399 replies to this topic

[thistlepong]

Nukelavee, on 14 April 2012 - 05:06 PM, said:

Thistlepong, just for you - http://en.wikipedia....i/Voice_of_fire

And, actually, yeah, you should read up on it yourself if you want to argue the point.  Otherwise, well, you won't know anything about anything anybody says about the topic.

You could read up on Mark Kostabi as well.  Fascinating guy, with a sharp sense of how critics in fine art work, and can be worked.

...

And, yes, some critics are totally viable, and valuable.  But they aren't the ones searching for hot artists to create work that justifies their views.

I still don't get it.  Admittedly, I'm just wiki'ing the people you mention and following your links.  I don't have much of a point other than that I desperately want to understand your position while you keep stuffing me with straw.  I'd love to see primary or secondary data where an artist admits to altering hir work in order to manipulate the false consciousness of an influential critic and further thereby experiences financial and critical success.  Otherwise I'll probably just take critics in general for granted and wonder why you're so worked up about it.

It's interestingly similar to the whole rabid animal sub-thread that's going on here.  Folks keep waiting for "proof" of its vitriolic specificity while declaiming it as nothing more than a garden variety epithet.

To whit:
IIRC Moon doesn't actually call the term racist, just loaded.  And it is.  To call a human an animal is to consider hir a chiefly physical, non-rational entity.  Most of the folks defending it here would never use it except, I dunno, to describe the most violent criminals.  Tacking rabid onto animal solidly connotes that which cannot be reasoned with and needs to be put down.  It's almost always racially charged.  The most strident commentators on Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman are still slinging it back and forth.  It comes up in connection to President Obama with alarming frequency.  So, really, modern usage hangs rabid animal squarely where Moon placed it: loaded and unacceptable.  That there's a strong literary and philosophical tradition of referring to non-whites as animals, in the specifically non-human sense, by whites only exacerbates the insult.  The Valente post that begins this thread is specifically about incommensurate and unequal commentary based on gender, but it applies to ethnicity as well.  Animal robs the target of agency and reason.  Rabid specifically connotes a death warrant.

In a discussion about shouting down women and threatening them with violence for stating opinions, why are so many folks defending robbing one of agency and marking hir for death?  The general ignorance on display isn't an excuse, really.  I don't remember encountering the n-word before I was seven, but when someone told me that was offensive I never thought to use it or excuse it.

[Sheep the Evicted]

Lyanna Stark, on 14 April 2012 - 10:50 AM, said:

I still think there is a special type of feeling of "betrayal" if it turns out a man pretends to be a woman. Conversely, there is rarely a problem with a woman pretending to be a man for a long period of time. That is seen as quite legit and understandable (there were 2-3 of these on my vanilla server during the first 1-2 years of WoW before speaking on ventrilo, teamspeak and skype became a must, all but one with male avatars and all of them in top guilds). Which in itself is an interesting observation. I'm not sure what it means, only that it is there.

Because, as we can all agree, being a woman in an MMO comes with its own particular brand of of bullshit and everybody understands that. At best people give you money and hit on you, at worst they make a constant, never-ending stream of "jokes".

In the MMO i played girls became a sort of mascot; any top team was incomplete without out and people seemed to take weird pride in keeping them in the "guild". But this also meant entry requirements for girls were seriously lossened and it kind of created a negative feedback loop so the best solution was usually to have the girl be in your guild but not in any of your primary attack forces (it was a 10vs10 pvp game).  

Also any girls, few that there were, that could actually play at really high levels at a dps class where generally deemed too good to be true by the enemy and generally accused (quite seriously i might add) of being transvestites or aim-botters. Yes, only if they were really good with a dps class; support classes like medic and techician were deemed fair play for a girl to be good at. I always thought that was interesting.

Kalbear, on 14 April 2012 - 11:34 AM, said:

Yep. That's basically the defining statement of privilege in a nutshell - to recognize that you have not experienced things like they have and that on a fundamental level cannot directly relate to it.

But really, recognizing that fact and being able to see what those differences are is about as good as you can do - as well as noting that your expeiences don't trump theirs.

I really don't undertsand this argument. To me it sounds as ludicrous as saying "well you've never made a film or published a novel so you can't make a criticism" and most of us would also agree that statement is ludicrous. Why as opposed to any other insult or any other criticism are racism and sexism deemed to be too sensitive ? Its not like these things (overtly) effect us in this day and age.

