Science Fiction

The Luddite is suspicious of Science Fiction in general and wants this made clear in advance. Star Trek for example is set in “the future”, a wholly improbable place where fierce alien races fear octogenarians in velour jumpers and being bald is no barrier to success. Homer Simpson for one knows this is untrue and centuries of progress are far more likely to bring a decent hair restorer than an acceptance of male pattern baldness. In the same vein with the current increase in obesity, fat people seem poorly represented in this utopian future with sliding doors that go ‘whoosh’.
Star Wars is equally questionable, despite being set a ‘long time ago’ in a galaxy ‘far far away’. It may start well, and any galaxy where small cuddly bears armed only with nets and stones can bring down a race of highly trained laser equipped crack storm troopers is a clear endorsement of Luddism. However The Luddite holds no truck with notions of ‘the force’ which is way too close to Russell Grant and Uri Geller territory, one minute you’re bending spoons, the next your lifting X-Wing fighters from a swamp in the Dagoba system. It’s not big or clever, and Alec Guinness should have known better.
The Luddite is, however, a sucker for 1970’s Dr. Who, despite having access to time travel and the unflinching belief that a police box looks inconspicuous throughout the universe, the Doctor is a prize luddite. He neither trusts nor understands technology and continually makes vague references to Neutron flows and force fields which he clearly knows nothing about. For every televised adventure where he gets it right, a hundred others show him blowing the whole place sky high and strolling away whistling. He is, much like the Luddite, a man out of time, and never better embodied than by Pertwee and Baker. He hates progress, and abhors posh weaponry and plans of galactic domination which he foils with a cheeky grin, a bag of jelly babies and in some cases ancient Venusian lullabys, fantastic.