(1) Laura J. Mixon’s Hugo speech and a great deal more commentary at – “Acceptance Speech Online! And Other Post-Hugo Neepery”
Tonight, I honor Rochita Loenen-Ruiz, Tricia Sullivan, Athena Andreadis, Rachel Manija Brown, Kari Sperring, Liz Williams, Hesychasm, Cindy Pon, and the many others targeted for abuse, whose experiences I documented in my report last fall. They’re great writers and bloggers—read their works!
Thanks go to those who stood up for them: Tade Thompson, Victor Fernando R. Ocampo, Patrick and Teresa Nielsen Hayden, Pat Cadigan, Sherwood Smith, and Nalo Hopkinson. Read their works too!
Thanks also to those who helped me with my research behind the scenes. You know who you are, and we wouldn’t be here with you, either. Thanks to George RR Martin, who boosted me for this award, and to all who voted for me.
I wrote my report out of love for this community. Out of a rejection of abusive behavior and the language of hate. There’s room for all of us here. But there is no middle ground between “we belong here” and “no you don’t,” which is what I hear when people disrespect members of our community. I believe we must find non-toxic ways to discuss our conflicting points of view. I plan to keep working toward that, in ways true to my own values and lived experiences. And I hope you all will, too. Science fiction and fantasy literature is our common bond and our common legacy. It belongs to all of us. Those who deny that do great harm.
I see our conflict as a reflection of a much larger societal struggle, as Robert Silverberg referred to, and I stand with people from marginalized groups who seek simply to be seen as fully human. Black lives matter. Thank you.
(2) Melina on Subversive Reader – “A Letter To ‘Old’ Hugo Voters from a ‘New’ Hugo Voter”
- We don’t necessarily bring the same schema to our voting as you do
Part of being part of a community for a while means you start knowing the players. You know that Joanne Bloggs edits for that publisher, and Jane Smith worked with those people who love her. As a new voter, you don’t necessarily know that – it’s possible that the new voter is dipping their toes into the inner circle of knowledge for the very first time.
This is where the packet is a brilliant idea – all the information a new voter needs to fairly judge a person or piece of writing against others. Except, in 2015, there were times when the packet just sucked (and I’m not just talking about the writing). Several of the awards ask us to judge a person’s output over a year – best editors, best fan writer, the art awards etc. And while some categories did this well (the art categories) others provided little or no example of what the nominees were achieving.
This is especially clear in the editing categories. I’ve heard a number of commentators complaining that these categories shouldn’t have been No Awarded without any of them acknowledging that the packets were either thin on quality work or pretty much non existent. Additionally, there weren’t a lot of credible commentators advocating that we vote for one editor or another. So how is a new voter supposed to know that we should vote for a certain editor without evidence or advocacy?
- No Award is not a tragedy or unethical
The option to use No Award is brilliant. It allows us to consider the works that are nominated, judge them according to our own criteria and say ‘nope’ when we think the work doesn’t reach the level a Hugo winner should reach. It’s like the perfect anti bell-curve mechanism.
So, when a No Award is awarded, it’s not a tragedy. It’s the voters, as a group, saying yeah, no, none of the nominated work was good enough. We’re not going to lower our standards just because that’s what was nominated. Try again next year.
Standards are fabulous. It makes sure that we’re celebrating the very best. It shows that we really value excellence in the winners.
Yes there were a lot of No Awards in 2015. That’s because the work nominated was not of a high enough quality to win or got on the ballot in a way we do not agree with as a community. Our standards are high and we should be proud of that.
(3) It’s a theory —
https://twitter.com/Grummz/status/637672487317192704
(4) CBC Radio’s news program As It Happens did an interview with Mary Robinette Kowal about the Puppies on August 28, so I’m told. I haven’t listened to it myself. The link to the program is here. Kowal reportedly begins at 16:40.
Hugo Awards flap
A group of angry reactionaries tries to hijack the biggest awards in science fiction and fantasy — but it turns out there’s no space for their opinions.
(5) Elizabeth Bear on Charlie’s Diary – “How I learned to stop worrying and love the concept of punitive slating…”
The Rabid Puppies, though, are self-declared reavers out to wreck the Hugos for everybody. I think their organizer Vox Day has made himself a laughingstock, personally—he’s been pitching ill-thought-out tantrums in SFF since before 2004, and all he ever brings is noise. But he and his partisans seem to be too ego-invested to admit they’re making fools of themselves, so they’ll never quit.
So it’s totally possible that the Rabid Puppy organizers and voters, in the spirit of burning it all down, would nominate a slate consisting of the sort of vocal anti-slate partisans who could conceivably swing legitimate Hugo nominations on fan support, having a track record of the same.
I’m talking about people such as our good host Charlie Stross, John Scalzi, George R.R. Martin, Patrick Nielsen Hayden, and myself. Or just, you know, people they hate—the categories overlap. The goal here would be to then attempt to either force us to withdraw or refuse nominations to prove our lack of hypocrisy, or for fandom to again No Award the whole process. This is the Human Shield option, which—in a slightly different application—is what led to the inclusion on the Rabid Puppy slate of uninvolved parties such as Marko Kloos, Annie Bellet, Black Gate, Jim Minz, and so on in 2015.
This possibility concerns me a bit more, but honestly, I think it’s pretty easy to manage. First of all, I’m going to state up front that I will never willingly participate in a slate. If I learn that I have been included on a slate, I will ask to be removed, and I will bring as much force to bear on that issue as I legally can.
Additionally, I’m going to rely on the discretion of readers and fans of goodwill, who I think are pretty smart people. If you see my name on a slate, please assume that it’s being done by ruiners to punish me, and that whoever put it there has ignored my requests to remove it. I have nothing but contempt for that kind of behavior, and I’m frankly not going to do anything to please them at all.
(6) Ann Leckie – “On Slates”
First off, I deplore slates. In the context of the Hugos, they are an asshole move. Just don’t slate.
