Thank You On Behalf Of My Family

@BillRM,

BillRM wrote:

Mr. Setanta wrote:
Just to sweeten the mix, he was elitist, sexist and racist

To sum up from either his personal life or his writings
I do not see him being guilty of any of the above charges.

Do u think that 's character assassination ?

1 Reply

@BillRM,

DAVID wrote:

Again, in The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress
the leading character (the 1 with a mechanical hand),
he was not shown to have come from the elite.

Maybe lower middle-class, was my general impression of him

BillRM wrote:

He married into one of the oldest and most important line marriages
on the moon so at the time of the story he did have a fairly high social standing.

Thank u, Bill. U remember the book better than I do. I loved it, tho.
He was not doing especially well, financially, as I recall; not "elite",
as someone has suggested.

1 Reply

@OmSigDAVID,

Quote:

Do u think that 's character assassination ?

I do not know as if our friend was a wide reader of Heinlein works I do not see how he could honestly come to the conclusions he came to.

No where can I think of any racism in any of Heinlein books and while he did think that men have a duty to protect women and children that did not stop him from writing very strong women characters able to take care of themselves.

As far as elitism he did believe in some people being far above the average but they was always self selecting and not base on race or birth or sex.

1 Reply

@OmSigDAVID,

David unlike Heinlein John W. Campbell editor of Astounding and a writer himself have more then a hint of racism and I remember Heinlein commenting about that when he was handed a manuscript by Campbell to take over and rewrite that he needed to removed a lot of racist elements from the story.

If memory serve me correctly it turn into his the sixth column book.

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@BillRM,

DAVID wrote:

Do u think that 's character assassination ?

BillRM wrote:

I do not know as if our friend was a wide reader of Heinlein works I do not see how he could honestly come to the conclusions he came to.

No where can I think of any racism in any of Heinlein books and while he did think that men have a duty to protect women and children that did not stop him from writing very strong women characters able to take care of themselves.

As far as elitism he did believe in some people being far above the average but they was always self selecting and not base on race or birth or sex.

I agree with your sentiments in the matter.
Y anyone 'd disagree is a mystery.

Do u think that he just despises personal freedom
as much as to lie about Heinlein ??

What is your opinion, Bill ?

David

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Anyone who thinks Heinlein is not an elitist, a sexist and a racist has never read Farnham's Freehold. I see Mr. Civility is obliquely calling me a liar. That's not very surprising, coming from him.

2 Replies

@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

Anyone who thinks Heinlein is not an elitist, a sexist and a racist has never read Farnham's Freehold.
I see Mr. Civility is obliquely calling me a liar. That's not very surprising, coming from him.

It woud have to be oblique,
because I 've been having trouble figuring out what u had in mind.
I 'll order the book from Amazon; then decide. I don t wanna pre-judge.

Incidentally, did u ever reveal
what it was that u found to be so implausible
that motivated u to either declare or imply
that I was a liar qua that commie that lived next door 1930s-'4Os
or those 2 young ladies who successfully approached me??

I was curious about that; I deemed it a little odd.

Y did u find those events to be un-believable ?

David

1 Reply

Take it easy, Bubba, don't get upset--it's not good for your health.

0 Replies

@OmSigDAVID,

I just reread Farnham's Freehold a few weeks ago as a matter of fact and can not see how that book support Setanta position that Heinlein is any of the three claims of his.

Let see as far as being a racist in the book the main character stated he would had no problem if his daughter was pregnant by his former black servant and that he is a fine man and that he would made a fine mate for her.

Somehow that does not seems to prove that Heinlein is a racist!!!!!!

Elitist? That is also an odd conclusion to come from reading the book as the main character was surely running his little family unit under lifeboat rules but there is nothing to indicate that he is an elitist.

Sexism? Heinlein paint the main character wife as being a worthless drunk however the main character take the blame for her becoming that way.

1 Reply

Bill, i have no interest in arguing with a idiot. Have a nice life, don't write.

1 Reply

@Setanta,

Quote:

Bill, i have no interest in arguing with a idiot. Have a nice life, don't write.

LOL instead of Heinlein I would suggest you spend your time in reading the book "How To Win Friends and Influence People" by D Carnegie.

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@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

Anyone who thinks Heinlein is not an elitist,
a sexist and a racist has never read Farnham's Freehold. . . .

I have not read the book.
Was there some particular incident
that moved u to believe that Heinlein was a racist ??

If so, will u tell us what it is ?

David

0 Replies

@BillRM,

BillRM wrote:

I just reread Farnham's Freehold a few weeks ago as a matter of fact
and can not see how that book support Setanta position that Heinlein
is any of the three claims of his.

Let see as far as being a racist in the book the main character stated
he would had no problem if his daughter was pregnant by his former
black servant and that he is a fine man and that he would made a fine
mate for her.

Is that the book that u said
its main character was a black ?

1 Reply

@OmSigDAVID,

Quote:

Is that the book that u said
its main character was a black ?

No that is starship trooper.

In any case, below is the main character a white man talking to his white daughter in the book Farnham's Freehold concerning her mating with/marrying Joe the former black servant of the family.