You know i read the other day that Eminem has never said "nigga" in any song despite being one of the leading icons of black culture (and its not like Em is scared of controversy) while lesser known Puerto Rican rappers like Immortal Technique can go at it all day with no bother. To me this double standard and the culture of guilt and awkwardness it creates (and only directed at white people) is far more problematic then whatever last bastions of hate the equality movement is campaigning against.

[Sci-2]

Quote

To me this double standard and the culture of guilt and awkwardness it creates (and only directed at white people) is far more problematic then whatever last bastions of hate the equality movement is campaigning against.

I don't think epic, heartbreaking struggle of white people getting to use the n-word is more problematic than the "last bastions of hate" the equality movement is fighting. I think not getting arrested or shot for the color of your skin or having people judge you for being raped because you're gay or are a woman is a bit higher on the list.

But hey, call me crazy. Just how I roll.

I'm also squinting at the idea that "black culture" is centered around mass-marketed rap music.

[Grack21]

sciborg2, on 15 April 2012 - 12:14 AM, said:

I don't actually agree with this, but it makes me laugh.

I was trying to say it was really surreal. But it was late and um I had already taken my sleepy pills.

[Grack21]

thistlepong, on 15 April 2012 - 11:42 AM, said:

In a discussion about shouting down women and threatening them with violence for stating opinions, why are so many folks defending robbing one of agency and marking hir for death?  The general ignorance on display isn't an excuse, really.  I don't remember encountering the n-word before I was seven, but when someone told me that was offensive I never thought to use it or excuse it.

Whoa whoa. I never have defended any of the rape/violent shit being hurled at anybody. I think some of ACM defenders are getting a little too touchy here. Yeah, I don't like her and think shes full of shit, but that doesn't automatically mean I secretly want her to be raped to death.

Regarding Watts: I don't think he knew how loaded the term was when he used it originally. It's honestly nothing I would have ever thought of either, but, and I rarely say this, I have been proved wrong on that account. Watts doubling down on it was a bad move, however.

I think it's interesting in a discussion about how men and women are treated differently on the Internet, people have started ragging on(rightfulyl so) Bakker for posting on other sites and being an ass, while defending Moon for doing the exact same thing.

[Sci-2]

Quote

Regarding Watts: I don't think he knew how loaded the term was when he used it originally. It's honestly nothing I would have ever thought of either, but, and I rarely say this, I have been proved wrong on that account. Watts doubling down on it was a bad move, however.

Just to be clear - I disagree with Watts. Personally I don't think he's sexist/racist at all.

Quote

I think it's interesting in a discussion about how men and women are treated differently on the Internet, people have started ragging on(rightfulyl so) Bakker for posting on other sites and being an ass, while defending Moon for doing the exact same thing.

I don't [think] people have a problem with Bakker posting on other sites (well Kalbear might), to me it is more head shakingly  laughable than anything. He's making himself the Millhouse of SFF.

Edited by sciborg2, 15 April 2012 - 12:47 PM.

[wolverine]

Ok I did not read the whole thread but was wondering which books, if any, in SFF that are sexist towards men, rather than women.  I am a guy and am just curuious if I have read any to see what my thoughts were while reading it.

[Sci-2]

wolverine, on 15 April 2012 - 12:55 PM, said:

Ok I did not read the whole thread but was wondering which books, if any, in SFF that are sexist towards men, rather than women.  I am a guy and am just curuious if I have read any to see what my thoughts were while reading it.

Some the weirder stuff out there has a lot of male-male rape and is meant to be erotica catering to women.

[Datepalm]

Grack21, on 15 April 2012 - 12:40 PM, said:

I think it's interesting in a discussion about how men and women are treated differently on the Internet, people have started ragging on(rightfulyl so) Bakker for posting on other sites and being an ass, while defending Moon for doing the exact same thing.

But its not really about them. (Well, everything is about Bakker, apparently) These extreme cases are our litmus test, as a cimmunity. Bakker is rude and ACM is rude - whatever. We're all rude sometimes. What we're looking at is the reactions. You don't think it's ok to call for someone to be raped - but clearly, lots of people do.  This is whats amazing and offensive. This debate, and all the rest of them, is our collective attempt to excise that, to make the SFF community/fandom/the internet/our entire society a place where that kind of shit is both off limits in pure terms of stuff you do not say, AND, more importantly maybe, with an understanding of WHY.

