Sad Puppies Update: The Melt Down Continues

So the Powder Blue Care Bear of the Evil Legion of Evil has finally been pushed too far, and out comes the flame thrower.

https://bradrtorgersen.wordpress.com/2015/03/30/former-tor-editor-still-longs-to-gatekeep-the-field/

Good stuff. Brad explains everything really well, it his moderate, reasonable manner. Now, for my hatey hatemongers I need to clarify a few things. Some of the things Queen Teresa Neilsen Hayden is STILL saying in that thread from yesterday need to be addressed… Well, laughed at. Because they’re stupid. http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/016177.html

Wendell Making Light

Seriously, when it comes to demonstrating what I’ve been talking about for years, that link is like the gift that keeps on giving.  Here is what Teresa Nielsen Hayden has to say:

When I say the Hugos belong to the worldcon, I’m talking about the literal legal status of the award. 

Sure you were! We all totally believe that.

I do love how when we actually quote them, that’s not what they meant, but then they fabricate bogus scare quotes for me, then that’s totally what I really meant. Man, that Straw Larry is such a jerk, I’d hate me too. 

But I also know that one of the biggest reasons the rocket is magic is because it spiritually belongs to all of us who love SF.

Just not you guys. You’re the wrong kind of fans. They’ve got 700+ posts over there now making that perfectly clear.

Here’s the thing, Teresa. You don’t speak for all of fandom. You don’t own them. You don’t even speak for all of the TrueFans or SMOF or whatever you want to call them. There are plenty of longtime SMOFs who are just as sick of your preening, entitled nonsense as my people are, and though they may find my actions upsetting or barbaric, or personally think I’m a jerk, at least everything I’ve done has been in the open… Plus, they are safe to criticize my side without fear of retribution or career sabotage. Can’t say the same thing about your side.

I’ve been thinking about the aspects of the Sad Puppy campaigns that bother me most. So far there are three.

Only three? Wow. I’d better check my privilege. I’m used to bothering these people in dozens of ways. 

Up first, the perpetual evil that is Mad Mike Williamson. 

First, there’s the Best Related Work category. That’s where the reference works wind up. Good reference books are labors of love, especially that last 10% of quality that takes 50% of the total labor. People who create reference books get one shot at the Hugo.

Oh really? Don’t worry. We’ll take a look at the history of this illustrious award in a moment.

Did you see Amazon’s sample text from Wisdom from My Internet by Michael Z. Williamson? Apparently it’s on the Hugo ballot in the Best Related Work category. Williamson didn’t know to keep his gob shut until the official announcement. @booksmugglers picked up and tweeted the story, and Kevin Maroney reported on it here.

I talked to Mike Williamson about this. It was a simple mistake. The email either wasn’t clear about keeping quiet until the 4th or he missed that part.  When Mike was informed of his error, he then deleted the posts, and apologized to the administrators, who said no harm done, and they apologized for not making the email clearer. 

Except Insider SMOF Queen knows that this is an unforgivable sin. 

That is a thoroughly bad book, including its frontmatter and interior design,

Says the editor, judging a book by its cover. 

and it’s not a related work. It’s just a nonfiction book published in the appropriate year by a Sad-Puppy-approved author, so they tossed it onto their stupid slate. I expect there are other SP titles in that category, so more than one book that would have been a nominee for Best Related Work has been displaced.

Uh huh… Let’s take a look at prior years in this illustrious, super prestigious category, that only consistently represents the best in sci-fi/fantasy, and not various insider cliques.   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Award_for_Best_Related_Work  

2009’s winner was sci fi author John Scalzi’s Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded: A Decade of Whatever, where the beloved Social Justice Warrior and SFWA president John Scalzi collected funny internet posts into a book. However, Teresa says that when evil libertarian sci fi author Mike Williamson collected funny internet posts into a book, that was SUPER BAD and SHOULD NOT COUNT. 

But wait, what other illustrious things have been on there? A cursory glance through the various nominees shows that Teresa is being disingenuous again. This isn’t just the category for scholarly reference works. Maybe it used to be, but now it is a grab bag of everything. 

In the last few years that category has had nominations for things like: 

Chicks Dig Timelords, A Celebration of Doctor Who by the Women Who Love It. (which won 2011, beating scholarly works about Robert Heinlein, and Resnick and Malzburg’s collection of writings on the business of sci-fi)

Chicks Dig Comics, A Celebration of Comics by the Women Who Love Them 

Chicks Unravel Time, Women Journey Through Every Season of Doctor Who. 

(That lost to Writing Excuses that year.  Good, Writing Excuses deserved it. I voted for it, plugged it, and the one year it won, was by a small margin so probably wouldn’t have made it without Sad Puppies voters. You are welcome, Mary)

Last year had Queers Dig Timelords, A Celebration of Doctor Who by the LGBTQ Fans Who Love It, but it lost to a feminist paper of dubious historical accuracy. 

But Mike Williamson’s bit of fan wankery will RUIN THE DIGNITY OF THE AWARDS FOREVER!  

Good thing the rest of our proposed slate consisted of scholarly related works. I’m sure Teresa will have no problem if any of those get on. 

Second: the nominees on the Sad Puppy slate who got onto the ballot. Indications are that a fair number of them, maybe a majority, are respectable members of the SF community who, for one reason or another, are approved of by the SPs while not being ideologically Sad Puppies themselves.

Yes, a majority of them are *respectable* members of the SF community (whatever that is supposed to mean), and they are *approved* by the Sad Puppies because they produced quality work that would normally be ignored or actively shunned or sabotaged by insider assholes. 

And to clarify, we’re not actually Sad Puppies. We’re doing this FOR the puppies, because the leading cause of Puppy Related Sadness is stupid preachy social justice message fic getting awards while good stuff is ignored. We are a coalition of fans and manatees taking a courageous stand against the scourge of PRS. 

You are welcome, America. 

The question isn’t why they are approved by us, but why they never have or never would be approved by you elitist pricks?

This means they’ve dreamed of winning the Hugo, just like all our other writers and artists and editors.

But because they failed to kiss your ring or sufficient Social Justice ass, they never had a snowball’s chance in hell until my people came along. 

They might not have had any real expectation of winding up on the ballot this year, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t wish for it with all the pure luminous desire of Ralphie wishing for a Red Ryder BB gun.

Naw… Most of them aren’t that naive. Old authors know that now they don’t have a shot unless they do something to suck up to one of the insider cliques, and new authors only have a chance if they happened to personally appeal to one of the insider cliques. 

And one of the most noxious things about this process was watching authors silence themselves or tweak their art to be more appealing to these assholes. 

They’ve been put in a horrible position. I mean, I’ve wanted a Hugo since I was in middle school, but I dreamed of being given one by SF community, not Larry Correia.

It wasn’t me that put them in this position. It was your ilk. I’m just part of the inevitable backlash that enters any system that has become stagnant and corrupted. 

I think at least two of those nominees turned down the nomination. I hope they someday get a real one.

Yep. Out of the fifty something people we put on our slate, we failed to speak with every one of them beforehand. I truly feel bad for them, because I’ve seen what happens to unsuspecting innocent authors when they end up the target of a social justice witch hunt. 

The reason we have to talk to the people we put on our slate first is because they need to be aware that SJWs are going to rip them apart, slander them, libel them, attack them, and try to damage their careers, all because they threaten the status quo. (Teresa conveniently left that part out) 

I’m actually impressed it was that few who dropped off. 

Note, she hopes they someday get a *real* nomination. Because you guys, the hundreds of you that shelled out your money to buy a membership? You don’t count. You’re not *real* fans. And your opinions are wrong and bad.  

Third: the ballot itself. This grows out of wondering why so many Sad Puppies are suddenly out and about on forums they don’t normally frequent, belatedly spreading this new and not very believable line about how the whole Sad Puppy thing is motivated by love, rather than spite and resentment. They sure haven’t felt the need to spread this line before now. Neither have they put a lot of effort into hiding the spite and resentment.

So much bullshit crammed into one paragraph. 

1. Forums we don’t normally frequent? Not really. My people show up all over. Only your kind normally just block or “disemvowel” them. 

2. Belatedly? We’ve been saying the same thing the whole time. You assholes have just chosen to ignore what we actually say and make up bullshit in “scare quotes” for us instead. 

3. Brad showed up on your blog because you had a gang of assholes lying about his character. How DARE he defend himself. How RUDE! 

4. To be clear, Brad Torgersen has always been motivated by love. I’m the one motivated by spite. Get it right. 

5. We’ve consistently spread this line the whole time. The fact you had your head shoved up your ass isn’t my fault. But I can understand the confusion. You guys lie so much that it must be hard to keep track of which narrative you’re using about us now. 

6. Again, I’m the spiteful one. I don’t like liars and career sabotaging bullies. I suppose it is because I didn’t get to Live Life On The Easiest Difficulty Setting.

So why are they doing it now?

Because we were responding to you?  So why are you doing it now? 

When you’re nominated for a Hugo, you’re contacted ahead of time by the Hugo administrators, who check to make sure you’ll accept nomination. If they’re going to have to add the next-highest nominee in a category, they want to do it before the general public sees the ballot, so that no one knows who’s the lowest-ranked nominee.

If the SPs got all or most of their slate onto the ballot, and those people had their nominations confirmed by the Hugo administrators, and they were comparing notes behind the scenes, they’d be uniquely able to reconstruct most or all of the final ballot.

Heh heh heh… 

This part is really fascinating and revealing. Let me break it down for you. 

A few years ago I told the truth in public, and said that SMOF insiders usually knew who all the award nominees were going to be for the year, based upon how popular the authors were to the tiny insular cliques, and they usually knew this before the books came out or had been read by anyone. (hell, that even wound up in our Sad Puppies video!)   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzGKlOkQsxY

I was called a liar. There is no insider info like this! The Hugos are a sainted, pure process. They’re not predictable or manipulated by politics! There are no suggested slates or campaigns behind the scenes! How DARE you?!

Uh huh… So I did in public, in the open, with a bunch of outsiders, what they’ve been doing for years with insiders. Outrage ensues. 

So here we are now, a few days away and Teresa is worried. Why? Because as an insider, the people she already knew were SUPPOSED to get Hugo nominations haven’t been contacted… 

But if there wasn’t insider info and insider cliques, and most of the noms aren’t predestined forgone conclusions, how does she even know she’s supposed to be so worried and upset?

Whoops. 
So.

I think they’ve succeeded in f*cking up the ballot beyond all expectation, and they know the SF community is going to explode when we see it.

By SF community, she means her people. By fucking it up, she means the wrong kind of fans got involved. But regardless, her people are going to explode, because that’s what they do. They’ll rant and rave, and go into hysterical fits, and they’ll libel and slander innocent people, and make up wild accusations… You know, the usual.

But here’s the thing, Teresa. Check your privilege. Your friends aren’t entitled to win everything. Fans are fans, people’s votes are equal. Sad Puppies is about being inclusive. We want more people involved. Look at your entire thread here. It is all about being exclusive, and having the most prestigious award in sci-fi just be a little club award for you and your buddies on the approved list. 

Look at Brad Torgersen’s first comment in this thread. I couldn’t figure out what he was on about when he first posted it. Now I think it’s one big steaming pile of special pleading from start to finish, all of it intended to deflect fannish wrath when the ballot’s announced.

Naw, Brad really is a nice guy who wants sci-fi to be a big tent. He truly wants the Hugos to be a shining light on a hill. I think at times he still believes that he can reach out to elitists and sway them. He’s idealistic like that.

On the other hand, I know that internet arguing is a spectator sport. I do this to give ammo to my side and convince the undecided. I know I will never sway the perpetually outraged. I don’t even want a Hugo. I’m only involved in this now because I believe the social justice stranglehold on free speech is killing our genre. 

However, neither Brad nor I are under any delusion that anything we do will “deflect fannish wrath”.  

Whether we get one nomination or a hundred, it won’t matter. These are the same people who unleash their “fannish wrath” against anybody who steps out of line, or anybody who disagrees with them, or anybody who uses forbidden words, or anybody who tells a story they don’t like, or even their own people who say that maybe they shouldn’t be so quick to outrage.

Wrath is all you people have.

Well, Teresa, no matter what we do,  no matter what the results, we know we’re going to feel your wrath. Luckily, I’ve demonstrated to the world that your wrath is impotent. For years, authors have lived in fear of angering these Social Justice mobs. They’ve moderated their speech, self censored their art, and walked on eggshells to avoid getting burned at the stake… That’s why I hate you people, and that’s why I’ve loved exposing you for the petty, petulant, and ultimately powerless little bullies that you are. 

Your angry mobs only have as much power as the person you’re attacking is willing to grant them. I stood up to you last year, and all it did was bring your antics to the attention of more, good, decent, regular fans. It isn’t your award. It is everyone who cares enough to get involved. And every time your side forms an angry Twitter mob, or runs an article in the Guardian full of easily disprovable lies, or attacks some comedian for jokes he hasn’t told yet, or lectures people that they’re having fun wrong, then more regular fans get pissed off and shell out their $40 to get involved, because they don’t like your entitled smugness either. 

I don’t like it, but it does fit all the known data. Wouldn’t it be nice if I turn out to be wrong?

You have no idea… 

##

EDIT, Read this too. It is great:             http://accordingtohoyt.com/2015/03/31/the-scarlet-letters/

Sarah Hoyt addressed the bit where they’re all mad at Brad for missing a few authors and not informing them that they were going to be on our slate.

Somehow, us failing to warn these people that SJWs are going to rip them apart for the crime of bad people liking their work, is somehow a bigger crime than the SJWs ripping them apart.

 

Sad Puppies Update: The Nominees Announced and Why I Refused My Nomination
Sad Puppies Update: Honesty from the Other Side

416 thoughts on “Sad Puppies Update: The Melt Down Continues”

  1. Your angry mobs only have as much power as the person you’re attacking is willing to grant them. I stood up to you last year, and all it did was bring your antics to the attention of more, good, decent, regular fans.

    Preach, preacher! That whole section was downright INSPIRATIONAL and well worthy of the International Lord of Hate.

  2. Wrath is all they have. And with the rise of indie publishing, they are becoming more and more impotent. People are finding they don’t need them any more.

    Or, as was said in a different context, “Can’t stop the signal.”

  3. All you “not real” and hateful pseudo-authors will have to console yourselves by sleeping on giant piles of money.

    Speaking of which, you’re really hitting my wallet this year….

    1. The inevitable rise in sales (especially of books that give good entertainment value) will be a complete mystery to many in Traditional Publishing. Especially when it’s not *their* house collected all the new cash.
      Wonder when/if they’ll make the connection.

  4. What I do not understand is why they feel the need to say these things in public. It’s all to similar to the need of lefty politicians to back gun control. They know the third rail is electrified, they know that discussion will energize far more of their opponents than their supporters and yet they still feel the need to go there. It’s clear what she was thinking. But why did she feel the need to share it?

