Has anyone been following the brewing storm over the Hugo sci-fi awards? There is apparently a backlash among some science fiction writers and readers regarding the genre's direction and there have been claims of Gamergate-esque motivations among some in the literary sci-fi world regarding the progressiveness of contemporary sci-fi.
After reading this article I was curious on Dakka's feelings on the matter. I operated under the notion that Science Fiction's was rooted in progressive themes, so I am surprised by the backlash.
What on Earthsea is happening with the 2015 Hugo Awards? On Saturday, nominations for the prestigious science fiction and fantasy prizes were announced. As usual, the finalists were determined by ballot; any member of the 2014, 2015, or 2016 WorldCons (that is, any fan who shelled out the requisite $40 to sign up for one of those conventions) could vote. And yet the names and works that rose to the top provoked a tsunami of controversy. That’s because a group of rightwing activists managed to game the selection process, proposing a fixed slate of nominees and feverishly promoting it. Since small margins are sufficient to secure Hugo nods, what emerged was what many are calling a strange, ideologically driven, and unrepresentative sample of fiction.
How earthshaking is this, really? As Will Shetterly points out on his blog, people have been manipulating the Hugo nomination processes for decades. (Shetterly recalls watching Orson Scott Card glad-handing his way through various gatherings, penning glowing reviews of fellow sci-fi travelers for his column, and otherwise using his superior resources to mount an effective awards campaign.) And it’s true that, in the past, authors and fans often ignited individual crusades around books they wrote or liked. Writer John Scalzi in particular was famous for opening the threads on his blog to sci-fi and fantasy scribes who wanted to remind the community that their work was Hugo-eligible.
But, Scalzi told me on the phone, explicitly anointing and championing a full group of titles, while not illegal, violates convention. It is unprecedented. (At least, it is for the Hugo awards. Read Arthur Chu for a better sense of the long, inglorious history of “freeping,” a strategy beloved in reactionary cesspools, whereby a diabolically galvanized fringe creates the illusion of majority by flooding a space.) Anyway, it is the agenda behind the 2015 ballot, as much as the effectiveness of the tactic, that has prompted so much anger and anxiety.
A long, long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away (last year), the Hugo Awards seemed to undergo a seismic change. Top prizes recognized a generation of younger, more diverse writers, with names like Ann Leckie, Kameron Hurley, and John Chu, and fans celebrated what appeared to be enriched levels of awareness/receptivity in the air. But then things took a distinctly Gamergate-tinged turn. Authors Brad R. Torgerson and Larry Correia re-upped a campaign called Sad Puppies (originally “Sad Puppies Think of the Children,” an ironic send-up of liberal bleeding hearts) that had achieved modest success in 2014, elevating a few ordained works to that year’s Hugo longlist.
The ostensible raison d’puppy—which multiple sources for this article, including Scalzi and sci-fi scholar Gerry Canavan, took pains to tell me is a perfectly legitimate subject for debate—is the belief that SFF now underserves a particular type of fan, writer, and work. The age of space operas—fun, swashbuckling, populist—may have passed into something less triumphal and more shaded. (At least, that’s the generous framing. To me Torgerson still sounds like he’s blaming SFF’s “decline” on the PC demands of boring scolds.) In his words:
A few decades ago, if you saw a lovely spaceship on a book cover, with a gorgeous planet in the background, you could be pretty sure you were going to get a rousing space adventure featuring starships and distant, amazing worlds. If you saw a barbarian swinging an axe? You were going to get a rousing fantasy epic with broad-chested heroes who slay monsters, and run off with beautiful women.
But now:
The book has a spaceship on the cover, but is it really going to be a story about space exploration and pioneering derring-do? Or is the story merely about racial prejudice and exploitation…
A planet, framed by a galactic backdrop. Could it be an actual bona fide space opera? Heroes and princesses and laser blasters? No, wait. It’s about sexism and the oppression of women.
Finally, a book with a painting of a person wearing a mechanized suit of armor! Holding a rifle! War story ahoy! Nope, wait. It’s actually about gay and transgender issues.
No longer interested in adventure, argue the Puppies, the Hugos have grown elitist, academic, and overly ideological—irrelevant to the average fan.
The Puppies aimed to right this wrong by using wholly legal freep tactics to advance a better slate of Hugo authors. And it worked. As the Daily Dot observes, the SPs—and their even more extreme cousins, the Rabid Puppies, led by Vox Day—swept all the main categories. “Three of the five Best Novel nominees come from the Sad Puppies list, while the Best Novella shortlist is identical to Vox Day’s own recommendations—including three separate nominations for works by John C. Wright, an author notorious for his homophobic views.” (And not much else, I might add. Wright has not a single bestseller to his name, operates out of a tiny Finland-based publishing house that is run, not coincidentally, by Vox Day, and perhaps wrought his most eternal turn of phrase when he called the creators of the Legend of Korra “disgusting, limp, soulless sacks of filth.” Their crime? Confirming that two female characters in the franchise liked women.)*
A quick sidebar on Vox Day, one of a handful of this saga’s bold-faced names. In addition to writing sci-fi, he’s a video game designer and early proponent of Gamergate, which, he argues, resembles Sad Puppies in that “both groups are striking back against the left-wing control freaks who have subjected science fiction to ideological control for two decades and are now attempting to do the same thing in the game industry.” He is the second human being to be expelled from the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA), after he used the organization’s official Twitter feed to slam the award-winning black novelist N.K. Jemisin as a “half-savage.” He questions the need for women’s suffrage. And he believes that our national ills can be partially attributed to “the infestation of even the smallest American heartland towns by African, Asian, and Aztec cultures.” Yes, Aztecs. ANYWAY.
Day is far from the only writer to invoke Gamergate as a model for the Puppies. Not only do Torgerson, Correia, and co. seem animated by a similar leeriness of minority voices and perspectives, but Teresa and Patrick Nielsen Hayden have tried to document Twitter cross-pollination between the movements.* Correia in particular appears unperturbed by the Gamergate-SP connection. On his blog, he refers to his progressive enemies as SJWs (“social justice warriors,” a Gamergate coinage describing a shadowy conspiracy of liberals and identity politickers out to trample white male freedom). And he endorses nicknaming the Puppy movement “the slate-ening,” an apparent callback to “The Fappening,” hackers’ approving term for the 2014 celebrity photo leaks. That unauthorized distribution of nude images from starlets’ phones—a delectation to which some dudes felt entitled by, I don’t know, an aggrieved apprehension of looming irrelevance—is an obvious spiritual cousin to Gamergate’s death threats and doxes.
I could go on trying to convince you that these Puppy people are unsavory characters. (Two more charming names they dreamed up for the pro-diversity crowd: CHORFs, or “Cliquish, Holier-than-thou, Obnoxious, Reactionary Fanatics,” and the HPPC, or “Hyper-Progressive Pissypants Club.”) Or I could try to poke additional holes in their pretexts. (The “science fiction and fantasy has become too literary” critique, for example. Is that more the case now than back in 1975, when ballots were studded with the likes of Ursula Le Guin and Isaac Asimov? Not to mention the elitist charges. In 2013, The Avengers, Torgerson’s example of a neglected lowbrow masterpiece, actually won a Hugo!) But it’s maybe more interesting to look at how various authors on and off the Puppy-powered slates have reacted.
Matthew Surridge declined his nomination for Best Fan Writer, citing “strong” aesthetic and ideological disagreements with Torgerson.
Kameron Hurley seemed inclined to wash her hands of the Hugos altogether. (And this is a danger for the SFWA—that instead of fighting to take the prizes back, mainstream fans will defect for climes untouched by reactionary swill. As Arthur Chu eloquently argues, the Puppies’ success should motivate WorldCon to rework its voting procedure before the trolls tank the entire operation.)
Deirdre Saoirse Moen crafted a new list of nominations, minus Puppies.
And a whole bunch of Hugo voters are pretty excited about a mysterious dark horse candidate, Noah Ward. (Say it out loud, slowly.) He is the perennial lurker on every ballot, in every category, and the last recourse of WorldCon members disenchanted with their options. I’ve crossed my fingers that he gets lots of love come August.
*Correction, April 8, 2015: This post originally misstated that the creators of the Legend of Korra revealed that a male character liked men. They revealed that two female characters liked women. It also misidentified Teresa and Patrick Nielsen Hayden as the founder of Tor Books. They are the founders of Ansatz Press.
Apart from that...I have no idea what Hugo is about etc. but what is the actual problem? If anyone is allowed to vote, then what's the problem with one party lobbying for votes? Would those people also have problems with democrats making advertisement during voting times? I don't get it. Can anyone explain? :/
DarkTraveler777 wrote: I operated under the notion that Science Fiction's was rooted in progressive themes, so I am surprised by the backlash.
It is. The whole issue is driven by a bunch of whiny s who want to return to the good old days when Heinlein wrote all of those completely non-political adventure stories (lol) and the original Star Trek never dared to feature a left-leaning agenda. Once you look at all at the history of science fiction it's pretty clear that their complaints are really just a cover for their real objection: that "SJW" stories and authors get more attention than the right-wing ideology they embrace.
The only unfortunate thing here is that voting in unison for the political agenda instead of for the works each individual voter prefers gives them voting power far beyond their actual numbers and destroys the credibility of the award. If they didn't have this disproportionate voting power they'd be an irrelevant minority that nobody pays any attention to.
Sigvatr wrote: If anyone is allowed to vote, then what's the problem with one party lobbying for votes?
The problem is not just lobbying for votes and letting the best work win, it's that they've given a list of "anti-SJW" works to vote for and their entire group is voting in unison according to the instructions of their leaders instead of for the works they actually prefer. So the "mainstream" vote is split between a bunch of different books because everyone has their own preferences, while the anti-SJW vote is united behind a single approved winner. Now the award is no longer about which work is the best, it's about which ideology is best at getting its followers to vote as a united whole to make a political point.
Peregrine wrote: The problem is not just lobbying for votes and letting the best work win, it's that they've given a list of "anti-SJW" works to vote for and their entire group is voting in unison according to the instructions of their leaders instead of for the works they actually prefer. So the "mainstream" vote is split between a bunch of different books because everyone has their own preferences, while the anti-SJW vote is united behind a single approved winner.
You've just summed up the difference between how the Democrats and Republicans choose their Presidential candidates
You've just summed up the difference between how the Democrats and Republicans choose their Presidential candidates
This basically is what it boils down to...isn't it? Conservatives have Sad Puppies lobbying for their votes, Leftists have their fellow SJW lobbying for their authors...so...where's the problem? If Sad Puppies have such a huge influence, then they represent a majority...and if SJW then keep howling wolf...then they don't understand how democracy works. Unless there's something I'm missing about the entire issue. As stated before, not familiar with sci-fi literature at all.
You've just summed up the difference between how the Democrats and Republicans choose their Presidential candidates
This basically is what it boils down to...isn't it? Conservatives have Sad Puppies lobbying for their votes, Leftists have their fellow SJW lobbying for their authors...so...where's the problem? If Sad Puppies have such a huge influence, then they represent a majority...and if SJW then keep howling wolf...then they don't understand how democracy works. Unless there's something I'm missing about the entire issue. As stated before, not familiar with sci-fi literature at all.
What follows is based only on the two articles in this thread, so I may be off base. Like you I don't follow sci-fi literature closely at all.
But the problem seems to be that the Puppies gamed the voting system so well, and lobbied in such an unprecedented manner, that the flaws in the Hugo nomination system became apparent. Sorta a RAW vs RAI situation.
Looks like the same conclusion I get from it. To me, it just seems like Sad Puppies know their stuff and how to do business and the other side is just overwhelmed by it and thus frustrated.
That is how a fair voting system works, though...it's the same for any bigger vote. I mean, everyone gets his respective vote. Every side does their best to win as many people as possible. Hm.
You can go the Oscar's way and have a fixed jury, but you then end up, mostly, ignoring your voters and ending up with even more lobby problems.
If I am recalling correctly, back when I read up on Sad Puppies a few years ago as they started, there was an issue of 'conservative' authors being ignored in the nominations, regardless of the quality of their work. Similarly, any writing that could have been considered 'pro-gun' was taboo.
Correia (the only person who's stuff I have read), being the fire arms enthusiast and conservative that he is, battle back with the Sad Puppies campaign, arguing that the literature and not the personal politics should be considered.
Fast forward a few years later after I've failed to follow the whole thing, and it appears to be a caricature of what it once was.
It's certainly not a surprise to see a group 'gaming' the Hugo's selection process,
but it's not novel either, just more visible in this day of facebooks, twitters and authors blogs that get read by more than a select few
It's also not surprising there is a right wing/conservative push back against the leftwing/liberal consensus of the past few years, looking back you can see it's happened before
that said the apparent arguments of the 'puppies'
The book has a spaceship on the cover, but is it really going to be a story about space exploration and pioneering derring-do? Or is the story merely about racial prejudice and exploitation…
A planet, framed by a galactic backdrop. Could it be an actual bona fide space opera? Heroes and princesses and laser blasters? No, wait. It’s about sexism and the oppression of women.
Finally, a book with a painting of a person wearing a mechanized suit of armor! Holding a rifle! War story ahoy! Nope, wait. It’s actually about gay and transgender issues.
No longer interested in adventure, argue the Puppies, the Hugos have grown elitist, academic, and overly ideological—irrelevant to the average fan.
do sound like a load of rubbish, good authors can and do produce enjoyable stories that can have a main theme (eg war story) and, gasp, also address other stuff too (eg gay/transgender issues)..,.
but sadly the Hugo's are voted for by attendees and hit the same problems as the New York Times best sellers list...
people in general tend to pick not necessarily the lowest common denominator, but certainly not the most sophisticated
(whereas critics would tend to pick more complex stuff the general public might not)
the best method (but not actually much use for promoting new work) would be to see what was still selling in 20 years time.... good stuff is much more likely to still be around
Peregrine wrote: The problem is not just lobbying for votes and letting the best work win, it's that they've given a list of "anti-SJW" works to vote for and their entire group is voting in unison according to the instructions of their leaders instead of for the works they actually prefer. So the "mainstream" vote is split between a bunch of different books because everyone has their own preferences, while the anti-SJW vote is united behind a single approved winner.
You've just summed up the difference between how the Democrats and Republicans choose their Presidential candidates
I was going to make a similar joke about Canadian Politics. But more people here recognize the US, so let's go with that one.
A small group committed to a certain agenda influenced the genre. Then another small group committed to a different agenda influenced the genre. Why does only the work of the second group merit criticism?
Apart from that...I have no idea what Hugo is about etc. but what is the actual problem? If anyone is allowed to vote, then what's the problem with one party lobbying for votes? Would those people also have problems with democrats making advertisement during voting times? I don't get it. Can anyone explain? :/
The problem is that the Hugo Award is supposed to be representative of the field of Science Fiction, a roadmap of where it has been and where it is going. The Hugo awards are supposed to be (but often aren't) the best novels, stories and media in the genre. Many new readers start out reading books straight from the Hugo Award Winner list because they believe they will get quality and a good idea of what science fiction is. Honestly, I object to this more because it promotes crappy books than because of their ideology. Then again, OSC's win for Speaker for the Dead pretty much disillusioned me, so this is just more of the same.
Imagine if some group purposefully set out to politicize the Oscars and make them into a big, irrelevant joke. Just imagine. Now picture that happening to Sci Fi.
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hotsauceman1 wrote: Sci-fi has always been about exploring issues in a way contemporary fiction can't. It's just to the forefront now
Not really. Much of the space opera and milSF subgenre was quite reactionary. Heck, Baen books pretty much banks on the eagerness for more hard-right SF in the market.
Manchu wrote: People seem to be assuming this is the first time politics played a major role in the nominations process ...
To this extent. I could believe politics determining the best novel category easily, but novellas, short stories and even fanzines? That's just too far!
Before the internet, it was really, really difficult to organize a politically-motivated rigging of the system on such a scale. It happened some, but I feel like the publishers and authors themselves were more to blame for any corruption in the Hugo Award nominations.
Besides, no Hugo Award season will ever be as contentious as the year Babylon 5 went up against Deep Space Nine.
It is. The whole issue is driven by a bunch of whiny s who want to return to the good old days when Heinlein wrote all of those completely non-political adventure stories (lol) and the original Star Trek never dared to feature a left-leaning agenda. Once you look at all at the history of science fiction it's pretty clear that their complaints are really just a cover for their real objection: that "SJW" stories and authors get more attention than the right-wing ideology they embrace.
The only unfortunate thing here is that voting in unison for the political agenda instead of for the works each individual voter prefers gives them voting power far beyond their actual numbers and destroys the credibility of the award. If they didn't have this disproportionate voting power they'd be an irrelevant minority that nobody pays any attention to.
Have you actually seen the list of those nominated? The list in no way reflects a right-wing ideology. The current list of nominees represents a broader range of race, creed and sexuality than it ever has.
Curious how you have come to the conclusion how those behind Sad Puppies are right wing idealogues.
Has anyone here read 'If You Were a Dinosaur, My Love' which was nominated for the 2014 Hugo Award for Best Short Story? I haven't, but I'm curious if it does or doesn't fit the bill for 'Science Fiction'
Michael Rennie was ill the day the earth stood still
But he told us where we stand
And Flash Gordon was there in silver underwear
Claude Raines was the invisible man
Then something went wrong for Fay Wray and King Kong
They got caught in a celluloid jam
Then at a deadly pace it came from outer space
And this is how the message ran:
Science Fiction - Double Feature
Dr. X will build a creature
See androids fighting Brad and Janet
Ann Francis stars in Forbidden Planet
Oh-oh at the late night, double feature, picture show.
I can't take the first article seriously when it uses this.
As Arthur Chu eloquently argues, the Puppies’ success should motivate WorldCon to rework its voting procedure before the trolls tank the entire operation.)
Manchu wrote: Yeah, one of the guys who has been lobbying the opposite way.
That and having read his thoughts, the man isn't eloquent, and he's just quite unpleasant in general, not to mention with his hiding of known rapists... Urgh.
Should've put it better, he knew of stalkers and rapists and never reported them.
But I don't want to get this to far off track.
As it is though it just seems like another political issue, one side fights, the other side fights back, and now that the second side is fighting the first side wants the rules changed.
Y'know. I'm liberal, I believe in LGBTQQIP2SAA rights, racial issues in the us are indeed a problem, and wage inequalities
but I'm getting sow tired of social justice warriors. All they do is batch and moan on tumblr, make issues out of non issues, try to kill everything I love, I'm just tired of them tbh.
The Hugo awards have always been like this. It's not the first time it's happened. The award has been heavily slanted towards conservative politics and idealogues and it doesn't need any 'gaming' to do that. The award was somewhat pretentious and really selective about what kind of sci-fi it tended to consider long before that. The only way to legitimately believe that this all started last year, is to have never paid attention to a Hugo Award for the last 2 decades.
DarkTraveler777 wrote: I operated under the notion that Science Fiction's was rooted in progressive themes, so I am surprised by the backlash.
Well, let me introduce you to Dan Simmons .
Damn, I read Flashback, his sockpuppeted rants were very, very damn annoying, and the whole world described was so utterly incoherent it was painful.
A quick sidebar on Vox Day, one of a handful of this saga’s bold-faced names. In addition to writing sci-fi, he’s a video game designer and early proponent of Gamergate, which, he argues, resembles Sad Puppies in that “both groups are striking back against the left-wing control freaks who have subjected science fiction to ideological control for two decades and are now attempting to do the same thing in the game industry.” He is the second human being to be expelled from the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA), after he used the organization’s official Twitter feed to slam the award-winning black novelist N.K. Jemisin as a “half-savage.” He questions the need for women’s suffrage. And he believes that our national ills can be partially attributed to “the infestation of even the smallest American heartland towns by African, Asian, and Aztec cultures.” Yes, Aztecs. ANYWAY.
LordofHats wrote: The Hugo awards have always been like this. It's not the first time it's happened. The award has been heavily slanted towards conservative politics and idealogues and it doesn't need any 'gaming' to do that. The award was somewhat pretentious and really selective about what kind of sci-fi it tended to consider long before that. The only way to legitimately believe that this all started last year, is to have never paid attention to a Hugo Award for the last 2 decades.
Nothing new here. Move along.
No, this is very new. The Hugo's, with their ultimately very small voting pool, have always been vulnerable to popularity shifts, and people pushing a particular agenda, but this is the first time it's been done to this scale. I remember the opinions floating around when books like The Goblet of Fire and A Storm of Swords won Hugos, and some people were -very- unhappy about it, thinking they only won because they were popular, but not good.
Whatever.
People get to vote however they want, but the issue here is how many titles of the SP's slate made, and how abberant the voting numbers are compared to previous years. Not only that, but you've got the direct link to the directions of Vox Day, with his threats of leaving the Hugos a 'smoking ruin' (his words), and Wright. Having your work connected to them is like baking a cake with dog gak frosting. It doesn't matter how AMAZING your cake is, because it's covered in dog gak.
Really the best way to sum up what's wrong with Wright, and being linked to him is a millstone, is the following. I've never been a big fan of Terry Pratchett, having gotten into him well after popular opinion declared him 'best thing EVER!' and really, no one could live up to that hype, but here is Wright showing his utter failure as a person and as a Christian, listening to Pratchett speak about Alzheimer's and getting to choose when you die.
His response to a speech by Terry Pratchett before his death (well, obviously... >.> about euthanasia tells you everything you need to know about him.
I sat and listened to pure evil being uttered in charming accents accentuated by droll witticism, and I did not stand up, and I did not strike the old man who uttered them across the mouth: and when he departed, everyone stood and gave him an ovation, even though he had done nothing in his life aside from entertain their idle afternoons. Only I did not stand, being too sick at heart. I did nothing, I said nothing. Was this Christian humility on my part, or merely the cowardice of the silence good men which allows evil men to triumph?
Manchu wrote: A small group committed to a certain agenda influenced the genre. Then another small group committed to a different agenda influenced the genre. Why does only the work of the second group merit criticism?
Basically sums up the situation as I see it as an outsider.
Manchu wrote: A small group committed to a certain agenda influenced the genre. Then another small group committed to a different agenda influenced the genre. Why does only the work of the second group merit criticism?
The difference is that the first group didn't attempt to rig the voting just to make a political point. Left-leaning authors made no effort to hide their politics in either their writing or their personal lives, but they didn't go beyond "this book is awesome" in trying to lobby for votes. The anti-SJW crowd, on the other hand, has crossed the line into "vote for this to make a political point, not because it's your favorite". Their goal isn't to reward deserving authors, it's to attack the "SJWs". Giving an award to a particular book is just a means to an end, and it doesn't really matter which book wins as long as it's one their enemies would disagree with.
Haemonculus wrote: Have you actually seen the list of those nominated? The list in no way reflects a right-wing ideology. The current list of nominees represents a broader range of race, creed and sexuality than it ever has.
The nomination list is not the same thing as the "vote for these to spite the SJWs" list. Not every anti-SJW book was nominated, and not every nominee was the result of anti-SJW lobbying.
Curious how you have come to the conclusion how those behind Sad Puppies are right wing idealogues.
Because they openly admit it? If you make even a token attempt to see what issues they advocate for it's pretty obvious that they're very definitely right-wing as a whole.
Sigvatr wrote: This basically is what it boils down to...isn't it? Conservatives have Sad Puppies lobbying for their votes, Leftists have their fellow SJW lobbying for their authors...so...where's the problem? If Sad Puppies have such a huge influence, then they represent a majority...and if SJW then keep howling wolf...then they don't understand how democracy works. Unless there's something I'm missing about the entire issue. As stated before, not familiar with sci-fi literature at all.
If the Hugo shortlists were supposed to represent which political sci-fi hacks had the best organised muppets voting loyally for their ‘cause’, then your answer would make sense. But the shortlists are actually supposed to represent the books that are most loved because they’re actually good books that people choose to vote for as their personal favourite.
Note that there is no equivalent left wing campaign to vote for their ‘approved’ books. But if there was the issue would actually become worse not better, because then you’d just get a second set of crappy books with effective marketing campaigns flooding the shortlists. There might be political balance between right and left on the list, but that would mean nothing because the awards aren’t about political balance, they’re about recognising the best work that year. The only effect would be quality work getting squeezed about by yet more culture war nonsense.
Take the politics out of this and understand the root of the problem – gak books with very few sales are getting Hugo shortlisted because of organised marketing campaigns. Whether those campaigns are by people organised around fringe politics, or by people organised around the belief that there aren’t enough Manx cats in sci-fi is irrelevant.
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LordofHats wrote: The Hugo awards have always been like this. It's not the first time it's happened. The award has been heavily slanted towards conservative politics and idealogues and it doesn't need any 'gaming' to do that. The award was somewhat pretentious and really selective about what kind of sci-fi it tended to consider long before that. The only way to legitimately believe that this all started last year, is to have never paid attention to a Hugo Award for the last 2 decades.
Nothing new here. Move along.
I don't think it needs to be happening for the first time ever to be worth commenting on. Here we're seeing the latest iteration, and it's a particularly effective model coming from a really small fringe of the audience, and given it is overtly political I think it's worth special attention.
I always thought that book publishers marketed authors for awards like these in the same way that movie studios market actors/films for the academy awards. I guess I'm kind of surprised to see that isn't true.
You guys do realise that the books presented on the sadpuppies slate have BOTH conservative and liberal authors right? And that rabidpuppies, which is run by Vox, iirc, is actually a seperate spin-off or sister movement rather than the same. It's not like sad puppies is just nominating conservative authors, which is the impression I'm getting from this thread.
At the end of the day, the privilege for voting is 40 bucks. Go spend it if you want to make your voice heard instead of complaining on a forum about how certain rabble are coming to take over the Hugo awards.
Breotan wrote: I always thought that book publishers marketed authors for awards like these in the same way that movie studios market actors/films for the academy awards. I guess I'm kind of surprised to see that isn't true.
Depends on the award probably. In this case it's an award voted on by the fans (originally the fans attending a specific convention, but now anyone who wants to buy a voting membership can vote), so that kind of marketing wouldn't be all that effective.
Peregrine wrote: The difference is that the first group didn't attempt to rig the voting just to make a political point. Left-leaning authors made no effort to hide their politics in either their writing or their personal lives, but they didn't go beyond "this book is awesome" in trying to lobby for votes. The anti-SJW crowd, on the other hand, has crossed the line into "vote for this to make a political point, not because it's your favorite". Their goal isn't to reward deserving authors, it's to attack the "SJWs". Giving an award to a particular book is just a means to an end, and it doesn't really matter which book wins as long as it's one their enemies would disagree with.
Exactly. People's opinions on books are going to be affected by their politics, and that means there is going to be politics in awards, but that's just life. But this movement is looking to make people's opinions on books secondary to their politics, which is something else entirely.
Curious how you have come to the conclusion how those behind Sad Puppies are right wing idealogues.
Because they openly admit it? If you make even a token attempt to see what issues they advocate for it's pretty obvious that they're very definitely right-wing as a whole.
Where did you get this evidence from? It's at this point I'm going to ask for proof. Yes, there are some right wingers (but being R-Wing is not a crime [although I'm centre left!]), but a cursory glance of SP3 supporters shows a diverse crowd. I'm genuinely curious, Peregrine: where did you find the information that they're " very definitely right wing as a whole", because as whole they are damn diverse.
The nomination list is not the same thing as the "vote for these to spite the SJWs" list. Not every anti-SJW book was nominated, and not every nominee was the result of anti-SJW lobbying.
Missed my point. The nominees do not reflect a right-wing lobby, nor an attempt to push a white agenda. The books that SP3 have supported are diverse. How the heck can that be evidence of right wing?
It's like you only think in the duality of left/right: "Oh, if you are against SJWs, you must be a right winger!". Things are more complex than that with SP3.
Curious how you have come to the conclusion how those behind Sad Puppies are right wing idealogues.
Because they openly admit it? If you make even a token attempt to see what issues they advocate for it's pretty obvious that they're very definitely right-wing as a whole.
