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Sining wrote:
If the Hugos are going to exclude people, then they already mean nothing. What's the point of getting a prize that had to exclude people? You'll never know if you won it on merit or because certain people were excluded

That has nothing to do with what I posted. I didn't mention exclusion. I can't even start to figure out how someone could read 'exclusion' in to my post. Are you just dragging in arguments made by other people, possibly people not even on this forum, and expecting me to have to defend them?


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 Blood Hawk wrote:
I will give you that sex being involved helped get peoples attention. However this not a political thing is just a person thing. People like sex scandals, they like talking about them because they are so "juicy" You add sex on any to any scandal and the average person will get more interested it doesn't really matter about the political views of the people involved.

Not just sex, but sex involving the kind of person that a group loves to hate.

However I think you are missing one major thing here, which like a lot of controversies it is not the initial act but the response. The gamers are dead articles and other actions by these so called "journalists" was like pouring kerosene on a fire.

No, I get that’s how it worked. I simply make the point that the articles themselves were nothing like what was claimed, and while the timing was confrontational, the content was anywhere near as incendiary as gamergate claims. Instead, gamergate went looking to find offence.

It is irrelevant what you think those articles definition of gamer was, what matters is what they (meaning the pro-GG people) thought the bloggers meant by gamer. They clearly saw "gamer" as just meaning people you play video games. And those articles pissed a lot of people off as you would imagine.

The meaning in the article was pretty clear. Anyone who read any of the articles would have seen clearly what was meant.

And people might claim it was just misinterpreted in the heat of the moment, that it was really just an accident, but that doesn’t really work. No-one ever accidentally misinterprets anything to think it was actually less incendiary and shocking than it really was. What happened was people in gamergate going looking for outrage, finding it by mischaracterising an article, and then repeating the mischaracterisation to hundreds of others, none of whom bothered to actually read the article.

In this regard gamergate was really no different to countless angry mobs that have come before.


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 Peregrine wrote:
1) It's almost entirely based on a very small number (2-5, depending on how you want to draw the line) of nominees that are significantly above the winner. Take away just a couple of dots from the graph and suddenly the past 2-3 years aren't exceptional at all. They do include a winner or two that is farther from the top score than average, but only by a margin that has happened quite a few times in previous years. So IMO this is just a case of trying to draw strong conclusions from a bit of random variation. To have a strong case for bias in the winners there would have to be a much longer trend than what we actually see.

The article also leaves off the reality that awards go through good periods and bad periods, and it happens for all sorts of reasons, the most common of which is that gak happens sometimes. Friends in the real world had complained about the recent Hugos, so I’ve no problem believing it’s been bad lately. The issue is in concluding that it must be because of some kind of conspiracy or clique to reward only certain kinds of authors, an argument that’s increasingly loopy when you consider Martin’s review of recent winners, to find there was no exclusion of conservative writers.

It’s an excellent and balanced article, by the way. Between this and the Martin/Correia dialogue I think anyone who’s interested can get pretty much all of the content needed by reading that stuff.


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 EmpNortonII wrote:
I can't help but think that if, instead of a mass-publishing of "gamers are dead" articles, Nathan Grayson had gotten a suspension without pay and an apology was issued, there'd be no GamerGate.

Maybe. I mean, whether or not it would have avoided gamergate, Grayson should have been fired, just out of basic ethical practice, not to avoid any kind of gamergate backlash. But as to whether it could have avoided gamergate, I really doubt it.

There were gamers who were very unhappy and very angry about lots of things, and once we got that first instance then they were going to go about finding whatever they could to sustain the anger.

The censorship on 4chan and reddit contributed heavily to the backlash as well. If people had been allowed to blow off steam, it would have died out before scum-sucking parasites like Brianna Wu and Anita Sarkeesian could purposefully blow the incident up as much as possible in order to profit from it.

I certainly think the other side of it, the provocation by certain people in order to sustain and gain from the incident is another major factor. And it’s another part of the reason this wasn’t going to go away if only people hadn’t written articles, or banned the topic on forums.

Maybe it's just my part of the country, maybe it's the industry. I worked at a call center for 2 years (specifically, one in the Midwest, that provides its services to Apple and Turbotax). I can name three names easily (one on which was eventually arrested for dealing meth, because Indiana).

I thought about it after, and I remembered I remembered this one girlfriend a mate had for a time, who did have sex for money. So there’s that . But it’s still a complex story, because the girl only did it for one guy, and that guy was a cop who very strongly pressured her in to it, so I’ll stand by my ‘sex is way too complex’, albeit with a less strong rejection that previously.

At any rate, I'm unaware of any group that has been actively pressuring the FTC to change its rules, specifically on youtube and in online journalism. You might know of one, but I don't.

I remember reading about how Australia was looking at changes, and was looking closely at the new model that was being built in the US. That was, I don’t know, maybe four years ago?

David Auerbach wrote what is probably the only sensible article on the anti-GG side of things that I've read, and it seems like this is a good place to post it.

It's meaningless, of course, because his suggestions are things like "be polite" and "throw Gawker under the bus," which will never happen.

It’s a reasonable article, if perhaps more than a bit dramatic. I mean, comparisons aren’t equating, but really any time that on-line bitterness brings in a reference to South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation process, it’s possible that the author needs to spend some time away from the internet

I think that’s probably the biggest issue with so much of this – the lack of perspective. Even the legitimate complaint about the woeful state of gaming journalism – well so fething what? It was terrible 20+ years ago when I read different magazines for the Amiga, and will probably always be bad. I suspect that model trains and topiary journalism is probably just as shoddy.

 Peregrine wrote:

Sining wrote:
http://difficultrun.nathanielgivens.com/2015/04/14/sad-puppy-data-analysis/

Interesting. So Vox Day's influence is pretty clear, and that pretty well disproves the idea that he's just some irrelevant fringe element that nobody is paying any attention to. However, the "average reviews" analysis has at least three major flaws:

1) It's almost entirely based on a very small number (2-5, depending on how you want to draw the line) of nominees that are significantly above the winner. Take away just a couple of dots from the graph and suddenly the past 2-3 years aren't exceptional at all. They do include a winner or two that is farther from the top score than average, but only by a margin that has happened quite a few times in previous years. So IMO this is just a case of trying to draw strong conclusions from a bit of random variation. To have a strong case for bias in the winners there would have to be a much longer trend than what we actually see.

2) The data points that the bias argument depends on are significantly above the average scores of nominees. The 4.6 average is the single highest score in the entire history of the award, and the 4.4 average has only been matched four times. Did the past five years really have such a dramatic improvement in the quality of science fiction writing? I seriously doubt it. I think the much more obvious explanation is that these two scores are the result of dedicated fans leaving "OMG BEST BOOK EVER" ratings and skewing the results for a book that most people wouldn't rate anywhere near that high.

3) It doesn't say anything to address the Sad Puppies criticism of the nomination process. The graph only looks at nominees who have already been approved by the supposed left-wing conspiracy. So if SP is correct then at best it can prove that some left-wing books were unfairly favored over other left-wing books. It doesn't say anything at all about the average scores of the center or right-wing books that were supposedly excluded from being nominated at all.