Second off, I am saying unequivocally that I do not agree to be on anyone’s slate, do not approve of my inclusion in any slate, and anyone who slates a work of mine is thereby demonstrating their extra-strong motivation to be seen as an asshole.
Now, there’s some concern that assholes making up a slate for next year would deliberately include the work of people they hate, in order to force those people to withdraw any nominations they might get. This might be a genuine concern for some writers. It is not one of mine.
(7) John Scalzi on Whatever – “Final(ish) Notes on Hugos and Puppies, (2015 Edition)”
[From the second of ten points.]
The going line in those quarters at the moment is that the blanket “No Award” just proves the Hugo Awards are corrupt. Well, no, that’s stupid. What the blanket “No Award” judgment shows is that the large mass of Hugo voters don’t like people trying to game the system for their own reasons that are largely independent of actual quality of work. In the Sad Puppy case the reasons were to vent anger and frustration at having not been given awards before, and for Brad Torgersen to try to boost his own profile as a tastemaker by nominating his pals (with a few human shields thrown in). In the Rabid Puppy case it was because Vox Day is an asshole who likes being an asshole to other people. And in both cases there was a thin candy shell of “Fuck the SJWs” surrounding the whole affair.
The shorter version of the above: You can’t game the system and then complain that people counteracting your gaming of the system goes to show the system is gamed. Or you can, but no one is obliged to take you seriously when you do.
(8) David Gerrold on Facebook
Given all those different belief systems, any attempt to discuss healing and recovery is likely to be doomed — because it’s no longer about “I’m right and you’re wrong” as much as it is about, “my story about all this is the only story.” That’s not just a difference of degree, it’s an attempt to control the paradigm in which all this is occurring.
Which brings me to the inescapable conclusion — if one person pees in the pool, we’re probably not going to notice it. But if we’re all peeing in the pool, it’s going to start stinking pretty bad.
There is a larger narrative — one that we seem to have forgotten. We are all fans because we are all enthralled by the sense of wonder that occurs when we read a good science fiction story or fantasy. Perhaps we came to this genre looking for escape, but ultimately what makes this genre special is that it’s about all the different possibilities. It’s about who we really want to be — it’s about the question, “What does it mean to be a human being?” Are we slans? Are we transhumans? Are we starship troopers?
As Tananarive said, “There are no final frontiers. There’s only the next one.”
That’s what SF is about — it’s about exploration, discovery, and stepping into the next possibility. Our awards are about excellence, innovation, and merit.
There is room in this community for everyone who brings their enthusiasm. We have steampunk and heroic engineers and fantasy fans and gothic horror and gender-punk and space opera and cyberpunk and deco-punk and alternate histories and utopias and dystopias and zombies and vampires and all the other different niches that make up this vast ecology of wonder.
None of us have the right to define SF — we each define it by what we read and what we write. None of us have the authority to demand or control the behavior of others. The best that any of us can do is recommend and invite. And yes, this is another narrative — a narrative of inclusion that stands in opposition to the narratives of division.
That’s the narrative I choose to live in.
(9) Jeffrey A. Carver on Pushing A Snake Up A Hill – “Sad Sad Puppies Affair – Sasquan Roundup, Part 2”
While I stand firmly with the rejection of the gaming effort of the SPs, I feel for those writers and editors who were hurt by the whole affair. Some innocent writers and editors were unwillingly associated with the puppies slate, because the SPs happened to like their work. Other worthy individuals were kept off the final ballot because of the stuffing. Still, the winning novel, The Three Body Problem, by Cixin Liu (translated by Ken Liu), got its place on the ballot because another author withdrew his work after receiving support from the stuffers. Some say that the Hugo Awards as an institution were strengthened by the voters’ repudiation of the attempt to game the system, and I hope that turns out to be true. But it’s hard to say that there were winners in the affected categories. Those writers who were shut out may get another chance, another year, and then again they may not. Either way, it has to hurt.
(10) Adam-Troy Castro – “These Are Not Reasons to Vote For Me For a Hugo”
Please don’t nominate me for a Hugo because you’re my friend on Facebook.
Please don’t nominate me for a Hugo because you’re my friend in real life.
Please don’t nominate me for a Hugo because we shared a great time at a convention.
Please don’t nominate me for a Hugo because I’m politically liberal and you like what I stand for.
Please don’t nominate me for a Hugo because my strongest opposition is politically conservative and you wish to oppose what they stand for.
Please don’t nominate me for a Hugo because it’s “my turn.”
(11) Adam-Troy Castro – “While I’m At It”
“I am among the finest writers working today.”
That, my friends, is the kind of statement that immediately casts doubt on itself.
(12) Sarah A. Hoyt on According To Hoyt – “I’ve Been To The Desert On A Horse With No Name”
Which brings me to: congratulations. You probably achieved at least half of your objective — to drive out the people who don’t think/act like you and aren’t part of your groups. It is heartily to be hoped you won’t live to regret it, but don’t bet on it.
So, the show over, and once I’d gotten over being both mad and sad but mostly sad, we started discussing (Kate and Amanda and I) operational details for next year. Stuff like how many noms, where do we get recommends, do all three of us have to read something before we recommend it, and oh, yeah, logo? patches? t-shirts? Incredibly threatening stuff like that, you know? Since Kate, Amanda and I routinely PM and send each other scads of emails everyday (otherwise known as being ‘thick as thieves’) including on all important topics such as “that cute thing the cat did yesterday”, it barely rose above the ambient noise.
So imagine our surprise when Kate got hacked on facebook, not once, not twice but three times in a 24 hour period and her account started spamming sunglass adds. Coincidence? I don’t know guys. One time, maybe. But three times, when Kate has pretty d*mn good security? Bah.
(13) Cedar Sanderson on Cedar Writes – “Muzzled Redux”
I still wholeheartedly support the idea of reclaiming the Hugo Awards for excellence above ‘connections’ and even more, the idea of making the Hugo Awards back into a ‘Best of’ rather than a tiny super-minority. I do support the idea of a diverse nomination pool. A really diverse one, where you don’t have to be ‘approved’ by the right people to be included. So it’s not that I was shut out.