Where did you get this evidence from? It's at this point I'm going to ask for proof. Yes, there are some right wingers (but being R-Wing is not a crime [although I'm centre left!]), but a cursory glance of SP3 supporters shows a diverse crowd. I'm genuinely curious, Peregrine: where did you find the information that they're " very definitely right wing as a whole", because as whole they are damn diverse.
Obviously from the same place that people got the idea that gamergate is behind sad puppies.
The nomination list is not the same thing as the "vote for these to spite the SJWs" list. Not every anti-SJW book was nominated, and not every nominee was the result of anti-SJW lobbying.
Missed my point. The nominees do not reflect a right-wing lobby, nor an attempt to push a white agenda. The books that SP3 have supported are diverse. How the heck can that be evidence of right wing?
It's like you only think in the duality of left/right: "Oh, if you are against SJWs, you must be a right winger!". Things are more complex than that with SP3.
Haemonculus wrote: Where did you get this evidence from? It's at this point I'm going to ask for proof. Yes, there are some right wingers (but being R-Wing is not a crime [although I'm centre left!]), but a cursory glance of SP3 supporters shows a diverse crowd. I'm genuinely curious, Peregrine: where did you find the information that they're " very definitely right wing as a whole", because as whole they are damn diverse.
Did you even read the OP in this thread? Let's look at the position of the person organized the SP 3 campaign:
A few decades ago, if you saw a lovely spaceship on a book cover, with a gorgeous planet in the background, you could be pretty sure you were going to get a rousing space adventure featuring starships and distant, amazing worlds. If you saw a barbarian swinging an axe? You were going to get a rousing fantasy epic with broad-chested heroes who slay monsters, and run off with beautiful women.
But now:
The book has a spaceship on the cover, but is it really going to be a story about space exploration and pioneering derring-do? Or is the story merely about racial prejudice and exploitation…
A planet, framed by a galactic backdrop. Could it be an actual bona fide space opera? Heroes and princesses and laser blasters? No, wait. It’s about sexism and the oppression of women.
Finally, a book with a painting of a person wearing a mechanized suit of armor! Holding a rifle! War story ahoy! Nope, wait. It’s actually about gay and transgender issues.
No longer interested in adventure, argue the Puppies, the Hugos have grown elitist, academic, and overly ideological—irrelevant to the average fan.
That's just the standard right-wing "SJW TUMBLR FEMINAZIS RUIN EVERYTHING" agenda. Or perhaps you could look up the political positions of a guy named Larry Correia. You know, the guy who came up with the Sad Puppies concept in the first place.
(And just to be nice I'll assume that the SP3 campaign is honest about Vox Day not being part of it, despite getting a nomination out of the deal.)
What Peregine is saying is that he believes the news when he agrees with it but not when he disagrees with it.
Also, something something about how Vox Day got a nomination so he must be supported by Sadpuppies somehow, despite the fact that other liberal authors got a nomination as well from SP. So somehow they're are also supported by SP.
I mean, it's like the concept of hey, this guy may be a political nutjob but he writes good fiction hasn't quite occured to some people.
Peregrine wrote: Did you even read the OP in this thread? Let's look at the position of the person organized the SP 3 campaign:
A few decades ago, if you saw a lovely spaceship on a book cover, with a gorgeous planet in the background, you could be pretty sure you were going to get a rousing space adventure featuring starships and distant, amazing worlds. If you saw a barbarian swinging an axe? You were going to get a rousing fantasy epic with broad-chested heroes who slay monsters, and run off with beautiful women.
But now:
The book has a spaceship on the cover, but is it really going to be a story about space exploration and pioneering derring-do? Or is the story merely about racial prejudice and exploitation…
A planet, framed by a galactic backdrop. Could it be an actual bona fide space opera? Heroes and princesses and laser blasters? No, wait. It’s about sexism and the oppression of women.
Finally, a book with a painting of a person wearing a mechanized suit of armor! Holding a rifle! War story ahoy! Nope, wait. It’s actually about gay and transgender issues.
No longer interested in adventure, argue the Puppies, the Hugos have grown elitist, academic, and overly ideological—irrelevant to the average fan.
That's just the standard right-wing "SJW TUMBLR FEMINAZIS RUIN EVERYTHING" agenda. Or perhaps you could look up the political positions of a guy named Larry Correia. You know, the guy who came up with the Sad Puppies concept in the first place.
(And just to be nice I'll assume that the SP3 campaign is honest about Vox Day not being part of it, despite getting a nomination out of the deal.)
So basically everyone in Sad Puppies is right wing because of this? Is this your evidence, Peregrine? Seriously?
Regarding the OP, that's just one article you've decided to agree with. Even the Telegraph amended the errors that the quoted article made in the OP.
Peregrine wrote: Did you even read the OP in this thread? Let's look at the position of the person organized the SP 3 campaign:
A few decades ago, if you saw a lovely spaceship on a book cover, with a gorgeous planet in the background, you could be pretty sure you were going to get a rousing space adventure featuring starships and distant, amazing worlds. If you saw a barbarian swinging an axe? You were going to get a rousing fantasy epic with broad-chested heroes who slay monsters, and run off with beautiful women.
But now:
The book has a spaceship on the cover, but is it really going to be a story about space exploration and pioneering derring-do? Or is the story merely about racial prejudice and exploitation…
A planet, framed by a galactic backdrop. Could it be an actual bona fide space opera? Heroes and princesses and laser blasters? No, wait. It’s about sexism and the oppression of women.
Finally, a book with a painting of a person wearing a mechanized suit of armor! Holding a rifle! War story ahoy! Nope, wait. It’s actually about gay and transgender issues.
No longer interested in adventure, argue the Puppies, the Hugos have grown elitist, academic, and overly ideological—irrelevant to the average fan.
That's just the standard right-wing "SJW TUMBLR FEMINAZIS RUIN EVERYTHING" agenda. Or perhaps you could look up the political positions of a guy named Larry Correia. You know, the guy who came up with the Sad Puppies concept in the first place.
(And just to be nice I'll assume that the SP3 campaign is honest about Vox Day not being part of it, despite getting a nomination out of the deal.)
So basically everyone in Sad Puppies is right wing because of this? Is this your evidence, Peregrine? Seriously?
So much for seeking collateral information before forming an opinion! To be honest, I've been a Hugo fan for years, and have an impressive collection of sci-fi; I've always known the Hugos to have diverse selections, such as Samuel DeLaney for example. So when I heard about SPs1, 2 & 3, I must admit that I was worried, but pretty much most sources discredit Telegraph, io9, etc!
Sining wrote: What Peregine is saying is that he believes the news when he agrees with it but not when he disagrees with it.
No, I believe a direct quote from the organizer of the SP3 campaign.
Also, something something about how Vox Day got a nomination so he must be supported by Sadpuppies somehow, despite the fact that other liberal authors got a nomination as well from SP. So somehow they're are also supported by SP.
There's a difference between getting a nomination and being actively involved in the campaign, endorsing the SP3 concept, and creating your own subtle variant of the SP3 list to campaign for.
Haemonculus wrote: So basically everyone in Sad Puppies is right wing because of this?
Not everyone is right-wing, but that doesn't mean it isn't a right-leaning group organized by right-wing people.
Again, you said that all SPs were right wing; and they are clearly all not. Evidenced by the range of nominees, which reflect a non-right wing movement. Fact and end of argument.
You do realize that I posted a direct quote from the organizer of the SP3 campaign, right? That's not "just one article".
Yes, just one friggen person. And so what, someone has a boogeyman right-wing world belief. Hardly evidence of a crime, and hardly evidence that the movement is right wing.
So much for seeking collateral information before forming an opinion! To be honest, I've been a Hugo fan for years, and have an impressive collection of sci-fi; I've always known the Hugos to have diverse selections, such as Samuel DeLaney for example. So when I heard about SPs1, 2 & 3, I must admit that I was worried, but pretty much most sources discredit Telegraph, io9, etc!
It should be interesting because EW! has already had to 'correct' its article after being contacted by the authors they mentioned in their own article. Will see if this affects the others as well
Sining wrote: What Peregine is saying is that he believes the news when he agrees with it but not when he disagrees with it.
No, I believe a direct quote from the organizer of the SP3 campaign.
Also, something something about how Vox Day got a nomination so he must be supported by Sadpuppies somehow, despite the fact that other liberal authors got a nomination as well from SP. So somehow they're are also supported by SP.
There's a difference between getting a nomination and being actively involved in the campaign, endorsing the SP3 concept, and creating your own subtle variant of the SP3 list to campaign for.
So you're saying SP3; which wants things to be less political inso much as they believe an authors political leanings shouldn't matter, should reject an author who supports that message because of his politcal leanings? LOLK
Automatically Appended Next Post: Here's an article from the other organiser of SP3. Apparently what Peregine is saying, that VoxDay was on their slate isn't even true. OMG, Peregine telling an untruth? What next?
Manchu wrote: A small group committed to a certain agenda influenced the genre. Then another small group committed to a different agenda influenced the genre. Why does only the work of the second group merit criticism?
The difference is that the first group didn't attempt to rig the voting just to make a political point. Left-leaning authors made no effort to hide their politics in either their writing or their personal lives, but they didn't go beyond "this book is awesome" in trying to lobby for votes. The anti-SJW crowd, on the other hand, has crossed the line into "vote for this to make a political point, not because it's your favorite". Their goal isn't to reward deserving authors, it's to attack the "SJWs". Giving an award to a particular book is just a means to an end, and it doesn't really matter which book wins as long as it's one their enemies would disagree with.
Have you read anything from some of the first group reacting to this? They clearly want to ensure that only their vetted special friends make the voting process.
Peregrine wrote: The difference is that the first group didn't attempt to rig the voting just to make a political point.
This hits the nail on the head. Correia and friends are railing against an unorganised movement to include women and people from minorities into what was traditionally a white, male preserve through an organised voting block for white male authors.
The Hugos have always been a popularity contest, but to this point have not been purposefully rigged (with the half exception of Theodore Beale who amusingly came behind 'none of the above' in the final ballot).
But however this movement will skew the results for a few years, these people are the vestigial remnants of an ugly time in western SF and will go the way of the dinosaurs they resemble. It might take a few years, but this is their last, pitiable attempt to stay current.
Haemonculus wrote: Again, you said that all SPs were right wing; and they are clearly all not.
I said no such thing. Please do not build straw men to attack.
Yes, just one friggen person. And so what, someone has a boogeyman right-wing world belief. Hardly evidence of a crime, and hardly evidence that the movement is right wing.
The guy organizing the SP3 campaign is not just some random person. And yes, it is evidence that the movement is right-wing because the organizer's explicit goal is to promote a right-wing (or at least anti-left) agenda.
What Correia and friends are doing is nothing new. They're just more organised than the people who've been doing it for years. I guess the incumbent were complacent.
Also, have you seen their list of nominations for those who made it into the Hugos? It may surprise you but surprisingly, not all of them are 'white male' authors as you so put it -_-. And people wonder if there's an agenda that was already present in the Hugos
Haemonculus wrote: Again, you said that all SPs were right wing; and they are clearly all not.
I said no such thing. Please do not build straw men to attack.
Yes, just one friggen person. And so what, someone has a boogeyman right-wing world belief. Hardly evidence of a crime, and hardly evidence that the movement is right wing.
The guy organizing the SP3 campaign is not just some random person. And yes, it is evidence that the movement is right-wing because the organizer's explicit goal is to promote a right-wing (or at least anti-left) agenda.
A few decades ago, if you saw a lovely spaceship on a book cover, with a gorgeous planet in the background, you could be pretty sure you were going to get a rousing space adventure featuring starships and distant, amazing worlds. If you saw a barbarian swinging an axe? You were going to get a rousing fantasy epic with broad-chested heroes who slay monsters, and run off with beautiful women.
But now:
The book has a spaceship on the cover, but is it really going to be a story about space exploration and pioneering derring-do? Or is the story merely about racial prejudice and exploitation…
A planet, framed by a galactic backdrop. Could it be an actual bona fide space opera? Heroes and princesses and laser blasters? No, wait. It’s about sexism and the oppression of women.
Finally, a book with a painting of a person wearing a mechanized suit of armor! Holding a rifle! War story ahoy! Nope, wait. It’s actually about gay and transgender issues.
No longer interested in adventure, argue the Puppies, the Hugos have grown elitist, academic, and overly ideological—irrelevant to the average fan.
I'm not reading anything even anti-left in this. Me think you doth protest too much
Have you read anything from some of the first group reacting to this? They clearly want to ensure that only their vetted special friends make the voting process.
No, they don't. A few people are saying the sad puppy candidates should be excluded, but they're int he minority, and none of the SFWA board members, who Correia is railing against, have said they should be excluded. Quote the opposite. In fact last year John Sclazi went out of his way to defend Vox Day's right to be nomiated, after Vox Day accused Scalzi of being pro rape, :
The whole ideology of the sad puppies is against the inclusive nature the Hugos have taken on. Banning people for their political views, however abhorrent, goes against that.
Sining wrote: So you're saying SP3; which wants things to be less political inso much as they believe an authors political leanings shouldn't matter, should reject an author who supports that message because of his politcal leanings? LOLK
I'm not saying they should or shouldn't do anything. But they are clearly comfortable having Vox Day (a thoroughly repulsive ) participate in their movement.
Apparently what Peregine is saying, that VoxDay was on their slate isn't even true. OMG, Peregine telling an untruth? What next?
After looking at it again you're partly correct. He got "best editor" nominations this year and his participation in the SP3 campaign (and related discussions/arguments/etc) probably had a lot more to do with it than his writing or editing talent, but he wasn't included on the official SP3 list. The SP3 nomination I was thinking of is actually for a story by another author in a collection edited by Vox Day, but he wouldn't get the award himself.
And of course Vox Day did get a nomination last year (with a pretty bad story that finished below "no award") after being included on the SP2 list.
Have you read anything from some of the first group reacting to this? They clearly want to ensure that only their vetted special friends make the voting process.
No, they don't. A few people are saying the sad puppy candidates should be excluded, but they're int he minority, and none of the SFWA board members, who Correia is railing against, have said they should be excluded. Quote the opposite. In fact last year John Sclazi went out of his way to defend Vox Day's right to be nomiated, after Vox Day accused Scalzi of being pro rape, :
The whole ideology of the sad puppies is against the inclusive nature the Hugos have taken on. Banning people for their political views, however abhorrent, goes against that.
Cat in particular has been very clear about the politics present in the group. Decent books are thrown aside for political gain, and I for one am glad that that is being challenged.
Sining wrote: What Correia and friends are doing is nothing new.
It absolutely is, because they're crossing the line from saying "I love this book and it deserves to win" into choosing a specific list of desired winners and then asking people to vote for them regardless of their personal preferences to maximize the anti-SJW voting power.
I'm not reading anything even anti-left in this. Me think you doth protest too much
You might not be familiar with this because you're not from the US, but things like feminism/gay rights/etc are typically left-wing issues and opposition to them usually comes from right-wing sources.
Sining wrote: What Correia and friends are doing is nothing new.
It absolutely is, because they're crossing the line from saying "I love this book and it deserves to win" into choosing a specific list of desired winners and then asking people to vote for them regardless of their personal preferences to maximize the anti-SJW voting power.
Really? How does them saying "I think these books are good and I think they're worthy of nomination" any different from what you said? Keep in mind they're not saying "these are anti-SJW books, vote them". That's what you're reading into what they're saying
Also, have you seen their list of nominations for those who made it into the Hugos? It may surprise you but surprisingly, not all of them are 'white male' authors as you so put it -_-. And people wonder if there's an agenda that was already present in the Hugos
I'm not reading anything even anti-left in this. Me think you doth protest too much
You might not be familiar with this because you're not from the US, but things like feminism/gay rights/etc are typically left-wing issues and opposition to them usually comes from right-wing sources.
Except they're not stating anything about opposing feminism or gay rights or so on in that paragraph you posted and keep touting as if it's the absolute truth. Here, let's go through the relevant quote again
Nope, wait. It’s actually about gay and transgender issues.
No longer interested in adventure, argue the Puppies, the Hugos have grown elitist, academic, and overly ideological—irrelevant to the average fan.
What you're reading from them is 'we hate gays and females and transgenders'. What I'm getting from it is 'We need more stuff that the average person can relate to'
Sining wrote: Really? How does them saying "I think these books are good and I think they're worthy of nomination" any different from what you said?
Because they aren't just saying "I think they're worthy", they're organizing a campaign to select designated winners and then get everyone to vote for the whole set at once.
Keep in mind they're not saying "these are anti-SJW books, vote them".
Yes they are. Their entire point from the very beginning was that certain authors aren't approved by the "SJWs" therefore the anti-SJWs should organize a protest vote and fix the problem. Somewhere in there they might have some books that deserve nomination on their own merits, but the primary goal is to produce a list of "SJWs won't let these win" books and get them nominated.
What I'm getting from it is 'We need more stuff that the average person can relate to'
Which depends on defining "the average person" as "a straight white middle-class man". Seriously, context matters, the things the SP3 organizer said in that quote are almost an exact copy/paste of the standard right-wing "SJW TUMBLR FEMINAZIS RUIN EVERYTHING" rant.
Also, let's not forget that this is science fiction we're talking about here. If a gay character is just too difficult to relate to then how can a reader possible relate to a half-robot space pirate commanding a fleet of battleships against the weirdest aliens an author can imagine? Are they just nodding in agreement with the description of all of the issues involved in transferring a wounded hero's brain into a healthy new body, and then suddenly throwing the book away in confusion when the author mentions that the new body is a different gender? Etc.
Peregrine wrote: Are they just nodding in agreement with the description of all of the issues involved in transferring a wounded hero's brain into a healthy new body, and then suddenly throwing the book away in confusion when the author mentions that the new body is a different gender? Etc.
Is the whole rest of the book the hero playing with the hero's new boobs?
So when someone else does it, they're organising a campaign. When other people do it, it's just recommending books? I mean, you do realise that they didn't say 'GUYS VOTE FOR THIS NOW' and you act as if they're acting with some unimind. They suggested, people looked at the nominations and voted for whichever ones they chose. You're pretty much just labelling everyone who followed sad puppies at this point.
So books that aren't approved by SJWs are anti-SJW books? I mean, the christians here don't approve of Archie comics. Is Archie an anti-christianity book then?
So you're comparing the guy's paragraph to an idealised rant. That doesn't even appear in his paragraph.
If people can't relate to half-robot space pirates, then maybe the half-robot space pirate shouldn't win the Hugos? I mean, this is a certain two-edged sword. Are the Hugos about what is the best literary work in terms of artistic merit or is it about what is the best novel in terms of most people like it (and considering Harry Potter won Hugo awards, I think it's the latter) then honestly, maybe the more relatable stuff should win the Hugos then. Considering it IS an open vote, I see nothing wrong with letting the masses decide.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
BrotherGecko wrote: The average person? Seriously, that was actually used as an arguement?
So females and lgbt are not average now?
Must be damn hard reading about all those post humans in power armor. Why can't they be about more average guys right?
Yeah, I didn't mean it that way but if you're always looking for things to be perfectly offended by, then I guess you've succeeded. Also, note that I've never said anything about females. It's always the people that disagree with me bringing it up. It's almost...as if they're looking for things to be offended by
Should've put it better, he knew of stalkers and rapists and never reported them.
But I don't want to get this to far off track.
As it is though it just seems like another political issue, one side fights, the other side fights back, and now that the second side is fighting the first side wants the rules changed.
As far as I can tell from the article in the Daily Telegraph, a special lobby group has been set up to influence the voting this year. It didn't mention special lobby groups being active in earlier years.
Should've put it better, he knew of stalkers and rapists and never reported them.
But I don't want to get this to far off track.
As it is though it just seems like another political issue, one side fights, the other side fights back, and now that the second side is fighting the first side wants the rules changed.
As far as I can tell from the article in the Daily Telegraph, a special lobby group has been set up to influence the voting this year. It didn't mention special lobby groups being active in earlier years.
Is that correct?
Sad Puppies has been around for 3 years. That's why this is called Sad Puppies 3
Nope. This is the third year of the Sad Puppies campaign, and there was a similar controversy in past years. The only difference this year is that they seem to have organized more effectively and had more luck getting their chosen works nominated.
sebster wrote: If the Hugo shortlists were supposed to represent which political sci-fi hacks had the best organised muppets voting loyally for their ‘cause’, then your answer would make sense. But the shortlists are actually supposed to represent the books that are most loved because they’re actually good books that people choose to vote for as their personal favourite.
Note that there is no equivalent left wing campaign to vote for their ‘approved’ books. But if there was the issue would actually become worse not better, because then you’d just get a second set of crappy books with effective marketing campaigns flooding the shortlists. There might be political balance between right and left on the list, but that would mean nothing because the awards aren’t about political balance, they’re about recognising the best work that year. The only effect would be quality work getting squeezed about by yet more culture war nonsense.
Take the politics out of this and understand the root of the problem – gak books with very few sales are getting Hugo shortlisted because of organised marketing campaigns. Whether those campaigns are by people organised around fringe politics, or by people organised around the belief that there aren’t enough Manx cats in sci-fi is irrelevant.
Couldn't have said it better myself. Have an exalt!
With the caveat that I do not, in principle, disagree with the statement that science fiction literature has become stale and boring (on both sides of this particular fence). After that, the movement in question seems to go way off the deep end.
So, anyone know of any actually decent science fiction writers around these days? I'm partial to Neal Stephenson myself, and very much a fan of Neil Gaiman for the fantasy end of the spectrum. Not so much a fan of everyone else's favorite psychopath, George Martin.
Nah, bro you specifically implied women and lgbt. Not my fault you can't notice it.
One of the things I learned in the military is if somebody is ate up you need to correct them. Doesn't matter if you didn't mean it that way. You wrote it that way and now you know that you did and you shouldn't do it.
If you want to pull the "offended" card then I suggest you have thicker skin if you going to make those kinds of comments.
Nope. This is the third year of the Sad Puppies campaign, and there was a similar controversy in past years. The only difference this year is that they seem to have organized more effectively and had more luck getting their chosen works nominated.
For three years a right-wing group has been organising a campaign to promote an anti-left-wing agenda in the Awards, although there wasn't any left-wing group to oppose.
Seems totally legit and fair to me.
I am sure this will result in magnificent literature being promoted, and a huge increase in the public appreciation of the Awards process.
Peregrine wrote: Left-leaning authors made no effort to hide their politics in either their writing or their personal lives, but they didn't go beyond "this book is awesome" in trying to lobby for votes.
Sining wrote: So when someone else does it, they're organising a campaign. When other people do it, it's just recommending books?
Sigh. Why do you keep ignoring the fact that there's a difference between saying "I think this should win" and organizing a bunch of people to coordinate their ballots?
They suggested, people looked at the nominations and voted for whichever ones they chose.
Except they didn't just make suggestions, they got a bunch of people together with the intent to get a certain category of book nominated, decided as a group which designated nominees they were all going to vote for, and then voted for the approved list. Let's make this nice and clear:
How it should work: I like book A, you like book B, someone else likes book C. We are free to discuss our preferences, but we each vote for our respective favorites as individuals.
How SP3 is doing it: we all agree that SJWs suck and one of (A, B, C) should win. I like A, you like B, someone else likes C. We all meet up and decide that C has the best chance of winning, so we all vote for C even though you and I would prefer something else.
So books that aren't approved by SJWs are anti-SJW books?
Exactly! The whole premise of the Sad Puppies campaign is that certain books are disliked by the "SJWs" for ideological reasons, and because they aren't approved they aren't allowed to win awards. Whether or not this is true (it isn't) that's what the SP3 organizers believe.
So you're comparing the guy's paragraph to an idealised rant.
No, I'm comparing it to similar statements made in other places by other people. Seriously, why is this hard to understand? It doesn't have to be a literal word for word copy/paste to see how the basic ideas are the same.
If people can't relate to half-robot space pirates, then maybe the half-robot space pirate shouldn't win the Hugos? I mean, this is a certain two-edged sword. Are the Hugos about what is the best literary work in terms of artistic merit or is it about what is the best novel in terms of most people like it (and considering Harry Potter won Hugo awards, I think it's the latter) then honestly, maybe the more relatable stuff should win the Hugos then. Considering it IS an open vote, I see nothing wrong with letting the masses decide.
You're missing the point completely. One of the primary goals of science fiction and fantasy is to explore things that don't exist in the real world. You know, all the cliches of the genre: spaceships, wizards, etc. If you take away all of the imaginative stuff you're left with a boring story about someone going to their 9-5 office job and maybe having an argument with their spouse as the highlight of the story. If you're reading science fiction and fantasy at all you're already demonstrating that you're capable of relating to characters that live in a completely different world from your own. And they're different in ways that make things like being gay look trivial in comparison.
BrotherGecko wrote: Nah, bro you specifically implied women and lgbt. Not my fault you can't notice it.
One of the things I learned in the military is if somebody is ate up you need to correct them. Doesn't matter if you didn't mean it that way. You wrote it that way and now you know that you did and you shouldn't do it.
If you want to pull the "offended" card then I suggest you have thicker skin if you going to make those kinds of comments.
Then you need to go read better. I replied to Peregine about his stance that the paragraph contained anti-lgbt, feminism rhetoric. Surprisingly, on the subject of feminism, I brought up females since it is feminism. I'm not offended, because people are going to read whatever they want into the paragraph.Especially if they're just looking to be offended.
Yes, of course I have documentation of every single word ever said by a left-leaning author and can prove that they've never tried to rig the vote like the SP3 campaign. Do you understand why proving a negative is impossible?
sebster wrote: But this movement is looking to make people's opinions on books secondary to their politics, which is something else entirely.
Actually, it is abundantly clear that the Sad Puppies people believe that this is already the state of things and have organized because they would also like their politics to have influence, or to use one of their opponents' buzzwords, they also want a "voice."
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Peregrine wrote: Yes, of course I have documentation of every single word ever said by a left-leaning author and can prove that they've never tried to rig the vote like the SP3 campaign. Do you understand why proving a negative is impossible?
So no then. What you in fact did was make an argument based on an assumption that according to yourself is impossible to prove.
Sining wrote: So when someone else does it, they're organising a campaign. When other people do it, it's just recommending books?
Sigh. Why do you keep ignoring the fact that there's a difference between saying "I think this should win" and organizing a bunch of people to coordinate their ballots?
They suggested, people looked at the nominations and voted for whichever ones they chose.
Except they didn't just make suggestions, they got a bunch of people together with the intent to get a certain category of book nominated, decided as a group which designated nominees they were all going to vote for, and then voted for the approved list. Let's make this nice and clear:
How it should work: I like book A, you like book B, someone else likes book C. We are free to discuss our preferences, but we each vote for our respective favorites as individuals.
How SP3 is doing it: we all agree that SJWs suck and one of (A, B, C) should win. I like A, you like B, someone else likes C. We all meet up and decide that C has the best chance of winning, so we all vote for C even though you and I would prefer something else.
Lol, how are you even getting that? I mean, are you privy to the inner workings of Sad puppies? Because what I'm getting is 'guys, we have some books we think are cool. Some of them were nominated by you guys. Just take a look through them and feel free but here's why I think they're good" Source?
http://monsterhunternation.com/2015/02/02/sad-puppies-3-the-slatening/
So books that aren't approved by SJWs are anti-SJW books?
Exactly! The whole premise of the Sad Puppies campaign is that certain books are disliked by the "SJWs" for ideological reasons, and because they aren't approved they aren't allowed to win awards. Whether or not this is true (it isn't) that's what the SP3 organizers believe.
Disliked by doesn't necessarily mean anti. You're the one saying they're Anti-SJW books.
If people can't relate to half-robot space pirates, then maybe the half-robot space pirate shouldn't win the Hugos? I mean, this is a certain two-edged sword. Are the Hugos about what is the best literary work in terms of artistic merit or is it about what is the best novel in terms of most people like it (and considering Harry Potter won Hugo awards, I think it's the latter) then honestly, maybe the more relatable stuff should win the Hugos then. Considering it IS an open vote, I see nothing wrong with letting the masses decide.
