Category: Uncategorized

Never retreat, never apologize

Brad Torgersen
Correia also likes women. We’re not sure about Scalzi on that count. If you know what I mean.

John Scalzi ‏@scalzi
Brad Torgersen attempts to insult me by implying I’m gay; I respond. He attempts an apology; I respond to that too.

Does no one listen or learn? Never, EVER apologize to SJWs! Case in point: “The apology was worse than the ini­tial attempted slur — it rein­forced
the fact that Torg­ersen thinks calling someone gay is a slur.”

I repeat. NEVER APOLOGIZE TO SJWs. They will see it as fear, take the apology, and use it as a club with which to beat you. Never back down to them, never retreat, never apologize.Notice that this was all posted AFTER Torgersen apologized to Scalzi.

    Hur hur, homophobia’s a gas when you’re a Sad Puppy!
    — John Scalzi (@scalzi) May 4, 2015

    Again: I’m mostly sad for the Sad Puppies. So much insecurity and envy and anger and need. For their own sakes, I wish they were happy.
    — John Scalzi (@scalzi) May 4, 2015

    Note that my pity for the Sad Puppies doesn’t preclude me pointing out they are assholes. And that they’ve made the active choice to be so.
    — John Scalzi (@scalzi) May 4, 2015

    Also, if I DID like men more than women, so what? That would be a perfectly good thing, nor would I be the slightest bit ashamed of it.
    — John Scalzi (@scalzi) May 4, 2015

    If Brad Torgersen wants to insult me, insinuating I’m gay won’t work. It’s not an insult to be gay. Be an insult to be a Sad Puppy, however.
    — John Scalzi (@scalzi) May 4, 2015

If it’s not an insult to be gay, then why is McRapey acting as if it is an insult? And how has Brad Torgersen damaged his potentially promising career by not insulting someone?

mintwitch ‏@mintwitch
Brad is just… so sad. He’s completely lost his grip, and unfortunately probably damaged a potentially promising career.

John Scalzi ‏@scalzi
If he has, I suspect he will attribute it to his politics rather than his personal behavior.

So, just a single insult of the wrong individual is sufficient to damage a promising career. That’s fascinating, in light of how we have been repeatedly assured that there isn’t any cabal or conspiracy or collection of people who will attempt to torpedo your career in science fiction over mere differences of opinion. After all, was it not Orson Scott Card’s personal behavior to which the SJWs objected when they attacked the Ender’s Game movie?

Was it not my personal behavior to which they objected when they attacked me on the basis of a syndicated op/ed column?

In the meantime, AN EDUCATIONAL DIALOGUE from the Evil Legion of Evil:

John Scalzi: “I’d rather like men than to be a Sad Puppy.”

Minion 189: “What do you mean when you say ‘like men’? Do you mean in the manner of owing someone a big favor in the Ground Forces?

John Scalzi: “Um, yeah.”

Big Gay Steve: “This can be arranged. I know a guy.”

John Scalzi: “SQUEEEE!”

The End

I don’t know about you, but I find it somewhat surprising that McRapey would publicly express a preference for being sodomized to seeing the likes of Jim Butcher or John C. Wright win a Hugo Award. It’s not exactly what you’d call a binary option.

Three centuries strong

As Supreme Dark Lord of the Evil Legion of Evil, we are pleased to declare that Malwyn, Whore-Mistress of the Spiked Six-Whip, has reported that she has completed the initial Branding of the Minions. She has now gone to take a well-deserved vacation in one of the more secluded lava pits in our Realm of Deepest Shadow, where she will no doubt be nursing her aching wrists and filing for overtime as well as worker’s compensation. 

Speaking of which… don’t bite next time, 331. That being said, we are, in our Evil Pleasure, now willing to entertain questions from our newly minted Minions, still Vile and Faceless, but no longer Numberless.

“Supreme Dark Lord, it would be an honor to become a minion of the Evil Legion of Evil.”

Naturally. An honor few truly merit, and yet, in Our Dark Grace, we are kind. I think I shall call you… 185.

“What are we supposed to call you?”

Supreme Dark Lord. Although we may be addressed as either “Your Malevolence” or “Shadow of Shadows”.

“How many of us are there?”

335 as of this morning. We are reliably informed that the Master of the Hunt is going to have to send out the Hellhounds twice a day to catch enough SJWs to feed you all once a week. Fortunately, Tor Books has just remaindered a good quantity of necrobestials he can use to bait the traps.

