Editing Starship Troopers (section)

===Race and gender===
Authors and commentators have stated that the manner in which the extraterrestrial beings are portrayed in ''Starship Troopers'' has [[Racism|racist]] aspects, arguing that the nicknames "Bugs" and "Skinnies" carry racial overtones. [[John Brunner (author)|John Brunner]] compared them to calling Koreans "[[gook]]s".<ref name=Brunner/> Slusser argued that the term "Bugs" was an "abusive and biologically inaccurate" word that justified the violence against alien beings, a tendency which, according to Slusser, the book shared with other commercially successful science fiction.<ref name=Cooke>{{cite encyclopedia|editor-last1=Slusser|editor-first1=George E.|editor-last2=Rabkin|editor-first2=Eric S.|last3=Cooke|first3=Leighton Brett|title=The Human Alien: In-Groups and Outbreeding in Enemy Mine|encyclopedia=Aliens The Anthropology of Science Fiction|date=1987|publisher=Southern Illinois University Press|location=Carbondale, Illinois, US|isbn=0-8093-1375-8|pages=[https://archive.org/details/aliensanthropolo00slus_0/page/132 132–137]|url=https://archive.org/details/aliensanthropolo00slus_0/page/132}}</ref>

Some of Heinlein's other works have also been described as racist, though Franklin argues that this was not unique to Heinlein, and that he was less racist than the US government of the time.{{sfn|Franklin|1980|p=51}} Heinlein's early novel ''[[Sixth Column]]'' was called a "racist paean" to a white resistance movement against an Asian horde derived from the [[Yellow Peril]].{{sfn|Suvin|2008|p=125}} In 1978, Moorcock wrote that ''Starship Troopers'' "set the pattern for Heinlein's more ambitious paternalistic, xenophobic" stories.<ref name=Moorcock/> Robert Lowndes argues that the war between the Terrans and the Arachnids is not about a quest for racial purity, but rather an extension of Heinlein's belief that man is a wild animal. According to this theory, if man lacks a [[moral compass]] beyond the will to survive, and he was confronted by another species with a similar lack of morality, then the only possible moral result would be warfare.<ref name=Lowndes/>

The fact that all pilots in the novel are women (in contrast to the infantry, which is entirely male) has been cited as evidence of progressive gender politics within the story, although the idea expressed by Rico that women are the motivation for men to fight in the military is a counter-example to this.<ref name="JW"/>{{sfn|Booker|Thomas|2009|p=221}} A 1996 science fiction encyclopedia said that like much of Heinlein's fiction, ''Starship Troopers'' exemplified "macho male culture".<ref>{{cite book|last1=Tymn|first1=Marshall B.|title=The Science Fiction Reference Book|date=1981|publisher=Starmont House|location=[[Mercer Island]], Washington, US|isbn=0-916732-49-5|page=[https://archive.org/details/sciencefictionre0000unse/page/332 332]|url=https://archive.org/details/sciencefictionre0000unse/page/332}}</ref> The prosthetically enhanced soldiers in the novel, all of whom are men, have been described as an example of the "hyper-masculinity" brought on by the proximity of these men to technology.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia|editor-last1=James|editor-first1=Edward|editor-first2=Farah|editor-last2=Mendlesohn|encyclopedia=The Cambridge Companion to Science Fiction|publisher=Cambridge University Press|year=2003|title=Gender in science fiction|first=Helen|last=Merrick|page=246|location=Cambridge, UK|isbn=978-0-521-01657-5}}</ref> The story portrays the Arachnids as so alien that the only response to them can be war. Feminist scholars have described this reaction as a "conventionally masculinist" one.{{sfn|Hollinger|2003|p=132}} Steffen Hantke has described the mechanized suits in the novel, which make the wearer resemble a "steel gorilla," as defining masculinity as "something intensely physical, based on animal power, instinct, and aggression". He calls this form of masculinity "all body, so to speak, and no brain".{{sfn|Hantke|1998|p=498}} Thus, in Hantke's reading, ''Starship Troopers'' expresses fears of how masculinity may be preserved in an environment of high technology.{{sfn|Hantke|1998|p=502}} This fear is exacerbated by the motifs of pregnancy and birth that Heinlein uses when describing how the soldiers in suits are dropped from spaceships piloted by women.{{sfn|Hantke|1998|pp=499–501}} Though Rico says he finds women "marvelous", he shows no desire for sexual activity; the war seems to have subsumed sex in this respect.<ref name="Magill"/> A 1979 summary argued that despite the gestures towards women's equality, women in the story were still objects, to be protected, and to fight wars over.<ref name="Magill"/>