Soon after the 2021 Hugo Awards finalists were announced, Chris Logan Edwards asked in comments here, “How is ‘George R.R. Martin Can Fuck Off Into the Sun’ not a violation of the DisCon III Code of Conduct?” That eye-catching phrase is attached to a Best Related Work finalist whose complete title is “George R.R. Martin Can Fuck Off Into the Sun, Or: The 2020 Hugo Awards Ceremony (Rageblog Edition)”, Natalie Luhrs (Pretty Terrible, August 2020).
The specific issue is that DisCon III disseminated this phrase on its website, in press releases, and on YouTube – and in doing so the committee itself (not Natalie Luhrs’ blog publication) violated their own Code of Conduct.
The applicable parts of DisCon III’s Code of Conduct are —
We do not tolerate harassment of convention attendees in any form. Behavior that will be considered harassment includes, but is not limited to…
Comments directly intended to belittle, offend, or cause discomfort including telling others they are not welcome and should leave…
We require attendees to follow the CoC in online interactions with the convention (including the volunteer mailings, wiki, and other online facilities), at all convention venues and convention-related social activities.
I sent Edwards’ question to several committee members together with the request, “If your immediate thought is that the Hugo voters can trump your Code of Conduct, please explain why you think that.”
DisCon III’s decision to broadcast this phrase on their own platform means they also are committing to having it repeated over and over again in all their venues. As Elio M. García, Jr. explained in another comment here:
Websites around the world have amplified that a member of the WSFS should fuck off. Every official publication that lists the nomination is telling a member of the WSFS to fuck off. The Hugo Nominees discussion panel will have people talking about how GRRM (and Robert Silverberg) should fuck off. On the night of the ceremonies, the screen, the presenter, the sign language interpreter will be announcing to an audience of hundreds that specific members of the WSFS should fuck off.
(Garcia is webmaster of Westeros, a George R.R. Martin fan site not run by the author.)
Tonight Adam Beaton, the Worldcon’s Outreach Division Head, emailed the committee’s reply to my question:
Our response for publication is, “DisCon III does not publicly comment on potential Code of Conduct matters.”
Have a great day, Mike!
The leadership is going to find out how hard it is to administer a Code of Conduct they are unwilling to publicly account to themselves.
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@JJ:
That’s the problem with pretty much all the messages being sent. They are metatextual, not plain text, and so there’s a lot of room to interpret them. That’s one of the many reasons this is very, very hard. But Annie’s perception is as valid as yours as to what the blog title means and what message it sends.
I would further argue, though, that it’s not possible to have a plain text message that doesn’t also have subtext and meta text, and that’s why there isn’t a clear way forward. Everything has implications, every action will cause people to make inferences based on the data they have, and there really isn’t ever a complete data set, since some of the data is the thoughts and feelings of people not ourselves.
@Meredith:
It’s context. Think of the words, “You fucker.” I say those, regularly, to my boyfriend when he has amused me in a slightly annoying way. He understands that to be a form of endearment, and wears it as a badge of pride. If, however, I said that to a stranger who had said something offensive or annoying, no one would think that it was a term of endearment. But they are the same words, used in different contexts and in different relationships.
If a person with a personal animus toward GRRM had written that title, it has with it the weight of personal anger. Having it on the ballot would be using the Worldcon community to further a personal grudge. (You’ve probably seen situations where someone in a bitter breakup tries to leverage an outside connection or relationship to enhance the damage they are attempting to wreak upon their ex. If you haven’t been a witness to that, count your lucky stars. It’s ugly.)
If the person who wrote it has only a relationship with GRRM through the medium of his celebrity and it is entirely based on a public performance, it is not personal in the same way. Now, GRRM is a person (and as I’ve said, a very nice one in my experience) and so the attack has a personal aspect to it. But everyone who needs both praise and scorn in our community is, in fact, a person. And people who are perfectly charming in one context can be terrible in another, and that’s the problem with people, really. They never are only one thing.
No matter what the con decides, there’s gonna be a fuss. So they’re pretty well screwed no matter what they do.
It’s been interesting following the posts here and blog and Twitter threads.
But I think one of my favorite things was reading that it was all started by some dude bro on File 770.
Also, get ready. One of the people posting on Courtney Milan’s Twitter said
“File770 is a hive of precious, pearl-clutching, civility-and-decorum-worshipping complete and utter wankers. Also I need to use that as the title of something and campaign for it to get on the Hugo finalist list.”
“Civility and decorum worshippers”.
In fact, I think the humorous nature of the insult stops it from being a personal attack, if she had written that Martin should jump off a bridge or kill himself or something of that kind, then that would certainly read as a direct personal attack but fuck off into the Sun?
I don’t think we expect Martin to find a spaceship and then travel into the Sun.
The other point which I forgot to make in my last comment was this, I’ve seen a lot of people concerned that the message in the blog post is not that Martin should try harder but that he should just go away, do people think he should be given another shot another go round and hopefully this time he’ll get it right?
I think the best solution is to have someone from a diverse background host the next Hugos ceremony personally which should avoid some of the pitfalls of the last one, and if Martin is offended by people pointing out his bad behaviour well I’m not sure how I feel about that but I certainly think that you should be able to criticise someone’s bad behaviour in the way that you feel best.
