Rabid Puppies 2016: Best Short Story

The preliminary recommendations for the Best Short Story category:

  • “Tuesdays With Molakesh the Destroyer”, Megan Grey, Fireside Magazine
  • “Asymmetrical Warfare”, S. R. Algernon, Nature Nr. 519
  • “Seven Kill Tiger”, Charles Shao, There Will Be War Vol. X
  • “The Commuter”, Thomas Mays, Amazon Kindle Single
  • “If You Were an Award, My Love”, Juan Tabo and S. Harris, Vox Popoli

Other 2016 Hugo categories

On a related note, there is an interesting discussion of what fueled the Puppies movement over at The Right Geek. She’s a Sad, not a Rabid, but her perspective is pretty accurate on the whole.

Over the same time frame, the Puppies have also become concerned about the artistic direction of our field. The “Human Wave” movement, the “Superversive” movement, and the more generalized complaints about “message fic” and “grey goo” that started gaining steam before last year’s Sad Puppies campaign are all flailing attempts by the Puppies to describe the flatness we’ve perceived in many recent award winners — particularly in the shorter fiction categories, where the stylistic sophistication and emotional catharsis beloved by creative writing professors and MFA programs the world over appear to be crowding out more accessible stories with identifiable plots and recognizably science-fictional ideas. Have the aforementioned accessible stories been shut out of the mix entirely? No, thankfully — but prominent fannish critics have definitely been agitating against any “traditional” authors who happen to be short-listed. When Larry Correia was nominated for the Campbell back in 2011, for example, one such critic hyperbolically proclaimed that a win for Larry would “end writing forever.”

Finally, before the Puppies became a controversial sensation, many of the same people were getting nominated for the Hugo year after year after year. Now, this state of affairs may have been justifiable if fandom were really tiny, but it’s not. As I remarked in my previous post, thousands of science fiction works are published and bought every year, and the most recent circulation figures I could find for, say, Asimov’s or Analog exceed the number of people who voted in the Hugos in 2012 by over 1000%. To us Puppies, the proposition that a couple thousand super-motivated Pre-Puppy World Con voters were in any way representative of the fandom in the aggregate was and is ridiculous on its face.

The Puppykickers have been trying to have it both ways. On the one hand, a very small group of people were creating awards they can’t even define solely for the sake of giving them to an even smaller group of people they like (awards such as the Best Related Work and Best Long-form Editor), on the other, they have repeatedly asserted that these awards, which are nothing more than the subjective popularity contest among a very small group of people, somehow prove that the recipients are objectively superior to the majority of their various colleagues and competitors in the science fiction and fantasy fields.

The Right Geek doesn’t quite go all the way back to the very beginning, however. The reason the original Sad Puppies campaign came to pass was because an SF-SJW was on Larry Correia’s blog, taunting him with being an inferior writer because although his books sold well, John Scalzi and other SF-SJWs had Hugo nominations and awards that Correia lacked. When Correia dismissed the SJW’s argument by saying that the Hugos were, like the Nebulas, nothing more than a popularity contest, the SJW furiously denied that was the case, prompting Larry to declare that he would prove otherwise.

Which he did, repeatedly, in spades.

Now Larry is a Hugo-nominated author. Brad Torgersen is a Hugo-nominated author. Mike Williamson is a Hugo-nominated author. Tom Kratman is a Hugo-nominated author. John C. Wright is record-setting Hugo-nominated author. I am a Hugo-nominated author and a Hugo-nominated editor. We are henceforth a part of Hugo history. And SF fandom can’t deny that, any more than they can take John Scalzi’s ludicrous “Best Novel” award away from him or Kameron Hurley’s utterly absurd “Best Related Work” award away from her.

We didn’t make the Hugo Awards ridiculous. We merely drew attention to the fact that the SJWs in science fiction already had.

If the SJWs in science fiction are unhappy with the present state of affairs, they need to realize that a) they started it and b) they exacerbated it. Patrick Nielsen Hayden and John Scalzi didn’t need to publicly attack me back in 2005 and collude to try to get me expelled from SFWA in 2013. SJWs didn’t need to falsely claim that I was responsible for gaming the 2014 nominations. And whoever that SJW was back in 2012 didn’t need to go to Larry’s site and start taunting him there.

The SJWs in science fiction could have done what we were doing to them all along and simply left us alone. But for one reason or another, they didn’t. So, it’s more than a bit rich for them to complain that we are now paying them too much unwanted attention when they went out of their way to draw it in the first place. In the words of Metallica:

Careful what you wish, you may regret it
Careful what you wish, you just might get it

They wanted the baleful eye of the Supreme Dark Lord upon them. Well, they have got it. And if they do not enjoy the burning touch of my gentle hand, how am I to blame for that? It is what they demanded, after all.

