The “Bully” That Therefore I Am: Final Thoughts on Fail-ty and Social Activism
The last week or so has been somewhat illuminating. First, I stumbled upon Lavid Tidhar’s coverage of the Elizabeth Moon Islamaphobic rant (a.k.a. the Moon Fiasco, which sounds suspiciously like a silly children’s detective story); when I say I stumbled, I mean that with the utmost sincerity, as I had not been looking for it, nor had I known about the incident until said stumbling. Then K. Tempest Bradford talked briefly about scare quotes and, as a subtitle of sorts, the distracting nature of others attempting to label social activists as some derivation of “fail” (fail fandom, fail community, fail Nazi, and so on), specifically in relation to the Manifesto of No-Consequence that I linked to here. And then it happened: I got called a bully by an anonymous individual in the comments located here. Why? Because apparently if you post something on your blog that offers a critical view of another viewpoint (or comment on another blog posting about an incident related to it, or both), and then defend yourself in your comment thread against individuals who haven’t the courage to even say who they are, that makes you a bully. Oh, and it gets worse. If that something you’re pointing to happens to be a counter-boycott to a hardly-organized, but public cry for a boycott against an author who says something pretty much everyone agrees is deplorable, and you decide to take the counter-boycott-ers to task for what amounts to a hypocritical position (first briefly in a post, and then at length in the comments on your blog–the italics will become important at the end, hang in there), then that really makes you a bully. At least, that’s the logic I’m being presented with. And, of course, it gets worse, because what the pronouncement of the “bully” title amounts to is a deflection of what clearly are legitimate critiques of a position that contradicts itself in the saying (even before the saying). Heaven forbid that one should actually address the hypocrisy or the contradictions inherent in one’s position. But let’s get specific. When I linked to S. F. Murphy’s post several days ago, I made the argument that I considered his counter-boycott hypocritical, intellectually vacuous, and fallacious. Strong words? You bet. I also said that Murphy and I have agreed on things in the past (which isn’t a lie; I have). Murphy isn’t alone, though, and it would be fair to say that I understand his frustration (and others like him) with the reactions that have occurred in the past with regards to seemingly less problematic issues. But that’s not a logical basis for the counter-boycott. Murphy certainly doesn’t agree with me, but what really acted as the catalyst for this post were the comments made by an anonymous individual who, similarly to Murphy, suggested I was a bully and, dissimilarly to Murphy, suggested that I was one of the individuals who “dog-piled” Moon’s blog, called for a boycott of her work, and tried to pressure the WisCon folks into revoking her Guest of Honor Status. Why? Frustration, on the one hand, and a general inability to see the fundamental contradiction that lies beneath the Manifesto of No-Consequence. It’s also a very clever attempt at confirmation bias (reality check: I didn’t post anything on Moon’s blog, I have only said that I won’t buy her work and that boycotts are reasonable and expected consequences for racist and ethnocentric behavior, and have no real opinion about WisCon except to say that it isn’t a convention I would likely go to anyway, so whether she is GoH or not is irrelevant to me personally–though I do have thoughts about it). But maybe this would be a good time to tear down a few fundamental flaws that seem to sit within the Manifesto of No-Consequence (within the terms presented to me by said anonymous commenter). The Manifesto of No-Consequence makes the following argument: I think what X did is deplorable, but I dislike the individuals who are reacting against her, and so I will continue to buy X’s stuff. OR When I ordered a copy of _The Deed of Paksenarrion_ a few minutes ago, it was because the *priority* of voting against this vilification was greater to me than the *priority* of disagreeing with her, which I feel too. (from my comment thread) OR So if I see a disproportionate response, e.g. a boycott or thousands of drive-by comments or an effort to have the woman’s con invitation revoked, there’s no contradiction in paying that down in my own slight way to lessen the personal consequences to someone who excites my sympathies for reasons outside of her politics. (from my comment thread) Notice that each one suggests that the speaker disagrees with X (or Moon)(in fact, one comment contained the following line about Moon’s position: “[it’s] ignorant, condescending, disrespectful, and full of bad in-group/out-group thinking”). But what it also suggests is a justification for the unwillingness to act. These are ideas that negate themselves. They enunciate disagreement while also suggesting that said disagreement is not strictly relevant, nor important enough to be valued equal to or greater than a presumably annoying, perhaps rude, social practice. se. But when one’s pronouncement of “disagreement at the level of deplorability” sits alongside a pronouncement of “support in counteraction to another group,” we’re presented an absolute contradiction. One cannot say “I disagree with your racist position” while also paying that individual for their words and have that first part mean anything whatsoever; so long as one claims to care about the dissolution of racism, these two positions are in contradiction. This is the same as saying that you do not support a company because it uses sweatshops, yet you continue to give money to that company. The justification might be “because I don’t like the protesters outside your door,” but the end result is still a negation of the “I don’t support sweatshops” position. This is what some people call “flapping your gums.” And this is
Strange Keywords People Arrive Here Through
