Personal - Death Is Bad

The other side of the fence

Oct 082015

I realize some people are just genetically monogamous. But if that’s not you, here’s yet another reason to not be afraid of opening up your relationship – it makes you appreciate your SO even more.

It’s a cliche that the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence. It’s because you can’t try that grass, so you end up idealizing it, and nothing in real life can compare to the ideals humans can imagine. It can drive a person to distraction, this constant feeling that you’re missing out on the best grass evar. And it’s right there, just in reach, but forbidden. Argh!

This sort of thing is toxic, but there turns out to be a really easy way to counter it. Just go and have some of the grass on the other side of the fence. You will realize that while it may be really darn good grass, it is still real-world stuff and not magical fairy food.

This metaphor is starting to outgrow itself, so to bring this back into the realm of the literal – when you develop extra-primary relationships, you reground yourself in reality. I have found that I appreciate my SO even more now. I’m not comparing our relationship to a Hollywood fantasy, I’m comparing it to other real people, and I notice all the things about her that make her ideal for me. No disrespect for my other partners, of course! I like them a *lot*, obviously. But you forget all the little things about your primary that makes life with them exceptional, and being involved with someone who doesn’t fit you as well reminds you in a hurry. I’m sure my paramores feel the same way about me vs their SOs. And the fact that we can all help each other remember what makes our primary so magical to us is a beautiful thing.

So, as I’ve said before, if you’re already with the right person, having an open relationship tends to make your relationship stronger. Don’t be scared of it.

Also, it really is nice to get that variety. :) No matter how much you love pinot grigio, a bit of sangria now and then to shake things up is vital.

What even is Cultural Appropriation?

Musings On Present Day, Personal 13 Responses »

Sep 152015

I’ve always believed that Humanity improves when cultures are allowed to mix and mesh. As such, “cultural appropriation” never made much sense to me. Where it’s meshing, it’s good, and where it’s racism, it’s bad. Why are some people conflating the two? So I was pretty happy about these two articles:

To the new culture cops, everything is appropriation

Reflections on Cultural Appropriation

I got some push back.

What is Cultural Appropriation anyway? I’m still not sure it’s even a thing. I don’t view the borrowing between cultures and mixing of cultures to be bad. I think it’s actually a positive for all parties. Does it impoverish other cultures if our teens start love the hell out of soccer, and start calling it “futbol”? Or does it give us more in common, make us more able to relate to each other, and enrich all sides?

I even suspect that it acts to weaken racists. If a stodgy old man can deal with his daughter or granddaughter wearing dreadlocks, he may have to come to admit that when he frowns at the black lady at his office wearing dreads he’s doing it because he’s racist and not because there’s anything wrong with dreadlocks themselves. His white granddaughter may very well be doing good by wearing dreadlocks rather than by shunning them.

And if I may bring up Hollywood – it’s been said that American Mass Media (primarily movies, TV, and music) has been the greatest force for exporting modern liberal values. While there are lots of fundamentalist types who think this is horrendous, I for one think that the spreading of liberal ideals is a great thing. Do we want to put a stop to THAT cultural appropriation, and tell people they can’t consume our media and must remain as foreign and segregated from us as possible? Why on earth would we want that?

I was informed that cultural appropriation is when the dominant group(?) adopts something from a minority and says “When people of my group do it, it’s cool. But when people of the culture that first introduced it do it, it’s not OK.” Like doing Yoga, but discriminating against Indians when hiring, or denigrating them for talking funny. I was given this example:

This is a made up and silly example, but maybe it could help: Let’s say Polish people *really* love cabage, and no one else knew about it. It this scenario, they’ve been enjoying cabbage for centuries, it’s a big thing to them. But… They’ve been fired from jobs for bringing cabbage for lunch. They’ve been run out of town for talking about cabbage publically. They’ve been tried in court for even smelling like cabbage. For centuries they have been negatively affected because the dominant culture is anti-cabbage for no real reason (it’s really just a convenient shortcut to be anti-Polish.)

Flash forward to now. All of those negative consequences are still there, just not talked about. Polish are still fired, shunned, etc. for their cabbage activities. But, the dominant culture has figured out how awesome cabbage is. (It is!) They’re having cabbage-meetup and cabbage-fests and cabbage-cleanses. So not only have the Polish suffered for centuries, they *still are* suffering, while watching the people around them eat cabbage, get media attention for it, etc. Do you see why that would be hurtful to experience?

Yes. But I think it’s stupid as hell to reply to this by saying that white people can’t eat cabbage! Please, share my love for cabbage! You see how awesome cabbage is now, right? So stop being a fucking racist. The way you describe it, claiming “cultural appropriation” rights sounds a lot like revenge. Which, in fairness, I totally get. I feel the desire for vengeance too sometimes.

