The book is about the failure of marxist-lenninism in the face of global capital and the inevitable Thucydides trap that China is stuck in as it girds itself to take on global hegemony, written by a man whose childhood was shaped by the cultural revolution, whose adulthood was shaped by the economic boom Dengism bestowed and whose future climate change and a 3rd World War looms over.
You're entitled to be disappointed and frustrated that the author's political views don't match your own, but maybe there are lessons to be learned here?
The book is about the failure of marxist-lenninism in the face of global capital and the inevitable Thucydides trap that China is stuck in as it girds itself to take on global hegemony, written by a man whose childhood was shaped by the cultural revolution, whose adulthood was shaped by the economic boom Dengism bestowed and whose future climate change and a 3rd World War looms over.
unironic based literaturemaxxer :galaxy-brain: moment* holy fucking shit the "dark forest theory" actually makes sense now as something real and not a fascist wet dream, what would be the interpretation of the series' ending based on this geopolitical reading?
*your interpretation is incredibly intelligent and bitingly insightful
what would be the interpretation of the series’ ending based on this geopolitical reading?
You tell me, I haven't had the time to read it. :data-laughing: It's entirely possible this reading is wrong btw, or that it changes with the later books. But it just felt natural to me, given China's history and the way nationalism factors so heavily in the book.
The thing is that the geopolitical reading that you have established really serves to explain the general series of events that take place in the later parts of the series The extent to which is uncanny, even with shit like the brain drain of Chinese intellectuals to the west being relevant lmao it makes everything so clear its amazing
Cixin Liu for me is now officially up there in the sigma literature canon, his later books depicting some fucked up romance between a based failboy academic and his imagination until his imagination becomes real, sounds like utter nonsense but id say its really worth a read
You’re entitled to be disappointed and frustrated that the author’s political views don’t match your own, but maybe there are lessons to be learned here?
Dontcha think this is slightly too aggressive? CriticalOtaku maybe should have worded the final section more preciesely, but I think most posters on this site are entitled to a good faith reading of their comments. Especially because a lot of us here aren't actually native english speakers, so we might come across as more obnoxious than we intended to.
You’re entitled to be disappointed and frustrated that my comment's political views don’t match your own, but maybe there are lessons to be learned here?
I'm in no way defending this book, since I've not read it, and I barely have time to read the non-fiction at this point, so I'm going to let your opinion stand uncontested. I just think you should treat your fellow Hexbearians better.
Telling someone to fuck off is one thing. But do not, under any circumstance, accuse someone of writing like The Economist. You are better than this :hasan-smash:
I did not mean to cause offense- this entire thread has felt like a surface reading of the book just looking for excuses to be performatively morally outraged that the Chinese author isn't The One True Leftist, as if he has to or should be, and that made me frustrated (which probably manifested as condescension, and for that I apologize, the last thing I want to do is talk down to people) - but also truthfully I would rather die than stop being pretentious. It's my last coping mechanism for this decaying world, the thin veneer separating me from annihilation. "I think, therefore I am"- but now that would be pretentious. Behold: The Pale Horse Pretension, and atop it CriticalOtaku!
Then again, maybe I don't think and am a creature of pure id, which would certainly explain why I'm posting this. Who the fuck knows.
Let's talk about the book.
Yes, Liu Cixin is a lib (Well, maybe he's a Dengist because in interviews he expresses nothing but complete support for his current government, but depending on who you ask Dengist is just another word for liberal) . Yes, the book is mid sci-fi, being generous. And other posters have pointed out the problematic bits. But the book is important to leftists because it is a contemporary criticism of Maoism from someone that lived through the Cultural Revolution, expressing in pop culture the mainstream contemporary view of that historical event as seen by its own citizens, and because Dark Forest Theory is something that would only come from the material conditions China has endured over the last century. That's what I meant by there being lessons to learn here- a critical Marxist reading.
Is the author making grand pronouncements about civilizational development, or instead merely Chinese foreign policy? The cartoonishly fascist technologically advanced aliens use videogames as propaganda- a pretty thinly veiled metaphor. I think I dropped my copy of Call of Duty around here somewhere. Maybe the fears of authoritarian invasion in the book are less projection of an authoritarian turn in the CPC and more projection of an invasion by a global hegemon? Or maybe there's a fear of one leading to the other? A conflation between the two- foreign policy to civilizational development.
