Tag: SFWA

How not to be SFWA president II

John Scalzi doubles down, not only in terms of jacking up his levels of emotion, irrationality, and vulgarity, but by expanding his attack on Random House to include ALL publishers who utilize a no-advance model:

So why are so many eBook-only publishers attempting to run with the “no advances” business model? If I had to guess, I would say because many of these then-erstwhile publishers assumed that publishing electronically had a low financial threshold of entry (not true, if you’re serious about it) and they fancied being publishers, so they started their businesses undercapitalized, and are now currently in the process of passing the consequences of that undercapitalization unto the authors they would like to work with. Alternately, as appears to be the case with Random House, they’re looking for a way to pass as much of the initial cost of publishing onto the author as possible, and one of the best ways to bring down those initial costs is to avoid paying the author anything up front. Both of these are bad business models, although one is more maliciously so, and both are to be avoided. Just because someone has stupidly or maliciously planned their business, doesn’t mean you’re obliged to sign a contract with them.

But, these publishers and their defenders may say (and have said), the publisher takes all the risk in producing a book! Yeah? Hey, to publishers and their defenders who say that: Fuck you. Fuck you for asserting that the author has shouldered no risk, when she’s invested the time, opportunity cost and material outlay required to create a manuscript. Fuck you for asserting the the author sees no risk to her own career from the choices that the publisher imposes on the publishing process that the author has no control of: everything from cover art (which, if horrible and/or out of step with the market, can sink a book) to the size and distribution of the initial print run, to the marketing plan the publisher has for retail.

Fuck you for lightly passing over the risk that the author has if the book fails — that any additional books in the contract might be cancelled or put out with the bare minimum of contractual obligation, that the author might not be able to sell another book to the publisher or other publishers because of a track record of poor sales — and for lightly passing over the fact the a publisher mitigates its own risk of the failure of a single book by having an entire portfolio of releases. If one single book fails but the publisher’s line holds up generally, then the risk the publisher encounters to its livelihood is minimal. The risk to the author, on the other hand, is substantially greater. Yes, to all of that, “fuck you,” is probably the politest thing to say in response.

Now, I could certainly point out that this is an incredibly stupid, unprofessional, and irresponsible thing to do, especially in light of how the Guardian has already mistaken one of his previous posts on the subject for the SFWA’s position.  So, given the dedicated journalistic commitment to calm and reasonable discourse, it would not be a surprise if we soon see headlines of this sort: SFWA To All Publishers: “FUCK YOU”.

However, I think that’s all readily apparent.  Being an Award-Winning Cruelty Artist, I happen to find it much more amusing to demonstrate that Scalzi simply doesn’t know what he’s talking about, and moreover, to show that his observed inability to understand the potential benefits of the no-advance, revenue-share system has already cost him hundreds of thousands of dollars in 2012 alone.

Scalzi has publicly stated that Tor sold
35,667 eBook versions of Redshirts at $11.99, 17,008 audiobooks at $19.95 and 26,604 hardcovers at $24.95.  If we assume that he gets the
standard 20% royalty on ebooks that Tor author Robert Sawyer says Tor is paying its authors, the customary 10(5K)-12.5(5K)-15% on hardcovers, and 8% on audio books, his royalty revenues under the traditional publishing model he is defending so vigorously are likely in the vicinity of the following:

Ebook: $59,870.62
Hardcover: $90,479.22
Audiobook: $27,144.77
Total royalties: $177,494.61

That’s excellent performance by any measure, almost surely in excess of whatever advance he received for Redshirts.  One must congratulate Scalzi on his ability to write fiction that people want to buy, regardless of what one thinks of the man or the fiction.  However, one also has to seriously question his financial acumen, because if he had the very sort of publishing deal that he is claiming is so dreadful and indefensible, he would have done considerably better.

Let’s be realistic and assume that in addition to the revenue-sharing model, his contract contains an amount of chargeable overhead as many of these 50/50 contracts do.  The largest of which I am aware permitted the publisher to charge the author up to a maximum of $10,000 from the author’s royalties.  Based on the same channel discount structure as above, but this time splitting the resulting revenue equally between Tor and the author results in the following figures:

Ebook: $149,676.57
Hardcover: $165,942.45
Audiobook: $84,827.40
Total royalties: $400,446.42
(less overhead charge $10,000)
Net author revenue: $390,446.42.  