      1. “Because they’re children, and children aren’t good at emotional subtlety.”

        Nonsense; most children are capable of learning. These dolts have demonstrated again and again that they do not learn save in the lowest common denominator manner of a mimic; repeating what has been recited at them.

        Seriously; they show all the grasp of higher reasoning of a lower promote that has been taught, say, sign language. They can form simple sentences, usually ungrammatically (but who am I to judge), and express some crude emotions. The do not display reason, or anything but the most basic level of deductive logic. Inductive logic us behind them. And self-examination produces nothing resembling insight.

        They really come across as so many ASL signing chimps.

    1. Because all they hear in their echo chamber is “polls say that 90% of the people support us.”

      Next thing you know Andrew Cuomo goes from “presidential contender” to “punchline”

        1. That’s a perfect example of their superficiality. I happened to be watching the news that night, BEFORE the “scream meme” started. I could tell immediately — and I was a punk teenager who didn’t know anything — that it was a noise-cancelling mike. It didn’t register except in hindsight, as people started making fun of him for it. Not on the substance of his ideas, but because he “sounded crazy.”

          That’s a liberal for you. It needs to FEEL right. If you’re not hitting the right FEEL, they have no use for you. Dean’s plenty crazy, but they don’t care about ideas by themselves.

        1. It will however be hilarious to watch all of the whiners who spent the ’00 election season whinging about the “Bush family dynasty” lining up to vote for Cuomo Mark 2…

    2. Mousestalker wrote:
      “What I do not understand is why they feel the need to say these things in public. It’s all to similar to the need of lefty politicians to back gun control. They know the third rail is electrified, they know that discussion will energize far more of their opponents than their supporters and yet they still feel the need to go there. It’s clear what she was thinking. But why did she feel the need to share it?”

      I believe it’s about reaffirming their identity. The “gun control”, on both sides, is largely about what kind of person you are. (Gun controllers want a society where violence by anyone, anytime, for ANY reason does not take place. Gun rights defenders believe defensive violence is a GOOD thing, and are proud to do it.)

      Having read hundreds of comments on Making Light, I’d say their big thing is ‘Hey, I’m not like _them_.’ To fail to say it would diminish them in their own eyes.

  5. I love this time of year. Sad puppies is always a great end cap to another accounting busy season. Watching all these people implode is just awesome. I tip my hat to you!

  6. I remember when I was a kid, I used to buy two yearly collections of Fantasy and Science Fiction stories that came out every year. Both were from a pretty big contest (it might have been writers of the future) and each year I picked up both volumes and spent the next day or so reading through them.

    I stopped eventually, after a few years. Not because I’d stopped enjoying sci-fi and fantasy, but because the stories had stopped being sci-fi and fantasy. Each year, the number of enjoyable stories in the collection dwindled, the rest becoming thinly-veiled social commentary that eventually just became flat-out soapboxing. No story. No real characters or conflict. Just thinly-veiled commentary.

    This was fifteen-odd years ago now or so, so I didn’t know why the stories had stopped being stories. All I knew is that they had. So I stopped reading them, and had to go find Sci-fi and fantasy elsewhere. To this day, I haven’t picked up one of those collections again.

    So according to Teresa here, I’m not a “real” sci-fi/fantasy fan because I don’t subscribe to those stories? No. I enjoy sci-fi and fantasy. Heck, I write sci-fi and fantasy. I just don’t like thinly-veiled soapboxes that give up half the pretenses of character.

    And I really don’t like it when the supporters of those stories insist that everyone else is being a fan “wrong” or a writer “wrong.”

    Kick their metaphorical butts, Larry. Sad Puppies started making the Hugo awards relevant in my world again.

    1. Yeah, I gave up on Asimov’s last year – their October issue had a ‘fantasy’ story about Girl Scouts going feral, ending with one being put down by her father.

      WT(Everloving)F? How was that SF? Or Fantasy?

      As it was, it apparently was ‘good literachure’ because the imagery has stayed with me for quite a while. Certainly it stayed long enough for me to cancel my sub, and write a letter to the editor (for which I got a rather regretful reply back, they were sorry to see me go, yada yada…) and here it is months later and I can’t get the taste of that story out of my metaphorical mouth.

      Guess I’m not a Trufan because I don’t appreciate stuff like that – despite being an Asimov subscriber for decades. And you’re right, things have been going downhill for a while – I just didn’t want to admit it before being slapped in the face with a rotten story.

      1. Yeah, that last bit is what gets me. Someone wants to write stories like that? You know what? That’s fine. I don’t care. I respect that we each write what we enjoy, and if someone enjoys reading that, well that’s fine.

        But the moment that line is crossed and the writer (or their fan) insists that I am NOT a science-fiction/fantasy fan because I didn’t enjoy the story, and that I must enjoy the story or not be a real fan? Line crossed. That’s not cool.

        They can write those stories all they want. But offering blanket statements that summarize as “everyone must like this story or they aren’t a fan of ____” is just bogus. That’s like a fanfic author arguing that their stories are so true to the X-men universe that any “real” fan reads all their stories and counts them as canon.

        Ridiculous.

        We can write what we want. But that doesn’t mean we can claim that our writing, or what we like, is the only “true” Scotsman.

      2. Wow…that sounds awesome. I’d read the heck out of a story like that…

        No judgment on those who feel otherwise. Thanks for cluing me in on the story’s existance.

    2. FYI, if it was Writers of the Future, you might give it another look. I’m in the volume that comes out in about two weeks (Vol. 31), plus Martin Shoemaker (great space-faring hard SF), Scott Parkin with a cool first contact story, and lots more. David (Wolverton) Farland is the coordinating judge now, so that may have shifted what kinds of stories end up in the book.

  7. As I’ve said before, I don’t really care about the Hugo Awards. It’s a prestige thing that doesn’t affect your bottom line. The number of people out there who will buy a book that they wouldn’t have bought otherwise, because that book got a Hugo, is statistically insignificant. Your cover art will drive sales a hell of a lot more than that.

    That said, I am enjoying the hysterics the Sad Puppies campaign is driving the social justice warrior crowd to. These are sad, screwed-up, broken people who hold inexplicably high opinions of themselves and of their little clique. It’s a snotty, left-wing mutual admiration society that presumes to issue out the “most prestigious” award in science fiction.

    Screw them. I’m glad Larry, Brad, and everyone else is upsetting their goddamn little apple cart. The people wailing and gnashing their teeth? They’re liars, defamers, and many of them seem to be on the emotional level of a fourteen-year-old. Their whole deal reeks of some weird, mirror universe, bizarro world high school where the nerds and geeks are the ones forming cliques and telling others they’re not cool enough.

    Except in this case, being cool means penning some mushy garbage that checks the right boxes for the cause of the day.

    So to hell with them all. Maybe, eventually, some good will come of this. Maybe the Hugo will actually mean something. Maybe a bigger audience will participate, and the supposed prestigious award will actually be something a regular sci-fi fan has actually heard of.

    Probably not, but maybe. In the meantime, their discomfort, their impotent rage, it makes me happy.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHldGEuS19Q

      1. If the Hugos are ever liberated from the clutches of the SJWs…that poor rocket is gonna need a LOT of disinfecting. IYKWIMAITYD.

    1. Emotional level of a fourteen year old?

      I’d say you’re being pretty generous. This “disemvoweling” business is the saddest, most immature thing I’ve seen in a long time.

      1. Actually, the “disemvoweling” thing, insofar as leftist-dominated blogs/discussion groups/etc are concerned, has been around at least since the old FIDONET/Usenet days. (Yes, I know this dates me…:) Almost without notable exception the SJW run groups will always “kick and ban”, as it used to be called, anyone whose posts do not fit the “approved” SJW meme, and it has been ever thus. Their (the SJWs) problem is that their positions are invariably based on lies, half truths and vacuous emotionalism. The average conservative shows up, armed only with facts and logic, and allowed a level playing field, will crush them every time, and the SJWs know it. Hence the “disemvoweling”, at least when they are in control of the environment.

    2. some weird, mirror universe, bizarro world […] where the nerds and geeks are the ones forming cliques and telling others they’re not cool enough.

      Been there, lived through that. It’s called MIT. [ducks]

  8. Brightest part of the day so far. Most of TNH’s spiritual allies are sitting this out so far. It will be interesting when a smoother approach is tried.

    If Larry got Scalzi so exercised that he did the ALL CAPS PAROXYM OF ORGIASTIC GLEE thing last year merely by getting some works nominated, imagine what we have to look to forward from Scalzi this year!

    1. They know the tide is turning. I listened to a podcast yesterday with 2 transgender, a lesbian and a manic feminist. In the past, they’ve been the source of endless and really insulting gripes about whites and men. I mean some really filthy and hostile innuendoes. They were on their best behavior.

      Here’s the problem: you can’t fisk your own quotes or make up quotes and conspiracies that don’t exist.

    2. 1) It’s an open question whether Scalzi believes what he says, or if he weather vanes to maintain popularity and influence. I took a look at Whatever and he’s very quiet on this. Makes one go “huh”

      2) I see on Whatever that there’s a new Travis Taylor novel! Why, I ask, do I need to learn this from _Scalzi_? Where are you folks when I need you? 🙂

      1. Scalzi is a true believer. However he’s trying to move from sci-fi writing to tv writing and he doesn’t want to post anything that’s going to get him in trouble with any media company. He’s at no risk for continuing his little game but he’s excessively cautious.

    3. Yeah, I loved that. The funny thing is that I believe Scalzi actually still thinks I care about winning a Hugo, so he projected all over about how me not winning left me all sobbing and heartbroken. Exactly what I predicted to happen, happened. If I’d won, I would have been proven wrong, and where’s the point in that?

      1. Larry, they ALL still think that, even though it was Brad who organized SP3. Empress Theresa, Cat, Gerrib, et al. They all think you did this because you so desperately want a Hugo, and that even winning one wouldn’t be good enough for you.

        It wouldn’t surprise me if they thought Brad was ‘your sockpuppet’ given their love of dismissing people as sockpuppets or ‘stuffed ballots.’

        They don’t get you already got what you wanted when they did exactly what you predicted they would. They never will, because that doesn’t fit their delusions.

        1. I’ve said repeatedly that I don’t care about getting myself nominated. The problem is these people don’t have success, readership, or sales. The awards are all they’ve got (which is why they are so freaked out about losing their stranglehold on those). And they’d murder their own grandmother for a best novel nomination. Since they go through life projecting their crazy on everyone else, they automatically assume that I’m lying.

          1. Indeed, it says something that these are supposedly masters of science fiction and fantasy, and yet I’ve never heard of most of them ASIDE from their engaging in racist segregation and constantly making racist and sexist statements against white males — and persecuting anyone who disagrees with them.

          2. That must be why you told everyone to vote for Jim Butcher, to throw them off the scent.

          3. I’ve never heard of most of them ASIDE from their engaging in racist segregation and constantly making racist and sexist statements against white males

            Jordan, you may be right, but I know that it took me until SP2 and friends posting links to Larry Correia blog posts for me to hear of him, and he’s as hard to miss as a marching band. Jordan, I remember you from rec.arts.sf-written, so unless you were a precocious child, I’m afraid you might not be down with what the kids are listening to reading these days.

  9. Teresa Nieslsen Haden wrote:

    If the SPs got all or most of their slate onto the ballot, and those people had their nominations confirmed by the Hugo administrators, and they were comparing notes behind the scenes, they’d be uniquely able to reconstruct most or all of the final ballot.

    In the same thread Patrick Nielsen Hayden wrote:

    * Regarding Best Novel: I’ve heard that three of the five finalists are SP-endorsed. (Which, see above, doesn’t in itself guarantee that any of them are unworthy of a Hugo.) I don’t know what any of those three books are. I do know the identity of the other two, and I don’t think anyone in this conversation will regard them as unworthy candidates. (Disclaimer: Neither of them are books Teresa or I worked on in any way.)

    So where is PNH getting his data? I assume either the Hugo committee or the nominees, or perhaps the publishers of the nominees. Apparently it’s OK if he pieces it together.

      1. So, they’re trying the old, RULES DON’T APPLY TO US, PEASANT!, I see.

        That’s an odd approach they’re taking, Cotton, let’s see how it plays out.

  10. What’ll you bet some SJW will see the first comment was authored by VD and start frothing at the mouth, thinking, “it’s him. it’s him. i know it. i’d recognize those initials anywhere.”

    1. Whenever this topic pops up at ThePassiveVoice blog, “Inigo Montoya” chimes in to complain about no one distancing themselves from Vox Day and that so long as he’s involved the rest of us should be ignored/scolded/ ashamed of ourselves or something.

      1. Vox isn’t even on the Sad Puppies slate. By distancing, he means join in the SJW mandated witch burning.

        If Vox gets on the slate this year, he did it all on his own. And if that’s the case, then the SJWs should really freak out, because Sad Puppies didn’t have anything to do with it.

        1. It could be that, by raising a ruckus about how evil Vox was and how terrible his books were, they publicized his books and hence induced many more fans to buy them. Furthermore, this could in part be a protest vote: the SJW’s may have pissed off so many fans that some fans want to see Vox win just to annoy the SJW’s.

      2. Sounds like Clamps. He’s been beating that drum on Brad’s site for the last couple days until Brad tossed him out.

        I have noticed that ever since Vox reported him, he’s been using SJW buzzwords and accusations of harassment, swatting, and the like instead of just arguing like a contrary two-year-old.

        1. Clamps has been doing that ALL OVER THE INTERNET as far as I can tell, at least from when he’s mentioned me a few times – Example in the comments. It’s almost copy-paste the same thing I spotted over in Brad’s blog before it got spamhammered.

          Clamps is also trying to portray me as a male misogynist anti-gay bigot over at Fundies Say The Darndest Things. Because Mr. I Threaten Children With Death for Mom’s Political Views is keen to try erase that past of his AND gain support. Hence the SJW buzzwords. (Notably it backfired badly on him the first time and he tried it again another time some weeks ago, but I honestly can’t be arsed to point out they’re listening to a misogynistic, racist stalker. Also he made the mistake of referring to Gamergate, which lead to a massive derailment.)

          What Vox did must have really cost him in some way if this is the best Clampsy can manage now.

          1. Vox got him tagged for cybercrime for his use of multiple accounts to evade blocking.

            Clamps has a court order to stp posting anything, period.

            He’s courting a prison term now, judges are unamused at tards that violate court orders.

          2. Clamps is also trying to portray me as a male misogynist anti-gay bigot over at Fundies Say The Darndest Things.

            MALE? Has he actually come to believe this, or is he deliberately lying? And if the latter, a LOT of people know you’re female … has anyone mentioned this yet on there?

  11. Wow, so much has changed in a year. And I have some bad news for these gender feminist dingbats: we haven’t even really marshaled all our forces.

