#Arkhaven INFOGALACTIC #Castalia House
This looks more entertaining than 99 percent of the magazines in the average magazine rack. Seriously, the only thing that befuddles me more than the decision to fund some of the magazines out there is the movies that are made these days.
This interview with NK Jemisin in The Atlantic is interesting, as it indicates a change in strategy on the part of the Puppykickers:
Just a year ago, the idea of a novel as deliberately outside the science-fiction norm as The Fifth Season winning the Hugo Award seemed unlikely. In 2013, a small group of science-fiction writers and commentators launched the “Sad Puppies” and “Rabid Puppies” campaigns to exploit the Hugo nomination system and place dozens of books and stories of their own choosing up for awards. Those campaigns arose as a reaction to perceived “politicization” of the genre—often code for it becoming more diverse and exploring more themes of social justice, race, and gender—and became a space for some science-fiction and fantasy communities to rail against “heavy handed message fic.” Led by people like the “alt-right” commentator Vox Day, the movements reached fever pitch in the 2015 Hugo Award cycle, and Jemisin herself was often caught up in the intense arguments about the future of the genre.
I spoke to Jemisin about her works, politics, the sad puppies controversy, and about race and gender representation in science-fiction and fantasy the day before The Fifth Season won the Hugo Award. Our conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Newkirk: For you, are those people something that bothers you as you build a profile? Are people louder now that The Fifth Season is getting so much love?
Jemisin: They may be, but I’m not hearing them as much. I seem to have passed some kind of threshold, and maybe it’s something as simple as I now have so many positive messages coming at me that the negatives are sort of drowned out. As a side note, the so-called boogeyman of science-fiction, the white supremacist asshat who started the Rabid Puppies, Vox Day, apparently posted something about me a few days ago and I just didn’t care. There was a whole to-do between me and him a few years back where he ended up getting booted out of SWFA [Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America] because of some stuff he said about me, and I just didn’t care. It was a watershed moment at that point but now it’s just sort of, “Oh, it’s him again. He must be needing to get some new readers or trying to raise his profile again. Or something.” I didn’t look at it. No one bothered to read it and dissect it and send me anything about it. No one cared.
She just didn’t care. She just didn’t care. No one cared.
And then, the next day, they completely revamped the rules of the Hugo Award.
SJWAL. What’s particularly amusing about this is that last year, the Puppykickers went running to the media, pointing-and-shrieking like banshees. That strategy completely failed, so now they’re going with the “oh, we don’t care” line, while simultaneously trying to claim that I am seeking to raise my profile. We’ll see how long that lasts.
Let’s face it, I’m not the one talking to The Atlantic about me. Nor do I have any need to do so. As Mike Cernovich says, we are the Alt Media now.
Notice how the interviewer doesn’t ask her about calling Robert Heinlein and most of SF fandom “racist as *fuck*”. The truth is that having Jemisin replace Scalzi as the public face of Pink SF is about the best possible thing for Blue SF.
I happen to know, from direct personal experience, that the Red Cross is entirely converged and totally corrupt, so it doesn’t surprise me in the slightest to hear that the Red Cross is refusing donations in Louisiana unless they can profit from them:
“So as we are headed back home from the River Center in Baton Rouge volunteering our nursing services Dawn and I have come to the conclusion that neither of us WILL EVER volunteer or donate to the RED CROSS. The Red Cross basically takes over the shelters and starts refusing clothes, donations and various volunteer services UNLESS they are previously contracted. So what does that mean….well, 60 boxes of doughnuts were discarded this morning becuase the delivery vendor was not in contract, hot meals were refused becuase the entity providing wasn’t contracted, and medical supplies including medications were trashed for same reason. Clothes that were “donated” needed to be left on the street unless they were “furnished” by Red Cross. As of tomorrow, the shelter we were at will be completely over taken by the Red Cross other than the medical area because they couldnt have the actual room since LSU has a contract with state to provide medical care. Its sad when the military police were helping to “protect” the medical areas from the red cross when there are so many other issues at hand. Anyway, next time to want to donate or volunteer your services, do your homework.”
