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This article is self-contradictory in its effort to prove that ST was nazi.
Yet if you pusue the link to Freikorps, you will find that the Freikorps "remained outsiders during the Third Reich". The Freikorps had no loyalty to Hitler. Or Nazism. Hence the comparison actually CONTRADICTS the ST/Heinlein=Nazi idea. Permission to restore NPOV by replacing this paragraph with a clarifying and neutral one? Tom S.
Bcrowell, you know, there's a street sign in Chicago, and it says "ONE WAY".... --L. 21:53, 30 August 2005 (UTC)
"only those who have volunteered for federal service (which includes military service) are permitted to vote and hold political office"
This is a somewhat controversial point, but by my reading (and I'm not alone) *only* military service qualified someone for voting. Anyone have thoughts on how best to address this in the article? I've read at least a couple of essays on the point, but foolishly haven't bookmarked them.
I recall it being military only, too, but then, I haven't read ST in awhile. --squadfifteen
Here we go... :-)
One novel which the article does not mention; but which follows directly in ST's footsteps is John Steakly's "Armor" -- this is an excellent novel which deals much more with the hardware and tactics of future combat. While its tone is much more action related (with virtually no political subtext) it combines action with a strong anti-war theme. Instead of taking the theme of war and the military from the view of its effects on society as a whole, the novel has a much more individual perspective. Much like WWI's "All Quiet on the Western Front", the novel features the grunt soldier as hero and, rather than the enemy being the insect-like "Ants" (the direct decendent of the "Bugs" in ST), the real enemy is an unfeeling, uncaring general staff.
Should something be said about the tone of the movie? I thought it was largely a spoof of the topics from the book. It definately didn't take the same attitude... --BlckKnght
I think the current entry explains it well enough (basically a satire), but perhaps it could be expanded a little. The preciding paragraph on the book could be made a little more neutral, IMHO. Some mention of Haldeman's The Forever War should be made, since it was an earlier "reply" to Heinlein's book. - DrBob
Having read the book a half dozen times in the last 20 years, I have to say it doesn't seem fascistic to me at all. The goverment Johnny Rico serves could be described as a meritocracy: anyone can participate in the government who proved, by "difficult and dangerous service" that they put the welfare of the whole ahead of their own -- or were at least willing to fake it for a term of 2 or more years.
Some reviewers (possibly not having actually read the book all the way through) seem to think that only military veterans get to vote, but the book takes pains to point out the various other forms of federal service possible, noting that not everyone qualifies for the military. If you flunk basic training, that doesn't make you a non-citizen: you can volunteer for something else.
Heinlein has taken a Christian principle and applied it to politics: "the leader among you should be the servant of all" -- or as Rev. Moon put it, the leader should be the one who works hardest.
The book wasn't pro-Fascist in any sense of the word. But the movie was. Verhoeven should be shot for what he did to this marvellous story, but that's a topic for another day... --LDC
Can we be consistent with the date for the film? At the top, we have 1997; lower down, 1995 (twice). I'm sure it wasn't released in 1995; 1997 sounds right --AdamW
According to the IMDB, it's 1997.
On the other hand, Joe Haldeman's The Forever War is an antiwar statement sometimes thought to be a direct reply to Troopers. is the kind of sentence I do not think belongs in an encyclopedia. "Thought" by whom? Unless the article makes this clear the passive voice and the qualifier "sometimes" (when? today? Last week?) merely serves to veil the author's point of view. NPOV should be about reporting on common (whether dominant or not) points of view, not just the author's. If someone can specify who makes this claim, the article would be informative; if not, the sentence should be cut.
Apropos, I thought Card's Ender's Game and the volumes that follow were an explicit reply to Starship Troopers. This is just my own opinion, so I wil not add it to the text. But perhaps Card himself or some critic has made this point publicly? If so, could someone introduce it to the text? 132.235.232.88
I have never understood the term anti-war. Activists who sought a Communist victory in the Vietnam War generally claimed to be "anti-war" but I never regarded them as pacifists: they just wanted their side to WIN the war. Perhaps "against the war" was short for "against the US military campaign in the war".