@Lydy Nickerson
I suppose I just don’t really see a big difference between being angry with and disliking a person because of a private interaction or a public performance, at least not for the particulars we’re dealing with. (Also, everything Cheryl S. just said about being focused too closely on Luhrs and her motivations/intent/relationships in general. It honestly doesn’t really matter to me how she meant it, because as a blog post, it was never a problem.)
To me, what keeps it firmly in the range of the “personal” is that, well, everyone who saw that ceremony knows GRRM deeply loves the Hugos and Worldcon. The whole reason people are angry with him revolves around it. And now that attack on him is embedded right in the heart of the Hugos, in such a way that he cannot possibly both avoid it and participate, and it will be repeated at every Hugo-related event and in every Hugo-related announcement and bit of paper until Discon III is over. I’m not referring to the intent or to any pre-existing relationship when I say “personal” – can’t know what truly lies in hearts, etc, etc – but I can’t think of another word suitable for a delivery mechanism so peculiarly suited to hurting the named person.
Also, if the intended message is “Worldcon fucked up and needs to change and do better” I’m not convinced that calling out that one dude over there, yes him specifically, even conveys that, which also brings it back down to the “personal” for me. That nominated title segment people are objecting to isn’t Worldcon: Do Better, it’s GRRM: Shoo. Which isn’t addressing any systemic issues, but is now aimed at A Person, Within Thing They Love.
It’s a mess and I don’t envy having to deal with it.
@Harold Osler
Huh. We’re not generally accused of having an excess of or excessive appreciation for civility or decorum. Quite the opposite. In fact, I think evilrooster’s point was more or less that.
Harold Osler:
Seems like more and more people are adapting the Rabid Puppy mindset of wanting to nominate stuff just to make people angry, doesn’t it?
I’m not sure if I got this across clearly enough: Whether they know each other or not has no relevance to me, because the bit I’m perceiving as personal is about the combination of delivery and target, and has nothing to do with the original context-of-blogpost at all, and so it also isn’t about Luhrs.
@Meredith: Thanks. The personal relationship between GRRM and the Hugos is, indeed, a known thing, so I see why you perceive the attack as personal.
Change tends to be really messy. One of the things people in general, and our tribe in particular, use a lot to parse things is Story, and Story likes having an
Antagonist. So, a bid to make major change cast as a story where GRRM is the antagonist is powerful in the way that a less personal and more systemic analysis would not be. I suspect that’s part of why Luhrs’ post worked for some people, it had a compelling storyline.
@Meredith:
Yes, I definitely know you’re not a StrawConservative. I just completely flailed in how I replied to you. My apologies.
@Lydy Nickerson:
Thank goodness I’m making sense to SOMEBODY. I’m coming to the end of two months of overtime using complex impartial rule systems to ruin kids educational dreams, and I was starting to think I wasn’t making any sense to anything human.
@Mike Glyer:
Maybe I’m not. My point is, if it’s a Code of Conduct violation, it should be aimed at a specific person or people. Not a generic “The committee”, or “DisCon”. Since a CoC violation should have the possibility of expulsion, that’s the only thing that makes sense. Which is also why I don’t see concentrating on the specific people in a ConCom as the only CoC violators makes sense.
Now if we’re talking about a general rule on language or presentation, that’s a different matter. That is something that can be addressed by the appropriate processes, whether it’s business meeting or whatever. Maybe DisCon can make a ruling on the language involved in nominations- but in that case I would strongly suggest it be a general rule, not addressing a specific person.
And anyway, here’s my other point, AGAIN:
@JJ:
And you have just said merely reprinting it is abusive, an attack, and is violating the CoC. Which means that posing it in the first place is a violating of CoC. Note that there is nothing in the CoC that states that an actionable offense has to take place during the convention, on site. In fact the nature of your complaint requires it be off site outside of convention hours. So. Are you or are you not saying Luhr violated the CoC in writing her piece? Because if you aren’t, it makes no sense to me to say the DisCon committee should be the primary recipient of a CoC hearing.
Lydy Nickerson: So, a bid to make major change cast as a story where GRRM is the antagonist is powerful in the way that a less personal and more systemic analysis would not be. I suspect that’s part of why Luhrs’ post worked for some people, it had a compelling storyline.
I’m extremely unhappy that people keep trying to change this back to being about Luhrs’ post, about its content and who it’s written by, and about the wealth, power, and fame differential between Luhrs and GRRM. It’s not about any of those things.
And I feel as though the reason that people keep trying to shift this back to being about Luhr and the post she wrote –
rather than, you know, about the fact that a Worldcon committee which has promised to be welcoming, inclusive, and non-harmful is repeatedly broadcasting a title which is an abusive personal attack –
is because claiming that it’s about Luhrs and the content of her post makes it easy for them to portray this as a case of “we can’t censor her post or squelch her opinion” (which I’ve seen almost no one actually trying to do).
Rose Embolism: Because if you aren’t, it makes no sense to me to say the DisCon committee should be the primary recipient of a CoC hearing.
I understand that it makes no sense to you, based on your frame of reference for Code of Conducts.
My point of view is that DisCon III has issued a Code of Conduct, and they are engaging in practices which directly contravene that CoC. Do they need to subject themselves to CoC hearing? I’ve got an idea: Why don’t they just modify their practices so they’re not contravening their own Code of Conduct?
