The Mind Parasites Q5 - Bias and diversity

RichardAbbott

Almost all of Colin Wilson's "adepts" are male Europeans or Americans. The only woman in the first group was killed (along with a whole bunch of men) when the parasites first counterattacked, and women were hugely in the minority in the second lot who disappeared mysteriously (but apparently positively) at the end. I can't recall any African or Asian adepts, let alone minority indigenous groups. Did you get the impression this was deliberate or unconscious?

Apocryphal

I didn’t really think about it at the time. When I started reading the novel I was thinking we were in the pulp era, maybe 1920-30, so that wouldn’t have been all that unusual for all these academic adventurers to be white men. Later on, I lost track of the characters, so I didn’t really note anything about them.

But given the whole sci-fi nature of the world, what with all the fast rockets and so forth, perhaps one should expect more diversity.

Was it intentional? Quite possibly, yes. But as this is my first exposure to this author I’d hate to guess.

NeilNjae

I put it down to laziness and unchallenged unconscious bias. Wilson didn't need to move outside his comfortable little echo chamber, so didn't. And his readers were similarly cloistered, so didn't complain.

And to bring out a point: the parasites were only defeated by the application of the highest forms of Western scientific thought.

RichardAbbott

I tend to agree with laziness, and all the more surprising as in subsequent writing he became interested in much more overt occult and mystical practice, which (one would have thought) would have exposed him to much more diversity than just a Euro-US position.

BarnerCobblewood

This bigoted aspect is (sadly) extremely like Lovecraft, and it is not credible to attribute it to laziness. If Wilson was lazy, how would he have written so many books? This is particularly true at the time Wilson was writing - 1967. C'mon. There's no need to excuse the reactionary and contemptuous ignorance of people on display in this book.

Readers who enter such conspiratorial, to be blunt simple-minded, world-systems encounter less and less actual diversity, while considering themselves more and more worldly-wise and knowledgeable. It's sad really.

NeilNjae

I was meaning intellectual laziness and lack of curiosity, not a comment on Wilson's work ethic in his narrow interest. It never occurred to him to attempt to move outside his bubble. And I agree that we should call out this insularity and the effects it has.

I think we can see similar processes play out with radicalization. I think of how sensible people get seduced by right wing ideology, like Rowling with anti -trans rights.

clash_bowley

How can you have diversity when the only people who can DO anything are extremely well educated white males? Oh, and a woman who was fridged. The entire nation/continent of Africa was taken over in a day and a half by a mind parasite infected flunky who exploited the seething mass of hatred that is all Africans. Really.