Pixel Scroll 2/11/16 Get Your Pixels For Nothin And Your Clicks For Free

(1) ALBERT WAS RIGHT! Einstein – what an insightful dude! He should have been on a bubblegum card.

Another bit of his work has been confirmed. Here’s The New Yorker’s account: “Gravitational Waves Exist: The Inside Story Of How Scientists Finally Found Them”.

…The waves rippled outward in every direction, weakening as they went. On Earth, dinosaurs arose, evolved, and went extinct. The waves kept going. About fifty thousand years ago, they entered our own Milky Way galaxy, just as Homo sapiens were beginning to replace our Neanderthal cousins as the planet’s dominant species of ape. A hundred years ago, Albert Einstein, one of the more advanced members of the species, predicted the waves’ existence, inspiring decades of speculation and fruitless searching. Twenty-two years ago, construction began on an enormous detector, the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO). Then, on September 14, 2015, at just before eleven in the morning, Central European Time, the waves reached Earth. Marco Drago, a thirty-two-year-old Italian postdoctoral student and a member of the LIGO Scientific Collaboration, was the first person to notice them. He was sitting in front of his computer at the Albert Einstein Institute, in Hannover, Germany, viewing the LIGO data remotely. The waves appeared on his screen as a compressed squiggle, but the most exquisite ears in the universe, attuned to vibrations of less than a trillionth of an inch, would have heard what astronomers call a chirp—a faint whooping from low to high. This morning, in a press conference in Washington, D.C., the LIGO team announced that the signal constitutes the first direct observation of gravitational waves.

(2) PERFECT TIMING. Michael A. Burstein observed in a comment on Facebook:

It’s probably not significant, but I find it interesting that the gravitational waves we detected from the black holes merging one billion light-years away from us…reached us on Rosh Hashanah.

(3) TIES AND JACKETS REQUIRED. At Black Gate, Doug Ellis posted some fascinating photos and letters from fandom’s early days in “The Great Pulp Gathering: That Time Jack Williamson, L. Sprague de Camp, Frank Belknap Long, Edmond Hamilton, John W. Campbell, Manly Wade Wellman, Otis Adelbert Kline and others met at Mort Weisinger’s House in 1937”

From time to time I’ve posted in various places material I acquired at an auction many years ago from the estate of Jack Darrow. In the 1930’s, Darrow (whose real name was Clifford Kornoelje) was pretty much science fiction fan #2 behind Forry Ackerman.

Darrow’s best friend was science fiction pulp author Otto Binder – who, with his brother, Earl, formed half of the writing tandem of Eando Binder (their other brother was pulp/comic artist Jack Binder). By 1936 however, although the byline often continued to read Eando, the stories were written solely by Otto. In 1939, Binder also began working in comics, particularly for Captain Marvel and the other Fawcett titles, though he would eventually work for all the major publishers. Among the material in Darrow’s estate was a box of correspondence between him and Binder about a foot thick.

Among these letters was one from Binder to Darrow, dated July 10, 1937, which was accompanied by two snapshots. On the back of each, Binder writes that these are photos of “science fiction authors at Mort Weisinger’s home June 1937” (the home was in New Jersey). At the time, Weisinger was the editor of Thrilling Wonder Stories….

(4) MILLENNIALS. “Who Are Millennial Fans?: An Interview with Louisa Stein (Part One)” conducted by Henry Jenkins at Confessions of an Aca-Fan.

In many ways, you see the millennial audience as emblematic of the “mainstreaming” of fan culture within a networked culture. You write, “Millennials have made fan practices more socially acceptable by action, word, and image, if not name.” To what degree is this something Millennials have done and to what degree is this something the industry has done as it has constructed millennials as a particular kind of fan?

First, I want to emphasize that I mean millennial as an imagined category, one co-created by industry and (the cultural participants we refer to as) millennials in an ongoing negotiation. Likewise, the depiction of millennials as modified fans is an ongoing joint creation: industry marketing, advertising, network positioning, programming, scheduling, and digital paratexts together construct a vision of millennials as modified fans; but millennials’ (and/or fans’) own performances of self, responses to one another, and collective interactions also shape this picture. Advertising campaigns and paratextual strategies (like officially coordinated hash tags or programming embedded with fan reference) may hail a modified fan position—one that is invested, created, and interactive up to a particular degree and in certain industry-accepted modes. But fans created many of these practices in the first place, and choose when and how to respond to industrial hailing, when to play along the designated lines and when to transgress….

The mainstreaming of fandom into millennial culture is a chosen stance of fans to represent their modes of engagement as more than only niche and subcultural. Fans choose to post about their fan engagement in the public spaces of Tumblr rather than the locked communities and friends-only journals of the late 1990s and early 2000s. They may perceive these fan spaces as intimate publics, as I’ve written about elsewhere, yet they choose to allow for the possibility of visibility, for a default public culture, albeit one with intimate semi-private pockets. Indeed, the social activism of, for example, what some refer to as Tumblr feminism is part of—or at least deeply connected to—this fan performance of fandom as an expansive mode of engagement with something important to share and spread.

(5) IT’S HUGE! You might like this enormous list of movies/tv series being developed from SF books. Adam Whitehead, “The SF and Fantasy novels currently being developed for the screen”, at The Wertzone.

After a glut of recent news, here’s a list of all the science fiction and fantasy novels, short stories and novellas which are currently being developed for the screen. Natalie Zutter’s article for Tor.com from last year was a helpful reference point for this post.

(6) HARRY THE EIGHTH. Shelf Awareness says another volume of Potter will be published this summer.