“Your Malevolence, if you or Malwyn are accepting ideas for gear, I would buy a pair of
steel-toed, black leather jackboots with the “Evil Legion of Evil” logo
on the side, and “Dread Ilk” embossed backwards across the front of the
toe.  I’m not made of money, but I would shell out upwards of $500 for
them.”

We refer you to Nero, the Fabulously Evil Style Consultant to the Legion. Despite our Dark Splendour, we are disinclined to concern ourselves with matters sartorial, preferring to focus Our Dark Genius on matters both strategic and sadistic.

“Is the Evil Legion of Evil really evil?”

Let us put it this way. A bona fide Harkonnen is Minion Nr. 250. How evil is THAT?

“Shadow of Shadows, can we use our number here?”

The measure of the depths of my total indifference can only be grasped by contemplating the outer limits of SJW deceit. That being said, it appears the favored usage is “name (#)”. Violators will be handed over to the Grand Strategikon for his ongoing experiments in crucifixion variants.

 “The Evil Legion of Evil is the best thing to happen to fandom in a long
time. I look forward to the final, high-casualty, low-survival,
apocalyptic battle of Total Doom with the wretched SJW hordes, and the
post-slaughter bbq & bourbon.”

Isn’t it though? SJWs make good eating. It’s the auto-forcefeeding that makes them so nice and plump. We find we prefer orientationally-challenged female SJWs for Our Dark Table, as they always have such a lovely hint of Doritos flavoring to them.

“Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Vox Day Italia wgah-nagl fhtagn!”

Gesundheit. Alas, Our Many-Tentacled Cousin (by adoption) appears likely to miss the party this year, as we are told he slumbers on beneath the ice, dreaming of wrong-angled R’lyah.

In Certainty of the Dawnless Day on which the Shadow Shall Embrace All,

Vox Day
Supreme Dark Lord
Evil Legion of Evil

The limits of vaccines

Tetyana Obukhanych, PhD, writes an open letter to the California legislature that is foolishly, and unconstitutionally, considering putting an end to all legal vaccine exemptions:

Dear Legislator:

My name is Tetyana Obukhanych. I hold a PhD in Immunology. I am writing this letter in the hope that it will correct several common misperceptions about vaccines in order to help you formulate a fair and balanced understanding that is supported by accepted vaccine theory and new scientific findings.

Do unvaccinated children pose a higher threat to the public than the vaccinated?

It is often stated that those who choose not to vaccinate their children for reasons of conscience endanger the rest of the public, and this is the rationale behind most of the legislation to end vaccine exemptions currently being considered by federal and state legislators country-wide. You should be aware that the nature of protection afforded by many modern vaccines – and that includes most of the vaccines recommended by the CDC for children – is not consistent with such a statement. I have outlined below the recommended vaccines that cannot prevent transmission of disease either because they are not designed to prevent the transmission of infection (rather, they are intended to prevent disease symptoms), or because they are for non-communicable diseases. People who have not received the vaccines mentioned below pose no higher threat to the general public than those who have, implying that discrimination against non-immunized children in a public school setting may not be warranted.

How often do serious vaccine adverse events happen?

It is often stated that vaccination rarely leads to serious adverse
events. Unfortunately, this statement is not supported by science. A
recent study done in Ontario, Canada, established that vaccination
actually leads to an emergency room visit for 1 in 168 children
following their 12-month vaccination appointment and for 1 in 730
children following their 18-month vaccination appointment (see appendix
for a scientific study, Item #5).

When the risk of an adverse event requiring an ER visit after
well-baby vaccinations is demonstrably so high, vaccination must remain a
choice for parents, who may understandably be unwilling to assume this
immediate risk in order to protect their children from diseases that are
generally considered mild or that their children may never be exposed
to.

In summary: 1) due to the properties of modern vaccines,
non-vaccinated individuals pose no greater risk of transmission of
polio, diphtheria, pertussis, and numerous non-type b H. influenzae
strains than vaccinated individuals do, non-vaccinated individuals pose
virtually no danger of transmission of hepatitis B in a school setting,
and tetanus is not transmissible at all; 2) there is a significantly
elevated risk of emergency room visits after childhood vaccination
appointments attesting that vaccination is not risk-free; 3) outbreaks
of measles cannot be entirely prevented even if we had nearly perfect
vaccination compliance; and 4) an effective method of preventing measles
and other viral diseases in vaccine-ineligible infants and the
immunocompromised, immunoglobulin, is available for those who may be
exposed to these diseases.

