The Hunger After You're Fed: Who is Héctor Prima?

by James S.A. Corey

Short story published in wired magazine

Genres: Science Fiction, Short Stories

8 pages, Unknown Binding

Published December 13, 2016

Reviews

[Richard Derus · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Amazon Prime series The Expanse is based on James S.A. Corey's extensive novel, novella, and one solitary short story future history of Earth under a world-governing UN, rebellious-now-independent colony Mars, and the Asteroid Belt, just the Belt in most all references, standing in for the Third World. Now in its fourth season, with a fifth due this time next year, the world it posits is run by the rich through the mechanism of the UN; the rich have learned, somehow, from the nightmarish passage we're living through that they'd better embrace social democracy (NOT democratic socialism! THEY ARE WILDLY DIFFERENT THINGS!) or shit gonna hit the fan for 'em all, so there's something called "Basic Assistance" that keeps people alive and reasonably healthy since there are just too bloody many of 'em for any capitalist OR socialist economy to keep gainfully employed.

But what actually is Basic (as it's referred to in the whole book and TV series)? It's never defined. It's just...there. While that's great for world building...how many of us go around ruminating about how our bank cards work?...it leaves the obsessive fans (hi guys!) with waaayyy too much latitude to eff things up in fanfic and its attendant flame wars. The battles over the recent Star Wars films' stories being "canonical", ie within the original created universe's parameters, should've reached all y'all's ears by now. A lot of that mishegas is rooted in different kinds of fans...curatorial versus transformative is the root polarity...battling for "control" of the IP, or "Intellectual Property," in which the fan in question has invested their emotional energy and often social identity.

So Author Corey (a writing partnership) did something very wise back in 2016. They created this extremely short story to address, without explaining using the dreaded infodump, the economic, social, and emotional reality of Basic and its billions of clients:

I’d worked cleaning out brambles and hauling contaminated gravel from an old power plant for extra money to fund my dream of sitting across from the man, of telling him how much his words meant to me. Of breathing the same air.

In eight pages, the ultimate problem of human existence is laid bare: Why?

By which I mean, why exist, why strive, why wake up? No one sees you, no one cares, you are a biological machine for turning food into pollution.

So when someone *does* see you:

This age, this generation, traded its demons for the void. When I was young we were poor, and we are poor again now but differently. When I was young we were afraid to starve, to be without medicines or homes, and the teeth of it gave us meaning. Now we fear being less important than our neighbors. We lost our junkie’s need, and we don’t know what to put in its place. So we make art or food or music or sport and scream for someone to notice us.

It is shocking to me, living on the modern equivalent of Basic, that this solution is death to something good, not just bad things.

We should nourish our children not just with food but with what food means. What it used to mean. We should cherish the memories of our poverty. Ghosts and bones are made to remind us to take joy in not being dead yet.

Don't miss reading this free online short. It means something no matter whether you're an Expanse fan or not.

[Justine · Rating 4 out of 5]

A short but impactful meditation on the constancy of the human condition of fundamental dissatisfaction and the continuing hunger for meaning in life.

We should nourish our children not just with food but with what food means. What it used to mean. We should cherish the memories of our poverty. Ghosts and bones are made to remind us to take joy in not being dead yet.

Available to read for free here:

https://www.wired.com/2016/12/james-c...

[Beige · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting, this is miles away from the style of The Expanse but i guess the theme of social welfare isn't all that far off.

https://www.wired.com/2016/12/james-c...

[Durval Menezes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not SciFi (except perhaps in a very loose, 'sociological' sense), but an interesting take on the subject of human happiness: what would happen to people if you satisfy their basic needs, e.g. no more hunger? Would that automatically make them happy? Or would they just be miserable in a different way? What does it really take to make someone happy?

Relative to wants/needs, is human happiness relative or absolute?

Good food for thought.

[Amy Mills · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting short, set in the Expanse universe, exploring what having Basic does, and doesn't, mean. It reminds me a bit of some of the existentialist writings I've run across recently. Well worth a look, even if you aren't interested in the rest of the series.

[Julie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hmm. A good read with an interesting take on the idea of universal basic income. It's still on Wired's website for free - a quick Google search will find it.

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fine enough writing, but a dreary view of what UBI can do for people.