The “eighth Harry Potter story,” a script of a stage play called Harry Potter and the Cursed Child Parts I & II, will be published in the U.S. and Canada by Scholastic at 12:01 a.m. — aka bookstore party time — on Sunday, July 31, the day after the play by Jack Thorne makes its world debut in London. The play is based on an original new story by J.K. Rowling, Jack Thorne and John Tiffany.

The “special rehearsal edition” book, called Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, will be priced at $29.99 in the U.S. and $39.99 in Canada and published under Scholastic’s Arthur A. Levine Books imprint. The book will be published in the U.K. by Little, Brown Book Group, and Pottermore.com will publish the e-book version.

(7) BSG REBOOT. The Battlestar Galactica reboot is still happening reports CinemaBlend.

The Social Network’s Michael de Luca has signed on to produce Battlestar Galactica, according to The Tracking Board. This doesn’t provide any new details on the movie’s creative direction, but de Luca reportedly describes himself as a “huge Battlestar Galactica fanatic,” so that should prove beneficial. De Luca’s other producing credits include Moneyball, Captain Phillips, Fifty Shades of Grey and the Syfy miniseries Childhood’s End.

(8) NO 2016 DUCKON. SF Site News has learned that “DucKon Remains on Hiatus”

After cancelling the 2015 DucKon and establishing a transition team to take care of the convention’s debt and retool for future DucKons, the Duckon Transition Team has announced that they are not in a position to host a DucKon in 2016….

(9) TODAY IN LAWSUIT HISTORY

In the latest of a series of legal battles involving J.R.R. Tolkien’s beloved trilogy The Lord of the Rings and film adaptations made of the books, several of Tolkien’s heirs join a group of publishers in filing a $150 million lawsuit against New Line Cinema on February 11, 2008, in Los Angeles Superior Court….

Behind the film trilogy’s phenomenal success, however, was a tangled web of legal conflict, as recounted in a February 2008 New York Times article on the most recent lawsuit. …Finally, in the Tolkien lawsuit, the holders of a trust for J.R.R. Tolkien, who died in 1973, stated that they had failed to receive any money from the films. According to the literary-rights agreement signed in 1969, they said, the trust was entitled to 7.5 percent of the gross revenue from any film adaptation of Tolkien’s novels.

(10) COPY OF THE COMPLAINT. If you’re in the market for a copy of the Kenyon v. Clare lawsuit, click here — http://www.courtneymilan.com/cc-complaint/1-main.pdf.

13. The Dark-Hunter Series and the Shadowhunter Series are so similar that CLARE’S own publisher mistakenly printed 100,000 copies of a Shadowhunter Book referencing the Dark-Hunter Mark on the cover. Upon written demand by PLAINTIFF, CLARE’s publisher destroyed tens of thousands of the Shadowhunter Book that contained PLAINTIFF’s Dark-Hunter Mark on its cover. Despite the destruction of tens of thousands of copies of this Shadowhunter Book, thousands of Shadowhunter Books including the Dark Hunter Marks on the cover have now been sold and substantial commercial confusion has resulted.

(11) ZOE QUINN. Zoë Quinn explains “Why I Just Dropped The Harassment Charges The Man Who Started GamerGate” [sic].

I just hung up from what I hope will be my last phone call with the District Attorney assigned to my case, and I choked back tears as she told me that I’d conducted myself with grace through this whole nightmare. I don’t know why I’m crying. I’m writing this and examining it as I go through the fog of someone with PTSD. I don’t know if the tears are out of frustration of having sunk a year and a half into this awful system for seemingly less than nothing, or if it’s out of relief….

One of the biggest myths that needs to die is that your first response to being abused should be to go to the police and seek justice. Leaving aside the fact that the police flat out murder unarmed citizens for their race all the time, and that sex workers are likely to be incarcerated when reporting crime done to them, and a myriad of other things I can’t get into, I have a certain amount of privilege and a well-documented case. I have one of the most public abuse cases out there, it started a hate movement that’s swept up my industry and hurt dozens of bystanders, and got international media attention. A lot of people don’t think of it in terms of domestic violence, they forget where the flashpoint of GamerGate came from – you might not even know the man responsible’s name. To make matters worse, I was unable to speak up during that time period out of fear of reprisal from the judicial system (more on that later) and watched as he was washed out of history (along with a lot of other people targeted). I was on my own on this front, until the Boston Magazine article was posted by a journalist who had been following everything and speaking with my ex. Shortly after, I got a call from the DA telling me that I shouldn’t have been told to simply go offline, and that she knew we had a very strong case worth prosecuting.

So why am I dissolving it then?

Ironically, getting a restraining order against Creep Throat was the least effective thing I could do in terms of getting him out of my life for good, and for protecting myself.

(12) GRRM REPORTS. George R.R. Martin posted another editor’s list of what she worked on in 2015 — “What They Edited, Once More”

So… as we discussed below, a lot of fans don’t know who to nominate for the Hugo in the two editorial categories because they don’t know who edited what last year. The problem is especially acute in Long Form. Fair enough. So I went and asked the editors I’d recommended what books they’d edited. We all benefit by being well informed, no?

…Today I received another answer, from DIANA PHO of Tor.

(13) BEST RELATED. Kate Paulk demonstrates the difference between Sad Puppies and Rabid Puppies in “Hugo Category Highlight: Best Related Work” at Mad Genius Club.

