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Ursula Le Guin has died

nytimes.com

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Re: Ursula Le Guin has died

#161

Post by auxbuss »

pavlov wrote: post #123
wz1000 wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they get mistreated by the system as often as they get lifted up by it. In the end she makes the explicit point that this is just one possible way of organizing human societies among a nearly infinite set of possibilities Well, the book is subtitled "An Ambiguous Utopia"

Interesting — I don’t think my copy had that.

I have the Avon paperback from 1975 and on the cover it says: The magnificent epic of an ambiguous utopia – Winner of the Nebula Award!

I don't believe this phrase was a subtitle so much as part of the cover blurb. It's not mentioned again.

Re: Ursula Le Guin has died

#162

Post by auxbuss »

kiliantics wrote: post #77
viburnum wrote: post #69

"We live in capitalism, its power seems inescapable – but then, so did the divine right of kings. Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings. Resistance and change often begin in art."

Ursula Le Guin was an ardent socialist and it comes through in all her writing. I don't understand why the only comments and quotes about her politics are all downvoted in this thread. But I guess that's the average Hackernews reader for you... EDIT: the quote is from a speech, which you can hear/see in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Et9Nf-rsALk

Ursula K. Le Guin was an anarchist and Taoist not a socialist[0]; she translated the Tao Te Ching, after all[1]. She was anti-authoritarian, whether libertarian (remembering this term was hijacked), socialist or otherwise. She was pro collaboration.

The Dispossessed is an anarchist utopian novel.

"I'd put it this way: Dispossessed is an Anarchist utopian novel. Its ideas come from the Pacifist Anarchist tradition: Kropotkin, etc. So did some of the ideas of the so-called counterculture of the sixties and seventies."[2]

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ursula_K._Le_Guin#Anarchism_an...

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ursula_K._Le_Guin_bibliography...

[2] https://www.theguardian.com/books/2004/feb/09/sciencefiction...

Re: Ursula Le Guin has died

#163

Post by kiliantics »

ghostcluster wrote: post #121
mmustapic wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, she warns about the creation of hierarchies even in a purely anarchist society.

Hierarchies are necessary for complex systems to function. The way that it is used as a boogeyword by ideologues is exhausting.

What anarchists are really worried about is "nonconsensual hierarchies". They are definitely necessary sometimes and people will often choose to participate in a hierarchy when they see its usefulness. Anarchists have done this a lot historically, like in the Spanish civil war, there were military hierarchies among the anarchists.

The problem in most societies is that a lot of the hierarchies, particularly the very important ones for survival and day to day life, are completely forced upon us.

Re: Ursula Le Guin has died

#164

Post by auxbuss »

dmitriid wrote: post #99
kiliantics wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ursula Le Guin was an ardent socialist and it comes through in all her writing. I don't understand why the only comments and quotes about her politics are all downvoted in this thread. But I guess that's the average Hackernews reader for you... EDIT: the quote is from a speech, which you can hear/see in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Et9Nf-rsALk

She also warns how socialism can be easily turned into the power of the few. See The Dispossessed .

No idea why you are being down-voted. Le Guin absolutely spoke of authoritarian socialism. These things are obviously not mutually exclusive.

Re: Ursula Le Guin has died

#165

Post by Fargren »

bolasanibk wrote: post #46
tunesmith wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anyone remember the source of the essay about the town where everyone was happy, and how it feels unbelievable until you find it has a horrible secret, which somehow makes it more believable? I think that is her writing.

That story always makes me question what decision I will make if in a similar situation.

After reading the story I immediately thought that the point was that most of us live in Omelas. I don't think I have it in me to walk away.

Re: Ursula Le Guin has died

#166

Post by kej »

emmelaich wrote: post #87
d_j_b wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is a short story called "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas"

Yes, a story that has haunted me ever since I read it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ones_Who_Walk_Away_from_Om... The EarthSea Trilogy has stuck with me too.

Earthsea was a trilogy from '72 to '90, but it's now five novels and a bunch of short stories. They're all good.

Re: Ursula Le Guin has died

#167

Post by icebraining »

MaysonL wrote: post #156
ixtli wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have also found that socialist positions get downvoted here. I'd recommend that people read the works of socialists (Marx, Rosa, etc.) because most of my negative associates came from liberal insinuation I received growing up in the US :) The very word has had a campaign against it for a long time because of the 20th century relations between America and Russia (which, btw, hasn't been anything remotely socialist i…

And yet there seems to be a fair amount of support here for guaranteed basic income / guaranteed employment.

Basic income is a capitalist solution - a patch to keep the whole thing going. It has long been supported by people on the economic right (e.g. Milton Friedman's negative income tax).

Re: Ursula Le Guin has died

#168

Post by ghostcluster »

MaysonL wrote: post #159
ghostcluster wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hierarchies are necessary for complex systems to function. The way that it is used as a boogeyword by ideologues is exhausting.

True, but not hierarchies of control over people's lives.

So you don't believe in the legal system?

Re: Ursula Le Guin has died

#169

Post by microcolonel »

ixtli wrote: post #154
kiliantics wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ursula Le Guin was an ardent socialist and it comes through in all her writing. I don't understand why the only comments and quotes about her politics are all downvoted in this thread. But I guess that's the average Hackernews reader for you... EDIT: the quote is from a speech, which you can hear/see in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Et9Nf-rsALk

I have also found that socialist positions get downvoted here. I'd recommend that people read the works of socialists (Marx, Rosa, etc.) because most of my negative associates came from liberal insinuation I received growing up in the US :) The very word has had a campaign against it for a long time because of the 20th century relations between America and Russia (which, btw, hasn't been anything remotely socialist i…

> The very word has had a campaign against it for a long time because of the 20th century relations between America and Russia

It might also have something to do with the roughly 85-100 million people whose deaths can be directly attributed to policies enacted in support of socialist utopia during the 20th century. Advocates of socialism like to say that they're anarchist, or that they're anti-authoritarian; but enacting socialism inherently requires authoritarian measures, because it is so rarely the will of competent people to receive as little as incompetents. In cases such as the red terror, competence and success are explicitly terrorized and destroyed in service of the goal.

Socialism is authoritarian because at least one person, myself, is unwilling to have his tools and life work taken from him, and given to a fool who will squander them just as that fool squandered the opportunity to attain them.

Re: Ursula Le Guin has died

#170

Post by Synaesthesia »

microcolonel wrote: post #169
ixtli wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have also found that socialist positions get downvoted here. I'd recommend that people read the works of socialists (Marx, Rosa, etc.) because most of my negative associates came from liberal insinuation I received growing up in the US :) The very word has had a campaign against it for a long time because of the 20th century relations between America and Russia (which, btw, hasn't been anything remotely socialist i…

> The very word has had a campaign against it for a long time because of the 20th century relations between America and Russia It might also have something to do with the roughly 85-100 million people whose deaths can be directly attributed to policies enacted in support of socialist utopia during the 20th century. Advocates of socialism like to say that they're anarchist, or that they're anti-authoritarian; but enac…

Socialism is about improving the lot of workers, and ordinary people and giving them more power, for instance saying that workers should own the factories together, make their own decisions democratically, rather than take orders from a boss. In that respect the USSR has very little to do with socialism, more resembling state capitalism. See Chomsky: The Soviet Union vs Socialism.

https://chomsky.info/1986____/

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