In the interest of humor, I present to you the oddest search terms/phrases that have led people to this blog at one point or another (with commentary): how to clean satin bags (Because there is an overabundance of things related to satin bags on this blog; just look at my “Cleaning For Cross Dressers” label) “craig herbertson” (I have no idea who this is) i hate jk rowling (I’ve apparently become the dispenser of author hate here; I guess it makes sense, since I did say this) scifi cat (At least it’s scifi based…) toodrunk satin blogspot (Maybe they were looking for “too drunk satin blogspot,” or “toodrunk” is a word I’m simply unfamiliar with; I suspect it’s drunkenese for “why am I drunk googling?”) “remember you’re a one-ball” (I will, thank you.) nirlum (Nak nak nulu bol ock ock to you too. That’s Ewok for “WTF?”) “verses on st. andrews” (Because nowhere is better to go for your Biblical learning than WISB) intrigued by something (How deliciously vague…) norp (Seriously, what’s with the weird words?) “i am afraid that we cannot keep” (How deliciously specific…) “i now pronounce you someone else” (Well, thank you…) “shaving my head” “locks of love” (I did something like that once; the next year, we were in two different wars…go figure) “sniffed his armpit” (…) does sean astin have asthma? (I find it amusing that some people think he might have asthma because he played an asthmatic in a movie. To which I say, “If he had asthma, he would have known how to use an inhaler correctly in The Goonies. That is all.) explain obsessions (No.) explain the laser technology? (No. Read a book.) felt crippled (I’m sorry…I really can’t help you with that.) gerbil food list (Because clearly you have something against hamsters…) limitations of primates (They have none. They are our masters. Bow before the ape king!) There are many more, but I think that’ll tide you over for the evening. What is the weirdest search term you’ve ever seen as a referral on your blog or website? Let me know in the comments.
A. Lee Martinez’s Marriage to the Internet (or Why the Internet is a Walking Contradiction of Good/Bad)
If you haven’t seen it already, A. Lee Martinez has come out in defense of the Internet. You see, folks are bashing the poor Internet, and someone needs to come out and say how good it really is, because, after all, the Internet is wonderful and it makes things all rainbows and flowers. Okay, so that’s an unfair look at things. I’m being facetious, or attempting to be anyway. A. Lee Martinez is right that there has been an inordinate amount of anti-Internet stuff lately. Hell, there has been anti-Internet stuff flooding the, well, Internet for a while now. See for yourself. Even The Atlantic has provided some interesting thoughts on the “it’s making us stupid” argument. The thing is, there are probably truths and falsehoods on both sides of the argument. There are real consequences for the changes the Internet has brought on us. As a teacher (new though I am), I have seen what many of these changes look like: there is an increased reluctance to “search on.” I wouldn’t say that this is somehow making us dumber so much as making us progressively more ignorant. That is a problem all on its own. The only thing I take issue with in Martinez’s post is this: But for all its unpleasantness, stupidity, and absurdity, the internet has done the unimaginable. It has given nearly everyone a voice. (Except for the very poor, who always, always get screwed.) It has taken the ability to express yourself and made it such a common thing that we don’t realize how amazing it is. It’s allowed us to tap the collective knowledge of mankind without having to even leave our homes. I find it amusing that this paragraph begins with what is not necessarily “good” by default, and then ends with an overwhelming positive. Yes, the Internet has completely changed how we share knowledge, and for all the bad things that the Internet does to us (I challenge the “stupid” assertion, though), the fact that it has made information, vital and trivial, instantly available to a much larger portion of the world’s population than every before is a monumental feat. Yes, our world is still imperfect; the poor still do not have access to the Internet, even in the United States. But we’re getting there. There will be a time when almost everyone will have access. The more knowledge we have at our fingertips, the greater the possibility that we can be informed about the things that really matter. The Internet, more or less, makes that possible. The problem, though, is this idea that providing everyone with a public voice is somehow a good thing. I challenge this notion because we have seen the consequences of this in the book world. Anyone can say anything about a book these days. There are rarely consequences for what we say, except consequences that go in the opposite direction (poor sales, for example). The “expert” opinion seems to have been supplanted by the “amateur” one. There are certainly amateurs who have valuable things to say about a subject, but there are also seas of individuals who have nothing productive to add to the conversation, and yet still feel as though they should somehow be granted the same attention given to the adequate amateur or the “expert.” I’m not suggesting that “experts” are always correct, or even always good at what they do. They get things wrong all the time, as do “amateurs.” But they are right more often than the folks who write one line critiques on Amazon.com or incoherent blog posts about why *insert President here* is evil and should be impeached. Even positive critiques from these folks are meaningless in the long run. So, I challenge this idea that providing a space for everyone to say whatever they want in public is inherently good. There are consequences: the quality of rhetoric drops drastically, false information is easy to spread, and so on. It’s great that we have more voices, because diversity is always a good thing, but a limitless diversity is problematic. The Internet, for all its wonders, has no way to deal with this. It is powerless to what is eating it alive from the inside. I don’t think it will ever gain the power to do something about the problems it has created either. I think we’re stuck with them, for good and for bad.