In other words, Scalzi has already thrown away $212,951.81 in additional royalty revenue due to his insistence on an advance and his inability to understand that the no-advance, 50/50 revenue-sharing model is not intrinsically unfair, disadvantageous to the writer, or predatory.  In fact, if he wasn’t such an angry and short-sighted fool, he would go to Tor and very politely ask them to publish his future books under the very no-advance model he is so vigorously decrying.  As it stands, every dollar he henceforth collects from Tor on Redshirts represents $2.55 (and counting) that he would have received had he the courage and foresight to accept the risk of foregoing a pre-payment on his royalties.

No doubt some authors believe that it is a good idea to heed the advice of a successful author when it comes to book contracts.  And that is quite often true.  But is it really a good idea to avoid no-advance, 50/50 publishing deals on the advice of an author dumb enough to hand over 54.5 percent of his potential royalties to the publisher for nothing more than the privilege of collecting part of the income beforehand?

UPDATE:  John Scalzi demonstrates that he not only can’t do math, he can’t read either:

The
fellow in question has no idea how my contract is structured, so he
hasn’t the slightest idea what I’m making. I will say his estimates
amuse me. His estimates about production and marketing costs likewise
suggest a profound ignorance of the real world (that $10,000 would have
covered this for a week, at most). Additionally, if the fellow is trying
to use the example of an outlier (i.e., a bestselling author with a
large and healthy following) in an overly-simplistic “all other things
being equal” sort of comparison, grounded in bad numbers, to show why
these sorts of contracts might be beneficial to other writers,
particularly new writers, then he’s, at best, once again letting his
need to get his mancrush on get in the way of clear and rational
thinking, or useful advice to other authors.

Ignorant and
mendacious is not a great combination, basically. And that’s all I will
say about that. It’s nice he’s still making money for those various
organizations, however.

As noted here, I have no problems with
authors choosing not to take advances — or making any other sort of
contractual maneuvers they choose — when the author has decided that it
is in his or her own best interests to do so, based on several factors.
This is manifestly different from the publisher having “no advances” as
its default setting. Anyone who doesn’t recognize the difference between
those two probably should not be dispensing career advice to anyone
else.

First, Scalzi is attempting to have it both
ways here.  I cited the standard royalty rates for ebooks, hardcovers,
and audio books from Tor Books in doing my calculations.  It is entirely
possible that as one of their leading authors, he gets better royalty
rates from them, although I very much doubt he is getting the 50 percent
royalties that Hydra is offering or that I get from my publishers.  The
numbers are not bad, they are standard and other writers, particularly
new writers, are not likely to get better royalty rates than those I
cited.

They are certainly more relevant than the numbers
that John is keeping to himself, which is certainly his right, but to which he
cannot reasonably appeal.  And, insofar as his royalties depart from those that new writers will receive he is making the very outlier mistake that he
erroneously accuses me of making.

Furthermore, I said absolutely
nothing about “production and marketing costs”, but rather, referred to
a fixed amount that is expected to help cover the publisher’s overhead
costs involved in publishing the book.  In my various book contracts,
that fixed amount ranges from zero to $10,000 and comes out of my 50
percent share.  Far from showing any “profound ignorance of the real
world”, it simply showed Scalzi’s lack of reading ability and
unfamiliarity with the revenue-sharing model.

Notice that he is backing down now that his argument has been exposed as ridiculous and materially self-defeating.  Suddenly the problem isn’t “no advances”,  but “no advances as its default setting”.

UPDATE II: The little rabbits actually manage to make Scalzi’s inept response look downright intelligent when they try to weigh in:


“Claiming that 10000 USD cover all the expenses involved in marketing and
producing Redshirts (Posters. Book tours. Wil Wheaton. Cover designs.
Typesetting. Editing. Proofreading.) is so fallacious that it renders
every other point invalid.”

Well, I suppose it might if anyone had ever made such a stupid and fallacious claim.  But no one did anything of the sort, least of all me.

