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American Science Fiction and the Politics of Masculinity, 1965

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American Science Fiction and the Politics of Masculinity, 1965 Making the Men of Tomorrow: American Science Fiction and the Politics of Masculinity, 1965 – 1974 By Jason Bruce James Bourget A thesis submitted to the Graduate Program in English Language and Literature in conformity with the requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy Queen’s University Kingston, Ontario, Canada Final submission November, 2016 Copyright © Jason Bruce James Bourget, 2016 Abstract Suggesting that the political diversity of American science fiction during the 1960s and early 1970s constitutes a response to the dominance of social liberalism throughout the 1940s and 1950s, I argue in Making the Men of Tomorrow that the development of new hegemonic masculinities in science fiction is a consequence of political speculation. Focusing on four representative and influential texts from the 1960s and early 1970s, Philip K. Dick’s The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch and Ubik, Robert A. Heinlein’s The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress, and Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Dispossessed, this thesis explores the relationship between different conceptions of hegemonic masculinity and three separate but related political ideologies: the social ethic, market libertarianism, and socialist libertarianism. In the first two chapters in which I discuss Dick’s novels, I argue that Dick interrogates organizational masculinity as part of a larger project that suggests the inevitable infeasibility of both the social ethic and its predecessor, social liberalism. In the next chapter, I shift my attention to Heinlein’s The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress as a way of showing how, unlike Dick, other authors of the 1960s and early 1970s sought to move beyond social liberalism by imagining how new political ideologies, in this case market libertarianism, might change the way men see themselves. Having demonstrated how the libertarian potential of Heinlein’s novel is ultimately undermined by its insistent and uncompromising biological determinism, I then discuss how Le Guin’s The Dispossessed uses the socialist libertarianism of the moon Anarres to suggest a more egalitarian form of masculinity, one that makes possible, to some extent at least, a future in which men might embrace not only the mutual aid of ii socialism, but also the primacy of individual rights that is at the heart of all forms of libertarianism and liberalism. iii Acknowledgments Without the encouragement and support of the following organizations, the creation of this thesis simply would not have been possible: • The Department of English Language and Literature at Queen’s University; • The English Department at Douglas College; • The Faculty of Language, Literature and Performing Arts and the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at Douglas College; • The Eaton Collection of Science Fiction and Fantasy at the University of California, Riverside • The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada; and • The annual science fiction conventions Ad Astra in Toronto, VCON in Vancouver, and Norwescon in Seattle, as well as Worldcon in Montréal (2009) and in London (2014). The following individuals also helped me along the way, all in different yet equally important ways: • At Queen’s University: Molly Wallace, whose thoughtful feedback, support, and patience made this entire project possible, and Sam McKegney and Tracy Ware, who provided invaluable feedback and encouragement, both formally and informally; • At Douglas College: Shaun Tyakoff, Heidi Currie, Brenna Clarke Gray, and Nancy Squair, all of whom discussed this work at length with me, and Manuela iv Costantino and Meg Stainsby, both of whom worked hard to ensure that I always had the institutional support I needed to complete this task; • At the University of California, Riverside: Rob Latham, who helped introduce me to the wider world of science fiction scholarship and became, for me, a model of scholarly rigour within the field, and Jennifer Kavetsky, who generously shared the results of her archival research into political ideology and 1930s and 1940s science fiction with me; • In Vancouver and Kingston: Devin Service, Brett Cameron, Julia Cameron, Paul Steeves, Terry Hickey, Gillian Dearle, Robert Dearle, Jordan Smith, Ryan Melsom, and Ryan Porter, all of whom have patiently listened to me hold forth on the politics of science fiction for years now; • In the classroom: my students, especially those who challenged conventional readings of the science fiction we discussed in class and who, in turn, prompted me to re-examine my own assessment of the genre; and • At conventions: my fellow fans, who more than anyone else, were always willing and eager to discuss the politics of gender in science fiction and who showed me, for the first time, what a community based on the principles of mutual aid, solidarity, and uncompromising individualism might actually look like in practice. Finally, this thesis would not exist without the support of my