Isn't it sad when a love affair dies?

2002-03-18 - 2:55 a.m.

I've fallen out of love with Heinlein. He's still a brilliant man and writer, but it's difficult to maintain a relationship when you disagree with over half of everything he says, but aren't quite bright enough to articulate why.

If I could find some way to address his very valid-seeming points on why the US should increase military spending, develop new and better nukes, become undisputed rulers of the world, then maybe I'd be able to read his short stories with some of the joy I had when I first encountered them.

I wish I had some eloquent way of arguing that, while democracy has a lot of problems, limitting who gets to vote for arbitrary (or not arbitrary) reasons destroys the whole -point- of democracy, and once again you've developped an aristocracy, or...well...a meritocracy. Where the world, once again, becomes more divided between the haves and have-nots. Show me your perfect plan for who gets to vote and who doesn't, and I'll show you a system ready to be abused...and, frankly, if we -can- abuse something, as a species we -will- abuse something.

Democracy doesn't work, but a meritocracy won't work any better...anyone who says otherwise is a dangerous idealist (I should know, 'cause I'm dangerously idealistic in many ways myself).

Maybe, one day, I'll be able to set aside my selfish need to always be right, or I'll miraculously develop new and amazing ideas to rival even the greatest of authors', and I'll be able to read Heinlein's disturbingly American essays without cringing or wondering what went wrong.

Cheers,

Magus

previous - next