Hello, friends! Welcome to this month’s meeting of the Insecure Writer’s Support Group, a blog hop created by Alex J. Cavanaugh and co-hosted this month by Diedre Knight, Lisa Buie Collard, Kim Lajevardi, and JQ Rose. Are you a writer? Do you feel insecure? Then this is the support group for you! Click here to learn more!
So this blog post is scheduled to come out the day after the U.S. Presidential Election; however, I am writing this a few days before the election. Therefore, the me who is writing this post does not yet know what the outcome of the election will be. Perhaps, when this post comes out, we still won’t know what the election results will be. It’s hard for me to guess what might happen, here in the past.
But I do know one thing. I know that, whatever the outcome of the election happens to be, a whole lot of people will be real happy about it, and a whole lot of other people will be real mad. I know I personally will be either really happy or really mad, depending on who wins this one. But it’s important to remember that elections are not the only things that matter in a democratic society. There are other ways to express your beliefs and advocate for causes you care about.
Which brings me, finally, to the real topic of today’s blog post: writing. I’m a science communicator and science fiction writer. I write about space, science, and the future of humanity. I believe in a future where we don’t destroy ourselves through nuclear war or climate change. I believe in a future where we come together as a species and where we go on to become explorers of the cosmos. In other words, I believe in the Star Trek future.
Sometimes, my writing gets a little preachy. Sometimes I want to get preachy in my writing. And sometimes I don’t. But even when I’m not deliberately trying to make some sort of moral or political statement, my beliefs and values still come through in everything I write. You can’t be a writer and not have your beliefs and values creep into your work somehow.
So if you’re a writer and if you have strong feelings (positive or negative) about whatever just happened in the U.S. Presidential election, my advice to you is this: go write. It doesn’t have to be overtly political writing. Write whatever makes you happy. Write whatever you’re passionate about writing. Just write. Your words matter more than you know. Your words can help people understand your point of view. Your words may change somebody’s mind. Your words can make the world a better place. So go write, keep writing, and make a difference.
P.S.: Oh no, I just wrote a blog post about politics and scheduled it for the day after a Presidential election. Okay, everybody, please try to be kind in the comments below. At the very least, try to be respectful. If you want to get into a fight with somebody about politics, there are plenty of other places on the Internet where you can go do that.
i-love-space.com 
The IWSG is a safe haven, so hopefully no one gets unruly today.
That was always the appeal of Star Trek. We’d finally come together as a people. Another reason I liked the first two series of Stargate – everyone worked together.
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Yes, I hope people can take this in the spirit that I intended. Whatever people’s political leanings are, and however they feel about the election results today, if you’re a writer, your writing matters, and your writing can help make a difference.
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As a Whovian and a Trekkie, I want a future of science and peace and the Daleks/Borg not to win. I’m not sure how to feel today. Yes, write–and create. I’m going to spend the day painting. It helps.
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Painting is good. I haven’t done a lot of writing since writing this post, as it turns out, but art has been very good for me lately.
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Definitely you can’t write without revealing yourself. But if we’re not willing to do that, why are we writing in the first place? Just go write. Good advice!
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Ancient alleged rule of conversation, re-examined by Lancaster university, UK, No sex, religion, politics. Add money, food, health. First document quoted ? Chicago Tribune, 1998. Invited to a firepit party by U.S. neighbours* recently no politics, surely? Rule broken immediately, by our hosts, not by timid Brits. Great evening
*quite a few, in our small village.
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I’ve been in a lot of situations lately where we weren’t supposed to talk politics, and yet it just keeps coming up. The election cast a very long shadow, it seems.
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I will admit I enjoy science fiction that’s a bit more pessimistic. Humanity just seems to be spiraling toward our own self-annihilation, so it’s fun (?) to see how writers imagine it’s going to come about.
I do enjoy Star Trek, but it’s one of the least believable universes out there. I just can’t imagine humanity coming together in such a peaceful and productive way.
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I get it. There was a book I read a while back that went even more utopian than Star Trek, and it totally broke my suspension of disbelief. Where we draw the line between a believable and not believable future is subjective.
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I’ve long been an advocate for robust discourse. The problem is robust discourse is no more, now there’s mud-slinging, pointy fingers and the like. Or it may be down to my mental health being unable to handle the polarization of viewpoints and their rabid defence. Either way, a utopian universe involving space travel can be a soothing experience – if only when inhabited via the pages of a book.
Take care & stay safe James.
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Thanks, friend. I’m doing my best.
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I also believe in a Star Trek future. There are so any people out there, science fiction writers included, who think that kind of a future is naive and unrealistic. But I believe that we need the ideal in order to survive as a society regardless whether that ideal is reached or not. But I do, personally, believe a Star Trek future can be achieved.
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I think there’s a place for both utopian and dystopian fiction. Star Trek offers us something to strive for (and I agree, I do think it is an achievable future). But we also need things like 1984 or Fahrenheit 451 as warnings of what could go wrong if we’re not careful.
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I totally agree about the warning stories. In fact, I try to make my sci fi horror stories those kinds of warnings.
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