"Ethics and Journalistic Integrity"

[Vainamoinen]

Links?

/edit: Ah.

http://www.themarysue.com/calgary-expo-gamergate-evicted/

[Henroid]

So glad the expo organizers kicked them out. From what I understand, the GG members never disclosed what their plans were nor what they were going to end up displaying / selling. So everyone take note that they had to be dishonest to get into an event - which is like an admission of being wrong / hostile.

 

Also a good lesson about how freedom of speech works. It's a protection from the government giving out reprisals against speech. But all other consequences from anyone else can still go down. Nobody has to hear your hate-driven bullshit, etc.

 

Also a good lesson that existing in any society automatically means participating in politics. Everything - every rule, standard, code of conduct, etc - is a politic. Welcome to life outside your homes, Gamergate.

[feelthedarkness]

Haha. almost 10k in donations down the drain. 

[Gormongous]

Haha. almost 10k in donations down the drain. 

 

Oh, I'm sure they managed to squirrel away some of the money, given the history of donations at AVFM.

[feelthedarkness]

Yeah. Are a few sleazy opportunists getting over worth the possibility of the dummies realizing they wasted their money? I assume almost all these organizations are basically grifts, and hope that at some point people would catch on. 

[Dewar]

Links?

/edit: Ah.

http://www.themarysue.com/calgary-expo-gamergate-evicted/

 

I... don't understand. So many of the individual things said in that article make sense, but then to assemble them all into... whatever it was that they were doing. My brain hurts.

[Henroid]

The GG people booted were all female, enabling GG to accuse the Calgary Expo of sexism (though I'm sure other women there are still there).

 

Meanwhile, some shit about "not your shield" or whatever?

[TychoCelchuuu]

GG freaking out over short hair? Reminds me of February of last year.

[Cleinhun]

I think I found the ultimate gamergate post:

 

I mean, it doesn't even have a skill tree, come on.

[Henroid]

"Video games are art!"

"Okay here's one without killing dudes."

"lol wtf is dis"

[Gormongous]

The GG people booted were all female, enabling GG to accuse the Calgary Expo of sexism (though I'm sure other women there are still there).

 

Meanwhile, some shit about "not your shield" or whatever?

 

Yeah, the discussion on We Hunted the Mammoth and videos that the so-called "Honey Badger Brigade" have posted make it clear that those women showed up spoiling for a fight and hoping to get kicked out at some point so that they could claim misogyny or bigotry or censorship or lizard people. The amazing thing is that the one panel they tried to disrupt was actually quite willing to accept the valid parts of the Honey Badger criticisms and to explain the misunderstandings that characterize most of the rest, which totally threw them off their script and left them bored and ready to bounce after maybe thirty minutes of grousing and occasional disruptions.

 

My favorite part, courtesy of a WHTM commenter:

There’s one bit that sums up the whole panel for me. Tieman argues that the romance novel industry discriminates against men because it’s female-dominated and the male characters are objectified.

 

Tieman: If you’re going to say you’re victims of this comics culture, are men victims of being excluded from romance fiction culture?

 

Panelist: Sure, why not?

 

Tieman: But– but–

 

Panelist: We’re not really saying we’re victims. We’re just saying, how can we raise our profile and how can we–

 

Tieman: But that’s– Everybody’s doing that!

 

Gerard: That’s marketing.

 

Tieman: Yeah! That’s marketing! That’s what everybody’s doing!

 

Panelist: Change doesn’t happen when you do what everybody else is doing. Change happens when you fight the norm.

 

I can’t make out the next few seconds due to the quality of the recording (it sounds like the recorder is hidden in a backpack or pocket, which fits with Gerard’s thing for playing spy), but the Honey Badgers give up on the conversation around there. By the time the sound comes back, the panel has moved on to another topic.

 

This is the point at which Tieman and Gerard sound most outraged, and it’s when the panelists i) agree with them, and ii) reveal that they’re normal people doing things everyone does. The Badgers seem totally baffled that real feminists aren’t screeching alien entities, and the panelists seem baffled by all the talk about men vs. women and victimhood. There’s not enough common ground for a coherent argument.