The criticism of the nomination process by Sad Puppies wasn't that stories were being overlooked because of author's politics but because the segment of SFF fandom that made up the majority of WorldCon attendees had a low opinion of pulp stories. There is a long and storied history of pulp writers in SFF and many of them have had a strong impact on both the genre and our culture but such stories are often criticized as not being proper literature. That is the oversight that Larry Correia wanted to correct, talented popular writers getting overlooked for the most prestigious SFF award because they weren't on the radar of the typical WorldCon attendee.

Here is Larry's first blog post about the Hugos back in January 2013:
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/quote/360/7757038.page

How to get Correia nominated for a Hugo.

Posted on January 8, 2013 by correia45


The Hugo awards are the most prestigious thing you can get in sci-fi/fantasy (other than fat royalty checks, obviously). Getting nominated for a Hugo is a great resume builder. I was a finalist for the Campbell award for best new writer a couple of years back, and though the Campbell is a separate award from the Hugo, it works through the same system, same voters, and is even given away at the same ceremony. Going through that experience was very enlightening.

The Hugo is pretty fancy, but basically, like most awards, it is a popularity contest. So who decides? Anybody who attended the last WorldCon (Chicago 2012) or who is a supporting member of the current WorldCon (San Antonio 2013) or next WorldCon (London 2014) can nominate. But you need to buy your membership by January 31.

Monster Hunter Legion is eligible… I’m just pointing that out. The fact that I write unabashed pulp action that isn’t heavy handed message fic annoys the literati to no end. When I got nominated for the Campbell, the literati message-fic crowd had a conniption fit. A European snob reviewer actually wrote “If Larry Correia wins the Campbell, it will END WRITING FOREVER.” (I’ve since won the prestigious Audie and got nominated for the Julia Verlanger for best fantasy novel IN FRANCE, and all writing still hasn’t been ended, so I must still need a Hugo nomination).

Okay, so you’re not going to be in Texas this year, but how about this? For $60 you can buy a supporting membership (and later on you can upgrade it to a full membership if you actually want to attend). This allows you to nominate whoever you want for the various Hugo awards. You tell them what you think the best books of the year were, the best TV shows, movies, even book review sites.

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 .Mikes. wrote:

Sining wrote:
Dude, I am not for Vox Day. Unfortunately, when you mix up the 3, Larry, Brad and Vox day together as one distinct entity, then I have issues with that.

I'm not mixing anything up. Day's and Correia's slates come from the same, self serving murk which ompliment each other.

Jason Sandford put it perfectly earlier this month:

Larry and Brad don't want to be associated with VD. But they also must not mind benefiting from his campaign. I say this because it's the only reason I can think of for why they're not calling Vox Day out for the obvious conflict of interest of his Rabid Puppies campaign turning out the block vote for both himself and his own publishing house.

Day, Correia, Torgerson and John C Wright have a well - documented, mututally beneficial relationship, as defending by Torgerson and Wright. If the various shades of puppies are not the same, why have Correia and Torgerson not denounced Day? I mean, as Sandford pointed out, his actoins go directly against their stated aims with sad puppies (ignoring those claims are bollocks of the hairiest degree).

Correia and Torgersen have repeatedly publicly explained that they have no affiliation with Vox Day, have no control over what Vox Day does in regards to campaigning for Hugos, and don't feel the need to apologize or denounce somebody for whom they bear no responsibility. The attempt to smear Correia and Torgersen with guilt by association regarding Vox Day is absurd because there is no association. Day, Torgersen and Correia all think Wright and Kloos are talented writers that deserve a Hugo. That shared opinion on the talent and worthiness of those authors doesn't mean that Torgersent and Correia have to apologize for or denounce Day's political beliefs and controversial statements that are wholly independent from the happenstance that they share similar tastes in SFF literature.

 sebster wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:
All of the suggested lists/ballots from various authors and websites were publically available. Whether it's from Scalzi or Locus or Sad Puppies or Tor.com or whomever. Sad Puppies put out a suggested list, Correia used his blog to promote the works on it and increase the sales of those stories on Amazon in the hopes that more people would read them find them worthy. There's nothing nefarious there.

Yes, I said it was publically available, that’s one of the parts of the slate strategy, obviously. No point having a slate if you don’t tell people about it

And to repeat it for hopefully the last time, there is a difference between saying ‘these authors are great, you guys should read them and vote for them if you like it as much as I do’, and ‘there is a clique dominating the Hugos, and to counter that clique we should strategically vote for a consistent ballot which is these books I’ve listed here’.

Here is the nomination post from MHN from Sad Puppies 1:
http://monsterhunternation.com/2013/02/28/hugo-nominating-there-is-only-ten-days-left/

HUGO Nominating! There is only ten days LEFT!

Posted on February 28, 2013 by correia45

Okay, for the many of you who I talked into registering to nominate/vote for the Hugos with my relentless onslaught of sad puppies, by now you should have received an email with your PINs for voting. (I just got mine last night).

Now, obviously I want everybody to vote for what they think is the best in each category. I’m not going to tell anybody what to do. If you think some particular book/story is absolutely amazing, then put it up.

What I would like to do with this post is have all of you post in the comments about what you think was totally awesome which came out in 2012. Tell us why you think some work should be nominated.

I’ll post my actual list once I get it filled in.

I am voting for Monster Hunter Legion for best novel, because I am selfish and entirely motivated by spite.

I am voting for Elitist Book Reviews for Best Fanzine, because I’m sick and tired of jerk face snob reviewers.

I’m voting for Schlock Mercenary in graphic works. (I have to check Howard’s blog to see what eligible 2012 book title was). This is a killer hard category, but I’ve been reading this comic every day for 12 YEARS and it has gotten better and better, with an excellent overall story. EDIT: The 2012 eligable book was Random Access Memorabilia.

I need to figure out what category Writing Excuses Podcast fits in, because they keep getting nominated, they’re all my friends, they’re awesome, but they keep running up against some unstoppable Dr. Who juggernaut every year.

EDIT: For artist, I can’t believe I forgot Vincent Chong. It is because he does the covers of my French novels, so mentally I was thinking those don’t count, but they totally do. The Hugo isn’t limited to America. Duh. The French Hard Magic cover was one of the coolest book covers I’ve ever seen and it came out in 2012.

Short stories/novellas, I’m still thinking about, because there are some really good ones. Here is a link to all of the Baen eligable works: http://larrycorreia.wordpress.com/2013/02/13/hugo-nominating/ And if you look those up, check out Gray Rinehart. Baen’s slushmaster general who has some eligable works.

So post below and let’s discuss. What do you think were the best works. Best cover artist? Best editor? Toni Weiskopf and Jim Minz, obviously. Best movie? Best TV show?

What do you think?

EDIT: Lots of good suggestions being listed below. Check them out.

And from Sad Puppies 2:

http://monsterhunternation.com/2014/02/20/sad-puppies-2-the-debatening/

Sad Puppies 2: The Debatening!