ETA - I don't know how successful it is, mind. I'm not suggesting that we're fine and dandy by mere fact of the debate.

Edited by Datepalm, 15 April 2012 - 01:02 PM.

[Nukelavee]

Thistle - board ate my reply.  I'll catch up to you later.  

Maia

Quote

What is this majority you speak of, that excludes fully half or more of possible audience? And what "rings true" in fantasy is stuff that has internal plausibility, not something lazily cribbed from RL history.

Why are you assuming I meant majority in a way that would refer to genders?  You did, didn't you?

Paris Hilton is an actual woman.  Would a realistic depiction of her result in a good or strong character...the way "you" want?

I doubt it.

Would it be a male/female split as to that being a good character?

I doubt it.

What I'm saying is, it's a futile quest to have both realistic, and "good", unless we accept good means realistic.

I'm not clear why you brought up cribbing from RL, btw.

Personally, I think fantasy works better when, yes, the "world" has internal plausibility, when it enables the suspension of disbelief, but the characters are realistic.

[Cleofis Patriarch]

I'm done lurking.

About the whole rabid animal thing.....what the hell, man? I read Moon's blog ignorant of her ethnicity. I was very annoyed with her posts, which looked to be dominated more by kneejerk emotional reaction than anything logical (oh noes little boy gets raped in the first pages of PON!!). But what really irritated me were her replies to her comments...which really weren't even replies to anything they talked about. She literally put words in their mouths by crossing out everything they had said and inserting her ridiculous, cartoonish interpretation of their arguments.

She certainly does act like a rabid animal, if not just a whiny brat. And I'm used to calling men animals.

And people have the nerve to pretend that Watts was racist, or that it, as she says, was "loaded". How is it not obvious that he made that epithet based on her behavior, which is, in my opinion too, rabid and animalistic? The fact that it had nothing to do with her gender or race is so blatant that I wonder why people are so eager to call others out on prejudice. I agree racism and sexism exist today, but they are nowhere as near as bad as what they were a century...or even fifty years ago. They're so subtle that feminists and anti-racists must wage some ridiculous guerilla war against then. The funny thing is, usually I agree with them, but when they start pulling racism and sexism out of thin-air, it's very annoying to me.

Oh, and obviously the rape and death threats were a big no-no. Don't mix my support for Watts up with those little immature teenaged nerds who talked about raping her.

What I notice from the people who support ACM is that they are quick to cover up her fiery, abrasive personality not only because she brings up good points, (which I agree, she does) but simply because she's funny sometimes. Why aren't some of you so quick to exonerate Bakker sometimes? It's not like he will only be remembered for sock-puppeting, being arrogant, and making flawed arguments. He has good qualities as well. (I could make the same argument for the books of authors accused of misogyny). It's not hard not to have just one opinion of someone.

Another thing her supporters do is bring up the fact that it's her blog, so she can say whatever she wants!   (Or that it's all just "theatrics" or pure  entertainment!) as if her temper tantrums and mistreatment of people who peacefully disagree with her are somehow justified simply because "there aren't any rules against it! she doesn't have to be nice! it's her blog!!! if you don't like it go somewhere else!" or because you agree with her in general and find her snarky remarks ohsohilarious. I find a lot of them funny, too, but it doesn't excuse her overall rabidness nor do I passively try to defend her and attack everyone else for the same reasons people hate her.

Edited by Cleofis Patriarch, 15 April 2012 - 02:00 PM.

[kalbear]

Once again - this topic and this board is not for slamming other boards or blogs. That also isn't the topic here specifically. There are plenty of places to beat up ROH. This isn't one of them.

Also, I think you'll find it a lot better going if instead of responding to what some fictitious people said, sometime, on a place that isn't here, you actually responded to what people actually state here.

[Sci-2]

eta: I can't really say anything more about my opinions on RoH that I haven't already said a few pages back.

=-=-=
One thing that might be interesting is how many times have we seen a positive female character who is unattractive, or even attractive to a different cultural standard?

(Grack - what are the women in 100,00 K described as in terms of appearance? I'm curious how Jeminsin chose to depict beauty.)

Obviously there's Brienne and I know Orphan Tales has various heroines, some explicitly described as ugly or plain, but beyond that?

