starship troopers 3 (2008)

[Pablo Sanchez]

Then you admit that the Federation is not fascist, or even dictatorial?

Like most people who like the government system presented by Heinlein, you're breezing right past the obvious problems with it and totally buying into the "it works satisfactorily" authorial fiat bullshit. We're talking about a government run by a small minority of people, all of whom by definition submitted to a term of several years service to that government, involving sustained training, indoctrination, and isolation from civil society, and who on their release from service had many of the best jobs reserved for them. It's also possible, but not clearly stated, that servicemen had extraterritoriality in civil jurisdictions (the deserter from Rico's training unit murders a child far from the camp, but rather than being dealt with there, he is turned over to military custody). There's obviously no potential for abuse in this system!

Heinlein dictates to the reader that this system of government is awesome and works perfectly, with no serious corruption, but this really tests suspension of disbelief. He also has a neat sideline in presenting semi-retarded criticisms of Marxist ideology (as in "lol people have different skills thus Marxism is dumb!") and proclaiming that liberal society is decadent and depraved, but poorly-thought-out political bullshit is Heinlein's stock in trade. In his formula, the way to prosperity and stability is to turn all power and responsibility over to a handful of military professionals and subject all offenders against order to punishment by summary violence. Things will work out great.

The best way to read Starship Troopers is as a work of biographical propaganda commissioned by the Federation government. Otherwise it is pretty stupid and unrealistic. The most obvious problems being the neat full circle of Rico's father (who at the end of the book has changed his mind about the military and by random chance become Rico's platoon sergeant, which is just astonishingly improbable) and the lack of sex, heterosexual and otherwise. Seen as this kind of satire, although it wasn't written as satire, it's actually a rather good work.

[Darth Hoth]

Like most people who like the government system presented by Heinlein, you're breezing right past the obvious problems with it and totally buying into the "it works satisfactorily" authorial fiat bullshit.

Um, did I ever say I like the system? I personally would not wish to live there as compared to, say, the modern world. Heinlein does make some good points, but overall, no. Does this mean that I consider the system "fascist" or anything like the Nazi/Soviet/"Evil America" analogue that Verhoeven pressed out? Also no. The system is clearly a limited-franchise democracy, with an unusual criterion for gaining the vote. No more, no less: neither dictatorship nor liberal democracy in its modern sense.

We're talking about a government run by a small minority of people, all of whom by definition submitted to a term of several years service to that government, involving sustained training, indoctrination, and isolation from civil society, and who on their release from service had many of the best jobs reserved for them.

The extent of the indoctrination, at least as portrayed, does not appear greater than that of the public school system today, at least here in Sweden, by any large margin. As for the last statement, where is this from? Rico's father is a good example that citizenship is not needed for prosperity or social status.

It's also possible, but not clearly stated, that servicemen had extraterritoriality in civil jurisdictions (the deserter from Rico's training unit murders a child far from the camp, but rather than being dealt with there, he is turned over to military custody). There's obviously no potential for abuse in this system!

Unless I am mistaken, military personnel are subject to different laws than are civilians in the US of today. If anything, those laws tend to be harsher than those of civil life.

Heinlein dictates to the reader that this system of government is awesome and works perfectly, with no serious corruption, but this really tests suspension of disbelief.

I believe the only statement to that effect was that it works adequately; as we do not see much of civil society, it is hard to measure objectively.

He also has a neat sideline in presenting semi-retarded criticisms of Marxist ideology (as in "lol people have different skills thus Marxism is dumb!") and proclaiming that liberal society is decadent and depraved, but poorly-thought-out political bullshit is Heinlein's stock in trade. In his formula, the way to prosperity and stability is to turn all power and responsibility over to a handful of military professionals and subject all offenders against order to punishment by summary violence. Things will work out great.

The book's advocacy of corporal punishment has always been controversial. I certainly do not agree with it, although there might be a point in Dubois's treatment of juvenile delinquents (i.e., that punishment, whatever its nature, should be as rapid as possible and actually meaningful). But what is this about military professionals? What the overwhelming majority of the servicemen are said to perform is the equivalent of a conscription term (mandatory in most countries at the time of writing), not a military career. Indeed, serving military men are prohibited from voting, so as to avoid conflicts of interest (an imperfect mechanism, perhaps, but a sign that the situation is not how you paint it).

I do agree that the book is simplistic, and it certainly should not be read as an attempt to produce a working society. If anything, the idea would have been to get the kiddies reading it thinking. However, I would not call it fascist. It lacks all the discernible features of fascism.