Posted on February 20, 2014 by correia45


Okay guys, Hugo nominations are now open. So this is the part where we argue about who to vote for! So I want you guys to make suggestions to the Monster Hunter Nation and those souls brave enough to sign up to combat Puppy Related Sadness.

There are the obvious nominations to end PRS, like Warbound for best novel (puppies love Faye, and Faye loves puppies). And I’ll post my final slate before I turn it in, but I want to hear what you have to say. What other deserving works are out there? Or another way to look at it, what deserving things are out there that the literati twaddle peddlers hate?

I’m nominating Toni Weisskopf for Best Editor, Elitist Book Reviews for Best Fanzine, and I’m nominating Dan Wells’ Butcher of Khardov for Best Novella, first because it was awesome, and second because I bet a random stranger on a game forum, five whole dollars, that I could get a work of game tie in fiction nominated for a Hugo.

So let’s hear some other ideas. What is out there for novels, novellas, short stories, etc? Please post. If I was a typical literati libprog blogger I would then “manage” or “massage” the comments so that only the stuff I liked appeared so it could be “progressive” or a “happy ending”, but since I’m a flaming capitalist right wing extermist I want my comments to be a blood sport of nerd arguing! WELCOME TO MY THUNDERDOME!

So let’s hear it. What do you think will best alleviate Puppy Related Sadness?

http://monsterhunternation.com/2014/03/18/sad-puppies-update-time-is-almost-up-to-nominate/

Sad Puppies Update: Time is almost up to nominate

Posted on March 18, 2014 by correia45


So everybody who registered to vote has probably received this note with your voting info:

There are just two weeks left in the nomination period for the 2014 Hugo Awards and the 1939 Retro Hugo Awards. Nominations will be accepted through March 31, 2014 at 11:59 pm PDT. Details for the process can be found on the Loncon 3 website at www.loncon3.org/nominations.php

Even if you have already submitted nominations, you may update your selections (either electronically or by mail) as long as the nomination period continues. If you’re submitting your nominations electronically, we recommend you do so in advance of the deadline to avoid any problems in the final hours when the system will be very busy.

I’ve not put together my final slate yet (been writing too much!) so don’t wait around for me. You can also go back and tweak your nominations up until the deadline.

This thread had a bunch of good ideas: http://monsterhunternation.com/2014/02/20/sad-puppies-2-the-debatening/

The ones that I’m sure on right now:

Best Novel: Warbound (the Grimnoir Chronicles trilogy) by Larry Correia

Best Novella: The Butcher of Khardov by Dan Wells

Seriously, go read it if you haven’t, because it is awesome. And I bet a random stranger on the internet $5 I could get a piece of game tie in fiction nominated for a Hugo

Sad Puppies has never advocated for voting for any stories that the voter hadn't read and has never advocated for voting for a suggested slate blindly. Both Larry and Brad have encouraged fans to vote for any story/author they felt deserving and done so publicly and repeatedly.

 sebster wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:
The only political aspect to Sad Puppies is that that they don't want an author's personal politics to play a role in evaluationg a story's Hugo worthiness. There is no unified political position shared by the authors promoted by Sad Puppies or any unifying demographic characteristic.

Holy gak man look at the fething name 'Sad Puppies Think of the Children'. When the name of your organisation is openly mocking a strawman of SJW, claiming there’s nothing political in the movement is just plain delusional.

The Sad Puppies came from a sad emotional commercial here in the US that plays sad music and tries to guilt viewers into adopting animals from local shelters.
http://monsterhunternation.com/2014/01/14/sad-puppies-2-the-illustrated-edition/
http://monsterhunternation.com/2013/01/16/how-to-get-correia-nominated-for-a-hugo-part-2-a-very-special-message/

The ugly truth is that the most prestigious award in sci-fi/fantasy is basically just a popularity contest, where the people who are popular with a tiny little group of WorldCon voters get nominated and thousands of other works are ignored. Books that tickle them are declared good and anybody who publically deviates from groupthink is bad. Over time this lame ass award process has become increasingly snooty and pretentious, and you can usually guess who all of the finalists are going to be that year before any of the books have actually come out or been read by anyone, entirely by how popular the author is with this tiny group.

This is a leading cause of puppy related sadness.

There are even explanatory cartoons that I've spoilered below:

That's the dirty little secret that was exposed and is causing such sour grapes; the Hugos had turned into an award determined by a tiny insular group of trufans that wanted the proper authors to win, the proper books to be reviewed and endorsed by the proper sites and make the suggested lists on the proper sites, tacitly condone the personal self promotion and campaigning done by the proper authors and enjoy a nice circle of affirmation and pats on the back when the proper stories won every year and their ideals of what real scifi and fantasy should be were upheld.

The number of nominators is very small considering the low hurdle for entry, that’s true. But the claim that therefore the awards were cliquish and insular and shut out deserving authors because of politics is the disputed point, and to be honest that claim is just total bs. Have you read the breakdown of winners that Martin put up? There’s just no case to claim that conservative authors had been shut out.

Here’s the thing, if the puppies hadn’t built themselves up around this anti-SJW nonsense, and instead just said focused on a get out the vote campaign, and just tried to encourage anyone to enrol and vote, there’d be no complaints, and no reason to challenge whatever the ballot was.

To an extent, sort of, that’s actually what Sad Puppies 3 did this year, by moving away from the previously all conservative slate to a slate spread across the political spectrum. The problem then is that their slate didn’t actually get the job done. While much of their picks got nominated, it was only when they happen to align with the Rabid Puppy slate. While the Rabid puppies were able to get up 6 nominations that weren’t on the Sad slate, the Sad slate didn’t get a single nomination across the line when it wasn’t on the Rabid slate.

The Sad puppies are actually a distraction. The real power was with the Rabid slate. I’m not sure if this is due to numbers, or because the Rabid slate more loyally followed the suggested slate, but it is what it is.

Now WorldCon has to decide if the Hugos are going to determined by any member of fandom willing to pay $40 and let the nominations fall as they will or if they want to change the system and make it an award given by a chosen few who determine who is worthy.

Moving to a select panel means it’s an entirely different award. Arguably a better award (I’ve never much liked the Hugos, to be honest), but if they change that radically they might as well just start from scratch with a totally different name.

I think it’s much more likely that the Hugos will continue much as they are, and for a period of time (hopefully a short period) the awards will be contested between two political factions both working with slate voting and drawing in as many voters as possible to beat the other side. For all the years that nonsense continues, the Hugos will mean nothing. Hopefully by the time the people involved grow up and move on to important things, the Hugos will still have some meaning.

The literatti is something Larry preaches against quite regularly and is what he's arguing against.
Stephen King argued the same point in his book "On Writing." He blames the literatti type as the ones that ruined poetry and are trying to ruin fiction.
Oh, and King is a liberal to boot. Shock I know. Two people from different political camps saying the same thing. Might be something to it?

 sebster wrote:

 Blood Hawk wrote:
I will give you that sex being involved helped get peoples attention. However this not a political thing is just a person thing. People like sex scandals, they like talking about them because they are so "juicy" You add sex on any to any scandal and the average person will get more interested it doesn't really matter about the political views of the people involved.

