Steampunk: 21st and 19th Century Issues [Draft]

Steampunk: 21^st and 19^th Century Issues

Thesis: Steampunk artistic medium to illustrate problems plaguing the early industrial era: workings class poverty, racism, feminism, and imperialism. The solutions to these past issues can shed light on solutions to our similar present day circumstances.

      I.         Introduction

A.     Definition of Steampunk

B.     As literature

C.     As culture

    II.         Past Steampunk origins – Other possible political works

A.     The Difference Engine, Morlock Night, Electric Life

  III.         Industrial Age Past Problems à Connect to the Steampunk culture

A.     Underpaid Wage Labor/Sporadic Employment – Seasonal Employment, Low Wages, Artisan loss of employment (MC often of gentry or white collar)

B.     Automation & the Rise of Mechanization – Industrial Assembly Line, The Jungle

C.     Polluted Environment – The Great Stink (The Thames), The Gowanus Canal, The Chicago River (Great engineering and Projects)

D.    Challenges to Societal Values

              1.       Temperance – Women’s Temperance Movement,

              2.       Gender Issues – Feminism, Suffragists (Tough/Active Women Characters)

              3.       Race Problems – Abolition of Slavery, Jim Crow Laws (Mute if at all present)

              4.       Religion – Lack of Religious Faith (Religious faith to blow back heathens)

E.     Govt. Control by Large Companies w/ Private Interests – Big Trusts (Money means to an end)

  IV.         The Modern Times and its Problems

A.     Underpaid Wage Labor/Sporadic Employment – Seasonal Employment, underemployment, Disintegrating middle class

B.     Polluted Environment – Current day Superfund sites

C.     Automation & The Rise of Computers – Computers taking Over, Driverless cars

D.    Challenges to Societal Values

E.     Govt. Influenced by Large Companies – Corporate Lobbying

    V.         Presentism “Solved” Industrial Age Problems

A.     Colonialism – Exporting the manufacture to other countries, White collar jobs

B.     Environmental protection, National parks, Engineering

C.     Automation

D.    Challenges to Societal Values

              1.       Binge Drinking

              2.       Right to Vote granted, Laws revived

              3.       Civil War & amendments

              4.       Materialism > Religion

E.     Trust busting, end of oligarchy

   VI.         Recent Artistic Changes to Steampunk – Battle over political vs. Art

*** Need to bring in Steampunk NOT just old Industrial Age Issues

Originally a literary genre, steampunk has now evolved to become a culture with its own ideology and art. The 19th century has once again returned to its full splendor with the empire expansive and progress unlimited. However, underneath all that shiny gloss of metal lays a dirty underbelly of industrialization. Steam punkers know about the darker aspects of the Victorian era and respond in their own ways. The ambiguity in their overall response is visible in literature such as The Difference Engine, Morlock Night and Electric Life. Analyzing steampunk literature for industrialization woes will provide a context for a later discussion about steampunk culture. Ultimately, steampunk utilizes an artistic medium to illustrate problems plaguing the early industrial era: workings class poverty, racism, gender inequality, and imperialism. As the problems of the past continue to haunt us today, steampunk gives voice to our issues in an ambiguous and creative way.
What is steampunk?
The first question is to determine what is defined as steampunk. This question has long provided a dilemma to everyone from the authors of the genre to the general populace. The Oxford references defines steampunk as “a genre of science fiction with a historical setting in the nineteenth century characterized by technologies extrapolated from the science of that era, but which were not invented at that time.”  Oxford’s definition is broad enough to cover the wide variety of explanations ranging from Victorian era London to mass appliance of steam engines. However, the label of steampunk is continually shifting. To complicate matters even further, some have even retroactively applied the label to earlier works.
Kevin Wayne Jeter first coined the term “steampunk” in his April 1987 letter to the Locus magazine.  The letter was in response to a favorable review by Faren Miller to Jeter’s book, Morlock Night. He was trying to come up with a phrase to categorize the literature that he, Tim Powers, and James Blaylock were working on. Little did he know that his one word spin on cyberpunk would catch on and become a whole new medium all together.
