Trust the news

Sure, Brian Williams may not have been shot at, or seen any dead bodies, but when he tells you that vaccines are perfectly safe, the economy is growing, and Vladimir Putin is about to invade France, you can have absolute confidence that what he is saying is true:

On Wednesday night, the world we live in became a confusing and unfamiliar place and most of us wandered the land not knowing what to believe when Brian Williams admitted that he was never in a chopper that was hit by RPG fire in Iraq in 2003. Brian was actually safely traveling in a different chopper. How can we believe anything now that Brian Williams has dribbled out lies to us? When Brian Williams says, “Good evening, I’m Brian Williams and this is the Nighty News,” do we know for sure it’s the evening and that it’s a good evening and that his name really is Brian Williams? Is that picture of Brian Williams’ supposed bulge a picture of his actual bulge or did he just stuff his khakis with the sack he keeps his lies in? Everything is squint-worthy now!!!

After getting called out on the lie he told, Brian said in Wednesday night’s broadcast of the NBC Nightly News that he “misremembered” the whole thing. Here’s Brian Williams’ apology in case you missed it:

Since Brian Williams admitted to “misremembering” the events of that day in Iraq, the media has been digging up and looking for other possible lies told by Brian Will-lie. The New Orleans Advocate says that while reporting in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina, Brian claimed to have seen a dead body floating in the French Quarter. But apparently, the French Quarter did not flood during Hurricane Katrina and remained pretty dry. Brian also claimed he got sick with dysentery after accidentally drinking floodwater, but a local health expert doesn’t remember anyone coming down with that shit. Basically, everything is a lie. Was Brian Williams even in New Orleans and Iraq? He was probably just reporting in front of a green screen. Has he even been in a helicopter? Riding in a helicopter while playing Call of Duty doesn’t count. Is Brian Williams real? Are we sure he’s not just a hologram made by NBC?

An NBC News source tells Page Six that he’s not going to be suspended or punished in any way.

Williams can’t even tell the truth about things that he experienced directly. So why would you believe anything that he, or any other talking head, reads to you off a teleprompter?

More measles facts

The US goverment reports more killed by measles vaccinations than by measles in the USA:

While those opposing mandatory vaccination for measles are widely portrayed as ignorant and even dangerous by some officials, pundits and even news media accounts, Centers for Disease Control records reveal a startling truth – while no one has died of measles in the U.S. in the last 12 years, 108 have died as a result of the adverse effects of the vaccine in that same time period.

The death statistics are recorded by Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, or VAERS, which captures only a small percentage of the actual number of deaths and other adverse reactions to the vaccine. In addition, 96 of the 108 deaths in that 12-year time period were a result of the MMR vaccine, now the preferred shot for measles immunization.

Now, it’s important not to exaggerate the relative risks involved. Nine deaths per year is still considerably less than the 248 per year I estimate would result from a completely unvaccinated situation. However, given the fact that some countries, such as the UK, have historically seen LOWER rates of measles incidence at moderate levels of vaccine coverage, it is entirely possible that the optimal risk-minimization level of vaccination for measles is considerably below 100 percent.

This may sound counter-intuitive, but a vaccination regime that prioritized testing for vaccine susceptibility and excluded those children deemed likely to experience an adverse reaction would almost certainly meet considerably less virulent opposition than the present one, let alone the more oppressive regime envisioned by some of the more rabid pro-vaxxers. Providing an alternative delayed schedule and stretching it out would almost surely help in this regard as well. The fact is that if you’re genuinely concerned about the falling vaccine uptake, the very last thing you should support is doubling-down on the public pressure and propaganda approach. It not only isn’t working, it is observably backfiring.

No amount of propaganda is going to convince anyone who has seen, with their own eyes, an adverse reaction, or had one described to them. And adverse reactions most certainly do happen. That’s a fact, and the sooner the pro-vaccine community accepts it and stops trying to hide it, the sooner a more effective solution can be found.

Nothing creates more fear, uncertainty, and doubt than shaded truths and a blanket refusal to answer obvious questions. Rhetoric is no answer for serious doubts, be they reasonable or unreasonable. And as for increasing the pressure via legal means, it shouldn’t take a vast amount of foresight to anticipate what sort of adverse reactions are going to occur if doctors begin forcibly administering vaccines to children without parental consent and a child subsequently experiences a fatal adverse reaction.

