I'm writing a currently genre ambiguous Sci-Fi/lovecraft/spaceopera/superhero novel that doesn't outright declare everyone is openly is Maoist/Anarchist/Stalinist/Etc., (the alien characters won't have human etymology for their ideologies) and maybe it's not actually all that political on the surface anyways, but any tips for slipping in vegan and leftist dog-whistles?

  • JuneFall [none/use name]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Stream of consciousness:

    Not using credits to pay for stuff. Have reproductive work and community relations (like small-ish collectives) be something no one bats an eye at. Have Polyamory and some people who pair bond. Have child care that isn't done by the "traditional" core family.

    Have easy access to resources and information. Historical newspaper clippings / blog posts about scarcity or lack of healthcare even though it was there.

    Maybe underline how much art there is, showing how much free time there is. Showing that conflict still exists. Job boards / skillshare boards. Historical reenactment of companies.

    Fancy voting systems? Mentions of Cybersyn? Holidays as in feasts for leftist things. Green bike-able and walk-able cities (think Ecotopia, but better) . Lots of usage of rivers and nice use of water bodies. Some produce is produced within arms reach where ever people are? No pets in the form we know them.

    Festivals with drug use and good consent?

    The Dispossessed is a neat book btw.

    Edit if there are sexual scenes then it could be possible to show that organic bodies how they come are not the non plus ultra, but that you can readily use whatever suits ie prosthetics, toys, or nothing, which is fine, too.

    "Altered" bodies, aka biomods, which are not scarce but more like fashion.

    Speaking of fashion: A multitude of options would be something I would like, but how is that done in an ecological fashion? Clubbing with colorful and fun outfits is good, but having 40 dresses might not be ideal, so they might be either cheap to fabricate and redo, some of them be semi-shared, might be so that they can change colour or form, be easily put into some water where magic aka chemical nano science magic does recolour / recode them. Maybe the threads of the fabric are not hard interwoven but connected so that they can easily change where every thread part goes.

    In terms of accessibility, I would like to imagine a world in which steps aren't a barrier for some of our comrades, this would mean that either there are no steps as we know them - as only option to get into something - to begin with, or techniques that enable to surpass them, since I believe hand-waving away that those are barriers since all people are able to climb them might be read as eugenically.

    Similarly displays of old ages are nice.

    Not having school as we know it, might be nice, too.

    Not having police and prisons, having semi-involved (local) communities that handle a lot of social frictions.

    Having a different way to deal with neurodivergents than our current society - which does repress, oppress, marginalize, criminalize, pathologize.

      • JuneFall [none/use name]
        ·
        3 years ago

        If you accept that animals have some kind of person hood like children do, then the question is if you basically locking them in a totalitarian prison in which you control their every move and food etc. or in which they have some kind of agency to live a life they want to live, which will reduce the mental, emotional and physical problems that can be found in many if not all animals to be found in flats or houses.

        Lets take a goldfish:

        A: Yes! Goldfish are social animals and when kept in groups often socialise with their fishy friends. They even learn to recognise people, too! You should have at least two goldfish in an aquarium to give them some company and stop them from being lazy, couch potatoes!

        They are often not held in environments which are socially stimulant enough, large enough (in "natural" conditions they are swimming much further than even your largest pool is sized) and enjoy a multitude of environmental objects and interactions.

        In door cats are basically prisoners, dogs are often bred to be pets in the first place and are put indoors for most of their life and can't properly socialize with other dogs, nor run around as much as they want to and there is a problematic hierarchy between the humans and the dogs (esp. since most humans have no clue that dominance theory is pseudoscientific bullshit) and since most humans are forced to work there is not enough time to properly interact with the dogs anyhow.

        So good pets would be those in which the domination of animal by human doesn't occur (or at least not in the brute force it does now), in which animals aren't produced in stuff like puppy mills.

        That said I think that some form of human / animal interactions are very sensible to keep going that aren't of mass industrialized cows being slaughtered for treats or locked in dogs.

        Also: common dogs with some caretakers might be nicer than the current way to have pets in any case.