How not to be SFWA president

Three-time and outgoing SFWA President John Scalzi appears to want to bring his period of amateurish misrule to an end on a fittingly diplomatic note:

THIS IS A HORRIBLE AWFUL TERRIBLE APPALLING DISGUSTING CONTRACT WHICH IS BAD AND NO WRITER SHOULD SIGN IT EVER. Yes, I’m aware I’ve already said this. It bears repeating. It doesn’t matter whether it’s from Alibi, Hydra or anyone. Run away from it, as fast as you can, arms flailing like a Muppet’s. It’s the only rational response.

I will note that at the moment I have in my email queue a letter from Random House, written in a “more in sorrow than anger” style, which expresses disappointment that I (for one) didn’t talk to them before writing my piece on their terrible regrettable insulting Hydra deal terms, and waxing rhapsodic about their bold new business model. It’s profit sharing, you see, not like apparently any of those other book contracts out there, which comes as a surprise to me, considering how much of Tor’s and Subterranean’s profits I’ve shared in over the years.

I am speaking for myself and only for myself when I say that I looked at the letter that the folks at Random House sent me and wondered just how incredibly stupid they must think I am to believe that just because they sent a letter that read as all reasonable and nice sounding, that would somehow change the fact that the business model of their new eBook imprints is predicated on preying on writers — and preying on the writers most at risk for being preyed upon, the new and the desperate.

This must be more of that smart diplomacy of which we heard so much in the recent presidential elections.  It’s hardly a joking matter, but it is a little amusing in light of expressed concerns regarding my ability to get along with the major publishers.  But while I may have been personally attacked by a pair of Tor editors and been guilty of asking questions concerning the number of Nebula nominations won by Tor Books, it can honestly say it never occurred to me to publicly assail a major publishing house’s basic business practices or make assumptions concerning its views of its authors.

I am not saying the business model of Random House’s ebook imprints is ideal or even fair.  But these are issues best raised privately, not shrieked from the mountaintops.  Despite Scalzi’s hysterical whining – no, Johnny, they’re not “fucking kidding you” – there is absolutely nothing wrong with the no-advance model; I prefer it myself because it reduces the amount of risk to the publisher and costs the writer nothing while simultaneously providing him with a considerably higher share of the upside.  The shared risk model is a good one; why should the publisher have to gamble and assure the writer of revenue that may never be realized?

And the publisher’s risk is real.  I’ve been paid “advances” on three books from two different publishers that I didn’t even have to write due to various reorganizations and turf wars inside the publishing houses.

Instead of jumping up and down and screaming “it’s not fair”, the SFWA president should be speaking quietly with Random House, and explaining what aspects of the contracts are reasonable and which are not.  That’s not only the best way to address situations like these, it is the only way, because SFWA is not about to win a pissing match with a major publisher facing a declining market and a genuine need to revise its traditional business model.

As an SFWA member, I’m embarrassed by the juvenile behavior of the president and appalled that the introduction of new contracts for the new medium appear to have taken the organization by surprise.  I’ve stated that the status quo leadership of the recent past has been amateurish in the extreme; this incident is only the most recent evidence of that.  And, needless to say, if I am elected president, these matters will be handled in a considerably more professional manner.

UPDATE: Publisher’s Weekly is on it, complete with a copy of the letter to Scalzi and the SFWA:

After the Science Fiction Writers of America (SFWA) came out swinging on Wednesday, with its president saying that it would not allow authors publishing with Random House’s e-only science fiction imprint Hydra to use that achievement as a credential for membership, the publisher has responded.

PW’s Genreville blog ran a post about the SFWA’s decision, but Random House said the organization never gave it the opportunity to address the issue at hand, namely royalty rates and overall contract terms. (The SFWA said the main reason for its decision is that Hydra “fails to pay authors an advance against royalties, as SFWA requires, and has contract terms that are onerous and unconscionable.”

In a letter to the SFWA, Random House’s digital publishing director Allison Dobson said that while it respects the organization’s stance “we strongly disagree with it, and wish you had contacted us before you published your posts.” The letter went on to say that Hydra “offers a different–but potentially lucrative–publishing model for authors: a profit share,” and that “as with every business partnership, there are specific costs associated with bringing a book successfully to market, and we state them very straightforwardly and transparently in our author agreements.”