One unanticipated outcome of forced vaccinations could well be the complete refusal of medical professionals to administer them.

In support of Puppies

Amal El-Mohtar bravely supports Rabid Puppies and Sad Puppies 3:

We need to have a serious talk about awards and eligibility and the
awkward eggshell-dance people feel obligated to do every time this year.

Recently I went on a tear on Twitter because I saw women for whom I have tremendous admiration and respect
speak up about how difficult they find it to overcome shyness and low
self-esteem enough to talk about their work, and what an ongoing
struggle it is for them to find value in their art, to think of it as in
any way contributing anything to the world.

There’s a peculiar, unbearable, vicious smugness in sitting back and
talking about how tacky it is of people to list their publications and
that of course YOU won’t do so because while winning awards is nice
naturally YOU don’t really care about them. I find that behaviour
several orders of magnitude more repellent than asking for votes.
Requests for votes I can ignore; what I can’t ignore is the real toll
taken on brilliantly talented people by this kind of rhetoric —
brilliantly talented people who already think themselves unworthy of any
kind of positive attention.

Can we please just accept — and make widespread the acceptance! —
that making lists during Awards season is fine? That it’s standard?

There you have it. Making lists is fine. It is standard. People like Amal expressly want our lists. So what on Earth can the pinkshirts possibly be complaining about? Is it, perhaps, the fact that our lists are not the same as their lists?

I have tremendous admiration and respect
for Larry Correia and Brad Torgersen, especially in light of how they have courageously overcome shyness and low
self-esteem enough to talk about their work.

Ruh-roh

Sad Puppies is starting to go viral.

Voxemort the Malevolent. Yeah, that works. I only insist upon being addressed as Supreme Dark Lord for formal occasions and in all Evil Legion of Evil-related correspondence.

Speaking of Sad Puppies, I have removed “The Jenregar and the Light” from the Novella category and replaced it with “Pale Realms of Shade” by John C. Wright, The Book of Feasts & Seasons. You may wish to update your ballots accordingly.

Sadly, it appears the author, Dave Creek, is a racist who says he is made “uncomfortable” being linked to Latinos and “wouldn’t want to be in the same room” as Native Americans.

Literary infidels

Scooter explains why movies so often part dramatic company from the story of the book upon which they are nominally based:

Poor Tolkien – he thought Hollywood just misperceived his intentions. What Hitchcock so frankly reveals is that filmmakers do not necessarily fail to apprehend ‘where the core of the original lies’; they aren’t even trying to apprehend it in the first place! By and large, they do not aim to be faithful. They are literary infidels – and they aren’t the only one.

Shakespeare famously borrowed plots — Hamlet was based on 12th century author Saxo Grammaticus’ Gesta Danorum (“Deeds of the Danes”). In Saxo’s version, Hamlet lives, and goes off to other adventures. Shakespeare, of course, opted for a slightly more downbeat ending.

‘Hey man’, an arrogant film director might say, ‘If Shakespeare borrowed plots and even changed them around too, what’s so wrong with that? Why can’t I add a little elf-dwarf romance to The Hobbit?’

First, because he is Shakespeare and you, Mr. Filmmaker, are not. Have a little humility. Yes, you can put your stamp on the material, just don’t stamp on it with your Orwellian boot; it’s not a face to be kicked in.

Second, because while in the process of adaptation you may end up borrowing plots, characters, and on rare occasions even the mysterious original ‘core’ of the material, what you are really wanting to borrow is the built-in fanbase of the book.

This is precisely why I have turned down multiple inquiries about acquiring the film options on my books. I have no interest in seeing Hollywood do its usual number on them. From Lloyd Alexander and Frank Herbert to Susan Cooper, CS Lewis, and JRR Tolkien, I have seen Hollywood repeatedly botch the translation and re-telling some of my most-cherished books. Whether it is small or large, I’m not going to let them borrow my base; if the visual editions are going to be made, then I will make them myself one day.