Taken together, these four facts make it clear that discrimination in
a public school setting against children who are not vaccinated for
reasons of conscience is completely unwarranted as the vaccine status of
conscientious objectors poses no undue public health risk. 

Unlike most vaccine advocates, who invariably point to irrelevant historical statistics that a) preceded the introduction of vaccines and b) involve vaccines that are very different than the vaccines now administered today, most vaccine skeptics pay close attention to the actual vaccines and vaccine schedules that are presently relevant today. If you’re not reasonably up to date on either when the various vaccines were first introduced or the historical and current death rates, I would advise that you get yourself up to speed before leaping in and saying something both stupid and easily disproved.

And it is important to be up to speed before trying to discuss the subject, because as Dr. Obukhanych observes, the vaccines that are being given today are not the same vaccines that helped wipe out the last vestiges of the various communicable diseases that had already declined dramatically as a result of improved sewage and health care systems.

Furthermore, there is very good reason to doubt the linear efficacy of vaccines that is commonly assumed due to the presence of the 5 percent of the population who are low-vaccine responders. If one factors in the additional percent of the population that is vaccine-sensitive, which is presently unknown but is unlikely to be any smaller than the low-vaccine responder population, somewhere between 5 and 15 percent of the population are simply never going to fit the “one size fits all approach”, which means that any law that would impose such a draconian vaccine regime on the general population is unconscionable, guaranteed to cause more harm than it prevents, and certain to fail in its stated objectives.

But even if one sets aside the science and the history of vaccines, one doesn’t need to be against vaccines or even to question the idea of their unmitigated beneficence in order to strongly oppose the idea of the government universally and forcibly dictating the injection of substances for which there is no legal liability by people for whom there is no legal accountability, without consent or even parental consent, into every single infant in the nation.

And the fact is that vaccines are not an unmitigated good. Like most things, they come with costs and benefits. It is foolish, even criminal, to attempt to set public policy without taking the downside aspects into account as well as the upside ones.

Furthermore, the scare tactics of vaccine advocates are based on absolute and utter absurdities that require complete ignorance of the historical facts to take seriously. Even in a completely
unvaccinated scenario with 90 percent infection rates that assumes
absolutely no improvement in health care in 55 years, we’re talking
about 450 deaths per year.  Realistically, we’re probably talking around
200, given the advancements in medical technology. THAT is what all the
pro-vaccine scaremongers are going on about. Americans would do far better
to ban bicycles, as they would save three times more lives per year.

383,542: Automobile deaths in last 10 years
6,770: Bicycle deaths in last 10 years
0: Measles deaths in last 10 years

As it happens, since 2003, 108 more Americans have died from reactions to the measles vaccine than have died from measles. Vaccine apologists like to claim that anti-vaxxers “have blood on their hands” due to hypothetical deaths that could theoretically occur as a result of imagined transmissions of communicable diseases that haven’t actually taken place, but the fact is that they have real blood from actual deaths on their own.

Anti-GamerGate bomb threat

Fortunately for the world, I can assure everyone that the 8th Wonder of the World, Nero’s hair, is safe:

The
event began at 9:30 pm and the local bar appeared to be having a good
time until approximately 11:30 pm when the local police received a
report from an unknown source about a bomb threat at Local 16. The
threat was made over Twitter according to the local police station. This
led to an evacuation, which took place at approximately a quarter after
midnight. Sources at the location that left prior to the evacuation say
there was no knowledge of the threat prior to their departure at about
11:45 pm.

The whole affair was initially run as a fire drill, and everyone was
able to get out without much issue, allowing the police to search the
premises afterwards. By all accounts and video footage, the people were
all calm about the events as it was on going.

After the investigation was done, everyone was allowed back into the
bar and, according to people at the event, there were several free
rounds. There is no information on who made the threat, and anyone calling
for investigations of particular people are being premature at this
moment in time.

This was the threat, which someone promptly archived:

I have multiple bombs planted around the area #GGinDC is being held in. If #GGinDC is not evacuated within the next hour, it will detonate.  

A number of people seem to think Arthur Chu was somehow involved, but I find it difficult to believe that he could be that stupid.