Edited by sciborg2, 15 April 2012 - 02:17 PM.

[Cleofis Patriarch]

Kalbear, on 15 April 2012 - 02:11 PM, said:

Once again - this topic and this board is not for slamming other boards or blogs. That also isn't the topic here specifically. There are plenty of places to beat up ROH. This isn't one of them.

Also, I think you'll find it a lot better going if instead of responding to what some fictitious people said, sometime, on a place that isn't here, you actually responded to what people actually state here.

And no one here has defended ROH, or agreed that rabid animal was a loaded insult or even racist? I was not just using it to "bash" her. I think it's rather obvious that I was responding to claims people have made about AMC in this thread. It's not like my post is irrelevant to the discussion going on here.

[Datepalm]

Mod:

If it's about things said here, then quote them. If it's about somewhere else on the internet, as a place rather than as content, then this isn't the place for it. (Yes, I know this distinction is nuanced and difficult. But we're all bright people capable of pulling complex meaning from a text, aren't we?)

[Sci-2]

.....did a few posts just get deleted?

eta: as in one's that didn't seem to violate the rules?

Edited by sciborg2, 15 April 2012 - 02:46 PM.

[Cleofis Patriarch]

Datepalm, on 15 April 2012 - 02:37 PM, said:

Mod:

If it's about things said here, then quote them. If it's about somewhere else on the internet, as a place rather than as content, then this isn't the place for it. (Yes, I know this distinction is nuanced and difficult. But we're all bright people capable of pulling complex meaning from a text, aren't we?)

Ok, lol.

I didn't think addressing a general set of opinions conspicuously held by multiple people in this thread really needed a quote to make my post relevant and clear that I wasn't just using this thread to bash other sites. Unless people are just being willfully ignorant and pretending that what I talked about in my confusingly quoteless post was not obviously pertaining to the subject matter of the thread.

It was a minor mistake that did not deserve the crime of people ignoring the points I brought up. But whatever. I will quote people next time to avoid to all of this bs.

[Sci-2]

We're coming to the final pages of this particular thread (these get locked after 20-21 pages) so I'll bite. What exactly do people want the non-ACM-haters to say about ACM?

Kalbear said he thinks she can be a jerk sometimes, I said I just read the reviews and really don't care what she does on the rest of the internet. So what's left to debate, what grand confession are people looking for?

Because I don't get it. I mean, is there a Team-Bakker / Team-ACM thing going on and we have to root for one or the other to hook up with Bella Swan?

[Cleofis Patriarch]

sciborg2, on 15 April 2012 - 02:57 PM, said:

We're coming to the final pages of this particular thread (these get locked after 20-21 pages) so I'll bite. What exactly do people want the non-ACM-haters to say about ACM?

Kalbear said he thinks she can be a jerk sometimes, I said I just read the reviews and really don't care what she does on the rest of the internet. So what's left to debate, what grand confession are people looking for?

Because I don't get it. I mean, is there a Team-Bakker / Team-ACM thing going on and we have to root for one or the other to hook up with Bella Swan?

Well, I wasn't demanding that people act a certain way. I just pointed out the passive defense that people who like or sort of like ACM engage in. The "Yeah, she's rude, yeahyeahyeah, so what, she's sort of funny sometimes, too BUT WATTS CALLED HER A RABID ANIMAL!!" attitude that you see. It's the downplaying of AMC's rudeness and simultaneous freak out over Watt's insult.

And I hope there is no team thing going on, because I'd be on neither side. But it certainly looks like people are choosing sides, even though on this thread it is a little bit more complicated than that.

[Sci-2]

I think the argument is whether or not rabid animal is a loaded term. I don't think anyone even believes that Watt's using it indicates he was sexist/racist.

I guess for me I look at Jeminsin who was also criticized by Moon, not only on the RoH site but also at Ars Marginal which specifically caters to people who are persons of color, LGBT, etc. Jeminsin did argue with Moon, but then felt it was a distraction and then even later said Moon had some good points.

So we have an author whose entire trilogy is slammed, in a place where it really could affect sales since Jeminsin as an African-American author would at least hypothetically supported by a site like Ars Marginal.

But she walks away, reflects, and holds onto her opinion that some of Moon's points are valid but others are not.

Seems like if an author who was far more likely to have lost readers because of ACM can do that Bakker should have given up the ghost eight months ago.