While I very much enjoyed seeing The Lord of the Rings and appreciated how Peter Jackson brought Middle Earth to visual life, I failed to place sufficient importance on was an observation of Spacebunny’s concerning the way in which Jackson insisted on showing what Tolkien had only implied. That minor element only expanded over time, until Jackson’s story entirely took over Tolkien’s.

The one exception that merits being pointed out is A Game of Thrones, which despite its occasional flaws bids fair to surpass the books of A Song of Ice and Fire, perhaps as soon as this coming season. Of course, there GRR Martin appears to have done Hollywood the service of ruining his books in advance with his own sequels, so it could be a matter of a better choice of medium – the miniseries rather than the movies – or perhaps it is merely a matter of lowered expectations.

Immigration saving America

Among the many blessings of open borders and diversity is the remarkable way immigrants are curbing the temptation for their daughters to behave like Western whores:

More girls in America are having their genitalia mutilated as immigration increases the vibrant diversity of U.S. neighborhoods, says a new report by a D.C.-based nonprofit.

In 2013, “there were up to 507,000 U.S. women and girls who had undergone [genital mutilation] or were at risk of the procedure… the rapid increase in women and girls at risk reflects an increase in immigration to the United States,” said the Friday report by the Population Reference Bureau.

“We’re seeing a lot more F.G.M.,” Dr. Gretchen Heinrichs, a gynecologist, told The New York Times. FGM stands for female genital mutilation….. Between 2000 and 2013, the African immigrant population in the United States more than doubled, from 881,000 to 1.8 million, said the new report.

Immigrants will play a vital role in ending the threat posed by slutwalks, college campuses, and the television show Girls. Among the other manifold blessings of vibrant diversity include curative rape for lesbianism and skilled spellcasters who can magically bring back a straying man to you. Unfortunately, practitioners have determined that contra expectations, chopping off the body parts of white people do not work for mutu purposes in the same manner as albinos.

So the next time some bigoted anti-immigrationist makes a crack about jobs or ethnic food, remind him that immigrants may turn out to be the key to ending the rampant plague of rampaging sluts in America.

The invisible Voxemort

McCreepy repeats his Very Important call for guest blogs about representation in science fiction and fantasy:

Last year, I posted an open call for guest blogs about representation in science fiction and fantasy. The resulting essays were, in my opinion, both important and powerful. I was hopeful when I first put out that call, but the stories people chose to share exceeded my expectations in so many ways.

So I’m doing it again. Because, to quote from last year’s call, “it’s one thing for me to talk about this stuff. But let’s face it, it’s not exactly difficult for me to find characters like me in books, TV, movies, advertising, video games, etc. And there’s a painful irony when conversations about representation end up spotlighting some guy who’s part of the most overrepresented group in the country.”

Once again, I’ll be looking for personal, first-hand stories between 400 and 1000 words, talking about what it’s like to not see yourself in stories, or to see yourself misrepresented, or the first time you found a character you could really relate to and what that meant, and so on.

I have to admit, reading those personal first-hand stories did make a real difference to me. I had previously had some respect for Katherine Kerr. But after reading her stupid self-pity party, I have lost all interest in ever reading any more of her books.


“At 16, confused and vulnerable, I gave it all up. I took no more “hard”
science courses. I left the math classes to the boys, just like the boys
wanted.”

Yes, because as we’ve all learned, the ideal way to make sure people are able to accomplish difficult things is by making it easier for them. That’s why the Navy SEAL program is going to replace 24-weeks of Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL (BUD/S)
school, a parachute course and the 26-week SEAL
Qualification Training program.with handing out ice cream cones and lollipops.

What I found very hurtful as a Native American was that Jim Hines didn’t feature any stories about my people. I will pen a personal and first-hand story about how terribly hard it was for me growing up Indian (feather, not dot) in a land full of pretty, blonde Scandinavian girls who had settled upon the ancestral lands of my tribal cousins, and I trust Mr. Hines will help the healing begin by including it in Invisible 2.

Meanwhile, speaking of McCreepy, this was amusing.