You're missing the point completely. One of the primary goals of science fiction and fantasy is to explore things that don't exist in the real world. You know, all the cliches of the genre: spaceships, wizards, etc. If you take away all of the imaginative stuff you're left with a boring story about someone going to their 9-5 office job and maybe having an argument with their spouse as the highlight of the story. If you're reading science fiction and fantasy at all you're already demonstrating that you're capable of relating to characters that live in a completely different world from your own. And they're different in ways that make things like being gay look trivial in comparison.
Again, is the Hugos supposed to be about the 'best artistic' book or the 'best most popular' book? Ignoring what Scifi is about in general, but what are the goals of the Hugo? Considering it's open to normal people to vote and not just a select committee, one would suggest that they're really just looking for the most popular book. So you may have one idea about Scifi but I'm sorry, if it's not the most popular idea, it's not going to be what wins the Hugos. There's nothing wrong with that
By paying at least some attention to the events of the past three years? It's not really a carefully-guarded secret that the Sad Puppies concept was "the Hugo nomination process has this weakness, let's all organize our votes and take advantage of it".
Though thanks for the link, which contains this hilarious quote:
Kevin J. Anderson for The Dark Between the Stars, because how the hell can a genre fixture with 23 million books in print get ignored for decades?
Answer: because there's an angry mob of Star Wars fans who still haven't forgiven him for the awful books he wrote, and apparently a similar mob in every other fandom he wrote for. I seriously doubt his writing talents have improved enough from their previous virtually-nonexistent state for him to deserve the award on his own merits.
Again, is the Hugos supposed to be about the 'best artistic' book or the 'best most popular' book?
They're supposed to be about the best book, which is why they bother to nominate candidates and have everyone vote on them. If it was supposed to be an award for the most popular book they'd just check the sales numbers for the past year and give the award to whoever sold the most copies.
Ignoring what Scifi is about in general, but what are the goals of the Hugo? Considering it's open to normal people to vote and not just a select committee, one would suggest that they're really just looking for the most popular book. So you may have one idea about Scifi but I'm sorry, if it's not the most popular idea, it's not going to be what wins the Hugos. There's nothing wrong with that
You're missing the point entirely. It wasn't about whether or not a particular book deserves a Hugo, it was that saying "people can't relate to a gay character" or whatever in a science fiction context it's just plain stupid. If you can't relate to someone whose sexual preferences don't match your own then how the hell are you supposed to relate to anything else in science fiction and fantasy?
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Manchu wrote: So no then. What you in fact did was make an argument based on an assumption that according to yourself is impossible to prove.
So how about instead of ridiculous demands to prove a negative (something you should know is impossible) you provide some evidence of left-leaning authors running a Sad Puppies equivalent of their own? It should be pretty easy to do so if you have a valid argument here, since if any Left Puppies campaign ever happened the Sad Puppies organizers would mention it at every opportunity to justify their own campaign.
Am a Star Wars fan. Actually liked Kevin J Anderson. Again, I mean, this is just how tastes differ. Also, would totally vote Kevin J Anderson for SW.
Also, the book that sold the most may not necessarily be the best book either. People who buy a book may not necessarily like the book enough to vote it.
At the end of the day, a character needs to be relatable to its audience. I see tons of people complain about this, about how they need female chars, need transgender chars in games to relate to scifantasy games. So why not the other way around? I mean, there is a reason why in those mouse books, where you have humanoid mice who talk and so on, that the book is written in english and the mice act in human ways.
Peregrine wrote: It's not really a carefully-guarded secret that the Sad Puppies concept was "the Hugo nomination process has this weakness, let's all organize our votes and take advantage of it".
That strikes me as a fair and accurate description of their tactics. But I don't find them objectionable or even remarkable. Whatever the truth of the matter, the Sad Puppies see themselves as arguing from the weaker position in terms of power. So they are using asymmetric tactics.
Sigvatr wrote: Just read that Sad Puppies predates Gamergate by two years. Some quality journalism there
Of course it does. This gak with the Hugo awards has been going on for ages as well.
It has nothing to do with GamerGate, but don't let that stop the narrative that they're behind all the evils in the world and that they're controlled by the evil misogyracists!
Peregrine wrote: So how about instead of ridiculous demands to prove a negative (something you should know is impossible) you provide some evidence of left-leaning authors running a Sad Puppies equivalent of their own? It should be pretty easy to do so if you have a valid argument here, since if any Left Puppies campaign ever happened the Sad Puppies organizers would mention it at every opportunity to justify their own campaign.
That is a disappointing piece of hypocrisy, after all the lectures you have posted on this site about burden shifting.
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Kilkrazy wrote: The Daily Telegraph article didn't mention any left wing action groups in the Hugos.
The Sad Puppies stance seems to be that scifi is currently dominated by left wing ideology. Their action group is an asymmetric response to that dominance.
Manchu wrote: Actually, it is abundantly clear that the Sad Puppies people believe that this is already the state of things and have organized because they would also like their politics to have influence, or to use one of their opponents' buzzwords, they also want a "voice."
Yes, but that's how fringe politics works - they always believe the reason they've not been placed front and centre in the most powerful and prestigious positions is because the other side is organising and scheming against them. In almost all cases, and in this one, it's just a silly fantasy. There is no organisation, no other group either literary or political, that was organizing block voting to keep out these people. They just weren't getting as represented as they liked because their kind of writing wasn't as dominant as it used to be.
"And for those who do not have the appetite to wage through thousands of posts, well, the basics are simple. A group of writers and fans, many of them of a conservative political and/or literary bent, felt that they were not being adequately represented in the Hugo Awards, and put together their own slate of stories and writers they wanted on the ballot. They blogged, they organized, they got out their voters, and they were wildly successful... to the extent that this year's Hugo ballot is dominated by their choices.
Call it block voting. Call it ballot stuffing. Call it gaming the system. There's truth to all of those characterizations.
You can't call it cheating, though. It was all within the rules.
But many things can be legal, and still bad... and this is one of those, from where I sit.
I think the Sad Puppies have broken the Hugo Awards, and I am not sure they can ever be repaired."
There's more there, mostly about how nasty this is and that he doesn't want to be part of it but as a fan feels he has to comment, and that he'll be writing posts expanding on individual parts of the issue in future.
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Sining wrote: Kind of like if Sad Puppies sweep the nominations this year, it's because that's what people like. I agree with that.
Sigh. Once again, there is a difference between people voting for who they like best, and people organising behind the scenes to all vote for a select group that suit their overall preferences/politics. That's the whole fething point of the conversation.
I think you guys honestly think the people who followed sad puppies aren't capable of making up their own minds. It's hilarious really. That's like believing a republican would only vote republican on all possible ballots just because they were told so.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Meanwhile, Scalzi was doing this by himself for many years. I guess this means 2x the people means its 2x as effective.
Also, I expect all of you to go buy a 40usd membership to vote next year since this is apparently so important to you
If people had made up their own minds in previous years, they would already have been voting for right wing novels, and so Sad Puppies would not have needed to set up this campaign.
You do realise there are different people as well right? I don't think most people even realised you could buy a 40usd membership and vote for the Hugos.
Manchu wrote: That strikes me as a fair and accurate description of their tactics. But I don't find them objectionable or even remarkable. Whatever the truth of the matter, the Sad Puppies see themselves as arguing from the weaker position in terms of power. So they are using asymmetric tactics.
So if we agree that they decided to do this an an aggression using asymmetric tactics, then it is perfectly legitimate to try to find a counter for this aggression that is working against the goal of the Hugo awards.
Kilkrazy wrote: If Sci Fi is dominated by left wing ideology that is because it is what people want to read.
I meant "sci fi" as a 'professional' community of writers and all manner of hangers-on who dole out awards like the Hugos. Sci fi in terms of sales is certainly not the exclusive purview of the left wing. That seems to be a major point of Sad Puppies.
Manchu has the way of it. ALthough sci fi often explores some serious philospohipcal stuff (often this is when sci fi is at its best), lets not kid ourselves about the amount of KILL SPACE ALIENS that is out there and has a place too.
Since we're on that may I suggest two hard sci fi:
*Lucifer's Hammer: what happens when a comet hits the earth.
*Footfall: what happens when aliens really do come. (plus the old US USSR politics are a nice window into the past).
I have read and enjoyed them both. I believe they won awards, and also have been criticised for certain supposedly right wing depictions.
One might ask how a substantial left leaning SF professional community could grow up to the position of supposedly controlling the awards if they were not successful at writing popular books.
As I understand it, though, the Hugos are not a kind of politically correct affirmative action campaign designed to ensure that minority white male right wing slanted fiction gets its fair place in the sun.
Going back to this year's nominations, it seems to me that there are various possible results. One is that the backlash might result in lots of the Sad Puppy promoted books being ruled out through the "None of the above" ballot mechanism. Another one is that next year, the left-wing vote will simply organise itself better and prevent any Sad Puppy books from being nominated at all.
In other words, the awards would have been politically polarised either way. I cannot think this would be a good thing.
Haemonculus wrote: Regarding the OP, that's just one article you've decided to agree with. Even the Telegraph amended the errors that the quoted article made in the OP.
Did I give my opinion anywhere in the OP? I merely presented an article I found and asked members of Dakka for their opinion. Please do not attribute commentary to me that I did not make.
There is a lot of misinformation flying around about Sad Puppies.
I know Larry Correia and Brad Torgerson personally and have followed this from the beginning.
Here's a run down.
The Hugos, the highest award in sci-fi, was run by a small group of elitists that all had the same political agenda. The books that would get nominations and thus win, were chosen because of their political message, not quality of work. (And usually by TOR publishing to boot.) Some authors, such as John Scalzi would game the system and campaign for votes so he would win. Which he did. A lot.
Larry tried to bring these problems to the Hugo's attention but they ignored him and when he pushed, said he wasn't the kind of person they wanted in science fiction.
So, Larry started sad puppies. (Boring literary message fiction is the leading cause of puppy sadness.) He wanted the Hugos to be about what's good, not what fits the political narrative of the people in charge. Others agreed. They even had to campaign to get the Wheel of Time series nominated. That should have gotten several Hugo's already. There are authors of different colors, gender and even politics associated with Sad Puppies. It's not about getting Conservative authors on the ballet, it's about getting good authors on the ballet.
So they adopted Scalzi's model and gamed the system in order to break it to show how broken and pointless the Hugos already were.
They're not misogynists. Many of the authors on the ballet are women.
They're not racists. Some of the authors are minorities. Brad has been married to a black woman for twenty years.
They're not all conservatives. Some are libertarians and some are even (gasp) liberals.
Peregrine wrote: Left-leaning authors made no effort to hide their politics in either their writing or their personal lives, but they didn't go beyond "this book is awesome" in trying to lobby for votes.
Do you have a source for that?
Several times in this thread you have implied a liberal conspiracy and domination of the Hugo Awards. You have yet to supply a shred of proof. Considering how many winners have had strong Libertarian or Authoritarian undertones over the years, I think you are full of it. post some evidence of your extraordinary claims.
And if anyone wants proof that conservative authors are blacklisted, just look at what was winning Hugos before, what the Hugo supporting authors are saying now. They're vomiting out insults, saying that they're not true fans, and even death threats.
Edit: Example, one blogger keeps insulting Brad and calling him a racist, that he only is married to a black woman as a shield. That, is what I think is racist, that a white man wouldn't want to marry a black woman except to be a "shield" for a kerfuffle twenty years down the road....okay.
Kilkrazy wrote: If Sci Fi is dominated by left wing ideology that is because it is what people want to read.
Or else the Secret Elders of Zion or the Bavarian Illuminati control the publishing industry.
Sci fi is not dominated by the Left. On TV, sure, but Jesus, read some of it.
Tor books actively pushes away right leaning authors.
BAEN is accused of being right wing because they publish based on quality of story, not politics of author. They have liberals, conservatives, socialists and even a card carrying member of the communist party, yet because they publish right wing authors as well, they get accused of being right wing.
It's not that left wing books is what people want to read, it's what the people in control of publishing want people to read.
People just want to read good stories.
Manchu wrote: Again, you seem to be assuming there was no previous political polarization.
Are you saying posts like this, and you have many of them, are not implying the Hugo Awards had a powerful, left-leaning concern? Essentially, a conspiracy to promote a Leftish agenda?
Kilkrazy wrote: If Sci Fi is dominated by left wing ideology that is because it is what people want to read.
Or else the Secret Elders of Zion or the Bavarian Illuminati control the publishing industry.
Sci fi is not dominated by the Left. On TV, sure, but Jesus, read some of it.
Tor books actively pushes away right leaning authors.
BAEN is accused of being right wing because they publish based on quality of story, not politics of author. They have liberals, conservatives, socialists and even a card carrying member of the communist party, yet because they publish right wing authors as well, they get accused of being right wing.
It's not that left wing books is what people want to read, it's what the people in control of publishing want people to read.
People just want to read good stories.
Wouldn't the market reward Baen with more sales then?
BobtheInquisitor wrote: Are you saying posts like this, and you have many of them, are not implying the Hugo Awards had a powerful, left-leaning concern? Essentially, a conspiracy to promote a Leftish agenda?
Because that is seriously how it comes across.
My posts mean exactly what they say (rather than what you say they mean, go figure) but I don't mind spelling it out once again for you:
One of the main points the Sad Puppies and their allies have made is that the Hugo awards are already politicized. They say they organized to resist this existing state of affairs rather than to simply wrest control away from leftists.
So -- again to be clear -- there are basically two narratives at play:
(1) The Hugos are non-political and recognize works purely on the basis of merit. Sad Puppies wants to transform the Hugos to promote conservative politics.
(2) The Hugos are currently controlled by publishing interests with left-leaning political sympathies. Sad Puppies wants to confront these interests by legally bloc voting for works on the basis of merit.
Nothing I have posted ITT claims that one narrative is more accurate than the other. What I have attempted to do is show how posters who assume the first narrative is correct have merely assumed it without making a case based on evidence.
MWHistorian wrote: And if anyone wants proof that conservative authors are blacklisted, just look at what was winning Hugos before, what the Hugo supporting authors are saying now. They're vomiting out insults, saying that they're not true fans, and even death threats.
Edit: Example, one blogger keeps insulting Brad and calling him a racist, that he only is married to a black woman as a shield. That, is what I think is racist, that a white man wouldn't want to marry a black woman except to be a "shield" for a kerfuffle twenty years down the road....okay.
That would be Arthur Chu, mentioned earlier in the thread.
There is a lot of misinformation flying around about Sad Puppies.
I know Larry Correia and Brad Torgerson personally and have followed this from the beginning.
Here's a run down.
The Hugos, the highest award in sci-fi, was run by a small group of elitists that all had the same political agenda. The books that would get nominations and thus win, were chosen because of their political message, not quality of work. (And usually by TOR publishing to boot.) Some authors, such as John Scalzi would game the system and campaign for votes so he would win. Which he did. A lot.
Larry tried to bring these problems to the Hugo's attention but they ignored him and when he pushed, said he wasn't the kind of person they wanted in science fiction.
So, Larry started sad puppies. (Boring literary message fiction is the leading cause of puppy sadness.) He wanted the Hugos to be about what's good, not what fits the political narrative of the people in charge. Others agreed. They even had to campaign to get the Wheel of Time series nominated. That should have gotten several Hugo's already. There are authors of different colors, gender and even politics associated with Sad Puppies. It's not about getting Conservative authors on the ballet, it's about getting good authors on the ballet.
So they adopted Scalzi's model and gamed the system in order to break it to show how broken and pointless the Hugos already were.
They're not misogynists. Many of the authors on the ballet are women.
They're not racists. Some of the authors are minorities. Brad has been married to a black woman for twenty years.
They're not all conservatives. Some are libertarians and some are even (gasp) liberals.
Interesting, but typical of some small organizations.
Though I'm curious as to what has been awarded overtime.
Manchu wrote: Again, you seem to be assuming there was no previous political polarization.
And, unless convincing arguments are being pushed to show it was not the case, we will likely all continue doing. Because, as was said above, showing that some polarization existed is just that much easier than proving it did not exist.
I'm sorry, arthur chu is claiming this man married his wife to deflect accusations of racism? That is insane, and also deeply fethed up. I'm as liberal as they come but I gotta say this is going way too far. For all the complaining about harassment and online bullying, this takes the cake for me.
Crablezworth wrote: I'm sorry, arthur chu is claiming this man married his wife to deflect accusations of racism? That is insane, and also deeply fethed up.
Crablezworth wrote: I'm sorry, arthur chu is claiming this man married his wife to deflect accusations of racism?
No. The tweet is just saying that he is using them as shield, not that he married them for that purpose. And it is in direct reference to the “Not your shield” hashtag.
Crablezworth wrote: I'm sorry, arthur chu is claiming this man married his wife to deflect accusations of racism?
No. The tweet is just saying that he is using them as shield, not that he married them for that purpose. And it is in direct reference to the “Not your shield” hashtag.
BobtheInquisitor wrote: Are you saying posts like this, and you have many of them, are not implying the Hugo Awards had a powerful, left-leaning concern? Essentially, a conspiracy to promote a Leftish agenda?
Because that is seriously how it comes across.
My posts mean exactly what they say (rather than what you say they mean, go figure) but I don't mind spelling it out once again for you:
One of the main points the Sad Puppies and their allies have made is that the Hugo awards are already politicized. They say they organized to resist this existing state of affairs rather than to simply wrest control away from leftists.
So -- again to be clear -- there are basically two narratives at play:
(1) The Hugos are non-political and recognize works purely on the basis of merit. Sad Puppies wants to transform the Hugos to promote conservative politics.
(2) The Hugos are currently controlled by publishing interests with left-leaning political sympathies. Sad Puppies wants to confront these interests by legally bloc voting for works on the basis of merit.
Nothing I have posted ITT claims that one narrative is more accurate than the other. What I have attempted to do is show how posters who assume the first narrative is correct have merely assumed it without making a case based on evidence.
I'm a progressive liberal by any definition and I can't stand that all it takes is to name drop the words liberal or conservative into anything and get immediate polarization result. With that said after seeing the arthur chu crap and the attempt to name drop gamersgate as if it's somehow related, if I'm honest my immediate reaction is to side more with the sad puppies. After reading the entire thread, I gotta say I still see their narrative as more plausible.
I don't mind fiction being very polemical in nature, but it has to feel right, it takes a good author, otherwise it just feels like every character is a mouth piece of the author. Powerful, thought provoking, but above all nuanced writing is important and to be valued, It's the same reason it's so hard to make a good fiction movie that makes a point without beating you over the head with it.
Manchu wrote: Again, you seem to be assuming there was no previous political polarization.
And, unless convincing arguments are being pushed to show it was not the case, we will likely all continue doing. Because, as was said above, showing that some polarization existed is just that much easier than proving it did not exist.
What you have done here is to declare that whatever you want to claim is true unless I prove otherwise ... without any irony.
"Politics is what the other guys do. We only do truth."
Crablezworth wrote: I'm sorry, arthur chu is claiming this man married his wife to deflect accusations of racism?
No. The tweet is just saying that he is using them as shield, not that he married them for that purpose. And it is in direct reference to the “Not your shield” hashtag.
Wow, if I were the other guys I'd be coming for this Arthur Chu dude.
Manchu wrote: What you have done here is to declare that whatever you want to claim is true unless I prove otherwise ...
Uh, no.
Manchu wrote: "Politics is what the other guys do. We only do truth."
Rather “I am unconvinced by claims with nothing to back them when finding such things should be extremely easy”. Now if you or someone else can come up with actual stuff supporting the idea that there was a left-wing bias before, then sure, I can change my mind. Or even disagree but acknowledge you have arguments. Now… well, I just cannot take you seriously until then. And I am not asking for much, just a list of nominated books and quick descriptions that shows they are left-wing or something.
As I explained to InquisitorBob (you might want to re-read that post), you simply wish that I claimed that the Hugo awards are manipulated by a left-wing conspiracy. Why? Because you want to shift the burden from you having to support your claim (which Peregrine believes is impossible) to me having to prove the opposite, despite never having claimed the opposite.
Manchu wrote: Again, you seem to be assuming there was no previous political polarization.
I am assuming that any previous polarisation was caused by choices made by readers rather than a left wing cabal's secret conspiracy to create a politically polarised Hugo winner.
Kilkrazy wrote: I am assuming that any previous polarisation was caused by choices made by readers rather than a left wing cabal's secret conspiracy to create a politically polarised Hugo winner.
And if there were possible explanations outside of that false dichotomy?
MWHistorian wrote: There is a lot of misinformation flying around about Sad Puppies.
I know Larry Correia and Brad Torgerson personally and have followed this from the beginning.
Here's a run down.
The Hugos, the highest award in sci-fi, was run by a small group of elitists that all had the same political agenda. The books that would get nominations and thus win, were chosen because of their political message, not quality of work. (And usually by TOR publishing to boot.) Some authors, such as John Scalzi would game the system and campaign for votes so he would win. Which he did. A lot.
Larry tried to bring these problems to the Hugo's attention but they ignored him and when he pushed, said he wasn't the kind of person they wanted in science fiction.
So, Larry started sad puppies. (Boring literary message fiction is the leading cause of puppy sadness.) He wanted the Hugos to be about what's good, not what fits the political narrative of the people in charge. Others agreed. They even had to campaign to get the Wheel of Time series nominated. That should have gotten several Hugo's already. There are authors of different colors, gender and even politics associated with Sad Puppies. It's not about getting Conservative authors on the ballet, it's about getting good authors on the ballet.
So they adopted Scalzi's model and gamed the system in order to break it to show how broken and pointless the Hugos already were.
They're not misogynists. Many of the authors on the ballet are women.
They're not racists. Some of the authors are minorities. Brad has been married to a black woman for twenty years.
They're not all conservatives. Some are libertarians and some are even (gasp) liberals.
Edit: And Footfall was awesome!
Exalted!
Unfortunately, a lot of people in this thread seem to want to ignore what Larry has said from the inception of The Campaign to End Puppy Related Sadness, all of which has always been available to the public on his own blog http://monsterhunternation.com/ for anyone to read. Of course why should people read the exact words of the creator of Sad Puppies when they can rely on second, third or fourth hand opinion pieces that clearly are agenda driven?
There is a lot of good enjoyable well written commercially successful SciFi out there written by authors that have a lot of fans who buy a lot of books and go to a lot of conventions. In recent years none of those books won Hugos and the stories that did win Hugos were championed by their fans as being important message fiction that had the proper boxes ticked in their checklist that aligned with their politics. The fans of those stories also actively disparaged other authors and fans of works of those authors for purely political reasons. Those authors and fans pushed back and lots of good popular stories were nominated by fans who cared enough to pay the fee and cast a ballot.
There are a lot of SciFi fans out there. Having more of them participate in the Hugo voting is a good thing. It brings in more money to WorldCon, gets more fan involvement for conventions, publicizes more good stories, breaks no rules. There is no downside to fan participation in fan awarded awards.
The people who are upset by the success of Sad Puppies are the only ones bringing politics into the Hugos. Fans of popular well selling books voted for them for Hugos. The fact that some people are upset that the "wrong" stories are being nominated by the "wrong" fans is telling. SciFi fandom is a big tent and everyone who pays the fee and signs up has the right to vote for the Hugos. The only "bad" SciFi stories are the ones that aren't enjoyable to read.
Prestor Jon wrote: The fact that some people are upset that the "wrong" stories are being nominated by the "wrong" fans is telling.
The counterargument is that those mobilized by Sad Puppies et al. are only voting for political reasons rather than aesthetic ones. That is, they are no more interested in excellence in science fiction than they allege their opponents are. I don't think that counter-argument stands up to reason: either one must admit that both sides are principally interested in politics or demonstrate that politics played no significant role in the awards prior to Sad Puppies' lobbying (i.e., that Sad Puppies only cares about politicizing a non-political award).
Correia himself offered a different explanation last year (i.e., pre-GamerGate):
The Hugos are supposed to be about honoring the best works, and many of the voters still take this responsibility very seriously. I thank them for this. But basically the Hugos are a popularity contest decided by the attendees of WorldCon. I am a popular writer, however my fans aren’t typical WorldCon attendees. Anyone who pays to purchase a WorldCon membership is allowed to vote. Other writers, bloggers, and even publishing houses have encouraged their fans to get involved in the nomination process before. I simply did the same thing. This controversy arises only because my fans are the wrong kind of fans.
Kilkrazy wrote: As I understand it, this "false dichotomy" is the basis for the Sad Puppies's group's course of action.
Then I think you misunderstand their argument. As shown above, Correia believes that there is a significant left-leaning bias among "typical WorldCon attendees," which is pretty short of some preposterous "left wing cabal's secret conspiracy" or "CIA mind control lasers."
"Yes and no. SP1 was very politically biased because it was just me. SP2 did have a preponderance of nominees on the right side of the political spectrum, again, because that slate was basically my suggested list of stuff that I personally enjoyed. However, ultimately that didn’t matter because the liberals we got noms for were just as attacked and vilified as the rest of us.
SP3 is actually extremely politically diverse. That’s because this time our slate of suggestions was put together by a bigger group of authors and fans, and since Brad was running the show and trying to be all about getting recognition for quality, deserving authors, their personal beliefs were of no concern. Don’t take my word for it. Go through our list of nominees for yourself. You’ll find that we have liberals, conservatives, moderates, and question marks who’ve kept their politics to themselves.
What these authors have in common is that they are good, entertaining, and wouldn’t normally have a snowball’s chance in hell of getting a nomination because they aren’t inclined to kiss the right butts. If you look at our best novel nominees, none of them are conservatives. I was the only one on there who could possibly be described as right wing, and I refused my nomination.
For the record, Brad Torgersen is a moderate. By Utah standards he is a flaming liberal.
As you go through the other categories, you’ll find that we put up many authors and editors who are my polar political opposites, and I’d guess that a majority of them are actually moderate to left on the spectrum.
That’s because Sad Puppies suggestions was about the quality of the work. Not the author’s politics. Anybody who says the SP nominees are a bunch of right wingers is either misinformed, willfully ignorant, or a liar."
Prestor Jon wrote: The fact that some people are upset that the "wrong" stories are being nominated by the "wrong" fans is telling.
The counterargument is that those mobilized by Sad Puppies et al. are only voting for political reasons rather than aesthetic ones. That is, they are no more interested in excellence in science fiction than they allege their opponents are. I don't think that counter-argument stands up to reason: either one must admit that both sides are principally interested in politics or demonstrate that politics played no significant role in the awards prior to Sad Puppies' lobbying.
Correia himself offered a different explanation last year (i.e., pre-GamerGate):
The Hugos are supposed to be about honoring the best works, and many of the voters still take this responsibility very seriously. I thank them for this. But basically the Hugos are a popularity contest decided by the attendees of WorldCon. I am a popular writer, however my fans aren’t typical WorldCon attendees. Anyone who pays to purchase a WorldCon membership is allowed to vote. Other writers, bloggers, and even publishing houses have encouraged their fans to get involved in the nomination process before. I simply did the same thing. This controversy arises only because my fans are the wrong kind of fans.
You're conflating politics with fandom. Fans of popular SciFi authors wonder why the books that win Hugos aren't the popular best selling ones. Some popular best selling authors provide the explanation and encourage their numerous fans to vote and vote for whatever books they want.
Larry has personally made the effort to push the books he felt were worthy of nomination and get more people to buy them. This was demonstrably proven by his book bombs for nominees increasing their sales and sales rank on amazon. The stories he pushed people to buy and read were written by various authors whose personal politics were across the spectrum, both men and women were included along with various races. The stories that he encouraged his fans to read were not some unified block of stories written by authors with the same political views or from within the same demographic they were just good stories that Larry thought his fans would also like and potentially want to vote for.
