heinleinblog

An Australian libertarian blogger wants to borrow from Heinlein when it comes to suffrage:

“The idea wasn’t ours, of course. It was Robert Heinlein’s in Starship Troopers. If you serve your society, you get to vote. You’re not required to serve. But if you don’t, you don’t vote. Heinlein figured that those who choose to defend the political society they come from - a free one - have a pretty good understanding of the value of freedom, having defended it against real enemies.

“Plus, Heinlein figured there were certain virtues you’d learn in military service that might make you a better voter. You’d learn that the welfare of your unit (or the polity) means not always gratifying your own desires and instincts. It’s an interesting idea, that voting requires some virtue. “

It’s just as bad here. In the United States, the government does its best to make sure that the anyone too stupid to find their way to get register on their gets signed up anyway. And then we make sure that it’s as as easy as possible for individuals who have no right to vote actually do so. Because, as you know, the number of people involved in making a decision improved the quality of the decision making. That’s why corporations get their board of directors by grabbing people randomly off the street, making sure they grab a couple of unemployed homeless losers because that makes it more diverse.

Sound politics has the following article about diversity in science fiction:

Her piece begins with this paragraph:

The face of fantastic fiction is changing. More than just its face: This former locus of racial and cultural stereotypes, where Robert Heinlein’s spaceship pilots look, sound and act like 1950s Pat Boone fans and J.R.R. Tolkien’s doughty elves battle hordes of Asiatic Orcs, is undergoing a transformation that’s more than skin deep. Three recent novels demonstrate the genre’s growing ability to represent human diversity.

That made me wonder if she had ever read Heinlein’s 1954 juvenile, The Star Beast, where one of the principal characters is from Kenya. Heinlein introduces him as follows:

Back on Earth at Federation Capital His Excellency the Right Honorable Henry Gladstone Kiku, M. A. (Oxon) Litt D. honoris causa (Capetown), O. B. E., Permanent Under Secretary for Spatial Affairs, was not worried about the doomed crustaceans because he would never know of them.

Secretary Kiku, Heinlein tells us, is responsible for “[a]nything and everything outside the Earth’s ionosphere” — in an age when humanity has explored hundreds of other star systems.

Original post by here

From just about every newspaper in America:

ON THIS DAY IN 1907 — Science fiction writer Robert Heinlein is born. He’s a four-time winner of the Hugo Award for best SF novel of the year and one of the giant figures in the history of the genre.

My friends at The Heinlein Society* Heinlein fans** are throwing one Hell of a birthday bash in Kansas City. Because I have to work, I can’t go. I’m not as active a following of Heinlein fandom as I once was. The job throws a kink into my social calender, and the blog soaks up a tremendous amount of time.

But I never forgot the important role the works of Robert A. Heinlein played in shaping my opinions. As I’ve written about before, I grew up in a family of Kennedy Democrats. My grandmother was a Kennedy delegate in 1960, for crying out loud. My youthful politics were liberal. I’ve stood there like an idiot with signs proclaiming that we ought to just give peace a chance.

Heinlein would have wanted to slap me upside the head and tell me to wake up. In a way, he did just that. My first Heinlein book was “Friday.” I didn’t buy it because I was impressed with all the glowing reviews of this and other Heinlein works. I bought it because the cover showed a busty blonde chick wearing a blue jump suit unbuttoned down to there. I was in junior high at the time, and the sexy passes left me flustered. The heady political commentary no doubt festered in the back of my brain.

You see, that’s how insidious Heinlein is. You read his stuff becauseit’s so damn much fun — all that violence and action — and you end up being taught tot hink for yourself. I remained a liberal Democrat for the next 15 years or so, but in retrospect, I have to admit there was always a little tinkle, a buzz, really, that was telling me that people really ought to be more self-reliant, and that I ought to not be supporting candidates who want to take away folks guns.

As much as Heinlein put the ideas in my head, it took having to work for a living for a few years that really soured me on the Democratic Party. The final straw came during the 1988 impeachment hearings for Bill Clinton, when members of the party I supported (including the years I worked as a reporter) fawned all over a man who was as far from the Heinlein heroes I respected as a man could get. Feh.

Still I knew I wasn’t a Republican or a conservative.

I came across a passage describing Heinlein as “libertarian,” so I visited a few Libertarian Party Web sites and decided I found a home. I left THAT home after 2001 when I heard LP standard bearer Harry Browne blame the United States for causing the terrorists to attack us. Heinlein would have slapped Browne silly - figuratively speaking, of course. Whether or not a more libertarian-minded foreign policy prior to Sept. 11, 2001, would have gotten the terrorists mad at us or not is debatable, but there’s no debate in my mind on what should have happened after Sept. 11, 2001. And it isn’t sitting around hoping that they don’t get mad at us again. “Starship Troopers” told us what Heinlein would have thought about that idea.

