(1) BROOKLINE SHOOTING INCIDENT. SF writer Michael A. Burstein faced an unexpected emergency decision today.
When I ran for Library Trustee of the Public Library of Brookline back in 2004 for the first time, I never expected the day would come when I would be saying the following over the phone to the Library Director:
“As far as I know at the moment, this is an active shooter situation in the town of Brookline. You have my complete authority as chair of the Library Trustees to send staff home, shut down the libraries, or do whatever you think you need to do to keep patrons and stay safe. Just keep me posted and I’ll check in with the police again once we’re off the phone.”
He, Nomi and their children were safe but rattled. At the time, Brookline police were responding to reports of two local incidents in which people were shot and/or stabbed.
Police have not yet captured the assailants, however, later in the day they found their car in Boston.
Police in Brookline said they have located the car from today’s shooting but are still looking for the driver and another suspect after three young men were shot and stabbed multiple times this morning in related incidents in Coolidge Corner and Brookline Village
(2) SFWA MAY ACCEPT GAME WRITERS. Science Fiction Writers of America will soon vote whether to allow sales in writing S/F games to qualify writers for membership. SFWA Vice President M.C.A. Hogarth discussed the question at the SFWA Blog.
The Gaming Committee has drafted solid credentials for admitting professional writers of SF/F games–tabletop or computer or console or app–to our numbers. The Board has reviewed them, made modifications, and chosen a final draft. Now it’s up to our members to vote to include our writing peers in the gaming industry into our numbers. The question will be going out on the election ballot at the end of Februrary.
Games, no less than books, tell compelling stories in our genre. I hope you’ll join me in opening our doors to our professional colleagues in SF/F game writing.
(3) HURLEY SAYS FIGHT BACK. Kameron Hurley on “Traditional Publishing, Non-Compete Clauses & Rights Grabs”.
One of the big issues we’ve been dealing with the last 15 years or so as self-publishing has become more popular are the increasing rights grabs and non-compete clauses stuck into the boilerplate from big traditional publishers terrified to get cut out of the publishing equation. Worse, these clauses are becoming tougher and tougher to negotiate at all, let alone get them to go away. Worser (yes, worser) – many new writers don’t realize that these are shitty terms they should be arguing over instead of just rolling over and accepting like a Good Little Author. What I’ve seen a lot in my decade of publishing is new writers on the scene who don’t read their contracts and who rely on their agent’s judgement totally (and that’s when they even HAVE an agent! eeeee). They don’t have writer networks yet. They aren’t sure what’s normal and what’s not and they don’t want to rock the boat.
I am here to tell you to rock the boat.
(4) DRUM LESSONS. M. Harold Page finds “Writerly Lessons from Louis L’Amour’s The Walking Drum” at Black Gate.
Even so, this literary failure is still a heroic one. The book not only displays the craft of a veteran adventure writer, it is also an object lesson in career strategy.
As an author I benefited from reading this book. Let me tell you why…
First, this book can teach us some craft. It confirms the idea that research can be layered (link). There’s a lot you don’t need to know when writing a Historical story and a lot you can put in on the final draft.
Identify the people who are a physical threat to your character and find the conflicts that link then.
However, what makes The Walking Drum truly illuminating is that it is like sitting Louis L’Amour down with beer and getting him to brainstorm historical adventure plots until we can see how he does it.
L’Amour clearly focuses on conflicts leading to physical threats. I’m a great enthusiast for exploring story worlds through conflict (link). However, L’Amour reveals a shortcut: Identify the people who are a physical threat to your character and find the conflicts that link them. I suppose L’Amour would say:…
(5) FINDING YOUR VOICE. Elizabeth Bear on authorial voice, in “he’s got one trick to last a lifetime but that’s all a pony needs”.
You have a voice, as an artist and as a human being. That voice is part of who you are, and it’s comprised of your core beliefs, your internalizations, your hopes and dreams and influences and experiences. You can develop it. You can make it better. But until you find it–until you find that authentic voice, and accept it, and begin working on making it stronger and trusting it and letting it shine through–you will always sound artificial and affected. And there’s a reason we call it “finding your voice,” and not “creating your voice.” The voice is there. Whatever it is, you are stuck with it. So you might as well learn to like it, and work with it, and improve it.
(6) X-FILES. Steve Davidson has lots to say in “The X Files Return: Review & Commentary” at Amazing Stories. No excerpt. BEWARE SPOILERS.
(7) TODAY IN HISTORY
- January 27, 1967 — Astronauts Virgil “Gus” Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee died in a fire aboard the Apollo 1 spacecraft during a launch simulation at Florida’s Kennedy Space Center
(8) MINSKY OBIT. Marvin Minsky (1927-2016), a leader in the field of artificial intelligence, as well as occasional sf author and convention participant, died January 24 reports SF Site.
He served as an advisor on the film 2001: a space odyssey and later collaborated with Harry Harrison on the novel The Turing Option.
The New York Times obituary noted:
Professor Minsky, in 1959, co-founded the M.I.T. Artificial Intelligence Project (later the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory) with his colleague John McCarthy, who is credited with coining the term “artificial intelligence.”
