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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 5116744" data-attributes="member: 4937">It isn't just a feasibility standpoint either.  Generally in science-fiction set in a galactic mileu with many races, humans are represented as monocultural as well.  Part of that is from the standpoint of feasibility, but part of that is simple literary device to contrast the human position from a non-human position in a clear manner.And note that this isn't a judgemental position necessarily either.  You don't necessarily need to be claiming that the human position is inferior or superior to the non-human one.  They are just different.To be completely open with what makes me uncomfortable in this discussion it is the assumption by some that in order to show respect for 'The Other' you have to make them exactly the same as yourself.  In other words, if I show humans as being multi-cultural or otherwise diverse, and I show some other race as not being multi-cutural and relatively undiverse, some are suggesting that this is disrespectful to 'The Other'.  Quite bluntly, I consider the reverse to be true.  If the only way you can only treat 'The Other' respectfully is to imagine that on every substantive point, humans and non-humans must be the same, then really you are completely uncomfortable with the idea of the 'The Other' entirely.  The fact is 'The Other' is alien by definition.  If you feel compelled to write away any feature that would actually make an alien different, then you are engaging not only in a dangerous willful blindness but lack any capacity to empathize with 'The Other' in the first place.  Both are to me very dangerous, and speaking as a computer programmer with interests in ethical AI, I find both assumptions to be both appalling and horribly dangerous.So, I find an imagined setting where the aliens within it share and do not share various important features with humanity to be one that is much more mature, sophisticated, and compelling than one where everything - regardless of biology - shares all the fundamental characteristics of humanity.  That the 'alien' is nothing more than a human in a different shape is insulting.</blockquote>

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