Not just sex, but sex involving the kind of person that a group loves to hate.

Yea a lot of people on pro-GG 'side' probably disagree with Quinn politics.

 sebster wrote:

 Blood Hawk wrote:
However I think you are missing one major thing here, which like a lot of controversies it is not the initial act but the response. The gamers are dead articles and other actions by these so called "journalists" was like pouring kerosene on a fire.

No, I get that’s how it worked. I simply make the point that the articles themselves were nothing like what was claimed, and while the timing was confrontational, the content was anywhere near as incendiary as gamergate claims. Instead, gamergate went looking to find offence.

Yea I am sure that people over exaggerated how bad the articles were. It is very clear by this whole situation that both sides have a level of distrust and disdain for the other side.

 sebster wrote:

 Blood Hawk wrote:
It is irrelevant what you think those articles definition of gamer was, what matters is what they (meaning the pro-GG people) thought the bloggers meant by gamer. They clearly saw "gamer" as just meaning people you play video games. And those articles pissed a lot of people off as you would imagine.

The meaning in the article was pretty clear. Anyone who read any of the articles would have seen clearly what was meant.

And people might claim it was just misinterpreted in the heat of the moment, that it was really just an accident, but that doesn’t really work. No-one ever accidentally misinterprets anything to think it was actually less incendiary and shocking than it really was. What happened was people in gamergate going looking for outrage, finding it by mischaracterising an article, and then repeating the mischaracterisation to hundreds of others, none of whom bothered to actually read the article.

In this regard gamergate was really no different to countless angry mobs that have come before.

Yes but gamer is just term that people use for people who play video games. That is it really, any other additional requirements just get us into the realm of no true scotsmen fallacy. I am sure the bloggers understood this and could used a different term or idea to explain themselves rather than saying gamer but I am sure they just used the term probably so they could have flashy headlines or something. You know things like “ ‘Gamers’ are over” or “A guide to ending ‘gamers’ ”. These flashy titles got them the attention, just not the type they wanted.

And Larry explains the separation of RP and SP and how they're are and aren't connected.
Or you could just make up whatever narrative fits your tastes.
http://monsterhunternation.com/2015/04/16/im-not-vox-day/

In short,

The Sad Puppies campaign doesn’t endorse anybody’s politics. Our slate had people from everything, left, right, middle, and question mark. We only cared if the works were good.

I personally do not agree with Vox on a wide variety of topics.

I do not speak for him.

I do not control him.

He does what he wants.

We have argued about this topic. You know the situation has gotten weird when I’m the voice of moderation.

I cannot disown what I do not own.

I neither condone nor defend any of his public statements. I did not make them.

Of course I do not like some of the things he has said.

Do you think the existence of Rabid Puppies has somehow made my life easier?

I’m not going to burn anyone in effigy. Stop asking.

I’m not going to condemn anyone by association. Stop asking.

 MWHistorian wrote:
The literatti is something Larry preaches against quite regularly and is what he's arguing against.
Stephen King argued the same point in his book "On Writing." He blames the literatti type as the ones that ruined poetry and are trying to ruin fiction.
Oh, and King is a liberal to boot. Shock I know. Two people from different political camps saying the same thing. Might be something to it?

Are there really a lot of literati in the Hugo Awards, though? Harry Potter won. Outside of the New Wave era, I don't really see a solid run of literati-types winning Hugos.

And if we are thinking of the same Stephen King article, he was more upset about the literati effect on literacy and readership. For example, pointing new readers to Ulysses as the greatest work of fiction in English is a sure way to prevent new readers.

Didn't he call out Harold Bloom for sneering at Harry Potter?

Prestor Jon wrote:
Correia and Torgersen have repeatedly publicly explained that they have no affiliation with Vox Day, have no control over what Vox Day does in regards to campaigning for Hugos, and don't feel the need to apologize or denounce somebody for whom they bear no responsibility.

I'm afraid the circumstances do not agree with you.

I don't need Larry and Brad or anyone else to say they're not Vox Day. I know that. Everyone knows VD is responsible for his own actions and statements.

But what many people suspect is that Larry and Brad worked with VD on all this. And based on the evidence, it's difficult to draw any other conclusion.

For example, Brad ran this year's Sad Puppies campaign and posted their voting slate on February 1. I can't tell you the exact time he posted the slate, but the first comment on the post appeared at 8:40 pm, followed quickly by many more.

Vox Day posted his Rabid Puppies ballot on February 2nd. Again, I don't know the exact time but the comments began coming in a little after 1 am. Depending on the time zone settings of these two sites, that means as little as a few hours separated the posting of the Sad and Rabid Puppies slates.

But hey, let's be generous and say an entire day separated the launch of their "separate" campaigns. If there was no coordination between the two campaigns that means in less than a day VD read all the stories on the Sad Puppies slate, decided which to discard and which to add to his own slate, and launched his campaign.

Oh, and he also found time to contact the artist who created the Sad Puppies logo and have that artist create a similar but different logo for the Rabid Puppies. (The artist is Lee Madison, who uses the name Artracoon on his art. He even set up a site to sell shirts with both Sad and Rabid Puppies logos.)

If it's possible to do all that in such a short time frame without coordinating the two campaigns, I'd love to hear how it was done.

Again, no one believes Larry and Brad are VD. But when people look at all this they see only one campaign, or two campaigns which have worked together.

Until Brad and Larry address this issue, no one will believe that VD didn't work together with them on the Puppy campaigns. And because of that, it's not unreasonable for people to lump both these two campaigns into the same pile of crap.

They're the same side of a particularly rank coin.

 .Mikes. wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:
Correia and Torgersen have repeatedly publicly explained that they have no affiliation with Vox Day, have no control over what Vox Day does in regards to campaigning for Hugos, and don't feel the need to apologize or denounce somebody for whom they bear no responsibility.

I'm afraid the circumstances do not agree with you.

I don't need Larry and Brad or anyone else to say they're not Vox Day. I know that. Everyone knows VD is responsible for his own actions and statements.

But what many people suspect is that Larry and Brad worked with VD on all this. And based on the evidence, it's difficult to draw any other conclusion.

For example, Brad ran this year's Sad Puppies campaign and posted their voting slate on February 1. I can't tell you the exact time he posted the slate, but the first comment on the post appeared at 8:40 pm, followed quickly by many more.

Vox Day posted his Rabid Puppies ballot on February 2nd. Again, I don't know the exact time but the comments began coming in a little after 1 am. Depending on the time zone settings of these two sites, that means as little as a few hours separated the posting of the Sad and Rabid Puppies slates.

But hey, let's be generous and say an entire day separated the launch of their "separate" campaigns. If there was no coordination between the two campaigns that means in less than a day VD read all the stories on the Sad Puppies slate, decided which to discard and which to add to his own slate, and launched his campaign.

Oh, and he also found time to contact the artist who created the Sad Puppies logo and have that artist create a similar but different logo for the Rabid Puppies. (The artist is Lee Madison, who uses the name Artracoon on his art. He even set up a site to sell shirts with both Sad and Rabid Puppies logos.)