Beyond its artificial intelligence charter, however, the lab would have a profound impact on the modern computing industry, helping to impassion a culture of computer and software design. It planted the seed for the idea that digital information should be shared freely, a notion that would shape the so-called open-source software movement, and it was a part of the original ARPAnet, the forerunner to the Internet.
(9) GRATEFUL. Mike Reynolds is one of the finalists who was not selected to be the teacher-astronaut aboard the Challenger.
The 30th anniversary of the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster this week has a deep meaning for college professor Mike Reynolds. At the time, he was a teacher at Fletcher High School and a finalist for the ill-fated Challenger mission.
Reynolds was picked out of thousands of educators nationwide, to fly in NASA’s teacher-in-space program, which was announced by President Ronald Reagan in 1984. It was teacher Christa McAullife who was ultimately chosen and perished during takeoff with the entire crew.
Reynolds witnessed the Challenger explosion from the Kennedy Space Center viewing area.
“It was so surreal. It took probably a minute, even for someone like myself who is familiar with launches, to really sink in what had happened,” Reynolds said….
Reynolds said the days and months that followed were the most painful in his life, but he made friends with families of the seven onboard, including Capt. Dick Scobee’s wife, June Rodgers Scobee, and Greg Jarvis’ parents. Reynolds said the horror the nation witnessed on that day deeply affected him.
“It’s really affected me, knowing that every day on this earth is a gift, so use that time wisely and stick to your mission and God’s given gifts, and that’s why I stayed in education,” he said.
(10) PLAQUE FOR PRATCHETT. The Beaconsfield town council knows Pratchett will eventually get one of those famous blue plaques. In the meantime, the city will honor Terry Pratchett with a commemorative plaque of its own.
Born in Beaconsfield and educated at John Hampden Grammar School in High Wycombe from 1959 to 1965, [Pratchett] went on to become a reporter at the Bucks Free Press in 1965 before making a name for himself as an author.
The town council hopes to install a plaque on the wall at Beaconsfield Library in Reynolds Road, where Sir Terry was a Saturday boy and returned to give talks.
Cllr Philip Bastiman, chair of the open spaces committee, said the council had been in touch with Sir Terry’s daughter Rhianna, who was “very supportive” of the idea of commemorating the author.
He said: “Because I believe he worked in the library and used the library a lot and he came back and actually gave talks at the library relatively recently, in their mind, it had a place in his affections.
“They feel it is wholly appropriate to have a commemorative plaque to Terry Pratchett at the library itself.”
Cllr Bastiman said they could have to wait “a number of years” for a blue plaque, which are commonly used to commemorate historical figures and places, so will remember him with their own plaque.
(11) COMMENTS DEFACE HARTWELL OBIT. The Register gave David G. Hartwell a nice obituary. Unfortunately, Puppification intruded at the third comment.
(12) WOMEN IN SF. Kristine Kathryn Rusch is working on an anthology, Women of Futures Past, that will be published by Baen. The project’s blog has a new entry by Toni Weisskopf.
[Kristine Kathryn Rusch] When it became clear to me that the sf field was losing its history, particularly the history of women in the field, I decided to do an anthology. And I immediately knew who would be the perfect publisher/editor: Toni Weisskopf of Baen. We’ve been the field for the same amount of time, and I knew, without checking, that all this talk about the fact that there are no women in sf had to bother her as much as it bothered me. We got together last February at a conference, and sure enough, I was right…
[Toni Weisskopf] …So I never experienced this mythical time of science fiction being an old boys club, with the Man oppressing women, keeping us down. What do these people imagine all the women in field before them did? I didn’t need Mike Resnick and Barry Malzberg to remind me about the contributions of editor Bea Mahaffey at Other Worlds, or the obituaries to tell me about Alice Turner at Playboy; in my circles, they were both still remembered. Same with Kay Tarrant at Astounding/Analog and Cele Goldsmith at Amazing.
So one wonders who is really devaluing the work of women. Perhaps it is those who imply that the women who are successful in SF today need some sort of special consideration. Or is it simply that these people have not bothered studying the history of the field they are talking about? I finally begin to understand the purpose of those lists of names in epic poetry and the Bible: these people existed, they were there. It is my hope that Kris’s anthology will do something towards balancing the scales and prove a resource for anyone who loves great SF and cares about historical accuracy.
(13) SHORTCHANGED. Remembering that the sf genre had ANY women addresses a different question than the fairness issues that arise now that there are MANY women genre writers. Consider the next post about the horror genre…
Nina Allen asks “Where Are We Going? Some Reflections on British Horror, Present and Future” at Strange Horizons.
Somewhat conveniently for the purposes of this discussion, FantasyCon 2015 saw the launch of three “best of” horror anthologies: the latest (#26) in Stephen Jones’s redoubtable Best New Horror series, which has now been running for more than a quarter of a century, The 2nd Spectral Book of Horror Stories under the editorship of Mark Morris, and the twenty-fifth anniversary reissue of Best New Horror #3, from 1991. Looking down the table of contents of this last, I encountered many familiar, well-loved names—some sadly no longer with us, some very much still writing and contributing to the literature. I want to stress right from the off how important the Best New Horror series has been to me, both as a reader and as a writer. When I began developing a professional interest in horror fiction towards the end of the 1990s, BNH was where I first started to acquaint myself with the field: who was writing, what they were writing, how they related to one another. I would read each volume cover to cover when it first appeared, adding to my knowledge and developing my taste with each new outing.
