Re: "To Sail beyond the Sunset" by Robert A. Heinlein

On 5/05/24 09:04, Mike Van Pelt wrote:

In article <nbp33j5auirk4n86p8jfdmu7tb2sgfskhr@4ax.com>,
John Savard  <quadibloc@servername.invalid> wrote:

Incidentally, it has been argued that Farnham's Freehold wasn't
_really_ racist. It's true that it didn't depict cannibalism as a
natural tendency, for genetic reasons, of America's black people, just
something imported by foreign black people who were also converted to
Islam. I don't think that, though, is quite enough to qualify it as
"not racist", since saying false bad things about foreign people of
other races still qualifies, not just American people of other races.

 
It's been decades since I've read it, but I recall the cannibalism
in "Farnham's Freehold" came about because the total collapse of
civilization resulted in mass starvation, people resorted to
cannibalism to survive, and it got incorporated into the culture.
The dominant culture was black because the USA/USSR/Europe/China
nuclear war just about completely destroyed those nations, and
Africa was all that was left.

I had forgotten but that succinctly explains why it is not racist, thank
you.

The out-of-story explanation for having cannibalism in there
was made pretty dang clear:  Heinlein saying that on the scale
of evils, cannibalism is less of an evil than slavery.

I agree. Advertisers targeting food shoppers emphasise the superiority
of young vegetables whether frozen, fresh or tinned naming them
affectionately baby this or baby that. Speaking from experience, this is
certainly correct for long pig. There is also the added enjoyment to a
meal of knowing that your choice of protein may have prevented the
misery of a lifetime of compulsory schooling followed by wage slavery.
I'll get my coat.