If it's possible to do all that in such a short time frame without coordinating the two campaigns, I'd love to hear how it was done.

Again, no one believes Larry and Brad are VD. But when people look at all this they see only one campaign, or two campaigns which have worked together.

Until Brad and Larry address this issue, no one will believe that VD didn't work together with them on the Puppy campaigns. And because of that, it's not unreasonable for people to lump both these two campaigns into the same pile of crap.

They're the same side of a particularly rank coin.

Let me get this straight, the entire body of "evidence" that you feel proves that there was collusion between Sad Puppies and Rabid Puppies is that both campaigns released their suggested ballots within 24 hours of each other and that Rabid Puppies hired the same artist to design their logo? That's it? The fact that everyone knew that registration ended on 1/31 and that therefore the most logical and practical time to release suggestions was 2/1 or 2/2 so that voters would have as much time as possible to review suggestions and make suggestions for alternate works and people to put on the ballot is irrelee? The ONLY reason that a campaign to promote Hugo nominees to release suggestions within 48 hours of voter registration closing is due facto collusion? Seriously? Correlation is not causation.

Sad Puppies had already established that pattern over the previous two years. First promote registration then when the registration period ends start discussing nominees as soon as possible to provide as much exposure for worthy suggestions as possible during the nominating period. That's just basic logic and preparation not evidence of collusion.

Prestor Jon wrote:

Let me get this straight, the entire body of "evidence" that you feel proves that there was collusion between Sad Puppies and Rabid Puppies is that both campaigns released their suggested ballots within 24 hours of each other ....

That's some very selective pickings there. No, it's not just that. However before going any further could you post the proof Correia provided for starting his campaign?

 .Mikes. wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

Let me get this straight, the entire body of "evidence" that you feel proves that there was collusion between Sad Puppies and Rabid Puppies is that both campaigns released their suggested ballots within 24 hours of each other ....

That's some very selective pickings there. No, it's not just that. However before going any further could you post the proof Correia provided for starting his campaign?

We can go back to the beginning and recap everything, although it's already been done in this thread. Admittedly, things got a little convoluted after the gamergate discussion took over for a while.

Here is Correia's very first Sad Puppies post, the inception of the campaign that's gone on for the past 3 years:
http://monsterhunternation.com/2013/01/08/how-to-get-correia-nominated-for-a-hugo/

How to get Correia nominated for a Hugo.

Posted on January 8, 2013 by correia45


The Hugo awards are the most prestigious thing you can get in sci-fi/fantasy (other than fat royalty checks, obviously). Getting nominated for a Hugo is a great resume builder. I was a finalist for the Campbell award for best new writer a couple of years back, and though the Campbell is a separate award from the Hugo, it works through the same system, same voters, and is even given away at the same ceremony. Going through that experience was very enlightening.

The Hugo is pretty fancy, but basically, like most awards, it is a popularity contest. So who decides? Anybody who attended the last WorldCon (Chicago 2012) or who is a supporting member of the current WorldCon (San Antonio 2013) or next WorldCon (London 2014) can nominate. But you need to buy your membership by January 31.

Monster Hunter Legion is eligible… I’m just pointing that out. The fact that I write unabashed pulp action that isn’t heavy handed message fic annoys the literati to no end. When I got nominated for the Campbell, the literati message-fic crowd had a conniption fit. A European snob reviewer actually wrote “If Larry Correia wins the Campbell, it will END WRITING FOREVER.” (I’ve since won the prestigious Audie and got nominated for the Julia Verlanger for best fantasy novel IN FRANCE, and all writing still hasn’t been ended, so I must still need a Hugo nomination).

Okay, so you’re not going to be in Texas this year, but how about this? For $60 you can buy a supporting membership (and later on you can upgrade it to a full membership if you actually want to attend). This allows you to nominate whoever you want for the various Hugo awards. You tell them what you think the best books of the year were, the best TV shows, movies, even book review sites.

Are the Hugos a popularity contest controlled and determined by a small group of people? Yes, that's demonstrably true. The nominees for Best Novel this year only ranged between 212 and 387 votes per finalist (granted if both Larry Correia and Marko Kloos hadn't dropped out that threshold would be higher). The most presitigous award for SFF is determined by only a few hundred people out the millions of fans who read millions of stories a year. There were 1,827 ballots for Best Novel this year, that's actually more than last year when there were fewer than 1,600. The size of the electorate isn't an anomaly this year, it's always been tiny. The primary motivation behind the whole outrage of SP and RP is that they brough in outsiders, wrong fans, who voted for the wrong stories, and took away the ability of the trufans who had become accustomed to being the arbiters of Hugo worthiness.

http://monsterhunternation.com/2015/03/30/sad-puppies-update-honesty-from-the-other-side/

Sad Puppies Update: Honesty from the Other Side

Posted on March 30, 2015 by correia45


If you want to get a great glimpse into the minds of the people who hate the Sad Puppies campaign, read these comments.

http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/016177.html

Once you get done, you’ll see the exact sort of people who inspired me to start Sad Puppies.

It is a fantastic glimpse into their mindset. It isn’t about the quality of the work, it is about protecting the clique. The nominations won’t even be announced until the 4th, and they’re already flipping out. There are so many lies, distortions, misconceptions, and half truths in that comment thread it would take a novel worth of writing to fisk it.

When you see nonsense posts with all the vowels removed, that’s what SJW bloggers do to people who disagree with them.

My favorite parts are where they whine about needing to change the rules to protect their clique or how the Hugo admin should be pressured to throw out questionable (i.e. things that disagree with them) votes. You know, the exact sort of behavior I predicted years ago when I started this campaign. Well, shaming, slander, and shunning only motivated my people more last time, so they’ve got to try something.

But this is the best comment of all because if finally displays the ugly truth. If you don’t know, Teresa Nielsen Hayden was an editor at Tor and a Queen Bee among SJWs. Her husband Patrick Nielsen Hayden is also a Tor editor, and has garnered a ton of nominations.

#499 ::: Teresa Nielsen Hayden ::: (view all by) ::: March 29, 2015, 03:43 PM:
Why are people talking about what would happen if everyone who reads SF voted in the Hugos? IMO, it’s not a relevant question. The Hugos don’t belong to the set of all people who read the genre; they belong to the worldcon, and the people who attend and/or support it. The set of all people who read SF can start their own award.

Wow… Wrap your brain around that.

Funny. I seem to recall one of the things that inspired me to start the Sad Puppies campaign went something like this:

Correia: The Hugos are just a popularity contest for one tiny, insular, politically biased group of people.
SMOFs: NO! The Hugos are a prestigious award that represents the best of all fandom.
Correia: Nope. Here, let me prove it.

Fast forward a few years of us getting increasing numbers of outsiders involved and authors who don’t sit at the cool kid’s table nominated, and it is sure nice to see Teresa Nielsen Hayden finally agreeing with me in public.

But it is too late now, Teresa. The Sad Puppies voters got involved with WorldCon, paid their dues, and bought memberships so they could participate. The problem is that they’re the *wrong* kind of fans. You guys should have just been honest to begin with and none of this would have ever happened.

