(1) Today in History —
1846 – Eighth planet discovered — “German astronomer Johann Gottfriend Galle discovers the planet Neptune at the Berlin Observatory”.
Neptune, generally the eighth planet from the sun, was postulated by the French astronomer Urbain-Jean-Joseph Le Verrier, who calculated the approximate location of the planet by studying gravity-induced disturbances in the motions of Uranus. On September 23, 1846, Le Verrier informed Galle of his findings, and the same night Galle and his assistant Heinrich Louis d’Arrest identified Neptune at their observatory in Berlin. Noting its movement relative to background stars over 24 hours confirmed that it was a planet.
(2) A judge checked in with the Salt Lake Comic Con and San Diego Comic Con folks this week, who assured him they are working on a settlement:
Settlement talks are under way between San Diego Comic-Con and Salt Lake Comic Con over the use of the words “comic con,” FOX 13 is told.
Lawyers for both conventions met with a federal judge in San Diego on Tuesday to update the status of the lawsuit. Salt Lake Comic Con co-founder Bryan Brandenburg said both sides were working to reach an agreement.
“The judge wanted us to check in to see if progress had been made in the settlement. We reported the parties are still working out an agreement, but that we haven’t reached settlement, at least not yet,” he told FOX 13.
Brandenburg would not reveal any details about a possible settlement. The judge scheduled another hearing next month.
(3) Forbes writer Scott Mendelson theorizes a trailer will help draw people to theaters when The Martian opens this weekend in “’X-Men: Apocalypse’ Trailer Is Hyping ‘The Martian’”
If the rumor mill is to be believed, and in this case it makes sense, 20th Century Fox will be debuting the first much-anticipated teaser for X-Men: Apocalypse over the next week alongside the theatrical debut of Ridley Scott’s The Martian….
Back in the old days, you attached an important trailer to a big movie so that lots of people would see that big movie. Or at least you attached the trailer for your next big movie before your current big movie. That of course still happens, was we’ve seen from Universal/Comcast Corp. all summer long (Furious 7 trailers Straight Outta Compton or Fifty Shades of Grey trailers Crimson Peak)….
But here is a situation where the presence of a trailer for an upcoming blockbuster acts as major marketing not just for the movie in question but for the current (and arguably less commercial by default) release. At this point, a X-Men trailer helps The Martain more than it helps X-Men: Apocalypse. None of this is problematic in any real way, it just amused me.
(4) SF Signal’s new “MIND MELD: The Translated Books and Why We Love Them”, curated by James Aquilone, discusses the favorite translated sf of Aidan Doyle, Justin Howe (10badhabits.com), Tiemen Zwaan , Rachel S. Cordasco (facebook.com/bookishlywitty), Anatoly Belilovsky (http://loldoc.net), Sylvia Spruck Wrigley, Amy Sisson, and Matthew Johnson (www.irregularverbs.ca).
(5) I tend to be interested in what Mad Genius Club columnists say specifically about the craft of writing,such as Sarah A. Hoyt’s advice about revisions.
[First of eight points.]
1- when polishing a story limit yourself to three passes: sense, wording and typos. Chances are if you go on (and boy, could you go on) you’ll take all the flavor and individuality out of the piece. Flavor and individuality is why we read your story, rather than someone else’s. Yes, I know it’s not perfect. Let it go. No story is ever perfect.
(6) In her post “Harassment: What do we do?” dated August 20, Lydy Nickerson took Sasquan’s recent experience as a starting point to analyze the handling of harassment at conventions.
The thing that’s most recently caught my attention has been Lou Antonelli and Sasquan. For those of you who haven’t been making a hobby of the Great Puppygate Train Wreck, the extremely short version is that some guy, in this case Lou Antonelli, sent a letter to the Spokane police alleging that David Gerrold, one of the GoH for Sasquan, was dangerously mentally unbalanced and might incite violence. He then bragged about it on a podcast. There was a round of shock, awe, and horror; an apology to Gerrold from Antonelli; and other things. Sasquan was notified, as is proper. David Gerrold accepted Lou Antonelli’s apology. Sasquan issued a statement saying, very roughly, that Antonelli had violated the Code of Conduct, but for Reasons, including a request from Gerrold, they’ve decided not to ban him.
So, then there’s a bunch of Monday morning quarterbacking from just about everybody. Which is fine by me, I like detailed analysis, outrage, and train wrecks. But I’m paying special attention, because on a much smaller scale, this could be me. A lot of people were very upset, and there were two things that caught my eye. The first was a demand for consistent application of the rules, and the second was for transparency. There’s a lot of variation on those two themes, but those were the two I am currently noodling on. Consistent application was often equated with zero tolerance.
So, let’s start with the actual, root problem. People who feel vulnerable to harassment at science fiction conventions do not trust those conventions to fairly and justly administer the rules. I cannot come close to doing justice to how very reasonable it is for them to feel that way. That distrust? We’ve built it, brick and mortar, over years. It’s not just well deserved, it’s hugely massively utterly deserved. Harassment policies have been non-existent, or poorly explained or hugely badly enforced. We have multiple known cases of people being allowed to fuck up because they were well connected, or because the concom didn’t want to be arsed, or because concoms just didn’t think there was a problem….
(7) Paul Weimer on “Orwellian unpersoning on the Sad/Rabid Puppies Part” at Blog, Jvstin Style.