@JJ: and I’m equally unhappy that you keep on trying to strip away the context of what was nominated, why it was nominated, and what that nomination means about us as a community. I simply do not accept your claim that this is the only issue. Nor do I accept your claim that it is a violation of the CoC. You do keep saying it, and I hear you, and I understand what you are saying. And I profoundly disagree. I do not think that the path you are on will actually create a more just and welcoming Worldcon. I think that if we just ignore the underlying issues that led to being at this pass, we are genuinely failing our community.
Even when I stipulate that this constitutes a personal attack, and I have seen some very useful discussion on that topic, that still doesn’t make this a CoC violation. And if it is a CoC violation, then context is vitally important. If someone is in a consuite yelling “Fuck all the way off” you really have to know why they are yelling that before you can meaningfully address the situation.
No matter which way you slice this baby, the reason for the blog post, the post itself, the reasons for people nominating it, and how all of this is understood by the community have to be part of the discussion.
And I really, really have to ask that you accept that I do not think that this is a personal attack, and that I feel very very very strongly that it is not, and I believe that treating it as such is a HUGE mistake. I feel this as strongly as you feel what you feel.
Lydy, people are talking about how they are sending messages.
Here’s the message I’m getting, loud and clear:
“Oh, we didn’t mean for Code of Conducts to protect everyone, we just mean for them to protect the people we decide are worthy of protection.”
* “we” being “the people who get to decide whether a Code of Conduct is relevant, and how it should be applied”
@JJ: I do, indeed, understand that this is the message you are getting. You have said that several times, and I have understood you. However, as I said, since the messages are largely subtextual and inferential, not everyone is getting the same message. I am asking that you consider that the other messages people are getting from this are also valid, also of concern, and that the way forward is more context, not less.
Lydy Nickerson: I am asking that you consider that the other messages people are getting from this are also valid, also of concern, and that the way forward is more context, not less.
I thought I had previously stipulated that other people are entitled to believe what they believe and feel what they feel. If not, I will stipulate to it now.
@JJ
I took Lydy’s comment as an aside about the appeal of the nominated post – title included – to the people who nominated it/are celebrating it getting a finalist spot rather than as a justification for anything or an attempt to reframe objections from the title’s presence on the ballot to the title and essay itself. It’s relevant, imo, since the appeal to people who nominated it is a reasonable thing to discuss.
@Lydy Nickerson
Villains make for powerful narrative, but the idea of trying to shove a human into a villain suit is… well, I haven’t enjoyed the people elseweb deciding that either Mike specifically or Filerdom as a whole ought to be the next villain of the piece, or all the bits they’ve chopped off or sewn onto the arguments and people here in order to make them better fit that. I don’t enjoy or appreciate the antis over in transformative works fandom continually resorting to a particular foul accusation I won’t repeat whenever they’re criticised or the AO3 defended. At a certain point, it stops being useful and actionable criticism, because it’s no longer really about the humans or the systems anymore. It’s about the Villain, and the Villain is a different being who has done and said and thought very different things.
Luhrs’ blogpost: Fine. Not a problem. Not why I dislike part of the title being on the list of finalists. But also, for me, not of great value. Clearly, it resonated for others, but for reasons that don’t resonate with me.
@Rose Embolism
Thank you for being patient with me getting a bit snarly in response.
Rose Embolism:
First I want to say I am sorry for reaction so harsh in my first post to you.
Your postion became more clear in the discusion.
What is imho the mistake you are making in your thinking, is that you think that if a CoC is violated there has to be a drastic punishment or that it is the goal. I know of 3 or 4 (I am not sure if one of them was a CoC violation or a violation of another rule) reactions to cases. There was one disinvite (a lawcase) one expulsion, one conmembership revoked for the rest of the day (here I am not sure, if the person sanctioned broke a rule in the CoC or a different role) and a warning.
So even in the history (and this all are prominent cases) we have a variaty of posible reaction.
Now towards this case. If you are understanding the potential violation as it is discused in this tread, than the culprit is Discon or people working for the convention.
People who were not malicious but at worst careless or taught they had no other choice than to do as they did.
In my opinion punishments are in this case not somethink I think that any worldcon will do in a million years.
Reactions like:
a) We don’t believe there is not a CoC-Violation
b) Upps not doing it again
c) In our opinion we have to read the nominees as submited, we have no other choice
are far more likly. (Of course a lot better worded and not so flapsy as I just made them)
And I know that the point is complicated (which imho makes punishment even less likly) and every decision hurts people, sends complicated mesages, etc.
It is a dificult situation.
@JJ: You are willing to stipulate it. However, I have not seen you be willing to engage with either the implications of your own beliefs, or the implications of other people’s different beliefs. I have seen you assert things as facts which I do not accept as facts, such as the “fact” that the mere presence of the full title is a personal attack, and that it is a clear violation of the CoC. How does that accord with having respect for other people’s points of view?
I have asked you this before, and I’m going to try again. How can it be that DisCon’s reporting of a legal nomination by its title is a violation of the CoC, but the people who nominated it so that DisCon would be forced to do this did not violate the CoC? I cannot see how one does not imply the other. You have asserted that it does not, but I have not understood your reasoning, which so far has largely been restating your case in stronger terms.