One last thing, I find it funny that they are casting all of these aspersions against the Hugo admins because they are holding firm and obeying the rules of their convention. I’ve seen where they are trying to pin this on me and saying that I’m trying to ruin the dignity of the Hugos. On the contrary, there had been allegations against that admins were suppressing votes for a long time, and I put those to bed. One of the goals of Sad Puppies 1 and 2 was to audit the system (I was an auditor before I became a writer). I kept track of Sad Puppies nominees and voters across the categories, and then compared the final numbers when they were released. After two years of doing that I was able to say that I saw zero indication of dishonesty or fraud, and that the Hugo admins had been perfectly honest in their dealings.

But somehow that has turned into me attacking their integrity. Nope. I did the opposite. I demonstrated that they were obeying all their rules. Now, I’m the bad guy because the SJWs are screaming at the admin to break their rules because people they don’t like obeyed the rules.

Man, it must be really hard for SJWs to say anything without lying.

Sad Puppies 3 standard bearer Brad Torgersen addressed all of their recent nonsense in more depth. He explains it rather well here: https://bradrtorgersen.wordpress.com/2015/03/29/nail-house/

And more here:
http://monsterhunternation.com/2015/03/31/sad-puppies-update-the-melt-down-continues/

I'll definitely give the Puppies that, though. They have definitely played with an open visor - I can't (and won't) accuse them of dishonesty or of cheating.

I do disagree with their rants against SJWs and PC-ness and other things that according to them have taken over the Hugo's.

It seems to me to be far more likely the WorldCon attendees are a fairly small group of people (everyone admits this), who like this Con because it and the rest of the attendees showcases similar tastes to their own, resulting in similar results year after year. I doubt the divide between Worldcon attendees and Sad Puppies is really along political lines as Correia claims (but he certainly foams at the mouth enough that I think he believes it).

For a better analysis of the problems of the Hugos we have noted left winger Eric Flint

http://www.ericflint.net/index.php/2015/04/16/some-comments-on-the-hugos-and-other-sf-awards/

The comments section includes agreement from Mercedes Lackey, and Larry Dixon

He also does a good job of putting the lie to the politics argument.

It is a very interesting article and major props to the author's hat!

I totally agree with his argument that the marketplace has grown and changed enormously since the 50s. I have been buying SF since the early 70s. Back in those days, there was almost no fantasy, the SF section was very much smaller than the Graphic Novels section of a modern bookshop (a section that didn't exist at all!)

Other categories that simply didn't exist include film and game tie-ins, and "dark fantasy". There were a lot fewer serial novels. It was starting to change by the 80s, thanks to the success of Star Wars merchandising, followed by novelisations of films like Alien.

Of course it has helped that disposable incomes have increased, and the physical cost of publishing books has reduced.

I don't know that quality has increased much if at all. Lots of people reading science fiction don't know or care much about real science. I doubt they care about Star Wars being a heroic fantasy story dressed up with SF tropes. It's still a good story, after all.

efarrer wrote:
For a better analysis of the problems of the Hugos we have noted left winger Eric Flint

http://www.ericflint.net/index.php/2015/04/16/some-comments-on-the-hugos-and-other-sf-awards/

The comments section includes agreement from Mercedes Lackey, and Larry Dixon

He also does a good job of putting the lie to the politics argument.

Interesting perspective.

efarrer wrote:
For a better analysis of the problems of the Hugos we have noted left winger Eric Flint

http://www.ericflint.net/index.php/2015/04/16/some-comments-on-the-hugos-and-other-sf-awards/

Interesting. It does support what I said earlier, about how the likely reason for Jim Butcher not winning an award (despite having a convincing argument that he deserves one) is the conflict between the Dresden Files being a long series that is most impressive when considered as a whole and the award being for the best novel of the current year, not political ideology.

 Kilkrazy wrote:

I don't know that quality has increased much if at all. Lots of people reading science fiction don't know or care much about real science. I doubt they care about Star Wars being a heroic fantasy story dressed up with SF tropes. It's still a good story, after all.

I suppose it depends on how you measure quality.

For me, the presence of real science in a sci fi story is usually an indicator of terrible prose or characterization ahead. If I want that, I'll read an actual science book. Some people just want pulpy thrillers. Others want books that make them think about society. And some want hard science fiction that makes absolutely no compromises to the story. So, what do you consider quality?

I find that the quality, as in the amount of satisfaction I get from reading a genre book, has improved quite a bit as the field has aged. Go back and read some of the early stuff, and you'll get painfully flat characters, simplistic plots, or tedious prose for the most part. Fiction writing has changed over the decades, and the expectations of readers and publishers have changed with it. There always has been a lot of garbage in the field, but there has never been a time when there were more authors delivering more books that satisfy. Your mileage may vary.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:

I don't know that quality has increased much if at all. Lots of people reading science fiction don't know or care much about real science. I doubt they care about Star Wars being a heroic fantasy story dressed up with SF tropes. It's still a good story, after all.

I suppose it depends on how you measure quality.

For me, the presence of real science in a sci fi story is usually an indicator of terrible prose or characterization ahead. If I want that, I'll read an actual science book. Some people just want pulpy thrillers. Others want books that make them think about society. And some want hard science fiction that makes absolutely no compromises to the story. So, what do you consider quality?

To be sure, and to some degree "quality" is a personal qualification. I don't particularly mind if the science in a story is wrong as long as it is a good story. In my view one of the points of SF as a genre is to transcend known science and create new situations that act as plot drivers.

I find that the quality, as in the amount of satisfaction I get from reading a genre book, has improved quite a bit as the field has aged. Go back and read some of the early stuff, and you'll get painfully flat characters, simplistic plots, or tedious prose for the most part. Fiction writing has changed over the decades, and the expectations of readers and publishers have changed with it. There always has been a lot of garbage in the field, but there has never been a time when there were more authors delivering more books that satisfy. Your mileage may vary.

Your finding that the books you read are getting better no doubt reflects your taste and judgement having improved, enabling you to select the best from the enlarged offering.

One of the benefits of Kindle is that a lot of early SF (30s to 50s) has now been re-released in very cheap anthologies (the Megapack series) which I have been reading. A lot of the early stuff was pretty rubbish but there was also a lot of good stuff.

According to the rule that 80% of everything is rubbish, there probably is as much rubbish around now as ever. Certainly I have read some absolute clangers of modern SF, strewn with lumpen prose, dull as ditchwater Mary Sue characters and plots sustained by a consistent series of dei ex machinae.

In other words there are a lot more good books and a lot more bad books and a much larger audience reading them. This of course increases the difficulty of any one novel getting noticed in a Hugo year, before we get on to the idea of the Hugo literary clique.