It does not sound like Heinlein is showing himself to be a racist in that book!

Quote:

"I wanted to be sure. Karen, you know that color does not matter to me. I want to know other things about a man. Is his word good? Does he meet his obligations? Does he do honest work? Is he brave? Will he stand up and be counted? Joe is very much a man by all standards that interest me. I think you are being hasty."
He sighed. "If we were in Mountain Springs, I would not urge you to marry any Negro. The pressures are too great; such a marriage is almost always a tragedy. But those barbaric factors do not obtain here. I urge that you give Joe serious thought."

2 Replies

@BillRM,

BillRM wrote:

Quote:
Is that the book that u said
its main character was a black ?

No that is starship trooper.

In any case, below is the main character a white man talking to his white daughter in the book Farnham's Freehold concerning her mating with/marrying Joe the former black servant of the family.

It does not sound like Heinlein is showing himself to be a racist in that book!

Quote:
"I wanted to be sure. Karen, you know that color does not matter to me. I want to know other things about a man. Is his word good? Does he meet his obligations? Does he do honest work? Is he brave? Will he stand up and be counted? Joe is very much a man by all standards that interest me. I think you are being hasty."
He sighed. "If we were in Mountain Springs, I would not urge you to marry any Negro. The pressures are too great; such a marriage is almost always a tragedy. But those barbaric factors do not obtain here. I urge that you give Joe serious thought."

In these circumstances, I can see where
maybe it is possible that Mr. Setanta meant that
Heinlein was a super-intense pro-black racist.

0 Replies

@BillRM,

Quote:

In these circumstances, I can see where
maybe it is possible that Mr. Setanta meant that
Heinlein was a super-intense pro-black racist.

LOL........Mr. Setanta is interesting to say the least.

Oh in starship trooper book it is assume that the main character is a white American person or at least the matter was not address at all.

In the **** poor movie from the book he was also picture as a white American.

Here is the throw away bit of information at the very end of the book that give other information on his background.

I wonder how many readers of the book picked it up.

Quote:

"I'm sure of it." I added something to myself and Bennie said, "What did you say?"
"Sorry, Bernardo. Just an old saying in my own language. I suppose you could translate it, more or less, as: 'Home is where the heart is.' "
"But what language was it?"
"Tagalog. My native language."
"Don't they talk Standard English where you come from?"
"Oh, certainly. For business and school and so forth. We just talk the old speech around home a little. Traditions. You know."
"Yeah, I know. My folks chatter in Español the same way. But where do you - " The speaker started playing "Meadowland"; Bennie broke into a grin. "Got a date with a ship! Watch yourself, fellow! See you."

Here is a picture of a Tagalog person

1 Reply

@BillRM,

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Tagalog
Wikang Tagalog
Native to Philippines
Region Central and South Luzon
Ethnicity Tagalog people
Native speakers 28 million (2007)[1]
96% of the Philippines can speak Tagalog (2000)[2]
Language family
Austronesian
Malayo-Polynesian
Philippine
Central Philippine
Tagalog
Standard forms
Filipino
Dialects
Bataan
Batangas
Bulacan
Lubang
Manila
Official status
Official language in Philippines (in the form of Filipino)
Regulated by Commission on the Filipino Language

Predominantly Tagalog-speaking regions in the Philippines.
The color-schemes represent the 4 dialect zones of the language:
Northern, Central, Southern, and Marinduque. In addition, Tagalog
is used as a second language across the entire country.

It is the first language of the Philippine region IV (CALABARZON and MIMAROPA),
of Bulacan and of Metro Manila. Its standardized form, officially named Filipino,
is the national language and one of two official languages of the Philippines, the other being English.

2 Replies

@OmSigDAVID,

It was interesting David in a strange way that Heinlein decided to throw in the information that he was non white/non American in such a causal and offhanded manner, after the reader had long ago form a mental picture of him otherwise.

Of course this was in 1959 at the start of the civil right movement and it was being aim at the American youth market beside and the issues of race did not fit in with the whole plot of the far future in any case.

But somehow David , I can not see a racist author in 1959 doing any such thing can you?

1 Reply

@OmSigDAVID,

having done exploration for copper in the Pkilipines, one of the biggest damn problems (besides fungus) was the multitude of languages that are undecipherable to native groups even 30 miles away.
There are even more unique native dialects that are related to Tagalog

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@BillRM,

BillRM wrote:

It was interesting David in a strange way that Heinlein decided to throw in the information that he was non white/non American in such a causal and offhanded manner, after the reader had long ago form a mental picture of him otherwise.

Of course this was in 1959 at the start of the civil right movement and it was being aim at the American youth market beside and the issues of race did not fit in with the whole plot of the far future in any case.

But somehow David, I can not see a racist author in 1959 doing any such thing can you?

It perplexes me.
I wonder what was going on in his mind.
I wish that I 'd have had the opportunity
to confer with Heinlein the way that we do in A2K,
to understand his reasoning, but in common with Mr. Setanta,
Heinlein was not interested in rendering explanations.

David

0 Replies

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