You know, its rich that Sad Rabid Puppies would go so far as to unperson someone they accused of being a “Social Justice Warrior”
http://leogrin.com/CimmerianBlog/your-cimmerian-bloggers/ http://www.scifiwright.com/2015/09/leo-grin-grins-when-he-slays/
Sure, freedom of association and all that…but this looks awfully…Orwellian?
The actual thing that caused this seems to be that one of the former bloggers said something bad about someone and their association with super genius Theodore Beale.
(8) John Scalzi in “eBook Sales and Author Incomes and All That Jazz” at Whatever.
I’ve noted before that I think in general there are three kinds of authors: Dinosaurs, mammals and cockroaches, where the dinosaurs are authors tied to an existing publishing model and are threatened when it is diminished or goes away, mammals are the authors who rise to success with a new publishing model (but who then risk becoming dinosaurs at a later date), and cockroaches are the authors who survive regardless of era, because they adapt to how the market is, rather than how they want it to be. Right now, I think publishing might be top-heavy with dinosaurs, and we’re seeing that reflected in that Author’s Guild survey.
What we’re missing — or at least what I haven’t seen — is reliable data showing that the mammals — indie/self-publishing folks, in this case — are doing any better on average. If these writers are doing significantly better on average, then that would be huge. It’s worth knowing.
(9) Deborah J. Ross in “Gossip and Controversy”
I have refrained from any commentary on the Hugo Awards and all the events that led up to them. This does not mean I have not had opinions. Excuse me, Opinions. Only that I saw no point in adding gasoline to the burgeoning wildfires. Now various voices are urging everyone to play nice, to not harbor grudges. To get on with the business of writing (and reading) the best stories we can. Here’s a post I composed a few years ago on the subject of gossip. I should add that I am not entirely innocent, and I have been on the receiving end of some vile accusations, as have folks I care about. It is helpful to me to consider my own behavior (both passing on gossip and being appalled by it) in a larger — and hopefully, more compassionate — context:…
A huge piece of the problem, in my experience, is that we are inundated with role models of gossipers. We are told overtly and covertly that it is not only acceptable but enjoyable to speak ill of others and to relish their misfortune. If they have no discernible misfortune to begin with, well then we will create some! If media portray the pain of those who are gossiped about, it is often to glorify retaliation in kind. Almost never are we taught what to do when we speak badly. Saying “I’m sorry,” or “Shake hands and make up,” (as we’re forced to do as small children) does not make amends.
Certainly, we must begin by looking fearlessly at what we have done or said (or left undone and unsaid), but we must also be willing to accept that there is no justification for our behavior. It doesn’t matter if what we said was true or not if it harmed someone. It doesn’t matter if we were hurting or grieving or too Hungry-Angry-Lonely-Tired.
What we have done does not make us unworthy, unlovable, inadequate, or anything except wrong. Good people can be wrong. Good people, when wrong, strive to make things right.
(10) Ruth A. Johnston, author of Re-Modeling the Mind: Personality in Balance, was interviewed by L. Jagi Lamplighter at Superversive SF about the psychology of science fiction. In “The SF Culture War Posts – Part Two” Johnston applies her theory to characters in John C. Wright’s Night Land stories.
Part Two of our multi-part look at the psychology of Science Fiction, as explained by Ruth Johnston, author of Re-Modeling the Mind, a new book that takes a fresh look at Jung’s work on personalities…
Q: Let’s talk about the ideas you share in your new book. What light can they shed either on the original Night Lands or on John and his version?
Science fiction fans are usually personalities in which Intuition is a very strong part, often the strongest and most dominant. When it’s Extroverted, the universe seems full of possibilities waiting to be connected. Under every rock or behind every star could be a great invention or cure. When it’s Introverted, the personality usually has an innate feeling of knowing the truth of the world, so that exploring ideas is a matter of looking inward, following an inborn map of meaning. It’s also a bit more pessimistic and idealistic: under every rock there might be a rattlesnake, not a cure for cancer. But the rocks do need to be turned over, because it’s terribly important to find truth and roll away anything that covers and hides.
William Hope Hodgson’s original story seems full of Extroverted Intuition to me. Technology keeps mankind alive and there’s no real downside. His dark world is filled with evil spirits and creatures, but mankind’s ability to solve problems keeps one step ahead so that they can build a good way of life. The optimism of his Intuition feels so powerful in the story that I believe he probably had this kind of Intuition in his personality. It creates a sort of worldview.
I think this is some of what charmed John when he read the 1912 novel, and because I know John from college, I can say without guessing that he has that kind of Intuition. In his mind, the world is full of dots to be connected, and we’ve barely begun to connect them all.
Now the other half of the polarity I’m calling A is Introverted Sensing, which can show up as an intense idealism about human social roles. In fantasy and science fiction, it comes out in taking fairy-tale roles like king and knight very seriously. It also believes strongly in archetypal images like mother and father, male and female. When someone with A writes SFF stories, the setting and events can become wild and even chaotic, but the human roles never move much from archetypes. We see this clearly in both Night Land versions, the original and John’s. Anyone walking in the Night Land is going to be surprised by whatever comes next, whether it’s a fire pit, a dangerous creature, an oddly detached spirit, a living stone monument, or a cluster of blind worms. The stories depend strongly on human thought, activity, and roles to give them structure: like putting a snail into its shell. Human roles are stable, not flexible and random like the setting and ideas….
(11) Vivienne Raper asks “Do the Hugo Awards have a short fiction problem?” at Futures Less Traveled
At least one person complained that the Sad/Rabid Puppy nominees kept award-worthy short stories off the 2015 Hugo ballot… So I was curious. Was this true? Were these stories better than the stuff I’d read? An experiment was in order. I’ve now read the nominees on io9’s Puppy-free ballot. Here’s how I’d have voted.
