Parliament of Dreams (B5)

[Crowley]

http://sfdebris.com/videos/babylon5/b5s1e05.php

This review and episode got me to thinking of religion, particularly the difference of how Star Trek and Babylon 5 handled it. JMS himself is openly atheistic, yet religion is an integral part of Babylon 5 and I don't think you could ever discern his personal ideology from how the subject matter is handled there. I remember reading where he was asked about this, how as an atheist he can write so well about religion:

As an atheist, I believe that all life is unspeakably precious, because it's only here for a brief moment, a flare against the dark, and then it's gone forever. No afterlives, no second chances, no backsies. So there can be nothing crueler than the abuse, destruction or wanton taking of a life. It is a crime no less than burning the Mona Lisa, for there is always just one of each.

So I cannot forgive. Which makes the notion of writing a character who CAN forgive momentarily attractive...because it allows me to explore in great detail something of which I am utterly incapable. I cannot fly, so I would write of birds and starships and kites; I cannot play an instrument, so I would write of composers and dancers; and I cannot forgive, so I would write of priests and monks and Minbari...

[MadAmosMalone]

I never read that particular passage before. Thanks for sharing it. It makes more sense than the one I had always read. Can't find it just now but the gist of it was that it would be too "easy" for him to write caricatures of religious people and use them as strawmen to illustrate his own viewpoint. "That's not writing, that's propaganda," he would say.

[Rocketboy1313]

Eh... It is not very open and accepting to say that "religion is for small minds and we will evolve beyond it". But at the same time, if you want to make a statement about the culture and norms of your fictional society it is the author's prerogative to smash all the idols in the Kaba.

It is close minded, but it is one of the conceits of the show. I don't see it as a problem in the logic of the show, only on the meta-textual level. The same reason I take issue with things like "Tarzan" (mighty whitey narrative), "Gor" (women are objects), and other old genre fiction which have issues in their "product of the time" morals.