Mailvox: the line between F and SF

An SFWA author writes concerning the upcoming SFWA election:

 I voted for you and my ballot’s going out tomorrow in the mail. I thought your opening statements were hilarious! Outlandish, too….  But anyway I liked most of your ideas for SFWA.

The idea of establishing two Nebula awards — one for SF and one for F is really over the top. They overlap. Just as a good story also overlaps with dark elements. (Which we politely do  not refer to as “horror” but it is.) This is the main reason I’m writing you –I’d like to know just how you would possibly chop SF & F in half –when novels and stories contain elements of both. “Hard” sf isn’t the only definition of Science Fiction. “Hard SF” implies that there is some explicit element of science explained within the story or novel (which Landis and Haldeman do well) but it’s not the only element and anything we imagine becomes fantasy.

This was my response:  In answer to your question, those nominating a novel for a Nebula Award would be expected to indicate that they considered the nominated work to be either F or SF as part of the nomination process.  A novel that received both SF and F nominations would have both types of nominations counted but would be put up for the award in the category that received the most nominations, assuming that it received enough combined nominations to qualify.  If the author happened to disagree with the categorization and the difference between the two categories was between one and three nominations, then the category would be switched at the author’s request.

Obviously, if everyone nominates something that is clearly Fantasy and the author prefers it to compete in the Science Fiction category because he believes he is the second coming of Isaac Asimov or because he thinks it will be easier to beat out Star Trek 562: Spock Takes a Nap than the most recent rewrite of a Brontë novel published by Tor Books, there would be no reason to accommodate that.

But if a book could be reasonably considered to be either science fiction or fantasy, to such an extent that it is unclear to the readers, there is no reason not to permit the author to determine which category the book most properly belongs.

70,000 readers per day!

One thing you have to keep in mind when dealing with the Left is that
leftists very seldom tell the truth about anything.  They depend upon misleading others.  That is why, if you notice a leftist is putting
particular stress on something, that is a glowing-red, beeping signal
that if you look a little closer, you’ll discover that whatever they are claiming is, if not entirely false, at least somewhat exaggerated.

Item 1: Rachel Maddow.  “A
poster on Twitter, upon seeing what he thought were very similar posts
referencing MSNBC host Rachel Maddow’s show, did some searching and
found out that Maddow has been using phony twitter accounts to boost her
“mentions” on the popular website.  As can be seen by screenshots
collected by a tweeter named @LeftyBollocks, Maddow has massive amount
of accounts posting the exact same claim that “Confession: I yell at my
TV while watching Rachel #Maddow talk about filibuster reform in the
same way most people do during football.”

Item 2: John Scalzi.   “Handily
demolishing the burger that he had chosen over a Midtown restaurant’s
fancier Mediterranean fare, Mr. Scalzi was anything but grim; he smiled
readily and giggled heartily. He is comfortable with the business of
promotion: An affable speaker, he is familiar with the patois of fandom
and is adept at generating buzz through the nerd mafia of like-minded
collaborators. He already reaches up to 50,000 readers a day through his
popular blog, “Whatever.” (“Taunting the tauntable since 1998” is the
slogan on its home page.)”

Item 3: 2012 Nebula Awards.  The SFWA Nebula ballots went out today.  As usual, Tor had 2 of the 6 nominations for Best Novel, but as Tor’s defenders are quick to point out, that could be accounted for by the fact that it publishes the most novels in the increasingly mislabeled field of “science fiction”.  However, even more questionable is the fact that three of the seven Best Novelette nominees were published on Tor.com, which is one fewer nomination than Asimov, Analog, F&SF, and Black Gate received for all short fiction combined.  Another apparent anomaly was that two writers, Aliette de Bodard and Kenneth Liu, received five nominations between them for the three shorter fiction awards, up from three last year.  Now, it would appear that either the two writers are the second comings of Asimov and Heinlein who will dominate the field of science fiction for decades to come or there is something else at work here.