#1 WINNER – When it Ends, He Catches Her, Eugie Foster
When It Ends, He Catches Her has a tale behind it, and it’s the saddest in the Hugos. The day after Daily Science Fiction published the story, Eugie Foster died. It was her last chance to win the award.
There is no doubt – to me – that When It Ends, He Catches Her should have won Best Short Story. It is a story I wish I could have written. That – to me – is the purpose of the Hugos, to showcase work that I know I can’t… Perhaps can never write.
But don’t stop there – Vivienne ranks No Award in second place, then goes on to discuss several proposed runners-up.
(12) Prometheus and Alien sequels are expected.
Ridley Scott set tongues wagging the other day by suggesting he might make as many as three more Prometheus sequels before tying it up with the Alien franchise, reports Comicbook.com.
Scott has promised that Prometheus 2 will answer many of the questions left open in the 2012 film. However, Scott has told German website FilmFutter (via bloody-disgusting) that he won’t show how the Prometheus franchise connects to Alien in the next film. He’s saving that reveal for … Prometheus 4?!
“It won’t be in the next one. It will be in the one after this one or maybe even a fourth film before we get back into the Alien franchise…,” explained Scott. “The whole point of it is to explain the Alien franchise and to explain the how and why of the creation of the Alien itself. I always thought of the Alien as kind of a piece of bacterial warfare. I always thought that that original ship, which I call the Croissant, was a battleship, holding these biomechanoid creatures that were all about destruction.”
Jon Spaihts’ original script for Prometheus was a direct prequel to Alien. In it, David (Michael Fassbender) the android comes across and revives the Space Jockey (also referred to as The Pilot) who was last seen as a fossil in the 1979 film. We would’ve seen how The Pilot ended up dead on LV-426 from a Chestburster, but that storyline was jettisoned during extensive rewrites. Instead, Scott chose to have David and the rest of the crew end up on a whole other moon and come upon the Last Engineer.
Prometheus 2 will begin filming in February of 2016.
“Maybe the next Alien will burst out halfway through the third Prometheus sequel??” joked Will R.
Earlier than that, figuratively speaking, There is an Alien sequel aiming for release in 2017.
Director Neill Blomkamp got media attention last February when he released concept art images from a new Alien movie he was working on, reportedly without authorization from any studio.
Variety reports separately that Blomkamp has a deal with 20th Century Fox to direct the movie, which will be a different project altogether to Fox’s Prometheus sequel with Ridley Scott. According to The Wrap, the untitled Blomkamp movie will be produced by Scott and take place after the events of Prometheus 2.
And he generated some more word-of-mouth for the project in July by repeating the stunt. First Showing then recapped what it knew about the prospective movie.
We don’t know too much about Blomkamp’s new Alien movie yet, however we’ll recap what we do know. Between this concept art and the last piece, it definitely looks like Sigourney Weaver will be back as Ripley. A few months ago, Blomkamp explained that “She knows about it, and part of it was just inspired by speaking to her on set when we were filming Chappie, and getting her thoughts on Alien and what she thought of the movies that came after Aliens and what she felt about Ripley and what was incomplete for her about Ripley. There was so much fuel in what she was telling me.” Fellow filmmaker Ridley Scott is also producing this new Alien, so he is directly involved in it and working with Blomkamp. The film is currently aiming for release in 2017, so stay tuned for any more updates.
[Thanks to Will R., L. Jagi Lamplighter, and John King Tarpinian for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day James H. Burns.]
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Meredith:
I don’t believe anyone did.
Meet Meredith:
Sure, but I think most of the original funny stuff was riffing off Catholicism and branches of Protestantism with a High Church aspect. Partly because of all the follow-up comments saying that either they were using their own Catholic background or that they don’t know jack about Orthodox. 🙂
And part of engaging online is having your sarcasm mistaken for a genuine comment. In 2015 the notion that everybody else should be doing the work to make sense of what one person says is a notion that was bankrupt for many years prior.
Again, you are free to choose to choose not to make sense but complaining about people not understanding you afterwards isn’t going to impress anybody – in 2015. Well in any age really.
@Nick Mamatas
Which isn’t even remotely the same thing.
You would also not tolerate anyone else putting something you didn’t say but was instead their perception of your words into quote marks – you’ve complained about it in this discussion – so don’t do it. Otherwise you might start giving the impression of Torgersen standards for everyone else’s behaviour.
CF:
And part of engaging online is having your sarcasm mistaken for a genuine comment.
Interestingly, not a few minutes ago you claimed to simply not know whether it was sarcastic or not.
That’s okay, you’re the guy who can’t tell that the person with the Greek surname is sarcastic when he says “ooh tee-hee those silly religionists and their icons hoo hoo look at ’em”. That’s you. You do you.
Which isn’t even remotely the same thing.
Here we go with “remotely” again. You really don’t think suggesting that someone doesn’t know jack about X is remotely the same as someone defensively asking how the hell they were supposed to know X?
You would also not tolerate anyone else putting something you didn’t say but was instead their perception of your words into quote marks – you’ve complained about it in this discussion – so don’t do it.
I did not attach your name to a false quote, as was done to me. I generated an abstract dialogue, you said nobody said something like that—I gave you an example of you saying something like that. I did not present the abstract dialogue as coming from your mouth.
Meri-Brad, know thyself.
