Geek Rage: A short note on ‘The War on Science Fiction and Marvin Minsky”
Posted on | October 14, 2009 | 1 Comment
There was an article recently featured on The Spearhead, a “Pro-Male/Anti-Feminist Tech” blog, which I’m not going to link to because this crud doesn’t need any more Googlejuice, about how women and gayness have ruined/are ruining SF. You can find the link on the response article I Remember When SF Was All About Straight Men Doing Stuff on Geektheory, among other places.
There have been plenty of responses to the article, many of them listed here on Geekfeminism.org. Most points of turditude in that post have been well covered, so I’d like to add one thing I haven’t seen mentioned yet.
The article opens with:
Science fiction is a very male form of fiction. Considerably more men than women are interested in reading and watching science fiction. This is no surprise. Science fiction traditionally is about men doing things, inventing new technologies, exploring new worlds, making new scientific discoveries, terraforming planets, etc. Many men working in the fields of science, engineering, and technology have cited science fiction (such as the original Star Trek) for inspiring them when they were boys to establish careers in these fields.
OH NO HE DIDN’T.
The very first pilot of Star Trek that was filmed featured an accomplished, efficient female second-in-command on a military vessel. In 1964. That pilot didn’t air until 1988, allegedly because studio execs couldn’t handle that fact, though this is contested. D.C. Fontana created a Romulan commander for the episode ‘The Enterprise Incident‘ who I still think was the best female character in the original series – a woman who was in command, efficient, intelligent, sensual, of an antagonistic alien race but still not evil. She did nothing the Enterprise crew wouldn’t do, to further her ends. Star Trek spinoffs have since then continued to place women in positions of power and to contest sexism as an evil to be put behind by civilized people. It’s one of the things Star Trek is all about: that there is no racism, sexism, sizeism or ableism in the 23rd century.
While the original series often failed miserably in its mission to portray this ideal (don’t get me started on Spock’s rape joke, Yeoman Rand’s wildly shifting characterisation, officers leaving Starfleet upon marriage etc.), the intent and the attempt were clearly there. How dare he use the example of this show, which has always had a huge female fan-base (some of whom may well have been inspired to establish scientific careers of their own), to further his straight-males-are-oppressed bullshit?
So that’s my moment of geek rage today. There’s a hell of a lot more to say about this article and how very wrong it is, but I think at this point we should move beyond rage and start to mock.
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October 14th, 2009 @ 6:29 pm
Great post. Really liked your examples.
These guys in serious need of education. Their agenda is so blatant. I guess they figure subtlety is for women. Way to shoot themselves in the foot.