Yeah, I also can’t stand Robinson.
Also, pro-pedophile. He’s written/talked about how he admires NAMBLA and that the whole “age of consent” thing is a fraud. Dude is a creep (and a terrible writer, IMO).
Get a grip, dude. Who the hell did you think I was speaking for when I was obviously writing about my opinion. :rolleyes: .
I dunno. Mighty Mouse? The Keebler Elf? Vox Day?
I got that you were speaking for yourself. I still wanted it put out there that while it may be a common opinion, it’s an absolutely bizarre one. IMO.
As for Delany and NAMBLA, here’s a very long discussion from 2014 in which his position is far, far more nuanced than pedophilia is good. I can’t say his argument convinced me, but he shows a different and autobiographical take on the subject that I have no personal experience to rebut. I also have no information on what NAMBLA was really like 20 years either. It may have been as scummy as the media makes it out to be, but he says it also had a different stance; it wouldn’t be the first time that an image was stuck falsely. I’m certainly not about to explore what the NAMBLA newsletter was actually printing in the old days. Delany might be polishing a turd. If so, that’s on him.
But here we go again with the artist vs. the work. For a good ten years Delany was in the running for being the absolute peak of the profession. I’ll never forget that.
What’s anyone’s problem with the North American Marlon Brando Look-Alikes?!
And that’s opinion is fine. What the sad puppies are up in arms about is they hate that story (and I’ve yet to see them point to any other story they object to) and think it’s the downfall of science fiction and they had to do something to keep it from ever appearing on the ballot.
We have a difference of opinion here (and the story didn’t win, anyway), but that’s how awards work: stories you love may not win or even get on the ballot. Stories you hate may win the award. But you don’t wreck the award because of one story you hate.
The best commentary on Torgersen’s critical ideas was penned by James Agee in 1947: “Very young children fiercely object to even minor changes in a retold story. Older boys and girls are not, as a rule, respected for such extreme conservatism.”
Here is an interesting blog post that looks and analyzes the Hugo winners.
No clear win for the sad puppies or the SJW, but thought provoking.
Also here is a discussion between Larry Correia and George R.R. Martin on the subject
(Larry is the founder of the sad puppies)
The first one: A response to George R. R. Martin from the author who started Sad Puppies
And GRRM’s response
Both are long but worth reading IMHO
That first link is a good analysis, but the data is misleading. Larry Correia has always proudly linked himself with Vox Day so the argument that Day hijacked their slate is just false ingenuousness. And the Sad Puppies celebrated that the Rabid Puppies put so many works on the ballot and clearly thought that that was part of their win.
But my objections are two-fold. First of all, this now means that Hugo voting will be dominated by cliques. People will vote for whichever clique they like – whether they like the works or not. Authors can write terrific works, but if they don’t meet the goals of the Sad Puppies or the Rabid Puppies or the Happy Puppies or the Keyboard Cats or whatever groups are putting forth slates, they work, though deserving, gets lost.
Second, Brad Torgeson’s justification of the slate is particularly stupid. Briefly, he compares books to breakfast cereal and complains that
Aside from the fact that there’s a proverb about judging a book by its cover, the argument boils down to “Science fiction is different than it was when I was a kid!” Well, yes. Everything is different than from when he was a kid (and from when I was a kid, which was longer ago). New people are entering the field and new types of stories are popular and considered deserving of awards. That’s life. And the genre isn’t served by telling the same old stories over and over.
So, ultimately, the Hugos will be crippled for years (and some of the people on the slate knew nothing about it and now face the choice of either withdrawing their work (a couple have) or knowing that no one will take the honor seriously). And because awards are going to science fiction awards are going to books that aren’t space opera (and I say that as an author of space opera).
The writer is himself a libertarian, so he naturally is inclined toward their side of the argument. His argument is ostensibly neutral, but not deep, and I see no indication he understands what the history of the issue is.