Moreover, invoking the CoC means that someone should be sanctioning someone else. You have stated that the presence of the title in the nomination list is, in itself, a violation. So, a violation has already occurred, by this argument. The video announcing the title was a violation. There are future violations contemplated, where the blog post title will be listed on the ballot, and in other con pubs. Who is the offender? And what sanctions should be taken against that offender? The thing is, when you pull that trigger, it has to hit someone. Who should be doing the sanctioning, and who should be sanctioned?
Nothing about this can happen in some ideal vacuum, consisting only of Platonic forms. You are a real person who has experienced harm. There are lots of other real people involved, as well, who have experienced a variety of harms and have a variety of motives and desires. I do not see that you are engaging with those other people. The action of invoking the CoC is not something that happens without involving a lot of other people, who have varying levels of standing and equity. And when I try to draw you out about the implications of this, you seem to retreat back to the Cave and the Platonic forms.
I assume that my own theories have some implications that I’ve missed. I’d be interested to understand what I haven’t understood about my own position (aside from the metatextual messaging, which we’ve covered). But to do that, you’d have to not merely acknowledge my position, but engage with it. And that is what I really would like you to do, and don’t feel that you have done.
@Meredith: I agree that putting a real human into a villain suit is a disservice to us all. (Those suckers never fit right, and they chafe.) I just noodling about why it was that Luhrs’ piece got traction. I also meant to gesture more specifically at the fact while Story is a powerful tool for understanding our situation, it has significant drawbacks, and that ill-fitting villain suit is one of many.
@Lydy Nickerson:
Just thought I’d point out the following text from the CoC that explicitly says it’s applicable to the committee:
So it seems to me that the CoC is a valid tool in this case, per its own text.
@Bartimaeus: No, I don’t think you are correct in this interpretation. It is specifying that staff are not protected by their membership as staff members from being subject to the CoC. Which is normal, right, and proper. But the failure here is not a staffer doing something inappropriate. Staffers don’t get a pass on saying gross things to other staffers or to members just because they’re on staff. What I’m arguing is that the failure is not of a staff member, but of the institution itself. I see a significant difference between individual action and institutional action.
In a lot of ways, I think one of the things on the table that really needs to be dealt with is how much of the horror show that was the awards ceremony last year is the responsibility of GRRM’s actions, and how much was an institutional failure. There are ways in which I think we really set GRRM up to fail. The lack of feedback because of the technological format really made it difficult for him to calibrate his jokes and stories, and the people in charge of the ceremony do not appear to have provided useful feedback which would have prevented the debacle. But sorting out how much of that lies with the individuals and how much with the institution is a live issue, and a complex one. Especially since, no matter how you slice it, it’s always people making choices. (That’s my anarchism coming to the fore, here. I call myself a failed anarchist because I am an anarchist who loves and cherishes institutions while still not believing in them.)
@Lydy Nickerson
Without getting too far into CoC issues…
Does all that roughly translate to “the way CoC’s are set up is the procedures can’t function without someone in the villain suit, so by invoking it you have unwittingly signed up for shoving someone into one – which is why the CoC is the wrong tool”?
Lydy Nickerson: I have asked you this before, and I’m going to try again. How can it be that DisCon’s reporting of a legal nomination by its title is a violation of the CoC, but the people who nominated it so that DisCon would be forced to do this did not violate the CoC?
I don’t know if there’s any way I can re-word this that you will find any more persuasive to you than what I’ve already said. But because you’ve asked sincerely, I will try in good faith to do so.
To me, I think it’s important to be able to distinguish between an action or a behavior, and a human being as a person. It’s much better, I think, to be able to say, “This thing you said / did is a racist thing to say or do”, rather than “You are a racist”. The possible options for the first are “Expectations are that you can and should do better, and here are ways you can do that”. The possible options for the second are “You are a garbage human being, and there is no hope for you”.
Similarly, I believe that is possible to make a distinction between the validity of a work’s nomination and the necessity (or lack thereof) for continually publishing a title that is an abusive personal attack. It’s up to the voters to decide whether they feel the work itself is an abusive personal attack or an individual’s valid expression of opinion. It’s up to DisCon III to decide whether continually publishing a title that is an abusive personal attack is consistent with their stated Code of Conduct principles.
The people who nominated this work did so because they thought it was a worthy work, and no doubt different peoples’ reasons for considering it a worthy work will cover a spectrum. Regardless of that, they believed it was worthy of nomination. How can nominating something you value be a Code of Conduct violation?
The obvious answer to that, I guess, is if you thought the work was in itself a CoC violation, and you believed that the people who nominated it did so because they deliberately wanted to, as you say, “force” something that was a CoC violation onto the ballot. But that goes to “intentions” and “motivations”, and I don’t think it’s helpful to try to adjudicate peoples’ intentions and motivations regarding the Hugo ballot.
The Hugo Admins, after all, don’t decide whether something belongs on the ballot based on the nominators’ intentions. Nominators’ reasons for nominating something are irrelevant. Hugo Admins say either “yes, this meets the requirements for the category definition and rules” or “no, it doesn’t”. They don’t say “yes, this is worthy of being on the ballot”, or “no, this is not worthy of being on the ballot”.
Once something is on the ballot, then it’s the Worldcon / Hugo Awards Committee’s responsibility to determine if there are special circumstances which require how a particular nomination is handled. For instance, Worldcons in the past have made the decision that certain works would not be permitted to appear in the voter packet because they were porn, or contained graphic descriptions of child abuse, or contained potentially libelous statements.
