This weekend, I’m going to be on a panel at Potlatch which is a small sf convention which focuses on the literature of sf – by which we mean, we talk books, and keep it on books and writing, not about movies or tv. I haven’t been on a potlatch panel in ages but Stu suggested me for it and after hesitating (what the heck do I know?) I realized that yup, I did know, well ,something so we’re going to have a discussion about

“Apocalypse Now – Welcome to the Dystopia they Used to Imagine”. It ws described to me this way: "Political deterioration, environmental collapse, the end of oil, fascism and democracy converging on a corporate totalitarianism, the rise of the omnipotent corporations... is this the beginning of the
end?

We look at science fiction as political tool, and political prophecy."

I hesitated at the whole idea at first because it can’t help but be political and I do not want to be involved in a political discussion of THAT sort – of the “look at the country aren’t we fucked up” type. But that’s not what anyone will want so once I realized we’re too smart for that I started thinking about “dystopian science fiction”

Here's what comes to MY mind - that we're looking right now at issues of security, privacy, safety - and we can talk Vchips, personal IDs (in the news today, 75% of the toys introduced at Toy Fair will have computer chips in them). That we can go back to George Orwell and talk about "big brother" - in some cases, with a fair amount of snideness, but it's a major development out of "sci-fi" into reality. Is that political? Um probably.

Regarding communications, from Dick Tracy to email, how that has changed the world - medicine for example, has apparently benefited since you can now post "What IS this?" and someone might be able to figure out your rare disease (no, not mine, not so far). But it's led to massive DISinformation as well.

Warfare has changed, and I'm not even talking technology but again, communication. We can't hide as much as we used to; it doesn't take days or even hours to get news of an event, an attack. Cell phones, blogs, satellite communications. but we're still using people as soldiers.

Environmental issues - um well, we're melting, aren't we? And where's my rocket pack? Where is the "energy too cheap to meter" (ok that was the claim for nuclear and that wasn't sf that was our government) but what about all those whiz-bang devices to make citizens lives easier and to eliminate work? ARE robots taking over? We're still a service industry, but in the case of the US, jobs have gone to poor countries, not to technological replacements, right?

And what about all those sex changes that John Varley proposed - that we could switch back and forth, be reborn in our new cloned body?

Then of course we get to talk about how the CIA or was the FBI had to ban "Furbies" from the pentagon cuz they were learning to talk.....

So then it was suggested we try to come up with examples; heh. Great. I know ABOUT some of these books but haven’t actually read ‘em. Still I sent off a list via email knowing I’d miss gobs of them – but even a discussion of some of these should be interesting, depending on which way we steer the panel.

The short fiction of folks, as I recall like Jack Williamson’s short story "With Folded Hands", 1947 about how life will be so easy once the robots take on all the hard jobs) (and of course investigations of robots and Asimov's laws, and that can go off in one direction for days.

The obvious of course - 1984 and FAHRENHEIT 451
I always hear Le Guin's THE DISPOSSESSED listed
Haldeman's FOREVER WAR? (1974)
Bob Asprin's COLD CASH WAR? (1977)
Certainly we can look at stuff like NEUROMANCER and other "cyberpunk" for the way it looks at a changed world in the future of computers and how close/far we are from that envisioned life. While I don't go cruising black ice, the internet has seriously, without question changed MY life. As a disabled non-working woman, without this link to "out there", I would be a very different person and my life would be quite different.

Mary Rosenblum's THE DRYLANDS as well as CHIMERA have strong themes that work here; Drylands of course about the environment, and CHIMERA about corporate ownership of people, their lies, their work and technology's impact on human interactions.
Kim Stanley Robinson's California Trilogy (WILD SHORE, GOLD COAST, PACIFIC EDGE) deal with apparently 3 different futures (haven't read all 3 and don't recall enough) as well as FORTY SIGNS OF RAIN, his latest (er also not read)

James Tiptree?

As for Varley, I can't recall all the short story titles but everything from "The Barbie Murders" which makes manipulation of the physical body - gender, parts, name it - easy and plausible to his brilliant "Blue Champagne" - cloning and reinventing ourselves were themes in many of his stories.

And look, I haven’t mentioned a word about a) how DHL has become an astonishingly messed up company or b) the results of the Olympic women’s long figure skating program (which I just watched on Canadian television.) Wow, huh? The DHL story is worth explaining at some point although I don’t know how it ends yet. The skating one – well, some of you might actually not want to know the results yet until you watch on NBC tonight. Man, am I admirable, huh? What?