[Young People Read Old SFF] The Menace from Earth by Robert A. Heinlein

[James Nicoll]

Young People Read Old SFF: The Menace from Earth by Robert A. Heinlein

http://youngpeoplereadoldsff.com/story/the-menace-from-earth

--
My reviews can be found at http://jamesdavisnicoll.com/
My Livejournal at http://www.livejournal.com/users/james_nicoll
My patreon is at https://www.patreon.com/jamesdnicoll

[Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)]

On 12/1/16 9:49 AM, James Nicoll wrote:
> Young People Read Old SFF: The Menace from Earth by Robert A. Heinlein
>
> http://youngpeoplereadoldsff.com/story/the-menace-from-earth
>

Interesting that three of the four readers had pretty positive
reactions and the fourth was practically spitting nails. (though I felt
the fourth was missing what, to me, were the screamingly large
not-even-really-hints-so-much-as-neon-signs that Holly WAS in love (or
at least tremendously crushing on) with Jeff, always had been, and just
didn't want to accept it because that might disrupt what she thought of
as a purely professional relationship).


--
Sea Wasp
/^\
;;;
Website: http://www.grandcentralarena.com Blog:
http://seawasp.livejournal.com

[William December Starr]

In article <o1pd9s$si1$1...@reader2.panix.com>,

jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) said:

> Young People Read Old SFF: The Menace from Earth by Robert A. Heinlein
>
> http://youngpeoplereadoldsff.com/story/the-menace-from-earth

...in which you said [URL links omitted*]:

> Of all the authors name-checked in the post that inspired this
> project, the one I figured would be least appealing to younger
> readers would be Robert A. Heinlein. He's one of the grand old
> men of the field: winner of multiple Hugos, architect of the
> Future History, over-user of the word "spung." He may have been
> a giant in his day, long long ago, but time has not been kind
> to his books. In fact, for a long time I intended to skip him
> entirely or offer my readers that least Heinlein-like of
> Heinlein stories, "The Man Who Travelled in Elephants." In the
> end I was convinced that perhaps "The Menace from Earth" might
> not have aged quite badly enough to irritate modern
> sensibilities. I am skeptical... but skipping Heinlein feels
> like cheating.

What about "The Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag"? As I
remember it (faintly) it didn't carry much of a "gender relations
in a past era as seen by a semi-pompous male author of the time"
stink. Or was it just too long for this project?

(By the way, "Menace" was where I encountered the word "insipid"
for the first time. For some reason I still remember that.)

-----------
*Yes, I know what the L in URL stands for. Now please be
quiet while I enter my PIN number into this ATM machine.

-- wds

[James Nicoll]

In article <o1s0gd$agl$1...@panix3.panix.com>,

William December Starr <wds...@panix.com> wrote:
>In article <o1pd9s$si1$1...@reader2.panix.com>,
>jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) said:
>
>> Young People Read Old SFF: The Menace from Earth by Robert A. Heinlein
>>
>> http://youngpeoplereadoldsff.com/story/the-menace-from-earth
>
>...in which you said [URL links omitted*]:
>
>> Of all the authors name-checked in the post that inspired this
>> project, the one I figured would be least appealing to younger
>> readers would be Robert A. Heinlein. He's one of the grand old
>> men of the field: winner of multiple Hugos, architect of the
>> Future History, over-user of the word "spung." He may have been
>> a giant in his day, long long ago, but time has not been kind
>> to his books. In fact, for a long time I intended to skip him
>> entirely or offer my readers that least Heinlein-like of
>> Heinlein stories, "The Man Who Travelled in Elephants." In the
>> end I was convinced that perhaps "The Menace from Earth" might
>> not have aged quite badly enough to irritate modern
>> sensibilities. I am skeptical... but skipping Heinlein feels
>> like cheating.
>
>What about "The Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag"? As I
>remember it (faintly) it didn't carry much of a "gender relations
>in a past era as seen by a semi-pompous male author of the time"
>stink. Or was it just too long for this project?
>

Actually, I somehow never thought of it.