Rather, due to full-time (plus some) school and family obligations that need my attention, I cannot afford the time to be slandered right now in public, and this is what will happen. Yes, I have to fear that from the people who are running the show right now. Doubt what I say? One of the people in the front lines, a Latina woman, was accused by a milk-white woman, of using an ethnic slur. Which confused the accused woman, since English is not her first language, maybe it meant something she didn’t know? No… it’s a standard identifier that had been used extensively in the military since the 1950s. The accuser was making up mud to fling and try to make it stick. You can see the inherent hypocrisy, and the reason I have to avoid the poo-flinging monkeys. The Sad Puppy movement supports me, knows what is happening in my life, but the other side? They wouldn’t care, and would no doubt use it as a tool to try and destroy me.
Pat Patterson in a comment on Cedar Writes
You know the scene in Henry V about the feast of St Crispan? I like the kenneth Branagh version, personally.
Well, on every instance of the Hugo awards, however long they last,
you will be able to strip your sleeve and show your scars and say “These wounds I had as a nominee for the Best Fan Writer Hugo,”
Old dogs forget; yet all shall be forgot,
But you’ll remember, with advantages,
What words you wrote this year. Then shall the names,
Familiar in your mouth as household words-
(14) Steven Brust on The Dream Café – “Who Really Runs the Hugo Awards?”
In a surprising development, the dispute among “Trufans” “SMOFS” “Sad Puppies” and “Rabid Puppies” has produced a result: We now know exactly who runs the Hugo Awards. It turns out to be Mrs. Gladys Knipperdowling, of Grand Rapids, Iowa.
Mrs. Knipperdowling, 81, came forward yesterday to reveal that she has personally chosen all Hugo winners and nominees since 1971 when her aunt Betty “got too old and cranky,” as she put it in an exclusive interview. “I wouldn’t have said anything about it,” she added, “but then I heard there was all of this trouble.”
Asked about the people usually accused of picking the Hugo winners, Mrs. Knipperdowling became confused. She claimed never to have heard of the Nielsen Haydens at all, and when John Scalzi was mentioned, she asked, “Is he the nice young man in the bow tie?”
(15) Dysfunctional Literacy – “I Am No Award!”
I’ve never heard of anybody named No Award, and I’ve never read anything by No Award, but No Award must be awesome.
No Award won so many honors because Hugo voters are in a big argument over stuff that non-Hugo voters don’t care about. Science fiction fans have always liked to argue about stuff that other people don’t care about. Before I was born, it was Jules Verne vs. H.G. Wells or Flash Gordon vs. Buck Rogers. When I was a kid, it was Star Wars vs. Star Trek or Marvel vs. DC. Today, science fiction fans are divided between social justice warriors and sad puppies.
[Thanks to Mark Dennehy, another Mark, Danny Sichel, and John King Tarpinian for some of these links. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Will R.]
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For Retro-Hugo for Short Dramatic Presentation, may I present for your consideration “The Shadow” radio show episode “The Laughing Death”? You can find it (and a whole lot of other Shadow episodes) HERE. It may well be the inspiration for Batman’s Joker, as it aired a few months before the Joker’s debut.
Camestros Felapton on August 31, 2015 at 12:06 pm said:
I’ve been thinking recently about the possibility of a “Life Work” award, something like the SFWA Grandmaster award, which would be open to authors, editors, publishers, art directors, etc.
It seemed to me, based on rhetoric that I read, that the sincere puppies (not the “make the SJWs’ heads explode” ones) this year nominated Toni Weisskopf and Sheila Gilbert, at least, and possibly others, not necessarily because of any specific work that they had done in 2014, but because they were deserving people who had done good work for a long time, and it was about time that X won a Hugo.
A Life Work Hugo would address this.
Cally on August 31, 2015 at 12:42 pm said:
I don’t see “The Laughing Death” at the link you provided; perhaps you mean “The Laughing Corpse”?
McJulie on August 31, 2015 at 6:51 am said:
I suspect the term you may be looking for is “house nigger“.
I wouldn’t know Sheila Gilbert was an editor if I hadn’t seen her mentioned in the author’s Acknowledgements of several books, most of them from the 80s.
Wrt Ancillary Justice and the pronouns: the use of “she” for everyone unless specified otherwise doesn’t bother me. I did have a moment of wondering which of the lieutenants was male at one point, but shrugged it off. (I also saw several written in the same time frame thank Virginia Kidd as their agent.)
I think those Puppies who haven’t read AJ may well have latched onto the lack of gender in Radchaai; I think those who have may be using for a smokescreen for other issues they have with it. It’s hard to miss the “some people just aren’t born to be in charge” and “those people don’t realize you have to work to get what you want” viewpoints put forth by characters as a mirror held up to people who say and believe the same things today. Add in that the empire isn’t presented as benign, even to the people it benefits, the perceived need to constantly expand the empire, and readers who want to believe in exceptionalism are going to feel mighty uncomfortable reading this book.
At this point, the Puppies are slinging shit just to sling shit.
Morris: Oops. You’re right, of course; the Shadow episode I’m recommending for Retro-Hugo is “The Laughing Corpse”, first aired on March 10, 1940. Stupid fingers decided to type the wrong word.
While there were some truly great SF radio shows, 1940 is just a tiny bit early for the best of them, alas. But the Shadow was often quite good.
@ascholl, I think there are three factors in the response to a slate: the existence of the slate, the contents of the slate, and the behavior of the proponents of the slate. Different segments of voters weight their tolerance for each of those buckets differently. A Friendly Puppies contingent out to make friends and raise the profile of their work would have tipped the scales for a subset of voters. A slate that focused on quality and nominated, for instance, short stories of the caliber of of Ben Bova’s Carbide-Tipped Pens hard SF anthology, while avoiding the appearance of cronyism, would tip the scales for a subset of voters. Given that the Puppies bottomed out on all three for most voters, it’s hard to tease apart what had the most impact, but I’m sure the numbers would have shifted some.