[Tanukitsune]

Wait, wait... HONEY BADGER BRIGADE? The group with the most volatile temper in the universe named themselves after the animal with the "Honey badger don't care" meme?

 

Are they that oblivious and unaware?

[Irishjohn]

This is so interesting. I was teaching a class on Thursday and, while his intentions were good unlike this group, he was doing a very similar thing. He wanted to "challenge" the discussion (that's good!) but his basic grasp of the facts and concepts were all over the place (not so good).

It happens from time to time. This group reminds me of students (almost always male) that come in spoiling for a fight but didn't do any prep of any description. In my case, the class is called "Creating the Orient". Arguing that "not all white men look at Asian women that way" or whatever isn't really addressing any of the discussion points in play, and pointing this out just discombobulates the would-be interruptor.

I must stress, I'm not equating these Honey Badger people that clearly acted in ill faith with students that dominate and undermine class discussions without realizing it. My student on Thursday was not trying to ruin anything. However the dynamics are interestingly similar.

[pkirkner]

Are they that oblivious and unaware?

 

GQ interviewed a few of them last year at an MRA conference and I'm confident the answer to that question is yes. And the Sage Gerard guy that interrupted the panel? He's quite a peach.

[Fingus]

There was an article where the author went to an MRA conference. It was pretty fascinating expose on the community. One of the things mentioned was that women who are "MRA-approved" and part of the gang have the nickname honey badgers. So that's likely where they took the name from.

[pkirkner]

It's actually the same specific group of about half a dozen women MRA's.

[Gormongous]

I know that outrage over the Sad Puppies fiasco hasn't gained much traction here, and that's totally okay, but the most famous person on the slate, Jim Butcher, finally tweeted something resembling his opinion on it and it's... well, it's what you expect from a more populist author who occasionally makes missteps in areas of social justice but generally just keeps his head down: https://twitter.com/longshotauthor/status/588441394806591488

 

The increasingly ubiquitous stance that opinions are bad and everyone should strive not to have any, unless they're benignly consumerist, is really upsetting to me.

[Tanukitsune]

Dammit! I really like the Dresden Files! But isn't the Sad Puppies more Republican/conservative than anything else, or am I misinformed?

[Twig]

To be perfectly honest, I'm not sure I understand what Jim Butcher is actually saying there. I think I'm missing context (like maybe I don't fully understand "Sad Puppies"?) I'd like to understand more clearly because I do like The Dresden Files quite a bit!

[Gormongous]

Dammit! I really like the Dresden Files! But isn't the Sad Puppies more Republican/conservative than anything else, or am I misinformed?

 

Sad Puppies (if you distinguish it from Rabid Puppies, which isn't always easy when no one's willing to disavow Vox Day, because Rabid Puppies finished the work that Sad Puppies started) is basically conservative, but they're still predicated on the idea that there's either a passive or an active liberal conspiracy to flood sci-fi and fantasy with "message fiction" and boring over-literary works and then give them all the awards. The slate is an open conspiracy formed in response to "take back" the awards and make them about "damned good stories" again, rather than race, sexuality, gender, religion, politics, or whatever.

 

I mean, that sounds about as great as "ethics and journalistic integrity," but George R.R. Martin makes it pretty clear in his excellent series of blog posts that Larry Correia (and later, Brad Torgenson) formed Sad Puppies after losing out on his (and Brad's) first Hugo. With regards to the slate itself, Martin's also said it best:

Got it. Politics, race, religion, and sexual orientation, OUT. Damned good stories, IN. And for this year's Damned Good Story standard bearer, you chose... John C. Wright SIX TIMES!!! John C. Wright, a writer famed far and wide for having no opinions on politics, race, religion, or sexual orientation, and would never dream of injecting such messages into his Damned Good Stories. Because, after all, the Puppies get sad when they are made to read Message Fiction.

