Years ago, I attended my first Comicon. (Much too late in life if you ask me, should have tried to go sooner.) A large part of the reason I went was because I was really getting the bug to learn to write and decided to attend the panels of some published authors. The one that stuck out for me the most, was Robert Sawyer.
Personally, I’ve not read anything of Mr. Sawyers. That’s my own fault and I’ll probably rectify that soon. Anyway, his entire presentation was about putting a theme or moral or whatever in your story. All the greats in genre fiction did it. Star Wars was really a classic fairy tail. Star Trek is about how humankind can be better than we are. Farscape is a love story. Blade Runner can be viewed as about prejudice (and the dangers of AI). The Expanse series has heavy themes around corporate greed. And there’s a ton more.
But what happens when a story takes a theme or moral that you don’t agree with? Even more so, what happens when that story’s moral becomes SO overwhelming, it ruins the story itself?
Those who know me know my political and social leanings. I don’t usually talk about that in public because too many people cannot have a civil discussion. And, to be honest, I don’t feel like I need to deal with the bullshit that comes along with political and social discussions online. I will say, however, that even though I’ve never read anything by Ayn Rand, I think that would be the case. I think that would be the case because I recently came across a series of books that became SO bogged down in it’s own morality, that I had to stop reading it.
A few months ago, I decided to take up reading the Sword of Truth series by Terry Goodkind. I had seen the Legend of the Seeker TV show awhile back, and wanted to dive into its inspiration. After book 1, Wizard’s First Rule, I was in love. My hunger for great fantasy came back from my childhood and dove, head first, into the rest of the series.
I got about halfway through Pillars of Creation (Book 7) and had to stop.
I’m not sure exactly where it started, maybe some in Book 3 or 4, (I’m sure it’s documented somewhere on the Internet, but I don’t care that much to go looking) but at some point I started to notice an uneasy feeling whenever the antagonist and his goals were described. Not because he was particularly evil, mind you. He is, though that’s not the point. Rather, it was because one of his goals did not seem quite evil to me. In fact, his goal was quite noble.
The goal, I’m talking about, is equality and care for everyone. Yes, that horrific red scourge, Communism.
In the real world, we all know that Communism, pure, true Communism, does not work. Or, at least it didn’t in the cases of the Soviet Union, Cuba and China. (I include China because even they have moved away from the pure Communist system to more a more socialist (if not semidespotic) system. And, in Goodkind’s Old World, it really doesn’t work. The Old World’s government is only held in place by a massive army compelled by the Emperor’s magical powers. The oppression has become an exceptionally dogmatic iron fist holding everyone down with the belief that everyone contributes to the betterment of everyone else, to the exclusion of themselves. Unions are tools of the government, distributing work out “equitably” instead of based on who the better worker/business is. Everyone is on a food-stamp like system, with only the privileged governmental heirarchs and black market dealers having access to more than scraps of food.
In short, everything is portrayed as dark, gloomy, bitter and sad. And yet, the people believe that their poor position and lot in life is their duty to maintain in order to support everyone else. Humanity is meant to suffer because we are inherently flawed and sinful creatures.
The people are hypertaxed, even to the point of getting negative wages from their employers. Of course, if they have nothing to pay for food, then they can always go and file for support (wellfare). All the while, the main protagonist rails against the “system,” proclaiming that no man should have to put anyone else above himself. And, that those same systems, by default make everyone lazy and not care about anything.
As most anyone would, I found the Old World a terrible and terrifying place. But not really because it was evil. My issue is because of the dangerous message it sends. The moral of the story becomes one of greed. ONLY by taking care of one’s own self interest can we truly be happy and free. Charity is bad, the self is good.
The theme goes so far as to describe an exaggerated style of art used by the Old World that sounds like a mix of art decco and gothic styles (making me think of Soviet Russia and medieval Europe). The art style is portrayed dark and twisted. What were harsh, angular lines meant to portray the strength of people united in the real world, became distorted and twisted images of pitiful and flawed wretches in the books.
Now, maybe I’m seeing things that aren’t there. Maybe, because I tend to lean to the left and do not think Socialism is a necessarily bad word, that I take personal exception to his portrayal. To that I say, “You’re goddamned right.”
In my mind, nothing is ever absolute. Everything in the middle. Moderation is king.
No, true communism won’t work. But neither can pure free market capitalism. Complete selflessness cannot really work on a global scale, but neither can rampant greed. We all have to look out for ourselves AND look out for each other at the same time.
I’ll finish this with a poem by John Donne.
No man is an island,
Entire of itself,
Every man is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manor of thy friend’s
Or of thine own were:
Any man’s death diminishes me,
Because I am involved in mankind,
And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;
It tolls for thee.
~John Donne, c. 1624