i mean iain banks managed https://twitter.com/Polygon/status/1317087551048568832

i think that ursula le guin managed in the disposessed. there's a really interesting radical society in eye of the heron too

those are dystopias! they are dystopian fiction! we did a comparison and contrast of 1984 and BNW when i was in school at 14 this is so fucking basic

defending utopia from outside threats, the ethics of expanding the utopia and that relationship to colonialism, interpersonal drama or slice of life, finding meaning without the conflicts of capitalism and war, meeting non-utopian cultures https://twitter.com/OtterSeaborne/status/1317678325389619201?s=19

dealing with a collapse of the structures that make the utopia work, outbreaks of kinds of thought that would destabilize the utopia if allowed unchecked but which would be inhumane to stamp out

dealing with a strange magical object that appears to be from a higher level of being appearing on the edge of known space and spending a bunch of time having an in-group of super smart artificial intelligences all have to figure out how to deal with it,

also i think you could make a strong argument for many civilization building or city building games being utopian games, or at least having a utopian play style

so much of simulation games are about slowly eliminating all the negative aspects of being a human living in that town and trying to maximize health and happiness

cities:skylines is a pretty utopian game! it's a very white european kind of utopia but it still offers this idea of creating a perfect city. and simcity is even more so, and more simply so, you can just slowly eliminate all waste and pollution over time

you can play it different ways but the old simcity games were clearly pushing you toward making totally green cities full of arcologies with green space and no crime

people keep saying star trek but i think that's only really a utopia in theory tbh. not in a brave new world way, in a "the writers did not think this through" way. it feels weird to describe something so colonialist and war-focused as "utopian"

anyway i don't think that essay is very good. i think the part about the kim stanley robinson new york book is interesting because i think that book does some interesting stuff with pulling together in crisis communally

but the stuff about dystopias that look nice are incredibly trite and freshman honors english level observations, and it doesn't really talk about actual utopian fiction

also too like the lightning is right there if you want to explore another interesting utopian angle (one built on shaky foundation facing its dissolution)

for the culture series i think the best intro is player of games. trigger warnings for sexual violence including against children, slavery, debilitating relationships with drugs. https://twitter.com/cholent_lover/status/1317694651298680833?s=19

i like player of games side by side with disposessed, which i would tw with sexual violence mainly, since they're both about the same basic concept-- utopian person on diplomatic mission to analogue of the united states. but they play out very differently

if you would rather hear long arguments between AIs, go for Excession (tw sexual assault among aliens). if you are interested in digital afterlives, go for Surface Detail (tw: slavery, rape). also the Hydrogen Sonata is great but i don't know how to describe it