OFF: Moorcock on sci-fi

[Douglas Pearson]

On Thu, 22 Mar 2001 15:55:42 GMT, M Holmes <fofp at HOLYROOD.ED.AC.UK> wrote:
>Nick Medford writes:
>
>> In message <a05010401b6d628178765@[10.0.0.5]>, Carl Edlund Anderson
>
>> >Moorcock would be a bit left-wing, then ...  ;)
>
>> Well he generally styles himself an anarchist and I think the essay
>> Doug quoted was in some anarchist journal originally.  He has also
>> written that the most important thing is to be a feminist first and
>> anything else second.  He's apparently a big fan of radical feminist
>> Andrea Dworkin.
>
>Bizarre, and more than a little dated. It's kinda weird to hear a writer
>making pro-censorship arguments.

Can you quote me one of the spots in the essay where he makes pro-
censorship arguments?

(URL again)
http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/Lobby/3998/Moorcock.html

I just re-read it and couldn't find anyplace where he comes remotely close
to saying that certain books should not be sold or published.  He certainly
talks about books he doesn't like because of their ideology, but that's
hardly the same as advocating censorship.  I certainly wouldn't want to
see 'Atlas Shrugged' banned, although I find its ideology repugnant (and
its "literary" qualities to be less than non-existent).  Or, to use a far
harsher example, 'Mein Kampf' (does this mean that I've devolved into the
standard Internet "reasoning" of comparing everyone you disagree with to
Nazis?).  At worst, I see MM displaying a sort of smugness along the lines
of, "you think you're some kind of left-wing progressive, yet you don't
have a clue that your favorite fiction espouses the sort of right-wing
ideals that you purport to despise".  But there are plenty of people on all
sides of the ideological spectrum who embrace conflicting ideas; I see no
problem with pointing out the contradictions (or, in some cases, outright
hypocrisy) of such an outlook.  On the other hand, who am I (or who is
anyone else!) to complain if a self-professed pacifist enjoys unwinding by
reading Tom Clancy novels (as long as, I suppose, mr./ms. s-p.p.
understands the inherent contradiction)?

    -Doug
     ceres at sirius.com