¶ … Lunatics and Social Injustice Central passage:

"So it's the most powerful substance in the world," Solly said. "But why us? Why are we here?"

"You don't know?" Jakob said.

"They blanked us, remember? All that's gone."

But because of Jakob, they knew what was up there: the domed palaces on the lunar surface, the fantastic luxuries of Earth… when he spoke of it, in fact, a lot of Earth came back to them, and they babbled and chattered at the unexpected upwellings. Memories that deep couldn't be blanked without killing, Jakob said. And so they prevailed after all, in a way.

But there was much that had been burnt forever. And so Jakob sighed. "Yeah, I remember. I just thought -- well. We're here for different reasons. Some were criminals. Some complained."

"Like Hester!" They laughed.

"Yeah, I suppose that's what got her here. But a lot of us were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Wrong politics or skin or whatever. Wrong look on your face."

"That was me, I bet," Solly said, and the others laughed at him. "Well I got a funny face, I know I do! I can feel it."

Jakob was silent for a long time. "What about you?" Oliver asked. More silence. The rumble of a distant detonation, like muted thunder.

"I wish I...

But I'm like you in that. I don't remember the actual arrest. They must have hit me on the head. Given me a concussion. I must have said something against the mines, I guess. And the wrong people heard me."
"Bad luck."

"Yeah. Bad luck." (265-266).

Discussion

The Lunatics, written by Kim Stanley Robinson, was first published in1988. The passage chosen for this essay is indicative of the social injustice that prevails in this futuristic setting and it is these inequities that drive the events of the story. Briefly, the story revolves around a group of promethium miners working beneath the surface of the moon. According to the story promethium is "…the most precious element. On Earth our masters rule by it. All their civilization is based on it…" (259). The main characters in the story have all been conscripted against their will and sent to the moon to work the mines.

Throughout the story the miners are subject to cruel and unusual treatment by the foremen. Due to their circumstances and the harsh conditions under which they live the miners from Pen Twelve, led by Jakob begin to disappear. When Freeman, the third miner to disappear after Naomi and mute Elijah, went missing Robinson subtlety alludes to the scheme, "Free at last,' murmured Jakob" (258). On another occasion a foreman…