When I look at the table of contents for BNH #3, I see the names of writers who first drew me into the genre (McGammon, Grant, Newman, Etchison), writers who deepened my understanding of what horror writing could do and cemented my allegiance (Campbell, Royle, Lane, Ligotti, Tem, Hand), as well as one more recent discovery, Käthe Koja, whose writing is everything that modern horror should aspire to be. A wonderful compendium indeed, and if I felt a little disappointed to see that of the twenty-nine stories listed, only four were by women, I reluctantly put it down to the times. While women have always written horror, the awareness of women writing horror was not then so advanced as it has become more recently. Any anthology that styled itself “Best New Horror” in 2015 would surely provide greater parity in representation.
How surprised was I then, when I turned to the table of contents for BNH #26 and discovered that of the nineteen stories listed, a mere three were by women writers.
Three must be somebody’s lucky number, and nineteen, come to that, because of the nineteen stories selected to appear in the 2nd Spectral Book of Horror Stories—and this from more than five hundred submissions received—only three of those were by women, also.
I honestly don’t see how this is a situation anyone can feel happy with. I’m not even going to get started on the representation of writers from minority ethnic backgrounds in these tables of contents, because it’s practically nil.
OK, those are the facts, the figures I’d brought with me for discussion on the panel. They speak for themselves, and what they say about the state of horror fiction in the UK in 2015 is that it’s very white, heavily male-dominated, and furthermore, that this situation hasn’t changed at all in the last quarter-century.
(14) MORE TO REMEMBER. The BBC has a little list of its own — 10 Women Who Changed Sci-Fi. The name that follows Mary Shelley is –
Ursula K Le Guin
Le Guin has been a significant player in the science fiction field since the 1960s and has nourished the sci-fi and fantasy genre with piercing visions of race, gender, ecology and politics. She has also been its heroic defender with a host of best-selling writers citing her as an inspiration.
(15) SHINDIG. The Hollywood Reporter details plans for the Star Trek 50th anniversary fan event in New York City.
This September, Star Trek marks its 50th anniversary by returning from the final frontier and landing in New York City for Star Trek: Mission New York, a three-day event based around a celebration of the beloved TV and movie franchise.
Taking place Sept. 2-4 at the Javits Center, Mission New York comes from New York Comic-Con organizers ReedPOP. Lance Festerman, global svp for the company, said in a statement that the new convention “will be a completely unique fan event unlike anything seen before, giving [fans] the chance to go beyond panels and autograph signings, and immerse themselves in the Star Trek universe.”
(16) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY BOY
- Born January 27, 1832 – Lewis Carroll.
(17) NEW JOURNAL. The Museum of Science Fiction has launched the MOSF Journal of Science Fiction. Journal editor Monica Louzon highlights the articles in the issue:
This first issue of the MOSF Journal of Science Fiction features four articles that explore science fiction through analysis of various themes, including—but by no means limited to—globalization, mythology, social commentary, and assemblage theory. Derrick King’s discussion of Paolo Bacigalupi’s critical dystopias explores utopian political possibilities that biogenetics could create, while Sami Khan’s analysis of Hindu gods in three Indian novels reveals how closely mythology and social commentary entwine with science fiction. Karma Waltonen examines how female science fiction writers have used loving the “other” as a means of challenging societal taboos about sex, and Amanda Rudd argues that Paul’s empire in Frank Herbert’s Dune (1965) is an entirely new assemblage composed of rearranged elements from the previous ruler’s empire and the indigenous Fremen culture.
(18) TYSON IN RAP BATTLE. Neil deGrasse Tyson and rapper B.o.B. are getting their clicks battling over B.o.B.’s flat earth claims. NPR has the story.
So, a Twitter spat between astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson and rapper B.o.B over the flat Earth theory has turned into a full-blown rap battle (and it’s way better than Drake vs. Meek Mill).
B.o.B, whom you might know from his hits “Airplanes,” “Nothin’ On You” and “Strange Clouds,” kicked things off Monday when he started tweeting about how he believes the Earth is flat. He also tweeted about why he believes NASA is hiding the truth about the edge of the world. And he shared several meaningless diagrams about the planet including one about flight routes….
In a short series of tweets, Tyson explained why the Earth was round. He tweeted:
“Earth’s curve indeed blocks 150 (not 170) ft of Manhattan. But most buildings in midtown are waaay taller than that.”
“Polaris is gone by 1.5 deg S. Latitude. You’ve never been south of Earth’s Equator, or if so, you’ve never looked up.”
“Flat Earth is a problem only when people in charge think that way. No law stops you from regressively basking in it.”…
Here’s another: “I see only good things on the horizon / That’s probably why the horizon is always rising / Indoctrinated in a cult called science / And graduated to a club full of liars.” You can read the full lyrics on Gawker.
That was Monday night.
Tuesday afternoon, Tyson dropped his own dis track, called “Flat To Fact,” written and rapped by his nephew, Stephen Tyson. He tweeted: “As an astrophysicist I don’t rap, but I know people who do. This one has my back.” Here’s a sample:
“Very important that I clear this up / You say that Neil’s vest is what he needs to loosen up? / The ignorance you’re spinning helps to keep people enslaved, I mean mentally.”