P.T. Barnumium #1041 ‏@PTBarnumium
@voxday are you Voldemort or something? Entire McCreepy thread where they’re contorting like maniacs to not mention you by name

Entryism in progress

Robert Conway at Reaxxion asks if  Magic: The Gathering adding a transsexual character is a problem:

Magic the Gathering has been a mainstay in geek culture since the 90’s, so it should come as no surprise that people are making a big deal about the addition of a new trans character, Alesha, Who Smiles At Death. The announcement came in the form of a short story on Wizards Coast’s website entitled The Truth of Names, and is not actually indicated on the card itself. In fact the only text besides the card’s ability is a quote: “Great death with Sword in hand”. The art doesn’t necessarily give you the impression that Alesha is a trans-person either.

The card’s back story, as detailed by writer James Wyatt, discusses a clan of people who earn their names in battle. The tale depicts an Orc who fights for the Mardu clan, which is lead by Alesha. During the battle the Orc questions Alesha’s gender, after failing to kill a dragon and claim his own name. The story goes on about the battle and eventually ends with other warriors detailing deeds that deemed the Orc worthy of the name. However at the end the Orc admits he has yet to figure out who he is and willfully acknowledges that Alesha is in fact a woman.

Certainly this news has caught the attention of SJW-friendly meadia such as Kotaku (archived link) and of The Mary Sue (archived link). To put it simply Nathan Grayson thinks it’s “pretty darn cool”. Not everyone is on board with it. Several IGN users have voiced their concerns as I’m sure many of our readers will do the same.

The answer is, ABSOLUTELY YES, it is a problem. It is a very serious and ultimately fatal problem that will eventually kill the game dead. It is a problem of such gargantuan and epic proportions that the only rational thing to do is to immediately stop playing Magic: The Gathering, and stop purchasing any of its related products, until the Alesha, Who Smiles At Death card is publicly withdrawn. The card is the gaming equivalent of a small but malignant melanoma.

One might as reasonably ask if the original decision to permit women to read Bible verses was a problem for the Anglican Church. Or if the original income tax, which was introduced with a maximum rate of 7 percent and affected less than 1 percent of the U.S. population was a problem for US taxpayers.

The point is not whether the addition of an overtly propagandistic SJW element immediately breaks the game. The first step never does. That’s because the first step is always only symbolic, a testing of the waters to see if the invasion of the SJWs is going to be resisted or not. When it is resisted, of course, there will be endless protestations of how it is harmless little thing, how it is “just this one brick”, and hand-on-heart vows of how there is, of course, absolutely NO intention of building a damn brick wall in the future.

The time to smack down the SJW entryists is when the camel first sticks its nose in the tent, not when it is already fully ensconced and defecating all over the carpets.

Yeah, THAT’S the problem

This is why the self-styled anti-racists can never be trusted. They would rather permit your daughters to be raped than admit to the fact of genetics-based behavioral differences:

Dozens of men were yesterday charged with a wide range of sex crimes against vulnerable girls after two separate police investigations. Following a ‘milestone’ operation by Northumbria Police, 20 suspects appeared in court to face charges including rape, sexual assault and sex trafficking.

The alleged offences involved 12 victims, including one girl who was aged just 13, with officers vowing to continue their investigation into the abuse of vulnerable children.

In a separate case, 25 men from Halifax, West Yorkshire, were charged with a number of historic and child-related sex offences. Almost all of the men in both cases are from Asian backgrounds, prompting police leading one of the cases to warn that far-Right groups may use the issue to stir up racial tension.

The issue SHOULD stir up racial tension. This is merely the latest in a very long line of evidence that strongly indicates different cultures cannot successfully live together peacefully over time. And contra those who attempt to hide racial differences behind cultural differences, culture is a product of human genetics.

Whether one subscribes to the theory of evolution by natural selection or some form of creationist intervention, both the science and logic of genetic differences is inescapable. And it is not “racist” to be scientifically and logically correct with regards to these matters, as the superiority of one race completely depends upon one’s perspective and favored metrics.

It cannot be denied that if rape, sexual assault, and sex trafficking are the metrics, the Asian population of Great Britain is absolutely superior to the English population. It is only racist if one argues that this factual observation is evidence of Asian racial superiority.