The larger fault is exactly as Chuck says: If the two slates have an 80% overlap out of all the F&SF published in the world, it’s impossible for outsiders to separate them. You cannot talk about Torgersen’s good intentions without acknowledging that Day’s slate swept the nominations and it looks at a glance like Torgersen’s plus more John C. Wright. And that Wright, Day, and nominees Steve Rzasa and Tom Kratman all are published by Castalia House, a Finnish publisher created by, ta da, Theodore Beale, aka Vox Day.
Beale is poison, on a God Hates Fags level of poison. You cannot associate with him without swallowing the poison yourself. On a political level, Torgersen should have understood that, although libertarian understanding of politics is oxymoronic.
More recent developments. Annie Bellet has withdrawn “Goodnight Stars” from nomination because she doesn’t want to be a pawn in someone else’s game. So has Marko Kloos, who withdrew his novel Lines of Departure. Connie Willis has stated she will not be a presenter at the Hugos. Some are calling for the Hugos to be cancelled entirely this year. This is far from over.
I found that blog post by Nathaniel yesterday and have been mulling it over for the past 24 hours. It’s an interesting read. While I don’t agree with everything (such as the layout of the Venn diagram – one of the circle excludes both the SP and RP slates by definition, but possible overlap is show), it does point out some things that many (myself included) have overlooked.
The most interesting, I think, is that where SP and RP conflicted, RP won. It seems that a lot of the animosity for stealing the slate has been aimed at Correia and Torgersen, the slate was stolen from them too and went to the more loathsome Vox Day. That doesn’t absolve the SP, but I did find it interesting.
I think the Goodreads rating to Hugo winner comparison needs a grain of salt. Goodreads launched in 2007, so I don’t think it’s apples to apples to compare a contemporary reviewers of Ancillary Justice to people who sought out a historical Hugo winner like Gateway. I suspect there is a difference between readers of current and classic fiction who go to Goodreads to rate it. I think there is a lot of overlap, but I don’t think they’re 100% the same.
I also think readers of classic science fiction have a much better idea of what they’re about to read than readers of contemporary fiction. I didn’t really understand what I was getting into when I read Windup Girl or Ancillary Justice, but I had a good idea of what Ringworld was when I picked it up. (I suspect that part of it is that the best ideas from the best books get adapted, iterated, and reincorporated.) Expectation plays a major part of what one’s opinion of a book is. For an extreme example, if you approach House of Leaves as a novel about a haunted house, you will hate the book, but if you approach it as a book you will have to work to understand with layers of narrators and ergodic text, you’ll come with the patience needed to have a chance of enjoying it (and even that is no guarantee). So when a reader in 2014 picks up Ringworld, they see Halo, Kilrathi, transporter pads, and other familiar tropes. When they pick up Windup Girl, they get thrown into a less familiar world of genehacking and calorie companies (with an additional wrinkle of Thai culture on top). I wonder what contemporary impressions were of similar genre-breaking novels like early cyberpunk works.
I’m not saying the score comparison is invalid, but that it may not be wholly revelatory without additional background. I’d like to see what average ratings for sci-fi novels that sold over a given number of units were for comparison. I’d also like to see how the comparison works out for other (non-sci-fi) awards to see if my historical rating theory holds up.
On to some of the arguments by Correia and Torgersen…
One argument for the necessity of the SP slate is that leftist sentiments (derisively Social Justice Warriors or SJW) predominate the Hugo voting, resulting in a decline in the quality in the Hugo winners and popularity of science fiction. This is more or less where they fall in line with Gamergate, only I think they have even less evidence to support their position. They allege vast conspiracies of lefties vote rigging, where I only see people of common background being friendly. Correia points to some nasty treatment at a con as evidence of exclusion, but a few jackasses hardly a conspiracy makes. (And if it does, do we get to lump Correia in with Vox Day’s opinions?)
Some of the outrage at the SP and RP slates paints Correia and Torgersen as racists, homophobes, and misogynists. From what I’ve read, they don’t deserve the label, though they do have “conservative oppression syndrome,” wherein they perceive they are being oppressed while being incapable of recognizing that other groups have similar or greater obstacles in their path. Their opinions are passively sexist in the way much of conservative though is sexist, but nowhere near the hate and outright misogyny of Vox Day. Also, Wright, the author with six nominations, was primarily a RP (i.e. Vox Day) recommendation. He only appears on the SP slate twice. RP added Wright in four more slots.
