Humanity Doesn’t Deserve Nice Things

A while back, I wrote a post about why I disliked the post-apocalyptic genre. In short, I find the genre bleak and hopeless in spite of its promise of social rebirth and its destruction of social complexity.

But friend of the blog Misha Burnett pointed out another aspect of the genre, one I think is very important:

Over on Twitter you described the genre as “misery porn”, but the kind of thing I am talking about is more of “guilt porn”. There is an assumption–often stately flatly, but sometimes only implied–that the cataclysm was deserved. A nuclear war caused by imperialist warmongers or an ecological disaster caused by greedy corporations, for example.

Those kinds of stories are anti-civilization. The villains are usually the ones trying to rebuild some kind of structure, usually military or religious (or both) in nature. The good guys (such as they are) tend to be parasitic scavengers fulfilling some version of a “all the bad rich people are dead and we get their stuff” fantasy.

Even if the “good guys” win, there is no sense that they intend to do anything other than root through the trash of the old world until all the canned beans are gone. It’s the juvenile nihilism of trust fund brats who can’t think past their next drink or their next screw.

The main idea is that the post-apocalypse is meant to put humanity in its place and punish it for its so-called arrogance.

Think about the following narrative: Once, humans thought they had a special destiny and believed that Earth was the center of the universe. Then, as science advanced, they discovered that the Earth rotated around the sun, shattering the idea that Earth was the center of existence. Then the theory of evolution showed that we are not special beings created by God, just animals no different from dogs or birds. Then more advanced astronomy shows that even the Solar System is merely one of many on an insignificant edge of the galaxy. Then genetic science and neurological studies show that free will doesn’t exist, challenging the idea of human moral reasoning. Then artificial intelligence threatens to make humanity useless altogether.

And all of this is, paradoxically, presented as a good thing — the relentless march of Science, running over the dead wood of Ignorance and Superstition as we move toward the bold new future.

What kinds of stories do you get when you are not only told that humanity is worthless, but that this is scientific fact, and any opposition to this notion is “magical thinking?”

You get stories where dirt-covered scavengers stalk the ruins of once-great cities, trying to keep their tiny little societies alive for just one more day. You get stories where everyone is a bastard and no one is a hero. The very idea of a great civilization proud of its achievements, a great people proud of its history, or a great individual proud of what they’ve done is seen as offensive. In this thinking, human “arrogance” must be brought low.

But what good does that even do?

Beating people down doesn’t enlighten them or make them better. It breaks them, reducing them to easily pliable objects who suffer what they must. Those who present this narrative want people to be weak, anxious, and unsure of themselves, and to parrot whatever those in charge say, no matter how absurd or untrue. Rather than the “wonderful creations of the magical sky fairy,” you’re just a number, a citizen, an interchangeable labor unit with no special role or destiny.

Look at how military training works: drill instructors break you down and degrade you to strip you of your “arrogance” and individuality in order to make you easier to instruct and more willing to follow orders. This makes sense — military units must follow the orders of their commanders and work as a team if they are to fulfill their missions. However, the training also has beneficial effects: it makes one more competent in dangerous situations like wars or natural disasters. That competence is valued by both fellow soldiers and society at large; as a result, military personnel are highly regarded. In other words, it makes a person better than they were.

It’s nothing like the misanthropic abuse heaped upon everyone by those who follow the “humans are garbage” narrative, since that narrative’s aim is to render humanity hopeless.

Another friend of the blog, JD Cowan, said it best:

Stories that exist solely to trash humanity have no intrinsic value except to plant seeds of doubt in the project of society–which is the goal of the worst propaganda. Insidious ideas should be shown for what they are. These are stories, by definition, that exist to harm.

In other words, these stories are themselves monsters.

In the religion of science fiction, Man is the Devil. The only salvation comes from lord god Science and its powers to atone by wiping away defects through evolution to lead us to the post-human Paradise. Is it any wonder Dianetics, Scientology, and Scientism, all sprang out through this cocoon of anti-social insanity? This is the result of “social” science fiction, and it might be the worst monster of all.

The misanthropes are wrong. Humanity does deserve nice things.

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My readers deserve nice things too. Back the Shining Tomorrow Indiegogo campaign today, and help me bring you a story that doesn’t trash humanity, but rather celebrates its capacity for good.