(19) MEANWHILE BACK AT HARRY POTTER FANDOM. Jen Juneau explains “Why we’re crushing hard on Fleur Delacour from ‘Harry Potter’”. That was news to me, so I paid close attention….
My absolute favorite Fleur moment isn’t in the movies, which is a travesty (and one of the 32843 reasons why everyone who enjoyed the movies even a little bit should go read the books, stat!). It’s at the end of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, when Molly Weasley is tending to her son (and Fleur’s fiancé) Bill’s wounds. Molly starts lamenting over the fact that Bill will never be the same again, and that he was going to be married and everything, while Fleur is standing right there.
Fleur basically snaps and asks Molly if she thinks Bill won’t marry her now that he has been bitten by a werewolf. While Molly starts sputtering, Fleur is relentless, telling Molly that Bill’s scars are proof of his bravery and that she is good-looking enough for the both of them before snatching the ointment out of Molly’s hand and tending to his wounds herself. The scene ends with Molly offering Fleur her Aunt Muriel’s goblin-crafted tiara to wear on her and Bill’s wedding day, and the two cry and hug it out.
And though Fleur is not immune to using her beauty in the series to get ahead (but really, who hasn’t used a natural advantage to get ahead when they can?), there are two big lessons here: 1. Fleur is a certified badass who refuses to let looks define her or anyone around her, and 2. Read the books, y’all.
(20) THAT LOVABLE ROGUE VADER. Yahoo! Tech predicts Darth Vader’s role will be bigger on the inside than expected in Rogue One.
The next time we buy tickets for a Star Wars picture, we’ll be signing up for a movie that’s going to bring back the greatest villains in movie history. Darth Vader is returning to the Star Wars universe this December complete with original costume and voice and he’s going to have a bigger role than anticipated, a new report indicates.
Movie site JoBlo says it’s able to confirm that Darth Vader will indeed appear in the film, and his role will be bigger than just appearing in hologram messages. Even so, it’s not clear what Darth Vader’s role in the movie plot is. In fact, the actual plot of the picture is still secret.
What we know about the movie is that Rogue One tells the story of a group of daring rebels looking to steal the plans of the Death Star. The action in Rogue One takes place between Episode III and Episode IV.
(21) FORCEFUL CARTOONS. Nina Horvath posted examples of “Cartoons from the Dark Side: Star Wars Exhibition in Vienna” at Europa SF.
Tomorrow a new Star Wars exhibition will start and open its doors until March the 6th, 2016. It should not be confused with the Star Wars Identities exhibition that takes place in the same city at almost the same period of time, no, it is different: It shows funny cartoons inspired by the Star Wars universe. Like Darth Vader experiencing the result of his paternity test!
[Thanks to John King Tarpinian, and David Langford for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Brian Z.]
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By the way, there were young girls as well as young boys reading sf and fantasy in the 1950s and 1960s, if you accept anecdotal evidence; I was one of them, and I’m pretty sure I wasn’t alone.
You weren’t – I was reading them also. (First library card in first grade, at the age of 6.) I still remember the school reading workbook in 6th grade (1961-62) with a guy in a space suit on the cover. (The background was what I remember most: green and yellow, very bright.)
The Seredy I remember is The White Stag.
Perhaps I have reviewed one or two Nortons in my day.
For a long time now, I’ve been suspecting that The Phantom is a sockpuppet caricature identity set up by someone who wants to make Puppies, conservatives, gun-rights activists, and Canadians look like total idiots.
These have finally convinced me that that is actually what’s going on:
And by the way, Andre Norton changed her pen name as a sales ploy to appeal to young male readers, whom she thought would not be interested in books written by a woman. Not so she could break in past the Forces of the Patriarchy.
my mother did all the hard work for you girls back when I was little, getting a degree and her own bank account in the early 1950s by staring down anybody who told her “no”. Feminism is about women having equal rights and responsibilities under the law, which is long, long since accomplished. By my mother and her generation. And they did it in about fifteen years.
Because nobody. NOBODY. Could possibly be that genuinely stupid.
I’m still trying to figure out what the sockpuppet creator has against Canadians.
Oddly, I don’t want Larry Correia or OSC to stop writing fiction. In fact, based on their non-fiction, they’d do better to stick with it. I approve of them getting sf and f into bookstores. And I think most people either approve or are 100% indifferent, as long as nobody makes them read the books if they don’ wanna. Where you get the idea the SJWs want either of them to stop publishing books as a whole, I don’t know.
I can’t comment on the Superman thing. I think Card would be the wrong choice to write for it, and I feel the crossing of two very different brands makes that a different issue from Card writing his own fiction. But it weren’t my circus, I wasn’t a part of the plans to hire him or failt to use him.
Sure. Sherwood Smith and Rachel Manija Brown and yesgayYA. is a good place to start, because while their SF book was YA, several of the people who chime in (and were quoted if you read far enough) are adult SF, adult mainstream, etc.