Steampunk has now expanded from a literary genre into a culture. The artistic design is often one replete with gears and anachronisms. Creatures are made out of twisted metal. Furniture is composed of an amalgamation of pipes. Clothing of the old generation is stylized for the present. The ladies get corsets and dresses. The gentlemen get suits and waistcoats with top hats. There is even an accompanying Victorian like philosophy of future optimism and self-reliant individualism. For the purposes of this paper I shall focus on the ideas behind steampunk visible in its literature.
 The Difference Engine, Morlock Night, and Electric Life
Three pieces of steampunk literature are at the fore of this analysis: The Difference Engine, Morlock Night, and Electric Life. All three novels depict different visions of industrialized urban society. The Difference Engine explores an alternative future London created as a result of Charles Babbage’s difference engine, a prototype computer. The citizens of this futuristic London explode into a massive riot following the outbreak of a noxious smell from the river Thames. Morlock Night is set in 19th century London, but crosses over into the fantasy realm with time traveling Morlocks. Here we get to see the less savory parts of the London underground and the people who live there. In addition, this story has a masculine women and a mage accompany our main character towards his final objective of repelling the Morlock invasion. Electric Life illustrates a futuristic France where the gadgets of life are powered by electricity. A new age of robots and automations has led to an explosion of different social interactions. The motives behind the characters actions and the environment of Paris help to provide dark humor.
The Difference Engine by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling helped to establish the fame of the steampunk genre. Although the novel came out in 1990 long after the Jeter coined the term steampunk, it was extremely influential due to its authors. Both Gibson and Sterling were pioneers in the field of cyberpunk, another subgenre of science fiction set in a high tech authoritarian society. Gibson’s first book, Neuromancer, became a cyberpunk staple winning the Hugo, Nebula, and Philip K. Dick Award. Sterling played his role as an organizer and promoter of cyberpunk. Their popularities in cyberpunk helped to provide momentum to steampunk.
Morlock Night by Kevin Wayne Jeter was one of the original novels from steampunk’s coiner. The book is a proposed sequel to H.G. Wells’ The Time Machine and contains certain elements of fantasy. In a sense the novel fits more into a story rather than providing an example of steampunk ideology. However, that does not rule out the book’s importance. As an early book in the steampunk movement, the novel highlights how the community has or has not changed.
Electric Life by Alfred Robida, differs from the other two, as it is a late 19th century literary work. Rather than placing the vision of steampunk as one of an alternative history or one taking placing in the past, it imagines the times ahead. Robida’s future image conveniently lines up with certain aspects of steampunk allowing us to tackle another issue, retroactive labeling. Would Robida’s work be actually considered steampunk? Yes, Electric Life is a steampunk novel that fully demonstrates the vision of the industrial age. Further discussion about the different aspects of Electric Life in connection to the 19th century will prove so.
Into the Urban Jungle – Rags and Riches of Industrial Progress
The 19th and early 20th century was a period of rapid industrialization and urbanization. Factory production and assembly line techniques had cheapened the value of artisan labor. What was once created by a small group of individuals toiling away for hours on end in a workshop was now being made in factories. These factories, conglomerates of metal, machinery, and systems, reduced production of manufactured goods to simple, repetitive steps. The repetitive process allowed for just about anyone plucked right off the street to take part. No longer did producers have to spend money on skilled artisans, who often spent years trying to master a craft. With the demand of their labor down, artisans faced a decline in living and struggled to just survive.  At the same, the population of the cities was exploding. New people were gathering from the farthest corners of the planet to travel to the big city. Farmers pushed out of their subsistence agricultural lives, migrated to the cities in waves. There they found factory work. Dense populations allowed people to survive by living off each other. Selling various goods from food to medicine became one way of urban life. However, this way of life was not a stable one. Sales fluctuated rapidly depending on the goods being sold. Thus, traders and sellers took multiple “jobs” selling various different goods. The workers employed in the factories were no better off. They suffered from seasonal and sporadic employment. The profits and losses of factories determined their production and when the bottom line was squeezed, employees were laid off.