So, Heinlein left me a man without a political party to call my own. Which is where any person with a working brain ought to be.

So, Happy Birthday, RAH. Thanks for the presents.

*As commenter Audry Gifford noted, the bash was organized by autonomous group, although no doubt most are members of the Society.

** I know for a fact that several members of THS were deeply involved in centennial celebration activities. I know because before I essentially gave up Heinlein related activities due to lack of time, etc., I attended one or two online planning sessions.

[tags]heinlein,robert a heinlein[/tags]

At the risk of being accused of being too self-referential, I am linking to my own post about a blogging controversy in Orange County, Calif. There IS a Heinlein connection: The blogger uses the pseudonym “Jubal.”

According to the author of the column I commented upon: “The name Jubal is, significantly, drawn from Stranger in a Strange Land, the novel by sci-fi writer and right-wing kook Robert Heinlein.”

Charming. It lands the writer in the category of “uninformed.”

Still, one would think an anonymous blogger/Heinlein fan would choose “Simon Jester” as a pseudonym.

There’s the beginnings of a good discussion on that question in alt.fan.heinlein.

Commenters insist the book is shock full of examples of characters in the Federal Service without being in the military. However, James Giford writes (PDF format) that there is no specific example of someone being able to earn Citizenship except through uniform-wearing military service. Gifford cites examples of clerks, technicians, scientists who clearly were “civilians” even though they worked for the military. And the novel clearly states that civilians did not earn the right to vote.

I am going to have to re-read the book and keep a highlighting pen handy. But Gifford seems to make a few good points here. It seems to be that there are examples of people who could not serve as fighting soliders who were instead given jobs within the military. That doesn’t imply they didn’t get uniforms or weren’t made subject to military discipline. Again, a critical reread on my part is necessary.

It’s an ipmporant question because the premise of the book is that only veterans were allowed to vote. It’s this premise that leads critics to incorrectly conclude that Heinlein was a “fascist.” It’s important to remember that Heinlein wasn’t necessarily advocating anything other than government comprised of people who understood and were accustomed to taking responsibility. Heinlein saw that personality trait among those who proudly served their country in war. There’s nothing fascist about that.

This charge was made in the 1960s, when anything to the right of center was dismissed as reactionary and being in the military meant you were a baby burner. Political opinions forged in that crucible do not die easilly. That is why this specific slur against Heinlein refuses to die.

NOTE: Of course, I might have to wait until I finish up Charles Sheffield’s “The Nimrod Hunt.” I haven’t figured out who the heros and villains are yet. And I have been wanting to delve into Spider’s “Time Pressue,” which I found in a box after I moved.

NOTE 2: I read the book again tonight. It’s still moving and thought provoking. And I used a highligher to mark every single passage in which the nature of Federal Service is discussed. While enlistees often though non-combat jobs, and enlistees who wanted to fight often found themselves serving in non-combat roles, there is NO PASSAGE anywhere that says you could enlist in Federal Service and be considered anything other than military.

So, I think we can put to bed the myth that it’s a myth that only military veterans had the right to vote in “Starship Troopers.”

An article on a Web site based in “occupied Iraq” hauls out the tired old argument that Robert Heinlein was a fascist.

How long has it been since you watched Starship Troopers? Perhaps you should again. I caught some of it last week on television, and I was surprised at how reality has outpaced it. I don’t mean the space travel and the giant bugs; I mean the abandonment of democracy and dutiful dissent and the remodeling of America into a martial society. The bugs, of course, were never bugs anyway. They’re the eternal, dehumanized other that needs only extermination. (The original title of 2002’s giant spider movie Eight Legged Freaks was “Arac Attack.”)

Paul Verhoeven’s film is smart enough to satirize Robert Heinlein’s rather straight-ahead authoritarianism (for instance, citizenship is a privilege of those who sign up for “federal service”), though satire seems a hard thing to grok for those who were disgusted by the story of “Hitler Youth in love.”

Besides expounding principles of governance which could arguably be described as fascist, Heinlein was also - again, arguably - a student of the occult, and a familiar of the principals of the Babalon Working: Jack Parsons, L Ron Hubbard and “the Scarlet Woman,” Marjorie Cameron.

How typical of the left to equate anything military with fascism.

In an example of guilt by association, the writer goes on to link Heinlein to the writer of the white supremacist manifesto “The Turner Diaries.”

I’ll do the guy a favor: Next time you want to leap to conclusions, you might want to mention Heinlein’s short story “Free Men,” which is about a bunch of red-neck gun nut survivalists who attempt to overthrow the legitimate government of the United States.