Noam Chomsky bitchslaps Sam Harris

I told you Sam Harris wasn’t more than a high midwit. It should have been readily apparent to everyone after my dissection of his reliable sloppiness in The Irrational Atheist. But if it wasn’t then, it certainly is now, as Noam Chomsky demonstrates the difference between a wannabe and an actual intellectual:

April 27, 2015
From: Noam Chomsky
To: Sam Harris

I am sorry you are unwilling to retract your false claim that I “ignore the moral significance of intentions.” Of course I did, as you know.  Also, I gave the appropriate answer, which applies accurately to you in the al-Shifa case, the very case in question.

If you had read further before launching your accusations, the usual procedure in work intended to be serious, you would have discovered that I also reviewed the substantial evidence about the very sincere intentions of Japanese fascists while they were devastating China, Hitler in the Sudetenland and Poland, etc.  There is at least as much reason to suppose that they were sincere as Clinton was when he bombed al-Shifa.  Much more so in fact.  Therefore, if you believe what you are saying, you should be justifying their actions as well.  I also reviewed other cases, pointing out that professing benign intentions is the norm for those who carry out atrocities and crimes, perhaps sincerely – and surely more plausibly than in this case.  And that only the most abject apologists justify the actions on the grounds that perpetrators are adopting the normal stance of criminals.

I am also sorry that you evade the fact that your charge of “moral equivalence” was flatly false, as you know.

And in particular, I am sorry to see your total refusal to respond to the question raised at the outset of the piece you quoted.  The scenario you describe here is, I’m afraid, so ludicrous as to be embarrassing.  It hasn’t even the remotest relation to Clinton’s decision to bomb al-Shifa – not because they had suddenly discovered anything remotely like what you fantasize here, or for that matter any credible evidence at all, and by sheer coincidence, immediately after the Embassy bombings for which it was retaliation, as widely acknowledged.  That is truly scandalous.

And of course they knew that there would be major casualties.  They are not imbeciles, but rather adopt a stance that is arguably even more immoral than purposeful killing, which at least recognizes the human status of the victims, not just killing ants while walking down the street, who cares?

In fact, as you would know if you deigned to read before launching accusations, they were informed at once by Kenneth Roth of HRW about the impending humanitarian catastrophe, already underway.  And of course they had far more information available than HRW did.

Your own moral stance is revealed even further by your complete lack of concern about the apparently huge casualties and the refusal even to investigate them.

As for Clinton and associates being “genuine humanitarians,” perhaps that explains why they were imposing sanctions on Iraq so murderous that both of the highly respected international diplomats who administered the “Oil for food” program resigned in protest because they regarded them as “genocidal,” condemning Clinton for blocking testimony at the UN Security Council.  Or why he poured arms into Turkey as it was carrying out a horrendous attack on its Kurdish population, one of the worst crimes of the ‘90s.  Or why he shifted Turkey from leading recipient of arms worldwide (Israel-Egypt excepted) to Colombia, as soon as the Turkish atrocities achieved their goal and while Colombia was leading the hemisphere by far in atrocious human rights violations.  Or why he authorized the Texaco Oil Company to provide oil to the murderous Haitian junta in violation of sanctions.  And on, and on, as you could learn if you bothered to read before launching accusations and professing to talk about “ethics” and “morality.”

I’ve seen apologetics for atrocities before, but rarely at this level – not to speak of the refusal to withdraw false charges, a minor fault in comparison.

Since you profess to be concerned about “God-intoxicated sociopaths,” perhaps you can refer me to your condemnation of the perpetrator of by far the worst crime of this millennium because God had instructed him that he must smite the enemy.

No point wasting time on your unwillingness to respond to my request that you “reciprocate by referring me to what I have written citing your published views.  If there is anything I’ve written that is remotely as erroneous as this – putting aside moral judgments – I’ll be happy to correct it.”

Plainly there is no point pretending to have a rational discussion.  But I do think you would do your readers a favor if you presented your tale about why Clinton bombed al-Shifa and his grand humanitarianism.  That is surely the least you can do, given your refusal to withdraw what you know to be completely false charges and a display of moral and ethical righteousness.

Harris is a completely inept debater. This is a bit more drawn-out than the norm, but it completely fits the way his debates almost invariably proceed

  1. Harris states something.
  2. Opponent presents obvious problem with Harris’s statement.
  3. Harris claims that is not the correct way to read his statement.
  4. Opponent presents historical quote from Harris proving that it is the correct way to read his statement.
  5. Harris claims that the quote is not being interpreted properly.

Either Sam Harris is the worst and most unclear writer in the history of the written word or he is an inept and intellectually dishonest interlocutor. I leave it to the reader to decide which of these two possibilities is, in fact, the case. But it should come as no surprise than an Irrational Atheist should be unable to have a rational discussion.