I’d say the Castalia House series about pedophilia in the science fiction and fantasy community is a worthy entry if seriously disturbing – and frankly, I expect this suggestion to be controversial because the series does not tiptoe around any of the major figures in the genre.

(14) A LONG DOGIE. Vox Day continues recommending things for his slate in “Rabid Puppies 2016: Dramatic Presentation (long)”.

Although the ancient geezers of fandom don’t seem to know it, or are just too old to either know or care about games, both computer and video games are eligible for the Hugo Award for Dramatic Presentation Long Form as they are included in the definition of “any medium of dramatized science fiction or fantasy” that lasts more than 90 minutes. Ergo, my recommendations for the category will probably look a little different than most this year.

  • The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
  • Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain
  • Until Dawn
  • Avengers: Age of Ultron
  • The Martian

(15) GEEKING OUT. You got me, clickbait.

Geeking Out About…  actually didn’t propose a slate but a platform. See “Road to the Hugo Awards: Presenting The Geeking Out About… Platform”

When word first broke on how a vocal and reactionary segment of the sci-fi/fantasy fandom managed to rally its supporters over the years into jamming works they liked into the nominations list for the Hugo Awards, culminating in a near-total overrun in 2015, I was amused at how it began, appalled and how it progressed, and ultimately impressed at what they managed to pull off.

Which makes me think that if a group of terrible people can push forwards works they think epitomize the best in science fiction and fantasy, why can’t someone like me who is not completely terrible do the same thing?

Here then are the planks of the first-ever “Geeking Out About…” platform for the 2016 Hugo Awards season:

1. All works which are being promoted must be created by people who believe that genre fiction should contain diverse characters and perspectives.

2. All fictional works which are being promoted must contain at least two characters whose gender, sexual, physical, and/or racial identity is substantially different from the creator’s and also:

a) Has their own agency within the plot.

b) Has a scene with another character who is also of their same gender, sexual, physical, and/or racial identity where they don’t speak about the main protagonist but do advance the plot.

c) If there is a love interest for either or both of the characters, it is not the same character as the main protagonist. d) If the characters die, the deaths are meaningful.

3. All non-fictional works which are being promoted must contain references to and/or significant discussion about diversity in genre fiction, and also:

a) If a web article written by one person or solo podcast or web series, must contain links to other articles or references to other work where the gender, sexual, physical, and/or racial identity of those creators/authors is substantially different from the solo creator’s.

b) If a multiple-creator podcast, article, or web series, one of the authors/creators or a guest speaker must be a person whose gender, sexual, physical, and/or racial identity is substantially different from the other creators.

4. All visual works which are being promoted which depict humanoid beings must contain imagery which does not demean individuals who are not of the same gender, sexual, physical, and/or racial identity of the creator.

[Thanks to Steven H Silver, John King Tarpinian, Mark-kitteh, Andrew Porter, and Will R. for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editors of the day Kip W., Cheryl S., JJ.]

454 thoughts on “Pixel Scroll 2/11/16 Get Your Pixels For Nothin And Your Clicks For Free

  1. Yeah, just so you know? Calling somebody’s interest in something a “hobby horse” is traditionally done as a dismissive insult.

    According to The Paperback Oxford English Dictionary, it is “a person’s favourite topic of conversation.”

    According to Merriam-Webster, it is “a subject that someone speaks about or complains about often.”

    According to Dictionary.com, it is “a pet idea or project.”

    According to the Collins Dictionary it is “a favourite topic or obsessive fixed idea”

    According to thefreedictionary.com, it is “A topic that one frequently brings up or dwells on; a fixation.”

    All of which very accurately describe both Tasha Turner’s postings on social issues and my postings on science. If you pick and choose negative connotations, that’s on you, not me. Mea most definitely will not be culpa-ing on this hill.

  2. Darren Garrison, denotative meaning does not always equal connotative meaning. And connotative meaning changes over time.

    Denotatively, “oriental” means someone from the east, most usually Asia. Connotatively, I learned only a few years ago that it is now considered an ethnic slur. (To the best of my knowledge and belief, it was not a slur when I was a child. But then, I knew very few Asians, so it’s entirely possible that it was and I simply didn’t know it…)

    I can point to all kinds of dictionaries that say it means “a person from Asia”. That doesn’t make it any less of a slur, because the connotation is somewhat different than the denotation.

    Language changes. I’m working on changing the linguistic habits of a lifetime and reframing terms to “Asian”, but I admit that sometimes I still use the offensive term. But then I apologize, because my intention is NOT to offend.

    (Apologies to any Asians I may have inadvertently offended with this post; it was the best example I could think of for denotative/connotative miss-match.)

  3. Words have history. It’s called Etymology. Below are a few sources of the Etymology of the phrase hobby horse. It’s important to remember words have more than a straight definition if one wants to communicate well with others. Etymology may continue on as a connotation if the word has continued to be used in that way.

    One would think a person interested in science would consider proper understanding of words important. Part of a good science textbook is using the correct words to describe concepts. Using ambiguous words leads to confusion on the part of the reader which leads to a poor understanding of the subject matter.

    Online Etymology Dictionary

    The modern sense of “a favorite pursuit, object, or topic” is from 1816, a shortening of hobbyhorse (q.v.) in this sense, which is attested from 1670s. Earlier it meant “a wooden or wickerwork figure of a horse,” as a child’s toy or a costume in the morris dance, the connecting notion being “activity that doesn’t go anywhere.” Hobby as a shortening of hobbyhorse also was used in the “morris horse” sense (1760) and the “child’s toy horse” sense (1680s).

