Hugo nominees for 2014 (shortlist @ post 156 on page 8)

[mormont]

I have no idea what you mean. :ninja:

[Maester Llama]

You know, after discussing the whole reading-for-subjective-merit thing and how it relates to "no award" with Felice and others here and considering the issue closed for now, I went away and read some opinions elsewhere in fandom and did a little more thinking and I think I may be changing my mind a little. Specifically, after reading points made elsewhere in fandom and thinking back to the [full disclosure: very few, though very telling] incidents I've read around the edges of involving this person, I'm not sure I'll be reading Vox Day's story, despite saying I'd read everything and try and judge in a measured way. My personal preference is to try and be "measured," and so this feels uncomfortable, but currently less uncomfortable than trying to read a work written by a person who is an active fountain of spewing molten hate like its a work written by anyone else. I'm not sure you get a hearing after you say things like that and stand by them, even if on a grammatical / sentence-by-sentence level your writing somehow makes the sun come out and the flowers grow or whatever. I feel like you don't. I feel like you really don't.

I was also being disingenuous in a way by pretending I was gonna read it and give it a fair try. Because, knowing what little I do about the author and the things he has said, even in the extremely unlikely event that I grooved on "the whispering promise of the incipient dark" and the rest of it, would I actually be comfortable with it receiving recognition, artificial though awards may be? No. No, I really don't think so. I'm undecided right now, but I'm leaning toward not reading Day. I may still go with the "fair shake" policy with the other authors caught up in this recommended slate thing -- which means that I should find out more about what was on the slate and delve into the bowels of the whole situation to be a responsible voter; fuck, I really didn't wanna get into this thing and go to their creepy websites and shit.

[David Selig]

Vox's story sucks anyway by any remotely objective measure, so not reading it for whatever reason is a good decision.

[thecryptile]

Correia's "Sad Puppies" campaign has accomplished everything it was intended to do. It proved unequivocally that the Hugos are just a popularity contest, where many voters don't even read the nominees and politics matters more than prose.

I hadn't heard of any of the nominees this year save Jordan (of course), hatemongers Correia & Sanderson (they're both devout Mormons who support traditional marriage for those who don't know), and progressives Stross & Chiang.

Personally, I think it's friggin' hilarious that LonCon rejected Gaiman's buddy Jonathon Ross because fat shaming and now they're stuck with doubleplus ungood thought criminal Vox Day.

The "No Award" campaign plays into the "Sad Puppies" strategy. By refusing to consider works because of politics, the "No Award" crowd are proving the that the Hugos are a farce where politics trumps prose.

[mormont]

Correia's "Sad Puppies" campaign has accomplished everything it was intended to do. It proved unequivocally that the Hugos are just a popularity contest, where many voters don't even read the nominees and politics matters more than prose.

Proving that the Hugos are (to whatever degree) a popularity contest is like proving that the sun rises in the morning. If that was what Correia intended to prove, well done (golf clap.)

Proving the rest: er, not proven. I'm willing to bet that most voters will read all the short fic nominees, as they do usually. And as for politics, I find it's important not to confuse politics with being an asshole. Too many people do. Being an asshole and a bigot will undoubtedly matter, but this does not prove that politics matters more than prose. It proves that being an asshole and a bigot matters. There might, I suppose, be a demonstration that being an asshole matter more than prose, if either Correia or Day actually write good prose. Big 'if', though.

Personally, I think it's friggin' hilarious that LonCon rejected Gaiman's buddy Jonathon Ross because fat shaming and now they're stuck with doubleplus ungood thought criminal Vox Day.

Potentially, the irony is even greater. Consider that Gaiman turned down a nom for Ocean. Now think: what if Correia's book was originally sixth on the list?

But this aside, as we've already pointed out - apples and oranges. Voters voting for a nominee is not at all the same as the organisers appointing a host. There's no discordance.

[Darth Richard II]

Sanderson is a hate monger now because of his religion? Have you actually read any interviews with the guy? I mean, what the fuck. I can't do this. Headache incoming.

[thecryptile]

Proving that the Hugos are (to whatever degree) a popularity contest is like proving that the sun rises in the morning. If that was what Correia intended to prove, well done (golf clap.)

In Correia's own words:

Short Version:

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.

3.The biased voters immediately got all outraged and mobilized to do exactly what I said they’d do.

4.Point made.

http://monsterhunternation.com/2014/04/24/an-explanation-about-the-hugo-awards-controversy/

Then you have the accusations of ballot stuffing etc. as if a best selling author doesn't have a fan-base.

I love, love, LOVE, Correia. As a gun-toting SFF geek, I am his target audience. I heard about him from Dillon Press (not a publisher, they make reloading equipment) and ran out and got Monster Hunter International and never looked back. This is a guy that is selling books at gunshows to people who've never heard of a Hugo, as well as the Baen Spectrum Hammer's Slammers crowd.

Correia also wanted to show that conservative SFF fans (like me) do exist, and that the typical WorldCon voter is not necessarily the typical SFF reader. I think he's made some good headway there too.