Martha Wells has a story about a copyeditor who started cutting out a minor character (To the point where the plot ceased to make sense) but only after that character is clearly noted to be gay. Her publisher backed her in that case. (Also, someone noted that GLB supporting-cast characters are gaining more acceptance, but main characters are still iffy. And T and onward tends to be worse.)
You think they come out that way by accident? That’s damned insulting.
You think being LBGTTQIA is misbehaviour? Also insulting, but even more so, telling.
The novel about the gay teen is set in the 1990s because I had my initial idea for that character, and some long-trunked short stories about him, when I was 16.
The first draft of the portal fantasy novel, the main character was off in the fantasy world to rescue a best friend she loved like a sister. It stalled at about 20k. In the second draft, I considered how much more interesting the story would be if, and quite deliberately, and not the least bit accidentally, wrote Ms. SJW correcting the dude she was talking to with “She’s my wife.”
The straight guy was very intentionally made straight because, if you squint real carefully around a whole lot of other epic fantasy trappings, you might notice he’s actually the prince from an obscure little fairy tale called Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. (Who, incidentally, did actually meet his princess before spell, and isn’t lusting after a random girl in a glass coffin. First thing I knew about him when I had the idea.)
These aren’t accidents, they’re not characters misbehaving, they are CHOICES.
JJ: Sadly there are plenty of stupid Canadians out there. I can believe he’s real because I occasionally make the mistake of commenting on the conversations threads for a couple of CBC radio programs on facebook. Same issue as comments everywhere; don’t unless you want your faith in how bad humanity can be to get confirmed.
JJ –the comments in question do model well as coming from a sock puppeteer who wants to give Puppies, conservatives and gun-rights activists a bad name. The Canadian stuff can be modeled as being the sock puppeteer making their sock puppet character claim to be Canadian in the hopes of gaining credibility because the *character* thinks we will find the other statements more convincing if we believe they come from a Canadian.
It does admittedly get a bit meta. And also abandons any attempt at a good will interpretation of the comments in question. However, the claim can be made that any commenter who claims sexism doesn’t exist while simultaneously using terms like “rage queens” and “shrieking fems” and “you girls” has demonstrated a convincing lack of good will and thus isn’t owed any.
Any commenter who claims sexism didn’t exist in the ’70s because his mother had trouble getting a bank account in the ’50s has demonstrated a convincing lack of logic.
I looked up some statistics (for 2011 & 2012, where data overlapped) for murder rates by method for Canada and the US.*
Adjusting for population (roughly, multiply the Canada figures x 9), the US kills about five times as many people as Canada when using guns.
Doing the same adjustment for stabbings, I found that, while Canada’s rate of murder-by-stabbing is still lower than the US, it’s by a pretty small margin. I think this may have more to do with the ubiquity of knives as tools (always available in the nearest kitchen). You can’t put effective controls on objects that can be re-purposed as a weapon. The world is filled with sharp edges and blunt objects.
Guns, otoh, start out as weapons and rarely have other uses, so putting stronger controls on their purchase and use really does cut down on gun deaths.
*Yes, I can give goddamn citations, but the gun-death disparity between the US and other countries has been cited many many many many many (repeat ad infinitum) times for many many many many many years, so fuck it.
@Bruce Arthurs, on the uses of guns
I always thought there should be a MacGyver episode where he’s locked up somewhere.
“MacGyver! Over here! I’ve found a pistol… and it’s loaded! You make a noise, and when the guard comes in, I’ll—”
“Perfect! We can take this firing pin and tie it to some long threads pulled from my coat. Now, take these bullets apart and put the powder in a little pile. By sighting through the barrel, I can take a reckoning on the sun, and…”
@ Mary Frances
Me! Me! I loved her books.
Uh, Phantom has hundreds of blog posts since 2005 spouting approximately the same sort of idiocy. That’s not a sockpuppet. Yes, there really are people that stupid and yes, some of them do comment online.
“From the starry skies we will swoop down to save you if we are dead.” (At least that’s how I remember the quote.) That’s from Old Arpad’s story about Attila’s descendants. The Old Miller told Prince Mikulas’ and Matyas’ story.
The problem with Poe’s Law is there’s no way to refute “it’s just a very long-running parody of a stupid bigot.” Even “I’ve known him since we were in school together decades ago” could in theory be answered with “but maybe he was trolling you even then.” [There are certainly people who do that sort of “I will say obnoxious things to get attention” around the dinner table, or over enough beers.) However, there is no meaningful difference between someone who trolls by pretending to think X stupid thing and hate Y and Z kinds of people, and someone who means it when they say that they believe X and hate Y and Z.
MaxL: Uh, Phantom has hundreds of blog posts since 2005 spouting approximately the same sort of idiocy. That’s not a sockpuppet. Yes, there really are people that stupid and yes, some of them do comment online.
That was really a sort of joke on my part — but clearly, I wasn’t being obvious enough. It was my way of marveling at the sort of stupidity which, if real, makes one expect that the person in question would not be bright enough to understand how to read and post on the internet — and yet, like a bizarre sort of idiot savant, they somehow still manage to do so.
As Vicki R says above, at a certain point, the difference between an idiot and a sockpuppet pretending to be an idiot functionally ceases to be a difference.
/god-stalk!
JJ, given your weak performance over at Mr. Felpatron’s the other day, your comment is hilarious.