 

So Wright is in, and who is out? James S.A. Corey. Emily St. John Mandel. John Scalzi (of course). THREE BODY PROBLEM. Joe Abercrombie. Larry Niven. Greg Bear. Daniel Abraham. John Varley. William Gibson. Joe Haldeman. Greg Benford. Lev Grossman. Stephen King. No damned good stories there. I guess. No real science fiction, no exciting fantasy, nothing entertaining or commercial, just pretentious left-wing literary crap, right?

 

Sad Puppies exists because a group of mostly conservative writers believed it impossible to see their favorite writers (which, of course, included themselves and their friends) on the list of Hugo nominees unless they gamed the system. It's an undemocratic "defense" of democracy, which is why everyone's worried about the future of the Hugos, even one of the all-time winners who usually presents them.

 

To be perfectly honest, I'm not sure I understand what Jim Butcher is actually saying there. I think I'm missing context (like maybe I don't fully understand "Sad Puppies"?) I'd like to understand more clearly because I do like The Dresden Files quite a bit!

 

I mean, it's possible that Butcher's not terribly articulate, but I saw the meaning as "People keep proclaiming their stance on everything, acting like politicians" (especially by putting "political" beliefs in books, unlike Butcher, I guess) "and then get all shocked when things become politicized" (when the "fans" mobilize against them to fix the Hugos). Whatever the word-to-word meaning, it's the same overall message as the Puppies: if you have the indiscretion to voice political beliefs as a creator, whether or not it's in your work, you're inviting mass action against you and your work. The upshot's to be apolitical, whatever the fuck that means in this day and age.

[Twig]

Ah, that makes sense. I mean it doesn't, but I understand it, now. I think I was originally trying to see something positive since I like his work, and was reading it as "a bunch of idiots are whining about politics, thus inherently making things more political".

 

Probably also because that's what I would say to mock these fools. X:

 

That's a shame.

[Gormongous]

I should also clarify, both Larry Correia and Brad Torgensen have each put out posts just recently condemning people for connecting them to and conflating them with Vox Day, which is not really the same thing as condemning Vox Day but maybe they were hoping that it'd be good enough. I admit, it's probably difficult to divest yourself entirely of connections to such a hateful misogynist and racist when he's just building off of your slate and your tactics, and when his attempts to shut works of liberal or broader appeal out of the nominees suddenly makes your original slate of nominees the best by default when compared to his additions. It's that ChainSawSuit comic about #GamerGate all over again.

 

Anyway, I don't want to be misinterpreted here. Torgensen did say, "Maybe Vox is terrible," which is a brave stance to take. Of course, he hedged it by then saying, "But the Marxist politics of unpersoning is much more so." By "unpersoning," I assume he means a handful of conservative authors occasionally not winning awards and/or getting mocked by John Scalzi. David Gerrold, writer for Star Trek and one of the other frequent presenters for the Hugos, can take it from here.

 

Ah, that makes sense. I mean it doesn't, but I understand it, now. I think I was originally trying to see something positive since I like his work, and was reading it as "a bunch of idiots are whining about politics, thus inherently making things more political".

 

Probably also because that's what I would say to mock these fools. X:

 

That's a shame.

 

I mean, I tried my best to read it charitably too. I want Jim Butcher to be one of those people who didn't really understand the Puppies at first but is now horrified, not one of the people who decided to roll with it. But "things" that have become "politicized" so clearly refer to the Hugos, so it only makes sense if the "people" are sci-fi authors and not the Puppies. It really bums me out, which is why I came here to post it, gadfly of misery that I am.

[itsamoose]

I haven't heard much about the sad puppies thing, but from what I gather it's pretty typical of a lot of criticism I see lately. Mainly if your politics don't agree with mine, I accuse you of pandering in some way, but if my politics agree with yours I laud you for exposing the truth.

The severe lack of self awareness is incredibly frustrating, and completely antithetical to the point of most of these works. OK, Rant time.