Neil Gaiman’s got a quote about making a career in the arts: People keep working… because their work is good, and because they are easy to get along with, and because they deliver the work on time. And you don’t even need all three. Two out of three is fine. People will tolerate how unpleasant you are if your work is good and you deliver it on time. They’ll forgive the lateness of the work if it’s good, and if they like you. And you don’t have to be as good as the others if you’re on time and it’s always a pleasure to hear from you.
Any group social situation is a bit like that, if you replace contractual deadlines with a more general “follow the social contract and help the group function more smoothly”. Nominate cleanly and be lovely to deal with, and a lot of people will give you a bit of a pass on the quality of the work. Nominate cleanly and champion great work, and you’ll get a bit of a pass for being an asshole. (Those two categories often include things like Doctor Who fans and their regular Doctor Who slot, or abrasive advocates of various flavors of underrepresented groups of authors.) Nominate in a way that breaks the social contract, and you need to both champion amazing stuff and be warmly thought-of in fandom. If your two good qualities are enough to make people not feel hard done by how bad your nominated work is, or how assholic your rhetoric is, or how you got on the ballot, it’ll put you on a relatively level playing field with everyone else.
The matter of removing and adding categories is fraught with issues. For example, while I personally think that they move in pairs, so I might draft them in a way that the deletion of one adds another, it would be perfectly logical to call for the two halves (the deletion and the addition) to be voted separately. Consequently, you could end up deleting some and adding others, and you could see a swing between -3 and +3 categories depending on what a pair of Business Meetings decided to do.
In fact, personally I think that Anthology and Magazine should be one category (it’s what Best Editor Short Form is supposed to recognize), but I doubt it would fly, so I gave up trying. I try not to back causes I don’t think have a chance of winning. (Popular Ratification was plausible, but I always knew it would be a hard sell.)
Oh, and in case anyone wonders: I don’t expect to be actually in the chain of command of next year’s Business Meeting. (I’ll probably end up as assistant Videographer, helping my wife get the various videos online as quickly as we can get them off the camera.) Therefore I’m not compromising myself by advocating proposals. The actual revamp of the MAC II Staff List will come later, so don’t take the current listing of me as deputy Chair that seriously.
Kevin Standlee on August 31, 2015 at 1:55 pm said:
Jared will Not Be Happy. I was present when he was explaining to someone that he had only agreed to be Chair on the condition that you would be there next to him to answer questions on procedure if necessary, because “I don’t know [expletive] everything”. His father immediately called for witnesses to this admission, and I commented that if he doesn’t know everything, he must not be as young as I thought.
@Kevin Standlee:
Use my name as co-sponsor if inclusion is useful. But of course you can get best mileage from past con chairs and division heads. Ditto upthread Best Publisher comments. Also, maybe you should consider separate deletion and addition motions?
Note to the assembled villainous horde: ‘Supporting’ Kevin’s motion divides into two subitems: seconding or voting for it, which requires attending the MAC2 Business Meeting, and being listed in its header as a co-sponsor, which doesn’t. The latter is practical politics: A motion bearing the endorsements of a dozen people widely seen as serious and informed people is more likely to be read fairly and considered than one that has just the proposer’s name on top.
Nell W: Tenser, said the Tensor. Tension, apprehension, and dissension have begun.
McJulie:
I was in the N.O.W. Contra Costa County Chapter at the time, and I really didn’t get it then, either. There was a (inaccurate) stereotype of backers being obnoxious and some sort of vague threat to equally vague family values. Ms. Schlafly — and I’ve been waiting since 1982 to use that coinage, so I thank you — seemed mostly valuable to opponents on a strictly image-marketing level, making a visceral limbic-system appeal to family and church loyalty. Look at the list of 15 states not ratifying, and four that rescinded, and you can see the pattern. Schlafly’s value-add, IMO, had nothing to do with anything particular she said, and everything to do with standing there looking and acting like a 1952 fossil.
A different — but overlapping? — hypothesis would be that the world’s Schlaflys are wanna-be Aunts from Atwood’s Republic of Gilead.
@Kstandlee / other people familiar with the WSFS-modified Robert’s:
Is a motion to sever (or divide) a constitutional amendment in order at any time?
I left the following comment on Dave Freer’s blog, awaiting moderation. After checking out the Locus list for 2015, I learned some fascinating stuff, and I inquired about swag from being in the File770 clique:
“Hi, Dave.
Serious question: While I’m tickled to think I’m now a member of the inner circle just by virtue of posting on File770, I am curious to know what benefits come with being in the inner clique, as I have not seen any yet. Will I get a book deal from Tor? Offered panel spots and free transportation to next year’s Worldcon? My SF screenplay optioned for money? Inquiring mind wants to know. If such a clique existed, I feel like I’d be Exhibit “A” for getting stuff–after all, I voted for EPH and set up the File770 meetup.
The term ‘slate’ is one Torgersen himself used, in his announcement entitled “Sad Puppies 3: The 2015 Hugo Slate.” Link below:
https://bradrtorgersen.wordpress.com/2015/02/01/sad-puppies-3-the-2015-hugo-slate/
The Locus List for 2015 has 27 sci-fi novels, 20+ fantasy novels, 13 novellas, 13 non-fiction books and 12 art books (for a combined total of 25 items potentially voteable in Best Related), and at least 35 novellettes. It is also worth noting that Locus lists no items for several Hugo categories (no editors, no dramatic presentations, no fan writers or fanzines) and multiple sublists with no corresponding Hugo (Anthologies, Collections, and Young Adult novels).
http://www.locusmag.com/Magazine/2015/02/2014-locus-recommended-reading-list/
Had the Sad Puppies “slate” had similar numbers of items to the Locus list, there are two very good reasons to believe no one would’ve been upset:
a) With that many unranked items, it would not have looked like an attempt to control 100% of the ballot.
b) With that many unranked items, SP3 wouldn’t have controlled 100% of the ballot.