[Quadibloc]

On Thursday, December 1, 2016 at 8:10:00 AM UTC-7, Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor) wrote:

> Interesting that three of the four readers had pretty positive
> reactions and the fourth was practically spitting nails. (though I felt
> the fourth was missing what, to me, were the screamingly large
> not-even-really-hints-so-much-as-neon-signs that Holly WAS in love (or
> at least tremendously crushing on) with Jeff, always had been, and just
> didn't want to accept it because that might disrupt what she thought of
> as a purely professional relationship).

I suppose that the apparent sexism in the story was so irritating that it
proved to be a distraction that blinded her to those hints though they may have
glowed like neon signs.

John Savard

[Ted Nolan <tednolan>]

In article <9f8c005a-a753-4888...@googlegroups.com>,

In other news, Young People Don't Read Old Literature..

http://www.kiro7.com/news/trending-now/virginia-schools-ban-to-kill-a-mockingbird-huckleberry-finn-for-racial-slurs/472065070
--
------
columbiaclosings.com
What's not in Columbia anymore..

[Lawrence Watt-Evans]

On 2 Dec 2016 09:29:33 -0500, wds...@panix.com (William December

Starr) wrote:

>In article <o1pd9s$si1$1...@reader2.panix.com>,
>jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) said:
>
>> Young People Read Old SFF: The Menace from Earth by Robert A. Heinlein
>>
>> http://youngpeoplereadoldsff.com/story/the-menace-from-earth
>
>...in which you said [URL links omitted*]:
>

>-----------
> *Yes, I know what the L in URL stands for. Now please be
> quiet while I enter my PIN number into this ATM machine.

The L stands for "Locator," not "link." Where's the problem?



--
My webpage is at http://www.watt-evans.com

[William December Starr]

In article <eadqj4...@mid.individual.net>,

t...@loft.tnolan.com (Ted Nolan <tednolan>) said:

> In other news, Young People Don't Read Old Literature..
>
> http://www.kiro7.com/news/trending-now/virginia-schools-ban-to-kill-a-mockingbird-huckleberry-finn-for-racial-slurs/472065070

1. The school district seems to have a hair-trigger on this sort of
thing -- as soon as *one* parent lodges a complaint, they ban first
and then ask questions. This doesn't seem to me to necessarily be
the best way of doing things, but I've never had to pilot a public
school district.

2. To my surprise, the complaining parent seems to *not* be a
hyper-sensitive nutjob:

The parent, whose son is biracial, said that her
concerns are "not even just a black and white thing."

"I keep hearing, 'This is a classic, This is a classic,'
... I understand this is a literature classic. But at
some point, I feel that children will not -- or do not
-- truly get the classic part -- the literature part,
which I'm not disputing," she said at a Nov. 15 school
board meeting. "This is great literature. But there (are
so many) racial slurs in there and offensive wording
that you can't get past that."

[...]

"So what are we teaching our children? We're validating
that these words are acceptable, and they are not
acceptable by (any) means," the parent said, also noting
psychological effects language has on children. "There
is other literature they can use."

I may not agree with her as to whether the harms that she suggests
will be done by not banning the books is great and prevalent enough
to justify a school ban on them, but at least she doesn't seem top
be one of those lunatards who try to get people fired for saying
"niggardly."

-- wds

[William December Starr]

In article <1bd34cpbb98fj6f5j...@reader80.eternal-september.org>,

Lawrence Watt-Evans <l...@sff.net> said:

> wds...@panix.com (William December Starr) wrote:
>
>> *Yes, I know what the L in URL stands for. Now please be
>> quiet while I enter my PIN number into this ATM machine.
>
> The L stands for "Locator," not "link." Where's the problem?

It does? Well, phooey.

-- wds

[David DeLaney]

On 2016-12-02, William December Starr <wds...@panix.com> wrote:
> -----------
> *Yes, I know what the L in URL stands for.