    Secondly, there is no way to present quotes about marginalizing the “underrepresented” from us that don’t exist or hiding your own mountain of racist supremacist quotes. There are open and public quotes that point to collusion or outright admit they won’t deal with literature by straight white men. On the other hand, the idea straight white men have ever conspired to do that is a straight up lie.

    I have yet to see a single Tweet urging whites to read whites, men to read men, or heterosexuals to read heterosexuals, or arranging that into awards or symposiums. The Tweets in the other direction is a flood.

    “Read this, she’s gay. Read this, he’s PoC. Read this, Women!!”

    Well, read this: fuck you.

    I see some tough times ahead for intersectionalists. The truth is no one was doing a single thing to gays, women or non-whites in the SFF field but now you’ve made genuine enemies. They’re not enemies because of who you are but what you say. You could’ve just written some good fiction and let it sit there like everyone else instead of marking us all for a KKK but you couldn’t do that. So, deal with the push back.

    1. I love pointing out to them that I’m an Approved Minority. I’m handicapped. Regular people are like “who cares?” as long as I’m doing reasonably okay. SJWs get headsplodey as they try to reconcile my politics with my wheelchair, which is hilarious. But K. Tempest Teacup says I’m an approved minority for her challenge!

        1. Don’t I know it. I was laughing at the Pat Carrigan fans who said that no one was allowed to disagree with her because she has a chronic illness. Hey, I get that cancer is bad, and I don’t have cancer . . . but I’m wondering why they haven’t been so considerate with MY chronic illnesses? ‘Cause I have more than one.

          Oh, right. I think bad and have fun wrong.

          1. I’ve got a grossly enlarged heart and am strapped to a portable defibrillator pending surgery. Should I tell the people I online game with they aren’t allowed to shoot back at me because I might get stressed and drop dead at the keyboard? Doesn’t seem sporting somehow.

          2. Normally, I find arguing with liberals to be like shooting an unarmed man. Still, like the unarmed man, if they’re left screaming and shouting and charging at people, eventually they’re going to do real damage.

            Not a lot of victory in it, except on occasion when I set up a particularly amusing trap. (As I did on the Pat Cadigan thread. We were being told by a fan — who was dropping f-bombs — that we were being horribly insulting. So I insulted her . . . using a copy-and-paste of Pat Cadigan’s own insults. She fell for it.) Instead, it’s like I’ve told some people in real life a time or two. “If you pick a fight with me and win, congratulations, you beat up a cripple. If you pick a fight with me and *I* win, congratulations, you got beat up *by* a cripple.”

            I became a cripple in the summer of 2005. No one’s taken a swing at me since the spring of the same year, and that guy was too drunk to realize why his buddies were pulling him away from me. 🙂

          3. Depends – will the half-second hesitation give you time to line up a headshot?

          4. “I’m diabetic. Up is down, black is white, and the Law of Gravity is merely an unsupported opinion. Dare anyone disagree with me? ;-)”

            I asked a diabetic. She said you’re wrong about all three.

        2. Standard Marxist stand-by explanation of actual human behavior refusing to conform to their beautiful theory – False Consciousness.

          It’s hasn’t gone out of style. See “What’s the Matter with Kansas” for one of the latest iterations.

          And the tune remains the same…

          1. “False Consciousness” is one of the most arrogant sociological arguments possible. It essentially argues that others are deluded regarding their own true interests and that the arguer thus has a superior right to decide for them what they should do. It’s also unfalsifiable in the Popperian sense — and hence nonsensical.

          2. Jordan S. Bassior, on April 2, 2015 at 11:05 pm said:
            “ ‘False Consciousness’ is one of the most arrogant sociological arguments possible. It essentially argues that others are deluded regarding their own true interests and that the arguer thus has a superior right to decide for them what they should do. It’s also unfalsifiable in the Popperian sense — and hence nonsensical.”

            Quite true, of course, but it serves important purposes. The argument, which goes back to Rousseau at least, allows the person deploying it to justify do evil on the ground that he’s doing good. It covers his own motivations, so that he can feel good about torture. It confuses onlookers (the stupider ones, anyway; see Stalinism, passim). And of course, it pollutes the language, making rational thought and discussion impossible.

            Really, when you think about it, it’s brilliant. Lucifer would be proud to call himself its author.

      1. Try being female.

        Okay… maybe female isn’t much more head ‘splody than being handicapped for rational people, but you still get that “what is wrong with you!” reaction from the group-identity sorts.

        Imagine what it’s like to be someone at the very top of the Approved Minority pyramid and not being in compliance with how other people have decided you’re supposed to think.

        1. I don’t get the rage kind of headsploding. It’s like Norman the android in “I, Mudd” after being informed that logic is wreath of pretty flowers that smell bad. I swear I’ve smelled smoke a time or two.

      2. *snort* The very fact that they have no problems putting the same ‘protected’ minorities they scream about into their sights the MOMENT those people dare express opinions mildly out of line of the Approved Message is constantly on display.

        It’s interesting to watch the SJWs backpedal HARD once they realize they’re being set up to harass a minority woman by a white man known as a misogynistic stalker though.

    2. “Read this, she’s gay. Read this, he’s PoC. Read this, Women!!”

      Whatever happened to just saying, “Read this, it’s great!”?

    3. Not only that, but by promoting low-talent writers just because they happen to be non-white, female, or gay and AGREE with the SJW’s (the most important qualification) they are giving non-white and gay writers a bad reputation among fans. (They would be doing this for women too, except that it’s usually obvious when a writer’s female and there are too many famous female sf writers in the field, from its very beginnings, for them to do much damage in this regard).

  12. As time goes more and more of their deceit and lies are exposed. For example the trope that campaigns never happened before. I saw it, on line, starting in 1986. I’ll bet, if one searches deep in the archives of rec.arts.sf.written you’d campaigns by some of the very whiners we see now…for their favorite LibProg.

  13. This person’s arrogance has no limit. “This grows out of wondering why so many Sad Puppies are suddenly out and about on forums they don’t normally frequent…”

    No- this grows out of why you’re suddenly deigning to notice the rabble.

    In other words “What are all these peasants doing here?? Have there ALWAYS been so many of them? Where did they all come from!?”

    1. There’s a certain level of… emboldenment… involved. I’m not very brave. Less brave in real life. A little bit more brave (but not all that much so) on the internet. Used to being somewhat covert… sitting on my hands… keeping my mouth shut… not making waves.

      1. That’s part of the reason why things like Sad Puppies are so important. They show people like you that you’re not alone, and that there are a lot of other people out there who share at least some of your values.

  14. Also, what is up with these people’s fascination with Doctor Who? You’d think they’d be complaining that the character has been played by a white man since the 1960s.

    1. I’ve seen suggestions that an upcoming incarnation of the Doctor should be a woman. I don’t know how seriously anyone in power is taking that idea, though.

      1. It’s the DOCTOR. We’re talking about an alien – how do we know that he ISN’T his species female-equivalent?

        I’m recalling that scene where Missy put the liplock on Capaldi to ‘transfer information’. Could it be that for Time Lords gender roles are reversed? (Which would really put his time with Romana on a different level.) Now that the Master is Missy, the Master is acting on long-suppressed feelings?

        Grief. The slash fic could get really wierd really fast…

        1. And since everything I’ve ever read/seen/heard about Capaldi is that he is one of the sweetest people you could hope to meet, that ain’t likely…

          1. There is already a video going around of Capaldi in character answering a 9yolds letter (about the death of his grandmother I believe) in a very sweet way. Certainly seems like a nice guy.

    2. Because it’s BBC and therefore already politically correct, and because the new doctors are soooo cuuuute! (<– that was hyperbole)

    3. UNEXPECTED SHOCKING SURPRISE SO TRIGGER YOUR WARNINGS!!!

      SFF author Sophia McDougall on casting the new Dr. Who TV show: “…would honestly have thought it had reached the point where it was simply *embarrassing* to cast another white man.”

      “yup, I agree. Outstanding actor, but still leaves a sour taste in the mouth.” – Hugo and Nebula winner Aliette de Bodard.

      I got a million of ’em. Hachacha.

    4. Oh, believe me, they have been complaining for the last two Doctors.

      Now, I personally think it might be fun if they decide to cast the Doctor as a woman, or a non-white guy. But that shouldn’t be the reason for doing so–the reason for doing so ought to be because the actor/actress is just perfect for the role. I *loved* the Master becoming Missy because the actress was one of the best Large Ham, scenery-chewing villains I’ve seen in a long time. She was great in the role–but I’d put it down to her abilities as an actor, not her gender. She just happens to be female. I’d feel the same if they pulled a similar switch with the Doctor…but only if they got someone really fantastic, and weren’t doing it just to make the SJWs happy. >.>

      1. This is why the next Doctor should be Idris Elba. Has nothing to do with him being black and everything to do with him being FREAKING IDRIS ELBA.

        That it will get the identity politics people to shut up about it for a bit is an added bonus, but not even the tertiary reason for casting him.

        1. That is one of the reasons I am hesitant about a Doctor picked based off of identity politics. The SJWs won’t shut up.

          Anything negative ever said during their tenure as the Doctor will be negated because of racism, sexism, whatever other -ism can be lobbed. Or that the cisgendered white males are mad that “they’re losing their privilege”.

          It can’t simply be because a given episode’s writing was lacking or what have you… it must be SEXISM! RACISM! HOMOPHOBIA!

          Blah.

          1. Anything negative ever said during their tenure as the Doctor will be negated because of racism, sexism, whatever other -ism can be lobbed.

            This kind of thing has made reading online commentary about various shows such a pain! If you are watching, say, The Flash and you say somehting about Iris, you aren’t just unhappy with one little thing a character did, everything is racist and misogynist, etc..etc… and if THEY aren’t happy with something about the character than its the writers who are the racists, hate women, etc.

            It is so, so tiresome. I just want to talk about my fluff shows without getting these obnoxious busybodies trying to guess at my motives. And guess wrong.

            I love Idris and he’d probably be a fantastic doctor (although he may get too big for the role soon), but that stuff would be irritating.

        2. Exactly! This is also why when, I saw someone suggest casting Idris Elba as Commander Vimes for the Watch tv series I went “Oooh! Hadn’t thought of him, but that would be AWESOME.” Because Idris Elba is all the badass.

          I also loved the guy who played the Marquis de Carrabas in the Neverwhere miniseries back in ’95 or so, and thought he’d make a great Doctor (and then Gaiman admitted he’d had the Doctor in mind when he wrote de Carrabas…)

          Again, don’t care about the skin color–they’re just awesome actors. They could be purple with orange polkadots, and it wouldn’t matter if they did a great job.

          1. “I also loved the guy who played the Marquis de Carrabas in the Neverwhere miniseries back in ’95 or so, and thought he’d make a great Doctor”

            Paterson Joseph. A fine actor, and he would indeed make a great Doctor.

          2. Skin color isn’t why I adore actors like Morgan Freeman and Samuel L. Jackson and Idris Elba, or James Earl Jones, Anthony Hopkins, Robert Downey Jr., or any number of other actors whose work I like. I like them because they’re AWESOME. I enjoyed Lucy Liu’s role as O-Ren Ishii not because she’s Asian or female, but because she was fantastic in playing that character.

            I wasn’t particularly fond of Tom Cruise’s work for a while but he’s gotten better so he’s now on the “Oh hey, he did this, let’s watch it” list.

            I cheerfully picked up a movie I’d never heard of before simply on the strength of seeing Scarlett Johansson and Morgan Freeman on the billing. And delighted myself with seeing the names on Last Vegas. Gravity was carried on the acting of two awesome actors mostly talking to each other, and glued me to the chair when I was shaking with fear over one of my big terrors brought to screen (adrift in space with no tether or little chance of getting to a rescue.)

            I’d love to see Reese Witherspoon do a Sci-Fi role, because I think quite frankly she has the chops for a role outside of her usual settings.

          3. correia45> That’s because Idris Elba should get all of the roles.

            Looking at imdb, Idris IS getting all the roles. He’s currently in 9 different projects including Avengers, Jungle Books and Star Trek.

          4. Yeah, but Vimes is a badass whose inner non-badass stands on his neck with a pair of poor man’s boots to keep him sane and in line. Much like Granny Weatherwax is a “bad witch by inclination and a good witch by decision.” Both of them are determined to do good in the worst way…and frequently do.

    5. And, of course, there’s the sad fact that at *least* every other NuWho episode has some SJW message or other snuck in. Some are a bit more heavy handed than others.

      I still love Doctor Who, though, even if I’ve started rolling my eyes more frequently than I’d like at the weekly SJW-Approved ™ messages…

    6. The Doctor is, frankly, too exceptionally and overtly masculine (especially for British television) to have the role go to a woman. Non-white, sure, but I’m not sure there *are* Timelords of the swarthier variety… I certainly don’t recall any.

      1. There have been some black (oh, sorry, SJWs . . . that should be “African-British”) actors playing Time Lords in recent years. I’m also told there was one back in the Sixth Doctor story “Trial of a Time Lord,” but that’s one of the few I’ve missed. (I’m a 20th-century fan myself. Tom Baker was my first Doctor, via reruns.)

        1. The correct term is “British African-American”.

          I can’t believe how ignorant you stupid colonialist pigs are!

          1. Nope. It’s (non-US nation of origin) African-American, as actually used by the members of the US press.

            I only wish I were joking…

        2. I stand corrected. Granted, I was to young to watch the original run, so if they were prior to 9 I wouldn’t have seen many of them.

      2. I dunno. I’d have told you a year ago the Master couldn’t possibly be played by a woman for the same reasons. And then they cast Michelle Gomez as Missy, and she has come very close to beating out the original Master (Roger Delgado) in my books as the very best of the Masters. I think it could work with the Doctor, too, if they cast as brilliantly. But again–it comes down to something that has zip to do with identity politics! 🙂

  15. You know, I’ve got several friends-of-friends who have complained in recent years about how little they like science fiction these days and how there aren’t any more good stories. They went on and on about how the stories just aren’t as captivating or entertaining as they used to be from when they remembered reading science fiction growing up.

    Turns out they’ve been mostly reading ‘those’ kind of science fiction novels. You know the ones. Hugo Award Winning novels.

    1. I looked down the list of recent noms/winners in the novel category and aside from the grrm and jk Rowling stuff, the only other one I had on my shelf was Jonathan strange and mr norell. Which sounded good in theory but actually was pretty mediocre since I haven’t bothered to retread it.

      I also read the hand maids tale but it was preachy dreck.

    2. I used to go the bookstore and buy stacks of books. Then about 5-10 years ago, I just stopped. The last dozen books I bought were all duds. Ever since then, I get books from the library first, then buy what I like after a first read.

      And I couldn’t tell you the background on most authors I like, just that the books are good.