A huge chunk of the book is dedicated to the notion that The Revolution was Betrayed- that for all the high ideals of Maoism the Party failed to protect it's people and the environment, and there's a pervasive sense in the book that all the suffering endured during the Cultural Revolution amounted to nothing. Even the Revolutionaries that fought for it were betrayed, not even benefitting from any corruption or nepotism that would (at least) provide some sort of justification. There's a MacDonald's on every street corner in Beijing, the protagonist works within the multi-national framework, hell the protagonist is a private sector scientist. Capital won! And not just won, the suffering ended because of it! (But did it really?) And because of that disillusionment with Communism the other PoV character becomes a misanthrope who sells out her planet to the alien imperialists. Not subtle.
Also, the fact that the "worst possible fate" the evil imperialist aliens impose upon humanity is what is essentially a technological blockade is HELLA not subtle.
Dark Forest Theory? Reactionary nonsense. But it should scare you, that so many people take it seriously. It means that the dream of the Internationale and the Comintern is dead- that the best thinkers in China and elsewhere have taken a long hard look and decided that broadcasting your presence is too dangerous, that keeping your head down is the better play lest other, larger colonial empires find you and devour you and subject you to a century of humiliation. That in the long broad sweep of human history this is the only outcome, and extrapolating from that there can only be fascism and colonialism all the way down. That the only way to avoid that fate or become a colonialist yourself is Communism with Chinese Characteristics.
What you've described is a much better book than what was printed on the page. The subtext and lore that you've read into it make for a much more interesting book. Would you say it's a reverse orientalism (occidentalism?) that the trisolarians (western imperialist stand-ins by your interpretation) cannot tell a lie? Perhaps my simple western mind is incapable of more than a surface level understanding of the novel since subtext requires a measure of duplicity which cannot be perceived by people of our background. Or maybe there really is nothing deeper there, which is exactly why this series received so much publicity, and was translated and published in the west. It doesn't challenge western hegemony so it's perfectly safe for wide distribution.
I'm really not scared by Dark Forest Theory. Inscrutable alien beings have been waging genocidal war on humanity since the dawn of science fiction. Justifying the behavior of War of the Worlds martians, Starship Troopers bugs, and Independence Day greys does nothing to change the landscape of science fiction. "The universe ain't big enough for the both of us" has always been justification enough. And once you wade through all the pretentious psychological bullshit, that's all that Dark Forest Theory boils down to isn't it?
I'm not mad that he wrote Space Battleship Yamato with Chinese characteristics, I'm mad that it's the same god damn story I've already been told in the west a hundred times before.
Perhaps my simple western mind is incapable of more than a surface level understanding of the novel since subtext requires a measure of duplicity which cannot be perceived by people of our background.
I... would never suggest something so racist. I would merely gently remind posters that terminally online leftists tend to forget historical contexts, and then leave it out of their analysis. Maybe that's what's happened here. Maybe not. Besides, subtext is for cowards.
Seriously, this wasn't the right line of attack to take. At least, if you don't want to appear chauvinist.
Or maybe there really is nothing deeper there
Yes. The curtain's are blue.
It doesn’t challenge western hegemony so it’s perfectly safe for wide distribution.
I can buy a copy of Lenin's State and Revolution off Amazon, right now. Nothing challenges western hegemony, that's the point of capitalist realism. Also, when did I say that The Three Body Problem had revolutionary potential? I just merely suggested that the book is informed by the author's historical context, and because of that it's of interest to leftists. Because, to spell it out, that context includes the Cultural Revolution. I never said that the book itself was leftist.
Besides, if the book was counter revolutionary surely the CPC would have banned it?
I’m really not scared by Dark Forest Theory.
Congratulations! You missed the point of what I wrote. The theory itself is laughably facile, a horrendous application of Game Theory based upon numerous faulty assumptions. But I said to be scared that people are taking it seriously, not that it is scary in-and-of itself. Since it could be a thinly veiled metaphor for Chinese foreign policy. China's, notably, isolationist foreign policy. The one where they keep their head down and don't draw attention to themselves, because they're surrounded by colonial foreign powers. That foreign policy.
But maybe the idea of their never again being a coordinated international communist effort backed by a state, maybe that doesn't frighten you. You're made of sterner stuff than me, then. Cheers.
