[BRIEF NOTE] On the queerness of science fiction
The cover article on the latest issue of fab is Scott Dagostino's "Why is Sci-Fi so gay?" Dagostino's examination of the increasing prominence of queer themes in science fiction is worth reading, not least for its broad historical perspective on science fiction's acceptance of these themes and official Star Trek's relative reluctance.
Felice Picano was both a pioneer and publisher of gay fiction [in the 1970s], celebrated for his autobiographical work and suspense novels. He loved what was happening in the sci-fi genre and worked on stories of his own (now collected in Tales: From a Distant Planet). His own novel, Dryland’s End, he explains, “is set in a matriarchy, so the women have been in charge for thousands of years. Nobody works, machines do everything - it’s just very, very different. In a situation like that, where everything has turned around, what’s a gay relationship? How important is that? Who’s going to be upset by that when all marriages consist of two women with a guy on the side?”
Science fiction, Picano argues, had become an integral tool for gay people: “The idea is to put out something so utterly different and yet human and amusing and interesting and involving that it will wipe away old ideas. That’s what science fiction is supposed to do - to wipe away old ideas and give you new ones!”
[. . .]
We’ve now entered the 21st century - a time of cloning, genetic engineering, weapons of mass destruction, holograms, nanotechnology and the instantaneous, worldwide sharing of information. We have new reproductive technologies and the possibility of extensive body modification through surgery and hormones. We are no longer enjoying science fiction, we are living it, and queers of all stripes have long found themselves in the middle of this ever-shifting body politic. Should we choose to pay attention, the sci-fi genre promises to continue doing what it always has - to expand our minds, warn us of future dangers and create new playgrounds for discovery.
Me, I was reminded of Wayne Studer writes, at his Pet Shop Boys Commentary website, about the 1993 Very/Relentless track "We Come From Outer Space."
If there is a meaning [to this song], it appears to have something to do with the kinds of verbal exchanges that might take place between earthlings and space-aliens who have just landed. Someone of them are delightful, such as "You know the difference between the two genders? No."
In fact, that very exchange, as well as the repeated words "We came from outer space to-to our parents," has inspired one of my online correspondents to interpret this track (quite cleverly, I might add) as an ironic commentary on how gay people strike some heterosexuals-perhaps their own parents-as beings so different in certain ways (particularly regarding gender relationships and perceptions) that they might as well be from another world. Interestingly, this mirrors the common glam-rock "conceit that gayness is the stuff of science fiction" [. . .], most notably employed by David Bowie and Jobriath, with its implied link between homo/bisexuality and space aliens. Think Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars.
I have to admit that, sometimes, heterosexuals do confuse me. How do you construct yourselves, again? Alien beings live on Earth, too.
Felice Picano was both a pioneer and publisher of gay fiction [in the 1970s], celebrated for his autobiographical work and suspense novels. He loved what was happening in the sci-fi genre and worked on stories of his own (now collected in Tales: From a Distant Planet). His own novel, Dryland’s End, he explains, “is set in a matriarchy, so the women have been in charge for thousands of years. Nobody works, machines do everything - it’s just very, very different. In a situation like that, where everything has turned around, what’s a gay relationship? How important is that? Who’s going to be upset by that when all marriages consist of two women with a guy on the side?”
Science fiction, Picano argues, had become an integral tool for gay people: “The idea is to put out something so utterly different and yet human and amusing and interesting and involving that it will wipe away old ideas. That’s what science fiction is supposed to do - to wipe away old ideas and give you new ones!”
[. . .]
We’ve now entered the 21st century - a time of cloning, genetic engineering, weapons of mass destruction, holograms, nanotechnology and the instantaneous, worldwide sharing of information. We have new reproductive technologies and the possibility of extensive body modification through surgery and hormones. We are no longer enjoying science fiction, we are living it, and queers of all stripes have long found themselves in the middle of this ever-shifting body politic. Should we choose to pay attention, the sci-fi genre promises to continue doing what it always has - to expand our minds, warn us of future dangers and create new playgrounds for discovery.
Me, I was reminded of Wayne Studer writes, at his Pet Shop Boys Commentary website, about the 1993 Very/Relentless track "We Come From Outer Space."
If there is a meaning [to this song], it appears to have something to do with the kinds of verbal exchanges that might take place between earthlings and space-aliens who have just landed. Someone of them are delightful, such as "You know the difference between the two genders? No."
In fact, that very exchange, as well as the repeated words "We came from outer space to-to our parents," has inspired one of my online correspondents to interpret this track (quite cleverly, I might add) as an ironic commentary on how gay people strike some heterosexuals-perhaps their own parents-as beings so different in certain ways (particularly regarding gender relationships and perceptions) that they might as well be from another world. Interestingly, this mirrors the common glam-rock "conceit that gayness is the stuff of science fiction" [. . .], most notably employed by David Bowie and Jobriath, with its implied link between homo/bisexuality and space aliens. Think Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars.
I have to admit that, sometimes, heterosexuals do confuse me. How do you construct yourselves, again? Alien beings live on Earth, too.