Two freebies at Baen

[Connallmac]

Originally Posted by C.S.

If there was a "like" button on this board, I'd press it. I agree 100%.

I have no problems with a "right wing" viewpoint - or any other viewpoint different from my own - but if that's just going to be used as a vehicle to promote bigotry, no thank you.

I agree as well. There is already more than enough hatred and ignorance in the world without folks like these adding to it.

[JeremyR]

And yet, A Handmaid's Tale is considered to be such a classic to the point where it's read in schools. That essentially postulates the same thing as this book, only with Christianity and in America.

[luqmaninbmore]

I was thinking about the Handmaid's Tale in this context and there are some differences between that novel and theIslamophobic novels in the OP. There is a strong element of xenophobia and racial stereotyping in the latter not present in the former, for example. There is also the intended effect of the novels. HT would hopefully cause us to guard our traditions of secularism and to more carefully protect the rights of women. The OP novels seem to be arguing against europe being taken over by 'farners' with the implication being that what needs to be guarded is racial/cultural 'purity.' Again, not too different from the Turner Diaries. Another aspect would be the quality of the writing, which is undoubtedly of a higher level in the case of Atwood. Finally, I don't think Gilead is meant to represent normative Christianity, while in the OP novels it is quite clear that Islam itself and not merely radical strains thereof is being presented as the problem. I don't see much of a difference between this and antisemitism.

[fencepost]

I'm not convinced that Baen is taking any particular political stances, they just have a couple of authors of military SF who are fairly right-wing. This is not a big surprise, I think a lot of military SF has an underlying theme of "highly competent people breaking free of incompetent/ineffective political leadership."

Baen also has some folks that are pretty liberal.

What do they have in common? People Buy Their Books.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by fencepost

I'm not convinced that Baen is taking any particular political stances, they just have a couple of authors of military SF who are fairly right-wing. This is not a big surprise, I think a lot of military SF has an underlying theme of "highly competent people breaking free of incompetent/ineffective political leadership."

I don't have the slightest issue with what you describe; what I do have a very real issue with is an author seemingly going out of his way to "demonise" a group of "real" people. These books (which I bought both of) appear to me to be quite deliberately setting out to incite hatred and fear of Islam. I can see no redeeming feature whatsoever in them. As has been said already, had their "target" been Jews or black people, I very much doubt that Baen would have touched them with a barge-pole, but seemingly it's "OK" to incite hatred against Muslims.

Originally Posted by luqmaninbmore

If someone had written a novel based on a future where Jews ruled the world and treated non-Jews as second class citizens and used out of context selections from the Tanakh and the Talmud, combined with the pronouncements rabid right wing Rabbis, to provide the novel a veneer of seaming verisimilitude, would we see fit to promote it? Criticism of the tenets of a religion is all well and good. History is of benefit. But this seems to be a smear in the guise of a novel. Would we all be curious to find out about the latest ebook edition of the Turner Diaries, for example? I'm rather disappointed in BAEN.

Pretty much as bad as would be promoting an ebook issue of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion?

[fjtorres]

I've read Caliphate.
It is a distopia and clearly written as such.
To me it read like a cautionary tale, on the *perils* of religious hatred in general, and "islamophobia" in particular.

The story is presented as a Bond-ian adventure, not military sf, with asides and a series of flashbacks to the early 21st century used to fill in the backstory.
Where military SF tends to have libertarian, Civic/patriotic heroes (which some incorrectly brand right-wing, as if the left couldn't be patriotic, too) there are no heroes in Caliphate and the author very plainly makes the case that the American Empire is guilty of horrors comparable to or worse to those of the "islamists" that triggered the nazification of america.

The books being free, it would not be hard to check out the back-end part of the ninth chapter to see just how "sympathetic" the portrayal of the americans under President Buchman *isn't*. The only truly sympathetic character in the book is, in fact, a european muslim. Everybody else s generally driven by anger, hate, fear, or greed.

It is, no question, an *uncomfortable* book to read and should be avoided by those that don't like to have their worldview challenged. Just as Heinlein's FARNHAM FREEHOLD, Stirling's DRAKAS books, or Niven and Pournelle's FALLEN ANGELS (heh! Also free at Baen), or L. Neil Smith's PROBABILITY BROACH, or F.M. Busby's RISSA KERGUELEN, the author takes a contrarian premise, drops a bunch of very flawed human beings into it and spins an adventure story.
I know nothing of the author: it is the only one of his books I've read though my webscriptions feature several others. They are not particularly high on my TBR list but I understand one of them is built around the conceit of a unit of SS Nazis fighting alien invaders, which I imagine must've rattled a few cages.
(Shrug)
I don't mind cage rattlers; some of the best SF has been written with that goal.

I'm not about to recommend the book outright; the core story is merely a good Bond pastiche, but if anybody is interested in seeing just how bad the "clash of civilizations" could get...

Well, it's free...

Oh, and in case you haven't heard: the Baen Free Library features whatever books the writers choose to offer up. If you have a bone to pick, take it up with the author. Toodles!

[bill_mchale]

Originally Posted by HarryT

I don't have the slightest issue with what you describe; what I do have a very real issue with is an author seemingly going out of his way to "demonise" a group of "real" people. These books (which I bought both of) appear to me to be quite deliberately setting out to incite hatred and fear of Islam. I can see no redeeming feature whatsoever in them. As has been said already, had their "target" been Jews or black people, I very much doubt that Baen would have touched them with a barge-pole, but seemingly it's "OK" to incite hatred against Muslims.

I haven't read the books, so I can't directly comment on them, however, I would point out that there is a flaw in your comparison. Islam is by definition defined by what its followers believe. Obviously that is not true of black people and in practice isn't true of Jewish people either (I know plenty of agnostic and atheistic Jews, while the very concept of an atheistic Muslim makes no sense).