I’m not mad that he wrote Space Battleship Yamato with Chinese characteristics, I’m mad that it’s the same god damn story I’ve already been told in the west a hundred times before.
That's your prerogative, but I was taught to read the text as it is, not as it should be. Anyway, Hao Jingfang's Vagabonds is probably more what you're looking for.
Edit:
The subtext and lore that you’ve read into it make for a much more interesting book.
If you want me to go line by line to back up my reading, I will. Don't threaten me with a good time. Just not right now, I have to go to work tomorrow morning and I'll be hella tired if I have to do my homework last minute again. But to be fair, a huge part of the book was taken up by dubious physics.
At the end of the day, Liu Cixin is just one man. One man's opinion isn't indicative of wider opinions so I don't know that there is much utility in doing a deep dive of this man's opinions when we both already agree that he is just a lib. Even if we could accurately parse his opinions from his body of work, all we would know is the idiosyncrasies of one man, and I seriously doubt he is the Chinese whisperer. I might read Hao Jingfang's Vagabonds but I won't assume she has a finger on the pulse of the Chinese either. Or I might not read it either and just dismiss it as the Chinese knock off novelization of Aldnoah.Zero. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, and pop culture is just pop culture, regardless of origin.
Literature is the study of "just one person", over and over again, which in aggregate maybe gives us insight into the human condition. To dismiss the need to think critically about art in such a way is... disappointing, no matter how crass or commercial said art is. I never meant to suggest that Liu Cixin spoke for the entire Chinese Proletariat, but rather to ask the questions "Why would the Chinese author incorporate these particular themes and motifs in his work, especially given his background and the historical period he finds himself in?" and "What can the widespread success of this work, and widespread adoption of the ideas held within, tell us about the world we find ourselves in?" The answers I landed upon might be wrong, but to be so uncurious as to not pursue any line of inquiry in the first place is... deeply disappointing.
That his account of the Cultural Revolution is written from a liberal perspective should make it even more valuable to leftists, in some ways. Knowing what a representative of the intelligentsia thinks about that event in the biggest Actually Existing Socialist nation might give us a clue as to how it's going. Or not. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, as you say.
Or I might not read it
Which would be a shame, since Vagabonds is rather an explicitly leftist work.
If you really want to break down this book to sus out Liu Cixin's politics then don't let me stop you. I'd be happy to read it, but by this point in this thread, you'll likely only have an audience of one. My concerns would be that it wouldn't be fun, since as you said, this is mid-level sci-fi and I'd say Liu is probably little more than a mid-level thinker. It would be like trying to gain insight into the American condition by examining the depiction of television production in John Scalzi's Redshirts. Very often pop sci-fi is just pop sci-fi.
But moreover, I'm not sure I know enough about Chinese politics to ascertain whether your understanding of it is correct. You said China (or it's populace) is isolationist, but I don't know how to square that interpretation with the Belt and Road Initiative. Likewise you talk about how they feel technologically constrained by the west, but they manufacture all of our consumer products, they're a nuclear power, and they're kicking off another space race. And perhaps Call of Duty is propaganda, but it's very obviously aimed at American audiences and is of little interest to the Chinese. If you had a Korean gatcha game smuggling ideology into communist China I'd be all ears to such an argument, but then again, Genshin is out capitalizing the west better than the capitalists could do to themselves.
I'd just make a new thread, but the problem would be me finding the time to do a deep dive.
It would be like trying to gain insight into the American condition by examining the depiction of television production in John Scalzi’s Redshirts.
And what is wrong with that? What if we examined Redshirts alongside Star Trek, then examined which tropes were being lampooned- and used that to see how far we've moved away from the ideas expressed in the original show, of a specific vision of the future- to one that's maybe more cynical? And maybe look and see which tropes were conserved, which values were kept between iterations. And then see what that tells us.
But moreover, I’m not sure I know enough about Chinese politics to ascertain whether your understanding of it is correct.
So my understanding of it could be correct? Although, I will not claim to be an expert on Chinese foreign policy.
However, China will not pull up the drawbridge and retreat to isolation completely. China will turn its back on the West but still keep its door open to non-Western countries by promoting the Belt and Road Initiative and investing in Russia, Africa, South America, Southeast Asia, and other developing economies. These are like-minded countries with a similar history of being colonized and humiliated by the West, plus strongman traditions and interests in seeking financial assistance from China. Developing countries will be happier than the West to see a partially open China.