... "locator".

Dave
--
\/David DeLaney posting thru EarthLink - "It's not the pot that grows the flower
It's not the clock that slows the hour The definition's plain for anyone to see
Love is all it takes to make a family" - R&P. VISUALIZE HAPPYNET VRbeable<BLINK>
gatekeeper.vic.com/~dbd - net.legends FAQ & Magic / I WUV you in all CAPS! --K.

[Greg Goss]

wds...@panix.com (William December Starr) wrote:

>In article <1bd34cpbb98fj6f5j...@reader80.eternal-september.org>,
>Lawrence Watt-Evans <l...@sff.net> said:
>
>> wds...@panix.com (William December Starr) wrote:
>>
>>> *Yes, I know what the L in URL stands for. Now please be
>>> quiet while I enter my PIN number into this ATM machine.
>>
>> The L stands for "Locator," not "link." Where's the problem?
>
>It does? Well, phooey.

I vaguely recall two completely different acronyms. Both were
mentioned in a talk given by someone at a computer show before I got
onto the Web in early 1995. (I never used pre-web internet. I got my
usenet from a system that phone-shared rather than using internet, at
least in its early days. By 1995 they were probably using internet
but it was buried from us.)

Anyhow, at that talk she said that URL could stand for two almost
unrelated phrases. I think that they might have been "Uniform
Resource Locator" and "Universal [something] Link".

In the same speech, she also pointed out that "doubleyou doubleyou
doubleyou" has far more syllables than saying "world wide web dot" at
the start of a URL you're reading out.

Thinking back to what computer shows I attended, this must have been a
PCCFA. I don't remember what other computer shows were big enough to
have side-room seminars in 1993 or 1994. So the Mosaic demonstrations
must have been in September 1994 at a PCCFA.
--
We are geeks. Resistance is voltage over current.

[Quadibloc]

On Friday, December 2, 2016 at 5:12:17 PM UTC-7, William December Starr wrote:

> 1. The school district seems to have a hair-trigger on this sort of
> thing -- as soon as *one* parent lodges a complaint, they ban first
> and then ask questions. This doesn't seem to me to necessarily be
> the best way of doing things, but I've never had to pilot a public
> school district.

Presumably, if you're a low-level civil servant, your only hope to survive is
to stay out of controversy. Only those with power and position can afford to be
bold.

> 2. To my surprise, the complaining parent seems to *not* be a
> hyper-sensitive nutjob:

> "So what are we teaching our children? We're validating
> that these words are acceptable, and they are not
> acceptable by (any) means," the parent said, also noting
> psychological effects language has on children. "There
> is other literature they can use."

Well, I agree that schools should equip children for the world they actually
live in. And, right now, the world as it is includes black people and white
people with a lot of painful historical baggage. So it is very important for
children not to be confused about what language is acceptable.

And because children are not adults, they are less well equipped to cope with
and recognize subtleties in literature.

Thus, until the present emergency is over, perhaps controlling everything
children are exposed to that touches on issues of race to ensure it supports
the current official line on equality is a regrettable necessity.

But doing things that way will be... unnatural... for Americans. It is their
enemies that are used to such careful control of expression.

John Savard

[David DeLaney]

On 2016-12-04, Quadibloc <jsa...@ecn.ab.ca> wrote:
[...]

> Thus, until the present emergency is over,

... uh-HUH.

Dave, not taking the bate

[Quadibloc]

On Saturday, December 3, 2016 at 7:39:55 PM UTC-7, Greg Goss wrote:

> Anyhow, at that talk she said that URL could stand for two almost
> unrelated phrases. I think that they might have been "Uniform
> Resource Locator" and "Universal [something] Link".

I was pretty sure that URL had one *official* meaning, Uniform Resource Locator.

If it became Universal Reference Link or something like that afterwards, that
would be an accident that may have been propagated a few times... something
like getting the Nobel Prize for inventing the scroll lock key.