Artisans were not the only ones feeling the squeeze of their occupation. Mechanization of life from transportation to food cultivation was depriving multiple professions of adequate employment. Trains and cars were beginning to replace horses for the transportation of goods and people. Photography displaced artists for visual representations of important figures. Tractors reduced the number farm hands and beasts of burden. New systems of distribution began to push out markets from the hands of the lower class.
The urban environment heavily polluted the water compounding the misery of its residents. Poor sewage disposal and piping leaked out waste into the ground. From the ground, rainfall and other liquids brought the wastes into the water supply. With the water supply contaminated, residents suffered from a variety of waterborne diseases. One disease that was especially feared was cholera. Spread through the presence of the bacteria Vibrio cholerae in water, cholera causes severe diarrhea and dehydration. The disease is often fatal if left untreated. There were outbreaks of cholera in urban centers throughout the 19th century referred to as “cholera pandemics.”  Besides diseases, residents had to fear the chemical and industrial garbage dumped into the rivers, which transformed them into toxic sludge. The disgusting water could be ignored to a certain extent if not viewed directly. However, the smell wafted through the air into the surrounding area and got considerably noxious during the summer. London’s Great Stink of 1858 was just one example of a polluted waterway.  In the US, the problem was equally as bad in major cities with the Gowanus Canal in Brooklyn known for emanating a horrid stench.
Accompanying these difficulties were social matters associated with the new urban lifestyle. Excessive drinking became commonplace as taverns became areas of socialization. Tales of working men spending away their paychecks on alcohol occur with familiar consistency in both real life and literature. To combat drunkenness, women’s groups formed temperance societies that advocated for a complete removal of alcohol. As a sign of their increasing influence, women advocated heavily for the right to vote in the late 19th century. Religion played a smaller role in 19th century developments as the state came to be a increasingly powerful separate entity. A new religious following was being developed in the industrial world, the God of materialism and money.
The era was a new period of wealth and prosperity unheard of in history with the concentration of wealth in large companies. These large companies more often than not pursued the God of profit relentlessly. They often did so through new innovative cost trimming and competition cutting methods. The US Gilded Age perfectly illustrated the new power of corporations. Leaders of industries such as Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockfeller became some of the wealthiest individuals in the world. Their companies, Standard Oil and Carnegie Steel respectively, held monopolies on oil and steel markets within the US. Critics pointed out that the control of a large portion of the market enable companies to beat out their competitors with ease. Yet the rise of both these individuals to new heights of wealth was viewed somewhat as a sign of progress. The fact that two rather obscure figures could strike it rich generated an image of the self-made man.
Steampunk Literary Cities
The setting of all three steampunk novels drops the character right in the middle of the burgeoning industrialized cities. Both The Difference Engine and Morlock Night are set in London, while the Electric Life is set in Paris. Despite being two different cities, both London and Paris are very similar. London is divided into different sections by the river Thames. Paris is divided into different sections by the river Seine. The conglomeration of buildings of various sizes is illustrated in Electric Life.  An equally building dense environment is described in The Difference Engine.  Within these cities, large masses of urbanities lived huddle together in compact quarters. Yet the stories have an astonishing lack of scenes depicting the masses. Of the three, only The Difference Engine illustrates crowds in a dangerous light.
The lack of the less appealing aspects of city life is due to the professions of our main characters. Life standards in the Victorian era varied wildly depending on your position in the class hierarchy. At the top existed the barons and company executives with enormous sums of money, property, and equity. At the bottom were poor urbanities with nothing, but the clothes on their back. In The Difference Engine, the two main characters are Sybil Gerard and Edward Mallory. Sybil Gerard is a prostitute from the high society that caters to gentlemen with respectable means. While not really entirely within the rungs of the elite, Sybil is quite well off with housing and nourishment. The gentlemen she caters to are Mick Radley, a politician from Manchester, Charles Egremont, a parliamentarian, Mr. Chadwick, and Mr. Kingsley.  