At the time I replied to your ‘tee hee’ comment. Since then time has passed and I am now quite confident that your comment was sarcastic – partly due to you having since told me it was. Despite rumors to the contrary I’m stuck within a linear experience of events temporally. My past self does not retroactively gain knowledge that my present/future self has acquired.
@Nick Mamatas
Honestly, at this point its starting to get funny. Torgersen standards, people must mean what you say they mean, people just can’t take criticism (even with an example in the same thread with a far more specific religious criticism that got resolved), people misquoting you are the worst but you misquoting an entire thread (more than once, even) is just gravy… Gosh. Well, you do you.
Nick,
I’ve lived in many countries, known many people, some of them Greek or otherwise Orthodox. I had to learn to spell ‘Stathopoulos’ at age 8, as her name was adjacent to mine in the class roll.
I know literally nothing about Orthodox theology, except for the things that caused the schism with western Christianity.
It is not a wise assumption to assume that people will, I think. If people mistake you because of it, I think that getting angry at them isn’t helpful. Not everyone knows the things that you know, or cares about the things you care about…
@Devin
“I know literally nothing about Orthodox theology, except for the things that caused the schism with western Christianity. ”
Sigh. I’m gonna spend the next few days looking this up aren’t I? Curse my poor impulse control
Argh, I’m not going to sleep if I don’t write this and shed myself of the whole thing.
Nick,
1) In Terry Pratchett’s Small Gods, the Goddess of Wisdom has a penguin as a symbol, because the sculptor whose versions of the gods are best known iconographically was a bad sculptor and carved a penguin in place of an owl. The person who made the religious references specifically said they were riffing on this. Ephebe is based on Ancient, not Modern, Greece.Just some meat for thought.
2) My comment about my Ukrainian friend was NOT actually meant as a “But I have a friend who is X” defense. Though it most surely reads as one and for that I apologize. It was meant as “This is my experience with how most people of Eastern Orthodoxy who deeply feel their faith would react. It;s why, when the remark was made, I thought it nothing inappropriate, and when you first snarked at it, I reacted so badly. I am now recalibrating.” Does that make sense? Most importantly, it was NOT meant to in any way invalidate your feelings.
3) I have at least one friend who, in person, and with all the cues of voice and body language, still cannot actually grasp sarcasm. And as far as I know, he’s considered neurotypical. Online can be much trickier; there’s a reason the mock-html {sarcasm} {/sarcasm} tags exist.
4) I still feel your way of approaching this gives the impression you *wanted* to prove that this group would be hypocritical about mocking your religion, and was calibrated to maximize that possibility in a way a more straightforward, “Excuse me, you’re stepping on my toes” phrasing would not have been. It did seem the person who used the religious lines was the first to correctly identify your point and recognize the error, and that this is why you claimed satisfaction about that, even as you also seemed to become unattractively smug about everyone else’s “Failure”. (My failure, NB, lacks the quote marks. I acknowledge it.)
At the time I replied to your ‘tee hee’ comment. Since then time has passed and I am now quite confident that your comment was sarcastic – partly due to you having since told me it was. Despite rumors to the contrary I’m stuck within a linear experience of events temporally. My past self does not retroactively gain knowledge that my present/future self has acquired.
Are you even reading your own comments anymore?
1: you “ask”: Why would you think religionists are silly for having icons? Seems like one of the most reasonable things about religions. If I had to have a religion I think I’d prefer one with pictures but maybe that is the remains of my latent Catholicism. (Note: not actually asking me if I was being sarcastic.)
1a Lauwolf writes: Camestros Felapton
I was assuming sarcasm.
2 you insist that my comment was not sarcastic: Well so far the only person who has said that ‘religionists’ are ‘silly’ has been yourself.
2a: I tell you this remark is right out of the VD playbook (i.e.John Scalzi is a _____.) That, I am telling you that you are taking a sarcastic comment and pretending that it was not sarcastic.
3: Your response to this is to continue to insist that my comment is not sarcastic, despite now being told twice by two different people: What VD did was to take an ironic claim by Scalzi and pretend that it was a factual claim. Whereas I am pointing out a simple fact that it was you who introduced the topic of religionists being silly. What your motives are and what your point was remain cryptic.
You didn’t just take my comment at face value, you continued to do so after being told by a third party that it was probably sarcastic, and after I objected to you taking it at face value. Then you blamed your sarcasm detectors.
That is, you started off, in real linear time, acting as though my obviously sarcastic comment was not sarcastic, then decided that you could not possibly figure it out, and now you claim to have been mistaken.
But you weren’t mistaken. You didn’t make an error. You made a choice to ignore both the textual clues in the remark, the comment of another observer, and my own comment accurately comparing your rhetorical gambit to an infamous one by VD.
If you were actually just all confoozled by my remark, my comment about the VD playbook would have cleared it up for you 100 percent.
And why, exactly, should the national origin of your surname been of particular significance to me when you made your tee-hee remark?
Ah, the ol’ appeal to ignorance yet again!
Devin:
I know literally nothing about Orthodox theology, except for the things that caused the schism with western Christianity.
Interestingly, reading about the schism often brings the reader’s attention to the Seventh Ecumenical Council, and later, to Iconoclasm. That is, to the relative importance of icons historically, geopolitically, and spiritually.
It is not a wise assumption to assume that people will, I think.
I’ve not made any assumptions. I simply pointed out that it isn’t my job to educate anyone (and it isn’t) and that if people want to learn something, well, there are millions of people around to ask.
