I have to say, after reading "Blood Child," I was a little weirded out; I guess that's what is supposed to happen since science fiction is about experiencing new ideas. To be fair, I did not even consider most of the ideas until reading the afterword, but once I did read it, everything began to click.
I started to see the piece as a critique of gender roles and how the gender roles that we have now are all circumstantial, and the short story does a good job of showing both sides of the argument. For example, the scene of implantation portrays the jobs of women and men in society. On one hand, a woman, such as Hoa, is "expected to carry other lives inside of her" (Butler 26). On the other hand, the men also end up pregnant with the worms. This shows that in pieces of science fiction, we can explore what it is like to have different gender roles without many outside consequences.
I also love how "Blood Child" describes that ideas are implanted (no pun intended) in our minds as children. For instance, Gan states, "Shown when we're young kids, and shown more than once" (Butler 29). The quote illustrates that our perceptions are based on what we learn as kids; if we learn that gender roles are different (when we are young), then we will see the world differently. Wouldn't that be strange to imagine? Males as females and females as males? I at least think it's interesting--let me know if you do too.
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Farhan Khan
2 comments:
Hey Farhan, I like the way how you see this story as a guideline to understanding different gender roles, and your mention of perceptions growing from young age. Your quotations were very appropriate and it was something that I couldn't catch while I was reading this story. It is totally agreeable and I think you set an original perpective to grasp the implications of the series of grotesque events happening in this story.
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