Dystopian Science Fiction only reinforces the real world Status Quo
Posted: Mon Jul 03, 2023 5:07 pm
They establish the Evil Government or Empire in question as being obviously Evil to the audience by being nakedly and obviously oppressive in a way no current First World Nation is. It doesn't matter how many Bread Tube Video Essays go on for hours about how it's a perfect allegory for the real world's problems, nor does it matter if that's what the author intended, the average viewer is at best going to see it as a Cautionary Tale.
And that's the problem, scaring the public with the variety of different ways things could be worse creates hostility to the very concept of change. In most of these stories the better freer society the rebels are fighting for is Liberal Democracy, the real world status quo. The official full name of the Rebellion in Star Wars is "The Alliance to Restore The Republic", that does make it technically speaking a Reactionary Revolution not a Progressive one, the kind Edmund Burke would call a Reformation.
We see how broken The Republic always was in The Prequels and Clone Wars, yet because The Empire is so blatantly worse people long for The Republic and are not even considering the idea of trying to build something new, or question the very concept of having a Galactic Government in the first place. The only value I ever saw in writing more Star Wars post ROTJ is attempting to address this. Instead the overarching narrative we're getting is that the New Republic's mistake was demilitarizing and refusing to take quick harsh action against the rising First Order, even though the message of The Prequels was that militarizing is exactly how The Republic became The Empire in the first place.
Andor is the first Star Wars project to actually really be this Genre. Star Wars may have "always been Political" but the politics was set dressing and framing devices. The Empire was something our protagonists were under the threat of but never living directly under. Andor is the first Star Wars project to be perceived as some groundbreaking Political Manifesto, but it's not. The character in the second arc who's supposed to be the ideologue of the groups never says a damn thing about the kind of society he wants to create, just a bunch of philosophizing about how highly authoritarian systems like the Empire inevitably destroy themselves, which isn't even true, Rome lasted Centuries.
Breadtubers really love to argue that every fictional Dystopia is either Fascist or Capitalist or both and the Right Wingers interpreting them as being in anyway Socialist are simply not getting them. Unfortunately most Hollywood writers are relatively Centrist Liberals who do view Communism and Nazism as two sides of the same coin. I like Divergent, I only saw the first movie but I found it more engaging then The Hunger Games. However the society it depicts can't be viewed as Capitalist nor does it contain any of the things that animate actual Fascist movements. Even watching it as a Communist I see it as what it looks like when Communism is tried but goes wrong, or at least what Liberals think it looks like when Communism is tried and "inevitably" doesn't work.
Classic CyberPunk is often alleged to be where Capitalism will inevitably lead if we don't change course. The problem is most viewers won't see it that way not because they are stupid but because CyberPunk is stupid, it is a fundamental misunderstanding of Capitalism to think it would ever benefit the Capitalists to get rid of the Government.
The Anime 86 is more interesting then many other Dystopian shows because the Republic of San Magnolia actually claims to be a Democracy.
I have now watched the Anime Psycho-Pass (only season one for now which I'm pretty sure was originally meant to stand on it's own). And I'm going to Spoil it.
Spoiler Alert!!!!
At first I liked it, it felt like the world depicted was close enough to the real world we're used to for the basic I laid out at the start of this post to be minimized. I found it very compelling how well the Sybil System and what's wrong with it is established in just the first episode. But then in episode 17 it kind of Jumps The Shark, there didn't need to be any deep dark secret to what the Sybil System was, it baffles me that isn't condemned the same way Darling in The Franxx was. It was a much more interesting SciFi Concept when it was presumable an AI or an Algorithm, making it a bunch of TransHumanist Sociopath who laugh Evilly at the end was way more stupid then throwing Aliens into Franxx.
None the less I was still clinging onto hope that the gist of how I was interpreting it could remain intact. But then in the last episode our now fully developed main character says "The Law doesn't project people, people protect The Law" which I found to be the most Fascist thing anyone has ever said since "Ask not what your Country cna do for you but what you can do for your Country". But more importantly then that her final decision about the Sybil System is that it's Evil and will be destroyed someday but society would collapse if it happened now. To me that decision is just as Centrist as being a true believer in The Sybil System. The problem with Centrists is that they value order and stability over all else.
Now don't get me wrong I think it's also very misguided to conclude Makishima was right in any capacity. So often when interpreting a set up like this the Evil Regime and the equally vilified Rebel are viewed as the opposite extremes and that it's condemning both equally that is Centrist. But in the situation Psycho-Pass has set up supporting or defending The Sybil System is what is Centrist. The difference between Makishima and an actual Left Wing Anarchist is not just his Methods but lies even in his stated ideology and motivations. It's clear that a working Communist Society would offend and "Bore" him just as much. His Free Will centric ideology makes him basically a Libertarian, it's hard for people to recognize that however since he's not talking about Economics. But there's also something pretty conservative in his fixation on on society being lazy and complacent.
