Between now and MidAmeriCon II people will expend a million words arguing whether Sad Puppies 4 is a slate or a recommendation list, a Hugo voter registration drive, an outlet for those frustrated with message fiction, a movement to oppose the dread SJWs, or all of the above.
But the opening paragraph of Kate Paulk’s Mad Genius Club post about Sad Puppies 4 shows its first priority is gratifying the egos of the organizers —
“Introducing Sad Puppies Four: The Bitches are Back” …(also the Embiggening, and the Embitchening, given that I, Kate the Impaler, am Queen Bitch and I am ably seconded by Sarah, the Beautiful But Evil Space Princess, and Amanda, the Redhead of Doom, and we are all more than capable of going Queen Bitch when we need to).
Apart from that, the stated goals of Sad Puppies 4 include:
Expanding the number of Hugo voters —
The Hugo awards has entirely too small a voting and nominating pool. Five thousand votes is the largest number ever received? Two thousand nomination ballots? That’s piddly. For a field loved by millions, it’s nowhere near enough, and makes it easy for any small clique to corrupt the idea of awarding great SF and start giving themselves awards.
Collecting nominee recommendations —
The tireless, wonderful volunteer Puppy Pack will be collating recommendations.
Hosting an SP4 website as the collecting point — http://sadpuppies4.org/
There will… be multiple permanent threads (one per category) on the SP4 website where people can make comments.
Generating lists of the 10 most popular recommendations in each Hugo category —
Later – most likely somewhere around February or early March, I’ll be posting The List to multiple locations. The List will not be a slate – it will be a list of the ten or so most popular recommendations in each Hugo category, and a link to the full list in all its glory. Nothing more, nothing less.
Being open to anyone, grudgingly —
SF is a big tent: we don’t want to kick out anyone, even writers of bad message fiction that makes puppies sad.
The three organizers will not appear on The List, however, they are not recusing themselves from being nominated. Paulk says, “If anyone wants to nominate any of us they’ll need to do it on their own.”
Paulk also says emphatically, “there is NO political test.”
She calls for people to recommend things only if “you’ve read it/watched it/seen it and you think it’s one of the best in its Hugo class published in 2015.”
ArtRaccoon (Lee Madison), who did logos for SP3 and Vox Day’s Rabid Puppies slate, has created the Sad Puppies 4 logo. In a comment, the artist explained each of the dogs has a name —
Issac is at front checking over the systems start up, probably worrying about not making the Robomutt Robert “Three Laws Safe”. Frank is the one on the laptop…totally violating the tenets of the Butlerian Jihad, and Ray is on Robert’s back checking his welding job.
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Petréa Mitchell:
Thanks for the clarification. I knew that the Pacific Northwesterners had done their damned-finest to get a Seattle con, and that the roadblock wasn’t some hotel-chain magnate refusing to allow Worldcon in any of their hotels.
Daniela said:
Yup, that was this comment:
That refers to the incident at Sasquan when Tor author John C. Wright sent his wife, Tor author L. Jagi Lamplighter, to speak with Tor editor Patrick Nielsen Hayden, in order to extent [sic] to him the olive branch of peace and reconciliation, according to a blog post by Wright charmingly titled “Smeagol Nielson [sic] Hayden”.
According to Wright, “Mr. Hayden erupted into a swearing and cursing, and he shouted and bellowed at the tiny and cheerful woman I married.”
According to Lamplighter herself, in a comment to Wright’s blog post apparently later deleted, but preserved here, “Mr, Nielsen Hayden did shout, swear, and stomp off…but he was shouting and swearing at/about John, not at me personally and, actually, as far as swearing, he just used the phrase ‘tell him to shovel it up his…’ You can figure out the rest.”
(I don’t know whether Hayden himself, or any witness, has described the incident publicly anywhere.)
Now, the incident has morphed into a “physical attack without provocation”, so therefore Puppies will have to pack heat for the next Worldcon, because Just How Many People Have To Die?
The derp is strong in this one.
@Lori Coulson: “Hell, Niagra Falls would probably be more affordable…”
NIAGARA FALLS!
Slowly I turn… step by step… inch by inch…
😉
Anyway, on the actual topic: I’m starting to think that maybe I’ve been looking at the Puppies from the wrong perspective. It’s obvious that Puppies 2015 wasn’t about the quality of the work, or even the content of the work… so let’s set what they slated aside in favor of why they did it. The motivations of the rank and file are pretty much unknowable, so let’s look at their leaders.