The SP slate is decently diverse, so I think it’s caught unreasonable flak for that. Last year was a high water mark for Hugo diversity, so nobody should be shocked to have a nominee list that has more white men. I feel that the puppy slates nod to diversity was more of a search for candidates to check the boxes.
(Again, that’s only what I’ve read from them. If they’ve said vile things, I’ve missed it, but I haven’t looked hard. Vox Day is a certifiable piece of crap who has said truly vile things.)
Torgersen makes the argument that when he opens a box of his favorite cereal Nutty Nuggets, he wants to find Nutty Nuggets on the inside. That is, if there’s a space ship on the cover, it should have spaceships and space men inside. Likewise, if there’s an orc and knight in combat on the cover, the book should have high fantasy tropes like orcs and knights inside.
RealityChuck pointed it out first, but it bears repeating: he is literally telling you to judge a book by its cover.
And the funny thing is that as foolish as this requirement is, you can judge recent winners by the cover. Ancillary Justice has a spaceship on the cover, and it’s a space opera at its core. Windup Girl has an elephant, city skyline and zeppelin on the cover, and that’s exactly what you get. Redshirts has a red shirt on the cover, and …well… It’s an odd novel that plays with expectations. I think it’s fair to say that Redshirts doesn’t give you exactly what you expect, though that is its strength.
Torgersen’s argument partially dismisses the argument that something like Ancillary Justice is a space opera at its core by asking “…is it really going to be a story about space exploration and pioneering derring-do? Or is the story merely a about racial prejudice and exploitation, with interplanetary or interstellar trappings.”
I have two problems with this line of argument. First, it’s a variation of No True Scotsman. “No true sci-fi talks about racial prejudice.” This argument effectively bars sci-fi that disagrees with his politics or that expands the genre.
Secondly, there is a large amount of sci-fi that does talk about racial prejudice and exploitation. Numerous Star Trek episodes discuss race and prejudice. Hugo Winners like The Forever War are deeply rooted in politics. I’m sure Left Hand of Dorkness could come up with a winner that has issues of racial prejudice and sexual identification. 1978’s winner Dreamsnake may not be the timeless great that Ender’s Game is, but it certainly shows that genres bend well beyond Torgersen’s Nutty Nuggets.
In the end, it seems like the argument boils down to “I don’t like it and I don’t like the politics of some of the winners.”
HookerChemical, I agree with your points. I was reading many of the classics (eg., Ringworld) when they first came out, and one thing I loved was that they were showing things I had never seen before. Torgerson seems only interested in SF he’s seen before.
Not all science fiction has to do this, of course. You can write a great traditional story, but my objection is that the genre should have room for more of that.
It’s interesting you brought up Star Trek. Torgerson praised the show for inspiring people to engineer some of the devices portrayed and that that was the great thing about it. David Gerrold (who should know) pointed out that many ST stories were socially aware – they had antiwar stories, anti prejudice stories, and stories about the 60s equivalents of what Torgerson hates today.
It’s OK not to like some of the award winners; there are some I don’t like, either. But the awards aren’t broken because your favorite stories aren’t winning.
I’m still not inclined to give Correia much of a pass. He teamed up with Vox Day from the beginning a few years back and has never distanced himself from the more odious things Vox Day has stated. As far as I’m concerned, it’s now totally fair to judge by his choice of bedfellows.
Torgerson, on the other hand, is trying to spin as best he can. Not that being slightly less wrong is much of an improvement, but at least there’s the attempt.
ETA: also, “they did it first” is a rather juvenile argument. Worse, they themselves disproved it. If there were an organized cabal of "SJW"s, the sick/rabid/whatever puppies would never have succeeded with their nomination slates. Nobody is “forcing” their opinions on other people except for these clowns, but that’s not stopping them. Typical persecution complex - wants to do whatever they want to other people but want to control what other people say to them. It’s not like they can’t start their own “No Mean People Allowed SF Awards”. But that’s not the point. They don’t want to celebrate good SF. They want to force other people to think like they do.
