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Serenity Found
Serenity Found is a set of essays on the Firefly TV series and the film Serenity edited by Jane Espenson. I found them a rather mixed bunch. My initial thoughts, after reading the first couple, were that the authors tended to rather over-state their case. I think Firefly was one of the best drama series of the past decade, however that doesn't mean I think it represented a quantum leap forward in either the insertion of social commentary into TV-SF or in the representation of women in genre shows.
However I was fascinated by a trio of the essays which, almost certainly unintentionally formed a dialogue with each other. Freedom in an Unfree World by P. Gardner Goldsmith interpreted Firefly and Serenity as a libertarian political tract, one in which the allegorical links to the American Civil War highlighted the South's position as one opposed to excessive government meddling. Mal Contents by Alex Bledsoe focused on the character of Malcolm Reynolds and explicitly rejected the idea that he is some kind of libertarian hero, stressing instead his teenage-like refusal to accept any authority over him, any criticism of his own authority or indeed any responsibility for others beyond those in his immediate vicinity. Bledsoe's theory is that it's only towards the end of Serenity that Mal is motivated by any kind of principles beyond self-absorption and knee-jerk rebellion. The Bonnie Brown Flag by Evelyn Vaughn examined directly the Civil War allegory and tried, though I'm unconvinced it succeeded, to address the erasure of the issue of slavery from the allegorical story. This highlighted one of the aspects of Goldsmith's essay that troubled me. In painting the South as heroic libertarian heroes, freedom fighters and underdogs and sidelining completely the issue of slavery it rather showed up, I felt, one of libertarianisms flaws - it's failure to account for the way the privileged tend to rise to the top in an unregulated environment and human-kind's unfortunate tendency to assume that people with superficial differences either do not count, or are happy with their lot. I find it hard to consider a side which was in no small part funded by slave-owning and motivated by a desire to protect the practice, even if it did not primarily consist of slave-owners, as suitable role-models for heroic freedom fighters and I doubt, somehow, that was Whedon's intention. It seems more likely that he found the cause of the South in the American Civil War a convenient allegory for Malcolm Reynolds' knee-jerk rebelliousness.
But, in the end, it has to be said I came away from the essays less happy with the Firefly stories than I went in. While I accept that slavery was far from the only issue involved in the American Civil War, I'm uncomfortable that the series can be read as a vindication of the South's position, that it provides a way for people to erase the issue of slavery from the conflict and, as a result, let's them view the Confederates as heroic freedom fighters and, essentially, the good guys. I also think libertarians should find themselves better heroes.
This entry was originally posted at http://purplecat.dreamwidth.org/28122.html.
However I was fascinated by a trio of the essays which, almost certainly unintentionally formed a dialogue with each other. Freedom in an Unfree World by P. Gardner Goldsmith interpreted Firefly and Serenity as a libertarian political tract, one in which the allegorical links to the American Civil War highlighted the South's position as one opposed to excessive government meddling. Mal Contents by Alex Bledsoe focused on the character of Malcolm Reynolds and explicitly rejected the idea that he is some kind of libertarian hero, stressing instead his teenage-like refusal to accept any authority over him, any criticism of his own authority or indeed any responsibility for others beyond those in his immediate vicinity. Bledsoe's theory is that it's only towards the end of Serenity that Mal is motivated by any kind of principles beyond self-absorption and knee-jerk rebellion. The Bonnie Brown Flag by Evelyn Vaughn examined directly the Civil War allegory and tried, though I'm unconvinced it succeeded, to address the erasure of the issue of slavery from the allegorical story. This highlighted one of the aspects of Goldsmith's essay that troubled me. In painting the South as heroic libertarian heroes, freedom fighters and underdogs and sidelining completely the issue of slavery it rather showed up, I felt, one of libertarianisms flaws - it's failure to account for the way the privileged tend to rise to the top in an unregulated environment and human-kind's unfortunate tendency to assume that people with superficial differences either do not count, or are happy with their lot. I find it hard to consider a side which was in no small part funded by slave-owning and motivated by a desire to protect the practice, even if it did not primarily consist of slave-owners, as suitable role-models for heroic freedom fighters and I doubt, somehow, that was Whedon's intention. It seems more likely that he found the cause of the South in the American Civil War a convenient allegory for Malcolm Reynolds' knee-jerk rebelliousness.
But, in the end, it has to be said I came away from the essays less happy with the Firefly stories than I went in. While I accept that slavery was far from the only issue involved in the American Civil War, I'm uncomfortable that the series can be read as a vindication of the South's position, that it provides a way for people to erase the issue of slavery from the conflict and, as a result, let's them view the Confederates as heroic freedom fighters and, essentially, the good guys. I also think libertarians should find themselves better heroes.
This entry was originally posted at http://purplecat.dreamwidth.org/28122.html.
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Proctor: All right, here's your last question. What was the cause of the Civil War?
Apu: Actually, there were numerous causes. Aside from the obvious schism between the abolitionists and the anti-abolitionists, there were economic factors, both domestic and inter...
Proctor: Wait, wait - just say slavery.
Apu: Slavery it is, sir.
I haven't read that article, but I have seen similar libertarian arguments about Firefly. For example, Joss Whedon won a Prometheus Award (libertarian SF award) for Serenity. Surely the fact that there is no suggestion in Firefly that the Independents kept slaves means that it's ok to see them as heroes doesn't it? If you read The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, you're clearly meant to see Aslan as a hero. But we know that Aslan is allegorically meant to be a christian allegory, and didn't nasty christians start the Crusades? Well maybe, but in the book, Aslan's followers don't do anything bad, and in Firefly, the Independents don't keep slaves. If they had, it would be a different matter.
Incidentally, I don't think libertarians tend to go for heroes. We're too free-thinking for that for the most part. It's the authoritarians and statists who go around wearing Che Guevara t-shirts, attending Nuremberg rallies and reading Polly Toynbee.
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I also love The Lion, the With and the Wardrobe but that doesn't stop me being uncomfortable with some of the ways it acts as a christian apologia, and some of the attitudes it tacitly vindicates by making its allegorically christian protagonists a good deal nicer and more sympathetic than many christians have en masse, historically, been. I also think, from a Christian perspective, it wraps up a number of attitudes which probably are not particularly Christian into the allegory and thus, to a certain extent, tars Christianity with the brush of some of Lewis' own prejudices.
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"We hold these truths to be sacred & undeniable; that all men are created equal & independent, that from that equal creation they derive rights inherent & inalienable, among which are the preservation of life, & liberty, & the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these ends, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government shall become destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, & to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles & organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety & happiness."
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Of course, whether he would have done so in practice is another matter. :-/
He was a separatist racist, and believed in deportation to Africa, but that's a different matter.
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