They had to know they couldn’t actually pull off a win with their numbers; SP2 proved that. Likewise, the reactions to SP2 had to tell them that doubling down and expanding their efforts would result in dominating the nominations; the whole “we had no idea we’d be that successful” line just doesn’t hold up. So what’s left?
I think the real goal was to be able to point to this year’s Hugos and say, “we did that.” I still remember how happy I was when a friend of mine got a Best Novel nomination a few years ago; I worked with her mother-in-law, and both of us were simply overjoyed to see her get recognized like that. Win or lose, that was a real accomplishment.
In the same way, I have to say that the outcome really didn’t matter to someone like VD, because he was able to say “I did that” as soon as the nominations were announced. Whatever happened after that, he’d made sure that his name would go down in Hugo history. He made his mark. If one of his picks won, that’d be another kind of victory. If not, he could sit and whine about how unfair They were for treating Those Noble Authors so badly. In that light – that callous, petty, vindictive light – his actions make sense. Even if his nominations had failed to make the final ballot, he had a ready excuse in the nonexistent Seekrit SJW Cabal: surely the only way his minions could have been thwarted was by an opposing force of equal or greater magnitude! From the moment he decided to set up RP1, there was a way he could spin any outcome into a way to get more attention and support – and if there’s one thing we know about Beale, it is that he is positively obsessed with measuring how much attention he gets.
So let’s say he shares some of this thinking with the Sads. Why wouldn’t they do the same thing? Gain support through the culture war talking points, or any other nonsense that’ll stick to the wall long enough to lure some sucker on board, and then spin the results to do it again next time. The books don’t matter, what the rest of fandom thinks doesn’t matter (as long as they’re not apathetic) – all that matters is that feeling of accomplishment and finding the right way to spin any result as both a victory and a call to arms.
They didn’t even have to fork over any of their own money for the show. Max Bialystock would be proud.
In other words, it all boils down to a pathetic cry for attention. We should not indulge them.
Teemu Leisti: I don’t know whether Hayden himself, or any witness, has described the incident publicly anywhere.
The Wrights’ account of PNH supposedly “shouting” has been contradicted by another person who was present:
Comment By: Jim Wright (no relation to John C.)
August 26th, 2015 at 12:19 am
Now just a damned minute. I read the whole article by the self proclaimed world’s finest writer.
Melinda, help me out here. We were standing about ten feet from PNH during the reception. John C. Wright, in the same article Adam-Troy Castro is quoting above claims that PNH “screamed” and “cursed” at his wife. It would have had to have happened within our earshot. I don’t recall any such event. Of course, I was drinking ice water, so I might have been a little loopy…
ETA: I love how the Puppies are studiously ignoring the fact that Lamplighter was engaged in harassment of someone who had made it clear they were not interested in engaging by refusing to respond to 3 previous e-mails.
Very strange. That robot is not a sad puppy – it’s clearly a MAD puppy. And oh, it looks like the Sads are bulking it up and adjusting it for a new campaign. The Rabids will be pleased that everything is all set up for them again.
That was my reaction as well. Seriously, folks, there’s already a process in place for collecting nominations and posting a final list to be voted on. Making a general reading list is cool, but curating more than that is just redundant at this point.
It’s a pretty major point that many Sad Puppies just don’t seem to comprehend. The Hugo voter pool IS the Worldcon membership. It’s never been anything more than that. Just because the award is esteemed outside of Worldcon doesn’t mean it should reflect the vote of anyone not signed up for their membership.
This continues to be my largest problem with the Sad Puppy campaign no matter what they call their “recommended list.” Finding more people to support Worldcon and vote for the Hugos: Good! Finding likeminded people who enjoy the works you enjoy: Good! Finding likeminded people who enjoy the works you enjoy JUST SO THEY CAN VOTE FOR THE HUGOS: Bad. Bad Puppies.
Let people vote how they want to vote. Don’t coerce them to vote a certain way. Don’t tell them to base their nominations on a mathematical strategy that nets YOUR list a 5x advantage over everyone else’s picks. People are still not going to like you if you continue to disenfranchise their Hugo nominations…and I suspect there will be significant No Awarding again if/when this voting strategy is employed and it fills up a lot of finalist slots.