I will encourage you to read the full article, as it gives a fuller understanding of current Chinese foreign policy by laying out the different near-future scenarios China can find itself in. Again, I will remind you that we are discussing the book and how it reflects the fears of, if not the Chinese people, then at least the author- rather than the actual geopolitical situation. But the initial point I was making was that China has abandoned International Communism, as envisioned by the Internationale and Comintern, in favour of "win-win cooperation"- so if say, a Maoist revolution succeeded in Myanmar, it would be extremely unlikely that China would commit its armed forces in defense of international communism should Myanmar be invaded by a hostile power bent on toppling the new communist regime, no matter how crucial that country is to the Belt and Road Initiative- and that Dark Forest Theory is really just a literary metaphor for Chinese foreign policy, more specifically the defensive strategy of not broadcasting your position.
Then again, a huge part of the book is also about how humanity's response to a global crisis requires that China be integrated into a neoliberal international framework. Maybe isolationist was too strong a word.
Likewise you talk about how they feel technologically constrained by the west
Maybe the videogame in Three Body Problem is a metaphor for hegemonic media in general, rather than a one-to-one comparison to a title that I came up with off-the-cuff? A big plot point of the book is that the evil alien's are recruiting the affluent and well-educated with their videogame, which constantly bombards the player with how great the aliens are. Creating a brain drain, in other words. And while heavily propagandized in the West, these fears of a brain drain were quite real in China.
Also, just gonna point out that the Three Body Problem was first printed in 2006, waaaaaay before Genshin Impact became a thing. Back then, there were major doubts about China's ability to project soft-power, and it's only with the recent successes of things like The Wolf Warrior series were that view has begun to shift.
Having said all this- the point isn't about whether my understanding of Chinese politics is right or not, or even whether my understanding of the book is right or not. The point is to find out whether or not the book has ideas, and if we can read those ideas from the book and maybe use them to learn something. Even (especially!) if those ideas could come from a perspective outside our own- I replied to OP initially because I felt like they missed a perspective that could help them look at the book in a new light.
re-read charitably and not in a haze of beery grumpiness it's not really that pretentious, I mistook your implication of subtext for a different more anticom point and transferred my disappointment at the book into anger at you. once you explained the foreign policy interpretation you're working with, your initial comment made a lot more sense to me
The book is about the failure of marxist-lenninism in the face of global capital and the inevitable Thucydides trap that China is stuck in as it girds itself to take on global hegemony, written by a man whose childhood was shaped by the cultural revolution, whose adulthood was shaped by the economic boom Dengism bestowed and whose future climate change and a 3rd World War looms over.
You're entitled to be disappointed and frustrated that the author's political views don't match your own, but maybe there are lessons to be learned here?
unironic based literaturemaxxer :galaxy-brain: moment* holy fucking shit the "dark forest theory" actually makes sense now as something real and not a fascist wet dream, what would be the interpretation of the series' ending based on this geopolitical reading?
*your interpretation is incredibly intelligent and bitingly insightful
You tell me, I haven't had the time to read it. :data-laughing: It's entirely possible this reading is wrong btw, or that it changes with the later books. But it just felt natural to me, given China's history and the way nationalism factors so heavily in the book.
Thank you, that's very kind of you to say.
The thing is that the geopolitical reading that you have established really serves to explain the general series of events that take place in the later parts of the series The extent to which is uncanny, even with shit like the brain drain of Chinese intellectuals to the west being relevant lmao it makes everything so clear its amazing
Cixin Liu for me is now officially up there in the sigma literature canon, his later books depicting some fucked up romance between a based failboy academic and his imagination until his imagination becomes real, sounds like utter nonsense but id say its really worth a read
fuck you and your condescending pretension
Dontcha think this is slightly too aggressive? CriticalOtaku maybe should have worded the final section more preciesely, but I think most posters on this site are entitled to a good faith reading of their comments. Especially because a lot of us here aren't actually native english speakers, so we might come across as more obnoxious than we intended to.
You’re entitled to be disappointed and frustrated that my comment's political views don’t match your own, but maybe there are lessons to be learned here?