Thus far, I am not aware of any Hugo finalist in the past which had a title that could, on its own, be considered an abusive personal attack against a specific Worldcon member (though Mike’s knowledge is encyclopedic compared to mine, and he may perhaps know of one). But even if such a title had appeared on the ballot at some point in the past, it was almost certainly before Worldcons had Codes of Conduct principles that they needed to follow. But we do have Codes of Conduct now, and we do expect Worldcons’ actions to be consistent with the principles in those CoCs. So this is a case unlike any that a Worldcon has had to deal with before.
I believe that it is possible for Worldcon and the Hugo Awards to honor the spirit of the author, the work, and the people who nominated it by leaving it on the ballot where it belongs, but by referring to it in all publications by its secondary title so as to behave consistently with the principles in their Code of Conduct. The issue with the title is not that it is an angry one (there have been some of those before). The issue is not that it contains the word “fuck”. The issue is that the title itself is worded very specifically as an abusive personal attack on a specific Worldcon member.
This does not require the work to be removed from the ballot, or for the author to withdraw it. It does not require the blog post itself to be officially renamed. It does not make a value judgment about the merit of the work. It just says, “We believe that, to be consistent with the principles of our Code of Conduct, it is not appropriate for us to be be publishing and broadcasting the primary title which is worded as an abusive personal attack on a specific Worldcon member.”
I truly hope that something here offers you some additional enlightenment as to my thought process on why it is perfectly feasible for the contents of a blog post, or its nomination, to not be a Code of Conduct violation, but for publishing and broadcasting of its title by the Worldcon to be inconsistent with the principles of the Code of Conduct. If not, I really don’t think there is anything else I can add which will make a difference.
@JJ: that is much clearer to me, thank you. I still think that the process you are describing as ideal is absolutely not an invocation of the CoC, but rather what I have been arguing for, which is an institutional response which makes it clear that the conventions values are in line with its CoC. I do think that this is a substantive difference, but I can also see where a lot of people would think it’s a distinction without a difference.
Lydy Nickerson: You are willing to stipulate it. However, I have not seen you be willing to engage with either the implications of your own beliefs, or the implications of other people’s different beliefs.
I believe that all the other people involved here, with all of their varying beliefs and feelings, have valid positions, too. I am extremely frustrated about feeling that my feelings and beliefs are being disregarded and dismissed, and I don’t want to do that to others.
Again, I think that the problem with this situation is that no one here is wrong. And unfortunately, because of the incompatible possible resolutions, there is no solution to this conundrum which is right, because there is no possible way to give everyone the full resolution that would make them feel that justice has been well-served.
@Meredith:
That is a very interesting and really useful way to put it. Thank you! Yes, when one invokes the CoC, one is saying that someone has behaved badly. And while we try, as best we can, not to fit out the offender with a villain suit (although some will absolutely don their Captain Lemming suit and head for the cliff, god knows), it is still an adversarial process. I made the mistake, early on, of acting like it wasn’t an adversarial process. “I just want to talk to you, friendly-like, about this problem.” It was the worst disaster of my tenure, and blew up spectacularly. Because I did not sufficiently understand that I was coming in as a person with power over them, and that the process was, no matter how kind I tried to be, an adversarial one. So, yes, I fitted them for a villain suit just by trying to talk to them. If I had understood that more clearly, I would have handled it very differently. I might well have decided not to address the issue at all, since it was primarily an issue of rudeness, not really a harassment issue. But, well, live, learn, show off the scars to strangers in bars.
@Lydy Nickerson:
If you say the CoC is the wrong tool, what would be the right tool to react to an imoprapriate title for a Hugonomination?
I mean we are in disagreement if this is the case here, but how can the membership react to that?
I know that is a difficult question but I think a important (and constructive) one.
I am suprised that the suposed hugonominated isult to File 770, leaves me more could. I would probably no award it, unread (mean of me, yes) but it would not get a strong reaction by me.
Kyel: I found the Chuck Tingle less an embaresment than some other titles on that shortlist. It contains the word butt, but shrug.
StefanB: I found the Chuck Tingle less an embaresment than some other titles on that shortlist. It contains the word butt, but shrug.
Yes, it really says something for the appalling quality of some of the Puppy-written works, that they were actually much worse than the porn. 😉
@StefanB: I think that something very close to what JJ has outlined is a workable solution. The leadership of the convention need to sit down, and evaluate whether or not the title is a personal attack. After they have done that, they should issue a statement reaffirming their core values, and explaining (very briefly) why they are or not taking an action which will bring them in line with their stated values. There are arguments on both sides. But I don’t think a breezy “thanks, but yeah, we aren’t going to talk about this” is working, especially since it implies that the CoC is, in fact the correct tool when (again) I think a lot of the problem is that it isn’t the correct tool. If they are want to let the title stand, then some explanation of holding the voters’ will sacrosanct is probably what they want. They might also consider some sort of AO3 style tag or content warning so as to increase people’s ability to avoid being subjected to the material that they consider to be offensive, although I’m not sure how that would work and it might well be completely unworkable. If they are going to change how the nomination is listed, they can explain that and how it fits with their values.