There you go, proof that Sad Puppies wasn't about politics. It was about getting talented authors more publicity, help them sell more books and introduce Larry's fans to stories they might like and if they did like them that they would be willing to vote for them for Hugos.
If you can find any shred of evidence that shows that Larry or Brad encouraged fans to vote for authors or stories based solely on that author's political beliefs I'd like to see it.
Prestor Jon wrote: The fact that some people are upset that the "wrong" stories are being nominated by the "wrong" fans is telling.
The counterargument is that those mobilized by Sad Puppies et al. are only voting for political reasons rather than aesthetic ones.
Then what's their political agenda? Because SP is filled with people from all walks of the political spectrum.
So, I guess it's gotta be something all sides could agree with. That in itself must be an amazing political agenda.
I find it really, really interesting that one of the major quotes from the people behind this is all about how, unlike the good old days, sci-fi and fantasy isn't just about barbarians plundering ancient barrows or space mari...errrrr...futuristic soldiers shooting evil alien bugs, but keeps having some kind of pesky message or social commentary.
That's not exactly a new phenomenon in either genre. In fact, his complaints fall more in line with critics of both genres who don't think they can be 'literary'. There's room for both Conan and Picard, and there always has been!
...and seriously? He touched on cover art being unreliable? Cover art has always been unreliable!
On the subject of that quote with regards to the late Sir Terry...wow.
I do think there is a political dimension to fandom. People tend to like things that support their existing worldview. In real life, they like to hang out with people who share their interests and opinions. This does not have to be and often is not a matter of conscious political organization and yet it is political all the same. But people who spend most of their time in situations where their opinions are reinforced and congratulated tend to believe those opinions are factual in contrast to political. Like I said above, anyone who disagrees, however, they are the ones doing politics.
The trouble is, the Hugos are not just a WorldCon affair (contrary to GRRM's recent, half-hearted assertions) but a term of wider marketable relevance. So even people not traditionally affiliated with WorldCon and its alleged political bent would naturally value receiving a Hugo award.
Prestor Jon wrote: If you can find any shred of evidence that shows that Larry or Brad encouraged fans to vote for authors or stories based solely on that author's political beliefs I'd like to see it.
As GRRM pointed out, the prestige of an award is largely a matter of who has received it. Vonnegut, Asimov, Heinlein, PKD, Arthur C. Clarke, etc., etc., are not around anymore to receive a newly-founded award.
Spinner wrote: I find it really, really interesting that one of the major quotes from the people behind this is all about how, unlike the good old days, sci-fi and fantasy isn't just about barbarians plundering ancient barrows or space mari...errrrr...futuristic soldiers shooting evil alien bugs, but keeps having some kind of pesky message or social commentary.
That's not exactly a new phenomenon in either genre. In fact, his complaints fall more in line with critics of both genres who don't think they can be 'literary'. There's room for both Conan and Picard, and there always has been!
...and seriously? He touched on cover art being unreliable? Cover art has always been unreliable!
On the subject of that quote with regards to the late Sir Terry...wow.
They're not saying fiction shouldn't have a message.
They're saying that message shouldn't override story.
They point to Dune as an example. Dune had a strong message about politics and society. Yet the story was what came first and as a result it's far more readable, enjoyable and even stronger in its message for doing so.
Spinner wrote: I find it really, really interesting that one of the major quotes from the people behind this is all about how, unlike the good old days, sci-fi and fantasy isn't just about barbarians plundering ancient barrows or space mari...errrrr...futuristic soldiers shooting evil alien bugs, but keeps having some kind of pesky message or social commentary.
That's not exactly a new phenomenon in either genre. In fact, his complaints fall more in line with critics of both genres who don't think they can be 'literary'. There's room for both Conan and Picard, and there always has been!
...and seriously? He touched on cover art being unreliable? Cover art has always been unreliable!
On the subject of that quote with regards to the late Sir Terry...wow.
They're not saying fiction shouldn't have a message.
They're saying that message shouldn't override story.
They point to Dune as an example. Dune had a strong message about politics and society. Yet the story was what came first and as a result it's far more readable, enjoyable and even stronger in its message for doing so.
Ender Games as well, but from how people talk about it now you'd think its the most controversial book.
Manchu wrote: you simply wish that I claimed that the Hugo awards are manipulated by a left-wing conspiracy.
Actually, I wish you would stop implying there was one. Replace “Manchu” by “Sad Puppies” in my message if that makes you feel better. But I am not going to assume conspiracy by default.
No one, not even Sad Puppies, has asked you to do so.
We've got more straw men ITT than a Wizard of Oz cosplay convention.
Frazzled wrote: So...just get more of your people to come to this convention? I mean how is it different then before? Was there a different voting procedure?
MWHistorian wrote: They're saying that message shouldn't override story.
So which of the recent winners have been such a horrible case of the message overriding the story? Even if they're honest about their motivations it's still a solution in need of a problem.
Peregrine wrote: So which of the recent winners have been such a horrible case of the message overriding the story?
That's a very good question but I don't think it is the right one. It has less to do with the winner being bad than good books not being considered, if I understand Sad Puppies correctly.
Manchu wrote: That's a very good question but I don't think it is the right one. It has less to do with the winner being bad than good books not being considered, if I understand Sad Puppies correctly.
No, it's definitely a claim that the winners didn't deserve it. Let's look at the SP3 organizer's own words:
No longer interested in adventure, argue the Puppies, the Hugos have grown elitist, academic, and overly ideological—irrelevant to the average fan.
And if the winners weren't bad then what's the point of the SP argument? If the winner deserved the award just as much as the books that didn't get it then the claims of bias disappear and we're left with nothing more than a few fans who are annoyed that their favorite thing isn't everyone else's favorite thing. I suppose rabid fans will have that argument all the time, but it certainly doesn't have any value to anyone outside their specific fandom. So if you want to reduce SP3 to nothing more than the average superman vs. batman argument then that's your right, but I don't think you really want to go down that path.
But sure, let's consider the other question too. Which deserving authors were excluded for political reasons? When you answer this question please remember three things:
1) The Hugo awards can only be given for a work published that year. There is no "lifetime achievement" award, and being a popular author with great stuff in the past isn't supposed to get you an award this year. Nor is writing the next book in a popular series, unless that book stands on its own merits without considering the previous books.
2) Not all authors received immediate popularity. For example, Terry Pratchett wasn't very well known outside the UK until the Discworld series was well established. So all of the earlier "wow that was awesome" books were no longer eligible by the time enough voters had heard of them. Same thing with Ian M. Banks (an openly far-left author who the "SJWs" should embrace), whose best work was virtually unknown in the US because the publisher didn't bother getting it into US stores. And I can imagine a similar thing happening with Jim Butcher and the Dresden Files series before 2015, his series has certainly been popular but the last few books have kind of suffered from a lack of editing (common with a successful author).
3) Not all authors are popular enough with the voting community to get a nomination. You can be the best author ever in a specific niche of science fiction and fantasy, but if you don't have broad appeal with the voting community then you aren't going to win. I think this is an issue with some of the right-leaning military science fiction authors, they're really popular with their fans, but those fans are kind of a separate niche. That isn't political bias excluding deserving authors from the process, it's just the inevitable result of a niche market being a niche market.
Manchu wrote: That's a very good question but I don't think it is the right one. It has less to do with the winner being bad than good books not being considered, if I understand Sad Puppies correctly.
No, it's definitely a claim that the winners didn't deserve it. Let's look at the SP3 organizer's own words:
No longer interested in adventure, argue the Puppies, the Hugos have grown elitist, academic, and overly ideological—irrelevant to the average fan.
And if the winners weren't bad then what's the point of the SP argument? If the winner deserved the award just as much as the books that didn't get it then the claims of bias disappear and we're left with nothing more than a few fans who are annoyed that their favorite thing isn't everyone else's favorite thing. I suppose rabid fans will have that argument all the time, but it certainly doesn't have any value to anyone outside their specific fandom. So if you want to reduce SP3 to nothing more than the average superman vs. batman argument then that's your right, but I don't think you really want to go down that path.
But sure, let's consider the other question too. Which deserving authors were excluded for political reasons? When you answer this question please remember three things:
1) The Hugo awards can only be given for a work published that year. There is no "lifetime achievement" award, and being a popular author with great stuff in the past isn't supposed to get you an award this year. Nor is writing the next book in a popular series, unless that book stands on its own merits without considering the previous books.
2) Not all authors received immediate popularity. For example, Terry Pratchett wasn't very well known outside the UK until the Discworld series was well established. So all of the earlier "wow that was awesome" books were no longer eligible by the time enough voters had heard of them. Same thing with Ian M. Banks (an openly far-left author who the "SJWs" should embrace), whose best work was virtually unknown in the US because the publisher didn't bother getting it into US stores. And I can imagine a similar thing happening with Jim Butcher and the Dresden Files series before 2015, his series has certainly been popular but the last few books have kind of suffered from a lack of editing (common with a successful author).
3) Not all authors are popular enough with the voting community to get a nomination. You can be the best author ever in a specific niche of science fiction and fantasy, but if you don't have broad appeal with the voting community then you aren't going to win. I think this is an issue with some of the right-leaning military science fiction authors, they're really popular with their fans, but those fans are kind of a separate niche. That isn't political bias excluding deserving authors from the process, it's just the inevitable result of a niche market being a niche market.
You're inventing strawmen with your points. The people voting for stories that are for some reason objectionable to a certain vocal subset of Hugo voters and/or SciFi fans are simply voting for Hugo eligible stories that they enjoyed reading. The only quasi political point of Sad Puppies was to explain that the reason popular well written SciFi wasn't winning awards is because not enough fans of those stories were voting and if more fans voted those books would win. Hugo's were being awarded to books that were relatively unknown and generates low sales. Popular authors of Hugo eligible stories encouraged their fans to vote for the Hugo's so they did. There's no reason to be upset over that because that how the Hugo's have been awarded nothing changed except more fans participated who had previously abstained.
Your third point is arguable at best. Regardless of the niche of an author's arbitrarily classified genre if nobody wants to read hi/her stories then its difficult to see how an unpopular author could be construed as good or successful. If you write stories that nobody wants to read what are you acxomplishing that is noteworthy or laudable?
I don't think Torgeson is referring to either the Hugo award or some recipient work as irrelevant -- rather I think he is complaining about how left-wing ideological standards allegedly shackle how works are considered. It seems to me that Torgeson is arguing that racial prejudice and exploitation, sexism and the oppression of women, and gay and transgender issues (all his words) are irrelevant to average sci fi fans. Meanwhile Correia is saying, the point is actually to get meritorious works nominated regardless of the authors' political ideology. And that just doesn't fit with the Torgeson soundbyte. In selecting a politically diverse slate of nominees, it seems Correia is not making a judgment one way or the other about what kinds of ideological standards are relevant to sci fi fans.
MWHistorian wrote: They're not misogynists. Many of the authors on the ballet are women.
They're not racists. Some of the authors are minorities. Brad has been married to a black woman for twenty years.
They're not all conservatives. Some are libertarians and some are even (gasp) liberals.
Women can be misogynists. Minorities can be racists.
Whether or not that's pertinent here, I don't know. I can't claim to have met anyone who identifies as a SP member.
I'm simply pointing out that having diversity in a movement is not an iron-clad shield against either being present. There are plenty of examples of terrible movements/groups with maligned individuals among them. Often they're "one of the good ones".
“Call it block voting. Call it ballot stuffing. Call it gaming the system. There’s truth to all of those characterisations. You can’t call it cheating, though. It was all within the rules. But many things can be legal, and still bad … and this is one of those, from where I sit. I think the Sad Puppies have broken the Hugo awards, and I am not sure they can ever be repaired,” he wrote.
“If the Sad Puppies wanted to start their own award … for Best Conservative SF, or Best Space Opera, or Best Military SF, or Best Old-Fashioned SF the Way It Used to Be … whatever it is they are actually looking for … hey, I don’t think anyone would have any objections to that. I certainly wouldn’t. More power to them,” he added. “But that’s not what they are doing here, it seems to me. Instead they seem to want to take the Hugos and turn them into their own awards.”
Suggested alternate headline: "Racist white male authors right to remain relevant in a world which has left them behind".
Peregrine wrote: No longer interested in adventure, argue the Puppies, the Hugos have grown elitist, academic, and overly ideological—irrelevant to the average fan.
All I can say to Mr. Puppies is Welcome to the Hugo Awards (or any Literary award for that matter). I still remember all the BS that was floating around when The Sandman won the Short Fiction award, which granted I agree that comics dont belong in the category, but that's beside all the snobby stuff people were saying ("lel comics are fer kids grow up" kind of nonsense). The Hugos didn't even recognize comics as a genre until 2009 and only because a circle of fans "conspired" to constantly submit comic books for the awards to the point WSFS finally caved and added a comic category. And that award was promptly taken over and dominated by the indy crowd.
To understand GRRM's point there you have to also understand that in order to make it he needed to revise his opinion on "who owns" the Hugo awards. He admitted that he has for years told scifi fans that they own the award because they get to vote for which works receive it. But for the purposes of this argument about Sad Puppies, GRRM has changed his view and says WorldCon owns the award.
This is an interesting point because GRRM has shifted from making a point about what the award means (i.e., that it is an opportunity for scifi fans to celebrate what they think is good scifi) to a point about ownership. Now, that's not just legal ownership, although of course WorldCon is the legal owner of the Hugo awards. But his new point is also about who gets to vote, i.e., WorldCon members. So right there, we see GRRM distinguishing between scifi fans, as per his older views, and WorldCon members.
So it seems to me that what GRRM is actually saying is, these Sad Puppies people are just invading WorldCon for the sake of the Hugos. They don't care about the long and storied history of WorldCon of scifi fandom generally. They want the prestige of the award.
My trouble with GRRM's point is that the Hugo awards are no longer just the WorldCon membership's stamp of approval. Whatever they started as, Hugos are now prestigious (because, as GRRM himself admits, they have been handed out to so many famous authors over the decades) and therefore people who are not WorldCon members or don't even know about WorldCon know about and respect the award and even might be more willing to buy a book that has won the award.
In short, the Hugo awards have probably outgrown WorldCon.
Prestor Jon wrote: There's no reason to be upset over that because that how the Hugo's have been awarded nothing changed except more fans participated who had previously abstained.
Sigh. I guess you're going to keep ignoring the fact that something did change: a group of people started agreeing to all vote for chosen works from a specific category to amplify their voting power. There's a difference between "hey, fans of {genre}, you should vote" and "hey, fans of {genre}, let's all vote as a unified group so that someone from our genre wins the award".
Your third point is arguable at best. Regardless of the niche of an author's arbitrarily classified genre if nobody wants to read hi/her stories then its difficult to see how an unpopular author could be construed as good or successful. If you write stories that nobody wants to read what are you acxomplishing that is noteworthy or laudable?
You're missing the point here, so I'll attempt to explain it again: an author can be popular and financially successful in a niche market, but fail to win awards if they don't have mass popularity outside of that niche. Let's say dedicated fans of right-leaning military science fiction are 10% of science fiction fandom as a whole (a completely imaginary number). That's a substantial number of people and enough of a market to have popular and successful authors, but even the most popular books in the niche aren't going to win a general-fandom award unless they manage to become successful in the other 90%. That doesn't mean there's some kind of conspiracy to keep them off the ballot, it's just a natural consequence of not having enough fans in the voting community. You know, kind of like how the absence of erotic (40k) space marine fanfiction on the nomination list isn't proof that its authors are being unfairly excluded.
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Manchu wrote: I don't think Torgeson is referring to either the Hugo award or some recipient work as irrelevant -- rather I think he is complaining about how left-wing ideological standards allegedly shackle how works are considered.
No, that's exactly what he said:
No longer interested in adventure, argue the Puppies, the Hugos have grown elitist, academic, and overly ideological—irrelevant to the average fan.
Meanwhile Correia is saying, the point is actually to get meritorious works nominated regardless of the authors' political ideology.
Ok, then I'll repeat my question: which meritorious works and/or authors are being left off the ballot for ideological reasons and need support from SP3?
In selecting a politically diverse slate of nominees, it seems Correia is not making a judgment one way or the other about what kinds of ideological standards are relevant to sci fi fans.
Note that Correia didn't run SP3. He did the first two, which were open attempts to get more right-wing authors and stories onto the ballot, but handed it over to Torgesson for this year.
Haemonculus wrote: Regarding the OP, that's just one article you've decided to agree with. Even the Telegraph amended the errors that the quoted article made in the OP.
Did I give my opinion anywhere in the OP? I merely presented an article I found and asked members of Dakka for their opinion. Please do not attribute commentary to me that I did not make.
My sincere apologies. I was not attacking you by pointing out that the article was factually incorrect. But I appreciate you raising the SP issue here.
Yeah I read that. But the interpretation you are suggesting, which I agree lines up with the syntax, makes no sense. It seems pretty clear that Sad Puppies is not trying to rescue the Hugos from irrelevance. If anything, their actions suggest the award itself is relevant to them and to a wider audience than existing WorldCon members.
Peregrine wrote: Ok, then I'll repeat my question: which meritorious works and/or authors are being left off the ballot for ideological reasons and need support from SP3?
It's hard to take this question at face value because you're a smart guy and I know you can use the internet to find the Sad Puppies slate of nominees all by yourself. So I am thinking this is another try at the old burden shifting.
Manchu wrote: Yeah I read that. But the interpretation you are suggesting, which I agree lines up with the syntax, makes no sense. It seems pretty clear that Sad Puppies is not trying to rescue the Hugos from irrelevance. If anything, their actions suggest the award itself is relevant to them and to a wider audience than existing WorldCon members.
You're right, it doesn't make much sense. Very little about the SP3 campaign makes sense. It assumes that there is a left-wing group controlling the nomination process and keeping out authors that don't agree with left-wing politics, but also a bunch of left-wing authors that have been unfairly neglected. It assumes that science fiction has abandoned the good old days when it was all about the story instead of the political message, and then cites the good old days of Heinlein and Star Trek. I think this is the result of having it start as a "SJW TUMBLR FEMINAZIS RUIN EVERYTHING" rant and the authors later realizing that they need to repackage the message a bit to attract people who aren't rabid right-wing lunatics like Vox Day.
It's hard to take this question at face value because you're a smart guy and I know you can use the internet to find the Sad Puppies slate of nominees all by yourself. So I am thinking this is another try at the old burden shifting.
I'm not asking which authors SP3 included, I'm asking which authors YOU feel are being overlooked for political reasons. If that's the SP3 list then you can just say "the authors on SP3". If you have your own list in mind then let's see it.
Peregrine wrote: I'm not asking which authors SP3 included, I'm asking which authors YOU feel are being overlooked for political reasons.
Well, he will just tell you that he does not think any author have been overlooked for political reasons but it is your burden of proof to show no author has been overlooked for political reasons even though he does not say any of them has been. Because, uh, reasons! The important thing being only that the burden of proof is on you.
Peregrine wrote: It assumes that there is a left-wing group controlling the nomination process and keeping out authors that don't agree with left-wing politics, but also a bunch of left-wing authors that have been unfairly neglected.
From what I can tell, their actual premise is WorldCon membership has become significantly biased against right-wing politics. Sad Puppies, as Correia articulates it, is exploiting WorldCon rules to nominate works of merit without regard to the authors' politics.
Peregrine wrote: the authors later realizing that they need to repackage the message a bit to attract people who aren't rabid right-wing lunatics like Vox Day
Or maybe to prevent that nutjob from hijacking their initiative/prevent disinformation tarring the Sad Puppies by association (see e.g., Entertainment Weekly's retraction/apology).
Peregrine wrote: I'm asking which authors YOU feel are being overlooked for political reasons.
Nah, this isn't about me as I am not a part of the Sad Puppies movement or their ally.
Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote: it is your burden of proof to show no author has been overlooked for political reasons
If someone claims no author has been overlooked for political reasons then it is on them to back that up. I'm perplexed that you don't understand this.
At the end of the day, the votes are legit and the system works as it was written. Whether it works as it was intended is another issue but considering many of these issues were apparently highlighted to the committee and ignored, then I'd say the committee had their chance to fix them (2 years chance in fact).
Honestly, this is like people claiming 'haha, you'll never win enough votes to be elected' and then when someone goes out to campaign (and in a very OPEN manner to boot, with public declarations on the internet), and somehow wins, somehow it's suddenly wrong. GRR Martins fable about sourgrapes really should be applied to some people, but I don't think it's Sad Puppies in this case
Manchu wrote: From what I can tell, their actual premise is WorldCon membership has become significantly biased against right-wing politics. Sad Puppies, as Correia articulates it, is exploiting WorldCon rules to nominate works of merit without regard to the authors' politics.
And the point is that the two aren't really consistent. If there is really a significant left-wing bias in the nomination process then we shouldn't expect to see deserving left-wing authors being excluded, and the Sad Puppies organizers should have a hard time finding any left-wing authors to nominate. Once you start talking about deserving left-wing authors who have been excluded unfairly then it's a concession that the nominating process isn't split along left vs. right lines.
Or maybe to prevent that nutjob from hijacking their initiative/prevent disinformation tarring the Sad Puppies by association (see e.g., Entertainment Weekly's retraction/apology).
It's not just Vox Day. Correia's own original Sad Puppies campaign was a lot heavier on the "SJW TUMLR FEMINAZIS RUIN EVERYTHING" ranting, and the current one seems like little more than a weak attempt to repackage the concept after realizing that right-wing fans alone aren't enough to win nominations.
Nah, this isn't about me as I am not a part of the Sad Puppies movement or their ally.
No, but you sure seem to be doing a lot of arguing for their case in this thread. If you don't agree with them then why are you defending them?
If someone claims no author has been overlooked for political reasons then it is on them to back that up. I'm perplexed that you don't understand this.
And once again you don't have any clue how proof works. It is impossible to prove that no author has been overlooked for political reasons because even if everyone who has ever voted for a Hugo nomination stated their reasoning for every vote or non-vote you could still claim that the voters are lying, or that there's some other author who was neglected that nobody mentioned, etc. There is nothing I could possibly say in response to your demand for proof that would satisfy you. So your demand for "proof" of the absence of bias does nothing more than direct attention away from the fact that the Sad Puppies campaign has made a lot of claims about political bias in the nomination process but provided very little evidence to support those claims.
Peregrine wrote: Once you start talking about deserving left-wing authors who have been excluded unfairly then it's a concession that the nominating process isn't split along left vs. right lines.
Not really. It could be, and I think this makes much more sense, that "left" is only a loose relational adjective describing the alleged political ideology of some significant part of WorldCon membership rather than a precise and exhaustive term.
Peregrine wrote: the current one seems like little more than a weak attempt to repackage the concept after realizing that right-wing fans alone aren't enough to win nominations
Sure -- or Correia's explanation could be sincere and/or accurate.
Peregrine wrote: If you don't agree with them then why are you defending them?
Because it irritates me when posters treat assumptions as facts.
Peregrine wrote: It is impossible to prove that no author has been overlooked for political reasons
If you claim something is a fact but cannot support it then you are really just declaring an opinion. I think you have explained this a number of times on this very forum.
Peregrine wrote: [...] nothing more than direct attention away from the fact that the Sad Puppies campaign has made a lot of claims about political bias in the nomination process but provided very little evidence to support those claims.
I don't think you have been paying attention. Or maybe you just don't read what doesn't fit how you would like the conversation to go? I have been very consistent in treating the Sad Puppies rhetoric as a narrative rather than a set of facts. Instead of trying to hide this, I explicitly laid it out.
It's my opinion. My opinion is, I don't really agree with the Sad Puppies movement and its allies about WorldCon overlooking authors on the basis of political ideology. I mean, I get that it is unpopular to like firearms in some circles, for example. It is harder for me to believe that someone might be passed over for Hugo nomination on that basis.
EDIT -- But OTOH I am not a right-wing scifi writer. I have never been in the position to experience the kind of garbage Correia describes facing. I am not saying that kind of thing does not happen as I would not know. It certainly sounds plausible. We have already seen just in the lifespan of this thread EW publish some pretty serious disinformation about Sad Puppies.
This whole thing reminds me of Happy Gilmore. Where Gilmore attracts the wrong type of fans to golfing tournaments and some of the old crowd are less than pleased with him
Yeah I think that, beyond the attempt to explain this in GamerGate terminology, the deeper issue is that the WorldCon model of fandom that produced the Hugo award is no longer really relevant to the prestige and marketability of the award today.
Manchu wrote: Not really. It could be, and I think this makes much more sense, that "left" is only a loose relational adjective describing the alleged political ideology of some significant part of WorldCon membership rather than a precise and exhaustive term.
Then what exactly is the supposed ideology, if "left-wing" isn't accurate?
Sure -- or Correia's explanation could be sincere and/or accurate.
I see very little reason to believe that it's a sincere explanation. It contrasts very obviously with his other statements, and the evidence supporting it is weak at best. The "repackaging after the failure of SP and SP2" explanation, on the other hand, fits very consistently with what we see from the SP3 campaign.
As for the rest, let's review the conversation:
SP3: THERE IS LIBERAL BIAS AND DESERVING AUTHORS ARE UNFAIRLY EXCLUDED!!!!!!!!
Me: there's no evidence for that.
You: PROVE THAT THERE IS NO EVIDENCE!!!!!!!!
Your demand for proof that there's no credible evidence for the SP3 accusations is simply ridiculous. You wouldn't say the same thing if I said "there's no proof of mind control messages in the chemtrails", so why is it any different here? SP3 have made a claim without supporting it, so if you want to disagree with me about there being no evidence for their claims then you need to provide some evidence instead of just nitpicking about who has the burden of proof.
Sure -- or Correia's explanation could be sincere and/or accurate.
I see very little reason to believe that it's a sincere explanation.
I dunno, I thought this provided at least some reasons:
Prestor Jon wrote: Larry has personally made the effort to push the books he felt were worthy of nomination and get more people to buy them. This was demonstrably proven by his book bombs for nominees increasing their sales and sales rank on amazon. The stories he pushed people to buy and read were written by various authors whose personal politics were across the spectrum, both men and women were included along with various races. The stories that he encouraged his fans to read were not some unified block of stories written by authors with the same political views or from within the same demographic they were just good stories that Larry thought his fans would also like and potentially want to vote for.
There you go, proof that Sad Puppies wasn't about politics. It was about getting talented authors more publicity, help them sell more books and introduce Larry's fans to stories they might like and if they did like them that they would be willing to vote for them for Hugos.
Peregrine wrote: As for the rest, let's review the conversation:
Yes, let's:
Peregrine: LEFT-LEANING AUTHORS DID NOT LOBBY FOR VOTES!!! Manchu: Can you back that up? Peregrine: IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO PROVE AND YOU ARE CLUELESS!!! YOU HAVE TO PROVE THAT THE OPPOSITE IS TRUE!!! FOR REASONS!!! CLUELESS!!! Manchu: I see ...
Peregrine wrote: so if you want to disagree with me about there being no evidence for their claims then you need to provide some evidence instead of just nitpicking about who has the burden of proof.
Nice try at moving the goal posts old chap. Here's your actual argument:
Peregrine wrote: Left-leaning authors made no effort to hide their politics in either their writing or their personal lives, but they didn't go beyond "this book is awesome" in trying to lobby for votes.
I really don't want to get involved in this thread any more than to say that I've read the Monster Hunter blog, and haven't had any sense of rabid nonsense or any of the other things Correia has been accused of. I think no malfeasance has occurred here and it is really just people being upset because the boat has been rocked in a way they don't approve of.
I have also found Correia's handling of all of this above reproach as he has written reams of his own thoughts on what is going on and exhaustively linked things he is talking about rather than obfuscate and/or make up entire articles.
Bromsy wrote: [...] rather than obfuscate and/or make up entire articles.