Nevertheless, because I am kind, and in the interest of restoring a modicum of peace to the science fiction community, I will extend an olive branch to my enemies. I will be pleased to vacate and disavow my past Hugo nominations once John Scalzi and Patrick Nielsen Hayden return their past awards and do the same. And furthermore, I will forswear all future Hugo nominations for myself if both men agree to do so as well.

Come, gentlemen, shall we not be inspired by the selfless and noble example of the late David Hartwell and allow others their moment to bask in Hugo glory?

Why Trump will win

It’s really quite simple, as this commenter at Althouse explained it:

Hillary says “Vote for me because I’m a woman.”
Bernie says “Vote for me and I’ll give you some of his.”
Ted Cruz says “Vote for me and I’ll kick over all those rice bowls in Washington”.
Donald Trump says “Vote for me and the emergency room at your local hospital won’t look like a bus station in rural Mexico”

Might not be fair but I think I know who is going to win that argument.

To this we can add: Marco Rubio says “Vote for me because I am electable as determined by the Republican establishment.”

People want relief from pain. And the pain from losing their country to 60 million invaders is much greater than the constant Washington shenanigans that few understand anyhow. 

A world-class tantrum

Matt Walsh is exceedingly butthurt by the fact that Donald Trump just took his third state in a row:

Dear Donald Trump Fan,

I’m going to tell you the truth, friend.

You say you want the truth. You say you want someone who speaks boldly and brashly and bluntly and “tells it like it is” and so on. According to exit polls in South Carolina, voters who want a president who “tells it like it is” are an essential demographic for Trump, just as they’re an essential demographic for Judge Judy and Dr. Phil. You say you want abrupt and matter-of-fact honesty, and you want it so much, you’ll make a man president for it regardless of whether he defies every principle and value you claim to hold.

Personally, I think you’re lying, and I’m going to test my theory. In fact, I believe I’ve already proven my theory because you’re now offended that I called you a liar. But Trump has called half of the Earth’s population a liar at some point over the past seven months, and you loved every second of it. You said you loved it not out of cruelty or spite, but out of admiration for a man who’s willing to call people liars — even if he’s lying when he does it.

Yet here I am employing the same tactic — accurately, I might add — and you recoil indignantly. Over the course of this campaign season I’ve said many harsh words about you and your leader, all of which I stand by, but you’ve never respected my harsh words, or the harsh words of any Trump critic. Indeed, you insist that our tough criticism of you only vindicates your support of Trump, while Trump’s vulgar and dishonest criticism of everyone else also vindicates your support of Trump. You’re tired of people being critical, but you love Trump because he’s critical. You say you like Trump for his style, but you hate his style when it’s directed at him or you.

It’s epic. You really have to read the whole thing to believe it, let alone appreciate it. But wait, there’s more! I happened to tweet about it.

Supreme Dark Lord @voxday
The butthurt. The salt. The tears. The meltdown of @MattWalshBlog is simply delicious. Deal with it, cucky.

Matt Walsh ‏@MattWalshBlog
Thanks for sharing my stuff

Supreme Dark Lord @voxday
Are you kidding? I made certain to archive it before you come to your senses and delete it. That was a self-evisceration!

Now, I don’t know much about Matt Walsh, but I do know where he stands socio-sexually now, because like every other Gamma bitterly licking his wounds, he didn’t hesitate to leap in and take a shot when he thought he saw the opportunity.

Supreme Dark Lord @voxday
Even as the political elite sneer at them, Trump tells the poorly-educated that he loves them. And they will love him back. #Trump2016

Matt Walsh ‏@MattWalshBlog
So you need politicians to tell you they love you? Are you an actual toddler or are you just pretending?

Supreme Dark Lord ‏@voxday
No, Matt, the difference is that they know you hate them and think you are better than them. That’s why you’re irrelevant.

Supreme Dark Lord ‏@voxday
Also, you’re projecting, Matt. That was a world-class tantrum you threw. That’s why so many people are laughing at you.

Klejdys ‏@klejdys
What @voxday is doing to @mattwalshblog now is illegal in 38 states.

That little exchange explains something I didn’t understand when I first read the article/tantrum, which is why Matt Walsh doesn’t merely oppose Donald Trump politically, but harbors genuine hatred for him. As a Gamma, he’s a Secret King, which is why he is simultaneously contemptuous of Trump and envious of Trump’s success.