They are, of course, damned if they do and damned if they don’t, at this point. And so I think their actual best strategy is to do the work, show their work, take their hits, and get on with the show. Dodging and weaving will make things worse.
@JJ: I always thought it was a really interesting failure on Vox Day’s part, to think that fandom, of all the communities in the world, would be shocked by a bit of smut. I mean, a lot of our elders totally wrote a ton of it when they couldn’t pay the bills with just sf (pretty sure Silverberg is in that number) and this is well known in the community. Also, one of VD’s biggest beefs with fandom was that people weren’t ashamed about sex, and that absolutely drove him spare, so it was just a fascinating failure.
Also, Chuck Tingle is a goddamn treasure. So, like, I’m not exactly grateful to VD, but I am delighted by Tingle.
@Lydy Nickerson: I just want to say that I appreciate your thoughtful responses in this comment thread. I personally find it difficult to separate the institutional and individual issues here, but I can understand your take on it.
Lydy Nickerson:
This is one of the things I don’t agree with you on.
Hampus Eckerman: This is one of the things I don’t agree with you on.
I agree with you that I think some of the DisCon III staff members are doing things that I don’t feel are consistent with the Code of Conduct – but they are doing so at the direction of DisCon III the entity, the responsibility lies with DisCon III, not the individuals, and the individuals themselves should not be subject to CoC complaints, hearings, or sanctions.
Hard as this is, I think Lydy’s right, and DisCon III just needs to front up to it. No, no one’s going to be happy no matter what they decide – but it’s not as if Worldcons are going to be grappling less with issues of appropriate behavior going forward. We (as in we Worldcon runners and members) might as well get used to fronting up and addressing things, starting now, because just abdicating responsibility for decisions is not a good solution, now or in the long-term.
Lydy Nickerson: Also, Chuck Tingle is a goddamn treasure. So, like, I’m not exactly grateful to VD, but I am delighted by Tingle.
I was totally pissed off about Tingle’s first nomination for the porn (as well as all of the Puppy crap), but he gave an absolute MasterClass in Trolling the Trolls, and I fully supported his nomination for Fan Writer the following year. In a room full of shit in 2016, he actually found the rainbow unicorn that was hiding in there, and I will always be grateful to him for that. 🙂
Luhrs was asked if she’d change the title. She declined. So if the title is changed (on the ballot, to be clear, I wouldn’t want you to misinterpret anything) then that would be against the author’s wish. Luhrs’s title would be changed against her will. Someone would be forcing that change. Ergo, “forcibly” changed.
You going to actually address my point or continue to find semantic issues to whine about?
There are certainly people here who have made it clear that they care more about civility and decorum than they do about people engaged in harmful behavior.
All laws/rules/codes of conduct/regulations/etc. have people who decide whether that law/rule/code of conduct/regulation/etc. is applicable in that situation and how it should be applied.
JJ wrote:
I think it’s a good point that we need to consider this as a general and potential future problem, not just as a singular case. It’s not difficult to imagine something with a more problematic title than Luhr’s blog post being nominated – in particular if the impression left this year is that getting a controversial title on the list of finalists in order to make a point is a good idea.
And in that perspective, I’m increasingly convinced that
1. DisCon III needs to do something more than they’ve done so far, and
2. the best reaction would be to refer to Luhr’s blog post by an alternative title on the ballot.
This is not a very harsh reaction – the work is still a finalist, and people will still read it. The title itself will not be changed – noone is forcing Luhrs to edit the title on her blog. But doing this will both reduce the problem this year, and it will set a precedent that makes it less tempting for future griefers to nominate a work with an offensive title just to see the title on the ballot.
(We should probably consider ourselves lucky that the puppies didn’t think of this angle of attack.)
It seems to me that one side of this argument is saying very strongly, “A CoC cannot apply to an institution,” and the other, “A CoC MUST apply to an institution.” Both are supported by an understanding of the importance of dealing with the problem…. but the contradiction of this plus varying approaches to contextual interpretations of the issue create a logical impasse that means everyone keeps bouncing off each other.
I think that I come down on the “it can’t apply to an institution” side of the problem. If a CoC is a legal framework designed to apply to individuals, it means that it is legally limited in what it can and can’t do. And that means that it is probably not an effective tool to deal with an institutional problem, as Lydy says.
So what WOULD be an effective mechanism to manage a problem like this? How would it be created, managed, and applied at an institutional level, and made to do so in a way that supports the values of the CoC? That’s the question that I’d like to see discussed. That’s what DisCon III and the larger community need to address.
I think that what frustrates me about this situation is that I feel like, once more, the wrong thing is focused on.
We’re sitting here debating about whether we should leave the title alone, whether the title should be changed, whether Luhrs harassed GRRM, or the nominators harassed GRRM, or no one harrassed him but the Con saying the title repeatedly WOULD, or what not… But it’s concentrated on what we do about Luhrs’s Blog Post being on the Ballot with an Offensive Title.
When do we decide to do about the things she wrote about? When do we decide what is to be done about the 4 hours of bullshit that GRRM foisted upon us? Lots of people here have talked about how much it pissed them off, and how File770 was lining up to hand out beatings to him, and blah blah blah.
