Tag: mailvox

Mailvox: how SJWs metastasize

An individual familiar with the con scene explains how SJW entryism metastasizes once they take control of an organization and start using it as a vehicle to spread their thought control elsewhere.

Greetings from Minnesota. I recently read SJWs Always Lie, and I noted in particular the parts about entryism and the way Codes of Conduct are weaponized to cull enemies from organizations because it parallels my own experience with the local fan con scene.

The big fan con, locally, remains CONvergence (“CVG”). Damn near all of the other local fan cons follow its lead and participate in an association with the defacto parent org, the Geek Partnership Society. When this organizational realignment occurred there also came the inclusion of the current Code of Conduct (masked as a simple “Harassment” statement), pushes for Costumes Are Not Consent as another fork in the process, and the inclusion of the Atheism Plus crowd via con-within-a-con Skepticon (Rebecca Watson, Amanda Marcotte, and P.Z. Myers are much loved by the ruling clique here.) as a recurring element. I wondered what the hell was going on.

Well, one of the former CVG con com members is a man by the name of Michael Lee who has recently organized a convention specific to organizers of fan con: JOFCon MSP. This con has an explicit Code of Conduct, and I note that this code makes explicit in writing what is in actual practice at CONvergence regarding how its harassment policy is intended to work.

Furthermore, this is a con catering to the “Secret Masters of Fandom” clique, and many of the current and former CVG con-com members who will attend JOFCon MSP adhere to the SMOFs in large part due to the Torlock crowd being long-time regulars at CVG . The Former Guests of Honor, Visiting Authors, and Attending Professions are listed and I’m sure you’d recognize many of those listed. Yes, this meant any “acceptable” talk of Sad Puppies or Gamergate was NOT in support.

I offer my above-linked examples as real-world cases worthy of study, as both CVG (in its current status as Local Con of Cons, and therefore a significant point in the con-centric travelling circus that many authors and artists run to earn their living) and this JOFCon seem to possess more influence than they seem. WorldCon is not the only example of SJWs using leverage to fuck up the greater culture; I suspect that they’re using the entire con scene to engineer their poison into the culture.

I’m telling others sympathetic to the anti-SJW push across all fandoms that attend conventions to check their materials for similar signs of entryism and reconsider the state of organizational integrity for that convention. I would advise professionals to do likewise for conferences related to their interests. Given the alternatives now available, it may be possible to render those too far gone totally irrelevant while others can be reconquered and then purged of the cultists.

Keep this in mind if you are feeling any qualms of conscience about jettisoning an SJW from your club or organization because “he hasn’t done anything yet”. Don’t look at them as individuals because they don’t operate as individuals and they certainly don’t think for themselves; they are merely an invasive tendril of the SJW hive mind that is attempting to force its way into your area of responsibility.

If you don’t force them out, if you don’t keep them out, they will eventually take you out and take it over. Don’t think you, your organization, or your purpose is too valuable or important, the Narrative ALWAYS comes first and foremost for SJWs.

And if the SJWs are already running the show, leave. Stop supporting it. If you can summon the manpower to take it back, then do so, but if you can’t, set up your own show in direct competition with it and run them out that way.

Mailvox: the power of rhetoric

RM puts SJWs Always Lie into practice:

On Twitter I was able to apply your tactics in realtime against some atheist chick. I demolished pseudo-dialectic with dialectic, and met rhetoric with rhetoric. Additionally, I also worked in the Red Pill, maintained frame and got her hamster working over time by saying her profile pic was one of a 4, and hitting the Wall must drive her to seek male attention. I got six tweets in response for one of mine with her hamster spinning like mad to qualify herself to me.

In the end, she started following my account and asked if I’d follow her and if I wanted to have a conversation with just her since she was shy on Twitter.

I dropped it and walked away at that point, shuddering.

Granted, I have room for improvement. It took me far too long to get her to that point and I replied too often, but the end result was a confirmation of your tactics for logic and your observations concerning socio-sexual interactions.

There is a definite connection between rhetoric and Game that merits further exploration. And on a tangential note, I’ve had some requests for how to respond to common rhetorical attacks. For example, it’s quite common to see atheists use the Old Testament to rhetorically attack Christianity, to which the ideal rhetorical response should be obvious: “You’re attacking the Torah? You’re an anti-semitic Jew-hating Nazi!”

