Response to "The Dispossessed"

At Jemuel's recommendation I read "The Dispossessed" by Ursula La Guin. It is lamely billed as "anarchist utopia science fiction" which mostly gives reasons not to read the book rather than actually give you any idea what it is about or if it is worth reading. It is worth reading.

There may be spoilers.

As a novel
The structure of the novel caught me off guard in that it was somewhat interesting. Science fiction in my experience is very A to B with space ships or something. Even Ray Bradbury, who I hold in high regard, wrote almost exclusively this way. La Guin structured this book so that after the first chapter (the present for the protagonist) we are without any indicator taken to the protagonist's early childhood. The next chapter continues in the present followed by the past again, but always moving forward.

The structure is still something like A to B but really it is something more like A to 1 to B to 2 to C and so forth except in theory the chapters could have been put in full chronological order and maintained a cohesive structure. The stepping back and forth to different times, once understood, was enjoyable and carefully revealed the character of the protagonist, his relationships and the settings of each time.

Purely as a writer I say it works but would hope that La Guin does not use this structure in multiple books. Certainly an artist plays with a mode or gimmick in multiple projects but if the artist never clings on to the mode for no real reason it becomes obnoxious. It would be especially offensive considering the ideals of the protagonist to be a part of novel but mechanical trick of the trade.

As a utopia
Jemuel described the anarchist society the protagonist comes from as "a realistic anarchist society." Hearing this I started the book with my magnifying glass to find clear hypocrisies, idealistic self denials and impractical solutions to the human condition (sinfulness). However I found Jemuel's description to have been quite accurate; La Guin had not intended the society to be a utopia at all. The people were sometimes jerks; life sometimes was hard; there were problems which the ideals of the society could not pretend to solve. Half of the past part of the story is the protagonist struggling to achieve an actual anarchist society in the anarchist society, to push the society to their own ideals.

The anarchist society was a moon of a earth like society (in a mode not unlike the past Cold War era). The two were meant to contrast each other and to La Guin's credit she does not deny the virtues of the hierarchical society the protagonist spends most of his time. Really she goes overboard to highlight the splendor, power and effectiveness of such a society. In contrast the anarchist society seems difficult but relaxed, sociable but overly casual, there are fewer boundaries to hold people in or protect them from the difficulties of others.

Most interesting about the anarchist society is the protagonist's general discovery that it had slowly replaced the freedom of individuals with the tyranny of social expectation. Though that tyranny is almost non-existent compared to the conventional use of the word. The big consequence of breaking social expectation is not much worse than being unpopular... rather than being shot at with machine guns from a helecopter.

Still with a surprsing few number of modifications the anarchist society could easily fit into my understanding of a realistic Christian society (though we'd have many of the same failing what with our sinful nature and all).

Christian Response
La Guin's anarchist society was most different from my understanding of a realistic Christian society in its sexual mores.

It is an obnoxious subject to disagree about because the blatant hypocrasy of almost everyone involved. It is difficult to even speak of the subject. I have encountered a chaotic blend of leanred rules, guilt and lust which leads almost everyone to strongly and irrationally defend or attack a sexual mores depending on circumstances and mood rather than any guiding principle. And the few non-Christians who are capable of navigating their sexuality without chaos are more private about it for fear of attack from the mass majority of angry people who don't really know what they believe about sex. I have heard many criticism of Christian sexual mores but rarely have I heard that the Christian sexual life is unclear.

Regardless of uselessness (and stereotype) of the Christian objection to a differen sexual standard I would be false to not explore the Christian reaction to the anarchist sexual mores. It is not the most important part of their society... but it still stands out.

The anarchist society operates in a socially constructed mode where consentual sexual activity between adults is politely kept private but beyond that has no other social standard or expectation. So people have sex when they feel like it with whoever feels like doing it. You get a room, you do your thing and its not that big of a deal. OR if you feel like it you have a lifetime partner and sex is something only shared with that partner. The partner model is shown to be the anomoly and in small ways causing friction to others but on the whole not very unusual. Still as the story progresses the protagonist does make a commitment to a partner and their relationship is indistinguishable from a successful marriage.

The Christian objection to the ideal La Guin imagines is based upon the principle that the structure and rule of Christian sexuality are made for our benefit and protection rather than to opress or supress sexuality. The criticism of La Guin's ideal is that it imagines that most of the cause of modern sexual unhappiness is socially constructed. If that were the case (and disease and preganncy were managed) in theory the only needed step would be to change the socially constructed mores: problem solved.

I'm getting tired and want to write about what the anarchist ideal does very right so I am not going to argue about it other than to say that the Christian position is that a undeniable part of sexual problems are beyond social construction.

One way La Guin's anarchism meets with Christianity is in the nature of work/play. In the anarchist society the two words work and play are the same word. In one part everyone does the kind of work/play that they feel inclined to do. So there are a lot of hobbies, of a sort. The people jsut do what they like, be it music, building, driving, physics, science or whatever. Passion focuses vocation. But then everyone takes a time doing mundane jobs which need to be done BUT they are done as an act of service to the people. One could say that they are done out of love.

This is not very different from the Christian model. I am going to be a teacher because that is what makes me come alive. I switch on when I'm in a class room. I would say God is calling me (existentially) to this path. But still there are some things I do which I "just got to do." But these supposed obligations when perceived as an act of love are transformed (if only in my mind) from a boring task to a supreme act. I get switched on when I teach but this does not compare to the high of helping someone in need.

Okay I'm going to go to sleep.