To: Amoxtli
I support EPH because it permanently locks in one slot in each category for Sad Puppies.
(And given the number of Rabids, they will also have one nominee in each category and perhaps 2 in fancast, fanartist, etc.)
As to emotional response to having my ingroup attacked — please note that I’ve been very calm and measured in my posts here — and that I consider myself a *Happy Puppy*. So when people attack — say — Sarah Hoyt — I don’t respond by calling you all SJWs (instead of say anti-slate voters (although I wish use of the labe lHappy Kittehs had been more popular)) — I simply try to give you facts (or let you know how what you propose — as Cat did — will be taken by most Puppies).
JJ: On August 24 Teresa Nielsen Hayden addressed the story in a tweet:
“Lamplighter had been sending Patrick emails that he’d been prudently ignoring. She was trying to talk about their contents.”
Since she did not contradict the story, only added context, I can’t put much stock in Wright’s failure to hear the exchange.
The puppies seem like total lunatics. All these talk about coming with guns to a convention to defend themselves.
http://madgeniusclub.com/2015/09/03/introducing-sad-puppies-four-the-bitches-are-back/#comment-63624
I want an updated code of conduct that says that people carrying working fire arms are NOT welcome at the convention. This together with their talk about war scares the bejesus out of me.
To Cat: I took the nominaton of “Wisdom from my Internet” to be a humorous poke at the fact that “Your Hatemail will be Graded” was on the 2009 list and won a Hugo.
It was clearly not meant to win.
Fannish humor often goes down the rabbit hole.
My impulse, based on my admittedly limited experience of cons, is to think that if Patrick had been shouting and screaming, we’d have other accounts of it. A public place, presumably fairly densely packed with long-time fans, witnessing a genuinely heated exchange like that? That’s the fodder of con reports and always has been. The fact that there aren’t – at least where I’ve seen – at least have a dozen other accounts makes me doubt that it happened.
I also admit to questioning Lamplighter’s standards, given the vitriol her husband routinely dishes out. Would she have said that her husband saying whatever Patrick did was shouting and screaming? Conversely, is there any strong dissent that would not strike her as shouted or worse?
I took the giant robot dog to be the giant No Award that landed on top of Sad Puppies 3 from orbit. The three puppies have just climbed out from under the huge thing that landed on them. The puppy on the laptop is looking up “Australian Rules” on the internet and is confused to discover that the winner of the Hugo has to fight multiple burly men for a ball on a grassy oval.
The beagle with a spanner is hoping to get a new gig as Gromit in the Broadway musical version of A Grand Day Out.
The puppy on the robot’s shoulder is simply reconsidering its career choice as a mascot.
To Hampus Eckerman: gun laws vary between jurisdictions. Pat Patterson claims to have a licence that allows him to be armed even in private spaces and to have aauthoritty to deputize. I think he’d risk losing that licence if he choose to deputize anyone who was not aiding him in the apprehension of a criminal during an ongoing crime.
I also note he is getting pushback from others questioning the need to go armed. Of course the Con should have a clear policy but I suspect that the Con may need to retain the services of a lawyer to draft it.
As to bearing arms for self defence: in the USA many people go armed whenever they leave the house – to go grocery shopping, buy a latte, to Church and so on. The Con would simply be another place one goes armed, no different than any other place. My family had a gun that was kept in the house and of course the kids were trained as marksmen by the NRA.
However, I do find the rhetoric excessive.
Happy Puppy: I support EPH because it permanently locks in one slot in each category for Sad Puppies.
Oh, gosh, Happy Puppy, I’m so sorry — but you’ve misunderstood how EPH works.
It doesn’t “lock in” any amount of slots for anyone. If the Puppies can only muster 10% of the nominators, they might be able to grab a slot in one of the shorter fiction categories — but they will likely not be able to get anything in the Novel category, unless the book they promote is widely popular with non-Puppies as well.
I’m so sorry that you got the wrong idea about EPH. I hope that this won’t cause you to withdraw your support for it.
My Illudim Peu-36 explosive space modulator is still cool though, right?
Mike Glyer: Since she did not contradict the story, only added context, I can’t put much stock in Wright’s failure to hear the exchange.
Since the Wrights are notoriously unreliable narrators, and since Lamplighter was actually engaging in harassment, I can’t put any stock in either of their accounts — especially given that those accounts differ significantly.
