Thread on cyberpunk, because I'm tired

Cyberpunk was at first a way for authors to gather a fandom that was totally lost in scifi and the way scifi became "apolitical" (Fredric Jameson). It also rose in the 80s for a reason, bc authors feared the advent of the internet (1/N)

the promises of virtual reality and data collections. It IS by essence political, because it was meant to be. But also, there's a bigger fear, which permeates in Neuromancer already (and even in Stephenson's work) : fetichism towards asian culture. (2/N)

It's BLATANT even in postcyberpunk, because authors (that were white straight males) didn't account for this fetishism before writing. They thought it would be a great thing to show the asian soft power that could even swallow western culture, but in the end it's - (3/N)

- just fetishisation in the sense that it is anchored in white saviorism in the end (Greta Aiyu Niu, Techno-Orientalism, Nanotechnology, Post-Humans and Post-Posthumans in Neal Stephenson’s and Linda Nagata’s SF, Oxford University Press, MELUS, vol 33 no.4, 2008, p. 78,) (4/N)

So, as it is political, the reader should feel empowered by that. As it should be "punk", there is the promise that future doesn't exist anymore because the world is in a state of stasis, due to how security and prevention has grown in every institution. (5/N)

Then, Cyberpunk should be a testimony of our present, the events we are living RIGHT NOW. It is mandatory to write cyberpunk that is in the wake of everything that has happened withing 2 decades. It should've been like that with the postcyberpunk movement - (6/N)

in the 90s but it remained blandly normal, with the same patriarchal, straight and white schemes that we are all used to see in the media. If for instance you read Stephenson's The Diamond Age, you can see how the promise of having a less pessimistic vision of the future - (7/N)

is tied to white saviorism (Nell, a woman (which at first seems a great idea)) saves asian women who can't think for themselves because they have been educated by an asian technology, which is just a defective copy of the western's) (8/N)

Capitalism has a great power, which is it can turn something anti-capitalistic into something valuable on the market, because as there is an audience, there is money to make. So, let's make cyberpunk and keep the tropes that worked so well in the 80s-90s ! (9/N)

No one seems to question that in the mainstream because, spoilers, it IS mainstream. So it takes no risks, it's meant to appeal to a big audience. 20*7 was about that from the start, so it was a red flage from the beginning (even if we could've had hopes I guess ?) (10/N)

20*7 takes all its inspiration from Neuromancer (the main city's name is even the same, and some gangs are identical except from their names). Neuromancer tells the story of how sex and drugs would be like in the future, through the lens of someone who didn't - (11/N)

go as far as questioning norms. In fact it's just straight vanilla sex without any form of fluidity, with an archetypal junkie character BUT IN A NEW HYPERTECHNOLOGICAL CONTEXT ! (12/N)

20*7 is fully inspired by that, and the worst thing is : it didn't actualized this vision, in the wake of all that happened since the 80s. It could've, but it didn't. (13/N)

So, if you hate 20*7 but you love cyberpunk, what should you do ?
If you'd like a non-western vision, watch Psycho Pass, it's really good and raises a lot of interesting questions (but TW : blood and gore) (14/N)

If you'd like a LGBT vision, read Infinite Details by Tim Maughan, and play The Red Strings Club.
If you'd like a middle-eastern vision, read @doctorow's short story called Unauthorized Bread (15/N)

Don't forget that cyberpunk HAS to come from marginalized communities, because it's the only way to actualize its tropes. Cyberpunk should tell our stories and be the product of our fears, after all we are the ones who suffer the most from the anxiety of having no future. (16/16)