All of provide enough for the survival of her and her cat, Toby. Compared to the sordid prostitutes on the lower levels of London, Sybil is living the good the life free of cramped lodgings and violent clients. Later on in the story we are introduced to Sir Edward Mallory. Edward is a professor of paleontology that explores the world for fossils. The profession does not grant him a mansion or a seat in Parliament, but he lives at least in his own apartment complex. After winning the bet on the steam mobile race, his lifestyle improves to a much greater degree than before. His new proceeds allow him to wear top of the line clothing instead of the “dead cheap, engine-made, pre-cut in a factory” clothing.  In Morlock Night, the main character is Sir Edwin Hocker, a British noble. His life is relaxing enough for him to be able to visit other acquaintances for teatime. In Electric Life, there are  two main characters: Philox Lorris and his son, George Lorris. Philox Lorris is the head of his own scientific business and stands at the crème de la crème of society in terms of wealth and knowledge.  George Lorris enjoys a cushy lifestyle because of his father’s patrimony. Both are nowhere near the bottom destitute classes of society and as such have close to no contact with the poor.
That does not mean the books do not delve into the dark recesses of the city. For despite the high-status background of the characters in both The Difference Engine and Morlock Night, there are specific points of the story where the characters get a chance to see the not so great parts of the London. In The Difference Engine, Edward Mallory ventures into a brothel and the dockyards. For the first place, Edward is led to the “accommodations” of Harriet Edwardes (for short) to partake in lustful satisfaction. There he comes across the Victorian issue of prostitution, which was somewhat coached in legality. Prostitution of the high society gentlemen appears a commonplace practice as Hetty is experienced in prying out money from her clients.  To reach the second place, Edward and his crew cross through the Thames River. With the city in chaos during the story’s imagined portrayal of The Great London Stink, Edward and crew hesitate to stick their legs into the filthy Thames. They eventually do so, retching along the entire way. Morlock Night takes the setting of the Thames River one step further by exploring London’s sewers. Edwin Hocker and his female companion, Tafe, are led by a tosher, Tom Clagger, into the sewers of London through an opening on the banks of the Thames. The group’s quest to find the swords of Excalibur lead them deep into the subterranean underground with its rat infested tunnels and suffocating fumes. The close contact with the polluted environment provides a colorful depiction of Henry Mayhew’s 19th century London.
While Robida’s Electric Life covers the topic of environmental pollution, the direct unpleasantness of the city is generally avoided. Instead Robida features advanced technology of the city to provide a futurist view of urban progress. Criticism he does employ generally relates to the role of the city compared to the role of nature. The role of the city is one of industry where the millions of its teeming inhabitants scurry away to perform labor both manual and mental. The role of nature is to serve as a place of relaxation away from the toils of the city. To emphasize this, the beauty of the natural parks in France is described in detail to provide juxtaposition against the ugliness of the city.  However, the city is never completely viewed as an abomination. Rather the city with its electric floors and spider web of wires is view as somewhat necessary for the productivity of society.
The rise of mechanization and its application to life are visible in London’s difference engine and the technologies present in Electric Life. In The Difference Engine, London has a massive, primitive computer used to keep track of individuals. Each individual has a card or ID associated with him or her. Every action of particular note whether political party vote or arrest charge is recorded onto the card. Similar to the modern day computer with its ability to search up specific individuals, the difference engine can single out individuals based on specific characteristics. Dandy Mick Radley discovers Sibyl Gerard’s background by using this card system.   In Electric Life, mechanization goes even further with all the advance technologies of the television, phonograph, and microwave. Philox Lorris can badger his son from his company headquarters miles away. Music from the musicians of the past can be played over and over again. Food is prepared instantly with the simple click of a button. Both stories demonstrate how the automation and increasing technologies eat away at the professions, while at the same time providing a luxurious standard of life.