It’s in the Nielsen Haydens’ best interests not to relay any account of what was actually said and done by PNH, especially if it cannot be corroborated by anyone. It’s not as if Puppies would be persuaded otherwise, and the people who know PNH are smart enough to have a pretty good idea how he actually reacted. TNH was wise not to say anything.
So it existed to deny space to a deserving work?
You know there’s a reason I’m not nominating The Last Voyage Of The Starship Lily in short story. Something amazing could fill that space instead of wasting it on a take-that.
So far, though the, uh, rhetoric, is different, it looks to me a lot like how Sad Puppy 3 kicked off, with a lot of commenters posting their recommendations.
We all know what happened next, with the “100% in the open, democratically, using a democratic process” slate, followed by Theodore Beale’s co-opting with his own slate.
I’ve said previously that if Brad Torgersen had simply left it as a recommendation thread, we would not have had cause for complaint. So with SP4, “Let’s see what happens'”…
Camestros Felapton: I took the giant robot dog to be the giant No Award that landed on top of Sad Puppies 3 from orbit. The three puppies have just climbed out from under the huge thing that landed on them. The puppy on the laptop is looking up “Australian Rules” on the internet and is confused to discover that the winner of the Hugo has to fight multiple burly men for a ball on a grassy oval. The beagle with a spanner is hoping to get a new gig as Gromit in the Broadway musical version of A Grand Day Out. The puppy on the robot’s shoulder is simply reconsidering its career choice as a mascot.
Please accept this internet. I stole it from Kyra.
Unless Pat Patterson is a sworn law officer, I’m not sure if he/she can carry onto private property if it is forbidden by the venue. IANAL, and it would depend somewhat on the state and local laws.
However, the comments they are making sound … odd.
I always love how the ‘libertarians’ are all for individual responsibility and the rights of a private business to choose how they will do business and with whom, and then get all bent out of shape when a business says, “Hey, no guns in here.”
And THAT is why we are annoyed. A JOKE should not be put on a Hugo ballot when it pushed real, honest works OFF the ballot. Fannish humor is often weird, but that was no joke, that was a turd in the punchbowl.
@Hampus:
Every con I’ve ever attended has spelled out, very explicitly, that the only way a con attendee can carry an actual weapon in a convention area is if it’s peace-bonded, which means allowing security to inspect it and secure it in a holster or sheath – usually with a zip-tie or the like. Even fake weapons are frowned upon, unless they’re very obviously toys/props. The sole exception I am aware of is in the case where a dealer sells weapons (such as MZW and his Sharp Pointy Things), and even then the dealer is responsible for keeping a sharp eye on them, and the buyer is strongly encouraged to take a non-bondable purchase straight to their room rather than wander the con with it. There are just too many liability issues to allow any more latitude than that.
This isn’t part of the code of conduct. This is part of the basic convention rules, the very ones you agree to follow when you buy your membership. Failure to follow those rules is grounds for having that membership revoked (without a refund), getting kicked out of the con, and being banned from future events if necessary – and “necessary” is in the opinion of the people running the con. A con is a private event, and as such it has every right to forbid guns, knives, swords, clubs, and whatever the hell else they see don’t want people carrying. It’s their party, and they get the last word on who gets allowed in.
And, seeing that somebody in that thread mentioned LibertyCon – yes, the same rules apply there, too. Doesn’t matter who you are or what you’re permitted for – the con prohibits weapons, so leave ’em at home or be prepared to get kicked out and told never to come back. Something as apparently innocent as putting a radiation or biohazard sticker on a mug as a gag can get you booted around here, thanks to a certain incident at Chattacon several years back. (Anything that results in the cops and the bomb squad getting called tends to have that effect, especially if it makes the news…)
To JJ: given that both Sad Puppies and Rabid Puppies seem to now have 500 voters and the numbers grow from year to year, I think Puppies will have a lock on one to two slots at the nomination stage. My support for EPH is based on the idea it is not good for fandom for any one faction to sweep the ballot.
Happy Puppy: gun laws vary between jurisdictions. Pat Patterson claims to have a licence that allows him to be armed even in private spaces
It doesn’t matter. Mr Patterson’s license does not override MidAmericon’s policies. If the MidAmericon II policy is that real guns are forbidden, Mr Patterson will probably find himself being escorted out by con security or police.
