According to the article in this week's Boston Phoenix, some Steampunk'rs see us as already living in the dystopian future of the science fiction novels and movies that inspire their aesthetic.

You know, a dystopian future where the cost of basic necessities for living skyrockets, where the gap between rich and poor reaches ridiculous proportions, where entire classes of people are suddenly declared illegal, rounded up, placed into camps, deported to countries they fled, or otherwise thrown into dehumanizing, life-threatening situations.

And still the sun shines, the electricity works, the water flows. I must be one of those women in a pleasure garden on the roof of a skyscraper. While my sisters and brothers sweat and skimp and starve and suffer.