Your attempt to compare Sad Puppies 3–with its careful, no more than 5-items per category–to Locus’ comparably giant list seems like a stretch, as does a failure to acknowledge that it was Brad himself who termed the enterprise a slate. Plenty of people would be mad at Locus if they suddenly switched to only 5 items per category and replicated a Hugo ballot.
You know who didn’t care about the Hugos in 2014? Me. I wasn’t following them at all, and if you’d ask me what File 770 was, I would’ve looked at you blankly and asked for Files 769 and 771. You don’t get much more neutral than completely uninvolved. And yet, here we are. You already *have* gotten the moderates involved. If they got involved on the other side, that’s on you for posting factually-challenged stuff like the above.
Unless, of course, I get a book deal from Tor in the next 24 hours, in which case I will withdraw this entire comment and sincerely apologize. “
Laura Resnick: I am among the finest blushers and shufflers of my generation.
You forgot #inallmodesty
Wait, what? John C. Wrong is now saying bad things about pterry?
I mean, I’m not surprised, but still. And yet the Pups lament mightily that pterry never got a Hugo, ignoring the fact that he turned down every nomination offered.
(I met him once, in the huckster’s room at a Worldcon. He laughed at something I said. I was thrilled, in all modesty.)
Holy bleep. Cat Rambo’s story “You Have Always Lived in the Castle.” Holy bleeping bleep.
It is very short. And amazing. Read it now.
http://dailysciencefiction.com/science-fiction/other-worlds-sf/cat-rambo/you-have-always-lived-in-the-castle
Courtesy Laura Gjovaag off her realtegan blog entry.
@Devin:
ObDisclaimer: I am nobody’s idea of an Emergency Holographic Standlee and am glad other people are willing to be parliamentarians, but I do have the WSFS Standing Rules and other stuff (as they stood at the beginning of Sasquan) and Robert’s Rules Newly Revised 11th Edition in front of me. Standing Rule 5.2 says ‘Motions to Amend the Constitution, to Ratify a Constitutional Amendment […] shall be considered ordinary main motions, except as otherwise provided in the Standing Rules or Constitution.’
Robert’s Rules section 27 covers Division of a Question, and starts out:
The further details are way too long to quote here, and there are fiddly details including what other motions it takes precedence over, it appears to be in order any time except when some other motion takes precedence over it. The motion to divide is classed as an ‘incidental motion’, which is a subclass of ‘secondary motion’. In general, secondary motions can be made and considered while a main motion is pending, and must be acted upon or disposed of before direct consideration of the main question can be continued.
Your question would be better answered by someone who truly groks Robert’s Rules, but I’ve at least taken a shot at it for you.
(I know the fact that I bothered to have a copy of Robert’s Rules Newly Revised with me and make sure it was the exact revision WSFS uses makes me suspect of parliamentarian tendencies, but they’re of strictly duffer grade.)
lurkertype on August 31, 2015 at 5:15 pm said:
The context is one of Wright’s blogposts. In the comment section to said post, Wright typed:
The “old man” Wright speaks of was Terry Pratchett.
Kevin Standlee said:
Seems like a good idea, and given the history of these awards you gave, I think it would make sense to have all these deletions and additions in a single proposal — with the exception of adding Best Publisher, which seems to me to be out of place.
If someone wanted to add a Best Publisher award category, it would be better to do that in a separate proposal. (My first reaction is that it wouldn’t be a good idea, due to the difficulty of voting — shouldn’t one read all or the majority of the works of all the final-ballot publishers in order to be able to vote?)
Well, in this particular case, with the exception of Best Publisher, I think it would actually be better to have all the changes in one proposal, because the deletions and additions are intended as replacements, not as independent of each other.
I’m not sure if it would help any, as I’m an unknown in fandom, but I’d be happy to co-sponsor your proposal, provided it did not include the addition of the Best Publisher category — which I think would hinder the proposal’s chances.
Robert Sneddon said:
Agreed.
And the “pure evil” Wright was condemning was Pratchett saying that he would choose to end his life while he was still capable of making that choice, rather than wait until the Alzheimer’s destroyed him.
Vicki Rosenzweig on August 31, 2015 at 6:17 pm said:
[nods] Yep. It’s all of a piece with Wright’s… peculiar form of Xtianity. I am given to understand that the no suicide! we really mean it! thing wasn’t part of the Xtianity beta-test. If I’ve got it right, the no-suicide rule was added on only after somebody realized that if you teach your followers to believe there is a Wonderful Existence waiting for them after they croak off, those followers might just decide why wait? let’s go for Heaven right now!…
The reason I included Best Publisher is that for the most part (with exceptions), Best Editor Long Form is a proxy for Best Publisher. In fact, all six categories I suggest are pairs, albeit not perfect ones:
Semiprozine + (some of) Editor Short Form = Best Professional Magazine
(Some of ) Editor Short Form = Anthology or Collection
Editor Long Form = Publisher
All three of the new categories have the advantage that the people making nominations are much more likely to be able to tell whether something fits into the category, if you define Professional Magazine as “Pays contributors in anything other than copies of the publication.” If you’re paid, it’s professional, whether or not it’s a SFWA-qualifying market or not, since WSFS isn’t responsible to SFWA or vice versa. Anthologies/Collections are relatively easy to figure out. Publishers merely need the disambiguation such as Tor/Tor UK, which almost certainly is easier than figuring out who the editors of a given book from a publisher that doesn’t include the editor credit is.
Robert B Finegold, M.D. I found the confrontations and unethical behaviors on-line and at Worldcon both distressing and disappointing. The nominees are fellow human beings and the Golden Rule applies, but sadly was not. Mr. Resnick, Mr. Anderson, and my friend and young talent Ms Kary Fisher deserved better. They are all Hugo worthy.