Patience is a strategic virtue

An informative dialogue between members of the Dread Ilk:

Ticticboom: “Larry Correia and Brad Torgensen have mentioned that most of their
interactions with Vox have been asking him not to burn the Hugos down.
What the SJWs don’t realize is how downright forgiving and tolerant Vox
is compared to what they think of as his followers.”

Vile Faceless Minion 156: “Agreed. When I see interviews where the left twists Vox’s (or another truthteller’s) words, calls names and basically spit on those I appreciate for standing up for Western Civilization… I feel blinding rage and a desire to destroy. Vox shrugs and presses onwards. I don’t understand this calm moderation and cannot maintain it.”

I feel flashes of emotional reaction just like anyone else. I know what it is like to feel the blinding rage and harbor the intense desire to destroy. The difference is that I spent six years in a very hard school learning not to trust such feelings or to give into them. In the martial arts, when you react emotionally, when you throw caution to the wind, you pay for it, and you often pay for it in pain.

The best, fastest, hardest kick I ever threw in my life was in my fifth year, when I was sparring my sensei one afternoon. We were going at it hard and fast. I was holding nothing back and he was probably going about 90 percent. He feinted with a left jab, then pulled back-and-up as he often did; reading it correctly, I moved in and launched a skipping front sidekick that would have taken a lesser fighter’s head off. I mean, it was a rocket! I had him absolutely dead to rights and I knew it.

But somehow, he managed to lift his head up and turn it so that my heel barely brushed the side of his chin. He ducked and leaped sideways to safety before I could follow it up, smiled broadly, and said, “Now THAT was close. But not close enough!”

I completely lost it. It was maddening. I couldn’t BELIEVE that I’d read him perfectly, timed him perfectly, threw the perfect kick, and STILL didn’t catch the bastard cleanly. I went after him hard with my hands, he retreated, blocking everything, until finally, in frustration, I literally leaped at him and threw a haymaker at his head. This was insanely stupid, and in five years I’d never made such an unmitigated error before, but I was seeing red. My sensei told me later that he had so much time, and I’d left myself so open by leaving my feet and extending myself, that he actually had time to think “I cannot believe he did that” as he ducked under the wild punch and came up and across with a rear-hand shot to the body, which in combination with my forward momentum hit me so hard that it not only knocked the wind out of me, it actually lifted me higher off the ground on his fist.

I was lucky that I didn’t rupture anything. I’ve been knocked out and I’ve had bones broken, but that was the hardest anyone has ever hit me. I went down in what we called the full “armadillo” and stayed down. Getting up was not an option;  I couldn’t breathe and I couldn’t even roll over onto my back. It felt like I’d been hit by a charging bull. My abdomen was bruised for days and if he’d hit me just a few inches to the left, I’d have had several broken ribs.

In light of that experience, consider the completely unsurprising news that Floyd Mayweather not only won last night, but won rather easily against a very highly-regarded fighter.

Floyd Mayweather Jr. spent Saturday night doing — for the most part
— what he’s done in the vast majority of his championship bouts over
the last decade. He fought strategically. He landed counterpunchers. He held to offset rallies. The significance of this one was that the opponent was Manny Pacquiao. In
a welterweight bout that’s seemingly been a generation in the making,
Mayweather controlled the action in mid ring, eluded prolonged damage
along the ropes and worked his way to a unanimous decision that earned
him the WBO welterweight title to go along with the WBA and WBC belts he
arrived with. The win boosted him to 48-0 as a pro in a 19-year career. Pacquiao is 57-6-2.

“He fought strategically.” That’s the significant quote here. Now let’s look at how fighting strategically applies to the Hugo 2015 situation. We know, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that the SJWs are going to vote No Award on most of the Puppy-recommended works. Some will claim to have read them all, some will proudly proclaim that they have read none, others will pretend to genuinely believe that there is not a single award-worthy work in the lot, and a few particularly foolish ones will even convince themselves they believe as much. That’s fine, we all know what their opinions are worth as the list of past winners are well-documented. The only relevant point is that they are going to do it.

