Starship Troopers and South Park

This thought just struck me.

I just finished reading Heinlein’s Starship Troopers. It reminded me of Ayn Rand’s stuff in that it seemed very keen on promoting a view of how society should be, but at least I wasn’t cursing Heinlein the way I cursed Rand when I read Anthem. (And no, I’m never reading her again. I had the kind of black anger you’d think only exists in anime or in one of Tony Jaa’s movies…that crazy, crazy anger).

In any case, Heinlein – or one of his characters – proposes the idea that beating children when they do wrong will keep them in line when they grow older and keep them from crime. It seems that the solution to juvenile delinquency in our century would be, to simplify, to beat some sense into these kids. Which I’m totally pro. At first. You see, the character making the argument compares a person to a puppy; you have to “paddle” it to get it to learn right. Okay, that works for a dog…but a human…?

Well, this is the idea that occurred to me; you see, that scenario was tried on South Park in the episode called “Tsst.” The Dog Whisperer goes to Eric Cartman’s house to get him under control. And if anyone is a juvenile delinquent, it’s Cartman. Using dog training techniques, Cesar Milano manages to change Cartman’s behavior. And he makes the same argument that Heinlein seems to make – that once the behavior changes, the personality will follow.

This reminds me of my psych class, when we learned that this kind of behavior modification works for phobias, for example. But other problems need other cures; I’m sure you couldn’t cure schizophrenia with “paddling.”

In any case, at the end of “Tsst,” Cartman returns to his normal self, proving that Heinlein’s theory that paddling will set people straight is pure bull. Hahaha, no that isn’t my real evidence. I don’t even have much evidence, except that I was never hit (okay once or twice) when I was younger, and neither was my brother, and we still turned out fine. Plus, I think there are plenty of parents that abuse their authority to spank their kids. My neighbor told how she and her husband once saw a large, older man beating the crap out of a nine-year-old in the street; when her husband told the man to stop, he turned and said, “You’re next.” (And her husband was probably in his sixties when this happened. What the hell is wrong with people?)

Well, I seem to have lost my thread here, but the idea is that just as Rico in Starship Troopers says that people are not the same as potatoes, I argue that they aren’t the same as puppies either.

Puppies are cuter.

 

Eschatology – The End?

CHILDREN OF MEN.

How incredible was THAT? On the whole drive home, I couldn’t stop saying how much I absolutely loved that movie.

It was strange, though, walking out of the theater and hearing someone say that it was great – except for the ending. I agree – Children of Men does not have the ending we expect. But then again, Children of Men is not a very predictable movie. Sure, after one of the characters dies (the one I expected to stick around for the whole movie and add a romantic element but amazingly did not – how awesome is that?), I realized that ANY character could die. And, yes, lots of characters – both “good” and “bad” – got the ax over time.

A major motif (? hehe) in the movie was immigration. With the whole world gone to shit – often radioactive shit (a shot of NYC getting hit with a nuclear bomb was absolutely mortifying, even though it lasted a split-second) – refugees were pouring into Great Britain, and were subsequently being hunted and often killed. My friend got so pissed because the woman next to her hissed, “Oh, the *immigrants*…” when the movie started discussing them – but really, Children of Men was showing how cruel the British government in 2027 was being to the immigrants (caging them, driving them off, torturing, and executing them). I did see some parallels with our own immigration issues, which are thankfully not as severe, although I think the movie should be taken as a warning. What’s with all these anti-immigration feelings when we’re all humans? Obviously, there’s laws, but I often see people dehumanizing illegal immigrants, which is ridiculous.

Other thoughts on the movie: What seemed to me to be very realistic action scenes shot in very fluid sequences, which I love since I hate it when the camera keeps cutting and I can’t tell what’s going on. Also, there were tons of adorable DOGS in the movie! Hahaha. It seemed that people had replaced children with dogs (and sheep and zebras and camels…or something like that). Clive Owen – loved him in Sin City, although I hated that movie, and in Inside Man, which I thought was okay. His “hero” is badass in that he’s realistic. Can’t help but dig that.

I recently realized that there seems to be a trend of increasingly apocalyptic fiction in my life. I recently finished Sakyo Komatsu’s book Japan Sinks, which is, duh, about Japan sinking. Three-quarters of the book was rather dull since it discussed much of the science (fiction) behind Japan sinking, but then the last quarter was horrifying as Japan actually sunk (well, of course it would – it wouldn’t be fair to build up the idea and then have nothing happen). The sheer destruction was startling; the death toll chilling. Are these the right adjectives for a book that gave me nightmares? A few nights after finishing, I had a dream that Tokyo was bombed just like Hiroshima, which scared the crap out of me. Although I live nowhere near Tokyo or Japan.