Challenges to societal traditions of the government legality are demonstrated in The Difference Engine with revolutionaries. The London government was formed after the Radical Party seized the government. Agitators in their own right, the radicals originally sided with Walter Gerard, Sybil’s father, in a massive Luddite movement to destroy the damning machinery of industrialization. However as the movement went on, the Radicals became ever less radical. Much like the United Kingdom’s Labor Party, the Radicals stepped in to take power from the Tory Party. Despite the change in leadership, the crushing poverty of the city remained the same. Thus when the Great Stink of London wafts into the story, a massive outbreak of rioting and looting occurs. The rioters are trying to enrich themselves. However, within the rioters is a subgroup of revolutionaries lead by Captain Swing, intent on toppling the Radical Party government. Their political line to loot and give back to the “common-folk of London, the masses, the oppressed, the sweated labor, those who produce all the riches of this city,” sounds eerily similar to anarchist or communist thought.  The speech by the Marquis about the arousal of the “working class” and the oration by Florence Russell Bartlett discussing “universal free love” confirm that the antagonists of the story are indeed communist revolutionaries.
The women present in the stories are quite the opposite of the Victorian standard of pitiful innocent beauties. Rather they are depicted as rough and clever women who are fully capable of managing themselves. The Difference Engine has three particularly strong females to note: Sybil Gerard, Florence Russell Bartlett, and Ada Byron. As stated earlier, Sybil Gerard is the daughter of the decreased Luddite, Walter Gerard. After the death of her father, she struggles to survive in London as a prostitute. With some coy scheming she manages to use Mark Radley’s connections to run away to Paris to start a new life. Florence Russell Bartlett is a member of Captain Swing’s entourage of revolutionaries. Her previous arrest history for murdering her husband via arsenic poisoning and escaping from prison by overpowering her jailer demonstrates that she is not one to trifle with.  She continues to work on behalf of the people’s revolution even after the death of Captain Swing by hiding out among a troupe of pantomimes, but is gunned down while attempting to take back the Modus, the holy grail of kineotrope cards. Ada Lovelace Byron is the daughter of the Lord Byron, the Prime Minister of Great Britain. She displays talent and genius for mathematics, a field dominated by males. Yet even more important it is revealed throughout the story that Lady Ada Byron is an accomplice in the conspiracy to steal the Modus.  Despite all that talk of her nobility and purity from Edwin Mallory and others, Ada is secretly playing her own part in gambling operations. Her addiction to gambling is one reason that Fraser, a secret police officer, has to stick with her.
In Morlock Night, Hocker’s female companion from the future, Tafe, acts masculine. When Hocker first meets her in future London, she is dressed in a “man’s rough trousers and jacket, with a belted leather harness crossing her shoulders and waist.”  Later, after being brought back into the 19th century to aid Hocker, Tafe dresses up in man’s suit and collar. She continues to do so for the rest of the story and even plays the part of the hero in her final stand to buy time for Hocker’s escape. Her gender-bending role as a male helps provides an antithesis to the stereotypical female companion.
Electric Life takes an even more radical step than the other two novels. In the Paris of Robida’s imaginations, women have equal rights to men. Hence they work alongside men, “doing as much as men, in offices, shops, factories and the Bourse!”  So powerful is the women coalition in politics that men have formed the “League for the Emanciptation of Men” to combat their growing and encroaching influence.  Oddly enough Robida does provide the image of a weak, pure women in Estelle Lacombe, the fiancé of George Lorris. She provides a sort of comparison with which the past and the “future” can be assessed by. Estelle is shy, but at the same time shown as fully capable of studying science.
There is a decidedly lack of religion involved in these stories. While the characters often do refer to God and all that is holy, these exclamations are more akin to an act of swearing rather than piety. The decline in faith is expected since the momentum of industrialization has left religion as an accessory on the road of progress. Both The Difference Engine and Electric Life hail science as the true glory of the nation. Even those less fortunate such as the lower classes in society were turning out for church in lower numbers.  The decline may be due to the new political focus of the lower class or just simply crass materialism coming in to replace faith. As noted by Charles Booth, “the great mass of men have more leisure, but the time freed goes in other directions; religion hardly gains.”  Direct and simple pleasures appear to have won over faith in a deity.