It would be helpful, in this regard, if you would list some of the common rhetorical attacks you’ve observed at school, at work, or online.

Mailvox: Game questions

Some of the quiz game contributors have asked me to post a list of the games for which we have questions so they can create more without reinventing any wheels. The current list of 96 games for which we have all ten questions is below; we’d like to have at least 250:

If you’d like to contribute, please use the following format

Game name
Platform(s)
Genre: (action, adventure, strategy, rpg, sim)
Decade: (1980, 1990, 2000, 2010)
Year
Developer
Publisher
Designer name (if known)

There should be 10 questions for each game, four Easy, three Medium, two Hard, and one Expert. Each question should have the correct answer as well as three incorrect multiple choice answers in the following format. Be sure to precisely mimic the formatting.

On which planet is the game set?
Chiron
1=Hermes;2=Vesta;3=Chiron;4=Eunomia
3

This allows us to enter the questions and answers directly into the database and utilize a unique quiz game mechanic that permits correct answers to be given in either fill-in-the-blank or multiple choice format. That way, there is a bonus for people who really know their stuff, but allowing those who recognize it rather than knowing it cold to stay competitive.

Keep the questions straightforward and don’t try to be cute or tricksy. The list of games for which we already have questions follows after the jump.

  1. Academagia
  2. Adventure
  3. Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings
  4. Agent U.S.A.
  5. Akalabeth: World of Doom
  6. Annals of Rome
  7. Baldur’s Gate 2
  8. Bomberman 64
  9. Civilization IV
  10. Civilization V
  11. Command & Conquer
  12. Command & Conquer: Red Alert
  13. Covert Action
  14. Darklands
  15. Dark Souls II
  16. Destiny
  17. Destiny of an Empire
  18. Dishonored
  19. Dominions 4
  20. Doom II: Hell on Earth
  21. Dragon Quest VIII
  22. Dragon Warrior
  23. Dwarf Fortress
  24. Europa Universalis IV
  25. EVE Online
  26. Executive Suite
  27. Fable: The Lost Chapters
  28. Fallout 3
  29. Fallout: New Vegas
  30. Fantasy General
  31. Grand Theft Auto: The Ballad of Gay Tony
  32. HALO: Combat Evolved
  33. Halo 2
  34. Halo 3
  35. Halo 3: ODST
  36. Halo: Reach
  37. Halo 4
  38. Halo: The Master Chief Collection
  39. Heroes of Might and Magic III
  40. Homeworld
  41. King of Dragon Pass
  42. Long Live the Queen
  43. Master of Magic
  44. Mechcommander 2
  45. Metal Gear Solid
  46. Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty
  47. M.U.L.E.
  48. Phantasie
  49. Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney
  50. Pick Axe Pete!
  51. Planescape: Torment
  52. Postal 2
  53. Quake
  54. Rebel Assault
  55. Robot Odyssey
  56. Romance of the Three Kingdoms X
  57. Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3
  58. Sid Meier’s Pirates!
  59. Sid Meier’s Alpha Centauri
  60. Sid Meier’s Alpha Centauri: Alien Crossfire
  61. Space Quest 3
  62. Sonic the Hedgehog 2
  63. Star Control II: The Ur-Quan Masters
  64. Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars
  65. Swashbuckler
  66. Swords and Serpents
  67. System Shock 2
  68. Taipan
  69. The Bard’s Tale
  70. The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
  71. The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past
  72. The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask
  73. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
  74. Thief
  75. Thief 2
  76. Thief Gold
  77. Tomb Raider
  78. Turok: Dinosaur Hunter
  79. Typhoon Thompson and the Quest for the Sea Child
  80. UFO: Enemy Unknown
  81. Ultima V
  82. Ultima VI: The False Prophet
  83. Ultima VII: The Black Gate
  84. Ultima Online
  85. Warcraft III
  86. Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne
  87. Warlords
  88. Wasteland 2
  89. Wipeout 2097
  90. Wizardry
  91. Worlds of Ultima: Savage Empire
  92. World of Warcraft
  93. World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade
  94. World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King
  95. X-COM: Terror From the Deep
  96. X-COM: Enemy Unknown

Mailvox: Rhetoric in action

The lightbulb goes on for IndecisiveEvidence:

My first instinct reading that exchange is to shake my head. It’s just you and Kluwe doing catty girl sniping. I’m a troll so I get it but it seems stupid. Then it hit me. You reminded me in the comment thread here. I read your book. You’re exercising the language Sparklepunter speaks. Brilliant. It’s still stupid but now in a completely different light that makes perfect sense.