    Wiktionary
    The meaning of hobby-horse shifted from “small horse, pony” to “child’s toy riding horse” to “favorite pastime or avocation” with the connecting notion being “activity that doesn’t go anywhere”.

    The Phrase Finder
    As time went by, the name hobby-horse was given to numerous other things; for example,
    A loose woman or strumpet:
    William Shakespeare, Loves Labour’s Lost, 1588 – “Cal’st thou my love Hobbi-horse?”

    It is the ‘favourite pastime’ version of the name, what we now call simply ‘a hobby’, that was adopted as a figurative expression meaning ‘a fixation; a thing one keeps coming back to’, that is, similar to having a bee in one’s bonnet.

  4. Darren Garrison, denotative meaning does not always equal connotative meaning. And connotative meaning changes over time.

    Yes, and in this case, I explicitly referred to my interests as hobby horses as well. Which means that, connotatively, I was either a.) using the term in a neutral or harmless way or b.) deliberately insulting myself as well as Tasha Turner.

    So I will be more direct: I conciser every strong interest that is central to someone’s life and is a common theme in their actions and conversations to be a “hobby horse.” (Just as I conciser every strong dis-interest that is yadda yadda yadda to be a “pet peeve.”) I intend no disrespect, I intend no political leanings, and I have absolutely no intention to stop using a perfectly cromulent term.

  5. @Darren Garrison

    You know, if I was specifically told that someone found a particular term to be insulting or hurtful, no matter what the dictionary definition was or how I felt about it, I would stop using the term. That’s called, you know, being considerate.

    English is a wonderfully varied language. There are plenty of synonyms for you to substitute!

  6. And Darren thinks he’s not liked because he’s an atheist. I suspect the answer is much simpler. It’s a lack of respect for others while believing his way is always right and superior.

    He never has to apologize or change his behavior but he can hold all religious people responsible for a comment a single one made. Cognitive dissonance at its best.

  7. redheadedfemme:

    You know, if I was specifically told that someone found a particular term to be insulting or hurtful, no matter what the dictionary definition was or how I felt about it, I would stop using the term. That’s called, you know, being considerate.

    English is a wonderfully varied language. There are plenty of synonyms for you to substitute!

    Quoted for truth.

    If it gets in the way of the discussion you want to have, maybe it’s time to not use it. For a not-too-inflammatory example, I stopped using patriarchy as often, especially when talking to confused would-be allies, because it generated more heat and huffiness than useful discourse. (Kyriarchy works better for social justice as a whole anyhow, even if it tends to mean one needs to put in a definition for the 101 level conversation.)

    On the other hand, I refuse to yield the definition of feminism to those who want to use it for radicalism only. And I’ve been trying to figure out why that’s different and special. Is it just because the people offended and irritated are the anti-social-justice cadre? But the people irritated at patriarchy tend towards that (Although they seem to be more educatable.)

  8. Okay, now this is edging over the line into a dogpile, I think. Darren Garrison has been a perfectly good community member here for the majority of the time he has commented; clearly he is incapable of speaking on the subject of religion without leaking disdain everywhere but otherwise I don’t believe he’s caused much in the way of strife, and I’m quite sure that once this thread has ended – and particularly if he goes back to exercising restraint and refrains from commenting much on religion – he’ll be generally considered a commenter in good standing with useful contributions again. And not disliked.

    Disagreement on one subject doesn’t have to poison overall relations, even disagreement on a subject as emotive as religion (or lack thereof).

    That being said… Darren, it doesn’t really matter how you prefer to use hobby horse. If it irritates people and causing that irritation is not your intent, you’re communicating badly when you use it. There are other terms you could use that do not cause irritation. Continuing to use a term when you know people aren’t hearing it the way you mean it is shooting yourself in the foot.

  9. At the risk of drawing out this conversation further
    as Darren said, since he described his own interest in science as a hobby horse, he clearly didn’t mean it in a derogatory way.
    You can say he should drop that word when people complained of being insulted, but equally, perhaps before getting insulted people should consider whether it was meant as an insult. The term is not universally understood as an insult, and he applied it to his own interests.
    ‘Queer’ is a word that some people use as an insult, and some people don’t. If someone says “queers like you and me” it is clearly not meant as an insult. If someone says “you have your hobby horses and I have mine”, it clearly doesn’t mean that hobby horses are stupid things that only stupid people have.

  10. Ray: To be honest, I find a lot of the responses to Darren to be insultingly patronising.

    To be honest, I think that people here have been pretty well restrained in pointing out his bad behavior.

    Based on what I know of him from here, I generally like Darren. He’s made a lot of interesting contributions here, some of which have increased my knowledge. That’s really cool.

    My atheism is a very considered choice based on many years of religious instruction, deep thought, analysis, discussion, and experience. And if someone is trying to get their religious beliefs made into laws which will affect me or other people not of their religion, or is otherwise insisting that I should somehow be subjected to, or conform with, their religious beliefs, I’ll be the first to speak up.

    But I don’t see why, in the ordinary course of things, I have to make a point of dismissing or expressing disgust with their beliefs, when they are not hurting me in any way.

    Burstein’s choice to see some sort of meaning in the timing of the discovery of gravitational waves does not hurt me or affect me in any way. I don’t need to be an asshole about that — and neither does Darren.

  11. A few scrolls back there was a discussion about the idea of the privileged first speaker. People understand the first amendment as meaning they can say anything they want, but interpreting critical responses as attacks on their free speech rather than more examples of free speech.

    Burstein says X.
    Darren disagrees.