Bruce Baugh: A court will accept credible, uncontradicted oral testimony. Why would your impulse overrule the facts on the record? Lamplighter has given her version of what happened, and when one of the people present, TNH, commented, she didn’t disagree the episode occurred, she just provided insight into why it occurred.
Happy Puppy: given that both Sad Puppies and Rabid Puppies seem to now have 500 voters and the numbers grow from year to year, I think Puppies will have a lock on one to two slots at the nomination stage. My support for EPH is based on the idea it is not good for fandom for any one faction to sweep the ballot.
I think that the Puppies have come close to maxing out their numbers, and that you will end up disappointed. But I still applaud your support for EPH.
Can you cite any Missouri or US federal law to that effect?
So there it is. If the venue posts a ‘no guns’ policy, that’s it. No guns inside.
I’ve been made to peacebond a grey plastic sword.
I missed the edit window, but since the document is online, here’s an excerpt from page six of LibertyCon 2015’s program book:
Just in case there was any doubt. Note the lack of exceptions.
@ Happy Puppy
Disagreeing with Ms Hoyt, which happens a good bit here, is not attacking her.
I, too, see no humour at all in wasting a Hugo ballot space (which could have been filled by, for example, What Makes This Book So Great) on MZW.
Mike Glyer: Can you cite any Missouri or US federal law to that effect?
TechGrrl1972 has the right of it.
TechGrrl1972: What was the source of your info?
Anyway, just to open this topic a little more — MidAmeriCon II is using the Kansas City Meeting & Convention Center. Isn’t that a public property?
The hotels they’re using are private property, though I expect the owner of the property determines whether a restriction gets posted.
I just googled “guns laws for kansas city mo. I clicked on a couple of them, that quote came from
http://civilliberty.about.com/od/guncontrol/a/Missouri-Gun-Laws.htm
Also, note the “Arenas and stadiums with seating for more than 5,000” which, depending on the convention center, might be on point. The owner of the convention center is probably not the city or the state.
“STRUCTURE
Visit KC is a nonprofit, 501(c)6 organization contracted by the City of Kansas City, Missouri. Formerly the Kansas City Convention & Visitors Association, we began doing business as Visit KC in September 2014.”
Mike: I dunno if Teresa is confirming so much as declining to engage, and like I said, the absence of accounts from anyone else – plus the one at least tentative direct contradiction from Jim W. – makes me wonder. It’s not something I feel strongly about. Patrick can be pretty voluble and sometimes voluble, it’s not that I think it’s impossible or anything. It’s more that I don’t have any particular reason to trust Lamplighter’s account.
@Mike: (convention on public property)
It’s still a private event, and the con has made arrangements with the venue – usually involving a contract – concerning access to it. If the convention is permitted to deny access to anyone without a badge (standard contract terms), then their right to revoke badges means their policies take precedence over any default settings that would normally be in effect. If they wanted to, the con organizers could deny access based on something as trivial as “you’re not wearing purple” – it’d be silly, but if they’ve contracted for exclusive access to the space, they get to make the rules. That’s what exclusive access means.
A few years ago, I stopped by a convention that I had not planned to attend, purely because I was passing by on the way home from seeing some friends. The hotel hosting it was open to the public; the convention was not. I poked into the lobby to say hello, but I had no expectation of being permitted into the convention areas. That access required a membership, even though I would have been freely able to enter those same areas on any other weekend. Making an arrangement for access to those spaces means the con gets to control that access. That’s the nature of such things.
I can tell you that Kansas City Convention Centre bans the following dread threats: Helium Balloons and Glitter. Their policies appear to be silent on guns.
I know this is a US v UK thing but, honestly, the very concept of going for a nice day out in a public space where random people might be covertly carrying firearms bewilders me.
To Hampus Eckerman: thank you for your thoughtful reply at. 9:29 p.m.
I would like a literary manifesto to accompany the campaign such as Sarah Hoyt’s Human Wave post.
Even if such a manifesto is not directly tied to SP4 it will not be possible to divorce politics from the campaign as I believe that Heroic Engineer “competence porn” stands in direct conflict with Modernist literary fiction. One values external problem solving while the other values internal conflict and change.
These two positions have become proxies in the American culture wars — as you saw when for some inexplicable reason everyone started talking about how they were “born in a log cabin” awhile back.
Whereas my family had servants and have been shamelessly over educated for generations. But then Roman politicians also would claim to be humble farmers — so the humble brag is not limited to Americans.