If people mistake you because of it, I think that getting angry at them isn’t helpful.
I’m not angry either.
@Nick
“Has, with the end of the Puppy wars, the rump of new File770 regulars become a hothouse where even a one-line negative comment must be countered for days on end with whining, passive-aggressive commentary, foot-stomping, Some-Of-My-Best-Friends-Are-Ukranian nonsense, and plain ol’ dumbass comments like yours? Uh-huh.” (link)
As someone who identifies as a “File770 regular”, I feel this comment was insulting and unnecessary. Specific examples of what I object to include applying “whining”, “passive aggressive” and making “dumbass comments” to the group of File770 regulars of which I form a part. I find these objectionable because I do not believe they form a fair or accurate representation of what File770 regulars do.
It is possible that you had some other meaning here, that I am missing some context to your remarks, or that I am just plain wrong, but I would appreciate you taking the time to consider what I said and responding.
Lenora:
2) My comment about my Ukrainian friend was NOT actually meant as a “But I have a friend who is X” defense. Though it most surely reads as one and for that I apologize. It was meant as “This is my experience with how most people of Eastern Orthodoxy who deeply feel their faith would react. It;s why, when the remark was made, I thought it nothing inappropriate, and when you first snarked at it, I reacted so badly. I am now recalibrating.” Does that make sense? Most importantly, it was NOT meant to in any way invalidate your feelings.
Thank you for this note. That does make sense. I might suggest that someone—not just your friend—in a position of being given a gift might say one thing about it while thinking something else about it. I have no idea what your Ukrainian pal was thinking, but it may be possible that what he said and what he thought are two different things. I’m sure we’ve all choked down bad meals with a smile on our faces at some point.
3) I have at least one friend who, in person, and with all the cues of voice and body language, still cannot actually grasp sarcasm. And as far as I know, he’s considered neurotypical. Online can be much trickier; there’s a reason the mock-html {sarcasm} {/sarcasm} tags exist.
And when someone tells your friend that the comment he had just heard was sarcastic and when the person who was being sarcastic also tells him so in a way that makes it clear, does he keep on with the shoulder-shrugging until it is no longer rhetorically convenient, or does he just acknowledge that he’s not very good at this sort of thing? I hope and presume the latter. Heck, I suspect that he’s probably a frequently confused fellow and might even apologetically ask to clarification because he knows his own limitation here. At least I hope he does that for his sake. I too know a few people who have trouble perceiving sarcasm—especially when deadpan (which my comment here was not)—in IRL, and not one of them decided on the frankly rhetorically suicidal gambit of taking all claims at face value as a lifestyle.
4. It did seem the person who used the religious lines was the first to correctly identify your point and recognize the error, and that this is why you claimed satisfaction about that, even as you also seemed to become unattractively smug about everyone else’s “Failure”. (My failure, NB, lacks the quote marks. I acknowledge it.)
I did appreciate Tint’s comment, but if you must know my satisfaction was not a matter of public comments. I had a Facebook message exchange with our host, Mike, about this issue, the details of which I won’t share. If we wishes to, he can.
Mark:
As someone who identifies as a “File770 regular”, I feel this comment was insulting and unnecessary.
Well Mark, I’m sorry you feel insulted, but I stand by what I said.
I find these objectionable because I do not believe they form a fair or accurate representation of what File770 regulars do.
Well I do think they are fair and accurate as regards to this thread, and if you would like me to dig up some specific examples of what I mean by each one so we can talk about them I can do that either here or via email. My email address is my first name, a dot, my surname, and gmail dot com.
It is possible that you had some other meaning here, that I am missing some context to your remarks, or that I am just plain wrong, but I would appreciate you taking the time to consider what I said and responding.
I think mostly the second (context) and a bit of the third (just plain wrong). But no, you got my meaning.
Which was correct and contained no comment on your intent or tone . You introduced that topic into the discussion – true then and still true now.
Which was an error your part. I was making a true statement about what you said. VD repeatedly makes a FALSE statement about what John Scalzi *is*.
My point is true whether you meant what you said or didn’t. VDs claim about Scalzi is false (aside from all the more obvious differences)
Being sarcastic doesn’t magically mean you never wrote something it just means that you didn’t neccesarilly agree with the words you used. It also doesn’t magically absolve ypu of responsibility for your words. Of course if it did then I’d have the perfect excuse – I could just claim I was being sarcastic!
Are we into who-gets-the-last-word-territory yet? Happy for you to get the honor whenever you are ready.
I seem to remember that earlier in this thread, there was this really nice exchange where someone made clear and well-explained criticism of another commenter about a religious matter and then it was all resolved rather well.
@Lenora
Dingdingding!
Also:
@Nick
FwiW, I didn’t take it as obviously sarcastic – I figured you were trying (very hard!) to offend people on some aspect of a discussion they were having. The best I could say was that it was unnecessarily cryptic. But hey, that’s just what I read into it.
You then proceded to flail blindly with everything from “Oooh, look at oppression inherent in Islamic art” to “I DON’T CARE” (not actual quotes, but that’s what you’re initial posts summed up to) just to muddy the waters regarding your initial complaint/ snark/ inaccurate summation.
After your subsequent explanations, the best I’m at is to use something similar to your VD analogy: Remember when Torgersen summed up a bunch of criticisms he received as “YOU WERE ASKING FOR IT” or whatever? *That’s* what you were doing.
@Nick
Ok, that’s fine, if you stand by the statement which I felt was insulting then we’ve done all we can here. As you say, I got your meaning.