Rhetoric often strikes those outside its emotional impact range as stupid. Think about the nasty little comment about her new dress that absolutely crushes the teen girl; the same comment made to anyone else might not only seem stupid, but insane. However, as I seem to keep having to point out to those who are quite stupidly attached to the idea that flawless logic and reason are genuinely capable of persuading 100 percent of all human beings of anything, rhetoric is devoid of information content. It is not intended to instruct or inform. It is intended to emotionally influence.

In the case of adversarial rhetoric, the objective is to cause sufficient emotional pain to the other party to force them to withdraw from the conflict. Now, withdrawal does not necessarily mean that any emotional pain has been caused, but one can usually tell if this is the case or not on the basis of any abrupt alteration of one party’s behavior. Usually, this will be the attacking party suddenly breaking off contact. To utilize the catty girl sniping analogy, whoever bursts into tears and runs away loses status, whoever remains there gains it.

Kluwe’s rhetoric was unfocused, shallow, and ineffective. He tried to associate me with Nazis, which is neither new to me nor true, and has no more effect on me than the previous five thousand attempts. Recognizing that, he then tried to pick at what he thought would be a sore spot, but I hadn’t spent any time thinking about how to respond to him and having three Hugo No Awards doesn’t bother me in the slightest. After all, I knowingly sought two of them this year. So he moved on to the assertion that my movement, whatever that may be, is failing and that my supporters are rats attempting to disassociate from me.

Considering that the VFM have grown from 434 strong to 445 in the last few days, the new book is still #1 in Political Philosophy, and the site traffic is on course to set a new monthly record, this was the precise opposite of effective rhetoric, which always has some basis in truth. How terrible do you feel, having been labeled a disloyal rodent by Sparklepunter?

Contrast with that my own rhetoric, which associated Kluwe, the father of two young girls, with pedophilia. This had a strong basis in truth, since Kluwe was actively defending a known pedophile in his unprovoked challenge to GamerGate. It was focused, as I continued to harp on that theme, and it was effective, as Kluwe rapidly went from attacking GamerGate and publicly asserting his support for Nyberg to retreating and hitting the mute button in the course of just a few tweets.

It was somewhat of a pity, because I had some even sharper rhetoric prepared, but it should illustrate that contra the mindless catty girl sniping some erroneously thought it to be, it was effective rhetoric that demoralized an enemy and defeated his rhetorical attack. No one came away from reading that thinking about National Socialism. A dialectical response that cited Nyberg’s various deeds would have been totally ineffective since Kluwe was already familiar with all of the relevant information and had chosen to ignore it.

“Before some audiences not even the possession of the exactest
knowledge will make it easy for what we say to produce conviction. For
argument based on knowledge implies instruction, and there are people
whom one cannot instruct.”
– Aristotle, Rhetoric 

I repeat: Meet dialectic with dialectic. Meet rhetoric with rhetoric. Meet pseudo-dialectic with dialectic to expose the rhetoric, then follow it up with rhetoric. Those who tend to favor dialectic very much need to understand that the emotional impact of dialectic in response to rhetoric is every bit as ineffective as the logical impact of rhetoric is in response to dialectic.

It may help to keep in mind that whenever you try to use information to persuade a rhetoric speaker, you sound like “the train is fine” guy. You may be correct, but you’re totally missing the point.

Mailvox: “we’re waiting for ISIS”

Shimshon asks about the Middle East:

i think i mentioned before. i heard word from someone who knows. the region north and west of amman, and all along the syrian border is thick with refugees. have you seen some of the pics? there’s around 600k i think. around 10% of the native population. my understanding is that king hussein is pretty terrified of the powderkeg in his midst.