Such as Entertainment Weekly:
CORRECTION: After misinterpreting reports in other news publications, EW published an unfair and inaccurate depiction of the Sad Puppies voting slate, which does, in fact, include many women and writers of color. As Sad Puppies’ Brad Torgerson explained to EW, the slate includes both women and non-caucasian writers, including Rajnar Vajra, Larry Correia, Annie Bellet, Kary English, Toni Weisskopf, Ann Sowards, Megan Gray, Sheila Gilbert, Jennifer Brozek, Cedar Sanderson, and Amanda Green.
This story has been updated to more accurately reflect this. EW regrets the error.
It would be a far more productive conversation ...
Sining wrote: It happens when you slander people who can afford lawyers
Not a bad point. EW's coverage was certainly slanderous. What gets me is they not only effectively admitted to reprinting from other sites but also admitted to doing a terrible job of it.
Sining wrote: I think you guys honestly think the people who followed sad puppies aren't capable of making up their own minds. It's hilarious really. That's like believing a republican would only vote republican on all possible ballots just because they were told so.
Umm, if people didn't follow Republican and Democratic tickets there'd be no reason to have organised political parties in the first place. The fact that not everyone follows the tickets slavishly doesn't mean you can claim that having the tickets has no effect (which would require no-one to follow the tickets).
And given the number of works on the ticket that made it in to the various shortlists, it's utterly ridiculous to claim the campaign had no effect.
No one is claiming the campaign had no effect. People are claiming however that the sad puppies aren't necessarily going to blindly follow whatever is on the slate without necessarily liking what is on the slate. But this may be too fine a distinction for you to understand
Frazzled wrote: Manchu has the way of it. ALthough sci fi often explores some serious philospohipcal stuff (often this is when sci fi is at its best), lets not kid ourselves about the amount of KILL SPACE ALIENS that is out there and has a place too.
KILL SPACE ALIENS doesn't just have a place, it is probably the most important part of the whole industry.
It's just that if someone read twenty KILL SPACE ALIEN books and two BOOKS THAT ARE REALLY ABOUT POVERTY OR HOMOSEXUALITY OR MAYBE EVEN HOMOSEXUAL POVERTY OR WHATEVER, and then you ask them which was the best, there is a pretty good chance they’ll say it was one of the last two. This may be because the former were fun time wasters but didn’t really change how the reader understands the world. It may also be that he answered that way because he wanted to sound smart by listing the more heavy going book as his favourite, or maybe he wanted to say something about his own political beliefs by. And often it’s a combination of all three.
It is actually a problem with pretty much every awards process on Earth. The problem is you don’t solve it by organising voting blocs.
You're really generalising there. You're assuming that mostly everyone will vote for the two books just because they were different. Also, voting is secret (afaik), unless the guy is going to brag about it, he can vote whatever he wants and say anything about what he voted as number 1.
Frazzled wrote: Manchu has the way of it. ALthough sci fi often explores some serious philospohipcal stuff (often this is when sci fi is at its best), lets not kid ourselves about the amount of KILL SPACE ALIENS that is out there and has a place too.
KILL SPACE ALIENS doesn't just have a place, it is probably the most important part of the whole industry.
It's just that if someone read twenty KILL SPACE ALIEN books and two BOOKS THAT ARE REALLY ABOUT POVERTY OR HOMOSEXUALITY OR MAYBE EVEN HOMOSEXUAL POVERTY OR WHATEVER, and then you ask them which was the best, there is a pretty good chance they’ll say it was one of the last two. This may be because the former were fun time wasters but didn’t really change how the reader understands the world. It may also be that he answered that way because he wanted to sound smart by listing the more heavy going book as his favourite, or maybe he wanted to say something about his own political beliefs by. And often it’s a combination of all three.
It is actually a problem with pretty much every awards process on Earth. The problem is you don’t solve it by organising voting blocs.
If you read Correia's blog; he isn't so much trying to 'solve' it. He was trying to point out (based on his personal experiences) the sheer amount of hatred and slanderous lies that are pedaled by a very vocal minority of Worldcon against anyone that does not fit their ideal of what an author should be, with the explicit point being made that much of the hatred is directed at him and people like them because of who they are and what their beliefs are - in many cases by people who have never and will never read his books rather than criticizing the works themselves.
He refused nomination for a Hugo this year and publicly stated that he will never accept a Hugo.
Sining wrote: No one is claiming the campaign had no effect. People are claiming however that the sad puppies aren't necessarily going to blindly follow whatever is on the slate without necessarily liking what is on the slate. But this may be too fine a distinction for you to understand
That they like the work is meaningless, if it isn’t the book they’d have voted for based on their own preference. That’s how block voting works – everyone getting together to vote in unison for something that’s good enough for everyone, instead of their own preference.
Four pages in to the thread and I find myself explaining the basic mechanics block voting, without which the other poster couldn’t have understood anything that’s been discussed so far. Such is dakka.
In the first place, no one is asking you to explain anything. If you find it such a chore, you can choose not to do it. Or you can drop your holier than thou attitude.
Secondly, you're again assuming that everyone isn't voting because they like the work and it's what they would have voted for anyway. I mean, if you have evidence, then please present it instead of constantly trying to imply it.
Bromsy wrote: He refused nomination for a Hugo this year and publicly stated that he will never accept a Hugo.
He did, however, nominate his own book for best novel as part of Sad Puppies 2 last year, and only declined this year's nomination because he didn't want his critics using it against him.
Bromsy wrote: He refused nomination for a Hugo this year and publicly stated that he will never accept a Hugo.
He did, however, nominate his own book for best novel as part of Sad Puppies 2 last year, and only declined this year's nomination because he didn't want his critics using it against him.
Probably got more and more disillusioned as time went by
Bromsy wrote: He refused nomination for a Hugo this year and publicly stated that he will never accept a Hugo.
He did, however, nominate his own book for best novel as part of Sad Puppies 2 last year, and only declined this year's nomination because he didn't want his critics using it against him.
Or, maybe somehow in that year of time his opinion and/or outlook changed because he is a person and that happens? That ax you seem to be grinding for whatever reason must be getting down to the haft by now.
Sining wrote: In the first place, no one is asking you to explain anything.
Apparently you are, because you keep posting things that demonstrate that you don't really understand how block voting works.
Secondly, you're again assuming that everyone isn't voting because they like the work and it's what they would have voted for anyway. I mean, if you have evidence, then please present it instead of constantly trying to imply it.
If everyone is voting for the works that they would have voted for anyway then what's the point of organizing people with similar views, selecting a single list to represent the Sad Puppies campaign, and promoting it as the single list of books to vote for?
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Bromsy wrote: Or, maybe somehow in that year of time his opinion and/or outlook changed because he is a person and that happens? That ax you seem to be grinding for whatever reason must be getting down to the haft by now.
How exactly is it "grinding an axe" to point out that he did seek the award last year, or that his refusal to accept the nomination this year is about shutting down the "you just want to get everyone to vote for you" accusations instead of a rejection of the award as a whole?
And I'm done having this discussion with you. All you've done is nitpick about who has the burden of proof without providing any evidence that my claim was wrong. You clearly don't understand how proof works or what is reasonable to ask for, and now we're just going in circles.
Sining wrote: In the first place, no one is asking you to explain anything.
Apparently you are, because you keep posting things that demonstrate that you don't really understand how block voting works.
Secondly, you're again assuming that everyone isn't voting because they like the work and it's what they would have voted for anyway. I mean, if you have evidence, then please present it instead of constantly trying to imply it.
If everyone is voting for the works that they would have voted for anyway then what's the point of organizing people with similar views, selecting a single list to represent the Sad Puppies campaign, and promoting it as the single list of books to vote for?
The problem with your notion of block voting is that you kind of assume everyone is going to do this because it's what's on the block. You have basically reduced the humans who have voted down into this into statistics that you feel only voted that way because they were told to. I mean, in general, that just seems to espouse a pretty dim view of other people in general. And yes, I know how block voting works, I just don't think your notion is applicable in this context, which you guys seem to keep missing.
Secondly, the list is nominations of what they consider to be the best by the organisers. They do not say that everyone must vote for it. In fact, I suspect SP3 would fail horribly if they tried to be authoritative. Why do some of the nominations on the list end up being voted for? You guys are claiming it's because it's on the list so that's the only reason it's voted in. Meanwhile, you forget there may simply be other factors at play. There could be people who already like those authors and were going to vote them anyway, people who were never exposed to those authors but now are and like them and will vote them.
Are there people who will vote just because a list tells them to? Yes, but thankfully I believe they're really a very minor segment of humanity and I don't think that's the case here.
Sining wrote: The problem with your notion of block voting is that you kind of assume everyone is going to do this because it's what's on the block.
No, I'm assuming that a significant number of people will do that. The SP3 organizers are also making the same assumption, otherwise they wouldn't bother with their current strategy.
It's been over from the beginning. You made a claim, insisted it was unsupportable, then further insisted that I somehow have to prove its opposite. 0/10
Also, I find it far more telling that certain people will not go and directly ask Larry and his sad puppies at a link that's been posted here several times what their intentions were and did they just mindlessly vote. Instead, they rather skulk here and post spurious claims about the other peoples intentions
Sining wrote: The problem with your notion of block voting is that you kind of assume everyone is going to do this because it's what's on the block.
No, I'm assuming that a significant number of people will do that. The SP3 organizers are also making the same assumption, otherwise they wouldn't bother with their current strategy.
I guess that's because at the end of the day, you're just looking down on other humans. There's a difference between 'guys, I love these books and I think you will too' and 'guys, vote these books because I tell you to'
Bromsy wrote: Or, maybe somehow in that year of time his opinion and/or outlook changed because he is a person and that happens? That ax you seem to be grinding for whatever reason must be getting down to the haft by now.
How exactly is it "grinding an axe" to point out that he did seek the award last year, or that his refusal to accept the nomination this year is about shutting down the "you just want to get everyone to vote for you" accusations instead of a rejection of the award as a whole?
Oh, I was speaking to your general tone and comments throughout the thread. You lead off with
DarkTraveler777 wrote: I operated under the notion that Science Fiction's was rooted in progressive themes, so I am surprised by the backlash.
It is. The whole issue is driven by a bunch of whiny s who want to return to the good old days when Heinlein wrote all of those completely non-political adventure stories (lol) and the original Star Trek never dared to feature a left-leaning agenda. Once you look at all at the history of science fiction it's pretty clear that their complaints are really just a cover for their real objection: that "SJW" stories and authors get more attention than the right-wing ideology they embrace.
The only unfortunate thing here is that voting in unison for the political agenda instead of for the works each individual voter prefers gives them voting power far beyond their actual numbers and destroys the credibility of the award. If they didn't have this disproportionate voting power they'd be an irrelevant minority that nobody pays any attention to.
Which is fairly inflammatory and biased for a fourth post in the thread with absolutely nothing to back it up, and you continued in that same vein throughout, accusing at the very least Correia of basically being a liar. You seem oddly fixated with painting these folks as being terrible, but you also seem unable to provide links or quotes of them being terrible - something the other 'side' for whatever that means in this debate has had no trouble doing.
Bromsy wrote: If you read Correia's blog; he isn't so much trying to 'solve' it. He was trying to point out (based on his personal experiences) the sheer amount of hatred and slanderous lies that are pedaled by a very vocal minority of Worldcon against anyone that does not fit their ideal of what an author should be, with the explicit point being made that much of the hatred is directed at him and people like them because of who they are and what their beliefs are - in many cases by people who have never and will never read his books rather than criticizing the works themselves.
He refused nomination for a Hugo this year and publicly stated that he will never accept a Hugo.
I haven't read Correia's blog, though I have read about his treatment at the Reno worldcon and wonder how much of this nonsense has come out of that bad experience. I agree, by the way, that he shouldn't have been treated like that, and that personal politics shouldn't be used to judge the merit of a work, especially when those politics aren't even in the author's work.
It's worth pointing out, though, that despite the claims of the Sad/Rabid Puppies that they just want to judge the merit of the work, they keep complaining about author's who's left wing politics doesn't show up in their nominated works.
sebster wrote: It's worth pointing out, though, that despite the claims of the Sad/Rabid Puppies that they just want to judge the merit of the work, they keep complaining about author's who's left wing politics doesn't show up in their nominated works.
Yeah, but the point there is that the left-wing authors' books are mediocre at best and wouldn't get any attention without the author's left-wing politics getting people to vote for them. There was a lot of "SCALZI ONLY WINS BECAUSE HES A SJW FEMINAZI" whining when Redshirts won "best novel", despite the book itself having no real political content.
Sining wrote: In the first place, no one is asking you to explain anything. If you find it such a chore, you can choose not to do it. Or you can drop your holier than thou attitude.
I'm trying to discuss the issue in a constructive way where we all come away with a better understanding of the issue. To achieve that, everyone involved needs to have a basic understanding of concepts like block voting. Fair enough if we were establishing that stuff on page 1, but it's now page 7, and it's clear that you've been making your arguments all this time without understanding how the process works.
Secondly, you're again assuming that everyone isn't voting because they like the work and it's what they would have voted for anyway. I mean, if you have evidence, then please present it instead of constantly trying to imply it.
The complaint from Sad/Rabid Puppies is that their preferred works were being neglected. This year they dominate the nominations. Is your argument that that domination would have happened anyway? Really?
Because if it would have happened anyway, then you should believe that the Puppies campaign has only sullied what should have been a triumphant year for their kind of authors, and so the campaign should be disbanded.
Either that, or you do the common sense, honest thing and accept that the campaign had a massive effect on the nominations, and then set about defending that effect as positive for whatever reason.
sebster wrote: It's worth pointing out, though, that despite the claims of the Sad/Rabid Puppies that they just want to judge the merit of the work, they keep complaining about author's who's left wing politics doesn't show up in their nominated works.
Yeah, but the point there is that the left-wing authors' books are mediocre at best and wouldn't get any attention without the author's left-wing politics getting people to vote for them. There was a lot of "SCALZI ONLY WINS BECAUSE HES A SJW FEMINAZI" whining when Redshirts won "best novel", despite the book itself having no real political content.
I have to admit it's hilarious how every time you have to discuss this you have to strawman with the "SJW FEMINAZI" while the same could be said towards the animosity towards SP.
Sining wrote: In the first place, no one is asking you to explain anything. If you find it such a chore, you can choose not to do it. Or you can drop your holier than thou attitude.
I'm trying to discuss the issue in a constructive way where we all come away with a better understanding of the issue. To achieve that, everyone involved needs to have a basic understanding of concepts like block voting. Fair enough if we were establishing that stuff on page 1, but it's now page 7, and it's clear that you've been making your arguments all this time without understanding how the process works.
You're pretty much trying to discuss the issue in a way that only you and perhaps Pere agree upon while ignoring everything else. Also, the counter-argument that 'no, your arguments are made up' is pretty petty isn't it. I've already said if you have proof that your view of block-voting is occuring, that people ARE voting only because it's on the list, you are welcome to show it. Instead, you rather come up with deflections and accusations.
Secondly, you're again assuming that everyone isn't voting because they like the work and it's what they would have voted for anyway. I mean, if you have evidence, then please present it instead of constantly trying to imply it.
The complaint from Sad/Rabid Puppies is that their preferred works were being neglected. This year they dominate the nominations. Is your argument that that domination would have happened anyway? Really?
Because if it would have happened anyway, then you should believe that the Puppies campaign has only sullied what should have been a triumphant year for their kind of authors, and so the campaign should be disbanded.
Either that, or you do the common sense, honest thing and accept that the campaign had a massive effect on the nominations, and then set about defending that effect as positive for whatever reason.
Read the above. Seriously, do you only cherry pick points?
I've already pointed out to Pere, and you've obviously seen the reply because you're replying to something after that, that the nominations could easily have let people discover new authors they didn't know existed and wanted to vote for. As it is, you have no proof that people voted these people just cause it was on a list and not because they didn't enjoy them but you seem intent on arguing that point.
Did the campaign affect the nominations? Considering they were advertising certain nominees pretty publicly, it had the same effect as advertising would. If you can PROVE (and here's the point that you keep missing) that voters just voted cause they were told to vote for them, then do so. Otherwise you're just being incredibly bitter
Peregrine wrote: Yeah, but the point there is that the left-wing authors' books are mediocre at best and wouldn't get any attention without the author's left-wing politics getting people to vote for them. There was a lot of "SCALZI ONLY WINS BECAUSE HES A SJW FEMINAZI" whining when Redshirts won "best novel", despite the book itself having no real political content.
Sure, which ultimately is a very, very silly way of seeing the world. I mean, I didn’t like Redshirts much, but the guy who lent it to me loved the hell out of it, just because that kind of meta-sci fi stuff is his thing. Him and the other person I know who loved it are probably the least political people I know (one I suspect wouldn’t be able to name the US president… yes, seriously).
The issue is going from ‘I didn’t like that book/I don’t think the book should have won’ to ‘and it only won because there’s some vague conspiracy keeping out the authors I do like’. But then, that’s pretty much how political fringes work – everything gets dragged in to their culture war. Every injustice ultimately reduces down to their politics/political enemies. Even with exactly zero evidence that the awards are dominated by the opposing political set… they’re happy just to assume it.
Incidentally, GRR Martin’s second blog post on the issue is up. It’s basically a long breakdown of previous winners of Hugos across all categories, both overall and more recently. He finds pretty much no bias towards SJWs or any other political group.
Sining wrote: Read the above. Seriously, do you only cherry pick points?
I've already pointed out to Pere, and you've obviously seen the reply because you're replying to something after that, that the nominations could easily have let people discover new authors they didn't know existed and wanted to vote for. As it is, you have no proof that people voted these people just cause it was on a list and not because they didn't enjoy them but you seem intent on arguing that point.
Did the campaign affect the nominations? Considering they were advertising certain nominees pretty publicly, it had the same effect as advertising would. If you can PROVE (and here's the point that you keep missing) that voters just voted cause they were told to vote for them, then do so. Otherwise you're just being incredibly bitter
Yeah, okay. On the one hand we can conclude that an effort to provide a standard vote approved list for the Hugos among a certain community… led to that community block voting for the approved titles.
Or we can conclude that the mere act of mentioning these titles led to thousands of fans learning about them and loving them and voluntarily choosing to vote for them in a way that’s indistinguishable from if they’d just obeyed the block vote recommendations to prove a political point.
I guess we could argue both things are possible. We won’t, because I think the suggestion is comically ridiculous, but I guess you can carry on doing whatever the hell you want.
The problem with your notion of block voting is that you kind of assume everyone is going to do this because it's what's on the block. You have basically reduced the humans who have voted down into this into statistics that you feel only voted that way because they were told to. I mean, in general, that just seems to espouse a pretty dim view of other people in general.
And yet this is exactly why, apparently, the authors who are complaining and organising this "event" hadn't won or been nominated before.
Not, maybe, what they wrote perhaps not being very good. Or at least viewed as being not as good by a really small number of people.
And yes, I know how block voting works, I just don't think your notion is applicable in this context, which you guys seem to keep missing.
One would suggest that this is/was the exact same case before as well then.
Larry has been nominated before. It's how he got to be there at the Hugos. Secondly, if they're a statistically a minority then there should be no problem because the process will correct itself. If they're not, then they're going to remain.
I mean, let's look at one of the nominations. Jim Butcher. Who's also been nominated for a Hugo before. So if he's on the slate and somehow ended up on the nominations as well, somehow this is because of the evil sadpuppies conspiracy and not because people think he's a good author.
What I'm getting here is that certain people don't like it that apparently people can campaign for fresh members to vote vs an insular in-crowd and actually manage to get nominations. Because remember, when Scalzi does it, it's recommendations. But when Larry does it, somehow he has the evil power to force everyone who's in sad puppies to follow his list to the letter.
Peregrine wrote: It assumes that there is a left-wing group controlling the nomination process and keeping out authors that don't agree with left-wing politics, but also a bunch of left-wing authors that have been unfairly neglected.
From what I can tell, their actual premise is WorldCon membership has become significantly biased against right-wing politics. Sad Puppies, as Correia articulates it, is exploiting WorldCon rules to nominate works of merit without regard to the authors' politics.
Peregrine wrote: the authors later realizing that they need to repackage the message a bit to attract people who aren't rabid right-wing lunatics like Vox Day
Or maybe to prevent that nutjob from hijacking their initiative/prevent disinformation tarring the Sad Puppies by association (see e.g., Entertainment Weekly's retraction/apology).
Peregrine wrote: I'm asking which authors YOU feel are being overlooked for political reasons.
Nah, this isn't about me as I am not a part of the Sad Puppies movement or their ally.
Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote: it is your burden of proof to show no author has been overlooked for political reasons
If someone claims no author has been overlooked for political reasons then it is on them to back that up. I'm perplexed that you don't understand this.
If that is correct perhaps it simply reflects a general social change, perhaps more women becoming interested in SF, for example, and voting for stuff they like which -- sexist generalisation -- is less likely to be military adventure stories.
I don't see how else to explain a bias in the nominations. It must either be an organised cabal, or the broad mass of SF fans (defined as people who think it is worth paying the $50 to become a member and gain the right to vote for the Hugos) acting independently.
If No Award takes a fiction category, you will likely never see another award given in that category again. The sword cuts both ways, Lois. We are prepared for all eventualities.
Sining wrote: Read the above. Seriously, do you only cherry pick points?
I've already pointed out to Pere, and you've obviously seen the reply because you're replying to something after that, that the nominations could easily have let people discover new authors they didn't know existed and wanted to vote for. As it is, you have no proof that people voted these people just cause it was on a list and not because they didn't enjoy them but you seem intent on arguing that point.
Did the campaign affect the nominations? Considering they were advertising certain nominees pretty publicly, it had the same effect as advertising would. If you can PROVE (and here's the point that you keep missing) that voters just voted cause they were told to vote for them, then do so. Otherwise you're just being incredibly bitter
Yeah, okay. On the one hand we can conclude that an effort to provide a standard vote approved list for the Hugos among a certain community… led to that community block voting for the approved titles.
Or we can conclude that the mere act of mentioning these titles led to thousands of fans learning about them and loving them and voluntarily choosing to vote for them in a way that’s indistinguishable from if they’d just obeyed the block vote recommendations to prove a political point.
I guess we could argue both things are possible. We won’t, because I think the suggestion is comically ridiculous, but I guess you can carry on doing whatever the hell you want.
Larry has personally made the effort to push the books he felt were worthy of nomination and get more people to buy them. This was demonstrably proven by his book bombs for nominees increasing their sales and sales rank on amazon. The stories he pushed people to buy and read were written by various authors whose personal politics were across the spectrum, both men and women were included along with various races. The stories that he encouraged his fans to read were not some unified block of stories written by authors with the same political views or from within the same demographic they were just good stories that Larry thought his fans would also like and potentially want to vote for.
There you go, proof that Sad Puppies wasn't about politics. It was about getting talented authors more publicity, help them sell more books and introduce Larry's fans to stories they might like and if they did like them that they would be willing to vote for them for Hugos.
If the Sad Puppies supporters who follow Larry's blog were only interested in voting for whatever stories Larry told them to, why would so many of them buy copies of the stories? While there is no way of determining if everyone who bought the stories read them, there is no denying that Larry increased the sales figures of those books and it's perfectly plausible that people read the stories, enjoyed them and voted for them.
You can see that not every category has the same number of ballots to because everybody who voted in Best Novel on the ballot didn't also cast a vote in all the other categories. If the Sad Puppies supporters were blindly voting en bloc for an entire ballot slate uniformly then you should be able to see that bloc show up in every category but it doesn't.
Kilkrazy wrote: It must either be an organised cabal, or the broad mass of SF fans (defined as people who think it is worth paying the $50 to become a member and gain the right to vote for the Hugos) acting independently.
WorldCon membership does not constitute "the broad mass of SF fans." If anything, I doubt most people who like SF had ever heard of WorldCon before now; not that they will join up having learned WorldCon exists, by the way, or that a vastly larger amount of people who like SF are still unaware of WorldCon. WorldCon membership sans Puppy invasion (or even with) constitutes a very small group of people heavily involved in a very specific community. It is something like saying people who have posted on Dakka daily for a decade or more are the broad mass of 40k players.
Kilkrazy wrote: It must either be an organised cabal, or the broad mass of SF fans (defined as people who think it is worth paying the $50 to become a member and gain the right to vote for the Hugos) acting independently.
WorldCon membership does not constitute "the broad mass of SF fans." If anything, I doubt most people who like SF had ever heard of WorldCon before now; not that they will join up having learned WorldCon exists, by the way, or that a vastly larger amount of people who like SF are still unaware of WorldCon. WorldCon membership sans Puppy invasion (or even with) constitutes a very small group of people heavily involved in a very specific community. It is something like saying people who have posted on Dakka daily for a decade or more are the broad mass of 40k players.
That doesn't really matter. The point is that Sad Puppies is trying to influence Worldcon/Hugos, not the whole English-speaking world. He obviously thinks it is important.
It would be interesting if something similar happened at the Nebula Awards, or the British SFA Awards.
It matters quite a lot. First, it obviates the argument that Hugo nominations just reflect what SF readers, broadly speaking, think is good SF. Rather, Hugo nominations are the product of a far more specific culture, including its political characteristics. Which is to say, we don't need to posit the existence of some secret cabal to understand how ideology can color nominations. Second, instead of just being another backlash against multiculturalism, I believe this issue is actually motivated by the fact that the Hugo award is far more well-known and prestigious than the obscure and arguably outmoded fandom represented by WorldCon membership.
Kilkrazy wrote: The point is that Sad Puppies is trying to influence Worldcon/Hugos, not the whole English-speaking world.
No, I don't think Sad Puppies are actually interested in taking over WorldCon. In fact, that is exactly what seems to irritate a lot of WorldCon members. The only interest Sad Puppies has in WorldCon is the Hugo awards, precisely because those awards are meaningful to so many more people than WorldCon is.
Most of them, frankly, suck. And the mere fact that so many people are discussing them makes me think that the Puppies won. They started this whole thing by saying the Hugo Awards were rigged to exclude them. That is completely untrue, as I believe I demonstrated conclusively in my last post. So what is happening now? The people on MY SIDE, the trufans and SMOFs and good guys, are having an endless circle jerk trying to come up with a foolproof way to RIG THE HUGOS AND EXCLUDE THEM. God DAMN, people. You are proving them right.
I don't know why but calling them True Fans, Good Guys just seems like compensation of Us Vs Them...Kinda what they were thinking to begin with.
Kilkrazy wrote: I thought there have been Hugos with no awards in a category before.
Vox is saying that if a catagory gets 'no award' this year, he's going to utilize the same resources he used for the current slate to push 'no award' for that catagory in every upcoming year.
Kilkrazy wrote: I thought there have been Hugos with no awards in a category before.
Vox is saying that if a catagory gets 'no award' this year, he's going to utilize the same resources he used for the current slate to push 'no award' for that catagory in every upcoming year.
But remember, it's all about giving opportunities to deserving authors.
What's amazing is that Vox isn't even the first person to suggest it. Instead, it's all the people hurt by SP3 that are suggesting awarding no awards just because SP3. And somehow Peregine makes it seem like Vox is the dirty one in this for suggesting they do the same thing to the people excluding them.
Not that I'm endorsing Vox's policy. Just pointing out the hypocrisy in this line of thinking. I also somehow doubt Vox has enough fans to push for no award in every category. Afaik, voting HAS to be done physically at worldcon while nominations can be done through the net.
Sining wrote: And somehow Peregine makes it seem like Vox is the dirty one in this for suggesting they do the same thing to the people excluding them.
I guess you don't understand the difference between "vote for 'no award' this year because SP3 has given those authors an unfair boost" and "if we don't win this year nobody gets to win, regardless of how deserving they are or what political campaigns may be involved". One is a temporary response to a perceived skew in the voting this year, the other is a threat to trash the whole thing indefinitely out of spite.
Also, even if you consider it a valid tactic, it still points out the blatant dishonesty of Vox Day claiming that his campaign is about giving opportunities to deserving authors and isn't about right-wing politics. He'd rather have no Hugos at all than an award where he doesn't get to win, no matter which authors it hurts in the future.