So why shouldn’t we join them? Why not pour on the gasoline as they run around shrieking and lighting matches? After all, getting things nominated that the other side would No Award, then turning around and joining them to ensure no awards were given out was my original idea, which I set aside in favor of SP3 and Brad Torgersen’s ultimately futile attempt to save the Hugos from the SJWs. The reason to abandon this original objective now that it is firmly in our grasp is that the situation has developed in ways that I did not fully anticipate, thereby indicating a strategic adjustment. Why settle for burning Munich when Berlin may be within reach, especially if the munchkins are promising to burn Munich for us as we advance? Jeff Duntemann’s summary to which Mike Glyer directed our attention yesterday is informative in this regard.

It’s something like a sociological law: Commotion attracts attention.
Attention is unpredictable, because it reaches friend and foe alike. It
can go your way, or it can go the other way. There’s no way to control
the polarity of adverse attention. The only way to limit adverse
attention is to stop the commotion.

In other words, just shut up.

I know, this is difficult. For some psychologies, hate is delicious
to the point of being psychological crack, so it’s hard to just lecture
them on the fact that hate has consequences, including but hardly
limited to adverse attention.

My conclusion is this: The opponents of Sad Puppies 3 put them on the map,
and probably took them from a fluke to a viable long-term institution. I
don’t think this is what the APs intended. In the wake of the April 4
announcement of the final Hugo ballot, I’d guess the opposition has
generated several hundred kilostreisands of adverse attention, and the
numbers will continue to increase.

In other words, thanks to the SJW overreaction, our capabilities may now permit us to accomplish more than we had reasonably believed possible at the start. Brad wanted to do something that was always impossible because the SJWs are much more poisonous than he naively believed them to be. I was not surprised by their nature (which is why I was always dubious about the SP3 goal), but I was surprised by how astonishingly stupid and self-destructive their post-shortlist reactions have been. So, thanks to them, the strategic situation has now changed and it behooves us to take advantage of their mistakes. The original options as I saw them, prior to the nominations being announced, were as follows:

  1. SJWs and Puppies play it straight. Puppies win between 1 and 3 awards. Vox Day collects two more 6th of 5 participation prizes.
  2. SJWs choose nuclear option and Puppies play it straight. No Award wins
    the majority of categories. Vox Day collects two more 6th of 5
    participation prizes.
  3. SJWs and Puppies choose nuclear option. No Award wins the majority of
    categories. Vox Day collects two more 6th of 5 participation prize.

Three options, two outcomes. From a strategic perspective, Option 3 is obviously the preferable one there. It may be little hard on John C. Wright, Jim Butcher, Toni Weisskopf, and other strong finalists who might genuinely appreciate winning an award, but as I have consistently pointed out from the start, I don’t care about awards. Neither do the hundreds of Vile Faceless Minions of the Evil Legion of Evil. But this situation no longer applies. Now, with the influx of THOUSANDS of new voters, whose allegiances are unknown, there are three possible outcomes.

  1. SJWs and Puppies play it straight. Puppies win between 3 and 6 awards. Vox Day collects neither Hugo Awards nor 6th of 5 participation prizes.
  2. SJWs and Puppies choose nuclear option. No Award wins the majority of categories.Vox Day collects two more 6th of 5 participation prizes.
  3. SJWs choose nuclear option and Puppies play it straight. No Award wins the majority of categories. Vox Day collects two more 6th of 5 participation prizes.
  4. SJWs choose nuclear option and Puppies play it straight. Puppies win between 10 and 12 awards. Vox Day wins Best Editor, Short Form and finishes third, behind Toni Weisskopf and Jim Minz, in the other editorial category.

The Option 4 is a legitimate possibility if two-thirds or more of the new supporting members are Puppy sympathizers. The reason Option 4 is the more desirable outcome is because a) the results of Option 2 and Option 3 are exactly the same, and b) it will publicly break the perceived power of the SJWs under the current rules. Option 2/3 interrupts their inability to hand out awards to themselves for a single year, but Option 4 will reveal the hard limits of their influence and render them relatively impotent for the foreseeable future.

The best possible outcome is not to see them nuke themselves, as amusing as that would be, but to see them try to nuke themselves and fail, thereby demonstrating that they don’t even possess the nukes they think they have. And even if Option 4 turns out to have been beyond our reach this year, its failure is still within the range of our victory conditions. This is what it means to successfully execute a Xanatos Gambit. If we fail, we win. If we succeed, we win even bigger. Why settle for victory when we can vanquish?

Now that the science fiction SJWs have publicly declared No Award, the best possible outcome for us is for them to try to burn down the awards and fail. And that is why we should not help them do it. I very much understand the temptation to cry havoc, run amok, and gleefully set fires, but keep this in mind: while strategic arson is good, strategic occupation is glorious.

