to the degree
she did, since he seemed to always have the story at least
in the back of his mind), especially later in his career.

>      3) Sci-fi, as a genre, tends to be very non-PC. Complaining  
that Sci-Fi is
> non-PC is like complaining that war novels are not pacifistic  
enough or that 
> romance novels contain to much romance.

Perhaps if you'd point to a branch of literature that IS PC, I'd
understand what you mean here.  Is the mainstream PC?  Are
mysteries?

Actually, the more I look at your post, the more I think the basic
problem with a couple of your statements is that you really
don't define "PC."  The phrase has a spectrum of meaning. In
some ways, SF IS PC: many SF novels were portraying multi-cultural
societies, societies with men and women equal, and so forth before
most other genres were.  But I'm assuming that that's NOT the
part of political correctness you are refering to, but more to 
the silly tendency of many of the "PC-types" to worry about
word use, and come up with phrases like "height-challenged" for
"short."

>      4) the PC dogma is internally inconsistent and oppressive,  
even by its own
> lights, and hence morally sensible individuals will not employ its  
tenets to 
> judge others.

Many otherwise sensible individuals employ internally inconsistent
dogma is some part or another of their lives.  

>      5) If one must judge works on their PCness, one should be fair  
and 
> consider the time period in which the author was writing in. After  
all, an 
> author that would seem to be a stodgy old conservative today may  
well have been
> a radical in his/her/its time.
> 

--
Jim Mann            
Stratus Computer   jmann@vineland.pubs.stratus.com  

Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written,rec.arts.books