the real reason I love scifi so much
Tuesday, October 10, 2006
As a confirmed scifi and space nut, I spend a lot of my time looking to the future and wondering if desperately hoping that humanity will make it to a time when we have sorted out our petty differences and can work towards some common goal. I know, not fucking likely eh? But I guess that's why scifi appeals to me so much; because in my heart I know that we're not likely to get past the threat of exterminating ourselves, so our only real hope for a rosy future lies in the art we create about it.
Along those lines, I have been thinking more than I should lately about nuclear war and whether it will be our final undoing, as generations of people have thought before me (during the Cold War, the Cuban Missile Crisis, etc.) As a kid I used to have terrible nightmares about blowing ourselves up in nuclear fire. I mean, real doozies. I'd wake up bathed in sweat and screaming my head off. Not all that uncommon as it turns out, and I know why: It's a valid thing to be scared about. Nowadays I understand that in order to go through our daily lives, we must be able to shelve fears of what people we have no control over could someday do that might lead to our end. And I generally am able to make that conscious shelving, and get busy in the details of my life, my commitments, my loved ones. But there are times.
Probably because I thought that I'd gotten past my childhood fears, I thought I'd be into Jericho, a tv series about surviving a nuclear attack. I have watched the first few episodes and aside from the initial horrific imagery, I've even enjoyed the show. And because I was okay with Jericho, I thought I would be in the right place to watch an old movie about nuclear war, so I put The Day After on my rent list, and I watched it today. It's a gritty look at what the after-effects of a nuclear attack would be like in middle America. It was made in the early eighties, but after you've forgiven that, its a thoughtful, gut-wrenching look at what the days after would really be like. And it made me sick to my stomach. Seriously. It was an all too authentic version of what I think surviving a nuclear attack might be like, and after watching it, I now clearly remember that it was one of the reasons I had those nightmares all those years ago.
I think that I have seen my last episode of Jericho.
I want to go back to not thinking about how stupid we are, and hope for that day when no one has to worry that all life could end based on some ridiculous posturing over natural resources, or economics, or religion.
Here are some articles that I dug up afterwards, mostly on wikipedia, in an attempt to make myself feel better. I had a good, cathartic cry after I had a look at them:
Videos of effects of nuclear explosions
The Nuclear Bomb explained
Hiroshima/Nagasaki bombings
How Fallout works
North Korean Nuclear Test
And here's Oppenheimer's account of witnessing the first tests of nuclear bombs, which were only made possible because of his research on The Manhattan Project:
Along those lines, I have been thinking more than I should lately about nuclear war and whether it will be our final undoing, as generations of people have thought before me (during the Cold War, the Cuban Missile Crisis, etc.) As a kid I used to have terrible nightmares about blowing ourselves up in nuclear fire. I mean, real doozies. I'd wake up bathed in sweat and screaming my head off. Not all that uncommon as it turns out, and I know why: It's a valid thing to be scared about. Nowadays I understand that in order to go through our daily lives, we must be able to shelve fears of what people we have no control over could someday do that might lead to our end. And I generally am able to make that conscious shelving, and get busy in the details of my life, my commitments, my loved ones. But there are times.
Probably because I thought that I'd gotten past my childhood fears, I thought I'd be into Jericho, a tv series about surviving a nuclear attack. I have watched the first few episodes and aside from the initial horrific imagery, I've even enjoyed the show. And because I was okay with Jericho, I thought I would be in the right place to watch an old movie about nuclear war, so I put The Day After on my rent list, and I watched it today. It's a gritty look at what the after-effects of a nuclear attack would be like in middle America. It was made in the early eighties, but after you've forgiven that, its a thoughtful, gut-wrenching look at what the days after would really be like. And it made me sick to my stomach. Seriously. It was an all too authentic version of what I think surviving a nuclear attack might be like, and after watching it, I now clearly remember that it was one of the reasons I had those nightmares all those years ago.
I think that I have seen my last episode of Jericho.
I want to go back to not thinking about how stupid we are, and hope for that day when no one has to worry that all life could end based on some ridiculous posturing over natural resources, or economics, or religion.
Here are some articles that I dug up afterwards, mostly on wikipedia, in an attempt to make myself feel better. I had a good, cathartic cry after I had a look at them:
Videos of effects of nuclear explosions
The Nuclear Bomb explained
Hiroshima/Nagasaki bombings
How Fallout works
North Korean Nuclear Test
And here's Oppenheimer's account of witnessing the first tests of nuclear bombs, which were only made possible because of his research on The Manhattan Project:
We knew the world would not be the same. A few people laughed, a few people cried, most people were silent. I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad-Gita. Vishnu is trying to persuade the Prince that he should do his duty and to impress him takes on his multi-armed form and says, "Now, I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds." I suppose we all thought that one way or another.Get why I'm a scifi fan now?
-J. Robert Oppenheimer
Labels: everything else, scifi
posted by raistlinsghost at 10/10/2006 01:47:00 AM
5 Comments:
Hey, Derek. Great, great post. I think about this quite a bit too, and really identify with trying to "shelve it".
Damn, humans are stupid.
The fact that they might actually make the world end, in my lifetime, makes me feel scared, angry, and sad, all at the same time.
When I was little, my nutty mother would make me watch those movies, The Day After, Strings and a few others I don't remember the names of. I used to shake while watching them, but she thought it was essential that I learn what it would be like after a war. She is still convinced that we are gonna blow ourselves up in our lifetimes. She lives up in Elliot Lake, thinks she'll be safe. I'd prefer to be close to ground zero.
M: Thanks man. I do still believe that it is possible for humanity to make it out of these dark ages. But recent events like the North Korean test really make me wonder.
Jennifer: I can relate to those feelings. Except I am not sure I want to go in the initial blast though. I don't want to go from the fallout either. Maybe Elliot Lake isn't such a bad idea...
Hi! Found your blog via Wil Wheaton's and came to check it out because you said you are a Gibson fan and if that's true we might have a lot to talk about.
I like this post because it made me think about what scares me. Biological warfare. For whatever reason I'm WAY more scared of that and things like The Stand and 28 Days Later freak me out because how bad would it suck if suddenly 75% of the entire world's population died? UFF! That would be so awful!!! To be alone on the planet or so few and far between that you might as well be! To walk through what was once a giant, bustling city and see it quiet and still! EEEE! Give me the heebie jeebies!!!
Hello Titankt: I am indeed a huge Gibson fan. Neuromancer is without a doubt, my favourite book. I loved all of the sprawl series, though I haven't enjoyed his more recent works as much until Pattern Recognition. That book was fantastic. And like Neuromancer, it predicted a cultural paradigm change due to a new technology. Although predicting lonelygirl15's use of 'footage' isn't quite the same as predicting the global emergence of cyberspace. But still.
And do I hear you about the Supervirus thing. That is probably the one we should really be scared of, but one can only have panic attacks about so many things at once, yah?
Although there's something to be said for getting a little piece and quiet out of the deal...
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