Your rebuttal of “women are richer, healthier and more free now in the USA than at any other time in history, thanks to the women of the 1940s and 50s getting it done” is “you’re a sockpuppet!”
All that means is you haven’t shaken the lice off your lazy mousing finger to click on my blog. My current blog goes back to 2005, previous incarnations began in the ancient days of 1996, if I remember right.
One click and a scroll-down would have told you that. You are a buffoon, sir.
Lenora Rose said: “You think they come out that way by accident? That’s damned insulting. You think being LBGTTQIA is misbehaviour? Also insulting, but even more so, telling.”
My comment was that -my- characters don’t go where I plan. I pick somebody (or something), hand them a problem and then see what they do with it. If it’s boring then I give them a bigger problem. If it’s still boring I start over with new people.
Evidently you do it differently. It’s probably easier your way, but when I do that the people won’t stay on the page. They become what they do, and I follow along behind. Most likely you’re a better writer than I am. Oh well.
When they wander off, that’s the misbehavior. What they wander off into is the story. If they’re gay, then they’re gay. Some are. If they’re not, then they’re not.
You can try all you want to make me out a racist/bigot/homophobe, but I’m not one. I just disagree with some of the stuff that gets said here. The shock with which said disagreement is met indicates to me that y’all need to get out more. While there are many who disagree with me, there are many who agree.
Dare I say, exposure to a diversity of viewpoints can be beneficial? Oh look, I did dare. I’m so brave! Progressive, even.
Cat on January 29, 2016 at 2:50 pm said: “Oh look, a troll has come with his big man brain to rescue me and my little woman brain by explaining to me what feminism is. How have I lived all my life without this assistance?”
No Cat, I’m not trying to explain it to you. I’m saying that since the real injustices, such as they were, got solved before you were even in high school (unless you’re over 60, in which case you were -in- high school).
Since the ’70s feminists have been making up stuff to be outraged about. Like Barbie’s waistline.Not being allowed to drive or work or read is oppression. Being told who you’re going to marry is oppression. Barbie’s waistline is not.
Feminism outside the Middle East and India is full of shit, pretty much.
A case could be made for American inner-city women being oppressed too, but less because they’re women and more because of their location. Socialism is oppressive.
By any objective measure, women in our Funky Western Civilization are more free, richer, healthier and live longer than anywhere else on Earth, and than at any other time in history. Thank your grandma, she did that. Or your mother, if you’re old.
Feel free to disagree, but be prepared to disagree without JJ’s “Phantom is a sock puppet” crap. Maybe point to where there’s some other place on Earth where women do better than Western civilization, by an objective measure. Like, with numbers in it. Otherwise it’s more of Barbie’s waistline.
And while you’re at it, maybe somebody could explain why the hell anyone would want to read a story based on a bunch of fabricated outrage about something as fundamentally unimportant as Barbie’s waistline?
After a bout of tab-opening that started with James Nicoll’s review of Davin, I found Jeanne Gomoll’s Open Letter to Joanna Russ. Note that Janus was a ’70s fanzine, then see how far we’ve come in the intervening decades….
@The Phantom
“My comment was that -my- characters don’t go where I plan. I pick somebody (or something), hand them a problem and then see what they do with it.”
You do get that all that happens inside your own head, right? You can’t actually blame it on imaginary people.
Actually, scratch that, disclaiming responsibility for the things you think and then write down is absolutely the best strategy for you right now.
@Christopher Davis
That link has some fascinating stuff, thank you.
The Phantom: And while you’re at it, maybe somebody could explain why the hell anyone would want to read a story based on a bunch of fabricated outrage about something as fundamentally unimportant as Barbie’s waistline?
May I point out–politely–that you were the person who brought Barbie’s waistline up? Mattel thinks that a wider variety of body-types on Barbie will sell more dolls; that’s kind of why any company issues new products, and if Mattel is wrong, they will lose money. Since you think the Barbie’s shape/size is unimportant, why did you react to Mattel’s action?
And–this is something that just occurred to me, mostly because in an earlier post you kept referring to “Fat Barbie”: are you equally incensed at Tall Barbie and Petite Barbie as you seem to be at Curvy Barbie? And if not, why not? I’ll leave the various racial and ethnic variants out of the discussion for now, because–as other commenters have noted–Mattel has done that before; it’s nothing new. But surely the other body types are relevant to your point . . . whatever it is?
CF :
Phantom
I swear, what IS it with right wing nutcases and their inability to grasp the Anecdotal Fallacy?
Did CF say the State could never kill you in Ontario? No.
I can only conclude that Phantom is either very ignorant in arguing in this fashion or deliberately attempting to mislead.
Anecdotally in the other direction: a decade or so ago I was in Montreal at the end of December. One day I was reading the Montreal Gazette, and there was a year-in-review article on everyone who had been murdered in Montreal that year, somewhere between 40 and 50 people. Montreal is about a quarter the size of New York City, and we would have been delighted and amazed to get the murder rate down to 200/year.
Before anyone goes “but that’s New York! Mean streets! Gangs! Dark Knight!”: at the time, according to the FBI New York was statistically the safest large city in the United States.