However, I want to point out that we managed to clarify and define our issues with each other in the course of no more than 2 comments, because I (a) linked to the specific statement I was reacting to (b) explained why I felt it applied to me ( c) outlined my concerns in general and then (d) gave specific examples of what I thought was wrong. Finally I (e) gave you the opportunity to respond.
Given the starting point to our exchanges in this thread, I assume it’s obvious why I’m making this point.
CF:
Which was correct and contained no comment on your intent or tone . You introduced that topic into the discussion – true then and still true now.
No, it isn’t correct, since you ignore intent and tone for rhetorical purposes of your own. That is, you’re not actually taking anything at face value nor simply reporting on some fact, you are playing a rhetorical game, all based on the mistaken belief (shared by LW) that I was talking about your “iconography” post.
Which was an error your part.
No it isn’t.
I was making a true statement about what you said.
No you weren’t. You were making a false statement by omitting intent and tone. Omitting intent and tone is as deceptive as omitting words. Further, after I made my remark about VD—clearly identified my remark as sarcastic, you continued, for rhetorical reasons, to not believe or understand that it was sarcastic, and only said that my remark was “cryptic.” That is, you confirmed to me that in fact you do understand sarcasm, but were just looking to play a little game. The truth-value of my remark is not of interest to you; what is of interest to you is pretending that you cannot tell ironic statements from non-ironic ones in order to peacock on his thread.
VD repeatedly makes a FALSE statement about what John Scalzi *is*.
That’s not relevant. The VD playbook is to take an ironic statement and pretend that it is non-ironic for rhetorical purposes. He’s even said he’s doing just that on his blog. You even described it thusly: What VD did was to take an ironic claim by Scalzi and pretend that it was a factual claim. You’re just shifting “factual claim” to some state of being now.
You were also pretending that an ironic claim was a real one. That Scalzi’s claim is about an action I took and my claim is about a value judgement isn’t the relevant distinction; the VD playbook isn’t specific about factual claims; anything that allows for peacocking will do.
You are doing the same exact thing, except that you also plead some sort of special inability to read sarcasm, and after being told a remark is sarcastic can only say that you find the remark cryptic.
My point is true whether you meant what you said or didn’t.
Nope.
It also doesn’t magically absolve ypu of responsibility for your words.
There’s nothing magic about sarcasm. I am terribly sorry to hear of your handicap when it comes to sarcasm, especially as it is co-morbid with an inability to understand that something is sarcastic even after being told it was sarcastic.
Are we into who-gets-the-last-word-territory yet? Happy for you to get the honor whenever you are ready.
I seriously doubt you could stay away, CF.
Mark:
However, I want to point out that we managed to clarify and define our issues with each other in the course of no more than 2 comments, because I (a) linked to the specific statement I was reacting to (b) explained why I felt it applied to me ( c) outlined my concerns in general and then (d) gave specific examples of what I thought was wrong. Finally I (e) gave you the opportunity to respond.
No Mark, that is actually not why. The issue was clarified—though not all that much, since you still seem to think that whining, passive-aggression, and dumbassery are inaccurate terms when it comes to this thread or group—and defined because you
a. you did not react histrionically even when perceiving an insult (that is, you did not whine),
b. you asked good faith questions about the statement instead of playing rhetorical games, nor did you insist on special rules for me that do not apply to other people who make similar claims (that is, you were not passive aggressive),
and c. you didn’t say anything obviously stupid, such as misidentifying a post that annoyed me or claiming that it is ridiculous that grown-ass adults who spend a lot of time online pretending to be intelligent and well-read would know something about a major world religion (that is, you did not make any dumbass comments).
When people whine, behave passive-aggressively, or are dumbasses when speaking to others, they will generally not find clarity or definition. Of course, the passive-aggressives aren’t actually seeking clarity or definition; the other two groups are just their own worst obstacles to the search.
snowcrash: FwiW, I didn’t take it as obviously sarcastic – I figured you were trying (very hard!) to offend people on some aspect of a discussion they were having.
Is the latter supposed to suggest that the comment isn’t sarcastic? (Serious question, since apparently you need it.) That sounds just downright unrealistic. Really, sarcasm is often used to offend people on some level. Thanks snowcrash, your comments are always sooooooo insightful. What would we do without yooooooou?
To use something similar to your VD analogy, remember when Torgersen summed up a bunch of criticisms he received as “YOU WERE ASKING FOR IT” or whatever? *That’s* what you were doing.
Actually, I really don’t remember that. But no, that isn’t what I was doing. See below!
You then proceded to flail blindly with everything from “Oooh, look at oppression inherent in Islamic art” to “I DON’T CARE” (not actual quotes, but that’s what you’re initial posts summed up to) just to muddy the waters regarding your initial complaint/ snark/ inaccurate summation.
Neither the quotes are accurate, even as paraphrases, nor are your claims that I was doing something both blindly and toward a goal of muddying the waters—which is a pretty basic contradiction there. Either I was flailing blindly, or I was working purposefully just to muddy the waters—or perhaps neither (which since you disagree, you can’t contemplate). But you can’t have me flailing blindly on purpose in order to achieve a very specific goal.
But here’s a little example of what I’ve been luring out of people: I did make a negative remark about the Islamic art hanging in the Hagia Sophia. That is worlds apart from claiming that Islamic art is inherently oppressive. That’s a little strawman you built for me. Whether it’s built from ignorance or design I don’t know, but I bet I can find out by the afternoon. Do you know anything about the Hagia Sophia? Why do you think Islamic art (as opposed to byzantine art, or secular art, or a pair of stuffed whales) was hung there? Why might that precise bit of Islamic art be a very strange thing to flash in a conversation where someone just objected to the rhetorical treatment of icons?