Anyhow, enjoy the salt. I certainly did.

Interview with Mike Cernovich

Mike Cernovich is one of the most inspiring individuals I have ever had the privilege to meet, and I’ve met everyone from Donald Trump and Henry Kissinger to Dolph Lundgren, Slash, and David Lee Roth. As you might expect, the interview is both interesting and informative:

You took, and passed, the California bar first time out of the box, yet failed to get your ticket punched.  Since you’ve written about it publicly, I need to ask: you were the target of a false rape accusation, back in the days when rape still meant rape. What happened? How did that experience affect you, shape your perspective?  What did you learn about the criminal justice system from having been in its clutches?

I was Patient Zero to the false rape epidemic. “Date rape” was common, the media said, and thus there was pressure to prosecute rape cases where there was no evidence of rape.

My case was bogus. I slept with the girl on the living room floor while her best friend was in the room. (Anyone who wants to fact-check me, ask me for a copy of the case file. It’s somewhere in my Gmail, I’m sure.)

The prosecutors were highly sensitive of the media, as was the judge, who once said to my lawyer, “Think about what the media would say if I dismissed this case!”

I was full of rage, anger, depression, and every other toxic emotion. I had followed all of the rules, and my life was “ruined” by a feminist media and legal system.

The biggest lesson of my rape case is to stay far away from the criminal system. Never talk to the police, even if you’re a witness, because who knows…Maybe they need to close a case, and you were there, after all.

You wrote a book review on Ordinary Injustice, and that was my case. I was a kid with such promise who worked hard, but hey, the media might say something rude about the judge or District Attorney. That’s what really matters.

That mindset, that the players within the system matter more than men charged with serious crimes, is yet another ordinary injustice of our day.

At some point, you “morphed” from the Mike Cernovich at Crime & Federalism, to the Danger & Play guy, your latest venture into blogging, where you have taken up arms promoting masculine health, both physical and mental. What happened? Was this a response to your youth, your having been falsely accused of rape? Your growing fat and realizing you needed to get your shit together?  What turned you into @PlayDangerously?

When you are falsely accused of rape and see the legal system from the inside as a client and the outside as lawyer, your eyes open up. You realize that everything you had been told about the legal system was a lie.

What other lies have we been told, and what are the source of those lies?

We’ve been lied to about rape culture. If you took the arguments about college rape culture seriously, you’d never send your daughter to college. That’d be like sending her to the Congo. Yet, people claim 1 in 4 women are raped while simultaneously sending girls off to college, and those girls even go walking in public and attend parties. It’s almost as if those rape statistics are made-up.

We have been lied to about gender, especially about a man’s role in society. As a man, you’re supposed to live for everyone except yourself. Make a woman happy, even if she nags. Please everyone, expect nothing for yourself because that’s selfish.

When a man buys a cool car, it’s because he’s having a mid-life crisis. A man can’t have fun or do anything he likes without being attacked.

A man who divorces a harpy is evil. A woman who divorces a man because she “just doesn’t feel it anymore” is a hero. Even a woman who cheats on her husband will be celebrated under the Eat, Pray, Love attitude towards women.

Those were lies resulting from what Nietzsche, who I read in college but never understood until I became a man, would call the “slave mindset.”

I began examining those lies one-by-one, and as I did, more lies were revealed.

What Mike saw in the legal system, I saw in the political and business worlds. And later, in the legal system. We both decided we would not play along to get along. After all what profits a man to gain the world if it costs him his soul?

The Trumpening

It’s fascinating to see the medias, both mainstream and conservative, scurrying around to find some explanation, any explanation, for Trump’s rise that does not address the obvious: America has been the victim of the single largest invasion in human history. But Invade America Happy Time is over.

France for the French. England for the English. America for Americans. Germany for the Germans. Scandinavia for the Scandinavians. Israel for the Jews. The Dar al-Islam for the Muslims.

Nationalism is peaceful, for the most part. It is the intermingling of peoples, the expansions of territories, and the subsequent clash of cultures that results which reliably produces war.

As military historian Martin van Creveld so aptly demonstrated in There Will Be War Vol. X, immigration is a form of war in which the violence is delayed.