Congratulations you have just confirmed the entire SP argument.
What difference does his personal political beliefs matter? The question is did he do an honest and fair assessment of what is happening with the Hugo’s?
so not only authors but someone who comments gets their political beliefs questioned. Nice.
funny you should bring that up. This came up today
http://monsterhunternation.com/2015/04/16/im-not-vox-day/
That’s exactly why it’s relevant.
Is the analysis flavored by the blogger’s personal opinions? Probably.
To the extent it overlooks some things? Yes, again probably.
“Honest” and “accurate” are two different things. I can accept it’s an honest assessment.
Is it accurate? Eh, not really.
The question is not whether or not there are deserving writers who don’t get exposure. There always are. And that’s the issue the blogger misses.
The question was whether there was an organized attempt to game the system to favor or disfavor writers because of their personal beliefs or their gender or sexuality or the type of fiction they write.
That blog post didn’t really address either of those points. To the extent the SP slate actually was blocked, it was by their associates at RP, not by some made-up cabal.
Basically, that post addresses a question that wasn’t actually asked.
ETA: And, for what it’s worth, that’s where GRRM made some good points. The actual nominees over the last decade or so run the political gamut. And as shown in this thread, nominees also run the gamut from literary to mass market. What is lacking are “Larry Correia nominations”, but that’s again a separate issue.
Meh. As I mentioned above, Correia’s teamed up with Vox Day in the past. I’m not inclined to give him much of a pass because it was now expedient to run two complementary campaigns rather than just one.
The Sad/Rabid Puppies really have a hate-on for John Scalzi; I’ve seen numerous references to his Hugo win for “Redshirts” as proof that the awards are broken. I was a bad SF/F fan that year and haven’t read any of the other nominees, so I can’t really say whether or not it was deserved, but frankly I didn’t think “Redshirts” was all that great either (although it did have its moments, especially in the first half.) I probably wouldn’t have voted it as the best SF/F novel I read in 2013, and if it was I would have been pretty upset at the state of the genre. Maybe he did really win just on his popularity.
But you look at the alleged stylistic complaints about the recent winners and it’s puzzling, since “Redshirts” is . . . a goofy SF adventure romp that riffs on absurdities in other space operas, in the most affectionate way. It doesn’t have any social justice themes that I can tell, it’s not pushing an agenda, it is straight-up high octane escapist entertainment. Okay, it’s a comedy, maybe “true SF” isn’t allowed to try at humor, but come on now. Compare the Hugo award winning works of, say, Robert Heinlein. The man could write, but he couldn’t write anything more than a couple of chapters without trying to make some kind of political point (the actual point depending on his age and current leanings). Or how about “The Left Hand of Darkness”, one of SF’s great classics, which was exploring sex and gender issues in 1969. “The Forever War”? “A Canticle for Leibowitz”? “Stand on Zanzibar”? All classics, all message works, although the messages do differ. I really think that the works that have been winning over the past decade or so are if anything less preachy than most of the 60s and 70s classics that Torgersen claims to want to return to.
Hang on there. I disagree with Exapno’s implication that there is nothing of value to the post, but Exapno does state what aspects of the argument Exapno doesn’t buy (no depth, lack of historical understanding). Some of which I agree with (lack of historical understanding) and the blogger concedes (indicating that more analysis would be beneficial). That’s not the same thing as outright dismissal due to libertarian leanings.
Acknowledging a blogger’s (or author’s) perspective is not the same as dismissal. If Bill O’Reilly accuses a white of being racist, it carries more weight to me than if Al Sharpton says the same thing.
When I first read the post, I inferred it was a fairly conservative blogger. About mid-way through, I actually checked and had my inference confirmed. I think he’s reasonably fair, if unrefined, in his review of the data. It’s a decent first pass, but it needs more depth and refinement, which the author concedes in his introduction and reiterates in the section discussion Goodreads.
I’ll reiterate that my biggest takeaway was the success of RP in the few instances where SP and RP slates conflicted.