The numerate among us
will recognize that 50,000 readers per day is 18.25 million readers per
year.  Now recall that McRapey was more than a little pleased to have hit 8.2 million in 2012,
up from 5.4 million in 2011.  That 8.2 million refers to
Wordpress views that amount to 7.8 million in Google pageview terms.  Now to
demonstrate how absurd that shows the “50,000 readers a day” claim to be, note that two months into 2013 I am presently right on pace to hit 25,309,493 readers
in 2013 by the NYT metric.  That’s 69,341 daily, which rounds nicely up
to 70,000 readers per day!

How seriously would
you take me if I claimed I had up to 70,000 readers per day?  That’s
precisely how seriously you should take any the posturing of any left-winger
about his popularity, his influence, or even his “bestselling” status, said the three-time Billboard top 40 recording artist.

These examples demonstrate why you should never,
ever give anyone on the Left even the smallest benefit of the doubt.  They always, at
the very least, stretch the truth.  They sockpuppet.  They pretend to
read things they have not.  They claim to have bought things they have
never seen.  They claim to have published three books when they have
only published one.  This reliable pattern of left-wing dishonesty is why I don’t
hesitate to call out fake reviewers and point out apparent shenanigans
even before I have gathered the incontrovertible and conclusive proof; experience and pattern
recognition have taught me that where there is the smoke of anomalies
and numbers not adding up, there is usually the fire of someone who is
“comfortable with the business of promotion” and “adept at generating
buzz”.

It is always unwise to place any trust whatsoever in those who live by attempting to redefine reality through their lies.

An addition to my platform

[Redacted due to a violation of SFWA Forum policies, which forbids both quoting and paraphrasing of Forum discussions.  Also, I should mention that I was in error in assuming that a question on the Forum was directed at me; it was directed at another individual’s post that I did not see.  My apologies to the questioner.]

If I win I will form a committee consisting of one author from each major publisher, who will be charged with discussing the issue with their publisher and receiving either a confirmation or a denial that the publisher has engaged in “bestseller campaigns” via bulk-buying or other methods.  What will be done with that information will be up to the membership, but at least they will be informed as to the facts of the situation.

Anyhow, it struck me that the problem of the appearance of corruption in science fiction and fantasy might have an easy solution.  Since Tor and its authors appear to be inordinately focused on seeing their names on bestseller lists and being nominated for awards, why not give them exactly what they want?  The SFWA can give out two Best Novel awards, one for Best Novel and another for Best Tor Novel.  That way, all the Tor writers can take turns giving each other awards, which is pretty much what they already do anyhow, and all the other books published in the genre can be considered on their literary merits. This would likely result in the genre’s best writers, such as Neal Stephenson, Charles Stross, and China Mieville, finally having a reasonable chance of winning and thereby legitimizing the Nebula awards again.

The alternative is for the organization to continue to hand out Nebula awards for Best Science Fiction Novel to parodies of Regency romances and thereby looking increasingly insane, until McRapey finally wins one for his historic “reboot” of John Norman, Cisgenders of Gor.

As for the bestseller campaigns, I have a solution there too.  Because the NYT is desperate for cash, it can surely be convinced to create a new SFWA Bestsellers category to which the various SF/F publishers can subscribe and be charged a moderate subscription fee.  Different slots will be sold each month, and the publisher can place whatever title he wants each week in the slots he owns that month.  Everyone can become a “New York Times Bestselling author” whether their books come anywhere close to the top 100-selling books or not, and the publishers can slap “New York Times Bestseller” on every book they publish.  Everyone is happy, everyone wins!

Two brilliant solutions.  Frankly, I’ll be shocked if they don’t elect me dictator-for-life.  Also, given what I am told about the vital importance of these lists, I should appreciate it if every reference to me in the future includes “TwoThree-time Billboard Top 40 Recording Artist”.

Don’t look at me

I received this in my email today:

Urgent Notice: DDoS Attack 

Dear Members,
SFWA.org
has been experiencing a DDoS attack since approximately 10am EST this
morning. Our webstaff has been working to restore the site. Please be
patient while they continue their efforts. Members may have difficulty
accessing the main sfwa.org site and the content within. The forums at
sfwa.org/forum are also experiencing intermittent outages as well.