Well, I imagine that MidAmericon II will be issuing a statement on this tout suite, now that it’s publicly become an issue.
I sure as hell wouldn’t feel safe at MAC II if there are Puppies carrying firearms there, given that a significant number of them have demonstrated extremely poor impulse control, and given that a number of them have, shall we say, demonstrated a marked lack of what is and is not an acceptable response to something one does not like.
Unless one plans on materializing in the KC Convention Center, Worldcon attendees are likely to walk by any number of armed people while in Missouri, which is a “shall issue” state.
Why can’t both elements be present in a story? I’m pretty sure I’ve read books and stories that include both elements. Also pretty sure I read somewhere in Heinlein’s life story that he valued internal conflict and change. That’s why he kept trying to bust out of the pulps into the slicks.
And, I am not a published author. I have dabbled in fanfiction, and I try to write plot-driven stories with internal conflict driving my characters. Don’t know if I’ve succeeded, but I’ve tried.
I think you have fallen into the either/or fallacy. Wait, wasn’t that Aristotle? A or not-A?
@Happy Puppy: “I believe that Heroic Engineer “competence porn” stands in direct conflict with Modernist literary fiction. One values external problem solving while the other values internal conflict and change.”
Oh, dear. I’ll have to tell quite a few milSF authors they’re Doing It Wrong, then. Their books tend to involve both external problems (say, repelling an invasion) and internal conflict and development (say, overcoming feelings of inadequacy).
You don’t happen to have Jack “The Lost Fleet” Campbell’s contact information handy, do you? I’ve got Mike Moscoe (aka Mike Shepherd)’s email address; would you like for me to include an educational statement from you about his Kris Longknife (and Vicky Peterwald) books? I might have David Weber’s email somewhere; how would you like me to break the news that both his Honor Harrington and Safehold series will have to go? Unfortunately, I don’t think I’ll be able to reach Robert Heinlein to break the news about “Slipstick” Libby…
Shall I continue, or have I made my point?
I have also had replica weapons zip-tied. I’d simply like to point out I also carried a pen knife so peace-bonding has always seemed to me to be a bit akin to security theatre.
Would any con policy prevent functional armaments altogether?
Nick Mamatas: I’ve submitted a question about carrying guns to the convention center sales staff. (Told them I am attending an event there next year. Didn’t specify which one.)
SJWs always lie. Except when they say they’re SJWs?
Mike,
Did you add “PS: I am not a kook” at the bottom?
If I were a concom, I would certainly make sure the venue had a no firearms policy. I’ve owned guns, including handguns, my whole life as an adult. That doesn’t mean I think taking my AR-15 for a walk to Starbucks or the grocery store makes any sense at all.
Even the most conservative Supreme Court justice stated unequivocally that nothing in the 2nd Amendment forbade ‘reasonable’ regulation of firearms. You could look it up.
And conservatives worship private business, so if a private business chooses to have a ‘no gun’ policy, that’s in the Ayn Randian spirit, innit?
TO Rev. Bob: Hah hah. Of course both can be present; it is a matter of emphasis. Furthermore, I notice the reliance on novels in your examples and many series novels which give room for both aspects to be developed.
Much of the current controversy is centered around the shorter fiction categories.
@TechGrrl1972: “And, I am not a published author. I have dabbled in fanfiction, and I try to write plot-driven stories with internal conflict driving my characters. Don’t know if I’ve succeeded, but I’ve tried.”
That blend was something I loved about Simon R. Green’s “Ghost Finders” series. Happy’s struggle with drugs, and its effects on his professional relationship with JC and his private relationship with Melody were devastating… especially since dealing with the external threat would always require him to get doped to the gills.
(For those who haven’t read them – and why not? Ghost Stalk! – Happy’s the team’s telepath. The drugs help him control his abilities and his moods. He usually uses them to shut the voices out, but the mission often means he has to expand them beyond his normal limits. By the opening of the sixth-current-final book, the accumulated toxic effects have him very close to death, and the guilt and anguish are tearing his teammates apart.)
@Happy Puppy:
Do you need a hand? Those goalposts look very heavy; I wouldn’t want you to throw your back out.
(I do not recall Hoyt’s “Human Wave” manifesto saying anything about story length.)
It may have come via Ms. Marvel, but “embiggen” is definitely a Simpsons thing.