Resist: Tales from a Future Worth Fighting Against

FOREWORD

THE FUTURE IS unknown, which is both exciting and terrifying. It is a place for dreamers and worriers to project their hopes and fears. Science fiction as a literary genre has a long history of filling readers’ minds with wondrous possibilities but also dire predictions. Utopias and dystopias. Flying cars and murderous robots.

And while every generation makes the mistake of thinking their time is special, there is some truth in this egoistic view—for all times are special in equal amounts. The recent past is always worth exploring, the present is always full of miraculous advancements, and the future always holds both promise and danger. This is most evident when it feels as if the past is repeating itself.

This anthology has been collected in just such times. There are echoes today of the same nationalism, protectionism, and xenophobia that led to last century’s world wars. Icons of heinous civil wars are being torn down, and those same acts are being protested by those who think our ugliest times were our best times. There are world leaders today whose rhetoric reminds us of speeches we thought we would never tolerate again.

It’s common enough to wonder how we might have responded had we lived in different times. Would we stand up for the rights of others and risk our privilege? Would we be brave enough to speak truth to power if we were in an unprotected minority? It’s easy to be brave after the fact; how would we respond in the moment?

This feels like one of those moments. But the truth is that if you look hard enough, these moments never go away. There is always something good worth fighting for and something bad worth resisting. The unknown future is created by the choices we make today. The warnings and promise of George Orwell’s 1984 and Arthur C. Clark’s 2001: A Space Odyssey get everything right except the dates. Margaret Atwood was clever to avoid that mistake, and there’s a reason her Handmaid’s Tale is back with a vengeance. These stories should never date themselves. We should always be wary of and joyful for the future in equal measure.

The undeniable and unbelievable truth is that the future is always better than the past. We do make progress. But the world only gets better because we fight for it. We fight by voting, marching, volunteering, donating, parenting, mentoring, and yes sometimes even Tweeting. And for some of us, the thing we do best is to write entertaining warnings, to draw readers in with stories and characters that capture the imagination while liberating the spirit. That’s what we, the editors, hope to accomplish with this anthology. It comes from a wide variety of voices, but they sing in chorus. They sing about a future that might be dire, but that we believe we are collectively amazing enough to avoid. It is a future that entertains, but is worth fighting against. We hope you enjoy. And we hope to see you all soon in a very different future.