But what concrete action was taken? What have we done to ensure that the people that were unwelcomed by that event are brought back? What have we done to ensure that names are pronounced correctly? What have we done to ensure that we don’t have to listen to 20 minutes of some old dude ramble about how things were back in his day? What have we done to ensure that the local fandom of an area gets some sorta spotlight when the Hugos as in their backyard?
Maybe the reason that people see File770 as “civility and decorum worshippers” is because File770 is currently spending 600 comments debating WHAT SHOULD BE DONE about Luhrs’s blog post mostly divorced of the context that the blog post was a reaction to something that SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN DONE.
A few more thoughts – please excuse the haphazardness.
Does GRRM feel hurt by the blog post, the fact that it is on the ballot, and/or the title? Probably. Does it make him feel less welcome or even unwelcome? Also, probably. However, this all still has its roots in his own behaviour, and the blog post, including its title and the fact that it is on the ballot, are all fundamentally about calling GRRM out for his bad behaviour as the host of the Hugo award ceremony last year. As such, I consider this – his feeling hurt by the backlash, feeling less welcome in the context where he misbehaved – to be natural and reasonable consequences. Nobody is, after all, trying to make him feel unwelcome because of who he is (whether by skin color, body shape, age, gender, sexuality, ability, or otherwise), but only in response specific things that he said and did that were disrespectful, hurtful, and made large swathes of fandom feel less welcome or even unwelcome.
And I say that as someone who has done similar things myself, in a smaller scale: I have in contexts where I was a welcome member of a group, said things that were sexist. and was quite rightly called out for it, which in turn made me feel unwelcome – but that is because I had made myself unwelcome. There was no fault on the side of the people who called me out for my behaviour; the fault, including for feeling unwelcome after being called out, was entirely mine. (I apologised profusely and then slunk away, head hanging in shame, and learned an important lesson.)
For similar reasons, I don’t consider the blog post, its title, or the blog posts or its title’s presence on the ballot an “attack” – they are a response to the attack the GRRM perpetrated against huge numbers of fans.
The fact that this is happening in the heart of something that GRRM cares about does not in this case to me make the response “personal”, because the response is simply happening in the same forum where GRRM’s own misbehaviour occurred. Had he said something somewhere else entirely and people had nominated a reply to that onto the Hugo ballot, then that argument might have had more merit; but here, the response is being raised in the same context where his original actions took place ad were broadcast, in the heart of the Hugos – which, by the way, the people against whom he directed his disrespect also care deeply about.
Regarding the wording of the title, to me it seems clear that “fuck off into the sun” is hyperbole – to me, it would mean something along the lines of “go away and leave us alone”. Many other phrases exist that have a similar meaning whilst looking horrible if taken at face value – pretty much the definition of hyperbole.
What message does it send to allow such a title on the ballot? Consider instead that GRRM’s shameful Hugo awards behaviour did not result in any action; if the perfectly reasonable complaints about him and his behaviour do result in negative consequences, then that sends the message that his behaviour was OK (no consequences) but complaining about it isn’t. – which would not be particularly great messages to send. Even if it were phrased as “don’t complain like this” that would look like an instance of “tone policing” which has a long history of being levelled against women, people of colour, and minorities in general for complaining about mistreatment “the wrong way”.
This also feeds back into the “punching up vs punching down” thing: GRRM was in a position of authority, hosting the Hugo award ceremony, and being disrespectful, definitely “punching down”; fans voting to get a response onto the Hugo ballot and into the ceremony I consider definitely “punching up”. If anything, punching down should have stronger consequences than punching up, especially when the punching up is in direct response to someone punching down. So if the punching down did not have any consequences, then punishing the punching up in response seems like punishing the wrong thing.
Using only a part of the essay’s title on the ballot would leave room for complaints that they are not respecting the work as-is.
My choice might have been to not use any part of the title at all – to write something like “an essay by Natalie Luhrs on the subject of the 2020 Hugo awards presentation ceremony, published on pretty-terrible.com on 1 August 2020” – this clearly and unambiguously identifies the work, does not alter anything, and also doesn’t push the title into anyone’s faces; and any inquiries could be answered with “we’re not spelling out the title because some would take offence to it”. There would likely still have been controversy about this decision (there’s a lot of “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” in this situation) but I think most people could have accepted that as a compromise.
But, of course, these are simply my own thoughts and opinions.
I’m really looking forward to next years BRW Hugo nominees:
“Mike Glyer is a *** ***** And Needs to **** *** With His Blog”
“John Scalzi Raped A Seven Year Old And Should to Go To Jail Forever”
“Nora Jemisen is a ** **** N**** B*** and Needs To Fuck Off Back To Africa Where She Belongs”
And for those titles to be immortalized in every Hugo Nominee list everywhere on the Web, forever, because nothing dies on the Internet. Sure, they’d be stuck below No Award. I suppose that would be sufficient?
Maybe the Hugos in general need a rule that says that personal attacks on living people are automatically disqualified. Of course that would leave Laura Mixon’s report on Sridankaew out as well.
@alexvdl:
What can be done? Well it’s not easy. First of the cons have to select their toastmaster better. I am very positive that Discon and Chicon have selected toastmasters that shouldn’t have this problems.
The only think one of uns can do is voluntaring, because most of the thinks are to big for a simple fan to fix.
And this probably why there isn’t the discusion. The case of Luhr’s blogpost is simple in realation to that.
We can’t fix what has happened (the video exists). We can only move forward and try to not creat this problems anymore.