Powderkeg barely begins to describe it. The refugee situation is even worse than that. I had lunch with a Lebanese Christian last week, who was visiting while on vacation. Apparently there are over a million refugees there now. I asked what the Maronites were doing and he said “we are waiting for ISIS.”

That sounded rather fatalistic, so I asked him if they would fight or if they would simply submit like the Assyrians and the Yazidi did. He smiled and said “We have always had to fight to stay alive. The difference is, this time many of those we used to fight against will be fighting with us.” It’s perhaps worth remembering that they were winning the Lebanese civil war when Syria entered and forced a settlement.

What the US and Israel should do is materially support Assad and the Alawites, the Jordanians, and the Lebanese Christians without getting involved in the fighting, and at the same time, clean house at home. Instead, they appear to be playing the same stupid game they did in Afghanistan, where they create a weaponized puppet who rapidly grows beyond their control. Too many parties appear to be too caught up in their historical concerns, such as the Turks with the Kurds, or their grand strategic vision, such as the Israelis with Iran, to focus on the actual danger at hand.

Sure, the Islamic State is no danger to Israel or the USA now, so they think they can use it to settle old scores. But just as the anti-Soviet mujahideen eventually transformed into the Taliban, Daesh is in the process of developing into a more serious and formidable force.

The Iran agreement, and the fact that Turkey, Israel, and the USA are all cooperating to hit Daesh in Syria may indicate that they’re finally beginning to rethink their previous perspectives. The one thing that is certain is that Syria is far less dangerous with Assad in control than Daesh.

Guess what? You’re fired

In which a reader reacts to bad news:

Today, tomorrow, next year. No matter when it happens, if it ever happens, hearing these words will inspire many things in men across the socio-sexual spectrum.

I know, because I got to hear them recently. And it sucks.

Suddenly your world is upside down, and for many of us, all that confidence you worked so hard to build feels as if it will evaporate before your eyes. Now what?

At the very least, it can happen to any of us, and even Vox has had the rug pulled out from under him during projects. I suspect even the highest-ranked men take a blow when this happens. So instead of bitching and crying about my situation, I’m sharing my general observations and what I’m doing. Take it for what you will, and I hope it helps if you ever find yourself in the same place.

Walking Away

From the moment I heard the words, the first thing I knew I had to realize was that the decision has been made. No amount of excusing or emotional-pleading would change anything (I’m looking at you gammas). It was beyond my control; their house, their rules. I decided to skip wasting any more time with people who weren’t furthering my goals.

Now, you may feel angry or sad or embarrassed or humiliated as you clean out your desk, and it’s fine to privately acknowledge those initial feelings (you’d be surprised how even a fairly confident man will feel them, I know I did). But it’s important to accept where you’re at now, so you can get back up on your feet.

You’ll be glad you walked away with your head up.

Don’t Panic

Let’s stop here for a moment. I cannot stress this one enough. Over the years I’ve seen several other friends get fired, and watching them panic is not only pathetic to see, it will definitely make the situation worse. If you have a woman and you’re panicking, she’ll panic x 100. Your house will be in disarray, energy will be spent dealing with that situation on top of everything else, and you will not be able to make the necessary decisions you’re about to need to make with a clear head. (Yes, there are decisions coming).

Instead of freaking out, I relaxed. Yeah, you heard that right. Relaxed. I recommend going for a long drive, going fishing or hiking, going to the track or to the gym. Not an all day affair, but wherever it is that you can be completely relaxed , enjoying what you’re doing for a bit (I recommend skipping your favorite bar though). For me, it was a long, long run at my favorite spot.

Now, I assessed the situation. Not who may have sold me out or how stupid I thought my boss was, but real assessment where you identify where you went wrong and what you may have done differently. By identifying what I could fix, if anything, I was gaining control over what was actually in my control.

Now I could move forward and move on with confidence. Time to rise up from this low point.

Initiate All Backup Plans Now

You do have backup plans, right? I cannot recommend enough that every many have a solid set of backups plans. If you don’t have any currently, you can start small by building up a little savings or by having a normal side-gig that brings in cash flow. Literally anything is better than nothing.