John Savard

[Quadibloc]

Ah, a bit of searching led me to Wikipedia.

The Uniform Resource Locator was defined in RFC 1738.

Its general form looks like...

http://andrewsmith:123...@www.somewhere.org:8080/uploads/page.htm?user=asmith#heading

where

http is a protocol
andrewsmith is a username
1234XYZ is a password
www.somewhere.org is a hostname
8080 is a port
uploads/page.htm is a path
user=asmith is a query, and
heading is a fragment

John Savard

[Quadibloc]

On Monday, December 5, 2016 at 1:23:56 AM UTC-7, Quadibloc wrote:

> If it became Universal Reference Link or something like that afterwards, that
> would be an accident that may have been propagated a few times...

Sadly, Google turns up a number of "definitions" of URL to just that phrase.

John Savard

[Scott Lurndal]

Greg Goss <go...@gossg.org> writes:
>wds...@panix.com (William December Starr) wrote:
>
>>In article <1bd34cpbb98fj6f5j...@reader80.eternal-september.org>,
>>Lawrence Watt-Evans <l...@sff.net> said:
>>
>>> wds...@panix.com (William December Starr) wrote:
>>>
>>>> *Yes, I know what the L in URL stands for. Now please be
>>>> quiet while I enter my PIN number into this ATM machine.
>>>
>>> The L stands for "Locator," not "link." Where's the problem?
>>
>>It does? Well, phooey.
>
>I vaguely recall two completely different acronyms. Both were
>mentioned in a talk given by someone at a computer show before I got
>onto the Web in early 1995. (I never used pre-web internet. I got my
>usenet from a system that phone-shared rather than using internet, at
>least in its early days. By 1995 they were probably using internet
>but it was buried from us.)

The _generic_ term is URI (Uniform Resource Identifier).

[Anthony Nance]

"Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)" <sea...@sgeinc.invalid.com> wrote:
> On 12/1/16 9:49 AM, James Nicoll wrote:
>> Young People Read Old SFF: The Menace from Earth by Robert A. Heinlein
>>
>> http://youngpeoplereadoldsff.com/story/the-menace-from-earth
>>
>
>
> Interesting that three of the four readers had pretty positive
> reactions and the fourth was practically spitting nails.

Without reading the rest of this thread, nor checking the URL,
I'm guessing the nail spitter is Mikayla. She's been pretty
consistently more negative and also a bit more visceral in
her reviews.[1]

Tony, who just checked the URL and should have said he wasn't sticking
his neck out too far with his guess
[1] Which I have zero problems with; just making the observation.

[Gene Wirchenko]

On Mon, 5 Dec 2016 15:55:14 -0000 (UTC), na...@math.ohio-state.edu
(Anthony Nance) wrote:

[snip]

>Without reading the rest of this thread, nor checking the URL,
>I'm guessing the nail spitter is Mikayla. She's been pretty
>consistently more negative and also a bit more visceral in
>her reviews.[1]
>
>Tony, who just checked the URL and should have said he wasn't sticking
> his neck out too far with his guess
>[1] Which I have zero problems with; just making the observation.

Hit.

I think she missed the point.

Sincerely,

Gene Wirchenko

[William December Starr]

In article <cpe1A.198717$HF2.1...@fx41.iad>,
sc...@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) said:

> Greg Goss <go...@gossg.org> writes:
>
>> I vaguely recall two completely different acronyms. Both were
>> mentioned in a talk given by someone at a computer show before I
>> got onto the Web in early 1995. (I never used pre-web internet.
>> I got my usenet from a system that phone-shared rather than using
>> internet, at least in its early days. By 1995 they were probably
>> using internet but it was buried from us.)
>
> The _generic_ term is URI (Uniform Resource Identifier).

Does anybody use it?

-- wds

[Kevrob]

Rhody the Ram?

Kevin R

[Richard Hershberger]

Even in my Heinlein-loving youth, I never got through that one.