Large companies with their private connections to the seat of power make their appearance in The Difference Engine and Electric Life, but are absent in Morlock Night. Three specific industries are worthy of note in Gibson and Sterling’s London: steam derby gambling, advertisement, and criminology. The steam race that Edwin Mallory wins to become a wealthy man is an international competition hosted by Great Britain. Like with all competitions and races, there is a large gamble scene. It is from this derby that all of Edwin Mallory’s troubles arise. While helping Lady Ada Lovelace Byron escape from her two “captors,” Edwin comes to possess the Modus. The considerable power behind the gamblers, evident in their harassment of Edwin, demonstrates that the corporate influence of the unnamed gambling company is vast. A man called “the king of bill stickers” controls the advertising bill industry in London.  Edwin Mallory meets the man when trying to remove the bills libeling him. The King is the standard capitalist businessman. He responds to Edwin’s complaints of the libelous nature of the bills being posted as not his responsibility because he does not print them; he only pastes them. Spoken like a true businessman, the King offers Edwin the chance to buy the bills if he wants them not to be posted. Even amidst the crisis of rioting, the King appears calm, a sign of his confidence in his business ventures. For the criminology industry the new difference engines are everything. With a couple of perforated cards, the government can narrow down a pool of suspects to less than fifty people. The input of data into each person’s ID card is also a massive source of power for the state. One “key-punch wrong and it’s all the difference between a clergyman and an arsonist.”  If the government wanted to they could even disappear individuals.
Electric Life studies the power of two specific groups: the military-industrial complex and the pharmaceuticals. The rapid developments in technology have shaped a new form of warfare replete with armored land cruisers and flying airships. However, the most important addition to the military industrial complex is the use of chemical warfare. We get to see the use of the chemicals first hand thanks George Lorris, who is also captain of the 17th artillery battery. With such overpowering fumes, armies would be laid to waste within an instant. However, France is not the only country developing its chemical weapons. Other nations are building up their own stockpiles of explosives and gas. Therefore, the country needs to continue spending enormous sums of money in order to stave off other competitive militaries. Philox Lorris’ invention of the debilitating miasmas is just one part of this armament business.  His ridiculous reasoning and equally extreme solutions highlights his power when the government officials accept his proposal. On the flip side of his offensive miasmas, is his plan for a Great National Medicament to treat the mentally exhausted. Philox Lorris’ plan is to have the duo combination funded together through public finances so that the population can be healthy and even more productive.
The Difference Engine, Morlock Night and Electric Life are not representative of all steampunk ideals. There are a huge variety of steampunk literature that does not specifically reflect all the themes of industrialization. However, each of the three is an important novel in the development of steampunk. The Difference Engine brought expertise of cyberpunk into the field of steampunk. Morlock Night was one a series of books that formed the foundation of the genre. Electric Life demonstrated that visions of a steam future from the past could easily coincide with genre. Therefore comparisons and analysis of the novels provide a fruitful discussion about the vision of steampunk.
Steampunk Culture and Modern Times
In the 21st century still suffers from many of the same problems of the 19th century industrialization. With the mass number of hard labor jobs exported over seas, workers now suffer from new issues of underemployment and seasonal employment. The white-collar jobs of the present rely increasingly on college education. However with rapidly climbing costs of tuition, the college degree remains out of reach for many. Even those that do get degrees find themselves working at low end retail or service jobs with little chance of promotion. In conjunction with these issues are rising costs of life in general with ever increasing inflation. With computer automation, the number of professions facing a squeeze will increase each year. As the machines get better at performing tasks that humans once performed, unemployment will rise. Large corporations are better able to weather the storm of economic difficulties that would sink smaller businesses. Being better versed in the legal loopholes of the system, large multinational companies will devour the smaller businesses. The environment continues to be a concern with global climate change appearing to be a guaranteed threat in the near future. On top of it all are social issues that society has never completely solved. The idea of nations has formed a permanent barrier to true globalization. The “us versus them” mentality remains ever strong with nationalism and racism still present. Females continue to find difficulty reaching the fabled land of equality and gender bias is still rampant in culture. The troubles of the past have not vanished. Rather they have morphed into new forms.