    Apparently, if you disagree with X, the proper course of action is to stay silent, because expressing your disagreement makes you an asshole. Of course Darren is not the protected first speaker, so while he should stay silent about his disagreement with Burstein, no-one is under any obligation to stay silent about their disagreement with him. The second speaker is fair game.

    And all the fainting fits over the term ‘hobby horse’ strike me as people looking for opportunities to get offended because it is important to present Darren as the asshole in the room.

  12. Ray: A few scrolls back there was a discussion about the idea of the privileged first speaker. People understand the first amendment as meaning they can say anything they want, but interpreting critical responses as attacks on their free speech rather than more examples of free speech.

    Burstein says X.
    Darren disagrees.

    Except that that isn’t what happened.

    Darren disagreed in a particularly insulting, dismissive way. I don’t know why he felt compelled to do that. It’s quite likely that there’s some personal history provoking such a response. That doesn’t make it okay.

    My response was “Meh, modern calendar inaccuracies rendering timing claims invalid, whatever makes you happy, fine”. And if Darren had responded in that way, I don’t think people would have a problem with it. His response was to go on the attack.

    I personally resent the way that Darren has repeatedly responded in this thread, because he makes atheists look like assholes.

  13. He pointed out that there are a lot of religious holidays and the odds of something happening on a holiday are high.
    Who, specifically, was he insulting? Was it a poster here?

    I find the repeated comments along the lines of “yes but here we’re all nice to each other – try to be nice in future” extremely insulting, to be honest. Do I get to put people in the bold corner too?

  14. Ray: Who, specifically, was he insulting?

    He was particularly rude, insulting, and dismissive about other peoples’ belief systems. It was unnecessary. He could have expressed his opinion in a non-asshole way. He chose to do otherwise.

    Ray: I find the repeated comments along the lines of “yes but here we’re all nice to each other – try to be nice in future” extremely insulting, to be honest. Do I get to put people in the bold corner too?

    If you’ve spent any amount of time around here, then you know that I’m not the sort to tiptoe around other peoples’ feelings. And I don’t think that is a requisite for posting here. On the other hand, I’ve done my share of overstepping and having to recognize and apologize for that.

    One of the things that keeps me coming back to File770 is the fact that it’s not the asshole / insult free-for-all that pretty much defines the Puppy blogs. I’d like it to stay that way. In order for that to happen, either the commenters and/or Mike have to prevent it from turning into that.

    There is a difference between free speech and unbridled assholism. Granted, it’s a subjective line. I actually tend to prefer the line being somewhere in the vicinity of the one that File770 commenters have drawn. If I wanted to be around a bunch of unmitigated assholes, I’d be hanging out on the Puppy blogs.

  15. @Ray

    And all the fainting fits over the term ‘hobby horse’ strike me as people looking for opportunities to get offended because it is important to present Darren as the asshole in the room.

    Same here. This thread has become an exemplar of what the right wing says the left wing does. I thought Darren came off jerky in his initial post, but all of this peck peck pecking is ludicrous.

  16. Niall McAuley: So, how about that recent SF story?

    *snort*

    I’m in the midst of reading Twelve Kings in Sharakhai. I’d be interested in hearing the thoughts of anyone else who has read it.

  17. I’d quite happily leave it at us disagreeing about how rude different people are being.

    Recent SF! This year’s books so far have been A God in Ruins, Between Me and the World, The Mosquito Coast, The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet, So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed, Annihilation, and The Armstrong and Miller book. Currently reading The Forgotten Waltz. Most of them very good, but nothing to trouble my Hugo ballot recently.

    The Long Way… reminded me of a discussion on here a while ago about fan fic. It was all too cosy, too much “wouldn’t you love to belong to this lovely and interesting family?”. It wasn’t awful, but I didn’t like it.

    Sorcerer to the Crown and You’re Never Weird on the Internet are on their way from the library, and I printed out a bunch of those Asimov’s novellas and novelettes, they might fill a few more spaces. I might even buy The Thing Itself before the close of nominations.

  18. @Ray–

    And all the fainting fits over the term ‘hobby horse’ strike me as people looking for opportunities to get offended because it is important to present Darren as the asshole in the room.

    I saw no fainting fits. I saw clearly explained and supported objection to the term “hobby horse” on the grounds that it is generally understood (even if not by Darren) to be contemptuous and dismissive. He could actually have continued to express his basic opinion while apologizing for the unintended insult–if in fact it were unintended. And no, I don’t find the fact that he then also used it to describe his own interests to be a “get out of jail free” card on not meaning it that way, because of the way in which he did it. Context isn’t everything, but it’s a great deal.

    Do I need to explain that “fainting fits” as a description of the objections expressed is dismissive and contemptuous? Am I going to get an argument on that?

    @Kathodus–

    Same here. This thread has become an exemplar of what the right wing says the left wing does. I thought Darren came off jerky in his initial post, but all of this peck peck pecking is ludicrous.

    And what is that awful thing? Attempt to maintain standards of courtesy and respect while expressing differing opinions–and expecting others in the conversation to do so also? Then I’m sure you won’t be at all offended that my initial response to reading this comment from you was, “Oh, fuck you, too.”

    Usually, I don’t post those “oh, fuck you, too” reactions. Have I been spinelessly submitting to censorship, rather than exercising courtesy and good sense, as I imagined?

  19. If Darren had apologized or shown he understood and cared at any point during this conversatio I would have dropped it. But every response was a doubling down with additional insults or justification for behaving like a jerk. I had hoped by explaining why that behavior is generally not accepted here he’d show some kind of acknowledgment that he wouldn’t behave differently in the future.