For me, it means shifting my energy toward other revenue-generating projects, falling back on my meager 1st-level emergency fund, and casually increasing the level of networking I do. Also, and here’s where the decision-making starts to come in, jettisoning unneeded luxuries. This isn’t to say that I’m some guy that’s always blowing through his money, but it’s time to figure out if there’s any additional fat you can trim from your budget. Downgrading cell services, assessing if you can learn to fix the wife’s car yourself, holding off a little longer on whatever you think you need to buy. Whatever it is, there’s always fat to trim, and you very well may need that extra $50 or $100 a month down the road. If you get fired, you’re going to be faced with a lot of these types of decisions in short order; best to get used to them fast.

Main point: don’t wait to deploy your multi-pronged set of back up plans. More initiatives today means more chance of success tomorrow.

Now that You’re Back Up, Hit it With Everything You Have

It might seem counter-intuitive to some men, but you’re not “fired” for all time or until you find another job. In fact, I’m already back on my feet. My situation is less than ideal, but I’m the man sitting at the table playing the hand I was dealt, and I damn well intend to play.

So what they tell you about making sure to keep your routine if you’re fired– it’s bullshit. For many men, routine means waking up at 8am, doing some stuff until 5pm, relaxing until 10pm, and then falling asleep. I’m going to tell you something far different: even if you feel like you don’t want to do anything, it’s actually the time to be doing as much as you can. If you wake up at 8am normally, start waking up at 6am. Fall asleep at your desk, every day. Yes, hit back at all hours until you’re literally falling asleep from exhaustion.

And it shouldn’t just be applying for jobs, though I can’t say enough that in this situation, you should be applying to 100s not merely a few due to fear of rejection. Hit the weights, run, read books, start new projects… write blog posts. Maximize your opportunities, and push forward with everything you have.

A Few Final Considerations

If you’re a regular guy, feelings like depression will pop up, at least the hints of them. I know I’ve had them. Like before, I recommend acknowledging them, and then refocusing. Do not dwell on them. They will do nothing to improve your situation.

On that note, I recommend drinking no more than one day a week, no matter your past habits. One day lets you blow of steam, but the last thing you want is to fall into a non-stop drink-a-thon. And for the gammas, no matter what you feel compelled to say: you are not on some fun vacation; this is not your wife’s gift to you this year, and you are not a stay-at-home dad with a wife that loves her career.

Lastly, understand that you must learn to STFU. I was lucky to know that no one cares why you were fired. Not your wife, not your buddies, not even your mom. Even close friends will likely give you funny looks if you tell them. I recommend not shying away from telling the truth if it comes up, but there’s no reason to broadcast it, and most importantly, really and truly, no one gives a damn about the details. Trying to socially peg down your old boss, as if anyone cared, reeks of desperation, and you… you’re a man with options.

Now, let’s get to it.

Mailvox: customer care fail

A Vile Faceless Minion sent me this:

Your message

   To: Nielsen Hayden, Patrick
   Subject: Irene Gallo’s comments regarding the Sad Puppies and Tor authors.

 was deleted without being read

That’s the only response anyone has received. Furthermore, John Scalzi, Stephen Brust, David Gerrold, and Laura Resnick are all proclaiming that Tor Books is as indifferent about continuing to sell books to their unhappy customers as they are, and PNH’s refusal to even read email from Tor’s customers does appear to accurately reflect that indifference.

It’s certainly a novel approach to selling books. We’ll see how well it works out for them.

Especially in light of how Macmillan’s Compliance Officer is not ignoring the emails sent to her.

Your message

   To: Brown, Rhonda
   Subject: Regarding comments from TOR senior employees

 was read

It’s certainly an interesting contrast. Whether it is meaningful or not, we’ll find out soon enough.

Mailvox: how to teach evolution

Mindy asks how to teach evolution to homeschooled children:

I’m off to purchase materials at a homeschooling conference in couple days. I was wondering what your thoughts were on teaching evolution to grade school level students. I want to introduce a more formal science curriculum but all of the conventional materials are saturated in evolutionary timescales and theory. 

Personally, my thoughts on creationism are rather fluid.  I don’t know that the six days of creation should be taken literally though I don’t believe man evolved from any other animal.  I would like to give my kids a firm foundation in Bible based science before teaching the conventional theory but am not sure whether to use the literal fundamentalist version to start with. Normally, when teaching younger children, we do so from the position of having a definitive answer instead of a more or less open question and yet I don’t want to confuse my first grader with my waffling.  At some point they will need to be introduced to the conventional theory of evolution.