[tags]heinlein,fascism,turner diaries[/tags]

The author of this Democratic Underground article looks shrinking middle class and the erosion of freedom of speech and expression and says the nation is ripe for a revolution:

Robert Heinlein characterized revolution as “a freak, a mutant, a monstrosity, its conditions never to be repeated and its operations carried out by amateurs and individuals.” A colorful way of saying that, like Tolstoy’s unhappy families, each is unique. The coming revolution, therefore, won’t look like the Boston Tea Party, or the rush to the barricades in 1789, or the storming of the Winter Palace in 1917. It won’t even look like the labor unrest of the 1920s or the long, hot summers of the 1960s in America. I don’t know what it will look like, exactly. But revolution, real revolution, is rarely pretty.

If there is a revolution, I certainly hope that it is one guided by the libertarian-flavored wisdom contained in the works of Robert A. Heinlein.

Which pretty much leaves out anyone associated with Democratic Underground.

From The Price of Liberty:

In Robert Heinlein’s classic 1951 science fiction novel “The Puppet Masters”, a slug-like alien race capable of attaching themselves to human being’s spinal cord and controlling their minds secretly invades earth. A shadowy intelligence operation detects the alien menace, and led by the protagonist “Sam” and his partner “Mary” manages to defeat them. One of their biggest challenges after they understood what they were up against was preventing infiltration of “Zone Green”, the areas known to be free of puppet masters. One of the measures necessary to defeat the alien menace was “Schedule Suntan”, ordering uninfected civilians to wear a bare minimum of clothing (or less) so that the slugs would have no place to hide. Desperate measures for desperate times.
—
Ignoring for the moment the obvious allusion to the invisible spread of insidiously dangerous political ideas like trading fundamental liberties for the illusion of safety, I was reminded of Heinlein’s bare-skin solution by a discussion about so-called “airport security” on the Liberty Round Table’s mailing list recently. One of the ladies joked that an effective protest against the comically ineffective airport “security” screeners and their frequent groping of women was to arrange a protest by “a gaggle of freedom lovers” who present themselves to the screeners wearing nothing but a trench coat. As she put it, “What a way to protest the increasingly inane ’security’ measures… show up and strip naked right there in front of God, goons, and everybody else!”
—
Most of us are willing to show that much skin in public on the beach for recreation. We should be willing to sacrifice a little dignity to fight for our freedom. Identify yourself as both somebody who is no threat to the other passengers, and somebody who wants everyone to know they have utter disdain for the whole farcical proceedings. Be tasteful and respectful, and remember that there are probably kids watching. I’d suggest wearing a jacket over your bathing suit until you actually reach the screening area. Be sure to pointedly tell anyone who asks WHY you are under-dressed for the occasion. If possible, be prepared with flyers and information presenting alternatives. One good source of information you might find useful is the Project: Safe Skies web site I maintain at www.projectsafeskies.org.

Not a bad idea. Perhaps it will catch on.

On one hand, I’m glad some nation is serious about space exploration. On the other, I’m P.O.ed that it’s not the United States of America. I suppose a nation can afford a real space program when it’s military owns and operates businesses, a right either denied its citizens or heavily regulated.

I am sure I am the last warblogger to post this humerous, yet wise advice, which I found here. But it is remarkably consistant with the philosophy behind the Robert A. Heinlein quote from my previous post.

With all of this talk of war, many of us will encounter “Peace Activists” who will try and convince us that we must refrain from retaliating against the ones who terrorized us all on September 11, 2001, and those who support terror.

These activists may be alone or in a gathering…..most of us don’t know how to react to them. When you come upon one of these people, or one of their rallies, here are the proper rules of etiquette:

1. Listen politely while this person explains their views. Strike up a conversation if necessary and look very interested in their ideas. They will tell you how revenge is immoral, and that by attacking the people who did this to us, we will only bring on more violence. They will probably use many arguments, ranging from political to religious to humanitarian.

2. In the middle of their remarks, without any warning, punch them in the nose.

3. When the person gets up off of the ground, they will be very angry and they may try to hit you, so be careful.

4. Very quickly and calmly remind the person that violence only brings about more violence and remind them of their stand on this matter. Tell them if they are really committed to a nonviolent approach to undeserved attacks, they will turn the other cheek and negotiate a solution. Tell them they must lead by example if they really believe what they are saying.

5. Most of them will think for a moment and then agree that you are correct.

6. As soon as they do that, hit them again. Only this time hit them much harder. Square in the nose.

7. Repeat steps 2-5 until the desired results are obtained and the idiot realizes how stupid of an argument he/she is making.

8. There is no difference in an individual attacking an unsuspecting victim or a group of terrorists attacking a nation of people. It is unacceptable and must be dealt with. Perhaps at a high cost.

We owe our military a huge debt for what they are about to do for us and our children. We must support them and our leaders at times like these. We have no choice. We either strike back, VERY HARD, or we will keep getting hit in the nose.

Lesson over, class dismissed.