Firstly, Mike Resnick is certainly a Hugo-worthy editor, he’s already been nominated for it a couple of times. But a lot of people have openly said that they struggle to vote in the Editor categories because of lack of information. And a lot of other people have openly said that they vote No Award in those categories, because they don’t feel they should exist due to being hugely problematic for voters. It’s not your purview to tell those people they are wrong for voting the way they did. And I’m pretty sure that Resnick, who is a true-blue SFF fan from way back, would rather, if he won, that it would have been on his own very real merits rather than because of a slate.
Secondly, your argument seems to be that because Anderson and English are nice human beings, their nominated works were Hugo-worthy. But in fact, there were numerous reviews and comments posted here and all over the Internet from people who read those works and felt that, in English’s case, the story showed promise but did not measure up to Hugo-nominee-quality, and in Anderson’s case, while he may have produced Hugo-quality works, The Dark Between the Stars was most definitely not one of them.
You are certainly entitled to have a different opinion. But you don’t get to condemn a lot of other SFF fans because they disagreed with you. It seems to me that’s also a violation of the Golden Rule — if you want other people to respect your opinions of given Hugo-nominated works, you need to respect theirs, even when those opinions differ from yours.
I’d like to go through this again and sort by category and add links where something is available free on places like Project Gutenberg, but that will take longer if I get to it at all. In the mean time, 1940 recs&publications:
Slan by A. E. van Vogt (Steve Wright&Kyra&paulcarp&David T.)
Grey Lensman by E. E. Smith (Steve Wright)
Requiem by Robert A. Heinlein (Steve Wright&Lyle&David T.)
Darker Than You Think by Jack Williamson (Steve Wright&Shambles&lurkertype)
Pat the Bunny by Dorothy Kunhardt (very funny, Jack Lint)
Synthetic Men of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs (Jack Lint&JJ)
Robbie or Strange Bedfellow by Isaac Asimov (Mark&Kyra)
The Roads Must Roll by Robert A. Heinlein (Mark&Lyle&Kyra&Jim Henley&David T.)
The Roaring Trumpet by L. Sprague de Camp and Fletcher Pratt (Kyra&Michael Eochaidh)
The Mathematics of Magic by L. Sprague de Camp and Fletcher Pratt (Kyra&Michael Eochaidh)
Incomplete Enchanter or Incompleat Enchanter (the combined version of The Roaring Trumpet and The Mathematics of Magic) by L. Sprague de Camp and Fletcher Pratt (Shambles&bloodstone75&lurkertype)
Twice in Time by Manly Wade Wellman (JJ)
Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius by Jorge Luis Borges (von Dimpleheimer&Steve Wright&Michael Eochaidh&Jim Henley)
Locked Out by H. B. Fyre (von Dimpleheimer)
All Aboard for Ararat by H. G. Wells (Steve Wright, with caveat)
Ill-Made Knight by TH White (Shambles)
All-Star Comics #3 – the first appearance of the JSA (Laura “Tegan” Gjovaag)
Dark Mission by Lester del Rey (Kyra)
The Stars Look Down by Lester del Rey (Kyra)
The Pipes of Pan by Lester del Rey (Kyra)
Dragon Moon by Henry Kuttner (Kyra)
Beauty and the Beast by Henry Kuttner (Kyra)
Creature From Beyond Infinity or A Million Years to Conquer by Henry Kuttner (Shambles&Kyra&bloodstone75)
Song in a Minor Key by C. L. Moore (Kyra)
Fruit of Knowledge by C. L. Moore (Kyra)
All is Illusion by Henry Kuttner and C. L. Moore (Kyra)
If This Goes On— by Robert A. Heinlein (Lyle&Kyra&lurkertype&David T.)
Coventry by Robert A. Heinlein (Lyle&Kyra&David T.)
Blowups Happen by Robert A. Heinlein (Lyle&Kyra&David T.)
Robert A. Heinlein: Fan Writer (Lyle)
Ray Bradbury: Fan Writer (Lyle)
Arthur C Clarke: Fan Writer (Lyle)
Bob Tucker: Fan Writer (Lyle)
Farewell to the Master by Harry Bates (Steve Wright)
Butyl and the Breather by Theodore Sturgeon (Kyra)
Mahout by Theodore Sturgeon (Kyra)
The Long Arm by Theodore Sturgeon (Kyra)
The Man on the Steps by Theodore Sturgeon (Kyra)
Punctuational Advice by Theodore Sturgeon (Kyra)
Derm Fool by Theodore Sturgeon (Kyra)
Place of Honor by Theodore Sturgeon (Kyra)
He Shuttles by Theodore Sturgeon (Kyra)
It by Theodore Sturgeon (Kyra)
The Black Lodge by Robert Weinberg (bloodstone75)
The Last Man by Alfred Noyes (bloodstone75)
The Twenty-Fifth Hour by Nermer Best (bloodstone75)
Magic, Inc by Robert A. Heinlein (Kyra)
Let There Be Light by Robert A. Heinlein (Kyra)
Successful Operation by Robert A. Heinlein (Kyra)
Half Breed by Isaac Asimov (Kyra)
Half Breeds on Venus by Isaac Asimov (Kyra)
Homo Sol by Isaac Asimov (Kyra)
Ring Around the Sun by Isaac Asimov (Kyra)
The Callistan Menace by Isaac Asimov (Kyra)
The Magnificant Possession by Isaac Asimov (Kyra)
The Hardwood Pile by L. Sprague de Camp (Kyra)
The Warrior Race by L. Sprague de Camp (Kyra)
Asokore Power by L. Sprague de Camp (Kyra)
The Flight of the Good Ship Clarissa by Ray Bradbury (Kyra)
Luana the Living by Ray Bradbury (Kyra)
The Piper by Ray Bradbury (Kyra)
It’s Not the Heat, It’s the Hu— by Ray Bradbury (Kyra)
Teacup Trouble by Fredric Brown (Kyra)
The Sea Thing by A. E. van Vogt (Kyra)
Vault of the Beast by A. E. van Vogt (Kyra)
Martian Quest by Leigh Brackett (Kyra)
The Treasure of Ptakuth by Leigh Brackett (Kyra)
The Tapestry Gate by Leigh Brackett (Kyra)
At the Mountains of Murkiness by Arthur C Clarke (Kyra)
Guinea Pig, Ph.D. by Alfred Bester (Kyra)
Voyage to Nowhere by Alfred Bester (Kyra)
Evening Primrose by John Collier (Kyra)
Another American Tragedy by John Collier (Kyra)
Thus I Refute Beelzy by John Collier (Kyra)
A Word to the Wise by John Collier (Kyra)
The Chaser by John Collier (Kyra)
Typewriter in the Sky by L. Ron Hubbard (Lin McAllister)
Kallocain by Karin Boye (Hampus Eckerman)
Donovan’s Brain by Curt Siodmak (Hampus Eckerman – but the publication date appears to be 1942)
The Invention of Morel by Adolfo Bioy Casares (Shao Ping)
—
Labyrinths by Jorge Luis Borges (Doctor Science) – if there’s an anthology category
—
Edmund Hamilton/L. Ron Hubbard/Margaret Brundage all got more general “hey they wrote stuff” pointers from various people, and Maximilian is voting for Heinlein. All of it, as far as I could tell from his comment.
