Life Log #03: Strange Spines, Mites, and BEER!
The past five days have been…interesting. Yes. Interesting. Let’s go with that. So, what happened?
SF/F Commentary
SF/F Commentary
On Forgiveness, Bad Behavior, and Block Policies
If the post-GamerGate years didn’t change the way I interact with people in SF/F and online, the past year certainly has. From the election of a serial asshole to the endless parade of turdmuffins on Twitter, the last year has made it clear that “business as usual” just won’t work for my sanity. In fact, more and more, I’m learning that a lot of folks I know have even less tolerance for all sorts of behavior we all might have put up with a few years ago. Ann Leckie, for example, has for a while used this basic policy for handling responses to her Tweets:
SF/F Commentary
SF and Food: The Future Shall Be Fed
When I think about representations of food in science fiction, I’m struck by the fact that a lot of science fiction simply washes over the issue of production and distribution. Food is almost always “around” in SF literature. After all, most SF characters have to eat something from time to time (though they never poop). However, very little of the genre actually directly addresses the future economics of food, and even when it does, it’s usually a cursory glance. The one exception might be the dystopian genre, especially Soylent Green (1973). Since dystopia and starvation go hand in hand, the genre is naturally concerned with food.
SF/F Commentary
Thoughts on Years of Reading (Mostly) Women
Back in 2015, roughly 92% of the works I read were by women. This was mostly intentional, as The Skiffy and Fanty Show hosted a women-centric (and non-binary friendly) theme throughout 2015.[note]If you count the works I assigned in my classes, the total comes out to roughly 55% in favor of women. The dramatic shift from 92% to 55% can be blamed on the relative absence of female writers during the periods in which my courses have focused, and so some of my courses swing in favor of men (though not by a massive margin; I didn’t actually read that much in 2015, so it’s not that hard to swing things in the other direction).[/note] In 2016, the numbers were less skewed, with 61% of works by women. Including my teaching numbers into this list is a bit too complicated, so I won’t bother including it here.[note]Complicated primarily because one of the courses I taught focused on “Queer Autobiography,” which includes numerous works by people with gender identities that are difficult to classify without making assumptions. If you count LGBTQ+ as a factor, at least 22% of the works I read were by people in that category. For all the numbers in this post, I went with easily accessible information about identity for what I hope are obvious reasons.[/note] Obviously, having a more “open” year for reading meant my numbers were more fluid. But even with that fluidity in place, there’s a clear indication that my reading habits have changed. So, here’s what I’ve learned from the past few years:
SF/F Commentary
Why I Will Never Give Up My Terrible Movies
Bad movies. Some of us love to hate them. Some of us just hate them. And then there are people like me. I have a fondness for a few films that practically everyone would agree are terrible. My seemingly illogical love of 1988’s absurd McDonald’s-funded E.T. rip-off, Mac & Me, has earned me a rotating sequence of callbacks on my podcast, The Skiffy and Fanty Show.[note]I’m only half teasing…[/note] It’s a sickness to some, but for me, it’s a product of experience.[note]This topic was suggested by wabbit89 on Twitter. Thanks![/note] To be fair, I almost deserve it. I will jump at the flip of a hat to defend that movie against almost any criticism, not because I believe it’s high quality cinema but because there is a deeper connection to that movie for me, as there is for so many of the trashfire films that occupy my DVD rack.
SF/F Commentary
On Generation Ships and Pandorum (2009)
One thing that has always struck me about generation ships is the way in which they are usually treated as microcosms for the Earth (as it was, is, or might be). Like the wagon train to the west, the generation ship can help us move the social and political problems of our world into an isolated space for interrogation. That detachment, I would argue, is a part of what makes so much of science fiction so influential, and why generation ships are somewhat easy mechanisms for staging the kinds of socio-political criticism so much of science fiction is known for (in theory).[note]The topic of generation ships was suggested by Jeff Xilon on Twitter. Thanks, Jeff![/note]