All month long, SciFi Camp 🛸 will be tackling the fascinating subjects of cow abductions and the topic of many a recent US government info dump: ALIENS. 👽
I don't remember the movie too well, but what I remember it was good and your take is reasonable.
I think it does kind of present an easy test, though. The aliens are largely peaceful and can be easily housed without much strain. The human response is one of fear and bigotry, which, to be fair, we've more than shown we're liable towards.
But it'd be interesting to see a work that explores the appropriate boundaries of compassion, as difficult and fraught as that concept is.
What if the aliens are less like oppressed refugees, and more like Conquistadors, siding with one nation against another? OR what if they require scarce resources or enough space to actually cost us something? What if we have to risk offending some other galactic power by taking them in?
Basically, where is the border line between loyalty to our fellow humans and loyalty to an outsider who needs help?
Of course, the problem with such a question is it quickly becomes about current political questions. But I think it's interesting in its own right. *Do* relations with a genuinely alien people mirror those with another human nation? Why shouldn't the one planet we're on and adapted to be reserved for us? Is there a moral space between self-sacrifice and aggressive imperialism?
In practice the *most* moral choice is probably to ignore the demagogues and search carefully for a mutually beneficial solution. Which if course is probably impossible in practice, due to that fear and bigotry explored in this movie. But even without it there remains difficult questions.
(Actually, this has been done in series I need to read, like Three Body Problem and The Mote in God's Eye, and maybe Babylon 5?)
“what if they require scarce resources or enough space to actually cost us something? What if we have to risk offending some other galactic power by taking them in?”
That would be a really interesting movie/story. It explores to what level of sacrifice does a species take on. I don’t recall specifically, but I think the video game Stellaris has a similar mechanic in it, where you can accept refugees into your empire, and I think other empires can/do hold that against you. If I am misremembering, then that’s something they should absolutely add.
I haven't actually seen District 9, but your description of Wikus's story is a textbook trope, isn't it? Someone gets forced to join the other side and learns they were wrong all along because they lacked empathy.
It reminds me of an episode of the 2002 Twilight Zone reboot called 'Shades of Guilt'. It does a similar thing with the trope (without aliens), but at the end, it firmly points to the question the humans in District 9 failed to ask, resulting in them dehumanising the aliens.
District 9 is one of my favorite movies. How are low-budget sci-fi movies just consistently so much better than overproduced blockbusters?
I don't remember the movie too well, but what I remember it was good and your take is reasonable.
I think it does kind of present an easy test, though. The aliens are largely peaceful and can be easily housed without much strain. The human response is one of fear and bigotry, which, to be fair, we've more than shown we're liable towards.
But it'd be interesting to see a work that explores the appropriate boundaries of compassion, as difficult and fraught as that concept is.
What if the aliens are less like oppressed refugees, and more like Conquistadors, siding with one nation against another? OR what if they require scarce resources or enough space to actually cost us something? What if we have to risk offending some other galactic power by taking them in?
Basically, where is the border line between loyalty to our fellow humans and loyalty to an outsider who needs help?
Of course, the problem with such a question is it quickly becomes about current political questions. But I think it's interesting in its own right. *Do* relations with a genuinely alien people mirror those with another human nation? Why shouldn't the one planet we're on and adapted to be reserved for us? Is there a moral space between self-sacrifice and aggressive imperialism?
In practice the *most* moral choice is probably to ignore the demagogues and search carefully for a mutually beneficial solution. Which if course is probably impossible in practice, due to that fear and bigotry explored in this movie. But even without it there remains difficult questions.
(Actually, this has been done in series I need to read, like Three Body Problem and The Mote in God's Eye, and maybe Babylon 5?)
“what if they require scarce resources or enough space to actually cost us something? What if we have to risk offending some other galactic power by taking them in?”
That would be a really interesting movie/story. It explores to what level of sacrifice does a species take on. I don’t recall specifically, but I think the video game Stellaris has a similar mechanic in it, where you can accept refugees into your empire, and I think other empires can/do hold that against you. If I am misremembering, then that’s something they should absolutely add.
I haven't actually seen District 9, but your description of Wikus's story is a textbook trope, isn't it? Someone gets forced to join the other side and learns they were wrong all along because they lacked empathy.
It reminds me of an episode of the 2002 Twilight Zone reboot called 'Shades of Guilt'. It does a similar thing with the trope (without aliens), but at the end, it firmly points to the question the humans in District 9 failed to ask, resulting in them dehumanising the aliens.
That question being: 'What if it were me?'