ZMan takes the Dean of Science Fiction to task on his concept of a soldier only franchise in “Starship Troopers.”
Of course he’s rightly basing it on the book but even the highly toxic spin that the director took with the movie still made it a fun experience to watch them zap those bugs. Hopefully some of Heinlein’s better novels and juveniles will be brought to the screen the way they deserve.
For fans (and detractors) of the book there is a lively discussion in the comments of the post.
Here was my comment on the ZMan post:
The Starship Troopers model has a very high chance of being successful if it ever gets implemented. As a Vet, (hate that cringe phrase, “As a fill-in-the-blank”) I too can detect the waft of BS from politicians like Graham and Crenshaw. These cretins who wear their military service as a shield to criticism are an abomination. As Z Man writes, democracy itself self-selects these clowns due to them putting on the biggest show in front of the audience.
I always saw the merit in getting citizens to earn the right to vote. I think there’s value in showing that voters have some minimal competence. The ZMan seems a little too dismissive of this kind of idea. And i remember the service didn’t necessarily have to be military, so even the squeamish would be accommodated. But I think it would be fair of him to say how he thinks a country should be run.
Wrong. In the book and in passing in the movie, it states that to earn the franchise you must be a veteran of federal service. In the book it says only a minority are military veterans. Any federal service where you prove that you value something above your own mangy hide by placing yourself at the mercy of the government for a term of not less than 2 years. You do not have the final say on what you do or where you go. All you can do is resign and lose forever the right to vote. You can still… Read more »
There’s definitely a logic to it. Heinlein was a pretty smart guy. It seems like a better system than the one we use.
Any system, like our current, that provides for universal suffrage on the basis of merely breathing (and not even that on some cases) will inevitably devolve into economic chaos as the “citizens” (and not even that on some cases) “vote themselves largesse from the public treasury”.
There should be a gateway, maybe several potential gateways to joining the club. Military service should be one.
“I don’t want to be a member of any club that would accept me”- G. Marx
When I look at the lengths that some of the blue states go to to ensure that anyone can vote, it’s beyond laughable. Next we’ll be signing up the squirrels and pigeons.
only if they vote democrat.
They handle that with the programming on the tabulators.