Maybe you do know (in which case suggesting that I was making some essentialist remark about Islamic art in general is just you being a cock) or maybe you don’t (which means you’re just blithely making ignorant comments about 400 years of occupation and mass murder unto genocide), but the important thing is…what? Insisting that I’m the jerk? Good luck with that, when you start off with bullshit like “Oooh, look at oppression inherent in Islamic art”.
That’s not me shouting “YOU WERE ASKING FOR IT” it’s me asking, “Wow, are you really like that? Really really? Let me see one more time?” and then deciding, “Hmm, well, looks like you are just like that after all.”
@Nick
I’m taking from this that it was the lack of any of your a), b) or c) in my comment led to you being prepared to fully reply?
If I’m correct in that, was it any of a), b) or c) that led you to decline to reply to this query?
Wait, what ‘special rules’?
On the subject of “obviously stupid,” we all know that basically iconography is to icons as cartography is to carts, right?
And for that matter the word “icon” when used to refer to Orthodox icons is a bit of a faux amis since when it was first used in the 19th century it was transliterated as “ikon” or “eikon” and only later was spelled as “icon.”
@Shao Ping
That ones sort of been clarified – there are two definitions of iconography, one that I think most people are using (and none of them have contradicted me yet), the art history one, and one that refers specifically to the creation of Byzantine or Orthodox icons, which is probably what kicked this off in the first place, although mostly I’ve only had evasions and comments about sculpture in reply to that.
Meredith: I’m pretty sure there is no meaning of iconography that refers to Byzantine or Orthodox art. Iconography only means “A pictorial representation, delineation; a drawing or plan” (a now obsolete meaning) or “The description or illustration of any subject by means of drawings or figures; any book or work in which this is done; also, the branch of knowledge which deals with the representation of persons or objects by any application of the arts of design.”
It never has and still does not have anything to do with Orthodox icons.
ETA: quotes are from the OED
@Shao Ping
Here:
And here:
It isn’t the standard or primary term, but it does seem to be one.
Then I stand corrected (and the OED online needs to be updated), though that certainly wasn’t the meaning originally used, which has nothing to do with Orthodox icons.
@Shao Ping
I’m pretty sure most people are familiar with and were using the art history term, and that’s why there was so much confusion about why someone would say a discussion of iconography necessarily had to include icons. I only found the other one when I was looking iconography up to check meanings before making a comment roughly along the lines of – A discussion about icons probably has to include iconography, but a discussion about iconography doesn’t have to include icons – but then I found the other definition and thought drawing attention to that would be more useful in alleviating confusion. (Last page of comments or something? Not sure.) It didn’t work, but that was my reasoning, anyway.
ETA: Honestly, I’m not sure the icons-iconography definition is widely enough used to put in the OED. It seems fairly clear that that definition is primarily a non-standard definition used in translated works, perhaps because there isn’t an English word for the production of icons.
It means exactly what it means – that it was meant to offend/ get a rise out of people. Whether it was sarcastic or whether it was a sincerely held belief of yours is meaningless to me, and I don’t bother with it. Clearly it means a great deal to you. Good luck with that.
True that (and finally I get an inkling of what a good editor is supposed to do!). I’ll go with the option quoted, which is still what I got from those comments.
I know as much about it as I do about Masjid Babri, and I care equally as much for the narrative surrounding *that* as I do for the narrative you claim.
Meredith on September 28, 2015 at 1:40 am said:
@Shao Ping
I’m pretty sure most people are familiar with and were using the art history term, and that’s why there was so much confusion about why someone would say a discussion of iconography necessarily had to include icons. I only found the other one when I was looking iconography up to check meanings before making a comment roughly along the lines of – A discussion about icons probably has to include iconography, but a discussion about iconography doesn’t have to include icons – but then I found the other definition and thought drawing attention to that would be more useful in alleviating confusion. (Last page of comments or something? Not sure.) It didn’t work, but that was my reasoning, anyway.
ETA: Honestly, I’m not sure the icons-iconography definition is widely enough used to put in the OED. It seems fairly clear that that definition is primarily a non-standard definition used in translated works, perhaps because there isn’t an English word for the production of icons.
Yeah, I did a dictionary run too, but there’s a strong don’t interrupt me with facts, I’m too busy reacting thing going on.
It’s Humpty Dumpty all the way down, with a few rousing bouts of And Another Thing I Think.
Boring.
Mark,
In that case, you appeared to be asking me to be more specific on behalf of people already engaging in a, b, c. In the post I did bother to respond to, you spelled out a rational position first on your own behalf.
Meredith,
One special rule that applied only to me is one you formulated: specifically the idea that it is less respectable to claim “I’m not here to educate you” in communal spaces (which this space is not anyway) as opposed to one’s own space. I seriously doubt you’d continue to claim such a general principle in actually communal spaces—say, a public park or the street—for any person who is not me. As you should! I can think of few things more potentially embarrassing than the image of someone walking up to, say, a Muslim woman in some form of head-covering on the public street, and asking “Why are you dressed like that?” innocently or not.
Snow:
I know as much about it as I do about Masjid Babri, and I care equally as much for the narrative surrounding *that* as I do for the narrative you claim.