Steampunk culture and its placement of 19th century styles and anachronisms help to highlight this notion of continual issues of industrialization. For even the cultural standards of the movement are shifting and undefined. Some visions of steampunk veer towards the political realm of class warfare. Other depictions prefer to focus on the rosier aspects of 19th century life. There are three specific relationships that steampunk challenges: people to technology, people to gender, and people to race.
Steampunk places the technology of the past on a higher pedestal in hopes of imagining an alternate world without present day technologies. Achievements of the period are trumped up in honor of the era. The steam engine is preferred over the combustion engine as a matter of genre. The wired telegram is present more than the telephone. This desire for past technologies fits in line with why steampunk art is based on recycled or simple metallic materials. Plastics and their ilk are nowhere in sight. There is even perhaps a sense of disillusionment against the new shiny, silicone computers and phones.
The stance of technology from the literature is even less clear. The Difference Engine is literally named after a prototype computer. This prototype computer is at the center of the entire plot. Another technology that makes an appearance is the Zephyr, a newly developed steam car by Mr. Michael Godwin and Tom Mallory. However, we can see that the new technologies are heavily influenced by steam and antiquity. The difference engine is an enormous, large, and complicated machine with perforated card stacks for memory instead of silicone chips. The Zephyr with its aerodynamic body is still powered by a steam engine that requires coal. In fact, the authors appear to criticize the advanced enlightenment of the era when Dr. McNeile says that the idea that “cholera is nothing more than the contamination water,” is utter rubbish.  From our position in the present we do know that cholera is caused by fecal contamination of water. Morlock Night places the whole technological rhetoric of steam engines to the side in preference of a more fantasy like tale. Except for the submarine, which is introduced as quickly as it vanishes, there is barely any technology brought into the picture. Electric Life praises the new developed technologies of the television and phonograph, but does so an overly exaggerated manner.
Women suffer from a two different type of stereotypical portrayals: the rough, can do women, and the frail, petite lady. The clash is between one of reimagining the era to promote gender equality and one of staying as close as possible to the “realities” of the period. In some cases, the women are leaders of their group and play important role in society. In others, women faint from the simplest overstimulation of their nerves. There is a distinct danger of what Amanda Stock calls “geek misogyny.”  Here steampunk is casted as perhaps a “retrosexual” movement where males crave a desire to return to an era where gender differentiation was clearer.  On the other hand, steampunk promotes gender equality through the characterization and fashion of its women. Women are depicted as clever and daring, capable of getting their way. At the same time, the once oppressive corset is redesigned to be liberating. Similar to how a symbol of oppression is reversed to become a symbol of liberation, the corset provides the taste of 19th aesthetic at the same time it promotes gender equality. Thus, the movement can be seen as splitting both ways.