There might, I suppose, be a demonstration that being an asshole matter more than prose, if either Correia or Day actually write good prose. Big 'if', though.

Are you actually going to read Warbound and Opera Vita Aeterna? Good for you. Too many are taking the attitude of "A Bad Man wrote the book, the book must be a Bad Book".

There are legions proudly proclaiming that not only will they refuse to read anything on the Sad Puppies slate, they will nominate "No Award" ahead of everyone on the slate-- even though several of them aren't really involved in the whole Red/Blue SF kerfluffle.

Sanderson is a hate monger now because of his religion? Have you actually read any interviews with the guy? I mean, what the fuck. I can't do this. Headache incoming.

It's not me calling Sanderson a hatemonger- I'm in the Correiatech Book Club camp myself. But other, more progressive and enlightened thinkers have denounced his homophobic bigotry:

It bothers me that people, both in the Fandom Secrets thread and in the discussion on Reddit, were quick to defend him and take a conciliatory tone, like it's fine that he believes homosexuality should repressed as long as he seems friendly, and it's okay that he'd vote against our right to get married, and thinks he'd be doing us a favor by doing so, because hey, he does say he's for civil unions (which is good, but also has some issues, which I won't get into). (...)

I think showing respect for homophobia sends the wrong message. It further encourages people to use religion and morals as an excuse to be bigoted. It gives the impression that homophobia is fine to express as long as you don't do it like Fred Phelps.

I also don't give anyone a pat on the head for being willing to "discuss" their prejudiced beliefs with queer people.

http://citrinesunset.dreamwidth.org/43738.html

[Darth Richard II]

I have no words.

[Maester Llama]

On the Sanderson issue I too have no words. On the "no award" issue I will bite:

Correia and some of the folks associated with him -- to the best of my limited knowledge -- have politics, some of which I disagree with to a significant degree. Awesome. I will read and see what I think, as I think is best to do when possible. Vox Day calls people of African-American descent subhuman animals. Sorry dude. No hearing. As was mentioned a couple posts ago, by Mormont I think, there's a difference between expressing opinions and hate speech, between being open about your politics and being a weapons grade asshole. I don't think writing something that numerous people feel is good prose [setting aside for the moment the fact that according to those brave souls here who've read it its actually pretty shitty] should be recognized more within a community than the fact that one's speech and influence are so toxic as to make other members of that community feel actively unsafe.

[Darth Richard II]

I find it funny that someone complains about all the liberal leaning hugo voters and then in the same post condems "hatemongers".

Also, Orson Scott Card and his hugos say hello,

You know, to go back to what I said a while ago, fuck the hugos.

[thecryptile]

I find it funny that someone complains about all the liberal leaning hugo voters and then in the same post condems "hatemongers".

I'm not condemning Sanderson, far from it. That's all on the liberal leaning Hugo voters I was complaining about. I'm condemning them and their groupthink.

They consider Sanderson a hatemonger in the same league as Card and Correia-- for the same reason more or less. All three are regressive thought criminals who fail to be sufficiently enthusiastic about values that they do not share. Neither Sanderson nor Correia ever advocated re-criminalizing homosexuality as Card did, but that doesn't matter to the Social Justice Warrior crowd. For the SJWs, they are all in the same boat as Fred Phelps.

Brad Torgersen's take:

If fandom evicted every author or editor who ever shot his or her mouth off about politics or religion or some other thing, we’d be showing many dozens of authors — and more than a few editors — the door. In fact, some of the recent authorial and editorial winners have been very outspoken about their beliefs, up to and including being rude and insulting to those who don’t share the same beliefs, and I am not sure you can pull the ladder up on Vox without admitting (as a fandom culture) that it’s okay to be boorish, crass, insulting, or worse, just as long as said author or said editor is boorish and rude in the correct way. Think Vox is a hideous character? Fine. I get that too. As personas go, Vox Day is a significantly spicy jalapeno! Even I can’t always go where he goes, despite having a degree of ideological overlap on the Venn diagram. I do not agree with Vox on every single thing, nor does Larry Correia for that matter. But if science fiction is truly supposed to be the liberal literary art that it claims to be, then I challenge anyone upset at seeing Vox on the ballot to pry his novelette "Opera Vita Aeterna" away from the ill will Vox the persona has generated, and consider the story on its own merits. As all our parents once told us: how do you know you won’t like it if you don’t try it? r as one plaintiff lamented, what if Vox’s work actually merits inclusion despite how much we don’t like him as a web personality?

http://bradrtorgersen.wordpress.com/2014/04/24/fear-and-loathing-at-the-awards-table-3/

[Mack Kilimaro]

"It's not me calling Sanderson a hatemonger," proclaims the same person who just referred to Sanderson as a hatemonger in his previous comment. Then quotes a passage from an "enlightened thinker" who is writing on a Dreamwidth journal that has 14 friends.