When would you do this and how? Any science curricula that is especially good for grade school kids? I look forward to some new ideas on this. I do so enjoy your home schooling threads.

Many parents prefer to keep their children in the dark concerning intellectual concepts with which they disagree. This is true across the political spectrum. I consider this to be a huge mistake.

If you have read RGD, then you will know that my description of Keynesian economics, which I consider to be utter bollocks, is nevertheless so complete and correct that people have described it as one of the better summaries of it that they have ever encountered. My belief is that if something is false, the best way to understand its falsity is to know it better than its advocates. So read the sources and read the current champions, then critique it.

And if you’re not capable of doing that, how do you know it is wrong?

As for the Theorum of Evolution by (probably) Natural Selection, Biased Mutation, Genetic Drift, and Gene Flow, or TE(p)NSBMGDaGF, I would recommend a child be 15 or 16 before studying it. Any younger and they won’t be able to identify the obvious flaws and will be tend to be inclined to simply accept whatever they are told, whether it is TENS, monetarist economics, or magic garden fairies.

Start with an abridged version of The Origin of the Species. Then read one or two of Richard Dawkins’s books; The Selfish Gene is much better than The Greatest Show on Earth because it is an explanation whereas the latter is an apology. That will ensure that the child is better-educated and more up-to-date on evolution than any graduate of the public or private schools.

Then introduce two or three of the critics. I can’t recommend one, because I’ve never actually read any of the various books by TENS critics as I have no need to bolster my own reasons for being skeptical of the theorum. But there are plenty out there and I’m sure the readers here can recommend a few of them.

The point is that there is never any need for those dedicated to the truth to shy away from falsehood or fear it. Hit it head on. Study it. Master it. And then you will be able to explain its weak points to others. That being said, I can see the need for an Evolution curriculum; if we can find a suitably credentialed skeptic, we will likely publish one.

Mailvox: the sorry state of SF

I thought this email from RC was interesting, as it demonstrates how Gresham’s Law applies to science fiction, with Pink SF tending to drive out Blue. Hey, even if Tor Books can’t be bothered to read your emails, at least I do:

I am writing to you today regarding the lack of professionalism of certain staff at Tor books.  I know others have contacted you regarding the contempt in which some staffers hold certain authors and a large part of your customer base.  What I wish to address is the editors’ contempt for the genre itself, and their incompetence at one of the essential tasks of producing SCIENCE fiction: getting the science right.  I am certain these are related.  The upshot is that Tor is printing a lot of stuff which ticks all the fashionable social and political check-boxes, but stinks on ice as SF.

An egregious example which I encountered recently is in the first of the Ender’s Game prequels, Earth Unaware.  There are a host of glaring faults in the orbital mechanics among other things, but they are too involved to detail in a short letter.  I will instead quote a concise example from page 261:

“The ship scoops up hydrogen atoms, which at near-lightspeed would be gamma radiation, then the rockets shoot this gamma plasma out the back for thrust.”

There is no such thing as a “gamma plasma”.  Gamma rays are photons, not atoms or parts of atoms.  Plasmas are a mixture of ionized matter and free electrons.  A high-energy proton is not a gamma ray; many cosmic rays are high-energy protons, but that does not make this phrase remotely acceptable in a science fiction book.  A well-read middle school science geek could have caught this error; I should know, I was one.

Shortly after this comes another one (p. 269):

“If it’s sucking up hydrogen atoms at near-lightspeed and taking in all this radiation….”

This is part of a plotline that plays for weeks, between a mining ship plying the Kuiper belt and Earth.  The Kuiper belt extends from about 30 astronomical units to 55 AU from the Sun (earth orbits at 1 AU).  Light travels 1 AU in roughly 500 seconds, so an object travelling at “near-lightspeed” would cover 55 AU in not much more than 27,500 seconds; on the order of 8 hours.  Even if the initial speed of the object is reduced to 25% of c and it decelerates linearly, the transit time is less than 3 days.  The whole plotline is nonsense because the author (Johnston, I’m sure; Card does better work) couldn’t be bothered to read a basic science book.  This is lousy even for fan-fiction.  Why did this ever make it to print?  More to the point, why do the editors have such contempt for the genre and its fans as to allow it, to the point of commissioning a lightweight like Johnston to play in Card’s universe in the first place?