Temporary response? If SP4 actually manages to keep getting people nominated, I expect it to become less of a temporary response and more of a normal response because let's be honest, I can't see some of the people involved in this changing their opinions a year from now.
Also, note that I didn't consider it a valid tactic but good job smearing people. And you're confusing Vox Day/Rabid puppies and Sad Puppies again. You do realise the 2 are different slates right
Sining wrote: Temporary response? If SP4 actually manages to keep getting people nominated, I expect it to become less of a temporary response and more of a normal response because let's be honest, I can't see some of the people involved in this changing their opinions a year from now.
It's temporary because the suggestion to vote "no award" in response to SP3 only exists as long as there's "unfair" organized campaigning for votes. As soon as Sad Puppies (and anyone else who might be motivated to try their strategy with their own political beliefs) stop their voting tactics the people saying "vote 'no award'" will stop making that suggestion. Vox Day, on the other hand, is proposing an indefinite spite campaign to destroy the award as revenge for not letting him succeed with his plan.
Also, note that I didn't consider it a valid tactic but good job smearing people.
Did you miss the "even if" part which clearly presents it as a hypothetical statement, or did you deliberately ignore it so you could have something to argue about?
And you're confusing Vox Day/Rabid puppies and Sad Puppies again. You do realise the 2 are different slates right
I'm not confusing anything. In fact I made it quite clear in my post that we're talking about Vox Day and his anti-SJW crusade, not the SP3 group.
The problem is there's always going to be 'unfair' organised campaigning for votes. SP alleges there's an organised hidden campaign to vote for the right type of literature and that's why they're making a covert one. At the end of the day, this is just going to make next year's Hugos have even more campaigning from both sides. There is no letting the cat out of the bag for this. So no, this really isn't going to be temporary in any way.
Why would you even need to make a hypothetical statement about me when I already made it clear I don't endorse it?
Sining wrote: The problem is there's always going to be 'unfair' organised campaigning for votes.
{citation needed}
SP alleges there's an organised hidden campaign to vote for the right type of literature and that's why they're making a covert one.
And they've provided no proof of this accusation. The Sad Puppies claims are on the same level as the tinfoil hatters screaming about mind control in the chemtrails.
At the end of the day, this is just going to make next year's Hugos have even more campaigning from both sides. There is no letting the cat out of the bag for this. So no, this really isn't going to be temporary in any way.
And that's the whole point! People want this ridiculous campaigning to go away and avoid having the Hugos become nothing more than a contest of which "side" can most efficiently organize a voting campaign, with the authors and books reduced to nothing more than pawns in a political argument. The point of voting "no award" is to deny the benefits of an organized voting campaign and remove the motivation to do it again in the future. If people get the hint and stop trying to organize SP-style campaigns then there's no more need to vote "no award". Vox Day, on the other hand, proposes trashing the whole system in future years as revenge for not getting to win.
Why would you even need to make a hypothetical statement about me when I already made it clear I don't endorse it?
I guess you don't understand the general "you" vs. the specific "you"?
Judging from the reactions of a lot of people, I'm going to say there probably was quite a bias present. A groupthink of sorts.
It won't happen because even if SP4 wasn't happening, there would be people who would be convinced that it all went dark and that the SP4 people are secretly gathering votes. And to counter this dark operation, they'll organise a campaign to do so.
At the end of the day, the Hugo isn't broken and it's doing exactly what it's meant to do. Just because someone is organising a campaign doesn't mean they're breaking the Hugo. If an author went out and campaigned for himself, I doubt we'd see as much furore over it. Yet because several authors went out and campaigned for other authors, this is somehow worse? I don't think so.
And considering the Hugo is a populist vote, the more votes the better. I have yet to see a democratic system that worked better the less votes you got.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also, don't put you when you don't mean you. There are other words in the dictionary if you want to give a hypothetical example
Kilkrazy wrote: If that is correct perhaps it simply reflects a general social change, perhaps more women becoming interested in SF, for example, and voting for stuff they like which -- sexist generalisation -- is less likely to be military adventure stories.
I don't see how else to explain a bias in the nominations. It must either be an organised cabal, or the broad mass of SF fans (defined as people who think it is worth paying the $50 to become a member and gain the right to vote for the Hugos) acting independently.
I wonder if people who used to buy books for fantasy action has moved on to computer games. So maybe it isn’t just that there’s more people looking for deeper themes in their fantasy, but that they have become relatively more important as the more action oriented audience has dropped away.
But on your overall point, I agree that it either must be an organised cabal or some kind of change in demographic among the voters. Given the complete lack of evidence for the former, I’m inclined to assume the latter.
Prestor Jon wrote: Larry has personally made the effort to push the books he felt were worthy of nomination and get more people to buy them.
I’m not sure if you’re massively overstating the standing of Larry Correia in sci-fi and fantasy, or are assuming that no-one ever before encouraged people to read other people’s works. Either way, the insistence that Correia, or anyone else really, just saying ‘this is good you should read it and vote for it’ having a noticeable impact on sales and award recognition without anything else going on is comically stupid.
Seriously, if you want to be blind to the politics of this, be blind.
And why are you calling him Larry? Is he your brother, or close friend or something?
ZebioLizard2 wrote: I don't know why but calling them True Fans, Good Guys just seems like compensation of Us Vs Them...Kinda what they were thinking to begin with.
Because there are sides, often one side is right and one side is wrong. Not in terms of book preferences, because people can like fast paced action and also like heavier stuff, or they can like just one of those types, or neither, and no-one ever has to draw lines and argue with people with different preferences.
But on other issues there are sides. And on this issue, where people have imagined up a vague conspiracy to keep out their kind of writers, and then gamed the system and ended up bringing in voters from outside of fantasy fandom (gamergate) to trump the vote… well it’s safe to call those people the wrong side.
This doesn’t mean whatever the ‘true fans’ do is right or justified, and if they respond very badly they will end up just as bad as the puppies (and the awards will be sunk entirely). But while it is likely they will end up as bad as the puppies, it hasn’t happened yet, and so before it does it is reasonable to differentiate the people who have acted badly from those who might respond badly.
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Sining wrote: The problem is there's always going to be 'unfair' organised campaigning for votes. SP alleges...
That you can't see the problem there is fething amazing. There is zero evidence that anything like this has ever happened before. It's just people claiming it, and people like you accepting that claim as something that must be true, because you like the suggestion.
I mean, the left wing can't organise a campaign when they're operating publicly, the idea that they could continue such a scheme for years in secrecy without ever falling apart with infighting is just incredible fantasy. fething flying rodent gak, really.
I've posted a link here to one of the organisers. If you want you can go ask him directly for proof. He's more than willing to reply to random people. Have I seen all the proof? No, but I've seen some circumstantial evidence but nothing definite.
And there a reason why I used alleges. In case you don't know what that word means either.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also what makes you think there's no in fighting? Were you there the last twenty years this alleged bias was taking place? Oh no, wait, you're assuming things again
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also the idea at implying someone is inappropriately close to Larry cause he called him Larry is hilarious. Larry Correia is pretty long to type out. What should we call him then that you feel is appropriate? Mr Larry? Mr correia? The international lord of hate?
But on other issues there are sides. And on this issue, where people have imagined up a vague conspiracy to keep out their kind of writers, and then gamed the system and ended up bringing in voters from outside of fantasy fandom (gamergate) to trump the vote… well it’s safe to call those people the wrong side.
Which didn't really happen, most gamergate folk didn't even know of it till people started lumping them together like some sort of insidious force because of one person. Most of the people on the Sad Puppies ballot has been there since even before GG was around.
So no, not really the "Wrong Side" so much as "Another Side"
Sining wrote: At the end of the day, the Hugo isn't broken and it's doing exactly what it's meant to do. Just because someone is organising a campaign doesn't mean they're breaking the Hugo. If an author went out and campaigned for himself, I doubt we'd see as much furore over it. Yet because several authors went out and campaigned for other authors, this is somehow worse? I don't think so.
Authors have always campaigned for other authors, and sometimes for themselves. That you are unaware of this tells me how little you know of the Hugos, or of award ceremonies in general.
The issue is that this campaign is different in several ways;
1) The campaign came with a specific slate of prescribed votes, which is pretty clearly gaming the system.
2) The whole issue is absolutely steeped in politics, splashing over from the gamergate weirdness. People deny it, but just reading Correia's defence of what's happened, he talks almost exclusively about being attacked for his politics. The attacks against him weren't right, but when the defence is that other people were mean about a writer's politics, it becomes a nonsense to claim this issue isn't about politics.
3) Most of the votes came from people parachuting in to the awards, buying a supporting membership just to take part in the puppies campaign. It is likely that many such people did this motivated only by the politics of the issue, having no real engagement with fantasy writing.
If you can't see how that's different from someone saying 'hey, you guys should read ABC written by XYZ, and maybe even nominate it for a Hugo'... then I don't know what to say.
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Sining wrote: And there a reason why I used alleges. In case you don't know what that word means either.
If you only meant there was an allegation, then you wouldn't have stated "here's always going to be" just before that.
Also what makes you think there's no in fighting? Were you there the last twenty years this alleged bias was taking place? Oh no, wait, you're assuming things again
Oh, so now there's been in-fighting... and we're talking about a group that organised a massive conspiracy to co-ordinate voting without ever leaving one scrap of evidence despite massive in-fighting. Uh huh.
Also the idea at implying someone is inappropriately close to Larry cause he called him Larry is hilarious. Larry Correia is pretty long to type out. What should we call him then that you feel is appropriate? Mr Larry? Mr correia? The international lord of hate?
You would call him Larry Correia for the first mention, and Correia after that. Are you seriously asking that question?
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ZebioLizard2 wrote: Which didn't really happen, most gamergate folk didn't even know of it till people started lumping them together like some sort of insidious force because of one person. Most of the people on the Sad Puppies ballot has been there since even before GG was around.
So no, not really the "Wrong Side" so much as "Another Side"
You don’t need many to be aware of it, for it to have a massive impact. Fantasy literature is a lot smaller than gaming, and Worldcon is only a very small part of fantasy literature. It would only take a very small portion of Gamergate to take an interest in expanding their nonsense campaign in to fantasy literature to dominate the Hugos.
Nor do their need to be any Gamergate people involved for the Puppies to be in the wrong. Based on a completely unsubstantiated conspiracy theory they set about gaming the awards… that just makes them completely wrong by itself.
And then to repeat my earlier point, that doesn’t mean the non-puppies are right. Many of their proposals for how to respond are just as bad, and if they’re followed they’ll end up bad guys as well. But they haven’t responded yet, and so until then it’s a nonsense to equate the sides.
Nor do their need to be any Gamergate people involved for the Puppies to be in the wrong. Based on a completely unsubstantiated conspiracy theory they set about gaming the awards… that just makes them completely wrong by itself.
So essentially, if gamergate did become involved they would automatically become wrong, do you not realize how hypocritical that is? There are some issues that have been pointed out that aren't unsubstantiated in that there is a rather vocal crowd for hugo that might be more liberal leaning and that there has been some incidents involving such. This one for example.
You don’t need many to be aware of it, for it to have a massive impact. Fantasy literature is a lot smaller than gaming, and Worldcon is only a very small part of fantasy literature. It would only take a very small portion of Gamergate to take an interest in expanding their nonsense campaign in to fantasy literature to dominate the Hugos.
So essentially, all it would take is someone with enough popularity to say "Vote for these people" and that happens, and now that it's happened people are complaining because this one gave a reason behind why he said "Vote for these people"
And then to repeat my earlier point, that doesn’t mean the non-puppies are right. Many of their proposals for how to respond are just as bad, and if they’re followed they’ll end up bad guys as well. But they haven’t responded yet, and so until then it’s a nonsense to equate the sides.
Along with all the articles smearing them (Several of which were so horrifically wrong they were outright retracted), the constant threats, the insults, the fact that they are now voting against people on the SP list in order "To Bite Back" rather then caring what content is within them while at the same time claiming all those he picked are white males involved in misogynistic writing, and you are telling me it is nonsense to equate both sides when they are both being as childish as could be? I can't claim either of them right, and to do so is disingenuous to the situation.
Sining wrote: Judging from the reactions of a lot of people, I'm going to say there probably was quite a bias present. A groupthink of sorts.
Not really. The majority of the outrage over SP3 isn't the fact that conservative-leaning authors got nominated, it was that a group with any ideology attempted to exploit the voting process for political purposes. In fact, some of them have even explicitly stated that they'd be just as unhappy if a left-wing group used the same strategy.
At the end of the day, the Hugo isn't broken and it's doing exactly what it's meant to do. Just because someone is organising a campaign doesn't mean they're breaking the Hugo. If an author went out and campaigned for himself, I doubt we'd see as much furore over it. Yet because several authors went out and campaigned for other authors, this is somehow worse? I don't think so.
It's worse because it's encouraging voting as an organized block, not just saying "I like this and it deserves to win". Seriously, why do you keep refusing to understand the concept of block voting vs. normal voting? We've explained it to you many times.
Also, don't put you when you don't mean you. There are other words in the dictionary if you want to give a hypothetical example
Again, you don't understand the general "you". For example if I say "if you order $X from GW you get free shipping" it does not just apply to the person I said it to, it's a general rule for anyone. It's not my fault if you don't understand how English works.
(And yes, I see the flag by your name. If English isn't your first language then that's fine, just say so instead of continuing to defend your mistake.)
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Sining wrote: I've posted a link here to one of the organisers. If you want you can go ask him directly for proof. He's more than willing to reply to random people. Have I seen all the proof? No, but I've seen some circumstantial evidence but nothing definite.
Why should we go ask him for proof? If he hasn't provided it yet then there's nothing to provide. The proof would just be far too useful to the SP side for anyone to keep it hidden. "Your side did it first" is pretty convincing justification that the anti-SP side can't really respond effectively to, if the claim is supported by sufficient evidence. So the fact that proof of organized voting isn't proudly displayed up front in every SP post is a pretty strong argument that no such proof exists.
Also what makes you think there's no in fighting?
The fact that nobody has come out and said "these people suck and are rigging the vote" after a hypothetical disagreement? Nobody has let an argument about the vote rigging get out into a public conversation/blog/etc? You're simultaneously assuming that the hypothetical left-wing conspiracy is large enough to rig the vote successfully and small enough that it can keep tight control over all evidence of its actions for years/decades at a time. That really doesn't make any sense.
Sining wrote: At the end of the day, the Hugo isn't broken and it's doing exactly what it's meant to do. Just because someone is organising a campaign doesn't mean they're breaking the Hugo. If an author went out and campaigned for himself, I doubt we'd see as much furore over it. Yet because several authors went out and campaigned for other authors, this is somehow worse? I don't think so.
Authors have always campaigned for other authors, and sometimes for themselves. That you are unaware of this tells me how little you know of the Hugos, or of award ceremonies in general.
Thank god we have you here to enlighten us then
The issue is that this campaign is different in several ways;
1) The campaign came with a specific slate of prescribed votes, which is pretty clearly gaming the system.
2) The whole issue is absolutely steeped in politics, splashing over from the gamergate weirdness. People deny it, but just reading Correia's defence of what's happened, he talks almost exclusively about being attacked for his politics. The attacks against him weren't right, but when the defence is that other people were mean about a writer's politics, it becomes a nonsense to claim this issue isn't about politics.
3) Most of the votes came from people parachuting in to the awards, buying a supporting membership just to take part in the puppies campaign. It is likely that many such people did this motivated only by the politics of the issue, having no real engagement with fantasy writing.
If you can't see how that's different from someone saying 'hey, you guys should read ABC written by XYZ, and maybe even nominate it for a Hugo'... then I don't know what to say.
1)Prescribed votes in what way?
2) SP is in its third year. For those who don't know, this means it started before Gamergate. Unless there is a time machine somewhere we don't know about, people really need to stop linking the two.
3) Lol. Evidence? I think this is the CLEAREST indication of the type of mindset certain people have. "These SP3 voters aren't trufans! They're here to wreck this community" Seriously? I mean, please can you be any more exclusive?
Oh, so now there's been in-fighting... and we're talking about a group that organised a massive conspiracy to co-ordinate voting without ever leaving one scrap of evidence despite massive in-fighting. Uh huh.
So your evidence of no-infighting is that you didn't see anything happen? I mean, like I said, were you in the Hugos in the last 20 years? Do you know everything about the Hugos?
Also the idea at implying someone is inappropriately close to Larry cause he called him Larry is hilarious. Larry Correia is pretty long to type out. What should we call him then that you feel is appropriate? Mr Larry? Mr correia? The international lord of hate?
You would call him Larry Correia for the first mention, and Correia after that. Are you seriously asking that question?
Are you seriously trying to tell people how to refer to other people online?
Sining wrote: Judging from the reactions of a lot of people, I'm going to say there probably was quite a bias present. A groupthink of sorts.
Not really. The majority of the outrage over SP3 isn't the fact that conservative-leaning authors got nominated, it was that a group with any ideology attempted to exploit the voting process for political purposes. In fact, some of them have even explicitly stated that they'd be just as unhappy if a left-wing group used the same strategy.
What political purpose? I mean, at the end of the day, BOTH left and right wing authors are in the same slate. If your argument is that they're doing it to screw over SJWs, SJW isn't a political purpose or party -_-
It's worse because it's encouraging voting as an organized block, not just saying "I like this and it deserves to win". Seriously, why do you keep refusing to understand the concept of block voting vs. normal voting? We've explained it to you many times.
Also, don't put you when you don't mean you. There are other words in the dictionary if you want to give a hypothetical example
Again, you don't understand the general "you". For example if I say "if you order $X from GW you get free shipping" it does not just apply to the person I said it to, it's a general rule for anyone. It's not my fault if you don't understand how English works.
(And yes, I see the flag by your name. If English isn't your first language then that's fine, just say so instead of continuing to defend your mistake.)
I was raised in the British system. Unlike you perhaps, I understand the nuances of english so perhaps a little less racial stereotyping here. Also I'm sure the hypothetical 'you' when referring to something that was vilified wasn't on purpose right after I explicitly stated that I disagree with the notion and it occurred during a time where I was the only person you're replying to (and whom you knew was reading this thread). And yes that was sarcasm. See what I mean by nuances?
Also, because you have no evidence people voted just because they were on the list.
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Sining wrote: I've posted a link here to one of the organisers. If you want you can go ask him directly for proof. He's more than willing to reply to random people. Have I seen all the proof? No, but I've seen some circumstantial evidence but nothing definite.
Why should we go ask him for proof? If he hasn't provided it yet then there's nothing to provide. The proof would just be far too useful to the SP side for anyone to keep it hidden. "Your side did it first" is pretty convincing justification that the anti-SP side can't really respond effectively to, if the claim is supported by sufficient evidence. So the fact that proof of organized voting isn't proudly displayed up front in every SP post is a pretty strong argument that no such proof exists.
Also what makes you think there's no in fighting?
The fact that nobody has come out and said "these people suck and are rigging the vote" after a hypothetical disagreement? Nobody has let an argument about the vote rigging get out into a public conversation/blog/etc? You're simultaneously assuming that the hypothetical left-wing conspiracy is large enough to rig the vote successfully and small enough that it can keep tight control over all evidence of its actions for years/decades at a time. That really doesn't make any sense.
So...you rather complain about having no proof, refuse to ask people for proof and just complain here? Got it
Sadly if you have even visited the site, you would realise he has posted what he considers proof in reply to peoples comments that were exactly like yours.
ZebioLizard2 wrote: So essentially, if gamergate did become involved they would automatically become wrong, do you not realize how hypocritical that is?
No, that’s nothing to do with what I said. What was done was wrong because organising slates and dragging in culture war nonsense on what should be a simple question about which book you liked best is wrong in and of itself. If parts of gamergate have contributed to the nonsense, then that makes it worse, but it is already bad.
There is no hypocrisy there because as I have already said if the left responds with shenanigans of their own, which may well be happening, then they will be wrong as well.
There are some issues that have been pointed out that aren't unsubstantiated in that there is a rather vocal crowd for hugo that might be more liberal leaning and that there has been some incidents involving such. This one for example.
That first article is an idiotic mess, while the second article does a good job of describing most of the actual situation before eventually just covering the twitter nonsense. Showing twitter complaints and then claiming those twitter complaints must have been the reason someone a presenter got cancelled only indicates that the writer has no idea how twitter works. On twitter everything is complained about.
Ross got cancelled because he was only ever appointed by the chairs, without first having the decision reviewed by the full committee. I have no opinion on Ross as a host (I’ve only seen him on stuff like QI, where he’s middling, but I’m happy to believe he’s a good host for events like this), but I can see why people might not want him and would veto him as host.
The only real issue is announcing him as host before it was properly agreed, which is barely news, to be honest. As evidence of some kind of leftist control of anything, it’s a pretty ridiculous piece of evidence.
So essentially, all it would take is someone with enough popularity to say "Vote for these people" and that happens, and now that it's happened people are complaining because this one gave a reason behind why he said "Vote for these people"
Well, yes, if the reason given is anything other than ‘this work is good and if you read it and vote for it that’s awesome’ then it’s a bad reason.
But why on earth did you make that comment to what I said? It had nothing to do with the sentence you quoted.
Along with all the articles smearing them (Several of which were so horrifically wrong they were outright retracted), the constant threats, the insults, the fact that they are now voting against people on the SP list in order "To Bite Back" rather then caring what content is within them while at the same time claiming all those he picked are white males involved in misogynistic writing, and you are telling me it is nonsense to equate both sides when they are both being as childish as could be? I can't claim either of them right, and to do so is disingenuous to the situation.
Sigh, once again. One side is clearly wrong – they gamed a voting system in order to fight against a political conspiracy for which there is zero evidence. The other side has not yet acted, but merely made proposals. Most of those proposals are just as mean as the puppies, and if followed through then they will be as bad.
But just writing everyone off before the response has even happened is lazy. It is only done because then you can ignore that the side you’re cheering for has already committed to a nasy, mean-spirited approach.
Rather than admit to that, and wait on the response, you just lead with ‘just as bad’.
Sigh, once again. One side is clearly wrong – they gamed a voting system in order to fight against a political conspiracy for which there is zero evidence. The other side has not yet acted, but merely made proposals. Most of those proposals are just as mean as the puppies, and if followed through then they will be as bad.
But just writing everyone off before the response has even happened is lazy. It is only done because then you can ignore that the side you’re cheering for has already committed to a nasy, mean-spirited approach.
Rather than admit to that, and wait on the response, you just lead with ‘just as bad’.
So one side is clearly wrong, so they deserve to be slandered, insulted, and voted against in every manner of possibility by another political faction even those that Sad puppies has placed into its voting? You seem to have ignored my statement and simply spoke of "proposals", but they are very clearly running them through the mud with a variety of vicious libel.
So yes, "Just as bad" if not worse, It's quite obvious which side you are cheering for (With your own hypocritical statement to boot), as I dislike both groups for what they've done but you cannot even look beyond what they are doing now as they act.
Sining wrote: What political purpose? I mean, at the end of the day, BOTH left and right wing authors are in the same slate. If your argument is that they're doing it to screw over SJWs, SJW isn't a political purpose or party -_-
Oh FFS, if you don't think SP3 is political then I really don't know what to say. Even if it's SJW vs. anti-SJW instead of left vs. right it's still political. And it has been political from the moment Larry Correia made his first post on the subject.
Unlike you perhaps, I understand the nuances of english so perhaps a little less racial stereotyping here.
You really are just looking for things to argue about. Nothing in there was in any way a racial stereotype.
Also I'm sure the hypothetical 'you' when referring to something that was vilified wasn't on purpose right after I explicitly stated that I disagree with the notion and it occurred during a time where I was the only person you're replying to (and whom you knew was reading this thread). And yes that was sarcasm. See what I mean by nuances?
Sigh. Is it really that hard for you to admit that you made a mistake? It was clearly a hypothetical "if one believes X" statement that did not in any way claim that you did in fact believe X.
Also, because you have no evidence people voted just because they were on the list.
Really? This again? If nobody (or very few people) voted for things because they were on the list then SP3 had no purpose.
So...you rather complain about having no proof, refuse to ask people for proof and just complain here? Got it
So let me get this straight: Larry Correia has proof, has presumably been asked for proof by a long list of people in the massive flame wars (both on his own blog and elsewhere), had strong incentive to post any proof he has as soon as Sad Puppies was announced, but for some bizarre reason he is waiting until I ask him for it? What makes you think that another person saying "where's the proof" is going to change anything?
Alternatively, since you have no better argument, you're just trying to evade the tough questions with "go look elsewhere".
Sadly if you have even visited the site, you would realise he has posted what he considers proof in reply to peoples comments that were exactly like yours.
I've read some of his original posts on SP3, I haven't been reading everything posted on the subject because I have better things to waste countless hours on. Perhaps instead of insisting that we go ask him for proof you could post a link to his post? After all, if you've seen it then you should have no problem posting a link.
How on earth is SJW even political? They're not a party. Are they left? Yes? Oh wait, there are left authors on the slate.
Also, I notice you know how to use the hypothetical one now instead of the hypothetical you now.
Also, you do realise I said he has already posted proof on his own website which I linked right? I mean, the answer is there. You're welcome to go to the link and look for it. I mean, I'm not sure but I'm supposed to be the one who has a hard time understanding english here when I told you exactly where the proof was?
Better time to spend yet spends countless hours arguing on this instead of going to a website and reading proof.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also, your argument is that there exists a list. People who were on this list got nominated. Therefore, this list is the sole reason why they were nominated. Not any of the explainations I gave before, but because their names were on this magical list of mind-compelling , they got nominated.
But if other people of other political beliefs make a list of what books they enjoyed, that list is perfectly fine.
Sining wrote: How on earth is SJW even political? They're not a party. Are they left? Yes? Oh wait, there are left authors on the slate.
Do you really not understand how "political" can include more than just US-style right vs. left politics and formal political parties?
Also, I notice you know how to use the hypothetical one now instead of the hypothetical you now.
They mean the same thing.
Also, you do realise I said he has already posted proof on his own website which I linked right? I mean, the answer is there. You're welcome to go to the link and look for it. I mean, I'm not sure but I'm supposed to be the one who has a hard time understanding english here when I told you exactly where the proof was?
"Go look through all of the countless posts and comments on the subject by someone who has been extremely active in this debate so I don't have to spend 30 seconds to tell you exactly what proof I'm referring to".
Sounds like you're just trying to avoid answering tough questions. Either post the link or admit that you don't have anything.
Also, your argument is that there exists a list. People who were on this list got nominated. Therefore, this list is the sole reason why they were nominated. Not any of the explainations I gave before, but because their names were on this magical list of mind-compelling , they got nominated.
I guess you're just going to ignore the fact that there wasn't "just a list", there was a list and an attempt to coordinate a large group of votes for the people on that list?
And no, I don't think "they all got nominated on their own merits" is a very compelling argument when these are supposedly authors that were being completely ignored and shunned until SP3. The success rate of the SP3 list is way too high for that to be a plausible explanation.
But if other people of other political beliefs make a list of what books they enjoyed, that list is perfectly fine.
And you continue to ignore the concept of block voting and why it is effective. We've already explained this to you many times: there's a huge difference in voting patterns between a bunch of individuals saying "this is what I like" and a group coordinating their votes to ensure that a single designated winner (which is at least reasonably appealing to everyone in the group, even if it's not their top choice) gets 100% of the vote from the group.
Sining wrote: How on earth is SJW even political? They're not a party. Are they left? Yes? Oh wait, there are left authors on the slate.
Do you really not understand how "political" can include more than just US-style right vs. left politics and formal political parties?
And how would you explain how the Hugos are political in this case then.
Also, you do realise I said he has already posted proof on his own website which I linked right? I mean, the answer is there. You're welcome to go to the link and look for it. I mean, I'm not sure but I'm supposed to be the one who has a hard time understanding english here when I told you exactly where the proof was?
"Go look through all of the countless posts and comments on the subject by someone who has been extremely active in this debate so I don't have to spend 30 seconds to tell you exactly what proof I'm referring to".