This event prompted an amount of speculation that the DDoS attack might possibly be related to certain differences of opinion between the current and future presidents of the SFWA.  As it happens, I had nothing whatsoever to do with it, (I was not even aware of it until after it had already been resolved), and neither did the Dread Ilk.  The reason, of course, is that it is the easiest thing in the world to determine if the Dread Ilk were involved in something within 24 hours of an event taking place.

  1. Were firearms involved? 
  2. Was the caliber larger than 9mm?
  3. Is the body count in excess of 20? 
  4. Are the fires still burning?

If the answer to all of these questions is no, you can be absolutely certain that the party responsible was not a regular reader of this blog.

Come see the violence inherent in the system

Help, help, I’m being threatened!  And by the SFWA South-Central Regional Director, no less.  At 3:30 AM, I was returning from a late night out with Silvio and the boys when I noticed literally hundreds of entries coming from a site belonging to leading science fiction author and international cross-dressing star Jim Hines.  Naturally, being the secure and self-confident image of modern masculinity, I immediately hastened to scour his site for every reference to me.

Imagine the horror and fear that struck me when I read the following:

lee_martindale wrote:
Feb. 1st, 2013 04:19 pm (UTC)
Ah, yes. Mr. Beale. When I decided to run for re-election as SFWA South-Central Regional Director, someone asked me what I would do if Mr. Beale won the Presidential election. I replied, “Ask my friends to start a bail fund.”

Naturally, I was panic-stricken by the violent implications of the Regional Director’s threat.  After I got off the phone with the local police, Homeland Security, the FBI, and Interpol, and managed to compose myself following an intense round of aromatherapy, some yoga exercises, and about a gallon of green tea, I posted the following in the Questions for Candidates section of the SFWA Forum:

Two questions for Lee Martindale: It was brought to my attention that
yesterday, you wrote the following on SFWA member Jim Hines’s web site: “When
I decided to run for re-election as SFWA South-Central Regional
Director, someone asked me what I would do if Mr. Beale won the
Presidential election. I replied, “Ask my friends to start a bail
fund.””

1. What did you mean by indicating that you would need a bail fund in the event of my election as SFWA President?(1)
2. Do you believe that threatening criminal activity and violence is appropriate for an officer of the SFWA Board?

I note that this is the second implication of violence an SFWA member
has directed towards me since I declared my candidacy. Two open
questions for everyone else:

1. Are these implied threats of criminality and/or violence acceptable behavior on the part of SFWA members, and in the case of Ms Martindale, current Board members?
2. Should Ms Martindale resign her position and terminate her candidacy due to her implied threats of criminal activity?

I find it hard to see how I, or any other elected SFWA official, could be
expected to work in a productive manner with Ms Martindale in the
knowledge that she may resort to criminal activity and physical violence
over a mere difference of opinion.

(1) Ms Martindale explained that she was, in fact, implying violence,
although she claimed that she only meant violence of the self-defensive
variety.

This post is dedicated to the memory of Bane.

Rabbits gonna rabbit

This is absolutely and utterly beautiful.  I wish I’d started running for SFWA office years ago.  I’m just sorry that what passes for discussion there is not open to the public.  On the SFWA Forum, in a thread entitled Questions for Candidates, some of the sadder little rabbits are lamenting the fact that they can’t disqualify me from running for office due to my doubleplusungood crimethink and discussing whether either the old bylaws or the new ones will permit revoking membership in the association.

A very important question was addressed to all the candidates about our belief that men and women are equal and equally deserving of respect, to which I answered thusly:  “No. I don’t believe equality exists in any material, legal, or
spiritual sense. And I am deeply amused by anyone who claims to be
pro-science and asserts that it does.”

Rabbits gonna rabbit.

Because I am a sensitive and responsive leader, and in light of my newfound appreciation for the importance of equality to the membership, I have added a plank to my platform: “All Active and Associate members will be required to provide a signed and notarized statement that they believe men and women are equal and equally deserving of respect.  Members who fail to provide a signed and notarized statement to that effect prior to December 31, 2013, will have their memberships in the association immediately and irrevocably terminated.”

When rabbits rage

I don’t know about you, but one of the things I found most illuminating about the inevitable reaction of various angry rabbits to the featuring of the fraudulent reviewer was the strength of their expressed emotions.  I mean, even if I was absolutely everything they claimed me to be: insecure, childish, a baby, bratty, thin-skinned, small, unprofessional, pathetic, out-of-line, and so forth, why would that be so observably upsetting to them?