The ceiling just broke

How much farther can Trump rise? Is 25% his ceiling, or his base?
– Red State

Nevada is a notoriously difficult state to poll and the caucus format could hurt Trump’s turnout.
– Slate

Yes, Trump leads all the national polls, and he keeps busting through what look like ceilings. But (unlike Dean) he doesn’t lead in Iowa, and his ceiling there looks very stable: He’s been hovering around 25 percent since September, and he’s never broken 30 percent…. There is no credible scenario in which a consistent 30 percent of the vote will deliver the delegates required to be the Republican nominee. So for Trump to lose, he doesn’t actually have to collapse; he just has to fail to expand his support. 
– Ross Douthat, New York Times


Yeah, well, that ceiling may have looked very stable, Ross. But looks can be deceiving.

Nevada Results:

45.9 Trump
23.7 Rubio
21.5 Cruz
6.1 Carson
3.6 Kasich

Stopping Trump now looks like a steeper proposition after he trampled Rubio and Cruz on Tuesday, scoring huge wins across nearly every cross-section of the Republican Party. Entrance polls show Trump won moderate voters and very conservative voters by huge margins. He won in rural and urban areas, and among voters with only high school diplomas and those with post-graduate degrees.

Trump even handily bested Cruz among his supposed based of evangelical Christians, and, though the sample was small, topped his two Cuban-American opponents among Hispanic caucus-goers.

Trump reveled in the details. “I love the evangelicals!” he yelled. ““Number one with Hispanics,” he bragged.

And he pointedly called out the home states of his remaining rivals — Texas for Cruz, Florida for Rubio and Ohio for John Kasich — as places he now leads in the polls and will win the coming weeks.

It looks like Cruz is effectively done. He’s a Christian who can’t win evangelicals and a Cuban Spanish-speaker who can’t win Hispanics. And there is no way, none, that all of his support is going to go to Rubio. I wouldn’t be surprised if more than half of it either went to Trump or goes home.

I have no idea why Kasich is still in. And Carson badly misplayed his hand; he should have thrown his support to Trump in return for a Cabinet position before South Carolina. Now Trump doesn’t actually need him, although it would still be wise to reach out to Carson and secure his support just for the optics.

Hillary’s stalking horse?

If so, Donald Trump is doing a very, very poor job of it:

The Fox News-sponsored controversy over Hillary Clinton’s use of a
private email server will become another anti-Clinton national tragedy
if Donald Trump wins, the Republican front-runner told Fox News’ Sean
Hannity at a town hall Monday night.

Hannity
asked if Trump would order his attorney general to investigate Clinton
if he wins the White House in November, and Trump said he would “have no
choice,” because “in fairness, you have to look into that — she seems
guilty.”

He momentarily tried to walk his comment back, saying,
“but you know what, I wouldn’t even say that,” before saying what he
just said he wouldn’t say again. “But certainly, it has to be looked
at,” he said. Trump later added that “she’s being protected, but if I
win, certainly it’s something we’re going to look at.”

Wheels within wheels, my friends. Wheels within wheels.This post also serves as an open thread to discuss the Nevada Republican caucus and its results.

In a state where only 33,000 of the state’s 400,000 GOP voters turned out to caucus in 2012—a mere 7%—the campaigns of Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio and one-time candidate Jeb Bush got organized early, snapping up talented operatives and key endorsements, while beginning caucus trainings last fall in the hopes that a strong organization could overcome Trump’s momentum.

But Trump appears to have steamrolled through all of that, dominating not just Nevada’s unreliable polls, but capturing the excitement and buzz in the race with his visits here. In interviews with dozens of Republican voters across the state over the last week, many said without hesitation that they were standing firmly with Trump and had given little thought to the other Republican candidates.

It’s going to be interesting to hear the convoluted explanations of how winning three states in a row is the certain death knell of the Trump campaign.

Cruz vs Trump on Immigration

Let’s let the two men speak for themselves:

SEN. TED CRUZ

My views on immigration are straightforward. I think there is considerable bipartisan agreement outside of Washington on immigration. There is overwhelming bipartisan agreement that we’ve got to get serious about securing the borders and stopping illegal immigration. There is considerable bipartisan agreement outside of Washington that we need to improve and streamline legal immigration so that we can remain a nation that welcomes and celebrates legal immigrants.

 I think it is a mistake for any politician to on the one hand embrace amnesty — embrace a pathway to citizenship for those who are here illegally — and on the other hand seek to restrict or punish legal immigrants. Amnesty is wrong. When I campaigned for the US senate I campaigned unambiguously against amnesty and was proud to receive 40 percent of the Hispanic vote in the state of Texas at the same time Mitt Romney was getting clobbered with 27 percent of the Hispanic vote nationwide.

