Another busy day where time got away from me. I will be glad when I no longer attend those three hour recovery meetings three times a week. That will give me back so much time. Also, I got my eyes dilated today, so reading and typing things is a bit difficult for me. Just typing this took about five minutes when ordinarily it would take less than one. Anyway, I just finished MAKE ROOM! MAKE ROOM! by Harry Harrison, the basis for the movie SOYLENT GREEN, so here is my Goodreads review. I should have something better for tomorrow night.
This was a fun read, and I'm glad 1999 didn't turn out the way Harrison expected. But it's still in the cards, especially now that Roe v Wade has been struck down by the Supreme Court. Andy Rusch is a cop in NYC, and his job is made worse by the economic situation of a city overstuffed with people. Murderers get away with their crimes everyday because the police don't have the resources to investigate them, but when a sleazy dude named Big Mike gets killed, all the politicians and mob bosses put pressure on Andy's boss to make sure he solves this one.
The thing I really liked, though, was Sol's speech near the end about how screwed the world is and how politicians use language to incite the mob to keep business as usual despite the fact that business as usual is atrociously horrible and changing it would make existence for everyone more tolerable. It's something we were probably suffering from back when Harrison wrote this, and it's certainly something we're dealing with now. It angers me that some politicians will defend the "lives" of unborn fetuses that are unwanted by their mothers. Not just because it will lead to the overpopulation Harrison describes, but mostly because it's a woman's right to decide what she does with her body. And yet those same politicians don't care about that fetus once it's born. By then it's just another welfare suck for them. The hypocrisy is practically blinding. The same goes for the reliance on fossil fuels. In the book, they're gone. We used it all up. We're on track to do that now, and what then? Just give up on cars, like in the book? It's really as simple as a politician's reliance on money from oil companies. They don't dare bite the hand that feeds. And the oil companies play it safe by paying ALL politicians. They don't care who wins, just so long as they paid for it. Therefore, because of this fear of not being reelected, these scumbags have doomed the rest of us and the future. I guess the oil companies haven't figured out how to monetize solar or wind power. Once they do, I'm sure we'll have a cleaner future, but they're still going to be horrible people who do things solely for the payday.
I'm getting off track. The big question on my mind while reading this is when do the suicide machines and Soylent Green come in? It turns out that they don't. An odd revelation, considering how famous that reveal is in the movie. And it does make sense that in an overpopulated world, the most reliable food source would be people. But that doesn't happen here. The book still comes to a satisfying ending, though, and for those who feel robbed by it, I would point out how low my opinion of bureaucracy is. Hint: It's lower than whale doo-doo.
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