    I was not having a fainting fit (Female slur). When I have fainting fits, based on a neurological disorder, I pass out and sometimes go into convolutions. Thanks for playing.

    Thank you all for weighing in.

    When I screw up I apologize.

    Sorry some of you found my trying to show someone that insulting something for no good reason was wrong. I’m also sorry I was unable to not continue being offended when insults were offered. In the future I reserve the right to have an opinion and express it politely. I will try not to belabor the point as that seems to upset some filers who didn’t see something as an insult and don’t mind using gender insults to shut me up. I won’t ask for forgiveness as this apology is snarky.

  20. When I screw up I apologize.

    Look, I meant one thing, you thought I meant another. That is not a “screw up”, that is a miscommunication on what turned out to be an ambiguous term. I will not be apologizing because I did nothing wrong, and no harm was intended. I said something that was less-than-complementary about something you believe in, and now you are doing everything possible to interpret everything I say in the least charitable way possible. I really think it is time for you to start with your “ignoring me” thing.

  21. Darren Garrison, if I give a friend a greeting-hug and then find out that they’d fallen down the stairs and bruised their ribs, I apologize, even though I did nothing wrong and no harm was intended.

    If I accidentally poke someone on a hotbutton, I apologize, even if I didn’t previously know of the hotbutton, and even though I did nothing wrong and no harm was intended.

    An apology signals sorrow at hurt caused, whether physical or emotional, whether intentional, accidental, or completely unpredictable. And an apology signals that I will do my best not to cause the same harm in the future.

    If I hug my friend and they wince and explain about the ribs, and I don’t apologize, then my friend will rightly consider than I’m behaving boorishly.

    Just my two cents.

  22. @Ray: Out of curiosity I just reviewed the thread and your characterizations here…

    A few scrolls back there was a discussion about the idea of the privileged first speaker. People understand the first amendment as meaning they can say anything they want, but interpreting critical responses as attacks on their free speech rather than more examples of free speech.

    Burstein says X.
    Darren disagrees.

    Apparently, if you disagree with X, the proper course of action is to stay silent, because expressing your disagreement makes you an asshole. Of course Darren is not the protected first speaker, so while he should stay silent about his disagreement with Burstein, no-one is under any obligation to stay silent about their disagreement with him. The second speaker is fair game.

    And all the fainting fits over the term ‘hobby horse’ strike me as people looking for opportunities to get offended because it is important to present Darren as the asshole in the room.

    are absurd. They are tantamount to a libel on Tasha’s character in specific. As a history of the thread they are false in every particular. No honest, competent reading of Darren’s first comment, Tasha’s reply to that, and Darren’s first reply to Tasha could arrive at your interpretation.

  23. @Ray: That’s cool. People should discuss what they like.

    As a general matter, though, let’s put this Darren Suffered From Not Being Protected First Speaker canard to rest.

    1. Burstein’s comment is in the main post.

    2. Darren’s first comment. Darren is now “not the protected first speaker.” Which is a shame because there is literally nothing objectionable about this comment – although by calling Rosh Hashahah an obscure Jewish holiday he does show a level of ignorance. In the suburban county where I live, the public schools close for Rosh Hashanah. The Jewish New Year is about as obscure as secular New Year or Chinese New Year – that is, not remotely obscure.

    But happily, nobody in fact objects to his comment. Not one person. Instead…

    3. Tasha’s reply to Darren. There is also literally nothing objectionable about this comment. It is certainly not a “fainting fit.” It doesn’t claim offense. Its tone is genial and it contains a lot of agreement with Darren’s statistical point, though Tasha does offer some gentle correctives about the Jewish calendar and Jewish influence on larger religions. Presumably, even though Tasha is also not “protected first speaker,” it is okay for her to do this. Which brings us to…

    4. Darren’s first reply to Tasha. And here the shitshow well and truly begins:

    While Judaism may be a minor religion 2 fairly large religions are based on it

    Unfortunately.

    This is formally anti-Semitic, a literal statement that it is unfortunate that Judaism influenced two larger religions. Darren’s remark about the FSM can be taken to soften the specific anti-Semitism of this passage. In its light we can construe “Unfortunately” as merely terrible writing. But it’s probably better to just not write anti-Semitic things at all than to write them and then smudge the profile a little.

    After that, Tasha politely but briskly corrects Darren’s ignorance about the Jewish calendar; The Young Pretender says Burstein can “find poetry where he likes” and makes a sensible point about the compartmentalization of knowledge; and Petrea Mitchell offers some interesting information on lunisolar calendars around the world. Neither TYP nor Petrea Mitchell are “the protected first speaker” either, but presumably it is still okay to say things.

    To this point, nobody has had a “fainting fit,” and only TYP has even differed with Darren’s opinion. (Others have corrected his factual errors.)

    5. Tasha comments again. Apologizes for “jumping the gun.” (IMHO, to this point she has said absolutely nothing objectionable, nothing sharp or peevish. But it’s not for me to second-guess her conscience.)

    Our story so far. Nobody has slammed Darren for his initial comment. Nobody has even slammed Darren for his follow-up comment, which is in fact demeaning. The person most reasonably demeaned has taken the responsibility on herself.

    6. Now Darren doubles down. In his first comment, he made entirely reasonable points about probability in a constructive way. And literally nobody minded. Even TYP’s demurral didn’t happen until after Darren waxed regretful over all that Jewish influence. Here in this new comment, Darren makes sure we know that he is “scornful” and considers religious beliefs “idiotic.”