Afterward, I started reading Chris Adrian’s book The Children’s Hospital. So far, it’s pretty good, although it got a little dull after a sort of climax halfway through. The book is about the apocalypse, literally. One day, the whole world gets buried under 7 miles of water and all that’s left is a sort of Noah’s Ark – a children’s hospital full of hospital staff, some families, and seven hundred incredibly sick kids. I am not really into the whole governing of the hospital bit – not my thing. Right now, I’m waiting for the destruction to get going. Maybe I’m a bit twisted, but it’s not like I find it good or exhilarating… I think I’d just like to get it over with.

A few years ago, I read Sir Arthur C. Clarke’s Childhood’s End, possibly THE SCARIEST book I have ever read in my life. Okay, I haven’t read that many horror books…some Goosebumps, a handful of Stephen King (not scary at all…except one scene in Pet Semetary)…but Childhood’s End was sci-fi anyway. It’s about a group of aliens that come to Earth and give us, basically, a paradise. Afterward, there evolve super children, or something like that… Anyway, it’s an apocalyptic vision of the sci-fi-ish end of the world, and it’s superb.

Curiously, I read both Childhood’s End and Japan Sinks because they were briefly referenced in the anime Rahxephon (another apocalyptic anime). This anime is often compared to Neon Genesis Evangelion, perhaps the greatest anime of all time.

NGE was brilliant, and the movie was to me probably the ultimate apocalypse, what with the copious amounts of bloodshed, killing of main characters, religious and sexual imagery, and the not very happy ending (all right, it was dismal and confusing). Hmm… according to Wikipedia, Childhood’s End greatly influenced the director, Hideaki Anno, particularly in creating the Human Instrumentality Project.

‘Tis all connected! Now I really want to read… Tokyo (or The Capital) Vanishes and Logan’s Run.

Maybe it’s the state of the world today that’s pushing me to read these books. For the past two weeks, especially, (and probably since I’ve been overloading on apocalyptic literature) I’ve felt oppressed. I haven’t been able to function properly, like I haven’t done much of anything I set out to do, and a single banner seems to be flashing through my head – that no matter what I do, I am going to lose everyone I care about or be lost to them. Sometimes, at night, I freak out. I don’t know if this happens to anyone else, but my life has a dreamlike quality to it – I just go through days and it’s like I’m expecting them to go on forever. But sometimes, when I’m trying to sleep, it hits me out of nowhere – that it’s all going to end someday, and the thought is horribly frightening, since we all have to go alone.

According to a website, Dec. 21, 2012 is the date the Mayan calendar ends. A rather important date in sci-fi lit, although I can only name to series that deal with it (off the top of my head). Although I didn’t actually watch it, the X-Files series finale apparently indicated that the coming alien invasian would occur in that year. Similarly, the Mulians arrived on that date in the anime Rahxephon. This may be an apocalyptic date, or a mark of something really weird happening; it’s not clear. I like the alien thing, since the Mayan civilization is so darn suspicious (as is Egyptian civilization…okay, the pyramids freak me out). Anyway, the site says the calendar ends at exactly 11:11 am GMT. A few years ago, I was having weird encounters with the number 11. I’d see it all the time on digital clocks and not mean to. One of my friends had a similar problem, but I think it was the number 23? Not sure (and I don’t want to end up referencing the upcoming movie…).

Do I believe this stuff? It’s scary, you know, but the world will end someday, although it may just be when we blow ourselves up or the Sun just gets bigger (red giant? can’t remember any astronomy) or the magnetic field goes… Why worry about the fate of the world? What about ourselves? What about me? Hahahaha. I could just imagine a character saying that. It’d be terrible if we did something stupid to finish ourselves off and then it turned out that a paradise was coming in the next few years. We should definitely take care of the Earth while we can and save ourselves the headache or ass-ache of kicking ourselves when things go to shit because of us.

Incidentally, Happy Feet was not so happy toward the end. Almost brought me to tears. The ending was very idealized. I hope little kids don’t walk out thinking the problem of over-fishing has been fixed. And I hope it doesn’t get to the point where penguins have to tap-dance for us before we notice that we’re killing off every other species on the planet (and each other but we’ve been doing that for ages).