What aspect of ST was Joe Haldeman's FW against? The idea that we should defend ourselves from foreign invasion? The practice of sparing enemy civilians and then becoming their allies against a common enemy? --Ed Poor
Characters in the book also advocate the use of corporal punishment, in military discipline, civilian criminal matters and raising children.
It isn't just characters, the whole society of the book uses corporal punishment. The only character who questions this is a girl who gets talked down to in the "History and Moral Philosophy" class, and she comes around.
Do we say, "characters advocate CP" or do we say "the society of the book takes CP as justified"?
Heinlein developed an entire philosophy on "morality, politics, and war," and he fits his justification of corporal punishment into this theory extremely smoothly. The current page only talks about the "politics," and leaves the other topics fragmented. I would personally make a segment called "Heinlein's philosophy" (or something like that), then sub-divide it into "morals," "politics" and "war" to present how Heinlein presents the ideas in a progressive order. --L. 17:35, 30 August 2005 (UTC)
Added (speculative) paragraph comparing the Mobile Infantry war against the Bugs to the campaigns of the U.S. Marines against Japan in World War II. orthogonal 11:33, 10 Nov 2003 (UTC)
For those of you who haven't yet, DO NOT SEE STARSHIP TROOPERS 2. I thought it was the most pointless thing ever; it was like someone shot it in their backyard. The first film was far better in many ways. I just wanted to let you know that the film is dumb.-B-101
I always thought the bugs were a communist analog more than a Japanese one. This may be a generational thing on my part but I believe one character refers to them as practicing communism by a species evolved for it. I don't think the author made clear that non-military service could earn the vote whatever he said subsequently. On the other hand it isn't a physical meritocracy, because at one point it is stated that anybody, even a deaf blind paraplegic can volunteer & earn the franchise - a moral meritocracy perhaps. [Neil Craig] 9/11/4
Given RAH's preference for the "capable man", I'd say it is a meritocracy, too. --squadfifteen
There seems to be an unintelligible sentence in this article. Under 'Film and animated series', the 5th paragraph, last sentence, from "...either..." onwards:
Jenks 16:38, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)
I see nothing in the Heinlein quote here that suggests that communism fails because of "flaws" in human nature, only because of human nature as it is. "[W]hat do-gooders and well-meaning aunt Nellies would like him to be" doesn't sound to me like a synonym for "unflawed". --Trovatore 05:55, 16 July 2005 (UTC)
I find this article absolutely fabulous and I think it deserves to be a featured article. It also answered my longstanding question about whether the movie is a brilliant satire (not of the book) or just stupid action :) EnSamulili 08:12, 20 July 2005 (UTC)
Deleted commentary: "Some wits, referring to how these elements are combined with an attractive young cast, like to call the film Triumph of the Will, 90210."
I never heard that one, but I did hear, Doogie Howser, SS. —wwoods 19:07, 20 July 2005 (UTC)
How about, Melrose Space... --L. 16:48, 28 August 2005 (UTC)
Everything I wrote was from memory, so it needs to be checked. I'll do it this weekend. By the way, I took out the word "subtext" because that refers specifically to what's not explicit, and you can't get much more explicit than the politics in ST. —JerryFriedman 19:08, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
By the way, if you add a reference showing some specific person unquestionably calling ST "fascist" or saying that its society resembles Nazi Germany, your name will shine. —JerryFriedman 19:31, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
I commented out my claim that capital punishment in ST was swifter than in the U.S. at the time. The book isn't clear on the time, but it seems that N. L. Dillinger's simple case might have taken almost a year, and I don't know how long capital cases took back then. If anyone knows whether my statement was true, you could put it back in or delete the comment. —JerryFriedman 16:07, 26 July 2005 (UTC)
I wonder about Heinlein's influences. It seems to me that the hanging scene is largely a recreation of the poem Danny Deever by Kipling. The regiment is faced with a disgrace in their midst and must deal with it. In Kipling it is murder of a fellow soldier, in ST it is (rape) and murder of a civilian.