    In other words, now it becomes a fight because Darren insists on making it a fight. He had made his original point, and aside from correcting some of his factual errors, people took it in stride. But that wasn’t good enough for him. Presumably because some people just hadn’t caught on to how much scorn Darren had for them, and he had to make that known.

    So everyone can please drop the Poor Darren Suffered From Not Being Protected First Speaker nonsense now. That wasn’t what happened.

  24. Apologies to Tasha, Lis, et al, for my previous comment. I obviously wasn’t following the thread closely enough. It looked like a pedantic battle over semantics to me, and a Quixotic attempt to get the stubbornly unapologetic to apologize, and I was in a shit mood. I largely missed the point.

  25. Even TYP’s demurral didn’t happen until after Darren waxed regretful over all that Jewish influence.

    Just a minor point of correction–I wasn’t saying that I regret that Judiasm has an influence on Islam and Christianity–I was saying that I regret that the religions ever formed in the first place. (For a precursor of that idea, see this post. Although I don’t actually believe the Akhenaten hypothesis, I’m just saying “what if.”) I say this because I honestly believe that religion is a negative, damaging influence in the world and I wish that it didn’t exist.

  26. This is formally anti-Semitic, a literal statement that it is unfortunate that Judaism influenced two larger religions.

    It is a criticism of Judaism as a religion rather than of Jews as a people/ethnicity. It is not strictly anti-semitic, although the former can be sued as a pretext for the latter.

  27. @Darren:

    Just a minor point of correction–I wasn’t saying that I regret that Judiasm has an influence on Islam and Christianity–I was saying that I regret that the religions ever formed in the first place.

    It’s important not to conflate what you meant with what you wrote. We all express ourselves poorly from time to time. But when we express ourselves poorly, it is a lapse on our own part. What cheeses me off about this whole thread is that by ignoring that particular bit, and even trying to end the conversation amicably, Tasha was giving you an enormous gift, and you seem to neither realize nor appreciate that.

  28. Kathodus,

    I weighed in on hobby-horse, so was a little stung by your and Ray’s comments. (As a peripheral note, in thinking about it, I found the phrase “peck peck pecking” to have a sexist connotation. I think my brain went to “henpecked”, which then flashed to cartoon depictions of hens in the Miss Prissy style. That may have contributed to the sting, especially following the “fainting fit” comment, but I didn’t identify that until just now. Brains are weird.)

    Anyway! I appreciate your apology and happily accept.

  29. @Camestros: That’s too tidy. Anti-Semitism has always come in both racialized and religious flavors. Were I Jewish*, I would certainly take “unfortunately” as an insult.

    ————————-
    *Note to Tasha: In addition to reading a Chaim Potok novel once, I also pledged ZBT in college. w00t!

  30. What cheeses me off about this whole thread is that by ignoring that particular bit, and even trying to end the conversation amicably, Tasha was giving you an enormous gift, and you seem to neither realize nor appreciate that.

    Actually, it wasn’t until your post saying so that it even remotely crossed my mind that anyone took the “unfortunately” to be antisemitism rather than broader anti-religion. I can’t apologize for something that I didn’t know about.

    So here we go: I formally apologize to Tasha and anyone who thought that my statements against religion are concentrated on any one religion (including Judaism), when instead they reflect my view on all of the many thousands of religions that have ever existed, along with all other claims of the paranormal and supernatural.

  31. @Camestros Felapton
    Can we not go down the rabbit hole of what is or isn’t anti-semitism? What Jim Henley says on this is really good.

    @Jim Henley
    Thanks for stepping in and bringing a calming perspective in.

    @Kathodus
    Thanks for apologizing. Happily accepted. I’m sorry I overreacted I should know better.

  32. Jim Henley on February 19, 2016 at 11:03 am said:

    @Camestros: That’s too tidy. Anti-Semitism has always come in both racialized and religious flavors. Were I Jewish*, I would certainly take “unfortunately” as an insult.

    As I said anti-semites do use attacks on Judaism as a pretext for their anti-semitism. However, if we don’t make a distinction between criticizing Judaism as a religion and anti-semitism you end up in awkward place that aids anti-semites. Similarly it is worth distinguishing between criticism of Islam as a religion and prejudice against Muslims whilst still noting that Islamaphobes use one as a pretext for the other.

    I wish Leviticus was not an influence on Christianity (for example). I think the racism of much of the Old Testament helped rationalise Western racism and feeds racial prejudice in the Middle East. I don’t think that is particularly the fault of Jewish people collectively – particularly as Jewish people have had little or no say in how either Islam or Christianity have elaborated or distorted Jewish traditions, scripture and theology.

  33. Apology accepted for what it is.

    Thanks, for what the acceptation is.

    Is it too late to elaborate on the “what are you reading” question where I mentioned the WTZ books? I wracked my brain at the time trying to remember a specific other book I had read just before those (I find reading ebooks makes it much harder for me to remember titles than when I’m constantly handling a dead tree book and seeing the cover.) Last night I looked through my log on my Sony PRS-350 (still running well if battered after 5 years of use) and my most recent read before that was City of Blades. I had contemplated posting a review, but then decided that a “kinda meh” review would be unfair to the writer, but what the heck, screw the writer.

    City of Blades was–okay. It was as well-written as the previous book, but a main part of what made City of Stairs so interesting was the slowly unveiled world-building, and City of Blades is basically “here’s another story in the same world.” Not a bad story, but nothing creatively new, either. Plus, some might argue that n znva srznyr punenpgre gung jnf xvyyrq va gur svany frpgvba bs gur obbx jnf “sevqtrq” whfg fb gung n znyr punenpgre jbhyq unir na rkphfr gb Trg Znq naq Trg Rira.

