NationStates Jolt Archive


Inequity

09-04-2003, 06:48
|SPOILER INSIDE|

I was wondering if anyone else thought this was funny.
JG as a peice of speculative fiction is so fresh and paints a socioty like ive never seen anywhere before. Sure books like Neuromancer had massive vapid consumer cultures, but it was all background noise to the main part of the book which was a lot of gritty angsty posing. Its really a great peice of speculation, and this speach in particualr

Ive given you a world without Government interference. There is now no advertising campaign, no intercompany deal, no promotion, no action you cant take. You want to pay kids to get the swoosh tattooed on their foreheads? Who's going to stop you? You want to make computers that need repair after three months? Whos going to stop you? You wnt to reward consumers who complain about your competitors in the media? You want to pay them for recruiting their little brothers and sisters to your brand of cigarettes? You want the NRA to help you eliminate your competition? Then do it. Just do it.
-John Nike on why he abolished the government

made me just want to stand up and shout YEEEHAWW! I couldnt beleive i just read it, it was so much like the exact kind of thing i would describe as entertaining to me.

I was just wondering if anyone else went from these same dizzying hights, to the almost snorting giggling lows of reading about Jennifer Government herself. Not that she is a boring character, just the oppocite really, i loved the caracter... like when i saw her in Dirty Harry... and oh yeah, every other formulaic rouge cop movie ever devised in the history of man. The great speculation definatly saves the book, but i almost began to wonder if the character of Jennifer was supposed to be a joke more subtle still than that whole double x thing he did with suryp. I mean, sure she has the whole single mom thing going, but all those sequences are direct rips from existing twists on rouge cop movies, as well as several super hero commic books. It just seemed innordinatly odd to see something so formulaic and done set against something i thought was so fresh and exciting.

also, hehe, did anyone else titter like a little girl when they read one of Billy NRA's allegedly Texan co-workers say "Good on ya" to Billy?
09-04-2003, 08:08
i was cruizing around the book website and saw there is a review by Naomi Klien.

If you liked the nightmareish satiric future portrayed in JG then pick up her book NoLogo (wich actualy has a pretty slick logo) and find out how you can enjoy all that shock and moralistic outrage right in your very own world.

In case anyone saw my name and thought "Great god what books on the negative impacts of global corporations can he suggest for me!?" the answer would probably have to be NOLOGO...

of course then after reading JG and nologo you should probably pick up a coppy of Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand... i bet the mental wiplash will give you an anurism.
05-05-2003, 09:54
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i was cruizing around the book website and saw there is a review by Naomi Klien.

If you liked the nightmareish satiric future portrayed in JG then pick up her book NoLogo (wich actualy has a pretty slick logo) and find out how you can enjoy all that shock and moralistic outrage right in your very
15-05-2003, 17:29
I cannot compare Barry to Gibson and Sterling. However, this is the first cyberpunk novel I read that gives the story from the point of view of members of the establishment. Gibson's main characters are almost always people on the fringes of the cyberpunk society.