Don’t ever donate to, or volunteer with, the Red Cross. They are fully SJW-converged and they have been for years. This is also why one should NEVER set up a non-profit. They are always quickly converged by the very people who have lots of time and are oh-so-eager to help.
I don’t see what The Rageaholic is upset about. They just hired NK Jemisin to help them with the story. She wouldn’t join a racist organization unless… oh. Right.
Year: votes (nominations)
2012: 1922 (1101)
2013: 1848 (1343)
2014: 3587 (1923)
2015: 5950 (2112)
2016: 3130 (4032)
The number of nominations rose in 2014 and 2015 due to the appearance of Sad Puppies, then Rabid Puppies. The big influx of Supporting Members began in 2014, when the SJWs, alarmed, gathered the herd to No Award Larry Correia and the rest of the Puppy finalists. They made an even bigger effort in 2015 in response to the Rabid Puppies.
However, their morale suffered a terrible blow when, despite there being nearly four times as many nominations cast in 2016 than in 2012, the Rabid Puppies selected more finalists than the Sad Puppies ever did. While most RP’s didn’t bother getting MidAmericaCon memberships in order to vote, what’s interesting is that over 2,000 SJWs didn’t either.
Anyhow, the first stage is now over. The new award has been established and the Hugo rules have been modified and complicated, as anticipated. Now we’re onto the second stage, which will last longer and promises to be more interesting than the first. RPs, be sure to keep your voting/nomination emails from Sasquan and MidAmericaCon, as you may need them next year if you are neither Brainstorm nor VFM.
We got here one year faster than I thought, as apparently a) we scared them worse than I’d expected and b) it turns out they care a lot more about me than they do about quality science fiction or science fiction history.
I wasn’t surprised that Toni Weisskopf didn’t win last year, but I was surprised that they voted her below No Award. This year, it doesn’t even surprise me a little bit that they would No Award an objectively high-quality work such as Between Light and Shadow or accomplished, highly respected individuals in the field such as Larry Elmore and Jerry Pournelle, who reportedly had the longest book-signing line at Worldcon.
I wonder how many SJWs who were begging for Dr. Pournelle’s signature had previously claimed that he did not merit a Best Editor award with their vote? Do tell us more about how the Hugo Awards concern quality and standing in the field, not SJW-driven politics.
951 No Award
766 Jerry Pournelle
893 No Award
497 Larry Elmore
That says it all about how seriously the awards deserve to be taken by science fiction readers these days. John Scalzi summed up the SF-SJW position rather well in a long diatribe yesterday. It’s rather remarkable how he devotes nearly 1,500 1,887 words to informing the world that absolutely none of it is about me, and somehow manages to do so while giving absolutely zero fucks.
What a masterpiece of its kind. As it is written, SJWs always lie. Just wait until Mr. ZFG learns what names are risking SJW disapproval to actively associate with Castalia House in 2017. But if an author doesn’t want to associate with the publishing house that is the fastest-growing in the field and pays such high royalties that the much larger publisher who inquired about acquiring it begged me to consider reducing them, that’s certainly their right. We don’t publish SJWs anyhow.
I particularly enjoyed McRapey’s attempt to cling to the original Narrative he’d tried to spin about the nomination of “Space Raptor Butt Invasion” being a devastating mistake on my part.
Rather than being appalled that Tingle had been nominated, the Worldcon community largely embraced him (or whoever Tingle is; no one is really sure). Here was someone who was nominated by a bigot to antagonize other people, who instead allied himself with those folks and was appreciated by them in return.
1508 No Award
659 “Space Raptor Butt Invasion”
Apparently those folks appreciate Mr. Tingle just about as much as they appreciate me. Did I not tell you that would happen despite the SJW’s feigned joy over how terribly funny and brilliant they found Mr. Tingle’s work?
Because, as we know, SJW’s always lie.
UPDATE: Dr. Pournelle is quite clearly crushed, and duly penitent, in consequence of his well-merited rebuke at the hands of Worldcon’s SJWs.
