Message from @Catboi
Discord ID: 655898355494289408
But, a lot of these set pieces in the worldbuilding actually make me realise it's how someone like Daniel Abraham sees the real world
They view it as inevitable that we'll have to have UBI, that anytime people move into new places they're oppressing the people there workers or otherwise. Etc
The whole main plot point is the tension between the belters, and Earth and Mars because the belters are "oppressed and exploited"
There's like a little detective murder mystery story in the first book that's still very good though, And the second book ties everything off, but there are like 8 books now.
That reminds me - I need to finish the Southern Reach and Sprawl trilogies
Might have to check out the first two Expanse books though. It at least sounds interesting if not terribly agreeable
VanderMeer is definitely a shitlib too
There's nothing too terrible about the first few books TBH
Gibson lives in Vancouver apparently so I'd assume he fits in politically overall
It's just noticing that one of the authors is a crazy shitlib who hates trump
Ah
and their whole thing is like the colonial opression narrative
That's basically what happened to the "Belters"
I kinda want a story that does the 50/50
even though if you look at any sort of group that would be like that in the real world, they'd all have gotten well off at worst, and damn rich at best
There's some corporate conspiracy stuff too
I'm making it sound more flat than it is, but it's definitely there
Earth is portrayed not so great with UBI
Mars doesn't have UBI
Mars is like a libertarianish society
There's a lot there, it's just it really occured to me about how belters are just the evils of colonialism narrative put in space
Like "hey, we wanted to keep these traditions" so some rebel and ask for everything to be returned to normal
But then most people are pretty okay with having proper agriculture and not sacrificing children to appease spirits and shit, and the officials just want everyone to shut up and assimilate to the degree that it creates stability and profitability
Ah
After books 4 is when I started going meh
On earth there's like illegal people because they force abortions
and without a real identity you cant get UBI on earth
Ah
so there's a whole underclass of criminals
there's interesting stuff in the Expanse still, the first 2 books are good, I think it really falls off at 4
A lot of the SF people are extreme shitlibs, and it shows in a lot of newer books IMO
Really I'm fine dropping a series short as long as the narrative threads have some sort of cut in the middle
Like a timelapse or they solve the interesting problems
Expanse has like 10-30 year jumps in the later books
the first 2 wrap up the main story, but there's a thread you can complete with book 4 if you want
I haven't read any VanderMeer but I wat thinking about giving it a try
event hough he seems just like the nutty feminazi that wrote the Anscillary justice book about the Ship AIs and cultures with no concept of "gender"
Annihilation seems very Roadside Picnic inspired
But few are as based as Russian sci fi writers tbh
I've just sort of accepted you can't avoid some pozz and them trying to slide their politics in with any SF unless you find virtual unknown indie authors online.
I didn't notice it in the Expanse as much until the other day when I found another clip of Abraham pronoucning that Trump is indeed Hitler