Substantive 2/Frontier Mentality

I should preface this by saying that while I will not give The Moon the title of "my favorite book" it does carry the title of "my favorite book by my favorite author" Although the libertarian revolution is the most obvious topic of discussion for the piece, I prefer another set of ideas explored in the novel--the ideas of Space as the next frontier and the ideal of the frontier mindset.

While many other social science aspects of his books change, Heinlein constantly emphasizes the importance of humanity venturing beyond our planet. One of the ways he does this is by idealizing and giving superiority to the frontier mindset. Moon is no exception to this trend. The loonies, the ideal characters of this book, are characterized by their rugged cowboy/homesteader/49er individualism and dedication to hard work. He makes it quite clear that taking care of oneself should be your biggest concern. The one thing that never seems to quite fit with this mindset is the idea of a linear marriage, the existence of such highly complex and communal family units would seem to indicate a more social and communal state of living among the loonies as a whole, yet they are quite indiendent.

The revolution is quite interesting as well. I find the untility of mike to be especially interesting. Mike makes revolution infinitely simpler fro the loonies--his ability to control every aspect of life on the moon begs the rather dipressing question; would the loonies have been able to revolt at all?