J. Michael Stracyznski Turns Harlan Ellison's Dangerous Visions Anthology Line Into Modern Leftist Corporate Propaganda

Harlan Ellison released 2 volumes of Dangerous visions, but Last Dangerous Visions clearly comes from J. Michael Stracyznski and not the late sci-fi legend.

Harlan Ellison’s Dangerous Visions anthology was one of the defining moments of science fiction in the 1960s. The collection's success rocked the publishing world, introducing hard-hitting political topics and wild characters into the sci-fin landscape with heavy hitters such as Poul Anderson, Fritz Leiber, and Larry Niven contributing. The legacy is one of distilled, mainstream corporate science fiction in the post-humous volume Last Dangerous Visions, edited by J. Michael Straczynski, who turned the book into a lecture of modern leftist talking points.

The 1960s, in hindsight, was the beginning of the destruction of American culture. At the time, what was dubbed the “counter-culture” and has since become the embraced corporate culture was one of narcissism, debauchery, and cynicism. The culture of the boomers took sex, drugs, and rock ‘n roll as a lifestyle brand and substituted a “do it on the road” attitude for any deep philosophy. 

At the time, it seemed edgy, different, cool, forbidden. These attitudes and lifestyles trickled into every facet of culture for a few years, and then, as the 1970s hit, it turned on like an open spicket.  While it’s easy to see the degradation of morality in  Hollywood as the film and television industries went from wholesome to perverted, much the same happened with the rest of culture, including the book industry and the genres of science fiction and fantasy. 

Harlan Ellison was a part of this movement that corrupted science fiction. Though his talent level was clearly off the charts, his Dangerous Visions paved the way for the next generation of leftists to create a political stranglehold on the industry. The one after that became a toxic, talentless wasteland as we know today's industry. 

Though pushing toward a culture of extremism and Satanism in the 1960s, the intentions were not to create a monoculture. In the original Dangerous Visions volume and its sequel, Ellison included open Republican writers such as Poul Anderson and open Catholic writers like Gene Wolfe in the projects to give truly diverse perspectives. 

A final volume, Last Dangerous Visions, was in the works, but a bout of severe depression, likely coming from the God-sized hole in Harlan Ellison’s heart from leading such a lifestyle, made it impossible for the author to finish. 

Harlan Ellison died in 2018, and his talent stands the testament of time. However, radical leftist J. Michael Straczynski was chosen as the executor of his estate, and with it came the task of completing this anthology in Harlan Ellison’s name. Even though the book bears Harlan Ellison’s name as editor, it seems to be mostly done by Straczysnki.

The anthology contents read like a list of J. Michael Straczynski’s peers and friends from recent years. Reading JMS’s social media and blogs, one can easily see it was his choices brought into here and not Ellison’s. With Hollywood writer Max Brooks (World War Z), James S.A. Corey (The Expanse), Corey Doctorow, and Adrian Tchaikovsky, these are clearly not even possibly writers that Harlan Ellison would have intended on including in the 1970s when compiling an original anthology and is more a group of modern sci-fi writers who the establishment wants to larp is on par with some of the greats from that era. 

It gets much less of a “dangerous” vision when getting into Straczynski’s introduction, and one starts to get a picture that this is simply corporatized leftism in a book, much like all of mainstream publishing. He lists the topics covered in the volume as “misogyny, racism, the role of religion in society” before getting into a litany of what it means to be edgy. He follows up by talking about the political climate, saying it’s “marked by open expressions of sexism, prejudice, and gender intolerance.”

Although this may be labeled Dangerous Visions as a brand, Straczynski is producing a thinly veiled skinsuit of acceptable extreme leftism that has caused the publishing industry to decay over the last two decades.

Rolling Stone, an establishment shill rag, ate up the piece, admitting much of the work was produced by Straczynski bringing in his friends, saying, “He then added seven more stories, newly commissioned for this publication — including ‘Binary System’ by Kayo Hartenbaum which is about isolation, the loss of definition in the absence of societal constructs, and the conditional immortality of being useful to capitalism.”

One can see there’s nothing dangerous to the establishment at all about Last Dangerous Visions. It’s much like seeing a Rage Against The Machine tour sponsored by Capital One.

Straczynski included no authors fighting against the establishment or having diverse opinions that buck mainstream norms.

A real successor, Forbidden Thoughts, came out in 2017 featuring authors one might consider dangerous to mainstream publications Milo Yiannopoulos, Nick Cole, Larry Correia, Vox Day, and more. If Straczynski had truly wanted to follow Harlan Ellison’s rebellious legacy, he would have included at least one writer of dissenting opinion. But in 2024, no real dangerous visions are allowed in publishing. It seems 1984 has become reality. 

What do you think of J. Michael Straczynski turning Harlan Ellison’s Dangerous Visions anthology into a leftist machine propaganda piece? Leave a comment and let us know.

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