Certainly one can say that modern Islam is not the same as it was in the past just as you can say that Modern Christianity is not the same as it was in the past. I think though we find that the many right wingers dispute whether Islam has really changed (and certainly in some parts of the world it appears not to have) and many left wingers dispute that Christianity has changed.

--
Bill

[luqmaninbmore]

Originally Posted by bill_mchale

I haven't read the books, so I can't directly comment on them, however, I would point out that there is a flaw in your comparison. Islam is by definition defined by what its followers believe. Obviously that is not true of black people and in practice isn't true of Jewish people either (I know plenty of agnostic and atheistic Jews, while the very concept of an atheistic Muslim makes no sense).

Certainly one can say that modern Islam is not the same as it was in the past just as you can say that Modern Christianity is not the same as it was in the past. I think though we find that the many right wingers dispute whether Islam has really changed (and certainly in some parts of the world it appears not to have) and many left wingers dispute that Christianity has changed.

--
Bill

I take your point, but the Islamophobes do not define Islam by what muslims actually believe. They define it by what they think Muslims ought to believe based on an extremely skewed reading of a selection of the source texts. When confronted with this discrepancy, the Islamophobes tend to adopt one of two tactics. The more paranoid adopt the stance that all of these moderate (or even liberal!) Muslims are simply being deceptive about what they really believe. The remainder simply dismiss the majority of muslims as having a real commitment to Islam. Ironically, this echoes the views of the jihadists themselves. The greates irony is that groups such as Alqaeda are not throwbacks to the 7th century; they are fundamentally postmodern in methodology and ideology. They do not adhere to the traditional readings of the classical texts but instead deconstruct them to support a militant ideology structured around a few key terms (jihad, tauheed, shirk, etc.).

[luqmaninbmore]

And I will add that there are very few, if any, 'atheist muslims,' there are quite a large number of 'cultural muslims' who, like nominal Jews and Christians, only attend places of worship on holidays, do not follow a rigourous form of religious practice, and only come into contact with mullahs and imams when someone gets married or someone dies. The identification as a muslim is essentially social or even ethnic.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by Iphinome

Baen beating a political horse? Must be a day that ends in y.

[luqmaninbmore]

I have downloaded the books and do plan on reading Caliphate, at the least. The dedication to Bat Yeor freaked me out a bit.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by HarryT

I choose not to read books which appear to have been written for no purpose other than to foment hatred and paranoia against certain religious or ethnic groups. Perhaps that does, as you say, seem boring, but that is my choice.

[cromag]

Originally Posted by HarryT

I choose not to read books which appear to have been written for no purpose other than to foment hatred and paranoia against certain religious or ethnic groups. Perhaps that does, as you say, seem boring, but that is my choice.

Me either, as they tend not to make very good stories.

[Iphinome]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

I've read Caliphate.


It is, no question, an *uncomfortable* book to read and should be avoided by those that don't like to have their worldview challenged. Just as Heinlein's FARNHAM FREEHOLD, Stirling's DRAKAS books, or Niven and Pournelle's FALLEN ANGELS (heh! Also free at Baen), or L. Neil Smith's PROBABILITY BROACH, or F.M. Busby's RISSA KERGUELEN, the author takes a contrarian premise, drops a bunch of very flawed human beings into it and spins an adventure story.

I'll start here, I've read only two of the above books, neither was very good. Farnham's claim to fame is in being able to displace To sail to sunset as Heinlein's worst book. Readers of other Heinlein can see what he was trying to say and understand it but it was honestly poorly executed and insensitive even for its time. It took a simple idea of the oppressed and ill-treated take power and do the same thing to their former oppressors and then turns up the dial to make them worse. A cautionary tail on not treating people badly because of their skin color, great but then he plays into the white American fears about black people that were more prominent at the time, I don't think for one second his intent was racist, not Heinlien, not after reading his other work, but his execution played right into it. They didn't just enslave white people, they ate them for dinner, how very deepest darkest Africa Stanley and Livingston tribal story. And the matter of sterilizing white slaves? Fear of some assumed black man's sexual prowess and of course the other 1950's fear with white women used as pleasure slaves for black men?

I might consider it a product of its time except that I know Heinlein knew better and wrote the book anyway.

Fallen Angels was just poorly written. it has a few funny nerd jokes, would probably have more if I knew the people characters were based on but as I've notied more with Baen than other publishers, the pacing was off, and the info dumps were too long.

Oh, and in case you haven't heard: the Baen Free Library features whatever books the writers choose to offer up. If you have a bone to pick, take it up with the author. Toodles!

There is that but we might as well get to my biggest problem with Baen of late. I don't know if the authors are refusing to be edited or the editing staff are just sub-par but as gatekeepers Baen is doing a poor job. No one seems to be taking an ax to the 6 page long chunks of expository text, saying hey how about you try to let some of this information come out naturally as part of the plot and how about cutting this down to two sentences because if this is the eighth book or whatever in the series, anyone reading it probably read the seventh and we don't need a 12 page recap of events from the last book in the middle of chapter nineteen, just saying.

What I'm trying to say is that if it pushes a political agenda quality doesn't seem to matter, the authors might as well be self publishing if their editors are going to let anything though so long as it promotes a right of center agenda. Hell why else wouldn't someone in the office call up the authors and say, Uh, Mary love the book just great, we'll sell a million copies if you could just maybe cut down that 25 page rant on the evils of public schooling to maybe 2 pages and get on with the space battle?

And that's why I made my earlier comment. It must be a day that ends in y because someone decided that their niche should be pushing a political agenda over the quality of the finished product. Try a test for yourself, pick something Baen has published in the last 5 years, better yes, pick give or six and tell me how many could have been published by Ace or Tor even with the politics left out?