By pure random statistical chance, your friends should be about
>10% gay, 10% black, 7% latino, 5% asian (I could be off on the
>asian/latino stats), 50/50 male/female, and overwhelmingly lower-middle
>class. Bet they're not.
As a Californian, you'd be way off on the Latino statistic, and while I do
have friends and acquaintances in each of those categories, the true social
fact is indeed that like groups tend to congregate with like groups, that
one is not generally exposed to all the possible variations or have contact
with all ethnic types, so of course, random statistical chance would
dictate that it is unlikely that my acquaintences would fall into the same
amounts as those in society at large. (Part of the problem in assigning
affirmative action preferences, etc., and why quotas become so despised.
For example, what white male in his right mind would want to work at a
corporation which has set asides that will give preferences to persons of
other genders and racial backgrounds if it means he is that much less
likely to be promoted no matter how hard he works. [I'm in favor of a true
meritocracy--with merit determined regardless of race and sex].
> But returning to covert discrimination and paranoia, yes
>marginalized groups tend to see racism/sexism/classism/homophobia/
>religious bigotry where it isn't, but it's because they can never really
>be sure that that isn't the motivation behind others's actions. That
>never-quite-knowing is a huge part of race relations, but I never seem to
>see it addressed in sci fi on the issue. Instead, the racial lines are
>always drawn in huge letters with black and white lines--the "good guys",
>who don't care about the species of the oppressed people, the "bad guys"
>who think that species is scum. Nowhere is there the subtlety of late
>20th century racism. And nowhere have I seen the issue of self-hatred
>properly addressed--the unfortunate double-whammie of a manichean
>dichotomy. I can't tell you how many times I've heard gay men deride each
>other for being "too faggy" (and on the other side, lesbians who consider
>each other "too butch").
> I think this lack is probably the effect of sci fi's mostly
>straight, white, middle-class male authors (to tie in another thread). In
>other words, a group that is only aware of overt discrimination, and has
>never experiences discrimination themselves. No one really wants to
>admit that they're racist or sexist or what-have-you, but since sci fi has
>the advantage of being able to address issues through metaphor (e.g.
>different species instead of different races), it would be nice to see
>some of the tough stuff taken head-on.
But most written s-f avoids the tough in favor of the simple. How many s-f
stories have you read that postulate feudal societies in outer space, even
though feudalism disappeared for some fundamental reasons, and how few
actually depict anything like a democracy in action. Why? Because tyranny
is easy to understand, who's in charge and whether they are good or bad
becomes very clear. There has been some s-f that deals directly with
racism--the ALIEN NATION TV program made that a staple, just as there was
one episode of STAR TREK--THE NEXT GENERATION that took a brilliant look at
sexual orientation prejudice, but such outstanding examples are rare. Lots
of things have been dumbed down as artists play to an audience that no
longer reads or wishes to think deeply about things. (Postman made a
brilliant analysis of how culture has been fundamentally changed by
television in his book AMUSED TO DEATH, which I highly recommend).
|