I could not but help but notice that Earth Unaware got all the “we are the world”, social justice, anti-corporate messages lined up front and center.  The priorities are literally that obvious.  That’s why I’ve not bothered to read the other two prequels.  I don’t waste my time on dreck. I spotted this trend quite some time ago, but it was only after the highly-publicized outbursts of certain senior Tor staff that I realized that it wasn’t due to the times, but was a matter of policy.

Well, we all make mistakes from time to time, authors and editors alike (cough, tunnel), but it is pretty egregious to combine SJW message fiction with a major plot foul-up of the sort one RC describes. I haven’t read the book, so I can’t testify to the accuracy of his critique, but it does sound like a rather impressive howler.

As for the total number of emails sent, based on the CC’s Peter and I received, around 2,300 emails were sent by 765 different people that we know of. And there were others being sent as well, although we can’t possibly know how many. Regardless, I expect that enough were sent to make it clear to Macmillan that the excuses given by the senior Tor employees for the emails that they previously received was a false one.

Those senior employees have publicly attacked Tor-published authors, Tor published-works, and Tor customers. They have needlessly antagonized tens of thousands of book-buyers in pursuit of their ideological agenda. They’ve now been caught lying to their superiors about the extent of the consequences of their unprofessional behavior and violations of the Macmillan code of conduct. And that is why, at this point, I wouldn’t be surprised if Macmillan cleans house even more thoroughly than people have been demanding. I certainly would if I were in their shoes.

Then again, for all we know the Macmillan executives are fanatic SJWs whose instinct will be to dig in and defend the actions of Irene Gallo, Moshe Feder, and Patrick Nielsen Hayden. If that’s the case, Peter Grant has made it clear that the boycott, which for no particular reason at all may be christened TORDROP, will begin at noon on Friday, June 19th. And since no one has received any sort of response at all from Macmillan or Tom Doherty as yet, this is a good time to take a picture of your books published by Tor Books and tally up the total of the books and ebooks you have purchased from them. The truth is that we’re not asking for much, only that the senior employees at Tor Books be held to the same professional standard expected of a retail sales clerk or a fry cook at McDonalds.

Mailvox: favorites in A GAME OF THRONES

AL is curious about the characters in A GAME OF THRONES:

Who is your favorite character? Would you be interested at all in a discussion on that on your blog? Maybe you discussed it before but after searching through your posts I couldn’t find who you thought your favorite character is.

I think one has to distinguish between the characters as written in the books and the characters in the TV show. For example, I think Roose Bolton is creepy and disgusting in the books, but I rather like him on the show. The former is The Leech, the latter is not.

On the show, easily my favorite figure is Littlefinger, Lord Peter Baelish. He might occasionally overreach himself, but I like his ambition, his ruthlessness, his confidence, and his style. I don’t like the Littlefinger of the books as much, as that Littlefinger is more of a self-conscious social-climber who tends to lack the confidence and style of the TV Littlefinger.

In the books, I liked the two Starks, Ned and Robb, although I found their cluelessness about the nature and behavior of evil, untrustworthy men to be as frustrating as it is realistic. I see them in many a conservative who is determined to lose as nobly and graciously as possible. I liked Tywin Lannister of the books and absolutely loved Charles Dance in that role – how could you not – although I found his hatred for Tyrion to be somewhat inexplicable given that he has no other heirs. I also found it highly implausible that he didn’t free Jaime from his Kingsguard oath; these are not people who respect oaths, priests, or gods.

The female character I find most attractive is Myranda, the psycho little daughter of the kennelmaster. The female character I most disliked was Caitlyn Stark, in the books and on TV. She was nasty to Jon Snow and kept trying to interfere, ineptly, in things of which she knew nothing. The showrunners were wise to leave her undead version out of the TV show. And the Sansa of the TV show is much more interesting and complex than Martin’s Sansa, who appears to exist mostly to absorb Martin’s Gamma hate for female innocence and hope.