UPDATE: The Reverend 3.0 considers his failed prediction concerning “Space Raptor Butt Invasion” winning Best Short Story:
I was incorrect. And while I’m ready to tuck in and eat my words, it’s interesting to look at where my logic broke down.
My logic was the following:
-Puppies will vote for it because they think it is hilarious, embarrasses the Hugos, and Chuck is one of them.
-Puppy Kickers will vote for it because they think it is hilarious, embarrasses the Puppies, and Chuck is one of them.
-If the two largest blocks vote for it, it can’t lose.But lo and behold, one of these two voting blocks failed to vote for SRBI and instead propelled Cat Pictures to victory and Noah Ward to second place. One of these two blocks was either lying to itself or lying through its teeth.
My prediction failed, and it failed because one of these two groups said one thing and then did another. So which group is the group of dirty liars? The Puppies? The Kickers? I’m sure the ballot numbers will tell.
Either way, learn from my mistake. Take that group’s tendency to lie into account in the future.
Now, I wonder who might have been lying and putting forth a false Narrative?
Dave Truesdale has posted the audio of his panel at Worldcon that led to his expulsion.
I had originally planned to post this unedited audio recording of the panel in conjunction with an article I wanted to have posted at Tangent Online the same day as the panel, and the text transcription of the audio. I now feel it is in the best interests of all parties to post the audio now, with the article and text transcription to follow as soon as I can get to it.
I had made notes for the article I wanted to have posted here, so brought them to the panel in their rough state, crossouts, arrows moving pieces around, written in thoughts in pen, the usual rough draft of any document. I did not intend to use anywhere near all of them but knew from experience that having too much material is better than having too little. As it turned out, the only item I used directly from these notes was the quote from David Hartwell.
It’s easy to see understand why they kicked him out. They really had no choice after he began singing “Horst Wessel Lied”, then threatened to whip NK Jemisin until she agreed to pick his cotton. Outrageous!
The panicked reaction to Truesdale’s recording illustrates why you must always record SJWs. When you’ve got a recording, they can’t convincingly lie about what they said or what you said. Keep in mind, as you listen to this, that Truesdale is accused of having caused “excessive discomfort” with his words, which was the grounds for his expulsion.
And SJWs ALWAYS lie.
Dave Truesdale’s membership was revoked because he violated MidAmeriCon II’s Code of Conduct. Specifically, he caused ‘significant interference with event operation and caused excessive discomfort to others.’”
Even hardcore SF-SJWs such as Jim Hines and Charles Stross find this difficult to believe. Hines wrote this before the MidAmericaCon II tweet:
I’m not at Worldcon. I didn’t see first-hand what happened on this panel. (I have read multiple reports from folks in the audience and others on the panel.) It does sound like Truesdale acted like an ass, derailed the panel, and pissed off a lot of people who wanted to, you know, talk about the state of short fiction.
As you might have guessed, I have thoughts about all this…
- Who the hell thought it was a good idea to put Dave Truesdale in charge of this panel? He’s been doing these rants for years, if not decades. How can the convention turn around and pretend to be shocked by his pearl-clutching derail when that’s pretty much who he is and what he’s known for?
- I’ve seen panel derails and blow-ups before. People have gotten into shouting matches, walked off of panels, and so on. I’ve never heard of someone being kicked out of the con for it. (Not invited back as a panelist, sure. Kicked out? Maybe it’s happened, but it’s not a practice I’m aware of.)
- Right now, we have only Truesdale’s post about him being kicked out. It’s possible there’s more to this than just his ridiculous behavior on that panel.
- As Truesdale has gone public with this, I hope Worldcon will issue a statement clarifying why he was expelled from the convention, and whether he violated convention policies either on the panel or elsewhere.
- ETA: From the Worldcon Code of Conduct: “MidAmeriCon II reserves the right to revoke membership from and eject anyone at any time from a MidAmeriCon II event without a refund. Any action or behavior that … adversely affects MidAmeriCon II’s relationship with its guests, its venue, or the public is strictly forbidden and may result in revocation of membership privileges.“
- I think we’ve all seen people derail panels for their own personal agendas. Truesdale’s moderation might have been an epic shitshow, but is it grounds for expulsion?