Science Fiction Movies: The Neglected Field? Since When?
A few weeks ago, Michael Booth posted an article on the Denver Post‘s website about the movie Serenity (i.e. Firefly the Movie). In that article, he made two interconnected points: 1) that Serenity is a good introductory science fiction film for the younger generation, particularly young teenagers, and 2) that science fiction movies are a neglected field. I don’t disagree with the first of these points. Serenity is a fantastic movie; it’s an exciting space adventure full of fascinating ideas, plenty of excitment, and just the right amount of humor. The second point, however, is one of the most ridiculous, if not downright ignorant, comments on science fiction I’ve seen in the last year. Since when have science fiction movies been neglected? Not in my lifetime, that’s for sure, and before I started writing this post, I would have bet hard cash on that. Now, I have hard evidence. IMDB has a list of the top all-time box office earners in the United States (not adjusted for inflation, I think). There are 466 movies on that list. Of those 466, a total of 86 are science fiction movies. 107 are fantasy, although there is a lot of crossover between science fiction, fantasy, and horror, so the numbers swing slightly in multiple directions. The point is that science fiction movies make up roughly 18.6% of the top 466 box office earners in the United States. That might not sound like much, but you have to remember that there are many major genres (fantasy, horror, drama, action, comedy, etc.). Making up 1/5th of IMDB’s list is nothing to scoff at. That’s bloody incredible. But it gets better. You knew that, right? It has to get better. Of the top 20 movies on that list, exactly half are science fiction (though you might argue that one or two of them are something else). Science fiction movies hold 3 of the top 5 spots (1st, 3rd, and 4th), and there are only two non-genre movies in the top twenty (Titanic at #2 and The Passion of the Christ at #15), since the rest are fantasy flicks. Neglected my ass. If science fiction movies are being neglected, then the entire movie industry is screwed. If Booth were making the point that science fiction movies are neglected in academic circles, I might have more to agree with him about, but he’s making an argument that is patently false. Science fiction movies don’t need you coercing children into watching them. They’re already watching them. All they need is exactly what they’re getting now: attention.
A Walmart Fail: A First For Me, or How Books and Girlie Things Are Related
Today was supposed to be an amazing day. Last week I ordered a new bookcase from Walmart after discovering I could fit one more in my apartment and move some of my books from the tops of bookshelves and the floor to an appropriate place (I also ordered a pair of pillows, but there’s nothing interesting about that). This morning I checked Fedex, saw that my package was being delivered today, and suddenly grew very excited. Bookshelves do that to me. But when I opened the package, this is what I discovered (after the fold): That’s right. Twelve pairs of black, high-heel shoes with flowers on them. Clearly shoes and bookcases have a lot in common. They’re of the same genus (litteraeus), they look remarkably the same (wood and shoe fabric clearly being made from the same source–a tree), and are obviously kept in the same department and used for exactly the same things. Except…all of that is a load of crap. They’re clearly not alike in any way, shape or form. Hell, they’re not even kept in the same bloody department. Have you ever been inside a Walmart where the shoes and the books were literally in the same place? No, of course not, because they are more closely tied into apparel than they are books (which are usually near all the media stuff, like DVDs, because both are about frakking stories). So, how was your day? Update: The bookshelf came at about 5:25 PM EST. The Fedex guy has no idea what happened. They sent two packages to me, apparently, and one of them wasn’t supposed to go to me at all. Fun, huh?
A Final Answer to the Question of Questions: Is Science Fiction Dying?
No, it is not. Now shut up already. The next person who raises this question, even if they’re going to say “no” in their response, will get an unwelcome at-home meeting from me and my polystyrene robot. Yes, the robot has a ray gun, and before Adam comes along and tries to tell me that a ray gun isn’t science fiction without an explanation for its power source, I’m going to say that it is powered by the tears from everyone who said George Lucas ruined their childhood with the prequel movies. That’s about as science fictional as you can get. That is all.