RACISM: The belief that all members of each race possess characteristics, abilities, or qualities specific to that race, especially so as to distinguish it as inferior or superior to another race or races.
– Oxford Dictionary

The definition most usefully serves to demonstrate the intrinsic idiocy of the concept; it is limited to binary thinkers and is not even relevant to those who are capable of thinking in probabilistic terms. Indeed, anyone who thinks in probabilistic terms cannot possibly be considered racist, given that no one who does so is going to be inclined to believe that “all members of each race” possesses virtually any characteristic in common.

How the Hugos became a battleground

Nero chronicles the politicization of science fiction and fantasy and explains the reason for the existence of Sad Puppies:

New York Times bestselling author Larry Correia told us that SFF is currently in the grip of a “systematic campaign to slander anybody who doesn’t toe their line,” which is breeding a culture of fear and self-censorship. “Most authors aren’t making that much money, so they are terrified of being slandered and losing business,” he says. The only exceptions are a “handful of people like me who are either big enough not to give a crap, or too obstinate to shut up.”

After years on the back foot, that obstinate handful are preparing to fight back.

Sad Puppies

To the outside world, the Hugo Awards are known as the most prestigious honor that a sci-fi or fantasy creator can achieve. However, inside the community they are widely seen as a popularity contest dominated by cliques and super-fandoms. This can be seen most clearly in the dominance of Doctor Who in the TV award categories. The show’s enormous fanbase has garnered 26 Hugo nominations in the last nine years. Episodes from the show triumphed in every year between 2006 and 2012, save one.

The Hugos have an advantage, though: they are difficult for a single group to dominate if others rise to challenge them. All one has to do to vote in the awards is pay a small membership fee to the World Science Fiction Convention. For the few who are brave enough to defend artistic freedom openly, the Hugos are a good place to make a stand.

That is precisely what is now happening. Ahead of 2013’s Hugo Awards, Larry Correia began making public blog posts about his nominations, inviting his readers to discuss and agree on a shared list of Hugo nominations, and vote collectively. The idea was to draw attention to authors and creators who were suffering from an undeserved lack of attention due to the political climate in sci-fi. The “Sad Puppies” slate was born.

(The original idea was to call it the “Sad Puppies Think of the Children Campaign” – a dig at those who take their social crusades too seriously.)

What began as a discussion among bloggers has turned into an annual event. Last year’s Sad Puppies slate was extraordinarily successful, with seven out of Correia’s twelve nominations making it to the final stage of the Hugos. Among the successful nominations was The Last Witchking, a novelette by Theodore Beale, also known as Vox Day – a writer whose radical right-wing views had put him at the top of the sci-fi SJWs’ hit list. The fact that an author like Beale could receive a Hugo nomination was proof that SJW domination of sci-fi was not as complete as the elites would have liked.

In addition to humiliating the activists, the slate also triggered significant debate. Even Jon Scalzi, the privilege-checking SFWA President discussed above, was forced to admit that works of science fiction and fantasy ought to be judged on their quality, not on the politics of their authors. This greatly upset some of Scalzi’s more radical supporters, who openly called for exclusion on the basis of political belief. The debate also spread beyond sci-fi to the pages of The Huffington Post and USA Today.

Stirring up debate was, of course, precisely the point of Sad Puppies. As well as ensuring that quality works of fiction made it past the cliques at places like SWFA and Tor.com to be considered by the fans themselves, the Sad Puppies slate also forced radicals to show their true colours. Those who supported political ostracism were outed as a tiny but vocal minority. As Correia explained on his blog, the slate managed to expose the “thought police” of the community before votes had even been cast.

This year, the Sad Puppies slate returns once more, championed by Hugo and Nebula-nominee Brad R. Torgerson. Although run by conservative authors, it includes many authors and creators who are left-wing, liberal, or non-politically aligned. In this way, the slate hopes to protect what radical activists want to eliminate: diversity of opinion and political tolerance.

It’s rather amusing how what is obvious to a reporter has managed to escape the pinkshirts for over a year now. We’ve never been into thought-policing or preventing anyone from getting published. They care more about that than they do about the history of the field, its traditions, or simply writing straightforward science fiction and fantasy.