Like I said, we don’t have all the facts on this. Just people’s comments on the panel, and Truesdale’s own account of why he was kicked out. But it sounds like a mess.
Charles Stross even points out that “derailing a panel” is hardly unknown:
I suspect there’s more to this than meets there eye.
Derailing a panel isn’t that unusual; and while I could see Programming quietly telling a disruptive panelist that they’re not required on any subsequent panels, that’s as far as I’d *expect* it to go. (And that would be a real pain in the neck for Programming because then they’d potentially have to find a bunch of substitutes at very short notice.)
Kicking him out of the convention completely is much more serious and I suspect there must have been some sort of face-to-face harassment incident. But as various folks have noted on twitter, MidAmeriCon say they can’t comment further, so unless the target of such an incident feels like speaking out we’re not going to find out any more.
(Truesdale has been an “anti-PC” gadfly and general nuisance presence on the net for a long time — I remember crossing swords with him on the Asimov’s reader fora back in the late 90s/early 00s before they turned into an utter cesspit no sane human would go near — and my impression is that he’s been getting more outspoken over the years.)
Except, of course, there wasn’t. This was pure SJW thought-policing. The badthink must be expelled! Racist! Sexist! Homophobic! The Name of the Narrative compels you! This demonstrates why one should never get involved with any organization that has a Code of Conduct. They are nothing but weaponized SJWism.
We’ll discuss this and more at the Rabid Puppies Hugo Party 2016 tonight. Dave, if you’re reading this, please feel free to stop by.
The SJWs are getting nervous about having their Narrative about Dave Truesdale’s expulsion from Worldcon punctured:
We might not get a chance to hear the audio of the panel. Panelist Jonathan Strahan posted this on Facebook to Dave Truesdale: “Dave, while I felt we had cordial communications on the panel yesterday, and while I tried at every point to treat you with respect and civility, I would point out that I was unaware that you were recording the panel, and that I do not consent to it being distributed publicly. I hope you will respect my request and not do so. Best, Jonathan.”
Oh, I rather suspect everyone will. This is why you ALWAYS record SJWs. Because, well, you know what they always do.
The SJWs in science fiction are upset again, this time because Dave Truesdale, the editor of Tangent Online, pointed out the long term consequences of their actions in a panel at MidAmericaCon II. From File 770:
At 3:00 PM at today’s panel on The State of Short Fiction, Dave Truesdale (of Tangent Online) shocked panelists and crowd alike by abusing his position as moderator to give what sounded like an alt-Right rant against political correctness. He declared that political correctness had destroyed short SFF by making it bland and destroying the careers of people. He waved around a fistful of pearl necklaces and told people to “clutch your pearls” and shut up whenever they felt the urge to point out some injustice.
He had started reading from a multi-page prepared speech (which he attributed to the late David Hartwell) when Sheila Williams shouted at him to stop. (It helped a lot that he seemed to be clueless as to how to operate a microphone whereas she was clearly a master, so she easily shouted him down.) He seemed very surprised that almost the entire crowd (minus one person who might have been a relative) was angry with him. From his behavior, I think he expected to have at least a large cohort agreeing with him.
Eric got a photo of Truesdale reading while Neil Clarke turned his back and other panelists grimaced.
The panelists denied that SFF had declined in quality or that political correctness particularly influenced them as editors. They did note that overt bigotry was no longer acceptable, but Truesdale indicated that he was okay with that change.
At a subsequent panel, we heard that MidAmeriCon II apologized to the panelists, saying no one had any idea this would happen. According to one source, he’d been about to launch into a section titled “definition of a bigot” before he was derailed. Most people seemed to agree that they’d never seen a panel moderator abuse his position to hijack the panel as a platform for his or her own personal agenda.
Seemed. Exactly. Remember, SJWs always – ALWAYS – lie. Translation: they’d before never seen a moderator fail to support the SJW agenda.