The best way to read Starship Troopers is as a work of biographical propaganda commissioned by the Federation government. Otherwise it is pretty stupid and unrealistic. The most obvious problems being the neat full circle of Rico's father (who at the end of the book has changed his mind about the military and by random chance become Rico's platoon sergeant, which is just astonishingly improbable) and the lack of sex, heterosexual and otherwise. Seen as this kind of satire, although it wasn't written as satire, it's actually a rather good work.

I simply chalk it down to it originally being a kiddie book, and therefore adapted to a particular target audience.

[Ender]

It's also possible, but not clearly stated, that servicemen had extraterritoriality in civil jurisdictions (the deserter from Rico's training unit murders a child far from the camp, but rather than being dealt with there, he is turned over to military custody).

That happens in real life. It lets you bypass double jeopardy laws - the civilians try you after the military does because otherwise you can't be held accountable under the UCMJ. We can charge them with different things (eg Article 92, Disobeying a lawful order), so it ensures that he takes his lumps from us, enforcing command discipline, while still leaving the "good" charges for the civilians. Take a DUI: Guy gets arrested, thrown in the cooler, and they call his command. Command sends over the MPs to bring him back, he gets NJP, and then when his NJP time is up they hand him over to the civilian courts. NJP/Court martial are also, bar a few exceptions, far harsher then civilian courts can hand down. Judge can't put you on bread and water, for example. Also, brigs and military prison are a bit harsher then regular jail. Setting aside Guantanamo for a minute, most brig time is effectively solitary confinement.

No, the only odd thing about the example in the book is that the military carried out the death sentence, IRL it takes much higher approval to do that and thus these guys usually sit in Leavenworth on lesser charges until we hand them over to the civilian courts to kill.

[Sea Skimmer]

No, the only odd thing about the example in the book is that the military carried out the death sentence, IRL it takes much higher approval to do that and thus these guys usually sit in Leavenworth on lesser charges until we hand them over to the civilian courts to kill.

Well in the aftermath of a Third World War, and probably some very brutal periods afterwards peoples opinions on capital punishment are bound to soft up. After all it was not more then 175 years ago that Britain had more then 200 crimes punishable by death (many of them ONLY punishable by death!) and today they don’t have any.

[Pablo Sanchez]

Heinlein does make some good points, but overall, no.

Like what?

The system is clearly a limited-franchise democracy, with an unusual criterion for gaining the vote. No more, no less: neither dictatorship nor liberal democracy in its modern sense.

My point is that Heinlein's government system is an unrealistic utopia which would, if it was designed as he claims, collapse into fascism more or less immediately.

The extent of the indoctrination, at least as portrayed, does not appear greater than that of the public school system today, at least here in Sweden, by any large margin.

So in your public schools it is constantly asserted that alternate forms of government to the one embraced by Sweden are depraved, corrupt, and incapable, that the highest purpose that government can aspire to is to function satisfactorily (hence if your life isn't a total mess, sit down and be a good, silent citizen), and Marxism is represented only by a clumsy and factually inaccurate strawman?

As for the last statement, where is this from? Rico's father is a good example that citizenship is not needed for prosperity or social status.

It's explicitly stated that several occupations (police and ethics teachers) are reserved for veterans, and are only two of an unknown number of such sinecures--I believe police positions are said to be "one of the cushy reserved jobs" or something similar.

Unless I am mistaken, military personnel are subject to different laws than are civilians in the US of today. If anything, those laws tend to be harsher than those of civil life.

As Ender says, so I understand it, but the book effectively says that the civil justice systems allows the military to handle its criminal problems in-house, and nothing indicates that the civilians get a crack at it later; the AWOL cadet in the book is executed after a summary court martial. This section seemed to imply to me not that soldiers were subject to both laws, but that they were subject only to military law.

I believe the only statement to that effect was that it works adequately; as we do not see much of civil society, it is hard to measure objectively.

I was engaging in hyperbole for effect. My point is that the system wouldn't work satisfactorily--it wouldn't work at all.

The book's advocacy of corporal punishment has always been controversial. I certainly do not agree with it,

Fine.

But what is this about military professionals? What the overwhelming majority of the servicemen are said to perform is the equivalent of a conscription term (mandatory in most countries at the time of writing),

Comparing it to conscription or reserve service is misleading. All federal service is voluntary and to gain citizenship the recruit must undergo training and spend several years working for the government in a military capacity as their sole profession. Quibble if you want.

