Heads up, writer and readers alike – post-cyberpunk webzine The Future Fire has just started reading submissions for an issue dedicated to feminist science fiction, which will be published some time around the turn of the year. From their editorial:

An old slogan defines feminism as “the radical idea that women are human beings”. This is an important statement, the more so because it has to be explained in what sense this idea is radical. If we merely said that “women are human beings,” nobody would disagree; it’s an easy platitude. But that isn’t enough: feminism is the recognition that true equality, true freedom for both sexes requires the more radical idea that full human rights still need to be fought for. The rights of women are up there with the rights of minority religions, the rights of disadvantaged ethnicities, the rights of the poor, the rights of queer and transexual and polyamorous people, the rights of unbelievers, the rights of those who disagree with you. And the rights of men. And they all need to be fought for. (Just see the recent “Race Fail” controversy to see how wide some of the misunderstandings still are.)

Partly as a result of these thoughts, and partly because it’s something that has always been close to our hearts, we have decided to run a themed “feminist science fiction” issue of TFF toward the end of this year or the beginning of 2010 (as long as it takes us to acquire the requisite number of stories). By “feminist” we do not mean stories necessarily written by women or featuring female protagonists; what we are interested in are science fiction (or speculative) stories that address issues of gender, sexual identity and sexuality; stories that take the “radical idea” and do something about it; stories that can engage, empower, educate, and inspire men and women alike. And of course stories that challenge our expectations, that avoid cliché, that are beautiful and useful, that are social, political, and speculative cyberfiction.

Be sure to check out The Future Fire‘s regular submission guidelines before sending anything off… but otherwise, break a leg! TFF picks some pretty strong stories at the best of times, so this should turn out to be an issue of considerable interest. [via Feminist-SF]