To me this isn't so much about the actual issue being discussed but the way we discuss. I feel as though in the internet of today people are more concerned with having something to say than saying something of substance. Because it is so easy to toss out a tweet or comment, simply peforming this act is seen as what is valuable. Whatever cause they proclaim matters little compared to the desire for their part in it to be recognized. We like to delude ourselves into thinking the number of comments or retweets matters, but in the end these are little more than the flaring of passions. They don't translate into real change without an additional, concerted and long term effort that could exist on its own.

This allows people to mask whatever intention they want with whatever reasoning they want. You discredit your opponents by associated them with a perceived negative--ignoring the specifics in favor of vague generalities. An unarmed man is gunned down in cold blood only to have mention of this be attributed to a desire to see the conflict inflamed. If we as a society could simply allow our egos to be injured, we might actually get somewhere. We would rather celebrate a public figure for aligning themself with a particular cause than seeing that cause furthered. We become enslaved to the spectre of our passions, elevate our egos and refuse to acknowledge what we know to be true if it conflicts with the myth we have created for ourselves.

Personally I don't know the way out. Hell, the only people who would even entertain this notion are the ones who are not guilty of it themselves. Trying to describe this to the ones who really need to hear it is like screaming at the wind.

And rant over. Thanks for playing.

[Denial]

I should also clarify, both Larry Correia and Brad Torgensen have each put out posts just recently condemning people for connecting them to and conflating them with Vox Day, which is not really the same thing as condemning Vox Day but maybe they were hoping that it'd be good enough. 

 

Amazingly, Larry Correia compares himself with Churchill, Brad Torgersen with FDR and Vox Day with Stalin, and rather than edging quietly away from that mess, Torgersen approvingly references it. I realise we've seen a lot of really next-level Dummheit recently, but wow.

[Gormongous]

Amazingly, Larry Correia compares himself with Churchill, Brad Torgersen with FDR and Vox Day with Stalin, and rather than edging quietly away from that mess, Torgersen approvingly references it. I realise we've seen a lot of really next-level Dummheit recently, but wow.

 

In a way, it's possibly the gentlest Godwin, isn't it?

 

In general, though he doesn't seem particularly malevolent, Correia does seem to be fond of especially outsize rhetoric. In his response to George R.R. Martin's initial spread of posts, he describes the feeling of arriving at his first Worldcon already a pariah thanks to a "whisper campaign." He claims to have been berated by fellow panelists and challenged by belligerent drunks, which formed what he eventually works himself up to calling a "lynch mob." In turn, Martin says again and again that he has literally never witnessed that kind of behavior at a Worldcon, even when he was a nobody or when his work was getting some feminist backlash a few years ago. As he says, people disagreed with him, often emphatically, but he was never made to feel unwelcome, unless the word "welcome" is changed to mean "unequivocally loved and celebrated by all." Martin punctuates the different sections of his response to Correia with the repeated question of who these people that harassed him are and what did they say. Martin doesn't say it, but calling them out should probably involve actually calling them out, as opposed to making vague allusions to misdeeds and then starting something like Sad Puppies to "expose" the culture that permits them. I mean, maybe we should be fixing state and federal elections in the US to expose the undue influence of corporate lobbyists in the political process, knowing that they'll all lose their shit when their contributions come to naught, but probably not, because burning down a house to cleanse it of vermin that you just know are there yet can't seem to find is the acme of foolishness.

 

Of course, Correia took Martin's indulgent credulity as naivete, saying in a later post both that Martin clearly is out of touch with Worldcon, which he attends almost every year, if he's not already aware of the harassment that Correia claimed and claims to have faced, but also that Martin is not responding in good faith if he won't take Correia's rough sketch of events as an objectively true basis for further discussion about the future of Worldcon and the Hugos. It's honestly been fascinating how many of the people affiliated with Sad and/or Rabid Puppies nurse grudges about their talent as writers being overlooked for Campbells and Hugos, but then post these nonsensical screeds in support of Sad and/or Rabid Puppies that exhibit absolutely no craft at all, let alone reason. On the other hand, Martin is not only a careful and thoughtful novelist whose books are marred mostly by excessive length and a slightly Old World sensibility, but he is also a careful and thoughtful blogger whose posts are marred mostly by excessive length and a slightly Old World sensibility.