  16. Yeah, I slipped, due to a bad email, and rather than anyone tell me I’d made a faux pas, they all apparently went shitzo (sic) on Twitter.

    A friend told me of the error, I pulled the posts, and told the committee. They said no harm no foul, so I have no idea where this Empress Teresa or whoever gets off saying I’m some sort of villain. Who put them in charge?

    And of course, by them promoting it on whatever blog she blogs on, they did the same thing I did, only with foreknowledge of the error.

    1. So since I will get your Hugo nominated work for free, I guess I will have to go out and buy another work of yours, simply to give the finger to The Toad and her kind.

      1. Over on FB, on a Brad thread, someone proposed “Grand SMOF Haden.” I admit to really liking that one.

        1. She’s not a SMOF.

          Smofs are those hardworking people who somehow manage to herd cats and get ducks in a row, for long enough to run a convention. Most of them are proud not to be big names.

          Teresa Nielsen Hayden used to be a “profan,” but since she is now unemployed, she is a BNF (Big Name Fan).

          Some BNFs are benevolent and helpful folks, and are famous for that. Others… not so much.

          You can usually tell which ones are the obnoxious ones by whether they are embarrassed to be thought of as famous; or at least, which ones spend way too much time basking in self-adoration and not enough time working or helping.

          1. Being a Big Name Fan, in the greater scheme of things, ranks right up there with being the world’s most famous Seminole War Re-Enactor.

            But, as with squabbles among academics, “their fights are so bitter because the rewards are so small.”

      1. I’m preferring “Saint Teresa,” myself. That certainly sums up HER opinion of herself, anyway…

        😉

        1. Oh, I was thinking more of the atrocity to the art of storytelling Empress Theresa, not any actual historical personage, by …uhm, I forget the name. Sorry. Lack of sleep, I’m afraid.

      2. Empress Maria-Theresa, were she to rise from her tomb, would no doubt have a few choice words to say regarding this pretender to her title.

        1. Oh heck yes. Maria-Theresa ran an empire, fought off Fredrick of Prussia, and had a dozen or so kids. I highly doubt that the former editrix could manage a tenth of that.

    2. Who put them in charge, Mike? YOU did. Because you REALLY agree with them DEEP DOWN. Thinking you disagree is just your false consciousness preventing you from seeing that you agree with the general will.

  17. So dreary reading the end of the aforementioned thread I see the idea coming up that the only way to stop Sad Puppies is to limit voting to attending members. That ship is going down fast!

    1. Two issues with that.

      First is that fewer people buy memberships – since there’s now no reason to do so – which means less money flowing into the coffers.

      Second is that the only real way to limit voting to attending members is to do the nominating and the voting within a day or two of each other. That has a ton of logistical issues that would probably make it impractical.

      1. That’s not really a problem. The nominations could still take place online, because anyone who was a member the previous year can nominate for the next year. You just need to be a CURRENT member to vote in the CURRENT year.

        However, I’m sure they wouldn’t find it to be even a slight problem to do what you describe, since they already have everything planned out ahead of time. Why bother with the public awards when it’s clear that they really want a private group?

        It’s hilarious, because their voting system is really quite excellent. Their problem is that they don’t want new blood. They don’t want people paying attention to the “World”Con. They want to be like the Oscars.

        Not to plug my own blog, but two posts I made this year are relevant:

        https://novelninja.wordpress.com/2015/02/25/how-to-fix-the-oscars/ I wrote this about how the Oscars aren’t relevant, but if they used the Hugo voting model, they’d fix that. That is, if they opened up the voting pool to the general public, who would pay a small fee to vote, they’d have more than just an incestuous group giving awards to themselves. But of course, then the wrong people would have a say in what was actually good fiction.

        And that’s exactly what the SJWs want for the Hugo Awards. They’ve managed to intimidate everyone out while stillk keeping the appearance of democracy. They’re actually UPSET at people following the rules. https://novelninja.wordpress.com/2015/03/30/piers-plowman-and-the-hugo-awards/

      2. Sasquan had an extra 718 supporting memberships between Dec. 21 and Jan. 31; 1765 in all.

        Source:
        http://file770.com/?p=20801

        Comments indicate Loncon had 1078 supporters at the same time last year.

        If half of all the supporters buy memberships in order to nominate or vote, you end up with (1765*.5*40=) $35,300.

        Be interesting comparing with typical worldcon budgets and profits, as an exercise I’m too lazy to personally do.

          1. Googling a bit turns up:

            http://file770.com/?p=20286

            “The financial review came during a Loncon 3 post-mortem held at Smofcon 32 in December with co-chair Steve Cooper, division heads Helen Montgomery and Eemeli Aro, deputy division head Theresa (TR) Renner, and adviser Vincent Docherty. They distributed a handout at the session that summarized total income at £939,393.77 and expenses at £938,475.33, leaving an estimated surplus of £918.44 (a little less than US$1500).”

  18. Don’t be fooled, the SJWs will try to remove nomination ability from supporting members. They didn’t succeed this year, but they will be back. It may take a few years, but this challenge to their authority will not go unpunished.

  19. As a voting supporter of the Sad Puppies 2 and 3 campaign (didn’t know about the inaugural Sad Puppies), I can say it is the best money I have spent in decades. The pure entertainment from just reading the responses is wonderful but I also truly believe the authors it supports is great. Can’t wait for SP 4 and beyond! .

  20. I wouldn’t mind seeing a Social Justice Hugo for most progressive politics in SF. Why not? Some people have enough appetite for the stuff to develop good taste in which ones are good and bad. I’d very much like to see a Trad Hugo Gernsback for stories in the tradition of Hugo Gernsback (I liked reading ‘124C41+’, once), Poul Anderson, Heinlein, Niven, Zelazny. People with no appetite for this stuff will not develop any good taste for which is good or bad. An Action Hugo, so people who can tell a good fight scene from a bad.

    As it is, most Making Light people think ‘Ancillary Justice’ is a great rip-roaring Mil-SF story, with great fight scenes. They don’t know any better. Maybe it was a great Social Justice SF story? I don’t know any better. Most posters here don’t either. How could we? No appetite to build up any good taste for the subject.

      1. “Ann Leckie ‏@ann_leckie Mar 29 You’re telling me how there has to be a narrative reason for a genderless character and I am totally listening and not just rolling my eyes”

        An actual writer wrote that. Why not just have Turkish Sultans and cavemen stroll into the scene?

        1. Jaysus, May, get with the program. That’s Turkish Othered People of Power and cavepeople. 😛
          (And yeah, I agree on the essentials. If something that big is just a gimmick, don’t do it.)

          1. I don’t get these people at all. They can’t figure out the difference between a white man and an everyman. In their mind, “Doc” Smith and Asimov ideologically populated their worlds with white men and SJWs never get tired of saying so. Narrative is what it is. If you’re a minority that’s the unpleasant fact. I’m not likely to see myself in kung-fu movies if I live in Hong Kong and I’m not going to start lighting them all up as racists immune to diversity.

      2. Agreed. It was a quite decent space opera novel – dang slow, but still decent. The gender-erasing language was interesting, but not, imo, as much as the under-developed issues of post-war occupation and time-lagged culture shifts.

    1. A crit group member once told me I did better military science fiction than David Weber. Or… something sort of like that. It’s absolute pure foolishness, of course, though I got such a kick out of it that it still gives me the warm fuzzies. Realistically, what it was was… he bounced off Weber. He found my short story, for whatever reason, more accessible. Probably because it was LESS military. Nothing wrong with that. I bounce off some stuff published as military science fiction because it entirely ignores the necessary structure and organizational realities and I know it does. (My story involved a very irregular unit of volunteers because I knew my limits.)

      Which is all a long way of saying… if an audience doesn’t know better, they’re still right about what they found engaging or believable or not. I can be in awe of Weber and still understand why someone might like a story like I read once, about an alien military officer who runs off with her military officer alien lover and Does Stuff that’s sort of action-y and fighter-like to confound the enemy.

      Makes me nuts… but I understand. 🙂

      1. My favorite is when someone says David Weber does hard science fiction. *snort* It’s hard to find a part of the Honorverse physics that’s immersed in normal physics. His most common sciency element is detailing acceleration, and few people actually calculate out exactly how fast the ships are going and how they’d blow through any star system a lot faster than indicated. Just about everything else besides inertia is fictional physics. He didn’t even give a fudgy explanation for the “gravity propagates faster than light” thing until book 11.

        What he does is be consistent. Good worldbuilding, good characters. The rules are set, and he doesn’t deviate from them without explaining the new paradigm, and never uses a retcon (except for the density of starships issue, but I forgive that).

        He’s successful because he makes his worlds accessible. Not everyone likes his style, but there are definite reasons why he succeeded. He showed that military SF doesn’t need to be gritty to be realistic, doesn’t need to engage in self-parody, and doesn’t need to do a huge military-versus-civilian feud in order to show that military culture is different.

        Well, that, and he also writes good plots. Can’t forget the good plots. ^_^

        1. He also accurately plots out the battles and if you follow what orders are being given along with the time stamps the ships are indeed at the correct distance away at all times and don’t massively overshoot or undershoot. Plus if you read the side material the right amount of hits are normally scored based off the angle the ships are at missles/counter missles and all the other nonsense if you start plugging in the numbers. You don’t see hit patterns on like the 6th-7th deviation off because plot reasons. So yes it’s internally consistent and very much so.

        2. I was unaware that the Honorverse presented Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity as axiomatic to its internal physics. In point of fact, the mere existence of grav waves themselves would seem to rule out GR as indicative of the speed of gravity

      2. Honestly, Weber is the sort of MilSF I don’t much care for. I liked the early Honor books all right, but quickly got bored with the others, and I actually came close to throwing “Out of the Dark” across the room (and the only reason I didn’t was because it was my shiny new Kindle). But I also think that, as with most things, there are differing flavors of the ‘same’ genre that appeal to different folks. 🙂

        1. Re: Out of the Dark

          I enjoyed it, but really want to know 2 things…

          First… who he was drinking with, and
          Second… what were the *precise* terms of the bet.

          1. I was fine with some of the absurd plot bits in Out of the Dark (though having lived in Romania, I was a bit irked at the fact that, in the book, it was apparently nothing but fog…) What made me give up on the book was entire chapters that were nothing but gushing over the hardware specs and that had pretty much no action at all. It got very boring, very fast. (I’m fine if someone wants to include stuff like the gun porn–what I’m not fine with is the gun porn taking the place of actual plot action.) And all of the characters sounded exactly the same–to the point that I had to go back and check frequently trying to figure out who the heck’s head we were in this time.

            But I get that what bugs the life out of me doesn’t bother other folks. My brain twin, for example, still gives me the eyeball if I start ranting about how much I hated Out of the Dark. (But then, I can’t fathom why I can’t get her to enjoy Georgette Heyer, so there you go.)

          2. Would have worked better as a short story. Getting to the punchline faster would have made it much more palatable.

          3. Actually, I knew about the vampire going in. That’s why I picked it up, even though I wasn’t a big Weber fan.

            I think it would have worked far better if it had been a short story too–and Vlad should have been the protagonist and POV character, not a million-and-one entirely identical/interchangeable nobodies. I’d love to see a vampire vs. aliens…but only if it’s done well and interestingly, and that one, sadly, was not.

            (But as prolific as Weber is, the man is surely allowed a stinker or two in his repertoir!)

          4. As I recall, “Out of the Dark” first appeared in novella form, in an anthology edited by George R.R. Martin (“Warriors?”). I’ve read that version as well as the novel-length one, and I thought the story worked much better as a novella. For certain values of “work.”

            @Synova: I dunno who Weber was drinking with, but I suspect the bet was something along the lines of “Wanna bet I can turn ‘Plan Nine From Outer Space” into a bestselling novel, based on my name alone?”

            😛

          5. Last I talked with DW he said TOR wants a sequel. Happily it’s way down on his list. Also I believe other books have moved ahead of it. Plus the Hell’s Gate Book series is starting back up with a different co-author Joelle Presby !!!

          6. @Jordan: I thought the novel was cheesy fun, but I did regret spending the money to get it in hardcover rather than waiting for the paperback.

            OTOH, you’d better believe I gladly spend the extra scratch to get all the “Safehold” and Honorverse novels in hardcover. Even if (*gack!*) the Safehold books are edited by Patrick Nielsen-Hayden and published by Tor…

          7. “Would have worked better as a short story. Getting to the punchline faster would have made it much more palatable.”

            It was originally a novella. TOR asked him to expand it.

  21. I like the part about ‘why are all these strange people coming here. It’s so suspicious they must be in the know’ when her whole post was about how she’s nervous because she’s in the know..

    Also, it’s called a link. This is how the internet works. It’s not suspicious or complicated.

  22. So, will you be adding “I Hate Straw Larry Too,” t-shirts to your Cafepress store? I want one.

    1. A big, bald, bearded scarecrow-like stick figure or something?

      With a nasty frown, of course.

      1. I keep imagining Straw Larry much resembling a Cactuar or a cartoon cactus though.

        (Let’s see if I can doodle that, the next time I am able to sit at my Cintiq.)

        1. Oh great, now I’ve got an image of TNH in a chainmail bikini with Cloud’s sword surrounded by dead Cactaur-Larrys and the victory music playing in the background stuck in my head. I’ll never be able to play FF7 again.

      2. We’ve had bearded Spock, so we’d need beardfree Straw Larry with Thor-like locks photoshopped in for good measure.

  23. “fannish wrath”

    My instant mental picture was a bunch of ankle-circling yapping Chihuahua’s and Pekinese’s.

    Someone do up a meme-poster for that.

  24. “Cora Buhlert retweeted Seanan McGuire @seananmcguire · 14h 14 hours ago Hey hey hey it’s the ToC for QUEERS DESTROY SCIENCE FICTION: http://www.destroysf.com/queers-destroy-science-fiction-original-fiction-lineup/ …”

    Hey, hey, hey. Fuck off.

    Any gay Orwell stuff? #SegregationIsDiversity

    “MichaelDamianThomas @michaeldthomas · 17h 17 hours ago So it meant something very important when the marginalized creators made it onto the Hugo ballot and WON. This is why they freaked out.”

    Bullshit. Prove it instead of mindreading us into a KKK. That scare quotes bullshit is what created Sad Puppies, not fear of a black planet.

  25. Sad Puppies aren’t *real* nominations? The arrogance of these folks is absolutely astonishing, even after all this time. Holy crap? Can you imagine how they’d respond if WE said that?

    1. But we’d like to know exactly why she was sacked? Was it cyberstalking, as some have claimed? Or something else?

  26. Secret Master of Fandom – old school term, variously used to describe the recurring pool of volunteers at well known cons or the group of fen who (try to) establish some cultural homogeneity in SFF (or Worldcon, more narrowly).

    There is some overlap, but the two populations are not the same.