Richard R. Hershberger

[Lawrence Watt-Evans]

Really? It's one of my favorites.

[Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)]

Same here. The Bird is Cruel!

That collection ( 6XH ) was a pretty good RAH anthology all around. It
also included The Man Who Traveled in Elephants.

[Quadibloc]

On Monday, December 5, 2016 at 6:59:40 AM UTC-7, Scott Lurndal wrote:

> The _generic_ term is URI (Uniform Resource Identifier).

Apparently, ftp://site.somewhere.com/directory/file.pdf is still an URL. Instead, an URI is distinguished from an URL by the fact that an URI can be missing pieces, so that you won't actually be able to find a document on the web knowing only its URI.

But the Wikipedia articles on the subject were sufficiently vague that I really couldn't figure out what the exact distinction was supposed to be, and I didn't quite feel up to trying to peruse the actual RFC in order to dig that out.

John Savard

[Dan Tilque]

David DeLaney wrote:
> On 2016-12-04, Quadibloc <jsa...@ecn.ab.ca> wrote:
> [...]
>> Thus, until the present emergency is over,
>
> ... uh-HUH.
>
> Dave, not taking the bate

But he's waiting with baited breath....

--
Dan Tilque

[Kevrob]

If you don't want baited breath, don't snack from the
chum bucket.


Kevin R

[Peter Trei]

I know you two are playing with the idiom, but this is one the most frequently
botch phrases online. It seems a lot people have no idea what 'bated breath'
means.

pt

[Dorothy J Heydt]

In article <42eae053-a004-4587...@googlegroups.com>,

And it will do no good to tell them it's a truncated form of
"abated," meaning "lessened."

--
Dorothy J. Heydt
Vallejo, California
djheydt at gmail dot com

[Juho Julkunen]

In article <o25dmc$d3v$1...@panix3.panix.com>, wds...@panix.com says...

In technical literature, yes.

--
Juho Julkunen

[Ted Nolan <tednolan>]

In article <MPG.32b25596a...@news.kolumbus.fi>,

All URLs are URIs, but not all URIs are URLs iirc.

[Kevrob]

On Wednesday, December 7, 2016 at 9:15:03 AM UTC-5, Dorothy J Heydt wrote:
> In article <42eae053-a004-4587...@googlegroups.com>,
> Peter Trei <pete...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >On Wednesday, December 7, 2016 at 2:34:59 AM UTC-5, Kevrob wrote:
> >> On Tuesday, December 6, 2016 at 8:57:43 PM UTC-5, Dan Tilque wrote:
> >> > David DeLaney wrote:
> >> > > On 2016-12-04, Quadibloc <jsa...@ecn.ab.ca> wrote:
> >> > > [...]
> >> > >> Thus, until the present emergency is over,
> >> > >
> >> > > ... uh-HUH.
> >> > >
> >> > > Dave, not taking the bate
> >> >
> >> > But he's waiting with baited breath....
> >> >
> >>
> >> If you don't want baited breath, don't snack from the
> >> chum bucket.
> >>
> >>
> >> Kevin R
> >
> >I know you two are playing with the idiom, but this is one the most frequently
> >botch phrases

If Dan had typed "bated breath," I wouldn't have been able
to crack wise.

Meanwhile, your "botch" is missing an -ed ending. Now, how will
Skitt’s Law kick me in the grammatical fundament?

> online. It seems a lot people have no idea what 'bated breath'
> >means.
>
> And it will do no good to tell them it's a truncated form of
> "abated," meaning "lessened."
>

"Bated" lead to a whole `nother series of jokes, dealing
with self-gratification.

Kevin R

[Greg Goss]

Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com> wrote:

>On Wednesday, December 7, 2016 at 9:15:03 AM UTC-5, Dorothy J Heydt wrote:
>> online. It seems a lot people have no idea what 'bated breath'
>> >means.

Don't hold your breath waiting for them to figure it out.