I do agree that the book is simplistic, and it certainly should not be read as an attempt to produce a working society. If anything, the idea would have been to get the kiddies reading it thinking.

Thinking about what? The political arguments presented in the book are totally specious; it's almost better for a "kiddie" to be altogether ignorant than to get his ideas from something like SST.

However, I would not call it fascist. It lacks all the discernible features of fascism.

In the same sense that the Freikorps movement lacked many discernible features of fascism, but happened to lead directly into it.

[Darth Hoth]

Like what?

Well, I was a kiddie when I first read it, so the points about civic responsibility got me thinking on what that meant. The point that you do not necessarily appreciate what you get for free, &c. Not the major political points, more the psychological ones.

My point is that Heinlein's government system is an unrealistic utopia which would, if it was designed as he claims, collapse into fascism more or less immediately.

I would not necessarily say fascism. Corruption would probably be a greater factor than what is implied, though.

So in your public schools it is constantly asserted that alternate forms of government to the one embraced by Sweden are depraved, corrupt, and incapable, that the highest purpose that government can aspire to is to function satisfactorily (hence if your life isn't a total mess, sit down and be a good, silent citizen), and Marxism is represented only by a clumsy and factually inaccurate strawman?

More or less, when I went to school at least. Every form of government but ours (liberal, parliamentary European-style democracy) was derided as being evil and oppressive (not that many are not, but the rhetoric was sort of exaggerated; the implication, for example, was that US democracy was flawed and corrupt). Marxism was not treated like that, of course, but as a fundamentally good idea that had gone somewhat astray in the Soviet Union (I forget whether they still thought Red China was sunny and happy).

It's explicitly stated that several occupations (police and ethics teachers) are reserved for veterans, and are only two of an unknown number of such sinecures--I believe police positions are said to be "one of the cushy reserved jobs" or something similar.

They actually say that about police? All right, then. Point conceded. Could you point to the context? Not doubting, merely curious; it does sound somewhat familiar, now that I think about it.

As Ender says, so I understand it, but the book effectively says that the civil justice systems allows the military to handle its criminal problems in-house, and nothing indicates that the civilians get a crack at it later; the AWOL cadet in the book is executed after a summary court martial. This section seemed to imply to me not that soldiers were subject to both laws, but that they were subject only to military law.

I remember a musing there that they did not need to take him back, but did so anyway, so they are probably not exclusively under military jurisdiction. It does appear as though the trial/court-martial was fairly quick, though.

Comparing it to conscription or reserve service is misleading. All federal service is voluntary and to gain citizenship the recruit must undergo training and spend several years working for the government in a military capacity as their sole profession. Quibble if you want.

If you are picked for the Service in Sweden, it is not voluntary; you can get locked up for not appearing at the call, even today (though it is fairly rare now). I would not say it is without parallel; the punishment for abstaining is harsher, but it is the same mechanism. Do not serve, you get punished. The term is shorter and the duty easier for us today, but that was not always so.

Thinking about what? The political arguments presented in the book are totally specious; it's almost better for a "kiddie" to be altogether ignorant than to get his ideas from something like SST.

Not to lap up the ideas, but to get his thoughts going. Reasoning, questioning, &c. That was how I read it as a kiddie.

In the same sense that the Freikorps movement lacked many discernible features of fascism, but happened to lead directly into it.

It did, however, have more of its trappings. And the continuity is still not all that clear.

[Darth Lucifer]

Is it me or did Jolene Blalock have more plastic surgery on her mouth after Enterprise?

I could almost feel her pain as she had to deliver those literally God-awful lines toward the end of the movie. I'll bet she wished she was back on Star Trek.

The gratuitous boobies shot was the high point of the movie for me.

[FedRebel]

I saw it last night

All I can say is it felt more like a Starship Troopers movie than 'Hero of the Federation' did

The religion bits were nauseating, though it just seems that it was Fundie-Bitch, First Class and the under duress conversion of Capt. Beck that were 'sincerely' religious, as Sky Marshal Bitch seems to be using religion as a tool to gain the unquestioned obedience of the masses.

I personally didn't get any out of universe "Christianity Defeats All" vibe out of the movie, it just seemed to be a hokey plot device to move the story along, and other than the vomit inducing 'Lord's prayer' bit I'd have to say it was a pretty fun movie, and more worth the money than 'Hero of the Federation' was

[Pulp Hero]

I enjoyed the film, and after watching the director's commentary actually appreciated both how hamstrung the budgets they pulled it off with was and why the religion plot played so heavily.

