American Cyberpunk Dystopias

[yeloson]

I'm thinking a bit about the classic American Cyberpunk Dystopia genre. Although often pointed to as a critique of capitalism and consumerism, it really seems a lot of these are more about white middle/upper class fears...

The lone (usually white, usually male) protagonist walks down the street, past the many stores and people that aren't in English, past the red-light district with non-mainstream prostitution, past the scary looking homeless people, and gets threatened by thugs.

Most of these people are simply Others to show this New World Order that has no room for the "normal" white guy, many are threatening, and few others get names or personalities, and the truly good are victims that need the special protagonist savior to rescue them.

The protagonist might live amongst all these "people", but certain isn't one of them. He has (special skillz, tools/equipment) that set him apart- that put him above these people and gives him a chance at "Fighting the Man" who happens to be usually some cool, collected, and smug CEO, who is a threat not because he has had a hand in creating the dystopia for everyone, but because... well, some vague reason about corporations destroying the world and society, despite the fact that the movie/book/comic just showed you a montage of shittiness all associated with anyone EXCEPT the Corporations.

Usually, the corporate "crime" which is supposed to rile up the audience is that the privatized government future limits the flow of information, GASP (Even more because Protagonist is a speshul snowflake who is a genius whose ideas NEED TO BE HEARD).

The fact that -this- is usually the "outrage" point, and not say, the people trying to get food to eat, the dead ocean sitting under an ozone-less atmosphere, the system that freely kidnaps children for organ harvesting... that a special someone didn't get heard?

Uh huh.

I'm not saying all cyberpunk falls into this trap, but there's plenty of common genre tropes there, that basically point to the same things that make "dystopia":

1) White folks no longer dominating the space. Other languages! Scary!
2) Poor people! Everywhere! Scary!
3) Poor + Not White? = Crime! Scary!
4) Sexuality! = Scary!
5) Not getting to know everything/spread your BRILLIANT IDEA? Unforgivable crime that outweighs genocide, planetary destruction, etc.

I know many people are advised to "write what you know" but really? It's kinda icky seeing the same privileged narcissistic fear stories over and over.

Comments

[tablesaw]

You know, as I was reading this, I was thinking about how this kind of dystopia is like an apocalypse from the perspective of white privilege. It brought to mind Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, where the earth is nearly empty, and Blade Runner, where the earth is nearly empty of white people.

And then, two spots down on the reading list, there's "I'm thinking I’m going to have to do a Shadowrun Hack of Apocalypse World at some point."

[yeloson]

Yep. I was thinking of Shadowrun and all these things. When I was a kid, one of the things I liked about cyberpunk stories was that there was actually POC influence- it never occurred to me that having US cities look like Hong Kong was being used as a "ZOMG US GONE TO HELL" image.

[rydra_wong]

some vague reason about corporations destroying the world and society

Japanese corporations, frequently.

And in cyberpunk dystopia, the US has often been displaced to the status of a developing country THE HORROR THE HORROR.

[yeloson]

Yeah, there's also the fear of the US no longer as the cultural center of the world either, which I think is part of the thing about other languages, foods, etc. "invading" the US.

[willow]

Was 'Jennifer Government' meant to be dystopic? I found it horrifying and couldn't finish because it felt too close to 'NOW' with people talking about The Australian Territories of the USA.

**shudders**

But back to your point, it tends to be a fricking Tea Party NIGHTMARE of multi-ethnicity and the incorporation of cultural & social mores from outside the USA.

There was a series I'd begun, which wasn't dystopia centered but was about a future earth dealing with aliens (The Retriever Series, I think). And the big thing there was how unfair it was to have Earthlings not be the most powerful beings in space and have to abide by legal decrees of other planets. How people ran away to avoid, for example, being brought to justice for destroying trees on an alien native planet.

On the one hand I liked the set up. But I kept twitching at how much frustration it brought the characters involved. 'Oh no, aliens will take my children, because I got into a no-fault accident many years ago by our standards but not by theirs!' There was a lot of blaming of the government for not being strong / firm enough in the face of these alien powers. With the implication that it no longer cared about 'real people' aka Earthlings. All of which in the story were white and predominately USian or USian descended.

I never did figure out why it made me so uncomfortable to read until this post - where now I realize it's because there was this great big deal going on about lost privilege and power and simmering frustration. But I kept still seeing the characters as privileged whiners. The whole thing tended to revolve around some character trying to escape the consequences of their actions with HUGE wallops of entitlement and dishonesty.

[littlebutfierce]

I haven't read much cyberpunk in quite a while, but my impressions of the narratives were along the lines of: The Future Will Be Just Like Japan! COOOOOOOL. :/

[yeloson]

Though, it's interesting to see how if it was simply Japan-fetish, it would be portrayed as an improvement, and the protagonist would be squee-ing about how awesome the new society is, etc. (and, god, if it would be white folk J-fetish, it'd be all about samurai ethos, forbidden schoolgirls and zen. UGHGHGGHG. The first book of the Kabuki comic series is pretty heavy in this category, though the later books actually become really awesome and deep). Even though the protagonists often get "ronin" used about them, they're also not falling into the Japanese ronin-story archetype, either, which is usually a criticism of how the powers that be preach ideals but don't live up to them.

[littlebutfierce]

(Late comment reply is late... )

Oh yeah, I didn't mean to sound like, "No, what's actually going on in these narratives is THIS" (this is what I get for sneaking DW during my lunch break at work...). But yeah, my impressions were generally on the fetish-y side, based on whatever small sample I'd read a long time ago. Doing the oh no creepy Asian conspiracy thing seems very likely too!!

[stewardess]

I'm trying really, really hard to come up with a cyperpunk film that doesn't fall into this category. Ah, Blade Runner, you were the granddaddy of them all...

Can we add to your list of fail: all the not-messed-up white people turn out to be androids? :D No real white people left, woe!

[yeloson]

LOL. I always kinda saw the replicants as kinda messed up as well. :P

It's interesting because you can see these tropes go from Robocop to Miller's Dark Knight Returns.

[stewardess]

Yep, the androids are usually messed up spiritually/mentally, but they're an ideal physical type, the blond master race. Did you see AI? If not, don't!