Do you know what the term ‘doomsaying’ means? It is the action of making dire predictions about the future. I’ve experienced it. Both with my eyes and my ears. There is also an element of doomsaying I’ve seen over the years practiced by hardcore fandoms that is very much of the protectionist, sour grapes variety. This consists of the idea that Science Fiction is reaching a much larger audience than ever before, and has therefore been compromised somehow and doesn’t retain the value it once did. “This is our thing! If it can’t be just ours, then it’s simply no good anymore!”
It is obviously silly, a joke. In fact, if it means SF in other media like film and television begins to catch up a bit with the more serious literature and leaves the pulpier aspects behind, I’m all for it if those movies/shows are well made. The more the merrier, in fact.
I am sick and tired of hearing that “we need dystopian SF to serve as a warning”. That may have been true in 1960’s, when the concept that humans are capable of permanently screwing up Earth biosphere was new and easy to dismiss, but now that concept is so ubiquitous, you cannot escape it even without reading SF. And in my experience, dystopian SF does not make people change their planet-destroying ways — in fact, just the opposite. I had met quite a few people who drive gas-guzzling cars, crank up air conditioning, take the whole “conspicuous consumption” thing to 11 — precisely because they think we are all going to die, and soon.
It is an easy and seductive trap to fall into. When you hear a thousand voices telling you the world is doomed, why not enjoy it while you can? Which of course makes the doom prophecies self-fulfilling.
Being hopeful, in today’s world, is…difficult. Not because there isn’t reason to be hopeful – science is giving us glimpses of our universe in ways and forms that were unimaginable and unheard of just a few scant years ago – but because at the same time, our science and technology is making us increasingly aware of all the things we’re doing wrong, all the things we’ve done to upset our promised better future. That is a very bitter pill for most people to swallow.
Humanity has a distinctly human-centric view of everything (much to our benefit and our downfall), and, on the whole, our species is very poor at seeing ourselves in the fullest and least pleasing light. We’ve cast ourselves in the role of masters and gods of our world. And the truth is that we’re anything but. We’re more like petulant children squabbling over whose turn it is to play on the swings.
But the best part of having all this unpleasant light being cast on all our many mistakes is that there are those learning from them. There are individuals trying to come up with better ways of doing things, imagining better ways for our world to work with us and for us to work with our world (rather than against). That kind of change takes time, but it won’t happen at all if we’re collectively refusing to see the truth, refusing to acknowledge the need for change.
To accept that “yes, things are bad, but they can be made better” means accepting responsibility for a lot of hard work, some of it quite unrewarding in the short term. This is something I feel like we really need in the here and now. So much of the feeling of doom and dystopia has taken over speculative fiction today. It’s time to be optimistic again.
It’s getting to be that time in this century where we can really start to define our trajectory and identify what our mark will be in this time. And so much of this rings true—the optimism, the groundedness, the freedom to write in different ways and formats and find an audience for it. At least for me, the access we have to new mythologies and perspectives and ideas through vastly greater numbers of writings from regions outside of our own makes the world feel both bigger and smaller. Such a lovely topic to ponder.
Humanity sucks, but it also has so much potential for greatness.
-Dagobot
Get at me on twitter: @markdago
Like me on THE Facebook: facebook.com/markdagoraps
Download my latest EP for free: markdago.bandcamp.com
Listen to MY podcast http: http://poppundits.libsyn.com