The star you won't see associated with the film in any meaningful way is the book's author. Card, one of the modern-day giants of science fiction, has been invisible in the marketing lead-up to the film's release. This is both profoundly sad and completely understandable: Card has been an outspoken opponent of gay rights for many years, arguing vociferously against same-sex marriage and serving until recently on the board of the National Organization for Marriage.
In 2013, a person neither can nor should expect previous statements such as "laws against homosexual behavior should remain on the books" to be overlooked without consequence. And there have been consequences. DC Comics put Card's Adventures of Superman anthology contribution on hold after fierce public reaction led the comic's artist to drop out of the project; the LGBT group Geeks OUT is organizing "Skip Ender's Game" protests; those associated with the movie, from Ford to director Gavin Hood to Lionsgate, have done the requisite dance, distancing themselves from Card's homophobic views while arguing that the author's bigotry should not detract from the movie's themes of inclusiveness and tolerance.
The movie's themes of inclusiveness and tolerance stem from the book's themes of inclusiveness and tolerance, which is what makes this entire episode so depressing. The book became an instant classic upon its release in 1985, winning both the Hugo and Nebula awards, science fiction's two highest honors. It also quickly won over millions of readers.
Including me. (...)
We all feel alienated at some point, but the book's message resonates even deeper with those who really stick out from the crowd. The empathy extends to the reader. There are no gay characters, but that is presumably because most of the characters are prepubescent children. (Ender is essentially asexual.) But there are girls at Battle School who play important roles; there are characters who are dismissed by other kids because they're too short; there are Jewish kids who get mocked for the size of their noses.
I am neither gay, nor a girl, nor short. I am, however, a Muslim who grew up in Kansas in the 1980s, and I struggle to think of a more perfect recipe for creating a sense of isolation in an American teenager. I literally did not know another practicing Muslim family in Wichita at the time. My best friend who recommended Ender's Game lived in Appleton, Wisconsin. I saw him once or twice a year, but because his dad and my dad emigrated from the Old Country together, I had more in common with him than with my next-door neighbor.
It was in the context of trying to find my place in the world, of struggling to reconcile my faith with my country when I had no role models to show me the way, that I encountered the following passage about Ender and his Battle School classmate Alai. It stopped me cold:
"I don't want to go," he said.
Alai hugged him back. "I understand them, Ender. You are the best of us. Maybe they're in a hurry to teach you everything."
"They don't want to teach me everything," Ender said. "I wanted to learn what it was like to have a friend."
Alai nodded soberly. "Always my friend, always the best of my friends," he said. Then he grinned. "Go slice up the buggers."
"Yeah." Ender smiled back. Alai suddenly kissed Ender on the cheek and whispered in his ear, "Salaam." Then, red-faced, he turned away and walked to his own bed at the back of the barracks. Ender guessed that the kiss and the word were somehow forbidden. A suppressed religion, perhaps. Or maybe the word had some private and powerful meaning for Alai alone. Whatever it meant to Alai, Ender knew that it was sacred; that he had uncovered himself for Ender, as once Ender's mother had done, when he was very young, before they put the monitor in his neck, and she had put her hands on his head when she thought he was asleep, and prayed over him. Ender had never spoken of that to anyone, not even to Mother, but had kept it as a memory of holiness, of how his mother loved him when she thought that no one, not even he, could see or hear. That was what Alai had given him; a gift so sacred that even Ender could not be allowed to understand what it meant.If you don't see the importance of this passage, I envy you. Alai is clearly a Muslim, and in the 1980s, Muslims were portrayed in American popular culture as one of three categories, if they were portrayed at all: crazy ayatollahs, greasy lecherous oil sheikhs, or bomb-wielding hijackers. Ender's Game was literally the first time I had encountered a positive portrayal of a Muslim character in American fiction. It floored me. I finally saw a positive image of myself in print, and it came not from a fellow Muslim but from a wildly popular Christian author who could trace his American lineage for generations.
I learned that I had more in common with Card than I had thought. Card is a Mormon; that lineage of his traces back to Brigham Young himself. Card and I were both devout believers in religions that were shrouded in stereotypes and inaccuracies. As white guys we were members of the racial majority, but we were also part of the religious minority, giving us the weird and vaguely uncomfortable ability to define ourselves depending on the needs of the moment.
Card's community had a far greater toehold in America, of course. Mormonism is an American religion at its fundamental core, while Islam was beaten out of the African slaves who practiced it centuries ago and wasn't revived in the African American community until the 20th century. Only after the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 did America's shores open to immigrants from the Muslim world. There were no writers from the Muslim world to whom I could turn in the 1980s, no Khaled Hosseinis or Reza Aslans who had mastered the rhetoric of American culture and could present the Muslim community to their countrymen in a native tongue.
As far as I was concerned, Card was carrying the torch that my own community was too young and inexperienced to hold. And as a Mormon, he was no doubt familiar with receiving prejudice from fellow Americans who held bigoted and misinformed views on his faith. Certainly this was someone who appreciated the value of tolerance, of trying to understand other views even when you don't agree with them.
by Rany Jazayerli, Grantland | Read more:
Image: AP Photo/Summit Entertainment
Card's community had a far greater toehold in America, of course. Mormonism is an American religion at its fundamental core, while Islam was beaten out of the African slaves who practiced it centuries ago and wasn't revived in the African American community until the 20th century. Only after the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 did America's shores open to immigrants from the Muslim world. There were no writers from the Muslim world to whom I could turn in the 1980s, no Khaled Hosseinis or Reza Aslans who had mastered the rhetoric of American culture and could present the Muslim community to their countrymen in a native tongue.
As far as I was concerned, Card was carrying the torch that my own community was too young and inexperienced to hold. And as a Mormon, he was no doubt familiar with receiving prejudice from fellow Americans who held bigoted and misinformed views on his faith. Certainly this was someone who appreciated the value of tolerance, of trying to understand other views even when you don't agree with them.
by Rany Jazayerli, Grantland | Read more:
Image: AP Photo/Summit Entertainment