    1. Ah. Thank you.

      EDIT: Really? I can’t just say, “Thank you” to a poster who answered my question without the comment being flagged? There may be an overactive spam filter here…

      1. We changed servers last week and it has been kind of weird, but I’ve got nothing from you stuck in spam.

        1. I guess it didn’t make it as far as the filter. The original message was just the first line, which I was informed was too short. Sticking my whining little edit on there made it long enough to get posted.

          Not sure if the “no short messages” is intentional on your part or not; if so, I’ll just be more wordy and effusive in my future thanks.

          1. Here’s the thing- the old version of the site was running a whole bunch of plugins that are no longer supported or even available anymore. So we had to find the closest matches we could. 12 hours of no spam filter was bad enough for the ILOH that we kinda had to use what we could. If anyone who knows WP has some suggestions on better spam filters, let me know….

  27. Well Holy shit. Even without the fisking in place, I could literally *taste* the dripping elitism pouring off every one of those paragraphs. EVERY. ONE.

    All three of those ‘concerns’ about the SP campaign is basically just “the wrong people going about the nomination process the wrong way (i.e. not getting approval from the central clique) and that’s bad.”

    I wouldn’t be able to read through this snobbery without Larry’s commentary to add levity and for that I am thankful.

    1. The overweening arrogance is remarkable. They usually have this woman named Abi doing the monitoring of comments and you’d think she was Queen Elizabeth. I guess they have fun wielding power over anyone who comes there. Kinda like Scalzi and his sheep, who never look up. I mean, how far down in the world are you to look up to Scalzi and the Haydens? A frickin’ 10 yr. old Boy Scout has more value and common sense.

      1. Abi is Abi Sutherland.

        (Not to be confused with Ariel Cinii, whose fannish name used to be Abii Cinii, among many other iterations.)

  28. Current contents of the Making List post that you linked to:

    I’ve been keeping an ear on the SF community’s gossip, and I think the subject of this year’s Hugo nominations is about to explode.

    Let me make this clear: my apprehensions are not based on insider information. I’m just correlating bits of gossip. It may help that I’ve been a member of the SF community for decades.

    If the subject does blow up, I may write about it in this space. In any event, watch that space.

    Hope we got screen captures.

  29. Argh, couldn’t resist posting over there when I read the brainstorming session on how to manipulate votes to exclude people they don’t agree with. The nominations haven’t even been officially announced and there is already a discussion about throwing out ballots that match the SP slate, or weighting ballots that don’t more heavily. Hypocrisy pushes my buttons almost as much as condescension.

    1. So, because people got results that they didn’t like, they’re going to destroy the integrity of the award? Wow, some animals *are* more equal than others…

    2. That, of course, would totally violate their charter and the posted voting rules. It MIGHT be legally-actionable, with anyone who had paid membership dues under the old rules having standing to sue.

  30. Between this and a possible Crazy Left boycott of GenCon (You mean all of you radical types don’t want to come to Indiana and scold us on wrongfun? Awesome!), things are looking up for fandom.

  31. Mr Correia, just as a counter to Ms. Haden’s quote: it may not have been a Hugo, but I was honored to have you give me an award. (On behalf of Baen books, sure, but you handed it over and that counts for… something).

    1. Congratulations. 🙂

      And also… you got to meet Larry Correia!!!!! I’ll admit that was about the biggest reason I entered the contest. 🙂

  32. “2009’s winner was sci fi author John Scalzi’s Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded: A Decade of Whatever”

    For extra hypocrisy points, note that the current publisher of this book is…Tor.

    It was originally published by a small press, but a quick look at Amazon will show that it’s now a Tor property.

  33. So, the basically, the message of the SJW/CHORF’s to people like me is “You suck and we hate you”.

    Only, unlike the more famous purveyors of that attitude, they don’t actually produce anything I would actually pay money to own.

  34. I’m hugely enjoying the caterwauling, sturm und drang by the SJWs over the Sad Puppies campaigns. I just wish I’d laid in more popcorn and whiskey, to properly enjoy the show.

    That said…I’m all out of fucks to give about the Hugo. Let it burn. Let the Nielsen-Haydens and their ilk run it into the ground.

    Decades ago, when Henry Block – founder of H&R Block – was barred from the best country clubs in Kansas City because of his Jewishness, he went and built the best country club in town…and all the people who snubbed him ended up begging to join.

    That’s what we ought to do with the Hugos. After all, Saint Teresa said it herself: The Hugos are for the increasingly-cliquish, SJW-dominated Worldcon; not for “all the fans.”

    So perhaps it’s time to create an award to compete with the Hugos that truly is for all the fans, not just the narrow segment of Puritanical, hysterical ninnies like the Nielsen-Haydens and the Scalzis. Maybe that way the popular (and disdained precisely because of their popularity) authors like David Weber and Robert Jordan will finally get their due…and the SJWs will get a well-deserved thumb in their eye.

    In the meantime, I’ll keep voting with my pocketbook.

    1. I agree, and make it an intersectional gender feminist-free zone. That right there is 100% of the problem.

      We’ve always had personality and political conflicts, but their hate speech is beyond the bounds of civilized behavior.

  35. After reading the first MHI book, I have been inspired and have decided to try my hand at a new interest and possibly new career. I plan to start small to see if I have an affinity and aptitude for the required work. Maybe I could get my feet wet by focusing initially on goblins or gremlins or something similar.

    Some questions:

    Do I need to register with the government first and get a license or something, or can I just show up at the White House with a bag full of goblin heads?

    Is there a listing of all of the government bounties on the various creatures?

    What kind of income can I expect in the first year?

    Will I need to get any special shots?

    Are silver bullets tax-deductible?

    What kind of education and experience does MHI look for? Would it help my prospects to get a Master’s degree in Folklore and Mythology?

    I can’t wait to get started! Thanks!

    1. Licensing is not necessary, but you do need permits for your equipment. Also, if you show up at the White House, you’ll probably meet Franks eventually. He’s not a people person. Delay that meeting.

      There is a partial list in the MHI Employee Handbook. You can purchase your own copy here: http://www.amazon.com/Monster-International-Employee-Handbook-Roleplaying/dp/1583661468

      Your expected income is one of three things. 1) Filthy emmereffer, 2) a nice severance check after you wash out in training or on your first mission, or 3) awesome death benefits for your dependents and next-of-kin.

      Silver bullets are only tax-deductible as a business expense. We recommend you get them through MHI rather than argue with the IRS.

      Qualifications for HMI employment are as follows. 1) Be in the know. 2) Be able to handle the forces of evil and darkness coming to eat you and all you hold dear while thinking clearly and nonlinearly. Folklore and mythology buffs tend to have to be retrained significantly, so don’t lean on that unless you’re learning from someone else in the know.

      Welcome to the happy face.

    2. Disclaimer: the following are my own opinions from spending too much time thinking about MHI. I’m not Larry.

      Start big. The PUFF for goblins will barely cover travel expenses across town. McDonald’s pays better than Goblin PUFF.

      You’ll need a license first. The weaponry required for monster hunting often falls in the Type III category, and local constabulary often takes a dim view of its use within city limits.

      Also, you’ll need to be briefed on the entire “keep your mouth shut” protocols, or Agent Franks might drop by.

      You can expect to lose your starting capital, life and sanity the first year. There are sound capitalistic reasons for the high PUFF bounties. Re-read Monster Hunter Alpha for insights on why monster hunting on a shoestring has drawbacks.

      You’ll need general immune boosters. You do NOT want to know what’s in an animated corpse’s bodily fluids that will invariably end up drenching you. Take your vitamins.

      Yes, the silver bullets are fully tax deductible as a business expense. The silver you dig out of the monster’s bodies should simply be recast into more bullets to save paperwork. The rare body parts you sell to Chinese pharmacies need to be reported. MCB may not get PUFF, but they do get promotions for turning monster hunters to the IRS for tax evasion.

      Experience: MHI looks for people who survive monster encounters and want to take the fight back to them. Yes, the MS will help. Worthwhile education always helps. You might want to try to earn some recognition as a competitive shooter…

      Would Owen and Harbinger be happy to see you standing behind Julie with a shotgun in the middle of a monster fight? If yes, you’re probably in. If not… become that person.

  36. This comment from Making Light takes the all the cake there is:

    “#873 ::: Tired_of_Modern_Geekdom ::: (view all by) ::: March 31, 2015, 09:20 PM:

    It’s time to say it.

    Sci-Fi, along with every other geek past-time these days, has been hopelessly politicized by culture warriors. Typically reactionary culture warriors who raise a stink at the slightest percieved offense.

    And they are ALL AMERICAN.

    This is an American issue. It’s like a drinking problem. And none of you are able to keep it out of Science Fiction or the Hugos. You are throwing up all over the floor and the rest of us are getting splattered every time we go near you.

    The solution is simple: If you’re American — Don’t vote. And don’t come. You can’t do it impartially, you won’t, and you will only raise a howling fit no matter what way the awards go.

    Just stay at home this years. Get off the internet for a few months. And leave the rest of us alone.”

      1. Well, that would ban the vast majority of SJWs. So at least we can look forwards to their outrage over *that*.

        “But we’re the GOOD Americans!”

    1. Empress Teresa disemvowelled Tired_of_Modern_Geekdom. They were an idiot, but that kind of heavy-handed censorship is unbecoming.

    2. Tho I’d like to point out that a lot of this claptwaddle originated in Europe, and is still being spewed by some Europeans. Clearly it’s a contagious disorder.

      1. He might be from the UK, but is generally thought of over here by most writers and editors I know as a bit of a bellend.

        Do we have to take the blame for him?

        1. A bellend? You give him credit. We think of him as a horse’s *ss.
          As for the blame, blame the vile progs. We do.

          1. Just for the record
            Bellend:
            The idiot in your group you try to stick in the corner for as long as possible and just nod at their random statements because they aren’t worth more than a grunt to make them think you’ve paid attention.
            Is the member of the group most likely to be left behind in case of bear attack and will almost always protest its not their round.

      1. Yep. Spokane, on the East side of the state of Washington, which makes it more a part of America than if it were on the Trans-Cascadian end.

        I can’t help but recall Hoyt’s recent post about how Americans are the only ones who organize things like WorldCon. If that is an accurate assessment, then without Americans there wouldn’t be a WorldCon for these people to complain about Americans participating in.

        1. And SJWs are a nuisance to English fans and writers too. I corresponded with a few of them last year during LonCon.

    3. That’s funny. On Brad’s blog I left a list of non-American asshats who drive this hysteria and was surprisingly called a racist for my trouble. But then, when aren’t we racist. In intersectional theory, I was a privileged racist the day I was born.

  37. Question: after reading all 800+ entries at the site linked, it looks as though we can still get a supporting membership and vote for the final winners-is that correct? Because, frankly, reading the self-involved and privileged comments is really starting to aggravate me. While I didn’t join in time to nominate anyone, can I still vote and receive my complimentary bottle of SJW tears?

    1. Indeed you can! In fact, we encourage it! 😀 Not only do we want the vote totals to skyrocket (hopefully in favor of good books, but either way), it will also bring in more money to WorldCon.

      Why is that a good thing? Why should we throw money at a Social Fiction Warrior-dominated convention? Because capitalism, that’s why. The more money they bring in from Sad Puppies (no matter who the voter actually backs), the more incentive they have to keep things open and fair, whatever the SFWs scream.

      Here’s the link: https://sasquan.swoc.us/sasquan/reg.php

      1. Thank you! I go to crush my enemies, see them driven before me, and to hear the lamentations of their wom…uhm, cis-wom…, oh the heck with it! Whichever of their 23 genders does the lamenting!

      2. Thank you for the link! I did not realize that I could still vote, so… another vote to prevent a puppy from being sad.

      3. Yes, thank you also! I’ll make a blog post specifically for informing that if folks want to vote for the Hugos and their favorite work is up there they can definitely still do it.

        Am I reading that right though? At the very top it says:

        Membership Sale April 2 (12:01 AM Pacific) to April 6 (11:59 AM Pacific)

        So there’s only this week to register? O_O

        1. It’s a reduced rate sale for attending memberships. Supporting memberships seem to be unaffected.

  38. > This grows out of wondering why so many Sad Puppies are suddenly out and about on forums they don’t normally frequent, belatedly spreading this new and not very believable line about how the whole Sad Puppy thing is motivated by love, rather than spite and resentment. They sure haven’t felt the need to spread this line before now. Neither have they put a lot of effort into hiding the spite and resentment.

    I think this was in part due to my showing up there. What Teresa doesn’t realize is that I have been friends with Brad for years and I often come to his defense on Facebook. I sometimes follow him to other sites, too, which is what happened the other day.

    I must say I was a bit disappointed with my reception. I think of John and I as fellow Tor authors, but if…

    Well, I’m not going to say anything bad about them except that a less generous person might have found the reception I received quite insulting.

      1. I saw that and they seemed to find that their lack of professionalism quite okay.

        I noticed this too, actually in a different forum where Teacup Tempest was basically insulting to anyone who dared even mildly disagree. I noticed that a number of people who would otherwise agree with her in that forum said that they found it very off-putting.

  39. From Twitter:

    “DamienAWalters · 4h4 hours ago
    @NMamatas @kyliu99 The Sad Puppies have really gone off the deep end, haven’t they? Message fic is ok only if it’s a msg they agree with?”

    PLEASE NOTE: This is a *different* Damien Walter than the one who’s been hounding us the past year. Yes, we’ve got BOTH Damiens after us now! 🙂

    1. Not to pull an SJW/SFW stunt and judge by the cover, but . . . Damien Walters looks like he/she came out of a Central Casting box marked “Transvestite, Stereotypical.” I’m sure he/she is a very nice person when he/she isn’t surrounded by badthinkers, though.

      1. Well, to be fair, they were getting info from Nick Mamatas, who is in the running to be this year’s new Damien.

        1. Mamatas and Walter have one thing in common: they each thought they were the new wunderkids who were going to tear up SFF and now they’ve gotten to the age where they realize that’s never going to happen.

          When Mamatas is trying to ride the coattails of a movie he had nothing to do with you know he is desperate for credibility.

          1. I think, honestly, that’s why they’re shouting so hard. A lot of the SJWs are women ten years younger than I who were brought into the field along with all the children of boomers and were told they were the “next big thing”. (And most of them, if writing, were writing unremarkable romancy stuff.)
            Now they’re hitting forty, most of them never married, almost all of them childless, and the waters haven’t parted and no heavenly choir has sung. They’re mad and it has to be someone’s fault.
            It can’t be the fault of those who brought them in and treated them like they were special when they weren’t, so it must be those “wrongthinkers” and “conservatives” that have so much power in the industry.
            This is behind idiocy like the all-female Hugo and the even more idiotic nomination of “If you were a dinosaur, my love” something I will NEVER let them live down, as I wrote better and more coherently than that at 13, and so did most people.
            I shall necklace them with that bathos-soaked piece of cr*p as long as I can type.