Translation: stow the flamethrowers. For now. And as for those who are tempted to freak out and overreact simply because the other side is throwing punches, keep in mind how the great champions react to getting hit.

Floyd Mayweather let Manny Pacquiao hit him with a slew of body blows, then looked Pacquiao in the eye, shook his head, and said NOPE.

Mailvox: Sigma’s Bane

GJ calls for more of that of which there is not very much to give:

I’m a regular reader of your blog. As I’m not living in the West I’m not participating in Gamergate or conflicts with SJWs so I make the following observations from a distant perspective.

Just as you used not to understand Gammas well, it seems to me that you’re overestimating the initiative of the average person who is willing to fight on your side. You’ve made more than one posts encouraging readers that they too can be leaders in Gamergate. But your sociosexual theory indicates that because most people are followers (ie not Alphas, Betas, or Sigmas but Deltas) they are hardly going to do anything of their own initiative, rather follow an example set by someone they consider as a leader. As an illustration, a Sigma like yourself would hardly care about getting a Minion badge (except maybe for the purpose of demonstration of mass numbers), but many of your readers do, which implies that they still seek a hierarchy within which to operate.

This means that even in the decentralised 4GW nature of the fight firm leadership is still needed. The Hugo nominations were a great way to demonstrate numbers on your side and intimidate the opponent. But if you want the numbers of your supportive readers to be exerted on the Twitter arena, for example, it would appear that regular reminders, along with a more explicit and emphatic instructions (ie. more so than what you’ve already posted).

And here Rabid Puppies is about as much “leadership” as I can handle without feeling the need to enter a Tibetan monastery and spend the next seven years in mystic contemplation.

That was my favorite thing about the 4GW concept, the way in which it obviated the need for leadership. But GJ is probably right, there is a distinction between a lack of centralization and a lack of leadership. Fortunately, I have reason to know that more of you are taking the initiative in various ways; the Minion badges themselves are an example of this as they weren’t my idea or my creation.

Malwyn is still in a foul temper, but she did get another 100 of them out and the outflow is finally exceeding the incoming number of requests. So 130 down, another 180 or so to go.

All that being said, I am very proud of the Dread Ilk and Rabid Puppies. It may be a small-scale action on a tertiary front, but nevertheless, this has been one of the most effective actions against the SJWs in Western culture in decades.

SJWs always lie

“Being a “social justice warrior” means I get to read (and incidentally,
vote for on award ballots) what I want, rather than waiting to be told
by someone else what I should like and what I shouldn’t.”
 – John Scalzi, 1 May 2015

Actually, that’s almost exactly the opposite of what it means to be an SJW. That sounds considerably more like a #GamerGate position, which McRapey vehemently opposes.

Translation: Johnny Con knows he’s on the losing side and he’s trying to run his “make nice” routine. Yep.

“You’ll note I’m addressing Mr. Ringo’s argument here and not Mr.
Ringo himself. He and I get on tolerably well as humans. Do likewise,
please. Likewise, avoid gratuitous slamming of Baen,
please. This all is less about the publisher itself than it is about the
publisher being used as a stand-in for a particular worldview, which it
(or its individual employees or authors) may or may not endorse.”
  – John Scalzi, 1 May 2015

“I think both Toni Weisskopf and Jim Minz are eminently worthy of Hugo
Award editor nominations; I regret the presence of the slates makes the
argument of their consideration more complicated for so many people.”
   – John Scalzi, 1 May 2015

Contrast with this:

When Ms. Weisskopf addresses the Baen true faithful like this (as she
does both in the Baen’s Bar and on the site of Ms. Hoyt, a Baen author),
aside from anything else she’s doing, she’s engaging in the laudable
tactic of binding — or rebinding — her company’s host to her company’s
product: Baen fans are the real science fiction fans, and real science fiction fans want real science fiction, which comes from Baen. It’s a nice bit of commercial epistemic closure. So good job, Ms. Weisskopf.

Ms. Weisskopf’s unilateral attempt to establish fans of her publishing house as the One True Church, with Heinlein as its graven image, is flat out wrong. Not only are they not the One True Church, they don’t even get Robert Heinlein to themselves. They have to timeshare him with me and with many other fans who love his work, see him as an influence, and at the same time are happy to welcome anyone who wants to be part of the science fiction and fantasy community into the fold, no matter how they got there. Try to take Robert Heinlein from me, guys. See where that gets you. He’s not yours alone. You can’t gatekeep him from me.