—
Lyle collected some stuff together for Dramatic Presentation:
Films
Pinocchio
Fantasia (lurkertype)
The Invisible Man Returns
The Invisible Woman
One Million BC
The Thief of Baghdad (Joe H.)
Serials
Flash Gordon Conquers the Universe
The Green Hornet Strikes Again
The Shadow (Cally puts in a word for the episode The Laughing Corpse)
Mysterious Doctor Satan
Radio
The Adventures of Superman
Buck Rogers
Captain Midnight
—
And I couldn’t figure out whether Andrew M was recommending anything, so here have a quote!
@JJ:
+1. I thought Ancillary Justice was brilliant; head and shoulders above the other Best Novel nominees that year. I can’t recall the exact quote, but the Sad Puppies claimed that it only won because of fraud. That’s not just an insult to Ann Leckie and LonCon, but to everyone else who thought it was a fantastic book.
Re anti-feminist women: Barbara Ehrenreich, in The Hearts of Men, describes the “male revolt” against traditional masculine responsibility (i.e., the duty to marry and support a wife and children) that preceded the feminist movement. She suggests in the final chapter that women who oppose feminism are really hoping to undo that male revolt.
“The Shadow” show I recommended is a radio show, just so you get your categories right.
Speaking as an old time radio fan who’s listened to a heck of a lot of old shows:
There was also a Flash Gordon radio show, but it was a few years earlier.
Green Hornet: The only science-fictional stuff in the Green Hornet radio shows is the gas gun. Mostly he’s taking on mobsters and conmen and the occasional racketeer. Not many 1940 episodes of the Green Hornet survive, but you can find the ones which did here: https://archive.org/details/TheGreenHornet
(note: I find the classic view of archive.org easiest to navigate. Look to the upper right corner of the screen.)
Superman: Unquestionably SF. All the 1940 shows are basically cliffhanger serials, not stand-alones. You can find them here: https://archive.org/details/Superman_page01 and https://archive.org/details/Superman_page02 Since it’s not immediately obvious, I should tell you “The Howling Coyote” serial crosses over into 1941.
Buck Rogers: Radio show not eligible. All the radio episodes I’m aware of are from 1939.
I wouldn’t personally call Captain Midnight science fiction. There’s very little super-science stuff, especially in 1940. It’s Boy’s Adventure Fiction, which is close, but not the same.
I’ve found another possible Hugo nominee for Dramatic Presentation Short Form: “My Client Curly”, broadcast as part of the Columbia Workshop anthology show on April 04, 1940. MP3 available HERE.
It’s a fantasy of the Tall Tale school, but well done.
Whee! I’ve got a comment awaiting moderation, no doubt because of all the links to places where you can listen to radio shows from 1940.
Wow.
I know many people who died of Alzheimer’s, and not once did it even cross my mind to smack them across the face, much less have to restrain myself from it and then tell everyone about it. I must be a saint by that qualification. In all honesty, I am therefore the Bestest Christian Evar! And the most modest! I don’t smack dying old people, yay me! she said humbly.
He is a terrible Catholic, always saying stuff the Church forbids, in a way that they forbid. Guess he didn’t pay any attention in catechism.
I thought English’s story was serviceable and well-written, but not that it was anywhere near Hugo-quality. It didn’t suck, but that alone doesn’t get you a Hugo.
I remember Bob Tucker fondly (smooooooth) and will be nominating him for Retro Fan Writer.
clicks over to document, makes notes from Meredith’s list.
Here’s a version of my post without the links. To find links, look about three entries above this once it’s released from moderation.
“The Shadow” show I recommended is a radio show, just so you get your categories right.
Speaking as an old time radio fan who’s listened to a heck of a lot of old shows:
There was also a Flash Gordon radio show, but it was a few years earlier.
Green Hornet: The only science-fictional stuff in the Green Hornet radio shows is the gas gun. Mostly he’s taking on mobsters and conmen and the occasional racketeer. Not many 1940 episodes of the Green Hornet survive, but you can find the ones which did at archive dot org.
(note: I find the classic view of archive dot org easiest to navigate. Look to the upper right corner of the screen.)
Superman: Unquestionably SF. All the 1940 shows are basically cliffhanger serials, not stand-alones. You can find them at archive dot org, too, looking for “Superman page 01” and “page 02” Since it’s not immediately obvious, I should tell you “The Howling Coyote” serial crosses over into 1941.
Buck Rogers: Radio show not eligible. All the radio episodes I’m aware of are from 1939.
