CATASTROPHIC EFFECTS OF POLITICAL CORRECTNESS ON THE „TENDELÉO’S STORY“ BY IAN MCDONALD

Abstract

This novella begins well, and, indeed, its (approximately) first half is very good science fiction, good literature. It begins in the year 2004, with the arrival, on earth, of a phenomenon so alien, that we cannot at first see it or comprehend it properly, because we do not have conceptual framework for it. The phenomenon lands first on Kilimanjaro, Africa, and it begins to spread, encrouching on our land, 50 meters a day, unstoppably. The impoverished civilian population is forced to evacuate, with much loss of life. The author excellently portrays the response of the local governments and militias, and various social classes, to this alien invasion. But then the story turns around. The aliens are nanorobots, trillions of them, with good intentions, they bring to us prosperity, advanced knowledge, they contaminate our bodies but this brings to us almost perfect health, almost instant healing of wounds, much longer life, etc. – but all these benefits are brought only to the Third world countries; the west is excluded; so this is a purely racist retaliation for previous collective sins of the white race. In our analysis we show that this intrusion of political correctness, or, rather, political masochism born from the guilt feeling, has, in fact, produced a vast amount of nonsense in the second half of the story, a great loss of plausibility and logical coherence, and, consequently, a catastrophic loss of literary quality.