Mary Frances on January 31, 2016 at 12:33 pm said: “May I point out–politely–that you were the person who brought Barbie’s waistline up? Mattel thinks that a wider variety of body-types on Barbie will sell more dolls; that’s kind of why any company issues new products, and if Mattel is wrong, they will lose money. Since you think the Barbie’s shape/size is unimportant, why did you react to Mattel’s action?”
Thank you Mary Frances, that was very polite.
Mattel’s action of bringing out Curvy Barbie is not because they think “a wider variety of body-types on Barbie will sell more dolls”. They do not think that. They are making a limited run of Curvy Barbie, or as I said Fat Barbie, because of pressure from feminist groups desperately searching for relevance in a post-oppressive world. When it doesn’t sell, they can say “See? We tried!” and get back to business selling toys that kids actually want.
Barbie’s waistline is an utter irrelevance over which train-cars full of ink have been spilled by people seeking tenure at universities all over America (and Canada).
Mary Frances also said: “And–this is something that just occurred to me, mostly because in an earlier post you kept referring to “Fat Barbie”: are you equally incensed at Tall Barbie and Petite Barbie as you seem to be at Curvy Barbie? And if not, why not?”
You have to go read the article to get the context, but one thing that was said in it was that the kids called her Fat Barbie, but not in front of an adult. My problem with the entire exercise is that they wouldn’t be doing this at all except for the never ending ruckus from a certain brand of feminists who think bullying people is the way to get ahead in life. So they bully Mattel, and they’ve been doing it since forever. Death threats were mentioned in the article. I find this behavior uncool.
There will be a doll shape that appeals to the largest number of buyers. They’ve done that research for a long time. Barbie, Monster High, Princesses, Bratz, these dolls are all disproportionate because that’s what works.
Tall, Petite and Curvy Barbie did not come out of that research according to the article. They are a bow to the pressure groups. They are “proportionate” according to the article. They are also a major logistics problem for the distribution chain, also mentioned in the article.
Therefore, it’s political. PR move. I’m not a little girl nor do I hold stock in Mattel, so I have no dog in this fight. I mentioned it to illustrate the futility of trying to appease agitators.
Mark on January 31, 2016 at 11:50 am said: “@The Phantom You do get that all that happens inside your own head, right? You can’t actually blame it on imaginary people. Actually, scratch that, disclaiming responsibility for the things you think and then write down is absolutely the best strategy for you right now.”
Yes Mark, I am aware that imagination is me thinking. But thanks for the lovely inclusive and supportive comment, it made me feel all warm inside.
Now, all you “discovery” writers out there, just remember that Mark thinks you’re lunatics. Sure is nice to come to a “fan” site and feel all that acceptance ain’t it?
So why did you manufacture this outrage about it? I mean, a toy company puts out curvier doll and it’s AAAAGH FEMINISTS STOP FEMINISTING YOU HAVE THE VOTE STAAAAHHP!
@The Phantom
I have to hand it to you, mischaracterising what I said despite having just quoted me in full takes a certain amount of chutzpah.
@Phantom
Mattel’s action of bringing out Curvy Barbie is not because they think “a wider variety of body-types on Barbie will sell more dolls”. They do not think that. They are making a limited run of Curvy Barbie, or as I said Fat Barbie, because of pressure from feminist groups desperately searching for relevance in a post-oppressive world. When it doesn’t sell, they can say “See? We tried!” and get back to business selling toys that kids actually want.
Seeing as, so far, you haven’t produced any proof that this actually happened, I tend to think that you’re pulling it out of your ass.
Citation frakking needed.
Also, contrary to your assertion, the dolls will be available at major toy retailers this spring, not just sold over the Internet.
So, once again, you don’t know what you’re talking about.
@The Phantom: “Mattel’s action of bringing out Curvy Barbie is not because they think “a wider variety of body-types on Barbie will sell more dolls”. They do not think that.”
Precisely when did you acquire telepathic powers? Were you born with them? And is this really the best use you can think of for them?
@RevBob and @Phantom
Plus the fact that his assertion simply is not true, per Mattel’s own press release.
Here are a few more links. (The last link, from the New York Times, points out that Barbie sales have been declining for years. This really is a shakeup for the company.)
Also, the Ava DeVernay collector’s doll sold out within one hour. So there is a market for dolls beyond the cliche thin blond Barbie.
So my mother was “making up” the struggles she had in the late ’70s and early ’80s to get charge cards and a bank account of her own, even as a working woman? Is that what you’re telling me? Yes, your mother had to struggle with misogyny in the corporate and financial world in the 1950s. That doesn’t mean that women weren’t facing exactly the same struggles 20 and 30 years later. The fact that your mother was oppressed in the 1950s didn’t make all the oppression magically go away afterwards.
What is with the screeching MRAs freaking out about dolls they won’t even play with?
I just realized that the Phantom’s argument-from-anecdote about his mother and sexism is like saying “my mother was very tough and recovered completely when she got the flu in 1956, and she defeated the virus so solidly that nobody has ever suffered from the flu since. So stop this nonsense about vaccines, hand washing, and people dying from H1N1, you hypochondriacs!”
I’m glad his mother was able to push through the sexism to get a bank account–but a bank giving in to one persistent woman doesn’t translate to that bank changing its policy, much less to every other bank doing the same.