I’ll reiterate that I think some of the vitriol for the SP slate backers is undeserved. On the other hand, the fact that Vox Day was on SP2 and the massive overlap between SP3 and RP certainly creates the appearance that they are in bed with Vox Day. It’s an association that does not look good, as Vox Day does post some serious vitriolic, misogynistic, racist crap.
Really, the only legitimate issue I see is there’s a lot of fiction being produced and not all of it gets a lot of exposure.
The stuff about politics and message fiction and whatnot are just bunkum. Just silly once you put more than 2 seconds of thought into it.
But exposure is a really big deal. The vast majority of fiction is not excluded due to politics or SJWs or anything. There’s just a lot out there. And some sub-genres are more popular than others and some writers get lucky. It’s just not possible that every writer will catch a break. It just doesn’t happen.
The solution is not then to cram your own personal opinions down everybody’s throats.
There are other ways to increase exposure that don’t simultaneously hurt other writers and fans. I disagree with some works on the Hugo nominations list every year. That doesn’t remotely imply a cabal working against “true” SF. It just means my tastes don’t line up with the majority of fans. It happens.
The internet means it’s harder to get noticed than in the past - there’s just more people putting out work than ever before. But it also means people who never would have had a chance in the past are getting breaks and being read. There’s more noise but there’s almost more opportunity.
You can do other things to support sub-genres or underexposed writers you like. Like a Times bestselling writer (like Correia) putting out a regular “list of SF I’m reading”. Or starting up your own awards (though there are plenty other awards than the Hugo’s). Or do like Locus - put out a “Suggested Reading” every year before the Hugo’s.
Or using that built-up clout to organize a regular (maybe monthly) fan/new writer contest with the winning story, judged by fan poll, getting published in an annual anthology or one of the bigger SF magazines (Asimov’s or F&SF or whatever) along with a brief feature on the author and the titles of runners-up.
But rather than working on things that might actually improve exposure for these writers or genres, these guys are focusing exclusively on the Hugo’s and decrying SJWs to prove some kind of inane point that’s actually counterproductive to celebrating and supporting SF.
Rather than “a rising tide lifts all boats”, they’re trying to elevate some people by pushing others down.
The Great Antibob got it, so I don’t feel I need to repeat his excellent summary. I in fact liked Nat’s attempt to quantify likes by examining one of the very few public sources of data. That the data is problematic is regrettable, but not a reflection on him. Nat’s lack of historic understanding and inadequate current understanding of the other side is on him, however, and from the way I read his words a direct product of his political beliefs.
Have you read the comments on that? Maybe Correia needs to disassociate himself from his own followers.
And this quote was fun.
Let’s skip that this makes the other side the Nazis. Let’s just ask ourselves how those who worked with Stalin were treated after the war. By the conservatives.
If the Sad Puppies are right, then they should be able to point to an organized campaign to get certain works on the ballot. But the only campaign is theirs. Vox Day started it three years ago and they joined in.
It’s not a campaign; it’s the changing demographics and a changing consensus about what constitutes a Hugo-worthy story.
I’ve also noticed there’s a lot a vagueness in the type of story they’re protesting against. Other than “If You Were a Dinosaur, My Love” and John Scalzi in general, I haven’t seen any list of anything else that they claim won because of politics. I have also had them talk about not liking stories where the story is poor and it’s just an excuse for political content. But I haven’t seen them mention any names.
A few years ago, the Nebula went to a story I detested (I usually read all the short fiction nominees), especially since there was another story that I thought was far superior. I didn’t whine or complain or bitch that the Nebulas were broken; I accepted the fact that it went to a story I didn’t like. But the story also was on the Hugo Ballot, so obviously fans liked it more than I did.
As I’ve said before, the Sad Puppies want to change SF from the literature of ideas to the literature of old ideas; from the literature of the future to the literature of the misremembered past; from the literature of imagination to literature with no imagination. Brad Torgesen has made this very clear as his goal.
I can’t speak for others, but as a person who had been reading classic SF to that point, it was electrifying and made me happy.