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The usefulness of SF
Feb. 7th, 2007 07:23 pmAn interview with a writer on Afghanistan included this observation:
"...women who live in a society that undervalues women as extremely as Afghan society does, never learn to empathise with other women, because they themselves don't place value on other women. And when they themselves are so mistreated it becomes virtually impossible for them to sympathise with other women who are being mistreated. And also of course they are in competition with those other women for the very slim resources that exist.
You know, I always have a hard time trying to talk about this to women in the West, because they say, yes, yes, but I can see by the looks on their faces that they don't believe me. They don't get it. And I was there for the better part of four years, and it took me all that time to come to grips with it myself."
I got it at once, I think; and I attribute this to having read a lot of SF, particularly feminist SF, particularly Suzie McKee Charnas' Holdfast series. SF gives you a form of experience with worlds and world-views you would never even imagine encountering. (Although, reading back through the whole interview, it has to be said that there are shadows of the same mind-set in the West; the Afghanis are not aliens.)
"...women who live in a society that undervalues women as extremely as Afghan society does, never learn to empathise with other women, because they themselves don't place value on other women. And when they themselves are so mistreated it becomes virtually impossible for them to sympathise with other women who are being mistreated. And also of course they are in competition with those other women for the very slim resources that exist.
You know, I always have a hard time trying to talk about this to women in the West, because they say, yes, yes, but I can see by the looks on their faces that they don't believe me. They don't get it. And I was there for the better part of four years, and it took me all that time to come to grips with it myself."
I got it at once, I think; and I attribute this to having read a lot of SF, particularly feminist SF, particularly Suzie McKee Charnas' Holdfast series. SF gives you a form of experience with worlds and world-views you would never even imagine encountering. (Although, reading back through the whole interview, it has to be said that there are shadows of the same mind-set in the West; the Afghanis are not aliens.)