          2. I think it’s true some of them get used as poster children and then dumped. What happened to Jemisin and Ahmed? Well they got Wong and Chu now. A couple years down the road it’ll be someone else, all of them for the wrong reasons. Would anyone lay bets on the future careers of Leckie and Hurley? Exactly how much blood can you squeeze from straight white men to prop up your unremarkable novels? No matter how much they fantasize, no one wants to read genderless Star Wars. That fit doesn’t even make any sense, although it makes perfect sense to them. It usually does to fanatic obsessives.

            Worse, when they act like Kate Hepburn on the set of the African Queen where she drove them nuts saying everything is “marvelous,” they don’t get to reflect and grow as authors. Why would they? They’re getting Hugo and Nebula nods right out of the gate for skin and gender. The gay Wong’s Nebula nominated story this year was actually written at Clarion, presumably because she’s a three-fer, like AAA steak. The problem is it’s just ground hamburger. The only hope the SFWA has is those self-pub authors at Amazon are dumb enough to join.

            Outside the bubble Leckie lives in, The Martian got 30,000 votes to Leckie’s 3,000. Leckie’s novel is unprecedented in its awards. Two things are going to destroy these people: epub and the sick ideology they’ve adopted for their very own. It’s getting increasing attention and it’s a safe bet the Syfy Channel and Avatar tie-ins don’t want to call its consumers white privileged racists. These people are complete no-shows at Amazon because there is no there, there. There are probably literally 5 to 10,000 SFF novels as good as the best hardcore SJW authors and SJWs are finding there’s not much for them outside their bizarre 50 years too late march from Selma to Montgomery.

            I’m not surprised they despise a meritocracy. Within one, they sink without a trace.

      1. If the message is, “don’t mouth off to archangels,” yeah, it’s message fic.

        Or maybe it’s “Demons don’t break holy swords, people do.”

        Or maybe it’s, “George Lucas is the Paraclete.”

        1. No, don’t you realize? It’s REALLY a disguised Christian allegory. That’s why Butcher sometimes occasionally every so often uses Catholic characters who are (gasp!) decent human beings.

        2. I think the message may be about the characters of folks who own unsual dogs.

          …I don’t wanna spoil it for anyone who hasn’t read the book. That was one of my favorite scenes in the whole thing. Utterly loved it.

          1. Oh, that chapter was . . . yes. Anyone who has read it and has a heart knows it to be true. Anyone who hasn’t read it deserves to enter that scene completely cold.

    2. I have come to disagree with Larry Correia, Sara Hoyt, et. al, that the important thing is “story first”. I see nothing wrong with writing message fiction, and checking the right boxes, and so forth, and even getting awards for the fiction…if the fiction is engaging.

      I have been in the process of reading Heinlein (sort-of for the first time), starting with his juveniles. I have the impression that if he were alive to write the most stereotypical, cliched, Social Justice message fic, it would probably be pretty engaging.

      The problem isn’t so much “message before story” as it is “message before good writing”. The common complaint from people trying to read the Hugos is that it’s not all that great (and in the case of “If You Were A Dinosaur My Love”, it’s not even clear that it’s science fiction…)

      But, yeah, I’m sure Larry and Sarah would say that I’m in “violent agreement” with them.

  40. I was amused, in a kind way, by one fellow who thought Sad Puppies was a mockery term that the Making Light crowd called the opposition. He was confused that Brad and I were using it, too.

    1. They are shockingly ill-informed. Some of them thought that last year was Sad Puppies 1. Or that Larry really wants a Hugo badly. 😉

      1. They STILL think that. They can be shown the exact spot where Larry refutes it and they still won’t believe because Straw Larry is more real to them than Larry Correia.

        The sad thing is, this really reveals far more of how they think and operate than they realize. The sheer amount of projection in their accusations is staggering.

  41. The seem appropriate with regards to being told who a real science fiction fan is.

    “Let us think the unthinkable, let us do the undoable, let us prepare to grapple with the ineffable itself, and see if we may not eff it after all.” — DirkGently’s Holistic Detective Agency

  42. The comment at Making Light that has stayed with me was one person who, quite seriously, could not understand how, after being told that SP2 made people feel uncomfortable and wasn’t strictly fair, the same folks could do it again?

    Didn’t they know that folks objected?

    I have tried to mentally frame an answer to this a few times…a kind answer, this person was serious…but so far, I’ve failed.

    1. Simple, quote me, or use me as an example.

      Legalizing marijuana makes me feel uncomfortable.

      Why not concede to me?

      If someone already agrees, why not make marijuana a capital felony?

      Emotional reactions are easy to find or fake. Hence with any great amount of people, keeping a life or society in compliance with same is unduly burdensome.

      This is why other means, easier to test and more difficult to create, are preferable.

    2. I’ll bet that if you told him that something HE said had made YOU feel uncomfortable and offended, and you wanted him to stop..,. he would be even more confused. Offense is a one-way street.

  43. Well, all of this makes me happy. : )

    Tweeted important bits to the #GamerGate contingent.

    Cheers from another front in the war against the censors and scolds.

      1. And they’ll shriek now about how that’s why they’ll punish Jim Butcher by destroying his career because he won’t disassociate his book from SP’s slate / telling us we’re not allowed to like it so much we aren’t allowed to nominate it for a Hugo or vote for it.

  44. If SP is supposed to notify all their prospective nominees, why shouldn’t that be required of everyone who nominates?? It’s not like there aren’t other campaigns (overt or not) now and again.

    I read Brad’s initial comment on ML that drew such ire, and I can’t see how it’s offensive even if I squint. Yet outright name-calling elsewhere in the thread is allowed??

    And tho personally I could give a hoot about the Hugos (and generally regard them as a warning label for boring stuff) seems to me that excluding any nominee on any basis other than “read it, wasn’t impressed” is contrary to the letter and spirit of the award. Doesn’t seem to bother some of ML’s commenters, tho, who said flat out that if it was a SP nominee, they’d not vote for it. No mention of whether its qualities as SF/F are even considered…

          1. Ah. I am enlightened. Double standards, doubleplusgood — I should have seen the relationship!!

  45. I remember back in 1992, when I was at the age where I eagerly devoured -any- fantasy or sf story I could get my hands on.

    I came across my first message fic.

    Not a story that included a message as a natural, organic part of the plot and characters. Oh no.

    I can’t recall the author. I can’t recall the title. I couldn’t tell you ANY of the character names. But the MESSAGE was pounded relentlessly down onto each and every page, pulverizing anything and everything else.

    The plot was a colony ship was in deep space, on its way to a new world. The ship was captained by an atheist biracial woman in a polyandrous relationship. Why do I remember this? Because every time the character was on the page, the author made sure we knew this. Every time the character spoke, they talked about how people who believe in God stink, how the pigmentation of their skin determines and defines everything about them, and how even though her two husbands aren’t attracted to each other, they NEED to make out with each other for her edification. Why? Because she knows them better than they do, and anyway, heterosexuality is just a tolerated nuisance.

    Oh, and the big conflict? Somewhere on the colony ship is a secret band of EVIL CHRISTIANS who want to (dramatic music sting) PEACEFULLY DISTRIBUTE CHRISTIAN LITERATURE!!!!

    …obviously, this is a threat to everyone on board.

    The one Evil Christian who gets speaking lines actually didn’t seem like such a bad guy. But he ended up getting killed anyway.

    After killing him, the captain reiterates: Had to be done. People who believe in God stink. The traditional family unit sucks. The colony is now free to begin a Utopia on the new world. The end.

    **************************************************

    Don’t get me wrong. When I was a kid in the 80s and 90s, I already knew that SF and Fantasy stuff was 700% more likely to include characters of all types than ANY other kind of story. The genres embraced the different and the myriad flavors of life.

    …but this was the first one I read where the message was “By the way, YOUR flavor is EVIL EVIL EVIL. Because it JUST IS, that’s why!”

    And to top it off, it was boring as hell.

    That’s the real reason I support Sad Puppies. Anything that makes sure readers of now and future times have plenty of alternatives to the above NEEDS full support.

    1. The plot was a colony ship was in deep space, on its way to a new world…. Somewhere on the colony ship is a secret band of EVIL CHRISTIANS who want to (dramatic music sting) PEACEFULLY DISTRIBUTE CHRISTIAN LITERATURE!!!!

      You know, one would think, given the amount of planning required for such a venture, that someone would have screened for that beforehand.

    2. Wow… where did you find that?

      Similar things that I remember were a bit more subtle. Though I definitely remember a strong strain of “we put all that irrationality behind us” in books back when.

      (Pern, for example, was a deliberately atheist colony… it just wasn’t gone on about *forever* and it might even have been a retcon to explain why Pern didn’t have any remnants of current religions.)

      1. And of course they’re ignoring that religions form spontaneously among humans. The “Holy corner” of Russian homes became the “Red corner.”
        I sometimes wonder if these people are all autistic spectrum and have never met real humans. I.e. if their ability to intuit how other people think and feel is responsible for their utterly unbelievable human-like constructs. (Not insulting anyone in the spectrum. Some of us make that leap though, being aware we’re not QUITE normal.)

      2. Y’know, I never quite could put my finger on it, but I think that’s one of the things that bugged me about the Pern books. (Which I still have a soft spot for, but going back to read the first few makes me want to slap all the characters for being idiots.) Because like Sarah Hoyt said: religions form spontaneously among humans. It’s one of those things that seems to be almost hardwired into us. (Heck, the atheists I know–particularly the reasonable, not-frothing-at-the-mouth ones–had to work at it as much as anyone of any other faith.)

        1. I actually found it different with Pern. Not that it wasn’t odd, but that it didn’t come across like message fic. Her stated reason was that she didn’t want to have religion be a divisive plot element. Now, I disagree that the presence of religion is necessarily divisive, and it’s odd to me that completely axing it would be the easier and more natural course than simply having it in there and not having conflict. However, I have no reason to disbelieve her.

          And, to be honest, adding religion wouldn’t really have added to the plot. I think it would have made for more natural worldbuilding, but the plots themselves were fine as-is. I think the only possible thing that would have been different was the extramarital sex (both hetero and homo, though the latter was just mentioned with background characters that amounted to walking scenery). Typically, religions frown on that. Even so, I didn’t find anything wrong about it other than the fact that I had to suspend disbelief a little more than just for intelligent genetically-engineered giant dragons.

          Granted, I was a liberal Catholic at the time and my concept of marriage was pretty fluid, but I still don’t think it’s the same as saying “all religion is bad, therefore we shall bash it every other chapter.”

          1. I think we need to distinguish between “What if?” and “This SHALL BE!!!” in sf.

            Someone wants to do a story in which there’s a communist society in the future, non-tyrannical and prosperous? Fine with me. Someone writes that all ‘first contact’ stories have to be peaceful, because all societies that reach the level of technology that allows for starflight will necessarily have evolved to communism? That’s a load of hogwash (though to be fair, the author probably had to write that, as he was living in the late USSR. [OOH! I just love to type “late USSR”! OOH!]).

            It’s “speculative” fiction, people, so don’t tell me that you know what the future is going to be, of necessity. And especially don’t tell me that when you’re positing a future that’s a complete break with the past, like this ‘the future is queer’ stuff. (Apparently, they never heard of evolution … )

          2. I don’t actually have a problem with Pern and the way it was done. I enjoyed it. I was just quibbling on a detail of world building. It’s one of those “writing nerd” things.

          3. If she was saying it would have got in the way to mention it and not deal with it that makes sense. Both take up words and interfere with the story’s structure and narrative.

            The first two were originally short stories and were pretty tightly scripted. They didn’t have room for that sort of scope. I thought they were both great, particularly “Weyr Search,” which was a game-changing story.

        2. Sara,

          It always struck me that religion DID form spontaneously among the Pern colonists. They may have been atheists in Dragonsdawn, but by the time of Dragonflight, for all intents and purposes, they worshiped the dragons.

      3. Synova: It was in my high school library, though I can’t for the life of me recall anymore details. Blocked it out, perhaps.

        On the other hand, I’m struggling to remember one book that started out like a proto-SJW message fic (All women on Earth relegate men to living in Stone Age conditions out in the wilderness while they form a super science Utopia)….only for the women to eventually realize their “paradise” has a monstrous cost.

        (And the book was written by a woman, though I’m blanking on the name. I seem to remember her as one of those mid-listers who write a bunch of stuff for a few years, then vanish into the mist.)

        1. The second could be Motherlines by Suzy Charnas. I might have read it a long time ago, so I’m not sure. Suzy is awesome, though… from a time back when feminists protested real unfairness and didn’t hate men, instead of making up things to be aggrieved over and playing never ending victim. Different politics from mine, but always thoughtful.

        2. I think that was “The Gate To Women’s Country”. Could be wrong.

          (The Charnas Motherlines series, mentioned below, is an exceptional work. (The ‘women in a science utopia’ plot thread doesn’t fit what you were asking after, I don’t think.) You need to go through all four books to get to “The Conqueror’s Child”, which imo brilliantly deals with the aftermath of righteous revolution in a way that I have so rarely seen.)

      4. According to one of the essays in _Dragonwriter_, McCaffrey had a very bad experience with religious organizations at some point early in her life and eschewed them from then on. But she did not have any problem with people IRL who were devout but didn’t preach at her. I suspect the scene in Dragons Dawn was retconed to answer all the people at Cons who asked about the lack of religion.

    1. Lightspeed magazine can say straight out they’re not reviewing me because I’m a straight white male and lay out the unwelcome mat in segregated anthologies about Queers and Women destroying SF for the same reason. But if I don’t want to bake them a cake for the same reasons, I’m a bigot. This is the merry-go-round of identity addiction that always ensures the straight white male in pinned in place like a bug. There is no moral ethos in play, only skin and sex in its place. Live by the sword, die by the sword, so just suck on it. If you don’t want to use a strike zone in baseball, don’t be surprised no game is played or that no one wants to play with cheaters.

  46. “I do love how when we actually quote them, that’s not what they meant, but then they fabricate bogus scare quotes for me, then that’s totally what I really meant.”

    “Forget what he said, we all know what he really meant, right?” is one of the most dishonest and effective rhetorical tactics in existence because it works not only to invalidate your opponents’ arguments but excuse any errors or apparent consistencies in your own. As always, Screwtape the Devil nails the tactic:

    “In civilised life domestic hatred usually expresses itself by saying things which would appear quite harmless on paper (the words are not offensive) but in such a voice, or at such a moment, that they are not far short of a blow in the face. To keep this game up you and Glubose must see to it that each of these two fools has a sort of double standard. Your patient must demand that all his own utterances are to be taken at their face value and judged simply on the actual words, while at the same time judging all his mother’s utterances with the fullest and most oversensitive interpretation of the tone and the context and the suspected intention. She must be encouraged to do the same to him. Hence from every quarrel they can both go away convinced, or very nearly convinced, that they are quite innocent. …Once this habit is well established you have the delightful situation of a human saying things with the express purpose of offending and yet having a grievance when offence is taken.”