:kelly:
now one of the aliens is giving a maudlin speech about how their harsh culture can't even speak of love (weird how he has a word for it then)
this is the kind of shit sci-fi was doing in the 1950s in black-and-white movies like Teenager From Outer Space, just baby-brained trash
I'm in no way defending this book, since I've not read it, and I barely have time to read the non-fiction at this point, so I'm going to let your opinion stand uncontested. I just think you should treat your fellow Hexbearians better.
I would have if they hadn't talked to me like they were writing for The Economist
Telling someone to fuck off is one thing. But do not, under any circumstance, accuse someone of writing like The Economist. You are better than this :hasan-smash:
I did not mean to cause offense- this entire thread has felt like a surface reading of the book just looking for excuses to be performatively morally outraged that the Chinese author isn't The One True Leftist, as if he has to or should be, and that made me frustrated (which probably manifested as condescension, and for that I apologize, the last thing I want to do is talk down to people) - but also truthfully I would rather die than stop being pretentious. It's my last coping mechanism for this decaying world, the thin veneer separating me from annihilation. "I think, therefore I am"- but now that would be pretentious. Behold: The Pale Horse Pretension, and atop it CriticalOtaku!
Then again, maybe I don't think and am a creature of pure id, which would certainly explain why I'm posting this. Who the fuck knows.
Let's talk about the book.
Yes, Liu Cixin is a lib (Well, maybe he's a Dengist because in interviews he expresses nothing but complete support for his current government, but depending on who you ask Dengist is just another word for liberal) . Yes, the book is mid sci-fi, being generous. And other posters have pointed out the problematic bits. But the book is important to leftists because it is a contemporary criticism of Maoism from someone that lived through the Cultural Revolution, expressing in pop culture the mainstream contemporary view of that historical event as seen by its own citizens, and because Dark Forest Theory is something that would only come from the material conditions China has endured over the last century. That's what I meant by there being lessons to learn here- a critical Marxist reading.
Is the author making grand pronouncements about civilizational development, or instead merely Chinese foreign policy? The cartoonishly fascist technologically advanced aliens use videogames as propaganda- a pretty thinly veiled metaphor. I think I dropped my copy of Call of Duty around here somewhere. Maybe the fears of authoritarian invasion in the book are less projection of an authoritarian turn in the CPC and more projection of an invasion by a global hegemon? Or maybe there's a fear of one leading to the other? A conflation between the two- foreign policy to civilizational development.
A huge chunk of the book is dedicated to the notion that The Revolution was Betrayed- that for all the high ideals of Maoism the Party failed to protect it's people and the environment, and there's a pervasive sense in the book that all the suffering endured during the Cultural Revolution amounted to nothing. Even the Revolutionaries that fought for it were betrayed, not even benefitting from any corruption or nepotism that would (at least) provide some sort of justification. There's a MacDonald's on every street corner in Beijing, the protagonist works within the multi-national framework, hell the protagonist is a private sector scientist. Capital won! And not just won, the suffering ended because of it! (But did it really?) And because of that disillusionment with Communism the other PoV character becomes a misanthrope who sells out her planet to the alien imperialists. Not subtle.
Also, the fact that the "worst possible fate" the evil imperialist aliens impose upon humanity is what is essentially a technological blockade is HELLA not subtle.
Dark Forest Theory? Reactionary nonsense. But it should scare you, that so many people take it seriously. It means that the dream of the Internationale and the Comintern is dead- that the best thinkers in China and elsewhere have taken a long hard look and decided that broadcasting your presence is too dangerous, that keeping your head down is the better play lest other, larger colonial empires find you and devour you and subject you to a century of humiliation. That in the long broad sweep of human history this is the only outcome, and extrapolating from that there can only be fascism and colonialism all the way down. That the only way to avoid that fate or become a colonialist yourself is Communism with Chinese Characteristics.
thanks for expanding, I accept your apology and I apologize for misapprehending your previous comment
What you've described is a much better book than what was printed on the page. The subtext and lore that you've read into it make for a much more interesting book. Would you say it's a reverse orientalism (occidentalism?) that the trisolarians (western imperialist stand-ins by your interpretation) cannot tell a lie? Perhaps my simple western mind is incapable of more than a surface level understanding of the novel since subtext requires a measure of duplicity which cannot be perceived by people of our background. Or maybe there really is nothing deeper there, which is exactly why this series received so much publicity, and was translated and published in the west. It doesn't challenge western hegemony so it's perfectly safe for wide distribution.