Prestor Jon wrote:
Here is the nomination post from MHN from Sad Puppies 1:

There’s a few problems with that line of argument;
The bolded text is from Sad Puppies 1, and is basically irrelevant to this year’s nominations. It’s a long stretch to claim that people coming in to Sad Puppies 3 went and read the organiser posts from two campaigns previously to conclude they should vote for their own preferences.
It’s confused at best, disingenuous at worst to say ‘pick who you want to pick, this is a movement to co-ordinate our impact on the Hugo awards, and by the way here’s exactly who I’m picking for this year, but really, please pick who you want to pick’.
This is really about Rabid Puppies, not Sad Puppies. They got up one best novel nomination in Sad Puppies 2. It’s when Rabid Puppies came on the scene that the impact dominated the awards, and while people like to claim that’s because Sad Puppies was picking up steam, a look at the split between the awards shows that isn’t true. Sad Puppies didn’t get up a single nomination that wasn’t also on the Rabid Puppies ticket, whereas Rabid Puppies got up 6 nominations without Sad support.

The Sad Puppies came from a sad emotional commercial here in the US that plays sad music and tries to guilt viewers into adopting animals from local shelters.

It’s pretty openly mocking the stereotype of the openly emotional SJW. If you really, truly just don’t see how this movement is about politics, here’s the words of the organisers;
Correia talking about the impact of Sad Puppies 2;
1. I said a chunk of the Hugo voters are biased toward the left, and put the author’s politics far ahead of the quality of the work. Those openly on the right are sabotaged. This was denied.
2. So I got some right wingers on the ballot.

Torgerson for SP3: Likewise, we’ve seen the Hugo voting skew ideological, as Worldcon and fandom alike have tended to use the Hugos as an affirmative action award: giving Hugos because a writer or artist is (insert underrepresented minority or victim group here) or because a given work features (insert underrepresented minority or victim group here) characters.

The original and current claim was that WorldCon voterstrufans were overlooking stories and authors that were popular and worthy because those authors/books didn't align with their own personal opinions of proper SFF literature and authors. The personal politics of authors came up during SP 2 when people that fit the SJW description started attacking Larry and others over politics and misconstruing what had been said by the SP campaign.

Well yeah, that’s all known, and established as why Sad Puppies came in to being. But the point is that just because they were attacked by some SJW types, it doesn’t mean the community as a whole was full of SJW who were letting their politics to decide the nominations and winners of the Hugos. Martin published a review of past winners (overall and recent) and found the awards handed out were spread across the political spectrum.

It’s probably a bit crass, but I’m going to repost my last post to you, because I think it gets to the crux of the issue pretty well.

“Here’s the thing, if the puppies hadn’t built themselves up around this anti-SJW nonsense, and instead just said focused on a get out the vote campaign, and just tried to encourage anyone to enrol and vote, there’d be no complaints, and no reason to challenge whatever the ballot was.

To an extent, sort of, that’s actually what Sad Puppies 3 did this year, by moving away from the previously all conservative slate to a slate spread across the political spectrum. The problem then is that their slate didn’t actually get the job done. While much of their picks got nominated, it was only when they happen to align with the Rabid Puppy slate. While the Rabid puppies were able to get up 6 nominations that weren’t on the Sad slate, the Sad slate didn’t get a single nomination across the line when it wasn’t on the Rabid slate.

The Sad puppies are actually a distraction. The real power was with the Rabid slate. I’m not sure if this is due to numbers, or because the Rabid slate more loyally followed the suggested slate, but it is what it is.”


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Blood Hawk wrote:
Yea I am sure that people over exaggerated how bad the articles were. It is very clear by this whole situation that both sides have a level of distrust and disdain for the other side.

There is, yeah. Two issues really, there’s a lot of bad blood over things that were said during this mess, and that’s on top of the issue that these two groups love to fight. It’s a tribal identity, really, “I am this kind of person and the way I prove it is to go and fight with this other kind of person, who are our enemy”.

Yes but gamer is just term that people use for people who play video games. That is it really, any other additional requirements just get us into the realm of no true scotsmen fallacy. I am sure the bloggers understood this and could used a different term or idea to explain themselves rather than saying gamer but I am sure they just used the term probably so they could have flashy headlines or something. You know things like “ ‘Gamers’ are over” or “A guide to ending ‘gamers’ ”. These flashy titles got them the attention, just not the type they wanted.

Sure, a gamer is a term for a person who plays video games. But the point is that term came with a whole lot of baggage until recently – 10 years ago very few guys would have mentioned they were a gamer on a first date, out of concern for what it signalled to their date. For most of us it’s been wonderful to see those negative connotations drop away.

But there is a handful of people who took on that gamer identity because it was a safe place, and then set about protecting it as much as they possibly could. I have no video game specific stories, but I have personal experience of people in my gaming group, friends, who reacted in downright insane ways to girls joining our group. They really didn’t want the outside world invading their safe, male adolescent space. As a result, many of the gamer stories ring true to me.

That’s really how I’ve seen much of gamergate, and especially the responses to those articles.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 MWHistorian wrote:
And Larry explains the separation of RP and SP and how they're are and aren't connected.

To repeat the point I've made a few times now - the Sad Puppy campaign is actually kind of a distraction. Before this year it had minimal effect, and this year the evidence shows that it's actually the Rabid Puppy campaign that's powerful, not Sad Puppy. Seriously, where the Sad and Rabid campaigns split, the Sad slate didn't get up a single nomination. It's likely that if Rabid hadn't existed, then the Sad Puppy campaign would have been like it was previously, getting one and sometimes two nominations on to some of the awards. If it wasn't for the slate voting and the political nonsense (which was largely removed for Sad Puppies 3), then the campaign would be fine, even a positive force.

But its Rabid Puppies that have likely caused the absolute domination of the awards, and done so for reasons of personality and politics that really have little to do with wanting more fun books to get recognised at the awards.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

efarrer wrote:
For a better analysis of the problems of the Hugos we have noted left winger Eric Flint

http://www.ericflint.net/index.php/2015/04/16/some-comments-on-the-hugos-and-other-sf-awards/

The comments section includes agreement from Mercedes Lackey, and Larry Dixon

He also does a good job of putting the lie to the politics argument.

That's a great article, thanks for posting it. As you say, it puts perhaps the final, most completely nail in the coffin that authors were being excluded because of their politics. Authors from across the political spectrum are excluded, and authors across the spectrum are constant award winners.

But what I found best in the article is the argument that the Hugos are much like most awards, people get almost arbitrarily deemed award winners or not, and from then on they will get nominated every year, or snubbed regardless of the quality of their work that year. Get nominated and win, and people will just assume you are worthy from then on.

And this isn’t just a Hugo’s problem. For a field involving tens of thousands of people, the Academy Awards have a remarkably narrow list that make up most of the nominations each year. It’s funny, people spent a long time talking about Martin Scorsese being ‘snubbed’ for best director, but at the same time people rarely mentioned that he kept getting nominated for his films, even when they weren’t very good. Gangs of New York was pretty much a complete mess, but he still got nominated for Best Director.

 sebster wrote:

Sure, a gamer is a term for a person who plays video games. But the point is that term came with a whole lot of baggage until recently – 10 years ago very few guys would have mentioned they were a gamer on a first date, out of concern for what it signalled to their date. For most of us it’s been wonderful to see those negative connotations drop away.