That is funny. And I know, don't feed the troll, but my goodness. Some random lurker might stumble into these parts and think no one is challenging that kind of assertion so we must all believe it. Are you sarcastically throwing out hyperbolic adjectives here or what, dude? Thought criminals! I actually laughed out loud.

Wherever large groups of people who rail against "SJWs" (and they freely use that acronym and everyone knows what they mean every time), I don't think that's a place I would ever want to be.

Anyway, if I was a voter, I would vote for The Wheel of Time and not feel bad about it. I'll have to see if I can get my hands on Ancillary Justice and Neptune's Brood from the library.

[Darth Richard II]

o.O

SJW?

Thought criminals?

Is...is this a joke? Am I even on westeros? Did someone hack this forum to redirect somewhere else?

[Datepalm]

SJW?

[David Selig]

SJW?

Social Justice Warrior.

You know, all this would be more worthy of a discussion if Vox could actually write fiction which is at least half-decent.

[mormont]

In Correia's own words:

http://monsterhunternation.com/2014/04/24/an-explanation-about-the-hugo-awards-controversy/

So, he thinks the Hugos are about popularity. Well, as I said: golf. Clap. We all know this and nobody denies it.

As to the rest of his point, it's incoherent. Right-wingers don't get on the ballot because bias, so I got some right-wingers on the ballot and now people are outraged. Except that Correia himself just proved that right-wingers could have been getting on the ballot all along, if their readers had thought they were good enough and had nominated them, so the real reason they haven't been on the ballot before is that even their own readers needed a reason unrelated to the quality of their work to put them forward. This does not suggest that their works are unfairly neglected classics. And the thing he's now gleefully crowing about (people voting no award to make a point) is the same as what he's doing himself (pushing the nomination of works to make a point).

So far as I can discern an actual point, it is that he thinks that his politics are to blame for him not doing well. Well, Torgersen's been on the ballot before, which tends to suggest this is BS. I read his stuff in complete ignorance of his politics, as I imagine most voters did. It was bang average, utterly unremarkable - not excruciatingly awful but no better than a hundred other stories I'd read that year. 2/5 material. I think Correia ought to consider the possibility that his stuff doesn't make the ballot because it just isn't award-worthy, and even his own readers don't really think it is. Otherwise, he'd have been on the ballot without having to make it a political campaign.

So, what have we learned from all this? Exactly nothing that we didn't already know. What we learned is that it's fairly easy to get a work onto the Hugo shortlist for reasons other than its quality, because not a lot of people nominate. Stunning. We also learned that people tend not to like writers who have a public record of hate speech and don't think it would be a good idea to give such writers a prestigious award. Woo. Hoo. And we learned that right-wing writers think they're being discriminated against. Uh. Huh.

In other words, any point that Correia thinks he's made is banal and uninteresting and he has wasted his time, and that of others, in an exercise designed to do nothing but reinforce his own view of the world, and his motivations should therefore be of zero interest to anyone else, including Hugo voters, who should simply ignore it.

So much for Correia's point. That leaves us with a shortlist to consider. I likely won't read Correia's book, unless it's short, because I doubt I'll have time: but I will read Day's short story, because I always read all the short fiction. And I'll rank it honestly, because I always do rank the short fiction honestly. Other people should do the same, IMO, but some won't. Some will vote to make a statement about Day's hate speech. Well, people vote for all sorts of reasons every year, so nothing much different there. I've known people who voted against fantasy stories because they think the Hugo ought to be a sci-fi only award, people who voted for their friends, people who voted for the only nominee they'd read, all sorts of reasons. Again, this is business as usual in the Hugos. Maybe it shouldn't be, but I don't encounter many people who even pretend it's otherwise.

The real issue is what we do about making the Hugos better. On this, not surprisingly, Correia and Day have f-all useful to say.

[Nearly Headless Ned]

Spiffingly good post Mormont.

[john]

On Sanderson - yes he believes in only traditional marriage. He also believes God wrote down instructions on gold plates about to reconstitute the Christian faith and buried them in a hill in New York. It's hard to muster much acrimony in the circumstances.

Personally I think the Hugos is less about politics and more about voting for your friends and people you follow on social media. I don't see it as too problematic. Either you read the stuff, vote on merit and a decent piece wins, or else a nominee the majority wanted to do well in their career, for whatever reason, wins. The people whose nominee didn't win are disappointed but that's the same with any award ceremony.

[mgambino]

Vox seems like a pretty detestable human being, but the rest of the writers from the "Sad Puppies" slate seem like decent enough, right-wingers. I read Corriea's Monster Hunter series (it's really, really dumb, but really fun). He's pretty vocal about his political opinions, but I've never read any hate-speak from the guy. I'm pretty sure he even supports gay marriage.

I do think the whole "entitled white American" stuff being said is pretty funny though because Larry isn't white, and I'm pretty sure Vox isn't white or American.

[mormont]

I've searched the topic and the only reference I can find to anyone saying 'entitled white American' is, erm, you.

Vox Day/Ted Beale, by the way, is certainly both white and American.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodore_Beale