Besides, how does "God is on our side- and he's citizen too!" not play as satire.

[Guardsman Bass]

Then you admit that the Federation is not fascist, or even dictatorial?

Like most people who like the government system presented by Heinlein, you're breezing right past the obvious problems with it and totally buying into the "it works satisfactorily" authorial fiat bullshit. We're talking about a government run by a small minority of people, all of whom by definition submitted to a term of several years service to that government, involving sustained training, indoctrination, and isolation from civil society, and who on their release from service had many of the best jobs reserved for them. It's also possible, but not clearly stated, that servicemen had extraterritoriality in civil jurisdictions (the deserter from Rico's training unit murders a child far from the camp, but rather than being dealt with there, he is turned over to military custody). There's obviously no potential for abuse in this system!

Keep in mind that the "veterans" are not necessarily a small minority - Heinlein specifically mentions a range in the movie from 90% in some areas to only about 3% in others.

The "best jobs" part is not true, either, unless you consider being a high school ethics teacher and cop one of the "best jobs". The "cop" position was mentioned by Rico's comrade on the one planet as an example of how he'd pretty much sink into obscurity after a career in the MI, whereas Rico was destined for greater heights.

Heinlein dictates to the reader that this system of government is awesome and works perfectly, with no serious corruption, but this really tests suspension of disbelief.

He never said anything about corruption in his society; in fact, considering that he mentioned that crime rates among veterans were the same as those among civilians, you could take the opposite tack. He also never says that his society is perfect; he says it is stable. He mentions that there is constant complaining and bitching but no violent revolts, and the society as a whole is a lot safer and orderly (but not some paradise).

He also has a neat sideline in presenting semi-retarded criticisms of Marxist ideology (as in "lol people have different skills thus Marxism is dumb!")

IIRC he was criticizing the Marxian idea that value is based off of how much labor was put into an object, while saying that there was some merit to the idea that objects didn't have value unless you felt you had earned it.

and proclaiming that liberal society is decadent and depraved, but poorly-thought-out political bullshit is Heinlein's stock in trade. In his formula, the way to prosperity and stability is to turn all power and responsibility over to a handful of military professionals and subject all offenders against order to punishment by summary violence. Things will work out great.

This "handful of military professionals" bit is getting rather irritating. Heinlein specifically mentions in his book that most of the people who run through Federal Service aren't military people - they've been "harried and overworked . . . but their votes count." The point of the system was simply to require people to actually serve the state and put their lives on the line for it before they could receive political power. I don't necessarily agree with that idea (there is room for distortion in the system if not enough people do it), but it's an idea - he's explored other political ideas in other books.

The best way to read Starship Troopers is as a work of biographical propaganda commissioned by the Federation government. Otherwise it is pretty stupid and unrealistic. The most obvious problems being the neat full circle of Rico's father (who at the end of the book has changed his mind about the military and by random chance become Rico's platoon sergeant, which is just astonishingly improbable)

That is improbable, although Rico's father joining the MI isn't necessarily that - his father explained that he'd been suffering depression issues for a while, and was enormously dissatisfied with his life at the time when Rico joined up. He was also not particularly old (only 22 years older than Rico, putting him in his early forties), and he joined up at a time when the MI seemed to be hurting for personnel (the camp he went to was much shorter than Rico's camp training experience).

and the lack of sex, heterosexual and otherwise. Seen as this kind of satire, although it wasn't written as satire, it's actually a rather good work.

There's that, but keep in mind that Rico doesn't really go into a lot of detail about what he does on his shore leave - we read him mentioning going on a date with a "chemist with expensive tastes", but no mention on whether he hooked up or not.

[tim31]

On that last point, I feel that the implication was of a fifties-era tv style of romance, where even a goodnight kiss was something to write home about.

In a draft for the first film that I read, there is a scene where Rico and Ibanez are coming home from the prom, waiting at a 'transit station', and get cautioned by a police officer for a public display of affection.

[Guardsman Bass]

On that last point, I feel that the implication was of a fifties-era tv style of romance, where even a goodnight kiss was something to write home about.

In a draft for the first film that I read, there is a scene where Rico and Ibanez are coming home from the prom, waiting at a 'transit station', and get cautioned by a police officer for a public display of affection.

I suppose that could be it - certainly that's what the date he had with Ibanez in the book later on consisted of. Did Heinlein ever bring up sex a lot in any other writings in this period (the 1950s)?

[Beowulf]

Stranger in a Strange Land was published only 2 years after Starship Troopers. It's a bit explicit in content.