What narrative did I claim? I only know the one you manufactured for me: that Islamic art is inherently oppressive. For the record, no art is inherently oppressive—though it can be used oppressively. Hanging the art of Religion B in the conquered home of Religion A is an example of that. I also don’t see how Hagia Sophia is like Babri Masjid: in the latter, there is a controversy over whether Hindu use of the site predates Islamic use of the site. In the former, it was a Christian site taken over by Muslims; Mehmed II didn’t claim that the site was any prior Muslim site, though it was apparently a propaganda belief that the first Muslim to pray there (ie., take Constantinople) would be guaranteed paradise. The current controversy over whether the bill turning HS the mosque into a secular museum was forged is essentially an internal Turkish political struggle, and while I’d prefer a secular democratic Turkey to one organized along Muslim religious grounds, that has nothing to do with the art.
PS: this is such grotesque shit:
I’m pretty sure most people are familiar with and were using the art history term, and that’s why there was so much confusion about why someone would say a discussion of iconography necessarily had to include icons.
I didn’t object to the term iconography or to the post that originally contained the term iconography. I spelled out, hours ago, the two posts that I objected to (and a third that appeared while I was typing my objection), though it is obvious which ones I objected to did because a. I objected within minutes of them going up, and b. I had an interaction with the author of one of them, which a number of people then guessed was a “victory condition” for me (speaking of passive-aggression) and c.I had ignored the “iconography” comment to the point of d. bringing up another subject instead. The posts I objected to specifically talked about iconographic reproductions of a notional religious figure in the manner of icons.
The idea that “iconography” as a term excludes icons when specifically talking about how the Blessed Laura Resnick was to be consistently depicted in art is ludicrous.
@Nick
The one where you reduce the Hagia Sophia to “a reminder of the slaughter and oppression of millions…“. I tend to have issues with such beliefs of persecution-football even when it’s sincerely held by someone. When it’s being mouthed off by someone trying to get a rise out of people, I find it irksome. That’s on me I guess.
Oh. And regarding me “manufacturing a narrative” for you – I think the quote of mine you’re referring to is““Oooh, look at oppression inherent in Islamic art”” (among other things).
How good are your sarcasm detectors Nick, for someone engaging online in 2015?
Snowcrash:
The one where you reduce the Hagia Sophia to “a reminder of the slaughter and oppression of millions…”.
Never happened. I never reduced HS to that—I was making a specific reference to the photo of the specific art hanging in the museum.
I tend to have issues with such beliefs of persecution-football even when it’s sincerely held by someone.
I’ll be sure to keep that in mind when reading your comment from now on, to see how consistent you are. Please remember to roll your eyes and snort and say “Not that again!” if the Holocaust ever comes up in conversation.
Oh. And regarding me “manufacturing a narrative” for you – I think the quote of mine you’re referring to is““Oooh, look at oppression inherent in Islamic art”” (among other things).
How good are your sarcasm detectors Nick, for someone engaging online in 2015?
Doing well, thanks. I wasn’t confused as to your sarcasm; I objected to it. And since you non-sarcastically just claimed that I reduce[d] the Hagia Sophia to “a reminder of the slaughter and oppression of millions…“ I was clearly right to do so.
@Nick
No, I was asking on my own behalf, which I think is a typical default assumption.
My mistake then, do I don’t think it is a default assumption when Person X intervenes in a conversation between Person A and B demanding clarification and Person C demurring that Person X is speaking only for himself.
PS: one need only look at the last day of comments to note that the nitpicking I predicted has come to pass.
So wait – being sarcastic is not a free pass for jumping to conclusions or inaccurately summing up what went on before?
Well, damn.
I’d take that as an acknowledgment that you were wrong to characterize my comment as reducing Hagia Sophia to a reminder of slaughter and wrong to characterize my view of Islamic Art as inherently oppressive, but I know you don’t mean it. Pretty cool swipes against two religions though; maybe one day you’ll be on stage at the Hugo Awards.
@Nick
Perhaps this is nitpicking, but I have to ask if saying “Perhaps you could be more specific?” qualifies as me demanding?
It’s a bit imperious. Compare it to:
“I don’t understand; please explain?”
Gee, I wonder what I meant by “…even when it’s sincerely held by someone. When it’s being mouthed off by someone trying to get a rise out of people, I find it irksome.”
This has been quite illustrative, and it’s certainly reinforced my believe that there is nothing that can stop someone who’s decided they need to be offended.
Are you pretending to be stupid, or are you really just completely lost?
Seriously: summarize what you think my objection to being told that I reduced HS to a reminder of slaughter and oppression is, in your own words. It’s an open-book test, so feel free to read prior comments.
@Nick
I see “more specific” as functionally equivalent to “please explain” in this particular instance – I was (ahem) specifying what species of explanation I thought was needed – which leaves us with “I don’t understand”, which I would suggest is already implicit in a query of that sort.
It seems to me that you chose to cast my words in an unnecessarily hostile light.
What made your request imperious is that it was a prod rather than a question.
“Perhaps you could make a titch less noise?” is different than “I’m sorry, could you please be quieter; I need silence right now.”
@Nick
Which of your examples is the good one?
I am sure you already know my answer.
@Nick
I asked because it wasn’t clear to me.
I’m sorry, I cannot help you. It is obvious that the former formulation, which begins with “Perhaps”, is much more similar than to “Perhaps” utterance—which I already described as imperious—than the second formulation is.
@Nick
On the contrary, you did help, by clarifying.
So, is the difference (at least in part) the element of explanation or context: “I don’t understand” “I need silence right now”