    1. A wise man, C.S. Lewis… (And of course, much reviled by the SJW/SFW crowd for being white, male, religious and ‘racist’. )

      1. Another good bit from the Screwtape Letters is along the lines of the demon having his human think “Oh, if I ever met someone of an exotic minority, what an AMAZING true-friend to them I would be,”

        ….while at the same time subtly teaching them to hate and revile the non-exotic people living and working right next door. Sound familiar?

  47. Lightspeed magazine can say straight out they’re not reviewing me because I’m a straight white male and lay out the unwelcome mat in segregated anthologies about Queers and Women destroying SF for the same reason. But if I don’t want to bake them a cake for the same reasons, I’m a bigot. This is the merry-go-round of identity addiction that always ensures the straight white male in pinned in place like a bug. There is no moral ethos in play, only skin and sex in its place. Live by the sword, die by the sword, so just suck on it. If you don’t want to use a strike zone in baseball, don’t be surprised no game is played or that no one wants to play with cheaters.

  48. “M J Locke retweeted Joyce Chng (JDamask) @jolantru · 2h 2 hours ago Since I am more rested, I might just tackle the #POCUFwriters issues, regarding POC outside the US’s dominant narrative.”

    Or you could just go back to sleep since I don’t give a damn about your racist bullshit.

    “Steven Gould retweeted Arthur Chu @arthur_affect · Mar 15 Why do ppl think SJWs are against ‘white culture’? Being against ‘whiteness’ is abt being against the erasure of cultures *within* whiteness”

    I love how racists justify their racism.

    It’s all about the rocket ships. Anyway, thanks for confirming what I already knew about SJWs. Please tell us how this doesn’t get into awards nominations.

    1. James May, on April 1, 2015 at 3:13 pm said:
      “M J Locke retweeted Joyce Chng (JDamask) @jolantru · 2h 2 hours ago Since I am more rested, I might just tackle the #POCUFwriters issues, regarding POC outside the US’s dominant narrative.”

      Notice that word “narritive”? Meaning “story”? Meaning “fiction”?

      The dominant REALITY is that a fair-sized majority of the U.S. is descended from caucasoid Europeans, and most of the “People of Color” have some caucasoid European ancestry too.

      Leftism has always been a hatred of whatever reality exists, and an intent to destroy said reality.

  49. And of course, inevitably:

    “damiengwalter · 4h4 hours ago  Chirayinkil, Kerala
    Zero point arguing with Sad Puppies about their intentions. The OUTCOME of their campaign is to enforce an all white, all male SF field.”

    Well then they “failed” from start, getting Larry in last year and (possibly) several women this year.

    1. Damien should lie about me in the Guardian again. Every time he does that we pick up another hundred Sad Puppies voters.

        1. Likely. Expect similar slurs to GG. Oh, and please, pretty please, let it be as coordinated and inept as the GameJournoPros one.

        1. I get the feeling that his analysis will be more insightful to understanding Damien than to understanding the works in question.

          1. Someone needs to ask Damian why he feels it ethical to erase women like Kary English and Megan Grey.

          2. This people are insane. Lots of us really liked Meghan’s story. She might be a Sikh from Chile but why would I care? SJWs seem to really believe that if I found that out I’d crinkle my nose up, frown and disavow liking the story.

            OH NO NOT A SIKH FROM CHILE!!!!!! THAT CHANGES EVERYTHING!!!

            SJWs have no proof whatsoever we even care about such things and yet state we do in post after comment after Tweet; never quotes. On the other hand they prove in quote after quote, anthology after anthology and in physical spaces and reading lists they actually do determine all of that by race and sex. How do you get so dumb you fly this flag of anti-racism in a community where you are the only ideological racist?

            This cult is a true Wrong-Way Corrigan. Somehow Scalzi is a liberal. Back in the day, a guy who’d censor comments in his own space, boycott conventions which don’t have feminist approved harassment policies and give off with smug preening moralizing was called a redneck rockhead conservative.

            On Brad’s blog I showed a stunning truth about these people: across 6 decades of old school SFF there are not five racial male supremacist authors who share a common ideology that can match last year’s 5 Nebula winners, who are a hive-mind of intersectionalism and racial and sexual supremacy. You can read their non-fiction so-called “political” remarks and they are so similar in theme you can’t tell them apart. All 5 light up white men as the source of all the woes in SFF and use the same distinct bizarre intersectional lingo to do so.

    2. Note the subtext here: Voting for SF awards based solely on readability will “enforce an all white, all male SF”… which must mean that, in Damien’s mind, only whites can write stuff people WANT to read; fandom must be FORCED to read nonwhite/nonmale/nonstraight authors because they’re just not good enough to be read otherwise.

      Quite the display of unconscious bigotry from Damien.
      Also notice that he left out “nonstraight”. Homophobe.

    3. The intention of NHL rules are irrelevant, the outcome is to enforce an all white, all male field.

      The intention of childcare rules is irrelevant, the outcome is to enforce a (nearly) all-female field.

      The intention of deep-sea welding rules are irrelevant, the outcome is to enforce an all male field.

  50. I posted over there a little bit yesterday. It wasn’t all that pleasant an experience. I was being civil and engaging in a little back and forth with some of the folks. I referenced a few of the previous posts, and attempted to make reasonable points. It took 2-3 posts before some uber angry guy was accusing me of “weaseling” and cursing, and I had the visual image of a frothing mouth (in my own head anyhow).

    I dismissed him and ignored him, and swapped a couple of posts with some folks who were debating the other side and laying out the history a little bit (I had no idea what gamergate was for instance).

    I had just thanked one person who responded reasonably and explained to me that some of the posters over there were already worked up before I entered the conversation. I even apologized for toe stepping, and went on to respond to another comment I had missed previously. Up to this point I had not attacked anyone, typed an ugly word, or taken the bait uber angry guy was posting.

    At one point in my response I scrolled up to check something on a previous post, and saw that my previous posts were jibberish. Then the blogs owner, Mrs. NielsenHayden, posted something along the lines of “If I believed you you would have more vowels in your previous posts”.

    Now, I like to read my own prose as much as anyone randomly posting on the internet, and to edit fairly civil and innocuous posts put my nose out of joint a little. I quit responding at that point, as it seemed useless to try to respond anymore if half a dozen civil posts resulted in that much hate and a punitive edit.

    As I said there, I have posted over here maybe half a dozen times since I became aware of the SP thing. I was not deeply invested in this, certainly not enough to work up a good case of hate. Frankly, Larry and I probably vote in different primaries. The worst things I did was reference a Nietzsche quote, use “collusion” correctly in a sentence, and say two wrongs don’t make a right.

    It made me angry. End result, I’ll be voting on the Hugos this year. Actually, I do a fair amount of work in Spokane, so if the stars line up I might go. At one point they had implied SP was a block of rubber stamping ballot stuffers acting not to award a deserving author but to spite the other side. At that point the idea was ludicrous to me. Now… not so much. I’m going to have to consciously read some of those nominations without bias if I want to vote impartially.

    The whole experience was kind of like a chemistry class… interesting, but I don’t want to do it again.

    1. John Layton, on April 1, 2015 at 5:23 pm said:

      “At one point they had implied SP was a block of rubber stamping ballot stuffers acting not to award a deserving author but to spite the other side.”

      In THE TACTICS OF MISTAKE, Dickson has his protagonist say that thieves expect everyone to steal from them, and con men think everyone is lying to them.

      In real life, I’ve seen alleged historians attempt to refute those they agree with by saying that various descriptions of past events are really propaganda made up to influence contemporary politics. The people who say this are always on the opposite side of the political issue in question, and when checked they turn out to be making their ‘history’ up.

      So I take the ‘it’s just spite-driven, with no concern for quality’ remarks as inadvertant confession of their motives.

  51. John Layton – “End result, I’ll be voting on the Hugos this year.”

    Hello John

    I, too, will be voting in the Hugos for the first time ever this year.

    I’d been following Sad Puppies from a distance, with no intention of joining in. But Mrs Neilsen Hayden’s ugly comments, and the rousing responses from Larry, Brad Torgersen, Vox Day, and Sarah Hoyt made me reconsider.

    And besides, I’ve read both Monster Hunter Nemesis and Skin Game. They are both awsome books, by awesome authors who deserve to win a Hugo award. If they both end up being nominated I’m going to find it hard to choose between them.

    Jim Butcher’s lack of a Hugo is especially ridiculous, when you consider that he’s – what? – fifteen books in to the Dresden Files, which show no sign of flagging in either quality or entertainment value, and not a single one of them has ever been nominated for best novel.

    But Redshirts won it.

    That doesn’t seem right to me, and Neilsen Hayden’s poison pen made me ticked off enough to decide to do something about it.

    Happy voting!

  52. “Trying not to take the latest SF crisis too seriously, but a campaign to force all diverse people off an award list is hard to laugh about.” “Zero point arguing with Sad Puppies about their intentions. The OUTCOME of their campaign is to enforce an all white, all male SF field.” – Damien Scarequotes in his “Biggest Liar in India” campaign speech.

    1. “All male”?

      My lips are sealed, but I think Damien and the rest of them are in for a nasty surprise in a few days . . .

  53. So, if the Usual Suspects are going to try and turn this into another GamerGate, does this mean we can expect our very own Law and Order: SVU episode a few months from now?

          1. Idris is also to thin to be convincing as Larry. Mr. Correia is BIG!!!

        1. Ok, that would be epic. Would he have to meet Larry to research his character? And who would be getting whom’s autograph in that case?

  54. It certainly takes a special kind of stupid to take an exclusive club and only book people without talent to entertain the customers. Maybe they can recover from the loss by burning it down and collecting the insurance money? I suppose it would only seem fair to them since these untalented people have been unfairly held back by being untalented and functionally illiterate. But, what does illiteracy have to do with books?

  55. In the new thread over at R’lyeh, Abi Sutherland writes Sad Puppies “ruins the nature of the Hugos as the strange, unpredictable product… It removes the mystery.”

    Hahahah.

    Pray tell what mystery was attached to who won the Hugos and Nebulas last year? Each is a moronic feminist lake.

    What mystery is there about a clique of morons who announce at Tor and Lightspeed they won’t be reviewing white men? What mystery is attached to Queers and Women Destroy SF to which I am disinvited? What mystery is there about who enters WisCon’s demented “safer-space”? What mystery is there about Kowal and Patel crowing about white men not winning Nebulas?

    Then, in a further fit of stupidity, the head Chorfulhu has the nerve to say WE want to get rid of racial and sexual diversity, but they can’t point to us having the institutions they themselves have. If there are any stupider and dishonest people on the planet than SJWs, please tell me.

    “Pick up a wide variety of books and be open to what they say” says the United States of Abi. What she really means is as long as they pre-crime the fuck out of straight white men with the more noble view of not seeing gender, gays rained on by horrible heterosexual blindness, Tarzan and Jim Crow, noble Incans helping stupid colonialist whites, and vengeful dinosaurs. Or in other words the droning of an insect that confirms their world view they’re being dragged behind trucks and being punched out in the real world.

    She adds in the first comment:

    “I am aware that posting a personal, reflective essay in a conversation that treats caring as a potential attack vector is risky. Enthusiasm and love are easily mocked.”

    You mean droning conformism and hate passed off as enthusiasm and love are easily mocked. Yes, you’re right.

    “Love.” Who are you trying to kid? You might notice there are intact vowels at Sad Puppies sites.

  56. Good grief. If the Toad gets any angrier over there, she’s going to have to change the blog’s name to “Making Butthurt”.

  57. “Cora Buhlert retweeted SFReviews.net/SFF180 @SFReviewsnet · Mar 31 The core sickness of the Sad Puppies is in insisting that all SFF fandom who isn’t them must be considered enemies and not allies.”

    Let me disabuse Frau Dummkopf and Retard Reviews of that notion. I would describe a “core sickness” as a silly obsession with race and gender not at all healthy or normal. We do not oppose or quote “all SFF fandom” but specific people with actual names and faces as opposed to the SJW practice of either using scare quotes or taking out 200 or 100 million white Americans at a time. Irony is in short supply in SJW Dummkopf-land when you accuse us of the very mass defamation so common to the drunken mentally addled intersectional feminist ideology you lap up like some people take drugs.

    Naturally you can’t provide quotes to back up your lie any more than the Chorfulhu of R’lyeh can back up her absurd claim we want fewer women and non-whites in SFF. You are all suffering from a mass hysteria brought on by your own stupidity and lack of ethics.

    “All SFF fandom” isn’t a bunch of dullards who gleefully announce they don’t review white men or want to put reading white men on a probationary status. SJW dummkopfs do that and they have names and we quote them.

    Plus there’s fuck off. That does not apply to “all SFF fandom” but to Frau Dummkopf and Retard Reviews.

  58. While not directly on point, I thought this would be apropos given the main point about SP being an attempt to beat back the barbarian hordes of message fiction. I looked at Hines blog to see if he was discussing the Hugo issue (so far, no) but his most recent guest post is this:

    http://www.jimchines.com/2015/04/double-standards-of-diversity-upkins/

    If you don’t want to give him page views, I’ll summarize. The author is Dennis Upkins who is a gay, black YA writer. He basically complains that he is expected to include proper diversity in his work, but that white writers aren’t and when he does include such characters, white audiences don’t buy his books. So on the one hand it is really unfair that people expect him to be diverse in his writing, but dammit everyone else needs to be more diverse. In other words, message fic doesn’t sell, but we need more of it. The cognitive dissonance is strong with this one. The best is when he complains about Card’s success, because, you know he’s homophobic and so should somehow be fired or unable to earn a living, and then does the whole if people would just quit buying tickets to Michael Bay movies there’d be more money for struggling indie artists. Somehow I doubt Michael Bay fans would spend their money on craptastic YA fiction (yes, I read only excerpts but that was enough to tell me that Upkins isn’t selling because he’s a crappy writer).

    Then I read the comments and lo and behold, it turns out our wonderfully diverse whiner is an honest to god/goddess/gaia/old one misogynist. Here are a few choice quotes Hines’ commenters found:

    “And the next breeder (specifically: speshul str8 wymnz) who tries to mansplain/white-cite/straight-talk down to me and defend that walking heterosexism simply because they have a homophobic fetish because they’re too fucking trifling to deal with their own sexuality, I’m paying them a visit with a lead pipe in tow.”

    and

    “Usually at this point we gay peeps are seeing red aand have to walk away from the keyboard, less we be tempted to run an IP trace and pay a visit to these fools in real life… with a piano wire.”