>> And it will do no good to tell them it's a truncated form of
>> "abated," meaning "lessened."
>>
>
>"Bated" lead to a whole `nother series of jokes, dealing
>with self-gratification.

Nothing to do with famous horror films? (He bates, they bated)

[Gene Wirchenko]

On 7 Dec 2016 15:52:18 GMT, t...@loft.tnolan.com (Ted Nolan <tednolan>)
wrote:

>In article <MPG.32b25596a...@news.kolumbus.fi>,
>Juho Julkunen <giao...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>>In article <o25dmc$d3v$1...@panix3.panix.com>, wds...@panix.com says...
>>>
>>> In article <cpe1A.198717$HF2.1...@fx41.iad>,
>>> sc...@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) said:
>>
>>> > The _generic_ term is URI (Uniform Resource Identifier).
>>>
>>> Does anybody use it?
>>
>>In technical literature, yes.
>>
>
>All URLs are URIs, but not all URIs are URLs iirc.

So I heard, too, but please give an example of a URI that is not
a URL, because I sure do not know.

Sincerely,

Gene Wirchenko

[Juho Julkunen]

In article <g1fh4cljt17l4qpqf...@4ax.com>,
ge...@telus.net says...

urn:isbn:0-486-27557-4

The most notable non-URL URIs used to be URNs (Uniform Resource Name),
which identify an object rather than its location (an URL can of course
do both), but apparently the term URN is now deprecated in favour of
just using URI.

--
Juho Julkunen

[Default User]

On Tuesday, December 6, 2016 at 11:28:22 AM UTC-6, Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor) wrote:
> On 12/6/16 11:22 AM, Lawrence Watt-Evans wrote:
> > On Tue, 6 Dec 2016 06:53:40 -0800 (PST), Richard Hershberger
> > <rrh...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> On Friday, December 2, 2016 at 12:33:38 PM UTC-5, James Nicoll wrote:
> >>> In article <o1s0gd$agl$1...@panix3.panix.com>,
> >>> William December Starr <wds...@panix.com> wrote:

> >>>> What about "The Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag"? As I
> >>>> remember it (faintly) it didn't carry much of a "gender relations
> >>>> in a past era as seen by a semi-pompous male author of the time"
> >>>> stink. Or was it just too long for this project?
> >>>>
> >>> Actually, I somehow never thought of it.
> >>
> >> Even in my Heinlein-loving youth, I never got through that one.
> >
> > Really? It's one of my favorites.
> >
>
>
> Same here. The Bird is Cruel!

I also enjoyed that story. I would have been happy to read some stories (even non-SF) of the adventures of Randall & Craig, PIs. Had the story turned out differently, there could have been a series of stories that would fit well with the current interest in paranormal investigators.

Brian

[Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)]

I'm pretty sure that Unpleasant Profession was one of Dean Koontz'
inspirations for his novel _The Bad Place_.

[Gene Wirchenko]

On Thu, 8 Dec 2016 05:09:08 +0200, Juho Julkunen
<giao...@hotmail.com> wrote:

>In article <g1fh4cljt17l4qpqf...@4ax.com>,
>ge...@telus.net says...
>>
>> On 7 Dec 2016 15:52:18 GMT, t...@loft.tnolan.com (Ted Nolan <tednolan>)
>> wrote:

[snip]

>> >All URLs are URIs, but not all URIs are URLs iirc.
>>
>> So I heard, too, but please give an example of a URI that is not
>> a URL, because I sure do not know.
>
>urn:isbn:0-486-27557-4
>
>The most notable non-URL URIs used to be URNs (Uniform Resource Name),
>which identify an object rather than its location (an URL can of course
>do both), but apparently the term URN is now deprecated in favour of
>just using URI.

Well, that makes sense. Thank you. It sure would have been
helpful to have examples instead of just the bare statement when I was
told it.

Sincerely,

Gene Wirchenko

[Default User]

I haven't read that, but I looked over the Wikipedia entry. I can see some similarities.

Brian