{"id":8313,"date":"2013-04-12T10:00:36","date_gmt":"2013-04-12T16:00:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/?p=8313"},"modified":"2013-04-17T02:25:51","modified_gmt":"2013-04-17T08:25:51","slug":"k-is-for-klingon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/k-is-for-klingon\/","title":{"rendered":"K is for Klingon"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"worf\"<\/a>Ah, the proud warrior race<\/a>.\u00a0 Where would science fiction be without it?\u00a0 From Klingons to Ur-Quans, Wookies to Sangheilis, Mri to Green Martians to Vor Lords, warrior races have been a staple of space opera and space-centered science fiction pretty much since the genre was invented.<\/p>\n

The concept behind this trope is the same as the one behind blood knight<\/a>: honor is more valuable than life, and the best way to win or defend honor is through combat.\u00a0 It’s not necessarily death that these guys live for, so much as glory and a chance to prove their prowess.\u00a0 Unlike the always chaotic evil<\/a> races, these guys usually follow a strict code of honor, sometimes to the point of absurdity<\/a>.<\/p>\n

When taken too far, of course, you get a planet of hats<\/a>, where everyone has exactly the same values without any kind of depth or diversity<\/a>.\u00a0 Fridge logic<\/a> leads to Klingon Scientists Get No Respect<\/a>.\u00a0 After all, how did the Klingons build starships and discover space travel if they’re all constantly fighting each other?<\/p>\n

Fortunately, we have plenty of real-world examples for how this sort of thing works.\u00a0 Lots of human cultures have placed a high value on warrior qualities, including the Spartans<\/a>, the Samurai<\/a>, the Vikings<\/a>, and the Mongols<\/a>, just to name a few.\u00a0 Of course, relying on stereotypes may lead to some\u00a0unfortunate implications<\/a>, so it’s not a good idea not to have too narrow or ethnocentric a reading of history.\u00a0 Still, there’s a lot from history that we can glean.<\/p>\n

In fact, you could make a valid argument that humans are the quintessential warrior race<\/a>.\u00a0 After all, we developed the technology to annihilate our own species before<\/em> we put a man in space.\u00a0 Even today, the amount of resources we spend on war and security far outstrips the amount of resources we dedicate to just about any other pursuit.\u00a0 From the earliest ages, we engage in competitive physical sporting activities that mimic warfare and video games that outright simulate actual combat.\u00a0 Our everyday language is full of violent terms<\/a> like “on target,” “wiped out,” and “having a blast,” to the point where most of them are invisible.\u00a0 Indeed, if we ever make contact with an alien race, we may very well find that we<\/em> are the Klingons.<\/p>\n

In that respect, this trope is just another way that science fiction acts as a mirror through which we can better see ourselves.\u00a0 The proud warrior race fascinates us because we have so much in common with them.\u00a0 Klingons are not just faceless orcs for the good guys to slay by the dozen–in many sci-fi universes, they (or individual members) actually become good guys.\u00a0 Just think of Worf from Star Trek, or The Arbiter from Halo, or Aral Vorkosigan from Louis McMaster Bujold’s Vorkosigan Saga<\/em>.\u00a0 While on the surface, these guys seem absolutely crazy, when you start to explore them you frequently find a lot of depth.<\/p>\n

I am fascinated by the concept of a warrior race.\u00a0 I’ve played with it quite a bit in my own work, especially with the Hameji in Bringing Stella Home, Sholpan,<\/strong> and Stars of Blood and Glory<\/strong>.\u00a0 The Hameji are an entirely spacefaring society that lives on the outer fringes of space, beyond any terraformed planets.\u00a0 Because they live entirely on spaceships, they must capture and repurpose new spaceships just to have enough living space to expand their families.\u00a0 Since their battleships also house their families, they make no distinction between military and civilian, and live by an extremely rigid social hierarchy with the patriarchal captain at the top and everyone else under his command.\u00a0 Life is a privilege, not a right, and disobedience is strictly punished since it has the potential to put everyone’s life at risk.<\/p>\n

As a result of all this, the Hameji are extremely vicious and warlike, living by a moral\/ethical code that runs completely counter to our modern sensibilities but makes perfect sense to them.\u00a0 They think nothing of slagging entire worlds and killing billions of people because to them, a world is a giant starship, and all those billions of people are so many enemy warriors.\u00a0 They look down at the planetborn as weak because of their lack of discipline and obedience, and think nothing of enslaving them due to their strict social hierarchy.\u00a0 In fact, because resources are limited and life is a privilege granted by the ship’s captain, the Hameji prefer to space their prisoners rather than keep them alive.<\/p>\n

Man, those books were fun to write. \ud83d\ude00 Brutal, but fun.\u00a0 Because the weird thing is, as much as you abhor a culture whose values contradict your own, when you really understand them, you can’t help but feel something of a connection.\u00a0 You might not love them, but you respect them, and in a strange sort of way sympathize with them.\u00a0 I’m not sure if that’s the experience with the Hameji that my readers have had, but that’s definitely been my experience in writing them.<\/p>\n

So yeah, I’m definitely a big fan of the proud warrior race.\u00a0 Expect to see me play with it many more times in the future.<\/p>\n

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