Comments on: Why men love science fiction

By: dmk

dmk — Tue, 19 Dec 2006 11:23:30 +0000

The quote Kaleberg was reaching for is “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” This is one of Clarke’s Laws; Arthur C. Clark is a scientist and SF writer. Or perhaps Kaleberg was trying to quote Larry Niven’s response to Sir Arthur: “Any sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology.”

By: charlieanders

charlieanders — Sat, 16 Dec 2006 19:54:22 +0000

Wow, I love skiffy snobs. I suppose you refuse to watch the Scifi channel too?

By: beachdog67

beachdog67 — Sat, 16 Dec 2006 19:34:12 +0000

…And any writer lame enough to refer to the genre as “sci fi” has already subverted any claim s/he might have held to being taken seriously regarding their observations/theories about those who enjoy the field.

By: Mel

Mel — Fri, 08 Dec 2006 18:14:49 +0000

Heh, and as a female Star Wars fan, I have to say that it is neither SF nor “orderly”–it is mythological fantasy and gaping with plotholes. Which is why I love it so. And if it’s all about “order” for men, why is it that almost all of the female SF authors I can think of offhand write hard military SF? And Star Trek wasn’t about “order,” either, it was about tackling difficult moral issues full of gray areas, especially in the later series.

I think it has much more to do with social acceptability–not necessarily that it’s more “acceptable” for men to be SF geeks (the stereotype of the Loser in the Comics Shop isn’t a nice one), but that women are raised to crave social acceptance more than men, and thus tend to stay away from socially unacceptable tastes, like F/SF.

By: Kaleberg

Kaleberg — Thu, 07 Dec 2006 03:44:24 +0000

As for science fiction versus fantasy, remember the old saying: Any magic sufficiently advanced is indistinguishable from technology. (I think that was Dr. Who, and quite right he was).

By: heather

heather — Wed, 06 Dec 2006 04:40:11 +0000

i think the real problem is what both of you touched on briefly: it’s more socially acceptable for men to be obsessed with the fantastic than it is for women. a non-scifi instance of this is the notion that most men will go through a midlife crisis, have an affair, get a hot car, etc. and that this is NORMAL. the fact that it is not considered normal for a woman to do this illustrates the gender bias we all live with.

incidentally it is my experience as well that there are more guys than girls in the scifi/fantasy world. that doesn’t mean there aren’t girls – there absolutely are – but the guys definitely seem to have us outnumbered. again, i think this goes to the above point.

great post btw! i just started reading this blog the other day. always makes me think.