Likewise, Ms. Weisskopf’s handwringing about what should be done about the interlopers and heretics incorrectly arrogates to her little group the ability to make any sort of decision on the matter. They can’t. Baen is not, in fact, the core of science fiction and fantasy; people who identify as Baen fans are not the only “real” science fiction and fantasy fans. 
– John Scalzi, 11 March, 2014

 Yeah, I tend to doubt she’s likely to buy it, Johnny Con. And “tolerably well as humans” should be translated as “John Ringo regards me with contempt, but I’m not done trying to suck up to him yet.”

And then there is, as usual, this: “Pretty sure that’s not the reason as far as regards Beale. I think his problem is straight-up envy.”

Mm-hmmm. Keep telling yourself that, Johnny. Perhaps one day you’ll even start to believe it.

Police accountability

It appears there has been at least one positive consequence of the Baltimore riots:

Six city police officers were charged Friday in the death of Freddie Gray, a 25-year-old man who suffered fatal spinal injuries last month while in custody, a swift development in a case that has heightened the national focus on policing in black communities.

The announcement by State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby, the city’s chief prosecutor, surprised many in a city where officials had cautioned for days that the investigation might not come to a quick resolution. Spontaneous celebrations broke out in some neighborhoods that were roiled by looting and violence after Mr. Gray’s funeral on Monday, while police union officials said they were disappointed in what they called a rush to judgment.

The most serious charges were brought against Officer Caesar Goodson, who was driving a police transport van that brought Mr. Gray to a police station after his April 12 arrest. Mr. Goodson, 45 years old, was charged with second-degree murder, involuntary manslaughter and other charges.

Officers William Porter, 25, Lt. Brian Rice, 41, and Sgt. Alicia White, 30, were each charged with involuntary manslaughter, second-degree assault and misconduct in office. Officers Edward Nero, 29, and Garrett Miller,
26, were charged with second-degree assault and misconduct in office.
Lt. Rice and Messrs. Nero and Miller were also charged with false
imprisonment for making what Ms. Mosby termed an illegal arrest of Mr.
Gray.

The officers surrendered to police and bail was set in
amounts ranging from $250,000 to $350,000, according to court records
and state officials. By Friday night, all six officers had posted bail
and been released, according to public records. Like Mr. Gray, three of
the officers, including Mr. Goodson, are African-American.

I have no doubt that the six officers will get off without a penalty, but at least the case will draw further attention to the problem of US police believing they are able to freely murder US citizens without being held accountable. Even though they will probably be “exonerated” by the legal system, the arrest and trial itself serves as a moderate deterrent for future officers tempted to impose rough justice on the public.

Mailvox: the Dungeon Crawl interview

DG has a few thoughts:

It struck me that – like “diversity” in some quarters – game reviewers / etc. DO treat “story” as an unalloyed good, without ever asking “what it is at the expense of”? Not only is time spent on retail/etc. time taken away from working on making the best possible game, but time spent on “story” qua story that doesn’t directly drive the game play – pointlessly long cutscenes, etc – is time spent on things other than immersing you in the GAMEPLAY.

Also – I’m going to borrow a gripe from Aurini – but his argument why HD sucks has some relevance. Sure, “quality” of 3d graphics and worlds is great, but every increase in detail, whether modeling or textures, requires a lot more work to get it looking right. 8-bit, or deliberately cartoony/stylized games can still have an environment that immerses you in the game – depending on the mechanics – but doesn’t require anywhere near as much time on artwork.

It comes down to opportunity cost. Time spent on graphics, 3D or otherwise, that makes the game play better and keeps you in the game, is time well spent. Time past that is time that could have gone into scenarios/etc.

After all – is the new Homeworld HD reskin a better GAME? No – just prettier. Possibly more immersive. but at some point you cross the threshold of “good enough” and ship, or keep focused on the game.

This is not a call to spend less time on graphic/game design. Some of the better recent hobbyist boardgames not only have beautiful graphics, but use them to make understanding the game mechanics and tracking game status and play easier. Again – does the time spent on the artwork make the game PLAY better, or does it just get in the way?

Incidentally – loved Doom and Doom2, but liked Marathon 2 even better. Just a little bit of flavor and story through the computer terminals to give you a purpose to what you’re doing, allowing even otherwise repetitive missions to have a different feel, without wasting a lot of your time on it. Some excellent humor in there too. “Introduce them to the ‘magic’ of orbital bombardment” being a favorite line, still.