The Phantom: Your rebuttal of “women are richer, healthier and more free now in the USA than at any other time in history, thanks to the women of the 1940s and 50s getting it done” is “you’re a sockpuppet!”
Nice try at moving those goalposts. What you actually said was quite different:
my mother did all the hard work for you girls back when I was little, getting a degree and her own bank account in the early 1950s by staring down anybody who told her “no”. Feminism is about women having equal rights and responsibilities under the law, which is long, long since accomplished. By my mother and her generation. And they did it in about fifteen years.
I don’t need to bother “rebutting” that, it’s so patently false.
The Phantom: All that means is you haven’t shaken the lice off your lazy mousing finger to click on my blog. My current blog goes back to 2005, previous incarnations began in the ancient days of 1996, if I remember right.
I guess you missed my later post where I pointed out that my comment was sarcasm. I’m well aware that you’re not a sockpuppet and that you’re just extremely intellectually-challenged.
Of course I haven’t bothered to go to your blog. Everything you post here, every single thing, is false. Why would I bother going to read the blog of someone who is either a) a massive liar, or b) so incredibly stupid that they aren’t capable of using Google to check whether the crap they’ve just made up is true?
You’re a joke, Phantom. You’re a caricature of yourself. You do more damage to the credibility of Puppies, conservatives, gun-rights activists, MRAs, and sexists combined than any other troll who’s ever posted on File770. (I still don’t know why you’d want to make Canadians look so bad.)
redheadedfemme on January 31, 2016 at 3:21 pm said: “Seeing as, so far, you haven’t produced any proof that this actually happened, I tend to think that you’re pulling it out of your ass.”
Omg. Rtfa, for f sakes. It hasn’t happened yet, it’s a prediction. That’s what you do when you’re pretty sure something will go a certain way. Predict. I’m predicting. Could be wrong, kinda doubt I will be. We’ll see.
Rev. Bob on January 31, 2016 at 3:28 pm said: “Precisely when did you acquire telepathic powers?”
It’s called reading, Bob. Try it sometime. Amazing what you can learn when you RTFA old son.
JJ the brave lad said: “You do more damage to the credibility of Puppies, conservatives, gun-rights activists, MRAs, and sexists combined than any other troll who’s ever posted on File770.”
So, I’m Number One then? Yay!
The Phantom: When it doesn’t sell, they can say “See? We tried!” and get back to business selling toys that kids actually want.
Actually, and based mostly on my memories of little girls playing with Barbies over the decades, I think the sales of all the New Barbies will mostly depend on how many cool outfits and accessories Mattel can come up with. Barbie is a fashion doll, after all–the main point is/was always dressing her up. If Mattel realizes that–and they ought to, they’ve been selling fashion dolls for a while–and provides the outfits, then the dolls will sell quite well, in my opinion. For that matter, a lot of the clothing and accessories should still be interchangeable among all the new models, and maybe even some of the old ones–anything that has any stretch to it, for example, or ties. So we’ll see how sales go, over the next year or two.
There is also the fact that when it comes to buying toys for the Barbie target age, it’s mostly adults who get out the credit cards . . . and I imagine that many adults will be quite happy to buy different varieties of New Barbie, or, alternatively, won’t even notice which one they are buying. (I’ve bought far more Barbie and knock-off Barbie outfits to give as gifts than I ever played with as a child–and I’ve also watched various adults grab the first doll on the shelf when they see the name “Barbie,” either assuming that they are all alike or not caring. Even when the dolls have been different, as they often have been.) What kids ask for will likely depend on the ad campaigns; new stuff tends to be more interesting than what’s been around for a while, as Mattel has been discovering with “old” Barbie over the past few years. So again, we’ll see.
@Phantom
O rly?
No comments about the links I provided, I notice, including Mattel’s own press release, which refutes pretty much everything you said.
Also, congratulations on moving the goalposts so quickly! But that’s only to be expected from your class of troll.
@RHF: “Plus the fact that his assertion simply is not true, per Mattel’s own press release.”
Hence the sarcasm in my reply. 😉
*Adds The Phantom’s Gravatar ID to the Stylish script*
img[src*=”4b1e05d5d5e554f9923485570054ea47″] + span::after /* The Phantom */
@Soon Lee: Thanks! 😉 Now if only that worked for e-mails….
@Soon Lee: (Stylish)
I’ve made my own modification to the Stylish script. Instead of using white at opacity 0.7, I use tan at 0.8. The resulting color seems much more appropriate to me.
@Rev. Bob,
Opacity 0.8 too, but in red as more of a “Danger Will Robinson!” warning. So if I choose to read the redded* comment, it’s on my own head.
*It’s a real word that I just now made up.
@RevBob
The resulting color seems much more appropriate to me.
Would that be the deep brown I think it is? 🙂
@RHF:
Why, yes. Yes, it would. 😉
@Lenora Rose:
Oh, good, it’s not just me. I was thinking that, from what was quoted here, it really sounded like yet another permutation of “You know who’s really hurting women? FEMINISTS!!!”
@Darren Garrison:
Or a genius gender-bent version of a recent Steven Universe episode.
*runs away, protecting head from thrown objects*