If the Far Left has any actual representation in the cast of Psycho-Pass it's the Lesbian Punk Rock Terrorist in episode 12, I just hope her character isn't ruined if she reappears in the sequels.
https://mithrandirolorin.blogspot.com/2 ... -only.html
And that's the problem, scaring the public with the variety of different ways things could be worse creates hostility to the very concept of change. In most of these stories the better freer society the rebels are fighting for is Liberal Democracy, the real world status quo. The official full name of the Rebellion in Star Wars is "The Alliance to Restore The Republic", that does make it technically speaking a Reactionary Revolution not a Progressive one, the kind Edmund Burke would call a Reformation.
We see how broken The Republic always was in The Prequels and Clone Wars, yet because The Empire is so blatantly worse people long for The Republic and are not even considering the idea of trying to build something new, or question the very concept of having a Galactic Government in the first place. The only value I ever saw in writing more Star Wars post ROTJ is attempting to address this. Instead the overarching narrative we're getting is that the New Republic's mistake was demilitarizing and refusing to take quick harsh action against the rising First Order, even though the message of The Prequels was that militarizing is exactly how The Republic became The Empire in the first place.
Andor is the first Star Wars project to actually really be this Genre. Star Wars may have "always been Political" but the politics was set dressing and framing devices. The Empire was something our protagonists were under the threat of but never living directly under. Andor is the first Star Wars project to be perceived as some groundbreaking Political Manifesto, but it's not. The character in the second arc who's supposed to be the ideologue of the groups never says a damn thing about the kind of society he wants to create, just a bunch of philosophizing about how highly authoritarian systems like the Empire inevitably destroy themselves, which isn't even true, Rome lasted Centuries.
Breadtubers really love to argue that every fictional Dystopia is either Fascist or Capitalist or both and the Right Wingers interpreting them as being in anyway Socialist are simply not getting them. Unfortunately most Hollywood writers are relatively Centrist Liberals who do view Communism and Nazism as two sides of the same coin. I like Divergent, I only saw the first movie but I found it more engaging then The Hunger Games. However the society it depicts can't be viewed as Capitalist nor does it contain any of the things that animate actual Fascist movements. Even watching it as a Communist I see it as what it looks like when Communism is tried but goes wrong, or at least what Liberals think it looks like when Communism is tried and "inevitably" doesn't work.
Classic CyberPunk is often alleged to be where Capitalism will inevitably lead if we don't change course. The problem is most viewers won't see it that way not because they are stupid but because CyberPunk is stupid, it is a fundamental misunderstanding of Capitalism to think it would ever benefit the Capitalists to get rid of the Government.
The Anime 86 is more interesting then many other Dystopian shows because the Republic of San Magnolia actually claims to be a Democracy.
I have now watched the Anime Psycho-Pass (only season one for now which I'm pretty sure was originally meant to stand on it's own). And I'm going to Spoil it.
Spoiler Alert!!!!
At first I liked it, it felt like the world depicted was close enough to the real world we're used to for the basic I laid out at the start of this post to be minimized. I found it very compelling how well the Sybil System and what's wrong with it is established in just the first episode. But then in episode 17 it kind of Jumps The Shark, there didn't need to be any deep dark secret to what the Sybil System was, it baffles me that isn't condemned the same way Darling in The Franxx was. It was a much more interesting SciFi Concept when it was presumable an AI or an Algorithm, making it a bunch of TransHumanist Sociopath who laugh Evilly at the end was way more stupid then throwing Aliens into Franxx.
None the less I was still clinging onto hope that the gist of how I was interpreting it could remain intact. But then in the last episode our now fully developed main character says "The Law doesn't project people, people protect The Law" which I found to be the most Fascist thing anyone has ever said since "Ask not what your Country cna do for you but what you can do for your Country". But more importantly then that her final decision about the Sybil System is that it's Evil and will be destroyed someday but society would collapse if it happened now. To me that decision is just as Centrist as being a true believer in The Sybil System. The problem with Centrists is that they value order and stability over all else.
Now don't get me wrong I think it's also very misguided to conclude Makishima was right in any capacity. So often when interpreting a set up like this the Evil Regime and the equally vilified Rebel are viewed as the opposite extremes and that it's condemning both equally that is Centrist. But in the situation Psycho-Pass has set up supporting or defending The Sybil System is what is Centrist. The difference between Makishima and an actual Left Wing Anarchist is not just his Methods but lies even in his stated ideology and motivations. It's clear that a working Communist Society would offend and "Bore" him just as much. His Free Will centric ideology makes him basically a Libertarian, it's hard for people to recognize that however since he's not talking about Economics. But there's also something pretty conservative in his fixation on on society being lazy and complacent.
If the Far Left has any actual representation in the cast of Psycho-Pass it's the Lesbian Punk Rock Terrorist in episode 12, I just hope her character isn't ruined if she reappears in the sequels.
https://mithrandirolorin.blogspot.com/2 ... -only.html