But there is a handful of people who took on that gamer identity because it was a safe place, and then set about protecting it as much as they possibly could. I have no video game specific stories, but I have personal experience of people in my gaming group, friends, who reacted in downright insane ways to girls joining our group. They really didn’t want the outside world invading their safe, male adolescent space. As a result, many of the gamer stories ring true to me.

That’s really how I’ve seen much of gamergate, and especially the responses to those articles.

I have never seen people act insane towards girls joining, however I have met guys that are gamers both online and in real life that are straight up sexist towards women. These weren't the trolls being obnoxious in region chat mind you, these were people that I spent time with in vent for example that were blatantly sexist. It was much easier to just ignore them since I was a guy.

As far as women invading their space another potential explanation is that these guys are not as threatened by women as much as change that these women represent. I do think some people in gaming see it as a "locker room utopia" as a book I just read recently put it and don't want that to change. Women like Anita Sarkeesian are a physical representations of that change hence the huge negative response.

 Blood Hawk wrote:
I have never seen people act insane towards girls joining, however I have met guys that are gamers both online and in real life that are straight up sexist towards women. These weren't the trolls being obnoxious in region chat mind you, these were people that I spent time with in vent for example that were blatantly sexist. It was much easier to just ignore them since I was a guy.

As far as women invading their space another potential explanation is that these guys are not as threatened by women as much as change that these women represent. I do think some people in gaming see it as a "locker room utopia" as a book I just read recently put it and don't want that to change. Women like Anita Sarkeesian are a physical representations of that change hence the huge negative response.

Yeah, 'locker room utopia' is a good way of describing it. And it gets complicated because people are allowed to have time away from the other sex. I guess the difference is between saying 'I want to go away on a fishing trip with the blokes' and 'there are no women allowed at this fishing hole, ever'.

Large parts of gamergate struck me as doing the latter.

Offered without comment.

Can't get it to load on iPad. Please comment.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Can't get it to load on iPad. Please comment.

Somebody wrote a ditty mocking and deriding people who vote for Hugo nominees that don't fit in with the accepted trufan clique criteria for proper nominees and Mikes thought it was so awesome that we should all listen to it. I can't get it to play but here are the lyrics:

New Song: "Sad Puppies (Aren't Much Fun)"
Published April 16, 2015 19:48:40
You have, perhaps, heard of the kerfuffle involving this year's Hugo Awards. (If you haven't, the link below is a pretty good summary.) To be blunt, the whole thing is a pain in the ass. So, song. Sad puppies, sad puppies, Sad puppies aren't much fun. All their plots, all their hooks, But no one nominated their books, Sad puppies never won. Oblivion was their fate, Till they stuffed the ballot with hate, Sad puppies want to run, no no no. Rabid puppies joined in too, They’ll kill the Hugo before they’re through, Rabid puppies have just begun. Sad puppies Brad’s puppies Sad and Rabid puppies aren't much fun. (C'mon, everybody! NO, REALLY, EVERYBODY!) Nominated barely, Can’t win fairly, Sad and Rabid puppies aren't much fun. (One more time for Theodore Beale!) Sad Puppies, Jesus, what annoying puppies, Sad and Rabid puppies aren't much fun. ----- Sad Puppies (Aren't Much Fun) Lyrics: Tom Smith Music: "Dead Puppies (Aren't Much Fun)" as recorded by Ogden Edsl From a suggestion by Kerry Gilley Parallel processing by Royce Day Lyric suggestions by Becky Kyle and Harold Feld "Noah Ward" used with permission -- Special Thanks to David Gerrold

You keep going on about this clique but have yet to offer any definition of what it is, or indeed any proof it actually exists.

Feel free to use your next post to provide these details.

 .Mikes. wrote:
You keep going on about this clique but have yet to offer any definition of what it is, or indeed any proof it actually exists.

Feel free to use your next post to provide these details.

There is a small group of people in the hugo awards who reject people based on their beliefs, simply enough not because of content of their books.

If a book has a neo-nazi who wrote a mass selling book it is fine for him to receive the hugo award. AS long as he or she or a transgender person are not a criminal who is spouting murder.

I mean there is this whole mentality that gamers are not welcoming of girls in gaming. 85% of gamers don't have their microphone on. Most don't care. A single person is not representative of any group. Unless they are an elected representative.

 Asherian Command wrote:

There is a small group of people in the hugo awards who reject people based on their beliefs, simply enough not because of content of their books.

If a book has a neo-nazi who wrote a mass selling book it is fine for him to receive the hugo award. AS long as he or she or a transgender person are not a criminal who is spouting murder.
sentative.

OK. Do you have the breakdown of all these transgender Hugo winners against other demographics?

 Asherian Command wrote:
There is a small group of people in the hugo awards who reject people based on their beliefs, simply enough not because of content of their books.

Well that's certainly stating the obvious. Two people would count as a "small group", but have no significant effect on the voting process. Perhaps you could clarify just what percentage of the voters are a member of this "small group"?

If a book has a neo-nazi who wrote a mass selling book it is fine for him to receive the hugo award. AS long as he or she or a transgender person are not a criminal who is spouting murder.

...

Is there some kind of typo in here, or did you really just say something that absurd?

I mean there is this whole mentality that gamers are not welcoming of girls in gaming.

It's not just a "mentality", it's what actually happens. Women who try to get into gaming often face sexist rejection, there are giant flame wars and endless whining about "censorship" if anyone criticizes sexist attitudes in gaming, etc. The response to people pointing out a problem in the community is to fix the problem, not to ignore it because you personally aren't guilty of anything.

 .Mikes. wrote:

 Asherian Command wrote:

There is a small group of people in the hugo awards who reject people based on their beliefs, simply enough not because of content of their books.

If a book has a neo-nazi who wrote a mass selling book it is fine for him to receive the hugo award. AS long as he or she or a transgender person are not a criminal who is spouting murder.
sentative.

OK. Do you have the breakdown of all these transgender Hugo winners against other demographics?

No its more of idea that people will reject anyone based on any thing that is not their belief.

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Is there some kind of typo in here, or did you really just say something that absurd?

Not really a typo just a misworded bit.

I meant that as long as they are not a criminal who is currently murdering people or is a criminal in general. Their beliefs don't really matter, if the stuff they write is nominated they have just as equal an opportunity to win as someone with a different set of ideas or rules.

It's not just a "mentality", it's what actually happens. Women who try to get into gaming often face sexist rejection, there are giant flame wars and endless whining about "censorship" if anyone criticizes sexist attitudes in gaming, etc. The response to people pointing out a problem in the community is to fix the problem, not to ignore it because you personally aren't guilty of anything.

True but false. It is not overwhelmingly sexist compared to say many other industries where it is absolutely toxic.

That idea of pointing at the community and saying it is your fault. will only make them hostile.

If i recall, there was this whole thing where i have talked to a few girls and I did a study a while ago. (Can't share it though due to not wanting to reveal my identity) But what it showed was that there wasn't as much sexism as once believed it still is tthere, but it is not as bad as people make it out to be. There isn't this massive toxicity problem as there once was. Its still there, but it is becoming more minimal as time goes on.

 Asherian Command wrote:

No its more of idea that people will reject anyone based on any thing that is not their belief.

How conveniently unprovable.