I wouldn’t personally call Captain Midnight science fiction. There’s very little super-science stuff, especially in 1940. It’s Boy’s Adventure Fiction, which is close, but not the same.
I’ve found another possible Hugo nominee for Dramatic Presentation Short Form: “My Client Curly”, broadcast as part of the Columbia Workshop anthology show on April 04, 1940. MP3 available at archive dot org under Columbia Workshop.
It’s a fantasy of the Tall Tale school, but well done.
Flash Gordon is great! They showed on TV when I was a kid and every episode ended with a cliff hanger. That will be my choice.
Seems I was wrong about publication date of Donovans Brain. 🙁
Kevin Standlee said:
OK, I understand that point, but I agree with the many people here who have criticized the very existence of the Best Editor Long Form award, given how well-nigh impossible it is to judge.
Furthermore, I do not think that adding a Best Publisher award is a good idea, for reasons given earlier; and think that the existing 15 categories are already quite a lot, and would prefer the number to decrease if possible, or at least not increase.
In that case, and on further thought, I suggest two separate proposals, to increase the chances of both:
Proposal A: remove categories Best Editor Short Form and Best Editor Long Form, and add categories Best Professional Magazine and Best Anthology or Collection.
Proposal B: remove category Best Editor Long Form.
@JackLint: Best SF for Retro Hugo of 1941: “Pat the Bunny.”
And sometimes, Jack Lint beats out Kyra and Camestros for winning the internet. Oh man, I really, really want to nominate Pat the Bunny for Retro Hugo.
Seth Gordon on August 31, 2015 at 8:12 pm said:
That’s an aspect of feminist history that I’ve gotten really interested in after seeing the first season of Mad Men. I should read that book.
@Cally:
But wouldn’t it be Best Dramatic Presentation regardless? Just like Orson Welles’ War of the Worlds was a 1939 Retro Hugo BDP nominee.
I’ll try and get it organised and cleaned up but if it isn’t done by Thursday (yay, surgery) assume the ball is probably dropped.
@Cally
Oh! So there was a radio show and a serial that year? Gotcha, I’ll change it when/if I try and clean it up. Thanks for the other radio links!
@Hampus Eckerman
Unless the date I found is wrong, yeah. 🙁
@Greg
Horton Hatches the Egg was also published in 1940!
@Ray Radlein
The nomination category is the same, but since The Shadow was out in both mediums that year it’s an awful lot easier to track down the right one for responsible nominating if I haven’t lead people astray with a misfile. 🙂
Meredith:
Nah, I checked. Your date was right. No Donovans Brain on the ballot.
1940 marks the first appearance of Bugs Bunny, but none of the Looney Tunes seem particularly SFnal.
Synthetic Men of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs has been mentioned as a 1940 novel. That was the year of the first single volume edition, but it was originally published as a serial in Argosy Weekly in early 1939 and I believe that makes it a 1939 novel for Hugo purposes. Apologies if somebody else has already made this point.
— Mark
@Mark Plummer
Ah! I’ll add a note. Thanks!
@Rick Moen: Thanks. I certainly don’t have my Robert’s Rules handy (it’s… 10 time zones away, I think), so thanks for doing that legwork.
That makes me happy to see a larger proposal submitted, with the option to chop it up if necessary. To me the most logical thing to do would be to submit two amendments:
1. Abolish BELF. Maybe add a lifetime achievement award/GOH spot/whatever for editors for the ConCom to use, either constitutionally (probably not) or via less-intrusive means.
2. Abolish Semiprozine, BESF. Add Magazine, Anthology. Have a look at the definition of magazine to make sure it matches modern understanding (Tor.com?).
Kevin, I’m a member of MAC II, and plan to attend the business meetings (I strangely enjoyed them at Sasquan). I’m happy to be a co-sponsor if you think it useful. I do share many of the commenters’ hesitations about Best Publisher, and would prefer a proposal such as Teemu suggests, but I’m okay with it either way.
The SF/F umbrella for the Hugos was big enough for Ms. Marvel, so it seems like Captain Midnight could fit under it as well.
::sneaks in::
::God Stalks::
I wrote:
That post was the result of a brain fart; please forget it. Instead, I support an proposal that
– removes BELF, and
– removes BESF, and
– removes Best Semiprozine, and
– adds Best Professional Magazine, and
– adds Best Anthology or Collection.
in other words, your original suggestion minus adding Best Publisher.
Or, maybe Devin’s split of these changes into two separate proposals, above, would work better.
Kevin (and others): replacing BELF with Best Publisher does at least replace a category impossible to assess with one which is, so that’s definitely an improvement. I don’t particularly favour the new category, but I have no objection in principle.
If it were to advance, it would have to be framed carefully:
a) Tor is a publisher, Baen is a publisher, but Orbit is an imprint, as is Del Rey, as is Ace. I’m not sure of DAW’s status within Penguin Random House.
b) Lots of publishers are indeed transatlantic — Voyager, Tor, Orbit, Del Rey, Titan and others. Among these, I think only Orbit is editorially unified, though I don’t know how the relaunch of Tor in the UK is going to position it.
c) Among others, DAW and Baen don’t actively publish in the UK (though many of Baen’s titles are distributed here). Gollancz don’t publish in the USA (though they distribute a few titles). Bragelonne don’t publish in English (to take a single non-Anglophone example).
I would frankly oppose Best Publisher for many of the reasons outlined above, and the fact that if we really want to pour oil on the flames of conspiracy theory, I can see no better way to do it than set up a Tor vs Baen myth among the voters, no matter how silly in the real world.
rcade: Ms. Marvel can fly under her own power, she has enhanced strength, durability and the ability to shoot concussive energy bursts from her hands. Captain Midnight … can fly an airplane. Real good.
I honestly don’t think that qualifies as SF.
He’s not magic, and his airplane isn’t super-science, just leading-edge.
I should say I don’t know what Captain Midnight was like on TV; all I know is the radio show. But I’m quite sure that early Captain Midnight on radio wasn’t SF, just adventure.