Are there any other themes or scenes in the book that he might have gotten from somewhere else? -- BT
My "unalienable" got changed to "inalienable". According to Declaration of Independence (United States)#Differences with draft, the original signed text has "un-", though Jefferson's draft and the version on the Jefferson memorial have "in-". You could make a case for either, but the novel (at least the edition I'm looking at) has "un-", and that's why I changed it back. —JerryFriedman 16:37, 2 August 2005 (UTC)
User L. added some text about homosexuality and homophobia to the section on Nazism: On the other hand, critics point out that in other works (most notably Stranger in a Strange Land), Heinlein is distinctly homophobic, although homosexuality is not raised as a topic in Starship Troopers. I've deleted it. There were a bunch of problems here:
(1) It has nothing to do with Nazism.
(2) It has nothing to do with Starship Troopers.
(3) The statement that "Heinlein is distinctly homophobic" is extremely POV and unsupported. In fact, Heinlein exhibited very positive attitudes toward homosexuality in books such as I Will Fear No Evil. In the article on Stranger in a Strange Land, User L. has added a discussion focusing on two passages that he/she considers homophobic; these might be the strongest evidence for homophobia on Heinlein's part, and they are actually pretty weak, since they deal with the hung-up character Jill, who is used as a dramatic foil for Smith's sexually liberated viewpoint.
(4) "Critics point out" is vague and unverifiable. The major print criticism on Heinlein (listed at the bottom of the Heinlein article) doesn't even mention any charge of homophobia.--Bcrowell 17:15, 28 August 2005 (UTC)
While national socialism promoted racial supremacy, it was not given such precedence in Italian fascism and was discouraged in similar fascist models such as integralism which stressed loyalty to the state as more important than racial characteristics. The argument that the book is different from fascism because of its multi-racial cast is not entirely accurate. --Homagetocatalonia 01:21, 8 September 2005 (UTC)
It seems like we all agree more than we disagree. If anyone has the time and motivation to take a whack at it, I say go ahead. I would like to suggest that no statement be made along the lines of "critics have observed..." or "critics say..." unless there's some actual evidence that (plural) critics --- and serious, respected critics, not a couple of bloggers --- have really said that. The Heinlein article gives references to (I think) all the major criticism that's been published in book form.--Bcrowell 06:29, 9 September 2005 (UTC)
Hi. The paragraph The MI's onscreen military tactics were also found questionable by many. [...] The best that could be argued is that the movie's aim was to show the brutality of conflict, not to demonstrate real-world tactics. kind of bugs me.
The "were also found questionable by many" doesn't have a basis. Perhaps "are questionable" or "are unrealistic". The way that it ends with "The best that could be argued" makes it seem as if the listed (and very valid) oddities of how the military worked are acting negatively to the film which to me seems like a review/criticism of the film and not simply listing aspects of it. If the film makers accidentally added all these oddities then I can see how it would be informative to suggest the movie could be criticized for such an accident, but it doesn't express whether it was accidental or deliberate.
I guess it bugged me because to me it seemed very deliberate. If you watch the film there are plenty of bits which are somewhat strange. The class autopsy near the beginning of the film featured students doing nothing more than pulling the creatures apart in a gruesome way with seemingly no scientific purpose.
That's my thoughts. Sorry. 62.252.3.70
Verhoven's incompetent troopers aren't alone. TV and movie writers can't seem to grasp the fact planets are gravity wells of no use to anyone, and the rare stand-up fights would more resemble battles between aircraft carriers, while the overwhelmingly most common actions would be convoy action, protecting trade between planets--just as in WW2. --squadfifteen
Verhoven's incompentant troopers were supposed to show that although the humans thought they were superior to the bugs they were actually not. This becomes apperent during the 'random light' seen where someone has made a mistake or is it due to the 'know it all' attitude of the humans.