Blog set 2

Alien or Human? As I read “Passengers” by Robert Silverberg and “Out of All Them Bright Stars” by Nancy Kress, I asked myself what makes these so called encounters different from how we as humans are? So as I continue to read on I see that these two stories has differences in why these “passengers” or “blue men” are here on earth for. In Passengers the aliens are these beings that come out of the sky and take over our body, which I find disturbing, and in Out of All Them Bright Stars they are not sure why these “blue” aliens are here on earth. Aliens as some of us have read or heard about over the years are always trying to take over earth or trying to make so called peace with us and yet in each story we humans are at war automatically due to the unknown which I assume many people are afraid of the unknown so are flight or fight instincts kick into high gear and we don’t know what to do with the unknowns that have invaded our earth but prepare for war.

There was a quote that had me thinking while I read the story Passengers and it was more of a question the main character Charles Roth said which was “leaving me the illusion of freedom,” (pg.434) and as I read that part it stuck with me imagine walking around not knowing if you are free or have a “passenger” inside and never feeling free. The thought of someone just letting you have that “illusion of freedom” is cruel in many ways, the main character Charles Roth is pretty strong minded to my viewing because in many other cases if that was to happen to you or someone you know you would think they would have gone mad by now and I would not blame them these “passengers” have no pity for humans and enjoy using them for their own pleasures.

The second story Out of All Them Bright Stars by Nancy Kress is shorter than the first story but leaves you with many questions such as “why are these blue beings here on earth” or “why does the blue guy want to eat a salad” and so many more but to answer some of those questions I would need more details I feel that the story was vague to some degree. There was that last sentence in the story where Sally Gourley the main character in the story was thinking back to what the blue guy said to her before he left which was “I seldom have the chance to show our friendliness to an ordinary Earth person. I make so little difference!” she makes inferences in what he says that she believes he is lying when he said “I make so little difference!” I was more curious in why they do not let him express that he is friendly and just trying to get to know us “ordinary earth persons”. Maybe the government knows that they are friendly and maybe just really do come in peace but they probably want the public to be on edge and scared of these “beings” on earth and to not trust them for fear that we will welcome them if we truly knew what they were here for.

These two stories combine and make a statement in what I call seeing through our eyes and not knowing what “they” see through their eyes. Who knows maybe they are friendly or just want to inhabit our bodies until then we may never know.

UPDATE:
   In class we discussed the previous stories and it actually gave me more insight to them such as in Out of All Them Bright Stars there was details in which depict things still going on in our country today such as racism and feminist, even though that is in the past there are people who still feel that way. When we spoke as a class I got more of the meaning behind the story than when  I had read it alone. We also spoke about if we thought the stories are a mirror to our world or a window? I think that in the Passengers, that it is a window because that has never happen to me or have I heard of such thing besides in the story, I think that as a person we would not tolerate what was happening to us as the characters in the story were doing. Overall after the class discussion it has changed my view on the stories making them more clearer to me as the reader what the author is trying to get at in the story.