How can we garantie that no con has ever again the wrong toastmaster is imposible to make.
How can we make signs to show that people are welcome? Do better. There is no magical way to ensure people feel welcome.
There is no magical way to fix what whent wrong.
alexvdl:
This is a good point and one that isn’t addressed by Luhrs nor by nominating her works. And I think this is a larger problem than the ceremonies, something that encompasses the convention as a whole with all public events.
My boring answer is that there needs to be guidelines and checklists. Guidelines to be handed out to everyone involved in a public event. On what to think of and take care about. Check list to go through to see that nothing was missed.
These guidelines and checklists should be more detailed than the CoC and customized for the type of events.
Heck, I don’t know if they already exists and of course there will be snafus anyhow. But a guideline telling GRRM what he should be wary of and a checklist to see that he really was would have gone a long way to avoid the “too big to edit”. As it would have been clear from the start what his limits were.
@Maytree:
Laura J. Mixon was nominatead as Laura J. Mixon. She was a fanwriternominee.
I also fail to see how the titel “A Report on Damage Done by One Individual Under Several Names” could be constracted as an insult.
I also think that only case 1 is similar to the current situation. (Sorry Mike)
The rest are cases were I would say the next worldcon would have to have a talk with their legal department.
No personal attack goes further than what I have seen. No insult in the titel is what I have seen proposed here, so Mixon would be in the clear in that case.
Absolutely. There’s no one answer that is going to please everyone.
Just like some people want SOMETHING done about the Blog Post situation and acknowledge fully that there is no right answer, I think that that SOMETHING should be done about the Awards situation, knowing that there is no right answer.
For me, a statement by ConZealand and Discon that shows they understand why it was bad, would be a good start.
alexvdl:
There is such a statement from CONZealand.
https://file770.com/conzealand-chairs-apologize-for-some-hugo-ceremony-flaws/
@StefanB:
The Favorite Fan Writer category would be another one prone to being weaponized in this manner. Does anyone have numbers on how many votes were had by the nominees in that category? I did a quick Google but didn’t find them.
I don’t think there’s any rule in the Hugos that says works with potentially defamatory titles, like the Scalzi one, are disqualified. Using the logic from this thread, if it’s written and nominated according to the current rules, it should stay on the ballot. I hope Kevin Standlee will correct me if I’m wrong about this.
And there’s nothing defamatory about the Nora Jemisin one (name spelled right this time since I was thinking of Mae Jemison); it’s opinion and therefore legally protected under the 1st Amendment, at least in the US.
The real question about the Mixon one would be, is it okay because “Benjanun Sriduangkaew” is a pseudonym and no one knows their legal identity? Not sure how defamation laws work on a person who is Doing Business As. I’ll ask a lawyer friend of mine next chance I get.
Regardless: This is a Pandora’s Box that’s been opened, make no mistake. If you think only “acceptable targets” like GRRM will be bitten by the Furies in the box, I suspect you are very, very wrong.
@Lydy — first, let me commend you on participating in a contentious discussion in a way that keeps stuff from boiling over. You are much better at this than I am.
Earlier, you mentioned that “not everyone is getting the same message”. You’ve said that you don’t see whatever is going on as rising to a CoC level. I take it, though, that you’d acknowledge that at least some people are getting the message that Luhrs is unwelcoming to GRRM and Silverberg, and it does rise to a CoC level. Isn’t that sufficient — that some people are experiencing harm from Luhrs’s post and that it was nominated for a Hugo?
@Hampus
Thank you for that. It doesn’t seem to address… the dragon in the room.
But it is SOMETHING.
@Maytree: Best fanwriter: 365 votes for 185 nominees, finalist range 89-42
(disclosure one of the nominators)
It is imposible to weaponise the fan writer catagory.
Nominees are the names. (Theoreticly it is posible to chance the name to an insult, but then every catagory is a problem)
Worldcon can distance itself from the material fanwriter produced. They don’t have to include it in the voter’s pacage.
Re your Nora Jemisin that may be protected in the USA, but I am going by my homecountry. Here a rasist insult would definitly a legal isue.
Re the Mixon report: Nominee: Laura J. Mixon no reason to do somethink.
Titel of the Report: “A Report on Damage Done by One Individual Under Several Names” Does not contain the name “Benjanun Sriduangkaew”.
Also not a problem.
Going in the report is comparing Apels and Oranges. (And frankly to much work for me at the moment)
The Mixon-Nomination and the Rageblocknomination are not similar problemwise.
@StefanB
I think you’re missing the forest for the trees here. The issue isn’t the details of the examples I made up on the fly. The issue is the idea of weaponizing the Hugos against individuals, and that there is no way to limit the targets to people you think “deserve it”. And that there are known bad actors out there who could quite easily get 40 or so nominations for something very similar to Natalie Luhrs’ essay, only aimed at other targets: BIPOC, transfolk, you name it. It’s not just the Puppies to be concerned about, either: 4chan would love to do something like this. As would Kiwi Farms. Or 8kun.
And yes, the US has no “hate speech” exceptions to the First Amendment right to free speech. Which is a hotly debated issue, but unlikely to change any time in the near future. Which adds another thing to worry about — what if such a title made it in to the nominees list and was legal in some countries but not in others? It would make quite a legal mess for Worldcon.