Sounds like you're just trying to avoid answering tough questions. Either post the link or admit that you don't have anything.
I'm not avoiding tough questions. You have tough questions about SP3 and its evidence, maybe you should consider ASKING the person in charge of SP3 since he is; in all honesty, the BEST person to ask about this. I've posted his link here multiple times. YET YOU REFUSE TO GO THERE.
http://www.monsterhunternation.com/ Honestly, you're like the person who keeps talking smack about how if someone was like this to you in real life you'd smack them down but when someone calls you on it, suddenly it's crickets or misdirection.
And no, I don't think "they all got nominated on their own merits" is a very compelling argument when these are supposedly authors that were being completely ignored and shunned until SP3. The success rate of the SP3 list is way too high for that to be a plausible explanation.
So let's look at the list again.
Recommendations for Best Novel
Kevin J. Anderson
Jim Butcher
Explain how those people were completely ignored/shunned? It's strange that they really haven't won a Hugo for their works, but if Harry Potter can get 2 Hugos, then I'm pretty sure that somehow Jim should have gotten one by now. If I was voting, I'd vote easily for Jim Butcher cause I like his books. But oh no, if I'm a Sad Puppy member, suddenly I'm only voting for Jim cause his name appeared on a list somewhere. Not because I've been reading his books since fool's moon and liked most of them. -_- That's totally not hypocritical of you guys to judge at all.
And you continue to ignore the concept of block voting and why it is effective. We've already explained this to you many times: there's a huge difference in voting patterns between a bunch of individuals saying "this is what I like" and a group coordinating their votes to ensure that a single designated winner (which is at least reasonably appealing to everyone in the group, even if it's not their top choice) gets 100% of the vote from the group.
You and I have very different opinions of what is block voting. Apparently you think people are morons or charlatans voting in a block and I don't.
I know Harry Potter is not great literature, but it is extremely popular. A left-wing conspiracy is hardly needed to explain why Harry Potter might get nominated over something else less popular that might happen to be considered more socially conservative.
Kilkrazy wrote: I know Harry Potter is not great literature, but it is extremely popular. A left-wing conspiracy is hardly needed to explain why Harry Potter might get nominated over something else less popular that might happen to be considered more socially conservative.
Bit of a strawman. No one believes Harry Potter was nominated/won over more conservative authors due to politics. I think Sining was just saying, if literary quality is any indicator, Jim likely should've had one, as Harry Potter, while popular and entertaining, isn't exactly high level prose., which you yourself admit.
Which is exactly the opposite of the point the Sad Puppies are making; they claim they made their list/slate/whatever because popular works were being excluded in favour of high-fallutin' works (paraphrasing a bit here) with more literary aspirations than actual science fiction themes.
Can't have it both ways; either the more popular work (Potter) has rightly won one over the less popular, but qualitatively better work (Butcher) -at least partly disarming the Puppy list's raison d'etre- or the higher quality work should have gotten one over the bespectacled boy wizard - which is exactly the opposite of the Puppies' arguments, so what was their point again?
Prestor Jon wrote: Larry has personally made the effort to push the books he felt were worthy of nomination and get more people to buy them.
I’m not sure if you’re massively overstating the standing of Larry Correia in sci-fi and fantasy, or are assuming that no-one ever before encouraged people to read other people’s works. Either way, the insistence that Correia, or anyone else really, just saying ‘this is good you should read it and vote for it’ having a noticeable impact on sales and award recognition without anything else going on is comically stupid.
Seriously, if you want to be blind to the politics of this, be blind.
And why are you calling him Larry? Is he your brother, or close friend or something?
He used his blog to promote the works of other authors that he felt were worthy of nomination because he read them or because friends of his recommended them. His fans bought the books and did in large enough numbers to have a strong visible impact on the sale of those stories on Amazon.
Here are the links to the proof of that (which I've posted twice already):
If Larry thought that people would blindly vote for whatever stories he suggested why bother taking the time and effort to get people to buy the stories and read them before nominating them?
I refer to Larry as Larry because that's his name.
Sining wrote: Temporary response? If SP4 actually manages to keep getting people nominated, I expect it to become less of a temporary response and more of a normal response because let's be honest, I can't see some of the people involved in this changing their opinions a year from now.
It's temporary because the suggestion to vote "no award" in response to SP3 only exists as long as there's "unfair" organized campaigning for votes. As soon as Sad Puppies (and anyone else who might be motivated to try their strategy with their own political beliefs) stop their voting tactics the people saying "vote 'no award'" will stop making that suggestion. Vox Day, on the other hand, is proposing an indefinite spite campaign to destroy the award as revenge for not letting him succeed with his plan.
The idea of fans voluntarily paying for memberships and voting for scifi/fantasy stories they like as being some sort of "unfair" advantage simply because you don't agree with their taste in literature is silly. Oh no! The wrong fans are voting for the wrong books! If WorldCon doesn't want fans to determine who wins Hugos they shouldn't let the awards be determined by fans in the first place.
If Vox Day can muster up enough fans to destroy the Hugos then the Hugos have fallen into such a state of disrepair that they deserve to go away.
Kilkrazy wrote: I know Harry Potter is not great literature, but it is extremely popular. A left-wing conspiracy is hardly needed to explain why Harry Potter might get nominated over something else less popular that might happen to be considered more socially conservative.
Bit of a strawman. No one believes Harry Potter was nominated/won over more conservative authors due to politics. I think Sining was just saying, if literary quality is any indicator, Jim likely should've had one, as Harry Potter, while popular and entertaining, isn't exactly high level prose., which you yourself admit.
It is not at all a straw man. The whole thrust and logic of the Sad Puppies' argument is that the kind of literature they want to champion is not getting nominated despite the fact that it is equally as good and/or popular as the stuff that was getting nominated. In other words, some kind of unfair, unseen forces have been operating.
I am astonished anyone would think Harry Potter would not be a massive title to go up against.
Kilkrazy wrote: I know Harry Potter is not great literature, but it is extremely popular. A left-wing conspiracy is hardly needed to explain why Harry Potter might get nominated over something else less popular that might happen to be considered more socially conservative.
Bit of a strawman. No one believes Harry Potter was nominated/won over more conservative authors due to politics. I think Sining was just saying, if literary quality is any indicator, Jim likely should've had one, as Harry Potter, while popular and entertaining, isn't exactly high level prose., which you yourself admit.
It is not at all a straw man. The whole thrust and logic of the Sad Puppies' argument is that the kind of literature they want to champion is not getting nominated despite the fact that it is equally as good and/or popular as the stuff that was getting nominated. In other words, some kind of unfair, unseen forces have been operating.
I am astonished anyone would think Harry Potter would not be a massive title to go up against.
correia45, on April 13, 2015 at 3:29 pm said:
We have achieved a whole bunch of our goals. They’ve proven there is political bias, they have admitted there are cliques and campaigning, they have admitted that they don’t in fact represent all of fandom, and we’ve gotten good people on who would normally be shunned.
What’s next and what’s long term? That entirely depends on what they do now. The ball is in their court. Our strategy will depend on how they want to proceed from here.
correia45, on April 13, 2015 at 3:24 pm said:
I would encourage you to read the works. That’s all I can do.
And even if you find them wanting, that doesn’t mean that it was all some ploy, A. We didn’t know we’d sweep, so couldn’t predict the No Award temper tantrum. B. Apparently even if capital F Fandom doesn’t like them, the rest of the world likes our suggestions, For example, if you take the star ratings on Amazon, this is by far the highest average rating for the nominees ever, and the first time in decades every work is above 4 stars.
correia45, on April 13, 2015 at 4:07 pm said:
Well, you are in luck. Since Sad Puppies 3 has no political litmus test, and we put up authors based on two critera 1. Being awesome. 2. Normally being ignored, their personal politics didn’t really factor into it. So on Monday when we were being attacked in a dozen major media outlets for being white supremacists, we actually had to look harder, and it turns out that our slate includes people from every political philosophy, and if anything the average skews left.
Not that we give a [gak], because Awesome and Ignored were our criteria.
Now, any other normal time I would be glad to debate specific beliefs and points, but I just don’t got the time right now.
Kilkrazy wrote: I know Harry Potter is not great literature, but it is extremely popular. A left-wing conspiracy is hardly needed to explain why Harry Potter might get nominated over something else less popular that might happen to be considered more socially conservative.
Bit of a strawman. No one believes Harry Potter was nominated/won over more conservative authors due to politics. I think Sining was just saying, if literary quality is any indicator, Jim likely should've had one, as Harry Potter, while popular and entertaining, isn't exactly high level prose., which you yourself admit.
It is not at all a straw man. The whole thrust and logic of the Sad Puppies' argument is that the kind of literature they want to champion is not getting nominated despite the fact that it is equally as good and/or popular as the stuff that was getting nominated. In other words, some kind of unfair, unseen forces have been operating.
I am astonished anyone would think Harry Potter would not be a massive title to go up against.
correia45, on April 13, 2015 at 3:29 pm said:
We have achieved a whole bunch of our goals. They’ve proven there is political bias, they have admitted there are cliques and campaigning, they have admitted that they don’t in fact represent all of fandom, and we’ve gotten good people on who would normally be shunned.
What’s next and what’s long term? That entirely depends on what they do now. The ball is in their court. Our strategy will depend on how they want to proceed from here.
correia45, on April 13, 2015 at 3:24 pm said:
I would encourage you to read the works. That’s all I can do.
And even if you find them wanting, that doesn’t mean that it was all some ploy, A. We didn’t know we’d sweep, so couldn’t predict the No Award temper tantrum. B. Apparently even if capital F Fandom doesn’t like them, the rest of the world likes our suggestions, For example, if you take the star ratings on Amazon, this is by far the highest average rating for the nominees ever, and the first time in decades every work is above 4 stars.
correia45, on April 13, 2015 at 4:07 pm said:
Well, you are in luck. Since Sad Puppies 3 has no political litmus test, and we put up authors based on two critera 1. Being awesome. 2. Normally being ignored, their personal politics didn’t really factor into it. So on Monday when we were being attacked in a dozen major media outlets for being white supremacists, we actually had to look harder, and it turns out that our slate includes people from every political philosophy, and if anything the average skews left.
Not that we give a [gak], because Awesome and Ignored were our criteria.
Now, any other normal time I would be glad to debate specific beliefs and points, but I just don’t got the time right now.
I don't understand what you are trying to express.
Sining wrote: And how would you explain how the Hugos are political in this case then.
The Hugos aren't. Sad Puppies is political, and trying to make the Hugos political.
I'm not avoiding tough questions. You have tough questions about SP3 and its evidence, maybe you should consider ASKING the person in charge of SP3 since he is; in all honesty, the BEST person to ask about this. I've posted his link here multiple times. YET YOU REFUSE TO GO THERE.
http://www.monsterhunternation.com/
Yes, I'm aware of Correia's blog and have read things there. You claimed that he has posted proof of left-wing vote rigging and/or block voting campaigns, so post a link to the specific post or comment where the proof is given. Stop saying "go ask this guy" when all you have to do is spend 30 seconds copy/pasting a link. You've already spent way more time complaining about how we should all go ask someone else than it would take to post a link directly to the supposed proof, if any proof exists.
Explain how those people were completely ignored/shunned?
Err, lol? The whole premise of Sad Puppies is that they're nominating authors that have been ignored and/or shunned because of politics. Think about what you're arguing here: that Jim Butcher is such a great author that he can be nominated entirely on his own merits without SP3 being guilty of block voting, but that he's simultaneously not such a great author that he can get a nomination by mass popularity overcoming the supposed bias in the process. And no, the "SP3 just got people to try something new and like it" argument doesn't work here because he's a popular author with a significant presence in mainstream bookstores.
Also, the effect is a lot more obvious in other categories. Do you really think that John C. Wright deserved three nominations for "best novella" for stories that couldn't get published outside of Vox Day's e-book store?
It's strange that they really haven't won a Hugo for their works, but if Harry Potter can get 2 Hugos, then I'm pretty sure that somehow Jim should have gotten one by now.
It's not strange at all when you remember that the window for winning a Hugo closes a year after the book is published. IIRC it took a while for him to get a lot of attention, and by that point his best work was no longer eligible and the Dresden Files series was starting to decline in quality. They were still entertaining and worth reading if you're already a fan of the series, but IMO they would have really benefited from an editor saying "cut out some of this sprawling mess". Skin Game was a welcome reversal of the trend and may have even been good enough to get a nomination without SP3's help, but that doesn't say anything about his lack of success in previous years.
And let's not forget that Jim Butcher is the easiest author to ask "why hasn't he won" about. You'd have a much harder time explaining how Kevin J. Anderson (an author that is absolutely hated by Star Wars and Dune fans) has been unfairly neglected and deserves to have won a "best novel" award or two.
If I was voting, I'd vote easily for Jim Butcher cause I like his books.
And now you're missing the point of the award entirely. You're not supposed to vote for an author because you like their books, you're supposed to vote for the best individual work. The fact that an author wrote some nice stuff in the past shouldn't in any way influence your decision in the current year. Each work has to stand on its own merits. If you think that Skin Game deserves "best novel" without considering the previous books in the series or how much you like the author in general then you, if you were voting this year, vote for it. Otherwise you vote for something else and it's just too bad that your favorite author isn't going to win an award this year.
Kilkrazy wrote: I know Harry Potter is not great literature, but it is extremely popular. A left-wing conspiracy is hardly needed to explain why Harry Potter might get nominated over something else less popular that might happen to be considered more socially conservative.
Bit of a strawman. No one believes Harry Potter was nominated/won over more conservative authors due to politics. I think Sining was just saying, if literary quality is any indicator, Jim likely should've had one, as Harry Potter, while popular and entertaining, isn't exactly high level prose., which you yourself admit.
It is not at all a straw man. The whole thrust and logic of the Sad Puppies' argument is that the kind of literature they want to champion is not getting nominated despite the fact that it is equally as good and/or popular as the stuff that was getting nominated. In other words, some kind of unfair, unseen forces have been operating.
I am astonished anyone would think Harry Potter would not be a massive title to go up against.
correia45, on April 13, 2015 at 3:29 pm said:
We have achieved a whole bunch of our goals. They’ve proven there is political bias, they have admitted there are cliques and campaigning, they have admitted that they don’t in fact represent all of fandom, and we’ve gotten good people on who would normally be shunned.
What’s next and what’s long term? That entirely depends on what they do now. The ball is in their court. Our strategy will depend on how they want to proceed from here.
correia45, on April 13, 2015 at 3:24 pm said:
I would encourage you to read the works. That’s all I can do.
And even if you find them wanting, that doesn’t mean that it was all some ploy, A. We didn’t know we’d sweep, so couldn’t predict the No Award temper tantrum. B. Apparently even if capital F Fandom doesn’t like them, the rest of the world likes our suggestions, For example, if you take the star ratings on Amazon, this is by far the highest average rating for the nominees ever, and the first time in decades every work is above 4 stars.
correia45, on April 13, 2015 at 4:07 pm said:
Well, you are in luck. Since Sad Puppies 3 has no political litmus test, and we put up authors based on two critera 1. Being awesome. 2. Normally being ignored, their personal politics didn’t really factor into it. So on Monday when we were being attacked in a dozen major media outlets for being white supremacists, we actually had to look harder, and it turns out that our slate includes people from every political philosophy, and if anything the average skews left.
Not that we give a [gak], because Awesome and Ignored were our criteria.
Now, any other normal time I would be glad to debate specific beliefs and points, but I just don’t got the time right now.
I don't understand what you are trying to express.
My bad, I lost the text of my post while copy pasting. I copied over Larry's comments from his most recent blog post regarding the Hugo's so you could see in his own words his explanations of why stories were chosen and what the goals were. It seemed to be an easy way to clear up the straw man argument.
Sining wrote: Thank god we have you here to enlighten us then
And there you go again, making smart alec comments to avoid learning anything.
1)Prescribed votes in what way?
There was a fething list - a puppies voting slate. How are you even asking that question?
1)Prescribed votes in what way?
2) SP is in its third year. For those who don't know, this means it started before Gamergate.
Yes, it started sooner but this is the first year when it's dominated the voting. And people believe its because it's been able to draw people across from gamergate.
3) Lol. Evidence? I think this is the CLEAREST indication of the type of mindset certain people have. "These SP3 voters aren't trufans! They're here to wreck this community" Seriously? I mean, please can you be any more exclusive?
Umm, there was a massive surge in first time voters. Whether this was mobilising an existing fan base or bringing in politically motivated people from outside fantasy writing is up for legitimate debate, but the fact that they parachuted in can't be debated.
So your evidence of no-infighting is that you didn't see anything happen? I mean, like I said, were you in the Hugos in the last 20 years? Do you know everything about the Hugos?
You're not following. My point isn't that there was or wasn't in-fighting, my point is that if you got a left wing conspiracy together there would be in-fighting, and that in-fighting would make this vast, multiple year conspiracy be revealed. And that's above the reality that any conspiracy operating over so many people, over so many years would leave masses of evidence and disgruntled people in its wake.
And yet there's not one fething scrap of evidence of this thing ever existing. The 9/11 truthers have more 'evidence', and those people are ridiculous crazies. So what does that make you and anyone who believes that there was this grand left wing Hugo conspiracy?
Are you seriously trying to tell people how to refer to other people online?
Nope, and if you actually read what was said instead actively re-interpreted things to make pointless digs you would know that.
Kilkrazy wrote: I know Harry Potter is not great literature, but it is extremely popular. A left-wing conspiracy is hardly needed to explain why Harry Potter might get nominated over something else less popular that might happen to be considered more socially conservative.
Bit of a strawman. No one believes Harry Potter was nominated/won over more conservative authors due to politics. I think Sining was just saying, if literary quality is any indicator, Jim likely should've had one, as Harry Potter, while popular and entertaining, isn't exactly high level prose., which you yourself admit.
It is not at all a straw man. The whole thrust and logic of the Sad Puppies' argument is that the kind of literature they want to champion is not getting nominated despite the fact that it is equally as good and/or popular as the stuff that was getting nominated. In other words, some kind of unfair, unseen forces have been operating.
I am astonished anyone would think Harry Potter would not be a massive title to go up against.
Gunslinger has the right of it in this case. Harry Potter is immensely popular but Harry potter also ended YEARS ago. Since then, Jim still hasn't won a HUGO for his books. What's with that?
If I was voting, I'd vote easily for Jim Butcher cause I like his books.
And now you're missing the point of the award entirely. You're not supposed to vote for an author because you like their books, you're supposed to vote for the best individual work. The fact that an author wrote some nice stuff in the past shouldn't in any way influence your decision in the current year. Each work has to stand on its own merits. If you think that Skin Game deserves "best novel" without considering the previous books in the series or how much you like the author in general then you, if you were voting this year, vote for it. Otherwise you vote for something else and it's just too bad that your favorite author isn't going to win an award this year.
Dude, if I like his books it means I like all his books. Even the ones you claim are worse than normal. I'm not voting a crappy book just because I like a guy's previous works which isn't even what I said. I mean, stop coming out with hypotheticals that are totally unconnected with what I said
Sining wrote: Thank god we have you here to enlighten us then
And there you go again, making smart alec comments to avoid learning anything.
Why bother? You've obviously learnt everything already. That's what we have you here for. To lecture us and tell us how to address people online.
1)Prescribed votes in what way?
There was a fething list - a puppies voting slate. How are you even asking that question?
It's very simple. Prescribed votes in what way? I would have thought a person of your intellect and wisdom would have been able to figure that out.
1)Prescribed votes in what way?
2) SP is in its third year. For those who don't know, this means it started before Gamergate.
Yes, it started sooner but this is the first year when it's dominated the voting. And people believe its because it's been able to draw people across from gamergate.
That's great. Evidence?
So your evidence of no-infighting is that you didn't see anything happen? I mean, like I said, were you in the Hugos in the last 20 years? Do you know everything about the Hugos?
You're not following. My point isn't that there was or wasn't in-fighting, my point is that if you got a left wing conspiracy together there would be in-fighting, and that in-fighting would make this vast, multiple year conspiracy be revealed. And that's above the reality that any conspiracy operating over so many people, over so many years would leave masses of evidence and disgruntled people in its wake.
And yet there's not one fething scrap of evidence of this thing ever existing. The 9/11 truthers have more 'evidence', and those people are ridiculous crazies. So what does that make you and anyone who believes that there was this grand left wing Hugo conspiracy?
So no evidence? Ok.
Are you seriously trying to tell people how to refer to other people online?
Nope, and if you actually read what was said instead actively re-interpreted things to make pointless digs you would know that.
You mean you trying to imply Prestor knew Larry in RL which was why he was defending them wasn't true? That you weren't trying to be a schmuck to him just cause he called Larry Correia Larry?
Automatically Appended Next Post: Btw, if any of you wants 40 bucks, Arthur Chu is willing to pay you guys to vote No Award.
ZebioLizard2 wrote: So one side is clearly wrong, so they deserve to be slandered, insulted, and voted against in every manner of possibility by another political faction even those that Sad puppies has placed into its voting?
No, they don’t deserve to be abused or slandered. Of course they don’t.
You seem to have ignored my statement and simply spoke of "proposals", but they are very clearly running them through the mud with a variety of vicious libel.
So yes, "Just as bad" if not worse, It's quite obvious which side you are cheering for (With your own hypocritical statement to boot), as I dislike both groups for what they've done but you cannot even look beyond what they are doing now as they act.
I didn’t ignore your statement, instead I put your claim in the proper context of what the left wing response has been to this point – proposals. To this point the left wing has done nothing, and so just picking out the nastiest responses is just trying to drag them down to the level of the puppies before they’ve actually done anything in response.
No. Random individuals have posted nasty things about the puppies, some of them have even suggested organised responses that are just as bad as what the puppies did. But so far there has been no organised, coherent effort.
And stop saying hypocritical. That word a fething meaning, and I haven’t met it in the slightest. Nor do I have a side.
My position is actually very fething simple, and has been made clear through this thread.
1) Awards for art shouldn’t be gamed or manipulated with strategies like block voting.
2) You shouldn’t judge art by the politics of the author, and you certainly shouldn’t drag politics in to an awards ceremony.
3) Any individual or group that’s done either or both of the above deserves criticism.
So this means that people who harangued authors like Correia and said they weren’t voting for him despite have no knowledge of his work deserve criticism, and groups like the puppies who organised campaigns to game the voting system deserve equal criticism. And that’s exactly who I’ve said have behaved badly.
The mistake you’re making is that it’s good enough to judge the whole of the left wing by picking out some random left wing shouty people on the internet. But until there is any kind of organised response, the only ones who can be criticised are those specific left wing shouty people who’ve said mean things.
Sining wrote: Gunslinger has the right of it in this case. Harry Potter is immensely popular but Harry potter also ended YEARS ago. Since then, Jim still hasn't won a HUGO for his books. What's with that?
He hasn't won a Hugo for his books because his books in the past few years haven't been all that good (at least compared to the earlier books in the series) and you don't get credit for past work. Skin Game was a welcome change in that trend, but now we'll never know if it would have won the award on its own merits without being used as a pawn in a political argument.
Dude, if I like his books it means I like all his books. Even the ones you claim are worse than normal. I'm not voting a crappy book just because I like a guy's previous works which isn't even what I said. I mean, stop coming out with hypotheticals that are totally unconnected with what I said
Let's look at your own words:
If I was voting, I'd vote easily for Jim Butcher cause I like his books.
BookS. Plural. If you're voting (in the hypothetical scenario where you vote*) for Skin Game because you like more than one book then you're doing it wrong. Whether or not you like Jim Butcher's books in general is irrelevant. All that matters is if you think Skin Game is the best novel of the year.
*See, now I've made it explicit that this is a hypothetical scenario and you can't claim be confused about it.
So no evidence? Ok.
Yes, there's no evidence of there being no evidence for this vast left-wing conspiracy to control the Hugo awards. Do you have any constructive arguments to offer or are you just going to say "evidence" in response to everything, no matter how absurd the demand for evidence is?
Sigvatr wrote: SJW aren't political on their own, politically, they are on the far,far left.
Yep. And the groups that rally motivated to resist them are, of themselves, political.
Whether or not you agree with either the SJWs or the anti-SJWs (both groups annoy me), it's bewildering to see people claiming it isn't political.
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Sining wrote: Why bother? You've obviously learnt everything already. That's what we have you here for. To lecture us and tell us how to address people online.
No, I’ve learned lots of things on-line from lots of clever people, and continue to do so when I meet people who know more about something that I do. That’s how you get to be smarter today than you were the day before.
Whereas you, from the two threads I’ve seen you in, just bicker and contradict with whatever first comes in to your head. That’s a method for learning nothing, ever.
It's very simple. Prescribed votes in what way? I would have thought a person of your intellect and wisdom would have been able to figure that out.
And I explained it to you – the puppies set out an actual slate for people to vote for. As was explained in the very first moments of this whole debacle. And then I’m left asking again how that’s even a question?
You’re now asking me to provide evidence that in-fighting doesn’t exist in a conspiracy that I don’t think exists. While at the same time not even pretending to offer up evidence of this conspiracy in any form.
You’re like a parody of the internet.
You mean you trying to imply Prestor knew Larry in RL which was why he was defending them wasn't true? That you weren't trying to be a schmuck to him just cause he called Larry Correia Larry?
No, what? How did you get that out of the exchange? Incredible.
Sigvatr wrote: It's very simple. Prescribed votes in what way? I would have thought a person of your intellect and wisdom would have been able to figure that out.
And I explained it to you – the puppies set out an actual slate for people to vote for. As was explained in the very first moments of this whole debacle. And then I’m left asking again how that’s even a question?
Here is our suggested slate! Brad Torgersen is this year’s banner carrier in our ongoing war against Puppy Related Sadness. Now that the registrations for memberships to nominate for the Hugo are closed, here is what the Evil League of Evil authors came up with in discussion. Here is the list, and I’ll talk about the philosophy/strategy below.
[list omitted to save space]
Now let’s talk STRATEGIC Puppies.
These are my suggested nominations. I am under no delusions that you guys do exactly what I suggest. (seriously, it is like herding cats!). But I would encourage you to take a look at these, and consider nominating all of them.
Pretty much the dictionary definition of prescribed.
Sining wrote: Gunslinger has the right of it in this case. Harry Potter is immensely popular but Harry potter also ended YEARS ago. Since then, Jim still hasn't won a HUGO for his books. What's with that?
He hasn't won a Hugo for his books because his books in the past few years haven't been all that good (at least compared to the earlier books in the series) and you don't get credit for past work. Skin Game was a welcome change in that trend, but now we'll never know if it would have won the award on its own merits without being used as a pawn in a political argument.
Dude, if I like his books it means I like all his books. Even the ones you claim are worse than normal. I'm not voting a crappy book just because I like a guy's previous works which isn't even what I said. I mean, stop coming out with hypotheticals that are totally unconnected with what I said
Let's look at your own words:
If I was voting, I'd vote easily for Jim Butcher cause I like his books.
BookS. Plural. If you're voting (in the hypothetical scenario where you vote*) for Skin Game because you like more than one book then you're doing it wrong. Whether or not you like Jim Butcher's books in general is irrelevant. All that matters is if you think Skin Game is the best novel of the year.
*See, now I've made it explicit that this is a hypothetical scenario and you can't claim be confused about it.
So no evidence? Ok.
Yes, there's no evidence of there being no evidence for this vast left-wing conspiracy to control the Hugo awards. Do you have any constructive arguments to offer or are you just going to say "evidence" in response to everything, no matter how absurd the demand for evidence is?
Books plural is perfectly acceptable for Hugo voting for Best Novel. The entire Wheel of Time series was legally nominated for Best Novel in 2014. It was on my ballot both as a nominees and finalist. The claim that you can't take previous works in a series into consideration for Best Novel nominees is demonstrably false.