    There were several links to Mr. Upkins thoughts on women, but this one provides links to most of the good stuff

    http://failfandomanonwiki.pbworks.com/w/page/46348354/Neo_Prodigy

    So what does Hines have to say? When one of his commenters said they wish the subject could have been covered by someone less woman hating, his lame response was “And that’s a totally understandable reaction.”

    So, making fun of the stupid ideas of MacFarlane or Bradford is so misogynistic you aren’t allowed to comment on Hines’ blog, but talk about how you want to strangle women with a piano wire or beat them with a pipe gets you a guest posting gig.

    1. Holy shit…

      These people are seriously like the gift that keeps on giving.

      Hines was all over calling me a misogynist for teaching women how to effectively defend themselves from people like his guest blogger. 😀

      1. So he calls you a liar on Twitter, then claims “oversimplifying” when I quote him to prove it was true. What a piece of work. And he’s one of the more reasonable SJW’s.

      2. “But teaching women to defend themselves is RAPE CULTURE because that means you think they might need to know how to protect themselves, THEREFORE approval of rape!!!”

        “Yeah. And anyway, evil str8t women are evil and deserve bad things. Because being gay somehow now means hating gender is A-Okay.”

        “….uh…y-yeah. (M-must resist urge to straight-splane….”

        1. But the women in question are cis-normative, therefor Larry is the International Lord of Hate for teaching them to defend themselves against SJW nutter special snowflakes with piano wire like him.

      3. “Jim C. Hines
        ‏@jimchines Trolls and truth-twisting aside, @monsterhunter45 is right about the nasty comments my latest guest blogger has made in the past.”

        1. I had a fun little exchange with Hines yesterday over this. I do love seeing hypocrites placed into awkward situations. 🙂

      4. Well you know, teach women to how defend themselves against rape, you’re encouraging rape culture. Just as if you teach people how to install locks and burglar alarms, you’re encouraging burglary culture.

        Yeah, the two statements make equal sense … or rather NON-sense. 🙂

          1. I guess that answers the question of whether Delany ever moved away from his support for pedophilia.

          2. The review was horrifying.
            The comments were worse.
            Good night, so many leftist weirdnesses were explaine there.
            Who has sex at the age of thirteen?

    2. Buddy, that’s great work. Keep it coming. I keep telling people these water-carriers like Hines have no idea of the hatred behind this “social justice” movement. “Useful idiot” is the term.

      How righteous is your cause when all you really have to do is quote the other side? How wrong is that other side when they use scare quotes, anecdotes and innuendoes?

    3. I notice the original post got taken down — I’m guessing because someone pointed out that talking about tracking people down by their IP and MURDERING them might be construed as making a terroristic threat under the law. I think it’s hilarious that he accused women of ‘mansplaining’ to him. I hope some of those he accused were women who took that term seriously and previously used it themselves. Live by the sword, …

  59. “@AaronPound · 5h5 hours ago
    The irony of the Sad Puppies is their project only works because they vote in lockstep and traditional fandom is disorganised.”

    You know, Mr. Pound doesn’t like us much. Perhaps he should try a slate of his own next year. If you’re reading this, you can call it “Pound Puppies”. Use the name. Just remember where you got it from. 😉

    1. I have been corrupted by the internet. My first thought was that you were making a joke about this fellow’s sexual preferences…

  60. Seems to be a lot of GamerGaters picking up on this. This is going to be bigger than anyone imagined.

    1. Yep.

      So many gamers out there learned to read on games like Ultima, and learned to love SFF with games ranging all over the freaking place given how SFF heavy gaming is.

      For all they are portrayed as ignorant trolls gamers are also just as smart and educated (on average) as SFF literature fans.

      I think a lot of them will like MHI – can you imagine how awesome a Video Game based on the setting could be?

      They probably won’t like everything in the SP slate, but hey, getting more voters from all sides is the point.

  61. Hello. I think you are magnificent bastards. Congratulations. I’ve been worried to run afoul of some unsaid norm of these social justice types, and the consequences of said transgression. (And all I do is draw some no-name webcomic as a hobby!) I’m glad to see the power of these cliques being slowly rendered null and void.

    P. s.: You can probably guess where I found out about the Sad Puppies.

    1. If you let us know what the name of your no-name webcomic is, you might get a batch of visitors. I for one am always on the lookout for new webcomics…

    2. I too would like to check out the comic, I have a daily slate that keeps me amused and makes life easier 🙂 But if it’s something that will make you uncomfortable with the trolling going on, that’s fine. Maybe when the ruckus dies down.

  62. “Cora Buhlert retweeted Sam J. Miller @sentencebender · 12h 12 hours ago @Cecily_Kane @RachaelKJones An SP Hugo coup upsets me not bc I care about the award, but missed opp to celebrate amazing marginalized voices”

    “Cora Buhlert retweeted Rachael K. Jones @RachaelKJones · 12h 12 hours ago @sentencebender @Cecily_Kane We can talk about the works of overlooked and marginalized people, and share them with our friends.”

    “Rachael K. Jones ‏@RachaelKJones 13h13 hours ago @Cecily_Kane I think I’m going to make a list of things I can do to make the world better, and do those next week while Hugo!Rage happens.”

    “Cora Buhlert retweeted The Book Smugglers @booksmugglers · Apr 2 Do you know WHO lives in fear? Those of us on the receiving end of sexist, homophobe, racist, abusive, shitty societal atitudes.”

    “Cora Buhlert retweeted Alice Nuttall @Ally_Nuttall · Apr 2 @booksmugglers “Let’s make sci-fi DANGEROUS again! To everyone except white cishet men, that is.”

    “Cora Buhlert retweeted Annalee @leeflower · 21h 21 hours ago But these issues affect me directly. Discrimination picks my pocket. Unconscious bias damages my reputation.”

    hahhahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahah Is there a stereotype factory somewhere that cranks these people out? Like these people never defamed straight white men by the metric ton and are only angry now. None of you are “marginalized.” Take your paranoia pills and cure your racism.

    Remember the scene in Animal House where Belushi grabs a guy’s guitar?

    1. It’s not like we needed any further proof of the fact these people engage in racial and sexual segregation which ranges from the casual to formal. But notice how they openly admit they are more than willing to skew their “literary” choices away from anyone who is a man, straight, and ethnic European based on their insane idea of the “marginalized”?

      These are the people who created Sad Puppies. Contrary to SJW lies about SP wanting to diminish the presence of women, gays and non-whites, there is nothing in our rhetoric to suggest any of us even care about such nonsense. SFF and books come first, the racial and sexual identity of the author is irrelevant. What we are against is people who claim that is relevant. So are we against sexually pie-charting and racial affirmative action? I suspect many of us are.

    2. next week while Hugo!Rage happens.

      It is probably wrong of me to be looking forward to this rage, today on good friday.

      But I am. It’s going to be so entertaining.

      1. Good Friday and Passover both, Lea. But yeah, I’m really curious just to see what’s on the slate for the Usual Fussers to fuss about.

    3. “Discrimination picks my pocket”

      …Translation: “I’m not confident I can sell based on my talent”

    4. An SP Hugo coup upsets me not bc I care about the award, but missed opp to celebrate amazing marginalized voices”

      I do like this tweet. It assumes that either all of these amazing marginalized voices have turned out the very best examples of their category in in 2014, or the poster just doesn’t care who put out the best work, and wants to use the Hugos to celebrate marginalized voices.

      1. :::face palm:::

        Yeah, I can’t say I’m all that surprised someone would say that. They view the world only though the lens of their prejudices.

      2. White Male Privilege according to that Chris G. fellow…

        No one assumes you’re an Affirmative Action hire… or you got your Hugo because someone voted for your story only because you’re a “marginalized voice.” Ie… you were an Affirmative Action hire.

  63. “… this screamathon between the left and right HAS to stop.” – Martin Wooster at File 770.

    This has nothing to do with Right vs. Left. Just because insane SJWs default me to a right-wing reactionary men’s rights activist conservative when I push back against the moronic group defamation of SJWs about “white saviors,” “rape culture,” “white privilege” and “male gaze” doesn’t make that so. That’s just stupid bullshit SJWs use to hide the fact they’re attacking race and sex.

  64. D***, I wish I hadn’t missed that registration deadline.

    Also, Wright’s “Golden Age” is amazing, reading it now. Thank God for SP.

      1. …and all this time I had him pegged as the reincarnation of Squirrel Girl’s former partner, Monkey Joe.

    1. AAAAAAHHHH… My kid just showed me that last night and I thought…. Larry has got to see this!

      I particularly appreciate the sexy norwales.

  65. “9. Ian Sales ‏@ian_sales Apr 2 @redrichie @holdencarver @nine_below that May is a piece of shit

    10. Richard Palmer ‏@redrichie Apr 2 @ian_sales @holdencarver @nine_below Who is he, btw? I only come across him in the context of dickery.

    11. Ian Sales ‏@ian_sales Apr 2 @redrichie @holdencarver @nine_below some KKKer who thinks he’s upholding Murican values, no doubt

    12. Martin Petto ‏@nine_below Apr 2 @redrichie @ian_sales @holdencarver Just some internet racist.”

    Hahahahah. Aren’t we all? And Conservative Right Wing reactionary Men’s Rights Activists dedicated to maintaining the patriarchy and the centrality of our whiteness; don’t forget that. Martin didn’t like Torgersen’s post or the comments.

    Let’s see what kind of anti-internet racists Martin Petto promotes:

    “Martin Petto retweeted Strange Horizons @strangehorizons · Mar 30 This week: a new column by Kari Sperring, a poem by Jaymee Goh… strangehorizons”

    Jaymee (“sour dough-faced”) Goh and the Strange Horizons which publishes posts by Rochita Loenen-Ruiz, each visciously anti-white women. Kari Sperring is also obsessive in her stupid comments about straight white men.

    Thanks for the definition of “internet racist,” Martin. By that standard, anyone not some fuck of a mentally short-changed gender feminist is an internet racist.

    1. They go after Brad and VD in that thread too. Elsewhere Ian Sales leaves this charmer:

      “Ian Sales ‏@ian_sales 20h20 hours ago @lavietidhar given all the sad puppets in the shortlists, a V-2 might be more appropriate for the Hugo…”

        1. I actually think the part about mainstreaming hate speech using gods/devils scenarios is an apt comparison…

          … for their side.

          See: “Nazi Gods” and “Jewish Devils”:
          The Dehumanizing Rhetoric of Nazi Propaganda, by Kelly Sutter.

        1. I think it was actually the Redstone, which is what the V-2 scientists and engineers designed when they became OUR scientists and engineers.

          1. The first Hugo award rocket had wings! It can be seen here. It was awarded in 1953. The Redstone can be seen here, and it didn’t enter service till 1958. Websearch winged finned rockets fictional and you can find images back to the 1920s.

  66. This is sitting at R’lyeh Under the Waves for some reason. I thght t ws fnny.

    “#484 ::: Thunder_Bear_Alpha! ::: (view all by) ::: April 04, 2015, 12:59 AM:
    Alex, that pome you wrote is realy amazing! When you said the Sad Puppies were Fox (News) Pups I thot that was really funny. I guess nobody else got the joke because they are stupid. The people here who don’t like you are Gay Fagets!”

  67. The latest proclamation of Chairman Davidson:

    “Some have suggested that destroying the Hugo Awards is the ultimate goal (if I can’t win, no one can) of this campaign, and this is not outside the realm of possibility. Even more reason to put a stop to it now.”

    I think that voting No Award sight-unseen to anything you disagree with will do that much quicker.

    1. The man who had racial incitement used against him doesn’t know what pushback against that looks like when he sees it for the simple reason he didn’t do it himself.

      It looks a lot like telling whack jobs to take their white privilege and rape culture theories and shove them up their asses

  68. At some point we should put together a platform of what it would take for us to stop. If we have no goals we look like fools who want to fight forever.

    My issue would be very simple: stop the racial (and sexual) incitement. That’s it – that’s everything. Rein in your weirdoes and I go away. Do that, or have some important institution (like WorldCon) at least make some kind of pledge along the lines of their harassment policies, and not only will I go away but I’ll delete everything I’ve ever written.

    That’s my promise, and seeing as how SFF went a hundred years without racial incitement, I truly don’t think it’s asking all that much. Bring back the SFF.

    The funny thing there is, these people already have such informal policies in place. See: Vox Day. The problem is, they’re one-sided. They’re one sided cuz they say women can’t be sexists and power-privilege, “punching up” and blah, blah, blah. So, just get rid of the double standard and you get rid of me. If you boot people out of an organization and there’s no “compared to what and who…” then there’s a problem.

    There’s a reason law and rules exist – it’s so we can live together. If we can’t even speak the same language we can’t communicate. We need balls and strikes. That’s such a universally recognized thing I can play a Japanese team which speaks no English while not able to play with other people in SFF who speak English. That’s sick.

    1. “Ian Sales @ian_sales · 44m 44 minutes ago Hugos, you put VD on your shortlists twice and you don’t think you’re broken yet? Look closely…”

      See? They have standards. They’re just double standards.

  69. So, reading the article, I had to find out who this Teresa Neilsen Hayden person is.

    She is a nasty little Fascist piece of work.

    (And if I had a dog that looked like that, I’d shave it’s butt and teach it to walk backwards.)

  70. God bless you sir, you are doing God’s work. For to long the SJFascists have been systematically coopting every facet of our culture and bending towards the left, using totalitarian methods. Who would have dreamed people sympathetic to communism with Che Guevara as their hero could be so evil?

  71. This amused me:

    “Good reference books are labors of love, especially that last 10% of quality that takes 50% of the total labor. People who create reference books get one shot at the Hugo.”

    The 1986 winner? Tom Weller’s “Science Made Stupid”

    A parody of ’60s science textbooks. Over the letters of John W. Campbell, Harlan Ellison’s “An Edge to My Voice”, and scholarly works by Brian Aldiss and Algis Budry.

    It’s not fair to go that far back, but it amused me.

  72. When I was a kid I had taken out and read every SF book in the school and public library. Every one. I bought every quality SF book that came thru the bookstore. I never really thot about the reasons the passion totally faded in my 20’s but the suspicion is rising in me that these SJW’s drove me out without my recognizing it at the time. I’ll be taste testing the catelogues of these alternative publishers rising to my attention and just maybe I’ll rediscover my passion.

  73. I don’t read sci-fi, and I don’t read your books. I’m merely a scribbler who would one day like to be an author (when I grow up and stuff).

    But I had to tell you I have thoroughly enjoyed reading your SP-related blog posts for the last few days tremendously.
    I read the initial EW article and it didn’t sit quite right with me. As a non sci-fi person I had no idea how the Hugos were nominated or what in the unholy was going on. So I read Brad’s posts. And then yours. And Sarah Hoyt’s. And now I’m sitting here giggling while I read you eviscerating comments.
    So thank you =)

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