The Oxford Book of Science Fiction Stories - Entry #9

The Piper's Son, by Lewis Padgett

                                  There are lots of reasons to appreciate Lewis Padgett’s (actually wife - husband team, C.L. Moore & Harold Kuttner) The Piper’s Son: telepathy from mutation, post-nuclear social reimagining, a hint of social anarchy, along with the three big themes it is tackling -- racism, mental health, and ethics. It is in these three themes that The Piper’s Son fails to engage with me as it might have when it was published in 1945. First racism; the authors use human fear of the “Baldies” (the telepaths marked by their total lack of hair ... a common enough trope when it comes to the telapthic in Sci-Fi) to examine racism, and they put the responsibility for overcoming the views of the ignorant squarely in the camp of the victims of racism, who are, and this is where things go from merely problematic to troublesome, the “Baldies” trying to assimilate, while the “Baldies” and “Freaks” who can’t function are merely cast aside without thought or care by anyone, and the supposed paranoid “Baldies” are seen as the root of ignorant fear and are actively and violently excised from the body politic. Second, mental health; the paranoics or dps (those with the old designation, dementia praecox) are cast away, seen as evil, seen as predators, and handled by their mentally healthy brethren with daggers and murder. What is most troubling about this is that the authors don’t seem to be making the connection between this fearful and ignorant behaviour and the racist behaviour of humans towards mainstream “Baldies.” If that connection was implied, it might enrich the story, but their failure diminishes the tale. Third, ethics; this is where the story gave me the most trouble. It seems to want to discuss ethics throughout, to makes us believe that Burkhalter is an ethical man, but when he engages in one form of behaviour, which sets up the baseline of his ethics, then casts his own impediments aside to engage in that very behaviour on his son because he is his son ... well, that troubles me. Perhaps they are making a comment on situational ethics, but if they are, their attempt is ham fisted at best. It is a fascinating story, however, and its undeniable connection to the superheroic makes it worth a look.