Every time I've voted for Hugos all I've done is pay $40, submit my ballot, receive my voter packet, read through what I hadn't read already, and vote for finalists. At no time did I receive and instruction from WorldCon informing me as to exactly what criteria I had to use to determine what stories I voted for. The "best" story in any given category is always going to be subjective. It's a popularity contest determined by fan voting. You buy your ballot and vote for whomever you choose. No rules were broken in the Hugos this year, all that happened is that more fans participated and voted for stories they enjoyed. I don't see why people are upset that fans paid their money and cast their votes. Not everybody is going to have the same opinions about which stories are great, that's certainly not something to get all outraged about.
Sad Puppies nominated talented writers published by Tor who sell lots of books and get great fan reviews yet there are editors from Tor the publishing house and numerous people on Tor.com who want to protest and vote no award to try keep Tor authors from winning simply because they were nominated by wrongfans having wrongfun enjoying those stories and those wrongfans shouldn't be allowed to crash the sanctified elite clique of SMOF/trufan WorldCon.
Sigvatr wrote: politically, they are on the far,far left.
They aren't really. They just have a strong opinion on social justice and shrilly complain about anything that they deem to have offended them, real or imagined. I agree with them in principle, although in practice I often find them tiresomely one dimensional and humourless.
What does this have to do with gamersgate? Gamersgate was all about the lack of journalistic integrity within the games industry; at least before all the shrieking manchildren on both sides turned it all to gak. I also dont understand why Gamersgate is associated with the political right.
The Sad/Rabid Puppy agenda has been spread, in part, through networks established by GamerGate.
GamerGate is associated with the "right" because its opposition is associated with the "left" (and vice versa). These are purely relative/non-substantive terms.
Manchu wrote: The Sad/Rabid Puppy agenda has been spread, in part, through networks established by GamerGate.
GamerGate is associated with the "right" because its opposition is associated with the "left" (and vice versa). These are purely relative/non-substantive terms.
Except that can't really be considering that this SP movement was started in 2013, a year before GG even formed, and was around last year's Hugo's as well.
As it is it seems like the gamergate monicker was only thrown around due to one minor person asking, people got involved and somehow think this is another gamergate thing despite well, SP came around for a fair bit of time before then, though it's quite noticible that GG was dragged into it by the same people who tend to attack GG to begin with because if it hadn't been the smearing of both with the same label most of GG hadn't even noticed it existed.
I do agree it is not so much of a far left vs. center left thing. I do think another thing going on in gamergate that is also somewhat at play here is that some people think that politics shouldn't come up in the discussion of whether something is good or not. People seem to be disagreeing in this thread about whether or not there was any bias prior to SP3, but there is no doubt that was going in video game reviews. I say this because I have seen people interview people on the pro-GG side who don't want game reviews to talk about the politics of the game. So GG seems to want game reviews to be a-political and SP3 also is claiming that it wants to prompt authors regardless of those authors politics.
Manchu wrote: The Sad/Rabid Puppy agenda has been spread, in part, through networks established by GamerGate.
Except that can't really be considering that this SP movement was started in 2013, a year before GG even formed, and was around last year's Hugo's as well.
That SP began in 2013 is irrelevant to the fact that it is being spread in 2015 by and to GG sympathizers.
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Blood Hawk wrote: some people think that politics shouldn't come up in the discussion of whether something is good or not
And some people don't like rainy days. But it keeps on raining nonetheless. Politics is an inherent part of our culture. It cannot not come up. Of course there was some degree of political bias (one suspects lots of different streams of political bias) running through the voting membership of WorldCon prior to SP mobilizing existing and new voters. The trouble is with folks who try to frame the argument as, either something is (a) non-political or (b) a conspiracy.
Manchu wrote: The Sad/Rabid Puppy agenda has been spread, in part, through networks established by GamerGate.
Except that can't really be considering that this SP movement was started in 2013, a year before GG even formed, and was around last year's Hugo's as well.
That SP began in 2013 is irrelevant to the fact that it is being spread in 2015 by and to GG sympathizers.
Which ironically only came about once again because they decided to associate SP with GG because of one single guy when most didn't know about it till suddenly they were being once again attacked in the news by a new source and started looking into what was going on.
So yeah you do have GG on their side in some ways as a result of that, doesn't help that some of the same people attacking GG are doing the same in the other branch.
ZebioLizard2 wrote: suddenly they were being once again attacked in the news
And who is "they" in this clause?
The simple fact is, there is a good amount of overlap from the top down and from the bottom up between Sad/Rabid Puppy organizers and sympathizers and GG. It's not hard to understand why. Both movements posit that "nerdy" media is being hijacked by "leftist" politics.
Blood Hawk wrote: I say this because I have seen people interview people on the pro-GG side who don't want game reviews to talk about the politics of the game. So GG seems to want game reviews to be a-political and SP3 also is claiming that it wants to prompt authors regardless of those authors politics.
I'm not interested in GG, but according to the more reasonable opponents, SP3's slate was at least a-political, as in it contained works from bpth ends of the spectrum which the SP organisers felt were being wrongfully excluded.
I still disagree with the why, the what and the how of what they did, but they do seem to have put their money where their mouth is with regards to whom.
So even if there were people being excluded from being nominated for a Hugo, their political bent seems to not be the deciding factor. I suspect that if, and it's a pretty big if, it's true, it's more due to the Worldcon attendees and organisers being a relatively small group with similar tastes rather than any kind of SJW-ism or other politics being involved.
ZebioLizard2 wrote: suddenly they were being once again attacked in the news
And who is "they" in this clause?
The simple fact is, there is a good amount of overlap from the top down and from the bottom up between Sad/Rabid Puppy organizers and sympathizers and GG. It's not hard to understand why. Both movements posit that "nerdy" media is being hijacked by "leftist" politics.
They being several media outlets who decided during the story outlet to paint the Sad Puppies as being a gamergate organizational offshoot rather then it's own group that has been around for longer.
Blood Hawk wrote: some people think that politics shouldn't come up in the discussion of whether something is good or not
And some people don't like rainy days. But it keeps on raining nonetheless. Politics is an inherent part of our culture. It cannot not come up. Of course there was some degree of political bias (one suspects lots of different streams of political bias) running through the voting membership of WorldCon prior to SP mobilizing existing and new voters. The trouble is with folks who try to frame the argument as, either something is (a) non-political or (b) a conspiracy.
Oh I agree that politics is important part of culture and entertainment but doesn't stop some people from wanting their entertainment to be judged in a-political way. Even though it may be a fruitless exercise.
Manchu wrote: I agree that certain "news sources" outed themselves as mere propaganda organs in "covering" SP.
That said, they didn't make up the GG connection.
That being one person and not really much else considering what I checked for, could he have pulled a few people perhaps, but this wasn't some sort of organizational output that Gamergate was even looking into up until the stories that came about that Gamergate has "Come to destroy the Hugo's for minorities and women" based on this one person and a few others.
Blood Hawk wrote: Oh I agree that politics is important part of culture and entertainment but doesn't stop some people from wanting their entertainment to be judged in a-political way. Even though it may be a fruitless exercise.
IME, when people say they want to leave politics out of something they usually mean that they want to exclude politics that disagrees with their own politics.
Blood Hawk wrote: I do think another thing going on in gamergate that is also somewhat at play here is that some people think that politics shouldn't come up in the discussion of whether something is good or not.[...] I say this because I have seen people interview people on the pro-GG side who don't want game reviews to talk about the politics of the game.
That is not true. They have no problem with politics being in the game, and those being mentioned in the review, as long as those do not challenge the status quo. What they hate is any challenge to the status quo.
Blood Hawk wrote: Oh I agree that politics is important part of culture and entertainment but doesn't stop some people from wanting their entertainment to be judged in a-political way.
If they want the journalists to refuse to include some additional information in their articles about some aspects of the game that are relevant to whether or not I am interested in it, then they certainly are not fighting for better journalistic ethics .
Blood Hawk wrote: I do think another thing going on in gamergate that is also somewhat at play here is that some people think that politics shouldn't come up in the discussion of whether something is good or not.[...] I say this because I have seen people interview people on the pro-GG side who don't want game reviews to talk about the politics of the game.
That is not true. They have no problem with politics being in the game, and those being mentioned in the review, as long as those do not challenge the status quo. What they hate is any challenge to the status quo.
Blood Hawk wrote: Oh I agree that politics is important part of culture and entertainment but doesn't stop some people from wanting their entertainment to be judged in a-political way.
If they want the journalists to refuse to include some additional information in their articles about some aspects of the game that are relevant to whether or not I am interested in it, then they certainly are not fighting for better journalistic ethics .
So wait you consider not including your own opinion about the politics of a game unethical behavior by a journalist?
Prestor Jon wrote: Books plural is perfectly acceptable for Hugo voting for Best Novel. The entire Wheel of Time series was legally nominated for Best Novel in 2014. It was on my ballot both as a nominees and finalist. The claim that you can't take previous works in a series into consideration for Best Novel nominees is demonstrably false.
It was nominated legally, but that isn't the same situation. Let's look at the rule that allowed the nomination:
3.2.6: Works appearing in a series are eligible as individual works, but the series as a whole is not eligible. However, a work appearing in a number of parts shall be eligible for the year of the final part.
So two things stand out:
1) The argument that WoT was a "work appearing in parts" and not a series succeeded, but was controversial at the time. The claim was that the entire story should be treated as a single book, which is IMO pretty absurd. But if you accept that argument and put WoT on the ballot then you're no longer considering the author's previous works. Instead, you're just voting for a single book that happens to be really long.
2) The loophole that got WoT as a whole on the ballot only applies once the series is finished. The Dresden Files series is not finished and can not be nominated as a whole.
No rules were broken in the Hugos this year, all that happened is that more fans participated and voted for stories they enjoyed.
No rules were broken, but finding and exploiting broken RAW doesn't mean that you're doing the right thing.
I don't see why people are upset that fans paid their money and cast their votes.
Sigh. You know perfectly well that this isn't what people are unhappy about. We've told you this many times and yet you still keep repeating the same old claims. I know you're a reasonably smart person and can't possibly have this much trouble understanding an argument, so please stop ignoring the explanations you've been given. The issue is block voting regardless of the political ideology behind it or the works nominated with it, not the fact that the "wrong" authors got on the ballot. The primary anti-SP argument is that block voting reduces the Hugos to a contest of which "side" is best at unifying its members behind a single set of designated winners. Even if Happy Puppies (a "SJW" campaign to nominate only books with gay main characters) "wins" over Sad Puppies 4 next year the legitimacy of the award has been destroyed.
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Blood Hawk wrote: So wait you consider not including your own opinion about the politics of a game unethical behavior by a journalist?
Of course not. There's no obligation to include discussion of politics in a game review. The point is that if you're demanding that journalists remove political content from their reviews you're no longer arguing for ethics in journalism, you're arguing for journalism that matches your ideology.
Blood Hawk wrote: So wait you consider not including your own opinion about the politics of a game unethical behavior by a journalist?
Of course not. There's no obligation to include discussion of politics in a game review. The point is that if you're demanding that journalists remove political content from their reviews you're no longer arguing for ethics in journalism, you're arguing for journalism that matches your ideology.
I don't think I would call arguing for a-political review is arguing for journalism that matches your ideology. Unless of course you assume that arguing for a-political reviews is in turn a political ideology which it isn't.
Blood Hawk wrote: I don't think I would call arguing for a-political review is arguing for journalism that matches your ideology. Unless of course you assume that arguing for a-political reviews is in turn a political ideology which it isn't.
You're missing the point. You're nitpicking whether "game journalism should be apolitical" qualifies as "ideology" or "politics" or merely "a preference" but you're ignoring the substance of the argument: that "I want apolitical reviews" is about your personal preferences, not ethics. Talking about ethics in journalism implies that you're criticizing unethical behavior, not merely the equivalent of preferring to read reviews of PC games instead of console games.
Blood Hawk wrote: I don't think I would call arguing for a-political review is arguing for journalism that matches your ideology. Unless of course you assume that arguing for a-political reviews is in turn a political ideology which it isn't.
You're missing the point. You're nitpicking whether "game journalism should be apolitical" qualifies as "ideology" or "politics" or merely "a preference" but you're ignoring the substance of the argument: that "I want apolitical reviews" is about your personal preferences, not ethics. Talking about ethics in journalism implies that you're criticizing unethical behavior, not merely the equivalent of preferring to read reviews of PC games instead of console games.
Ok here is the thing, you can talk about ethics and also talk about having a-political reviews. The two are not mutually exclusive. Some people in GG from what I have seen talk about both how they want to end the unethical behavior and they want a-political reviews. I don't think people consider them the same thing.
Just because I like bananas doesn't mean that undermines my likeness of apples, you can in fact like both. Some people I have seen who are pro-GG talk about ethics as well as having a-political reviews. The two are not mutually exclusive and it is possible to have a conversation about both.
I think that the one thing me and Peregrine agree on is that block voting is not good. SP did it as a protest to demonstrate how broken the Hugos already were. But now we really need to unite as a community and find a system where books are judged by the quality of work and not the political or social views of the author.
(And I don't believe that's what we had. Look at the SFWA kerffuffle that was previous to the Hugo kerfuffle.)
Blood Hawk wrote: Yes they have an issue with politics finding their way into the review. I have repeatably heard that line from pro-GG people even when they do interviews.
Of course they said so. They just demonstrated otherwise by their actions.
Blood Hawk wrote: So wait you consider not including your own opinion about the politics of a game unethical behavior by a journalist?
I consider trying to forbid game journalists to mention some aspects of the game that are relevant to me unethical. The will to silence is the unethical part here. The reporting by journalists is fine.
MWHistorian wrote: I think that the one thing me and Peregrine agree on is that block voting is not good. SP did it as a protest to demonstrate how broken the Hugos already were. But now we really need to unite as a community and find a system where books are judged by the quality of work and not the political or social views of the author.
(And I don't believe that's what we had. Look at the SFWA kerffuffle that was previous to the Hugo kerfuffle.)
The kind of "block" voting happening in Hugo's isn't bad. Anytime popular authors encourage their fans to participate in something you'll get groups of people that are at least somewhat like minded participating. That's good because increased participation is what the Hugo's need if they want to stay relevant.
The reason the Hugo's are having this problem is because the people voting for Hugo's the SMOF WorldCon people were content to become a small insular group wherein the "right" books would get good reviews by the "right" sites and reviewers and get promoted by the "right" people and authors and the number of voters was small enough that those books would win Hugo's and if the "wrong" stories or authors got nominated there were enough zealous ideological gatekeepers that sneer, smear and do their best to drive away wrong stories wrong authors and wrong fans. That small mindedness and elitism and hubris caused this backlash because when somebody like Larry Correia saw the numbers and felt the derisive attitude of the self appointed gatekeepers of "worthy" stories and authors he wanted to push back and empower fans to make the Hugo's more inclusive.
Look at the number of nominating ballots cast this year most categories barely have over 1000 ballots. With that level of turn out its easy to see how Sad Puppies coupled with the addition of the unaffiliated Rabid Puppies could have so much influence on the nominations. It also simultaneously shows how its farcical that a tiny fraction of a percent of fans of genres that sell millions of books are really picking the "best" books/works of a given year.
I don't see the value in trying to shoehorn literary worthiness into an award process that is determined by fan voting. Fan voting will always be a popularity contest. If an author sells millions of books and has lots of fans that author must be pretty good even if some people don't think their prose is as good as some of the iconic names in the genre. You guys can agree that the "best" books should win but you may never agree on which books are "best" and popular authors can always get fans to vote for them simply by mentioning to their fans that they've got eligible works.
The solution to the current "problem" is to push for more fan involvement so that the larger electorate evens out the blocks that can be formed by popular authors or groups.
Blood Hawk wrote: Yes they have an issue with politics finding their way into the review. I have repeatably heard that line from pro-GG people even when they do interviews.
Of course they said so. They just demonstrated otherwise by their actions.
They showed that they don't care about politics in reviews? Since when?
Blood Hawk wrote: So wait you consider not including your own opinion about the politics of a game unethical behavior by a journalist?
I consider trying to forbid game journalists to mention some aspects of the game that are relevant to me unethical. The will to silence is the unethical part here. The reporting by journalists is fine.
Wait a consumer saying they don't like a part of something means the consumer is participating in unethical behavior. How?
It's long, but its the best summation of the situation I've read so far. And for anyone wondering I suggest they go to Correia's blog and check that, no, he wasn't taken out of context, he really does make it out that he's pi**ed the cool kids didn't like and by god he'll tear the cool kids club house down and they'll shown them, that'll show all of them.
It's long, but its the best summation of the situation I've read so far. And for anyone wondering I suggest they go to Correia's blog and check that, no, he wasn't taken out of context, he really does make it out that he's pi**ed the cool kids didn't like and by god he'll tear the cool kids club house down and they'll shown them, that'll show all of them.
Manchu wrote: The Sad/Rabid Puppy agenda has been spread, in part, through networks established by GamerGate.
GamerGate is associated with the "right" because its opposition is associated with the "left" (and vice versa). These are purely relative/non-substantive terms.
As someone who's been following most GG news, it really hasn't been spread by GG at all. There've been mentions of it before the whole thing blew up but honestly, the reason why most GGers would even KNOW of this issue is because right after SP3 won, suddenly a whole slew of articles came out linking GG to SP3 and then lambasting both of them. You'd think journalists would do a bit more research. The GG sub on reddit alone has 30k subscribers. There's only been an increase of less than a thousand voters to the Hugo awards. If GG had been in any way involved, the numbers would probably be a lot higher. tl;dr Some overlap but not much
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also, block voting as Peregine imagines doesn't exist in the form he thinks it does. Even the quote Mike quotes from Larry says 'guys, these are suggestions.' which Mike and Perry take to mean 'guys, VOTE FOR THESE'
At the end of the day, to paraphrase Mike, I guess the coolkids are upset because they're no longer the cool kids.
I have a Proffessor that recently said
"There is always going to be inequality, racism, sexism, Transphobia, Give up, you are always going to be screwed"
hotsauceman1 wrote: I have a Proffessor that recently said
"There is always going to be inequality, racism, sexism, Transphobia, Give up, you are always going to be screwed"
...I sincerely hope he was being sarcastic. That's a very dismal outlook on life. Yeah, you're NOT going to be able to keep everyone from being a frakhead. Doesn't mean that you can't make things better, or that you should give up.
You should do that because eventually the sun will expand and scorch the life from our planet, there's nothing you can do about THAT, and it won't matter on a cosmic scale. Keep your existential despair aligned properly, dammit!
Silent Puffin? wrote: What does this have to do with gamersgate? Gamersgate was all about the lack of journalistic integrity within the games industry; at least before all the shrieking manchildren on both sides turned it all to gak. I also dont understand why Gamersgate is associated with the political right.
Historical correction, if you don't mind: the Gamergate hashtag was coined on a tweet linking to a harassment video. The "journalistic integrity" figleaf appeared later.
Gamergate is associated with the political right for a variety of reasons, but one is that a number of right-wing writers and public figures noticed it early on and began promoting it. Some of these, like Milo Yiannopoulos, have subsequently gone on to write glowing pieces in support of the Sad Puppies. People like Yiannopoulos are very openly and strongly political and have very little to do with gaming (in fact, he himself had written some really contemptuous things about gamers) but saw a potential audience and went for it with significant success.
There are other common factors, but Gamergate is (was? I don't know what sort of shape it's in now) driven strongly by a similar kind of sentiment.
HiveFleetPlastic wrote: Historical correction, if you don't mind: the Gamergate hashtag was coined on a tweet linking to a harassment video. The "journalistic integrity" figleaf appeared later.
Gamergate is associated with the political right for a variety of reasons, but one is that a number of right-wing writers and public figures noticed it early on and began promoting it. Some of these, like Milo Yiannopoulos, have subsequently gone on to write glowing pieces in support of the Sad Puppies. People like Yiannopoulos are very openly and strongly political and have very little to do with gaming (in fact, he himself had written some really contemptuous things about gamers) but saw a potential audience and went for it with significant success.
There are other common factors, but Gamergate is (was? I don't know what sort of shape it's in now) driven strongly by a similar kind of sentiment.
Historical correction? Surely you mean historical revision, given the amount of nonsense you just posted.
GamerGate came about as a hashtag after the event we now call GamerGate started. Original it was 5 Guys, as the catalyst for the event was not a "harassment video" (whatever the hell that means), but a video detailing the shady antics of a number of journalists and how they related to a single indie developer.
It then spun out from there as a movement, predominately left-leaning if the various polls are to be believed (not that that should matter - being a conservative doesn't instantly invalidate your opinion and only those that ascribe to poisonous identity politics where what you are matters more than who you are would believe that), centrered around the idea of cleaning up the joke of a gaming press that we have.
You're right about Milo being derisive towards gamers in the past, but so what? He sure through the bs and reported what was happening, despite his previous views. He busted open the GameJournoPros ring. And now he wants to profit from it, which he can if he wants to, nothing much you or I can do to stop him there.
hotsauceman1 wrote: I have a Proffessor that recently said
"There is always going to be inequality, racism, sexism, Transphobia, Give up, you are always going to be screwed"
...I sincerely hope he was being sarcastic. That's a very dismal outlook on life. Yeah, you're NOT going to be able to keep everyone from being a frakhead. Doesn't mean that you can't make things better, or that you should give up.
You should do that because eventually the sun will expand and scorch the life from our planet, there's nothing you can do about THAT, and it won't matter on a cosmic scale. Keep your existential despair aligned properly, dammit!
She is roughly 68 years old and has studied inequality for all that time. She said it was pragmatic.
Blood Hawk wrote: I don't think I would call arguing for a-political review is arguing for journalism that matches your ideology. Unless of course you assume that arguing for a-political reviews is in turn a political ideology which it isn't.
You're missing the point. You're nitpicking whether "game journalism should be apolitical" qualifies as "ideology" or "politics" or merely "a preference" but you're ignoring the substance of the argument: that "I want apolitical reviews" is about your personal preferences, not ethics. Talking about ethics in journalism implies that you're criticizing unethical behavior, not merely the equivalent of preferring to read reviews of PC games instead of console games.
And here i thought it was about judging a book on its story, I can read a book that is totally against my political views but still can appreciate it if it is a good story.
Manchu wrote: People seem to be assuming this is the first time politics played a major role in the nominations process ...
WHAT? HOW?
I still can't believe that people don't know about that.
I won't comment on the purposed group of 'gamergate' due to the idiocy that it causes in some people. But one of the things I find quite amusing is people talk about gamergate and blame it like it is some sort of valid scapegoat it reminds me quite a bit of other groups such as blaming a certain group say the mexicans because drugs simply exist.
You are basically using a group or a name and just using it to blame. There is no valid reason to blame them. ITs what journalism has turned too....
Well if you count Kotaku, Polygon or hell anything from Gawker Media 'Journalism'.
Though that is my personal opinion
Currently these websites have only pushed their foot into their mouth and have started to choke on it.
For example anyone that has gotten involved from the proposed 'anti gamergate', have only shot themselves in the foot by saying some really stupid things. Though you could say that about alot of gamergaters.
Though I think the hugo awards thing is kind of interesting.
Though I think this left and right debate is quite stupid..
Though I feel like that is an american thing to do is to associate things with black and white or left or right. Instead of you know, having different prespectives.
See political alignment is a 2d space, a line graph.
Left and right are not really seen as anything good in this day and age.... For some reason.... Being left means you are far too government centered and controlled heavy, while being a right person means you are conservative nutball. They aren't good identifiers and something that many people that study politics know to be bad to use in actual politics. Though they do use it in terms to spark controversy.
Silent Puffin? wrote: What does this have to do with gamersgate? Gamersgate was all about the lack of journalistic integrity within the games industry; at least before all the shrieking manchildren on both sides turned it all to gak. I also dont understand why Gamersgate is associated with the political right.
People like Yiannopoulos are very openly and strongly political and have very little to do with gaming (in fact, he himself had written some really contemptuous things about gamers) but saw a potential audience and went for it with significant success.
I remember hearing anita sarkesian (or however her last name is spelled) supposedly never even played a video game or at least not before throwing out her opinions. At least that's what i've heard. So you know some of your leaders are also not terribly involved but they sure as hell want to throw their opinions around.
Personally i was of the opinion gaming journalism like most other forms of news are just biased crap anyway. How many critics have sold out and written glowing reviews for big bucks? The first one i remember was the kane & lynch: dead men review on gamespot where they were paid for a review and a critic rebelled and wrote a bad review of it. Funny how some people seem to forget that. Oh and that was back in like 2005-2007 or so. Basically it's been happening for at the very least a decade.
Silent Puffin? wrote: What does this have to do with gamersgate? Gamersgate was all about the lack of journalistic integrity within the games industry; at least before all the shrieking manchildren on both sides turned it all to gak. I also dont understand why Gamersgate is associated with the political right.
People like Yiannopoulos are very openly and strongly political and have very little to do with gaming (in fact, he himself had written some really contemptuous things about gamers) but saw a potential audience and went for it with significant success.
I remember hearing anita sarkesian (or however her last name is spelled) supposedly never even played a video game or at least not before throwing out her opinions. At least that's what i've heard. So you know some of your leaders are also not terribly involved but they sure as hell want to throw their opinions around.
Personally i was of the opinion gaming journalism like most other forms of news are just biased crap anyway. How many critics have sold out and written glowing reviews for big bucks? The first one i remember was the kane & lynch: dead men review on gamespot where they were paid for a review and a critic rebelled and wrote a bad review of it. Funny how some people seem to forget that. Oh and that was back in like 2005-2007 or so. Basically it's been happening for at the very least a decade.
Well you could say that about any group.
Though to call a hashtag a movement and having a leadership is quite interesting it is like calling tumblr an organization.
Gamergate has no leadership for all tense and purposes there is no organization called gamergate. There are no payments or dues. ITs just a group of people that are from twitter and use social media to talk through.
That kane lynch thing has been rerferenced quite a bit by many people from within gamergate at the very beginning but it was lost in the endless slew of 'mass harassment'.
And if anyone needs reminding again how petulent the sad puppies are being:
But then Vox Day and his followers made it impossible for me to remain silent , keep calm, and carry on. Not content with just using dirty tricks to get on the ballot, they’re now demanding they win, too, or they’ll destroy the Hugos altogether. When a commenter on File 770 suggested people fight back by voting for “No Award,” Vox Day wrote: “If No Award takes a fiction category, you will likely never see another award given in that category again. The sword cuts both ways, Lois. We are prepared for all eventualities.”
I assume that means they intend to use the same bloc-voting technique to block anyone but their nominees from winning in future years. Or, in other words, “If you ever want to see your precious award again, do exactly as I say.” It’s a threat, pure and simple. Everyone who votes has been ordered (under the threat of violence being done to something we love) to let their stories–stories which got on the ballot dishonestly–win.
Silent Puffin? wrote: I also dont understand why Gamersgate is associated with the political right.
People like Yiannopoulos are very openly and strongly political and have very little to do with gaming (in fact, he himself had written some really contemptuous things about gamers) but saw a potential audience and went for it with significant success.
I remember hearing anita sarkesian (or however her last name is spelled) supposedly never even played a video game or at least not before throwing out her opinions. At least that's what i've heard. So you know some of your leaders are also not terribly involved but they sure as hell want to throw their opinions around.
I do not have a leader, unless you mean Tony Abbott. I don't know what sort of gaming history he has. In any event, what I was trying to do is explain at least some part of why people are making the comparison.
From the outside, it does seem weird that the groups are linked. Maybe you can imagine a tenuous link between SF and video games? But quite early on a number of right-wing writers realised they had a potential audience in Gamergate enthusiasts, and that link hasn't gone away since. Those same right-wing writers are also really into saving the Sad Puppies and help bridge the gap. Both the puppies and many Gamergate participants spend a lot of time talking about SJWs and how they must be stopped - they have plenty of common ground.
s who want to return to the good old days when Heinlein wrote all of those completely non-political adventure stories (
about euthanasia tells you everything you need to know about him.
