Scary thought I had today....

[conuly]

In popular sci-fi, humans are often the driving force behind the universe. Monsters and supernatural beings that have destroyed hundreds of sentient species will realize that they're "rather attached to those strange humans". Humans will repeatedly conquer invincible foes, and triumph against insurmountable odds. Often, you see otherwise intelligent people reverting to saying "as the humans say" to express a concept instead of "as the bariaga say" or even using a term from their own culture. The Q put the Enterprise on trial for "humanity's crimes" even when many people on the ship weren't human - nobody else mattered.

In short, humans are the marysues of the universe.

Just kill me now.

Comments

Re: *pimp hat*

[azarias.livejournal.com]

Go ahead and add any Cherryh s.f. written before the mid 1990s. I find her fantasy generally weak, and her newer s.f. has that "written for profit" quality of recycled themes and so-so writing (though her so-so writing is also better than most of what's on the market). Her earlier s.f. that I've read so far is uniformly grand.

The Pride has sequels, but the novel is complete whether you read them or not; it's also tangentially related to her Alliance/Union novels, if you want to find out just what the humans are up to in their own space. The characters in The Pride (even the human, really) don't know what's going on there, either, and don't care much, so it's fine if you don't.