I very much doubt Truesdale was surprised in the slightest by the crowd’s reaction. These morons have absolutely no idea what to do other than virtue-signal and blindly defend the current Narrative. This picture of Neil Clarke prissily turning his back in order to maximally signal his virtue in order to avoid besoiling himself with badthink association is hilarious.
Considering that Truesdale was directly addressing the subject matter, the state of short fiction, it’s obvious that the reason they are angry is not that he “hijacked the panel”, but because he told them the unpleasant truth as they know it to be.
Here is how one SJW subsequently characterized it.
Sunil Patel @ghostwritingcow
This panel is fucking UNREAL. It’s DT being a whiny pissy manbaby and everyone else yelling at him.
Well done, Dave. Mission accomplished.
And speaking of Worldcon, Tor’s campaign for E Pluribus Hugo continues apace, as the EPH Analysis for the years 2014 and 2015 has been released(pdf). Of course, they didn’t dare publish their analysis for any other years, for as they have tacitly admitted, doing so would prove that there are whisper slates that have been having an effect on the Hugo Awards for years.
Here is the first amusing thing about it. In the “slate” year of 2015, 10 long list spots and 14 ballot spots changed under EPH. In the “non-slate” year of 2014 – never mind that Sad Puppies was in action then – 17 long list spots and 5 ballot spots changed. And they wonder why I support EPH!
The second amusing thing is the fact that the authors got it wrong. Contra their insistence that only the long list would have been affected, had EPH been in effect in 2015, Alyssa Wong would have made been a Campbell finalist in the place of Rolf Nelson.
(((Joel Stein))) attacks the Alt-Right in Time:
Trolling is, overtly, a political fight. Liberals do indeed troll–sex-advice columnist Dan Savage used his followers to make Googling former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum’s last name a blunt lesson in the hygienic challenges of anal sex; the hunter who killed Cecil the lion got it really bad.
But trolling has become the main tool of the alt-right, an Internet-grown reactionary movement that works for men’s rights and against immigration and may have used the computer from Weird Science to fabricate Donald Trump. Not only does Trump share their attitudes, but he’s got mad trolling skills: he doxxed Republican primary opponent Senator Lindsey Graham by giving out his cell-phone number on TV and indirectly got his Twitter followers to attack GOP political strategist Cheri Jacobus so severely that her lawyers sent him a cease-and-desist order.
The alt-right’s favorite insult is to call men who don’t hate feminism “cucks,” as in “cuckold.” Republicans who don’t like Trump are “cuckservatives.” Men who don’t see how feminists are secretly controlling them haven’t “taken the red pill,” a reference to the truth-revealing drug in The Matrix. They derisively call their adversaries “social-justice warriors” and believe that liberal interest groups purposely exploit their weakness to gain pity, which allows them to control the levers of power. Trolling is the alt-right’s version of political activism, and its ranks view any attempt to take it away as a denial of democracy.
It’s always educational to see how the media inevitably attempts to push its Narrative by redefining terms. They’re actually attempting to ban self-expression in the name of self-expression, in much the same way the EU tries to bar democracy in the name of democracy.
The alt-right argues that if you can’t handle opprobrium, you should just turn off your computer. But that’s arguing against self-expression, something antithetical to the original values of the Internet.
No, that’s not arguing against self-expression, that IS self-expression. Moreover, it is using the media’s own argument against it: “if you don’t like it, turn off the TV”. It’s amazing to see them resorting to the Moral Majority’s position they used to oppose. They’re going to pine for the good old days when they were dealing with the terrible, no-good Religious Right they hated so much, as the Alt-Right is considerably less tolerant and merciful.
And, of course, the conservative media loves this stuff; they hate the Alt-Right worse than they ever hated communism, leftists, or Democrats.
Dana Perino @DanaPerino
How Trolls Are Ruining the Internet – article in TIME – we are doing this subject on @TheFiveFNC. Mostly AGREE!
First the New York Times, then Time magazine, and now Fox News are attacking the Alt Right. Looks like we got ourselves a new media offensive on our hands. This is a good sign. They used to ignore us. Then they mocked us. Now, they’re fighting us. You know what comes next. We win.