Sunday, March 9, 2008

What?!? Orson Scott Card is a Homophobe?


I've been reading some Orson Scott Card books lately. I just finished Ender's Game and Speaker for the Dead. I loved them both! Deep, full of politics, technology, Nostradamal predictions, and character. And I just started on Xenocide, which has started off a little slow for me.

So I find out today (totally randomly on one of Leo Laporte's gaxillion podcasts), that Orson Scott Card is an outspoken homophobe. I had no idea! Apparently this was old news back in 2000, as you can see in this article by Salon.com. You've got to ask, how can someone genius enough to write Ender's Game and Speaker for the Dead be homophobic?

Well, part of me wants to stop reading Card's Ender series, but I'll probably finish Xenocide anyway, since I bought it. I definitely am disappointed and disillusioned, and probably won't enjoy the book as much. And I don't know if I'll buy any more of his books. Damn, I just loved the series. Hopefully, Card will educate himself and change his views. What a contrast to a writer like Joe Haldeman, who wrote The Forever War. Writers, especially writers who write about an imagined future, have a responsibility to include homosexual people and tolerance in their vision of the future.

1 comment:

UtesFan89 said...

Thanks for the comment.
It might seem like a stupid question, but is The Forever War any good?