Why would they go out of their way to declare, with considerable umbrage, that they would never read a book of which they had never heard before and which they never had any intention of reading anyhow? Why would they find it to be “utterly reprehensible” to do what literally dozens of other sites were already doing?  Why did they find me to be “scary” when they presumably don’t feel that way about MyAddress or Google Street View?  Why would they feel the urgent need to follow the fraudulent reviewer’s example and “warning other to stay away” from my terrifying books? 

Part of the answer can be found inadvertently provided in the comment of Farida Y.  “He deliberately posted the address of a woman as a clear target of contempt.”  Remember, we usually give away our values in the process of attacking others.  Because I most typically deride others as weaklings, fools and idiots, I betray the fact that I value strength, wisdom, and intelligence, and aspire to those things.

From their insults, we can see that Rabbit People place particular value on being viewed as sane, grown-up, mature, professional, and in-line.  For example, if you see a blog that describes itself as “thoughtful”, you can be sure that it belongs to a rabbit.  This doesn’t mean, of course, that they actually are any of those things, it merely means that those things are what they aspire to, and what they erroneously believe everyone else aspires to as well.

Now, the main reason the Rabbit People were offended was that they correctly interpreted my action to be one of contempt.  They know that I do not see them as equals, but as inferiors whose opinions are not to be taken seriously and are useful only for the purpose of amusing me and my readers.  This tends to infuriate those who consider themselves to be thoughtful, grown-up, and responsible because one of their primary objectives is to be taken seriously by the herd, thereby elevating their status within it.

But if the correctly perceived contempt explains the offense, and therefore the nature of the responses, it does not explain their vehemence or the level of emotions that fueled them.  To understand this, you must first understand that the Rabbit mind is fundamentally feminine, and the feminine mind is ruled, first, foremost, and forever, by fear.

This is why, in addition to the previously listed descriptions, I was also described as: angry, scary, frightening, psychopathic, creepy, unstable, and obsessed.  These labels are not meant literally, they are simply code words meant to warn fellow rabbits ELIL AHEAD: BEWARE THE PREDATOR.  In addition to being offended, the rabbits are also afraid on two counts.  First, I have demonstrated that I am immune to their weapons of excoriation and exclusion, which, being herd animals, is something they find inexplicable and frightening.  Second, I have shown that I am willing to step “out-of-line”, which means that I am capable of taking actions that they cannot imagine, anticipate, or control.  The combination of these two things is enough to strike absolute terror in the rabbity heart; it quite literally panics them even when, as in the case of the fraudulent reviewer, no one was threatened in any way, shape, or form.

Their antics weren’t inspired by the fact that my actions were intrinsically dangerous, as they obviously were not, but rather, from the fact that those actions were outside the boundaries defined by the rabbits as being safe.  Rabbits bolt from big scary noises; they don’t stop to reflect upon whether it is a hungry bear with a particular hankering for rabbit or a truck that isn’t anywhere near them and isn’t even capable of being aware of their existence.  The simple act of stepping outside the lines is, from the rabbity perspective, an inherently dangerous act, because their way of life revolves around the dynamic construction of rules designed to circumscribe the behavior of others.

Jack Amok explained it correctly: “Rabbit/Lefty people count on this, that their opponents will hold
themselves to civilized rules of conduct the lefties will themselves
aggressively ignore. Like a woman who screams, spits and throws things
at a man, confident he wouldn’t dare backhand her across the room in
response.  The shock when he doesn’t conform to expectations is usually dramatic.” 

Stickwick added: “For the rabbit people, any behavior that isn’t sufficiently supplicating
in response to their attempts to shame and cow probably does have the
appearance of psychopathy.”

And Allyn asked an apt question:

“A question for those that have a better understanding of rabbit behavior.  Do rabbit folk go blind during their rage and lose the ability for reading cognitive recognition?  This question is a direct result of observing today’s acts.

Vox claims “For my next trick I will make the rabbits appear and then dance and hop on one foot”.