sister and mother, Nicki Nelson and Pat Bourget, the unreserved affection of my three cats, Mochka, Bella, and Poesy, and the unfailing encouragement and incisive feedback of my partner, Heather Cyr. Like Le Guin’s The Dispossessed, which carries the same dedication, this thesis is thus “for the partner.” v Table of Contents Abstract ii Acknowledgments iv Table of Contents vi Chapter 1 – Introduction 1 Chapter 2 – “It Looks Into Our Eyes; and It Looks Out of Our Eyes”: 58 Organizational Masculinity and the Social Ethic in Philip K. Dick’s The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch Chapter 3 – “They Go as I Say, They Do as I Tell Them”: Consumer 104 Capitalism and the Theology of Organizational Masculinity in Philip K. Dick’s Ubik Chapter 4 – “Could Say Our Customs Are Natural Laws”: Biological 136 Determinism, Market Libertarianism, and the Politics of Masculine Strength in Robert A. Heinlein’s The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress Chapter 5 – “The Idea of Anarchism, Made Flesh”: Socialist 162 Libertarianism, Classical Liberalism, and the Politics of Masculinity in Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Dispossessed Chapter 6 – Conclusion 202 Works Cited 209 vi Chapter 1 Introduction In early 2015 and again in 2016, two science fiction fan groups, the Sad Puppies and Rabid Puppies, organized overlapping internet campaigns1 to purge the annual fan- nominated Hugo Awards ballot of any texts that they believe are symptomatic of “the corruption and ideological rot that is rife within the world of modern science fiction and fantasy” (Day). Objecting to texts such as Ann Leckie’s Ancillary Justice (2013), which won the 2014 Hugo Award for Best Novel and which challenges assumptions about masculinity by showing how an aggressive martial masculinity might develop even in a sexually androgynous culture,2 the Puppies used block voting techniques to game the Hugo nomination process and rid the ballot of any work they deemed “guilty” of “intersectional equalitarianism, racial and gender inclusion, literary pyrotechnics, or professional rabbitology” (Day). Sadly, and much to the dismay of the vast majority of fans involved in organized fandom, these two groups succeeded in their aims and managed to nominate a disproportionately large amount of socially conservative science fiction and fantasy in both years. Although grassroots political activism among other 1 Even though Sad Puppies such as Brad Torgersen have been vocal in insisting that they “are not Rabid Puppies” and that they are merely “driving on the same freeway” (“We Are Not”), the political objectives of the two groups are identical, in that both the Sad and Rabid Puppies have consistently sought to prevent the nomination of any work by writers whom they term “social justice warriors,” those authors who are, in other words, open to the possibility that science fiction should speculate about more than the future of straight, white, middle-class men. 2 In Ancillary Justice and its sequels, the people of the Radchaai empire are physiologically bisexual, but have completely decoupled biological sex from the concept of gender. One of the effects of this decoupling is the extent to which it reveals just how inherently political and culturally constructed masculinity is. Though they are ostensibly gender-neutral, the Radchaai nevertheless embrace a form of martial masculinity that is effectively made hegemonic by the aggressive and exploitative military annexations that are necessary to drive their economy. 1 fans ensured that none of the texts nominated won any of the awards in either year,3 this incident illuminated a truth which even the Puppies must now find difficult to deny; namely, that much American science fiction is and historically has been defined by its commitment to explore, examine, and evaluate the relationships between and among political ideologies and the different forms of identity those ideologies permit and encourage. Like those voters who helped elect Donald Trump as President of the United States because they believe he will somehow “make America great again” by leading the United States “back to safety, prosperity, and peace” (Trump), the Puppies sought to “make science fiction great again” by restoring the genre to a past state of affairs that never actually existed.4 According to Brad Torgersen in his announcement of the 2015 Sad Puppy Hugo campaign, science fiction has historically been an apolitical genre that focused on creating “the kind of child-like enjoyment that comes easily and naturally when you don’t have to crawl so far into your brain (or your navel) that you lose sight of the forest for the trees.” Only the “Hyper-Progressive Pissypants Club” of contemporary political authors and fans, Torgersen claims, in their misguided attempt to make science fiction “niche, academic, [and] overtly to the Left in ideology and flavor,” have lost sight of this “visceral, gut-level, swashbuckling fun” that, for him, has always defined the 3 In both 2015 and 2016, fans attending the World Science Fiction Convention organized a popular movement among themselves and successfully voted for “No Award” in all of the fully rigged categories.
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