But I am the son of an immigrant who came legally from Cuba. Reagan referred to legal immigrants as Americans by choice and there is no stronger advocate of legal immigration in the U.S. Senate than I am. I think the right approach is to secure the border, follow the rule of law, and embrace and improve legal immigration.



DONALD TRUMP 

Real immigration reform puts the needs of working people first – not
wealthy globetrotting donors. We are the only country in the world whose
immigration system puts the needs of other nations ahead of our own.
That must change. Here are the three core principles of real immigration
reform:

1. A nation without borders is not a nation. There must be a wall across the southern border.

2. A nation without laws is not a nation. Laws passed in accordance with our Constitutional system of government must be enforced.

3. A nation that does not serve its own citizens is not a nation. Any immigration plan must improve jobs, wages and security for all Americans.

Make Mexico Pay For The Wall

Defend The Laws And Constitution Of The United States

America will only be great as long as America remains a nation of laws that lives according to the Constitution. No one is above the law. The following steps will return to the American people the safety of their laws, which politicians have stolen from them:

  • Triple the number of ICE officers.
  • Nationwide e-verify.
  • Mandatory return of all criminal aliens.
  • Detention—not catch-and-release.
  • Defund sanctuary cities.
  • Enhanced penalties for overstaying a visa.
  • Cooperate with local gang task forces.
  • End birthright citizenship.
  • Put American Workers First
  • Increase prevailing wage for H-1Bs.
  • Requirement to hire American workers first.
  • End welfare abuse.
  • Jobs program for inner city youth.
  • Refugee program for American children.
  • Immigration moderation. 

Literally Wu proves SJWAL

Because SJWs always lie.

 [Larry Correia] and other conservative figures like Adam Baldwin are claiming that Twitter is breaking down on “free speech” and capitulating to the “SJWs,” which I guess means people like me. I have spent much of the last year asking Twitter and other tech companies to improve their harassment policies. There is one problem with Mr. Correria’s claim.

There is no evidence whatsoever for it.

None, zilch, zero. It’s a fantasy. A similar lie is going around that Twitter has put Anita Sarkeesian in charge of their Trust and Safety council, which is similarly baseless. I’ve spoken with a lot of tech companies in the last year and I have never heard anyone propose shadowbanning.

The only “proof” that Twitter is shadowbanning people comes from a disreputable conservative blog, that is so disreputable it cannot even be used as sourcing on Wikipedia. That blog used anonymous sourcing, and was written by someone with a personal axe to grind against Twitter.

The truth is, companies like Twitter are finally enforcing their own TOS if you threaten someone, dox someone, or set up an account specifically created to harass someone. That has led to some people being banned, and some accounts that perpetually break Twitter harassment rules to become deverified.

The backlash against Twitter is by people that prefer these system to remain as they are – a place where the women in your life will get rape threats, where anyone can have their private information posted, and where swarms of vicious mobs are destroying people’s reputation with slander.

The last I checked, almost 100 people have spread Mr. Correria’s baseless claim – and even more with Adam Baldwin. This is an important thing to fact check, and I hope you’ll share this to set the record straight.

Remember, Literally Wu is so stupid and dishonest that in addition to claiming that he is really a pretty, pretty girl despite conclusive evidence to the contrary, he once harassed himself without forgetting to log out of his other account first. He is as in complete denial of Twitter’s actions as he is of his own sex.

There is copious documentary and testimonial evidence that Twitter is shadowbanning various individuals on Twitter, among them me. Here is additional proof:

Samuel B Roberts @SBRoberts10 Feb 22
He’s so “boorish”! BTW, did the shadow ban thing end? I saw this on my feed.

ConantheCimmerian ‏@ConanTCimmerian Feb 21
Even though I follow him, I haven’t seen a direct tweet from @voxday in 2 weeks.

Taxi Driver ‏@northofdoom Feb 20
I never see direct @voxday tweets, despite following

ChateauEmissary Feb 20
Same here. No direct tweets from vox.

Some fantasy. It is telling that Twitter’s Committee of Public Safety isn’t saying anything, but has stalking horses running around publicly denying what Twitter is observably doing. Notice that the dates mentioned above just happen to correspond with the otherwise inexplicable decline and subsequent recovery of my impressions despite the number of my tweets being flat and the numbers of my followers increasing during the same period.

And if you weren’t already convinced that File 770 commenters are literal cretins, here is the relentlessly stupid Tasha Turner again:

15) BRIANNA WU DEFENDS TWITTER
A voice of reason

That, in a nutshell, is why I am more concerned about what my dogs think about the upcoming US presidential election than about anything an SJW might “think”. Any connection between what they say and objective reality is purely accidental.