The literature mentioned thus far feature strong women, but there are weak women on the sidelines. Sybil Gerard is a prostitute, but manages to slip out through to Paris with her skill. Equally strong are Ada Byron and Russell Bartlett. Ada breaks from the norm by being a mathematical genius and Bartlett breaks from the norm by being a capable warrior and orator. However, on the sidelines we have other women characters that appear to be living up to the Victorian standards. Harriet Edwardes is characterized as a chatty prostitute who loves to indulge in gossip.  She also is skilled in trying to worm money out of her clients, evident when she attempts to blackmail Edwin into revisiting her. From the outside perspective, there could be an argument that Harriet is a woman using the power of her feminine wiles. However, she could very easily be seen here as the Victorian image of a dirty whore trying to honey trap an upstanding gentlemen. Estelle Lacombe from Electric Life is a perfect example of a timid and frail woman. She panics easily when taking examinations and fears confrontation with other individuals. Her life is made better by her marriage to the noble George Lorris who provides her a sense of confidence. Just focusing on the Estelle alone would generate the incorrect explanation of Robida being a promoter of Victorian morals. The rest of his story is littered with smart scientific women achieving just as much as men do. The steampunk literary genre caters to both the promotion of gender equality as well as the preconceived notions of Victorian feminine morality.
The empire looms large above all steampunk stories, as the era was one of imperialism and colonialism. For this reason, praise of the empire appears to occur more often in stories than criticisms. Many argue that the recreation of the empire image in steampunk “revises history to account for the offences of the Victorian era.”  Indeed one of the main reasons steampunk appeals to audiences is because “we admire the pomp and spirit of the globe trotting Victorians.”  However, this raises issues about whether steampunk’s recreation of the empire is done out of introspection or imperialist nostalgia. If present, how does steampunk address racial tension resulting from empire difficulties?
In literature, racial tension is generally ignored, as the focus is on the great Anglo-Saxon people, not the colonized. Morlock Night completely leaves out any trace of racial issues by focusing mostly on the fantasy element of the story. Electric Life addresses the other racial groups briefly to make a point about the condition of society. In future Paris, the people of “modern” society are so enervated by mental strain that they are crippled. This disability is passed down genetically and creates subsequently weaker people. To combat this degeneration, scientists crossbreed more intelligent people to “sturdy country girls” or “coarse negro street porters.”  The proposal of miscegenation serves as an example of how absurd the country has become and is supposed to heighten the readers’ horror of the situation.
The Difference Engine takes racial issues a little more seriously in the context of empire. Edwin Mallory recalls his gun running experience in Wyoming dealing with the Indian savages. His description of them as “a wilder breed” links back to the developing idea of eugenics with its hope of creating the perfect master race.  Further references of the Native Americans are filled with negative connotations, for they are seen as uncivilized people. On the other hand, Asians, especially the Japanese, are shown as graceful and polite people. Edwin Mallory’s first meeting with the Japanese leaves him “utterly at sea” as he is unaccustomed to their habit of bowing.  Mr. Oliphant thinks quite highly of Japan as he remarks, “Japan is the Britain of Asia.”  His opinion matches with that of Edwin Mallory’s brother, Brian Mallory. After returning from his tour of duty in India, Brian remarks, “there’s only one folk in Asia with any sense, and that’s the Japanese.”  This praise of Japan reflects a positive view of imperialism, as later on Japan will copy the British in gaining its own colonies. On the topic of Africans, the book appears to take pride in Britain’s abolitionist stance. During Edwin’s discussion with the marquis, the marquis decrys how “so many Britons” are “anti-slavery bigots.”  Edwin then proceeds to take note that he “was in fact an abolitionist and supporter of Negro repatriation.”  The British could confidently support the African freedom movement because their economy was not heavily invested in slave labor. Thus, they could wax on about morality and inherit rights. However, when a rebellion comes against the empire, such as the sepoy revolt, the dialogue shifts to a pro-Britannia stance.
Steampunk literature and culture reflect the modern society with its ambiguity over the industrialization, gender, and race. Views towards promoting anachronistic technologies reflect a sense of nostalgia. This nostalgia moves in line with “retroactive” chauvinism and a desire to see the genders roles clearly separated. Yet other steam punkers advocate gender equality through the empowerment of women in their works. The same ambiguity plays out with the discussion about the role of race in steampunk. Victorian era Britain was an empire with colonies across the globe aptly summed up by the phrase, “the sun never sets on the British empire.” From this triumphalist narrative arose, empire worshipping, which is always present in steampunk culture and literature. Steampunk is a flexible culture that shifts and changes to match the users wishes and desires.