I'm really not scared by Dark Forest Theory. Inscrutable alien beings have been waging genocidal war on humanity since the dawn of science fiction. Justifying the behavior of War of the Worlds martians, Starship Troopers bugs, and Independence Day greys does nothing to change the landscape of science fiction. "The universe ain't big enough for the both of us" has always been justification enough. And once you wade through all the pretentious psychological bullshit, that's all that Dark Forest Theory boils down to isn't it?
I'm not mad that he wrote Space Battleship Yamato with Chinese characteristics, I'm mad that it's the same god damn story I've already been told in the west a hundred times before.
I... would never suggest something so racist. I would merely gently remind posters that terminally online leftists tend to forget historical contexts, and then leave it out of their analysis. Maybe that's what's happened here. Maybe not. Besides, subtext is for cowards.
Seriously, this wasn't the right line of attack to take. At least, if you don't want to appear chauvinist.
Yes. The curtain's are blue.
I can buy a copy of Lenin's State and Revolution off Amazon, right now. Nothing challenges western hegemony, that's the point of capitalist realism. Also, when did I say that The Three Body Problem had revolutionary potential? I just merely suggested that the book is informed by the author's historical context, and because of that it's of interest to leftists. Because, to spell it out, that context includes the Cultural Revolution. I never said that the book itself was leftist.
Besides, if the book was counter revolutionary surely the CPC would have banned it?
Congratulations! You missed the point of what I wrote. The theory itself is laughably facile, a horrendous application of Game Theory based upon numerous faulty assumptions. But I said to be scared that people are taking it seriously, not that it is scary in-and-of itself. Since it could be a thinly veiled metaphor for Chinese foreign policy. China's, notably, isolationist foreign policy. The one where they keep their head down and don't draw attention to themselves, because they're surrounded by colonial foreign powers. That foreign policy.
But maybe the idea of their never again being a coordinated international communist effort backed by a state, maybe that doesn't frighten you. You're made of sterner stuff than me, then. Cheers.
That's your prerogative, but I was taught to read the text as it is, not as it should be. Anyway, Hao Jingfang's Vagabonds is probably more what you're looking for.
Edit:
If you want me to go line by line to back up my reading, I will. Don't threaten me with a good time. Just not right now, I have to go to work tomorrow morning and I'll be hella tired if I have to do my homework last minute again. But to be fair, a huge part of the book was taken up by dubious physics.
At the end of the day, Liu Cixin is just one man. One man's opinion isn't indicative of wider opinions so I don't know that there is much utility in doing a deep dive of this man's opinions when we both already agree that he is just a lib. Even if we could accurately parse his opinions from his body of work, all we would know is the idiosyncrasies of one man, and I seriously doubt he is the Chinese whisperer. I might read Hao Jingfang's Vagabonds but I won't assume she has a finger on the pulse of the Chinese either. Or I might not read it either and just dismiss it as the Chinese knock off novelization of Aldnoah.Zero. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, and pop culture is just pop culture, regardless of origin.
Literature is the study of "just one person", over and over again, which in aggregate maybe gives us insight into the human condition. To dismiss the need to think critically about art in such a way is... disappointing, no matter how crass or commercial said art is. I never meant to suggest that Liu Cixin spoke for the entire Chinese Proletariat, but rather to ask the questions "Why would the Chinese author incorporate these particular themes and motifs in his work, especially given his background and the historical period he finds himself in?" and "What can the widespread success of this work, and widespread adoption of the ideas held within, tell us about the world we find ourselves in?" The answers I landed upon might be wrong, but to be so uncurious as to not pursue any line of inquiry in the first place is... deeply disappointing.
That his account of the Cultural Revolution is written from a liberal perspective should make it even more valuable to leftists, in some ways. Knowing what a representative of the intelligentsia thinks about that event in the biggest Actually Existing Socialist nation might give us a clue as to how it's going. Or not. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, as you say.
Which would be a shame, since Vagabonds is rather an explicitly leftist work.
