Space Opera Fans discussion

A lot of great SF uses prejudice as a key plot point. I'm sure you know of several, so I'm going to start the conversation with just one (and add more later perhaps).

Family Law by Mackey Chandler
An exploration ship has a married couple (human) and their daughter, and their partner (alien). They have been together for a long time. The parents are killed, and the partner gets the daughter and ship back to civilization. His planet first, then back to Earth. Both planets have authority figures who do not approve of the partner and daughter staying together as a family (surprise surprise). Prejudice rampant. Dang anything else is a blatant spoiler.....

What's your favorite book that fits this theme?

No nibbles? Hint for quite a few: look in the Liaden Universe.

Right now I have three books screaming at me to mention them. All three are of the "attending military academy" category. I'm forcing a limit on myself of one per day.

The Riss Gamble by C.R. Daems. There's this alien species that is a symbiote inside their normal host bodies. They negotiate for some of them to attend the Naval academy sharing the bodies of human volunteers. Main character is one of those volunteers. Most of the rest of the Navy are extremely prejudiced against both the Riss and the humans sharing their bodies with them.

Empire The In Her Name series has Amazonian like alien invaders attacking humans. One of the themes is how these fierce women imprison their males as breeding servants.

Phillip wrote: "Empire The In Her Name series has Amazonian like alien invaders attacking humans. One of the themes is how these fierce women imprison their males as breeding servants."
Interesting. Is it true culture suppression, or something more biological such as the way bees keep the male drones?

They started as equals, but by the time of the original books (there was a later prequel series) the males had devolved to basically being animals.

The David Birkenhead series starts with Ship's Boy by Phil Geusz. This series follows the life of David from boyhood to death at an advanced age. A couple of centuries before the first book, humans had genetically engineered several races of slaves by combining animal genes with human ones to make moderately intelligent but subservient beings that were used for menial labor, dangerous work, and sex objects. David is a Rabbit, with fur, long ears and large feet, but he and his father are more intelligent than most Rabbits. David might possibly be more intelligent than most humans for that matter.

Lots of action, creative tactics after David is an officer, and the expected extreme prejudice against all Rabbits and David in particular for not staying in a menial subservient role.

Ship's Boy is free but only about 90 pages; the sequels are closer to novel length. Not sure we would ever choose this for a group read unless we pick the omnibus edition.

Teresa wrote: "No nibbles? ."

In the context of Space Opera it’s hard to think of many which focus on prejudice. It’s often there as part of the mix, of course, such as how humans and kzinti regard each other in Niven’s Known Space.

An Unkindness of Ghosts is a new book I haven’t read yet that takes place on a generation ship which is set up like the Antebellum South with the exact same race relations. Seems kind of on the nose, but it looks like people really like it.

Strange. I thought this would be one with a lot of books mentioned, since I could think of so many. There were even Star Trek episodes that had key plot points due to prejudice.

In any case, this topic appears to be one we shouldn't use for a THEME category. That's what I'm doing with these oddball discussion threads: finding topics that seem popular and either narrowing them or broadening them so that we get a reasonable number of nominations. And in some cases it's "I want to be able to nominate X, so what's a theme that fits?" There are soooo many great books that don't qualify for either Reader or Indie categories.

Phillip wrote: "Empire The In Her Name series has Amazonian like alien invaders attacking humans. One of the themes is how these fierce women imprison their males as breeding servants."

I liked this series by Michael Hicks. He had 3 series that were each trilogies, set in this universe and mythology. They are female, but not women, which I see as a human term. "Nightmarish female warriors with blue skin, fangs, and razor sharp talons, the Kreelans have technology that is millennia beyond (us)". They are prejudiced against all races and think all such are herd animals. It is very difficult to fight a war when we don't understand why and what the fight is about.

In regards to how they treat their own males, I didn't see it as prejudice but as cultural based on biology and manipulation of those in control, which is explained In the First Empress trilogy. Yes, it has become a prejudice as do most things that exist for some other reason but are followed religiously because of culture, religion, and politics, rather than reasoning.

Teresa. I think prejudice is integral to so much sci fi, that it is hard to think of books where that is just the main issue. We have stories of human vs. AI all over the genre. in Generational ship stories, we have crew vs. passengers. Male vs. female is everywhere. Any ESP or talents are usually prejudiced against in books. Forms other than human, are commonly treated as less. The theme is just so generalized through the genre that it would need to be more specific.

One of the reasons I like The Shadow Order series by Michael Robertson is because all the other races look at humans as scum to be wiped off their boots. It's a nice difference from our usual self-importance.

Thanks Lizzie. That was why I had thought of it as a theme. I doubt we will use this as a theme because it didn't generate a lot of suggested books. Odds are it's too fuzzy.

What about The Honor of the Queen? The suppression of females by the Grayson's is not really prejudice, nor even really misogyny. It's fear and overprotectiveness. But the effect is the same. Females are restricted. And it's a central theme of the book.

Good one Betsy!

Maybe, if this is such a common theme, you could split it into smaller ones. Misogyny. Prejudice against aliens. Prejudice against AI. Economic inequality. Racial prejudice.

Good idea. I particularly like stories involving prejudice against other species, whether it is humans looking down their noses at aliens or aliens treating humans like dirt. Or the rare cross bred people who get it from both sides.