On
command the rabbits appear, raging at Vox for being a Nazi, homophobic,
poopy head that is not smarter than them. What they seem to miss is
they are doing this while dancing and hopping on one foot.”

 Yes, that’s exactly what they do.  They go blind with rage and fear.  A sufficiently angry rabbit, (which is essentially synonymous with a sufficiently frightened rabbit), is hopelessly irrational and possesses mere fragments of the cognitive abilities it usually has.  They are rendered intellectually tharn.

Let me give you an example from an exchange that followed yesterday’s chorus line of hopping, dancing rabbits between an SFWA member and me.  Unfortunately, I can’t quote the other individual due to where the exchange took place, but the summary should suffice to illustrate the point.  Being a candidate for the office of president, I was asked to explain my actions related to the fraudulent reviewer, which I did as follows:

“[I]t was part of a larger point I was making about Rabbit People and one of their common tactics. I knew several Whatever readers would attack my books by using the reviews because that’s the sort of readership Mr. Scalzi has. I had a similar experience with Richard Dawkins’s fans after publishing TIA. There were a number of other fake reviews posted yesterday that I reported in the conventional manner and were immediately removed by Amazon, such as this one: “Vox Day” is not only a bad writer; he’s also an angry, racist psychopath. Stay far away from this mediocre book.””

This led to a response from one gentleman who rejoices in sprinkling his missives with lawyerly idioms.  He claimed that because he happened to provide a few of Whatever’s 7.8 MILLION PAGEVIEWS in 2012, I had personally insulted him by accusing him of engaging in unprofessional tactics, and furthermore, had attacked the SFWA membership as well.

Now, it shouldn’t be terribly difficult for anyone who has graduated from elementary school, much less law school, to realize that an insignificant number of readers are not synonymous with the entire readership.  Still less does the subset necessarily have anything to do with a separate organization, even if that organization happens to have some degree of overlap with the set.  But the rabbit, esq. was so angry and tharn that he manufactured a nonsensical ex post facto justification for his wounded feelings, which of course required me, as a known healer and teacher, to gently explain the errors in his reasoning to him.

Which explanation I provided with such care and compassion that one giant of science fiction was moved to exclaim in open amazement and wonder.

I have to admit, I wasn’t particularly sanguine about my electoral prospects before yesterday, but I’m feeling pretty optimistic about them now.  After all, even rabbits like seeing a lawyer get bitch-slapped.

Correction(s)

In my post at Black Gate in support of Amazon’s decision to forbid authors to review works in their genres, I erroneously stated that Catherine Asaro was the SFWA president at the time she was awarded the 2002 Nebula for Best Novel.  Michael Capobianco, another past SFWA president, corrected me thusly:

“The Quantum Rose won the Nebula Award for best novel on April
27, 2002. Catherine Asaro was not an officer of SFWA at the time.
She was VP of SFWA from July 1, 2002 to June 30, 2003 and
President of SFWA from July 1, 2003 to June 30, 2005.”

However, a little research showed Capobianco’s correction to be a little on the disingenuous side, which I suspected given his misleading answer concerning the justification for changes to the Nebula award process.  The SF Site reported in 2002:

SFWA Elections 

The results of the SFWA officer elections were announced
on April 27 at the SFWA Business Meeting in Kansas City,
MO. Sharon Lee defeated incumbent Norman Spinrad for
the Presidency. Two other authors received write-in
votes. Catherine Asaro defeated Lee Martindale for the
Vice-Presidency, again with two other (different)
authors receiving write-in votes. Chuck Rothman
(treasurer) and ElizaBeth Gilligan (Secretary) both ran
unopposed. Because of the closeness of the race for
Eastern Regional Director, the election committee has
decided re-balloting will take place in that race.
 Nebula Awards

Only hours after being named Vice President of SFWA,
Catherine Asaro was honored with a Nebula for her novel
The Quantum Rose (Tor).

In other words, Asaro wasn’t the President, she was the Vice President-elect.  Which underlines the point that I was making, which was never that Asaro had somehow abused her position as President, or, as more accurately, Vice President-elect, (I don’t even know how it would have been possible in either case), but  rather that the award that year was a simple popularity contest which led to a mediocre novel being unjustly awarded the Best Novel award.