If you really want to break down this book to sus out Liu Cixin's politics then don't let me stop you. I'd be happy to read it, but by this point in this thread, you'll likely only have an audience of one. My concerns would be that it wouldn't be fun, since as you said, this is mid-level sci-fi and I'd say Liu is probably little more than a mid-level thinker. It would be like trying to gain insight into the American condition by examining the depiction of television production in John Scalzi's Redshirts. Very often pop sci-fi is just pop sci-fi.
But moreover, I'm not sure I know enough about Chinese politics to ascertain whether your understanding of it is correct. You said China (or it's populace) is isolationist, but I don't know how to square that interpretation with the Belt and Road Initiative. Likewise you talk about how they feel technologically constrained by the west, but they manufacture all of our consumer products, they're a nuclear power, and they're kicking off another space race. And perhaps Call of Duty is propaganda, but it's very obviously aimed at American audiences and is of little interest to the Chinese. If you had a Korean gatcha game smuggling ideology into communist China I'd be all ears to such an argument, but then again, Genshin is out capitalizing the west better than the capitalists could do to themselves.
I'd just make a new thread, but the problem would be me finding the time to do a deep dive.
And what is wrong with that? What if we examined Redshirts alongside Star Trek, then examined which tropes were being lampooned- and used that to see how far we've moved away from the ideas expressed in the original show, of a specific vision of the future- to one that's maybe more cynical? And maybe look and see which tropes were conserved, which values were kept between iterations. And then see what that tells us.
So my understanding of it could be correct? Although, I will not claim to be an expert on Chinese foreign policy.
Let's go through these point by point.
Here's a very interesting article on how the Belt and Road Initiative can play into a semi-isolationist strategy, written by a Chinese expert on US foreign policy and Sino-US relations.
Relevant quote:
I will encourage you to read the full article, as it gives a fuller understanding of current Chinese foreign policy by laying out the different near-future scenarios China can find itself in. Again, I will remind you that we are discussing the book and how it reflects the fears of, if not the Chinese people, then at least the author- rather than the actual geopolitical situation. But the initial point I was making was that China has abandoned International Communism, as envisioned by the Internationale and Comintern, in favour of "win-win cooperation"- so if say, a Maoist revolution succeeded in Myanmar, it would be extremely unlikely that China would commit its armed forces in defense of international communism should Myanmar be invaded by a hostile power bent on toppling the new communist regime, no matter how crucial that country is to the Belt and Road Initiative- and that Dark Forest Theory is really just a literary metaphor for Chinese foreign policy, more specifically the defensive strategy of not broadcasting your position.
Then again, a huge part of the book is also about how humanity's response to a global crisis requires that China be integrated into a neoliberal international framework. Maybe isolationist was too strong a word.
China still can't self-sufficiently manufacture semiconductors yet. A trade blockade targeting semiconductors would have grave implications for China's self-defense.
Maybe the videogame in Three Body Problem is a metaphor for hegemonic media in general, rather than a one-to-one comparison to a title that I came up with off-the-cuff? A big plot point of the book is that the evil alien's are recruiting the affluent and well-educated with their videogame, which constantly bombards the player with how great the aliens are. Creating a brain drain, in other words. And while heavily propagandized in the West, these fears of a brain drain were quite real in China.
Also, just gonna point out that the Three Body Problem was first printed in 2006, waaaaaay before Genshin Impact became a thing. Back then, there were major doubts about China's ability to project soft-power, and it's only with the recent successes of things like The Wolf Warrior series were that view has begun to shift.
Having said all this- the point isn't about whether my understanding of Chinese politics is right or not, or even whether my understanding of the book is right or not. The point is to find out whether or not the book has ideas, and if we can read those ideas from the book and maybe use them to learn something. Even (especially!) if those ideas could come from a perspective outside our own- I replied to OP initially because I felt like they missed a perspective that could help them look at the book in a new light.
Hey it didn't sound harsh
we worked it out, I mistook where they were coming from at first. kinda feeling like a dumbass but hey what's new
If it makes you feel any better, feeling like a dumbass is my default state. Hence the pretense. :zizek-preference:
re-read charitably and not in a haze of beery grumpiness it's not really that pretentious, I mistook your implication of subtext for a different more anticom point and transferred my disappointment at the book into anger at you. once you explained the foreign policy interpretation you're working with, your initial comment made a lot more sense to me
Hey, no harm, no foul. I probably should have just lead with my premise rather than bury the lede like that.