    Before that in my log was Library at Mount Char. Didn’t know anything about this one going in, other than it was getting positive chatter here. Turns out to be fantasy very reminiscent of some of Clive Barker’s writing, such as Imagica and The Great and Secret Show, in that vg vaibyirf uhznaf jub tnva tbqyvxr cbjref guebhtu frperg xabjyrqtr nybat jvgu npghny tbqf. Vg nyfb unf bar bs gur zbfg zvaq-oybjvatyl fghcvq cvrprf bs snxr nfgebculfvpf rire, rira sbe n snagnfl obbx. Also enjoyable.

  34. Tasha Turner on February 19, 2016 at 11:36 am said:

    @Camestros Felapton
    Can we not go down the rabbit hole of what is or isn’t anti-semitism? What Jim Henley says on this is really good.

    It isn’t just anti-semitism Tasha, it is the distinction between criticism of a religion as a religion and criticism of followers of that religion. Anti-semites, Islamaphobes and various other kinds of nasties like to make that distinction blurred and confused i.e. aspect X of religion Y is bad therefore Yists are bad people. However there are legitimate reasons for people to say aspect X or religion Y is bad – particularly when it comes to issues of sex, sexuality and race. I don’t think Jim was intentionally trying to make that distinction more blurry but his statement worried me a great deal.

    However, yes I don’t think anything would be served by an attempt here to define the exact borders of anti-semitism. My point was a more general one than that – we need to be clear about distinction between criticizing a religion and criticizing the followers of the religion (despite implication of one towards the other) because others seeks to make that distinction unclear for bad reasons.

  35. @Camestros: Currently at piano lessons I’m learning to play one of my own songs. (I am a bad piano player.)The song is a ballad that posits that God set Satan up to be the bad guy in the Garden of Eden. So I think I can say that as a general rule I get the validity of criticizing aspects of particular religions, even ones for which I have a lot of sympathy. (ZBT! Did I mention?) But like anything else it’s a fraught business, and bound up with issues of power and relative status. And I think we might agree that the following two exchanges have very different valences:

    1.
    SHE: So when the Men of Sodom demand that Lot send his guests out to be gang-raped, Lot offers them his daughters instead. He’s the good guy.
    HE: Unfortunately.

    2.
    SHE: Judaism is itself a small religion but it had a huge influence on two large ones.
    HE: Unfortunately.

  36. @Camestros Felapton
    I think their are times and places to discuss the distinction between criticizing a religion or parts of a religion and criticizing its followers. I just don’t think this thread where emotions are already overheated is the time or place.

    I have no problem with well thought out criticism. Gratuitous insults are different.

  37. And I think we might agree that the following two exchanges have very different valences:

    1.
    SHE: So when the Men of Sodom demand that Lot send his guests out to be gang-raped, Lot offers them his daughters instead. He’s the good guy.
    HE: Unfortunately.

    2.
    SHE: Judaism is itself a small religion but it had a huge influence on two large ones.
    HE: Unfortunately.

    Tasha asked me not to get into defining the limits of anti-semitism and I can see, given the preceding discussion why she would feel that way. So I’d rather not discuss my point using those two specific examples even though the second is the relevant quote from the thread. We could consider swapping out 2. for a different religion but given the history and toxicity of anti-semitism the analogy doesn’t hold.

    So if you wouldn’t mind reframing your reply in a different way we can continue or we can leave it at that.

  38. @Darren Garrison
    I haven’t read City of Stairs. I think it’s on the TBR mountain. As is City of Blades.

    I’m avoiding Library at Mount Char as it has too many of my trigger issues.

    Books/stories read recently

    I’ve been reading SL Haung Russell’s Attic series and shorts. An urban fantasy about a woman with the superpower of mathematics. It’s been fun. Plot lines are a bit out there but I’m enjoying the world, characters, growth, humor, some of the body count and occasional torture scene is a bit much bot otherwise it’s a change from the usual. I’m thinking of nominating her for a Campbell

    One Con Glory was fun if your into attending SFF conventions and want to read a funny book based around one.

    The Merger by Sunil Patel is a fascinating short first contact story as well as an interesting look at relationships. The aliens want to take over his body. His wife has thoughts. He is another author I’m considering for the Campbell. I read something else by in Flash Fiction online June 2015 issue.

  39. Oh, I can reframe it in a way that I see as structurally and substantively equivalent (and topical!)

    1
    SHE: John C. Wright’s insists in his Hugo-nominated work Transhuman and Subhuman that women should be portrayed in more passive, less forceful roles?
    HE: Unfortunately

    2.
    SHE: Larry Corellia is a single author but he had a huge influence on both the Sad and the Rabid Puppies.
    HE: Unfortunately

  40. I haven’t read City of Stairs. I think it’s on the TBR mountain. As is City of Blades.

    The spoiler I have ROT13’d for City of Blades may be a trigger issue for you.

  41. Also, I read One Con Glory a couple of years back, but for the life of me can’t remember anything other than the cover.

    (I don’t like crowds, don’t like traveling, and live in the middle of nowhere, so the only convention I’ve ever attended was a rare local Star Trek convention in the early 1990s. I left before the one star, John “I knew him first as Eugine Bradford” Delancie showed up. (Maybe someone reading here attended the same convention–it was in Greenville, SC.))

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