To take a less made-up example, I sometimes wish that pro-lifers were denied abortions, and creationists were denied antibiotics. But in the end, I realize that’s horrible. When a pro-lifer is raped and wants to abort, I full support her right to do so, even though I kinda in the back of my mind am thinking “You should be forced to live by the shit you tried to force on my loved ones.” Because despite my desire for vengeance, I know that’s bad.

And to extend the metaphor further, even if I did think that pro-lifers should be denied abortions, I wouldn’t say that all Christians categorically should be denied abortions, because I know that lots of Christians are very much pro-choice! Denying it to all of them is even worse that just denying it to just the ones who in a poetic justice way “should” be denied.

So no, I don’t want cabbage denied to all white people. At best I only want it to denied to those who denigrate me for loving cabbage. But the solution is to fix racism, not to make up terms like “cultural appropriation” and say anyone who loves cabbage has to be Polish or else they’re appropriating imperialist oppressors. If Cultural Appropriation is “Hey, I like what you’re doing. You’re going to suffer if you keep doing it, but I get to do it all I want,” then I want to stop the “you’re going to suffer if you keep doing it” part.

I was told:

I too would love to see a dismantling of the systems of systemic oppression, but until we’re there you should understand that you get to do something that they don’t because you’re a part of that system. Saying “in a perfect world this wouldn’t be a problem, so get over it” sounds like a bad approach. It’s not revenge to say “maybe hold off on taking our culture until after you stop punishing us for the same behavior that you’re doing.”

To which I again totally agree. How far does this extend? Am I responsible for the behavior of others, or only my own? ie: if I’ve never denigrated anyone for liking cabbage, and treat cabbage-lovers as I would anyone else, can I eat cabbage? What if I’m not Polish myself, but I was adopted by a Polish family at age 6? Can I move out of a state that has anti-Polish laws to a state that has Polish-equality laws, and eat cabbage there? Or is it better to stay in my anti-Polish state but fight for Polish-equality laws?

In reply:
I don’t have great answers, because I’m the epitome of privileged, and will never have my culture appropriated, but I encourage awareness. We can be aware of our privileges, we can listen to those that are affected, and we can try to engage with those around us.

I realize that’s the “wise” answer, but I need a useful answer, not a wise one, because I want to be able to A) eat cabbage, and B) not be viewed as a monster by Polish people. And in this case, please feel free to swap out our euphemisms for real things that may happen in my life. ie: it’s actually important to me to know if I can use the c-word in my writing.

Then we got to the icky, sticky mess at the center of all this:

if I wanted to grow my hair out and get dreadlocks, I should probably talk to a few dozen of my black/African American friends and see what they say. If I don’t have a few dozen friends of a group that I want to pull from? That should be a giant flashing warning sign. How can I believe I could be respectful without feedback from knowledgeable people?

Even if you were adopted by a black family, and grew up in a black neighborhood, and all your friends say “fuck yes, you of all people are legit allowed to do that”, you know what will happen? You’ll be accused of “tokenizing” your black friends/family, and culturally appropriating the dreadlocks. You’ll be accused by people who don’t know you or your history, but they will see you are white, and that’s all they need. They will win, and you will be a monster. That is my problem with cultural appropriation.

think about people in the following Venn diagram:

( oblivious/privileged ) (correctly offended) (incorrectly offended)
While you might never please the ones on the far right (incorrectly offended), it’s the ones in the middle (correctly offended) you’re probably really concerned with.

And the thing is… no, it’s not. I believe that the “correctly offended” people will generally be very small, because I have faith in my education and upbringing to keep me from doing most things that are horribly offensive. I know that I will sometimes be offensive out of ignorance, and I further have faith that those who are correctly offended will help me to see when I’m ignorant and help me to overcome this. I’ll grow, I’ll apologize, and things will be ok.

No, the group I’m actually worried about is the “incorrectly offended” ones, because they can be far, far larger. And they are the ones who don’t care about you, your background, or your apologies. They are the ones who are willing to go to whatever measures they can to try to destroy someone socially. They are the ones who use “cultural appropriation” as a weapon. They are the reason I think it is by-and-large a BS claim, and people should stick to “You are being racist” rather than vague claims about my social background and the circumstances of power structures in my (local?) area.

WorldCon 2015 Highlights

Personal, WorldCon 1 Response »

Aug 282015

Wow, where to begin?

The thing that sticks out more than anything else is the award for Best Related Work. Because everything up until that award wasn’t too badly vandalized by the Puppies. Best Related Work was the first big pile of crap that was nothing but awful Puppy trash. This was the big turning point – if this didn’t get No Award, it was likely nothing would. So I was tense and actually on the edge of my seat. The cheer that went up when No Award was announced was viseral. I was part of it. Things would be OK.

I sat in the Literary Beer with Neil Clarke, which was really fun. The man had great stories about his heart attack, the Clarkesworld Stalker, and the amount of sweat that went into deciding whether to publish Spar, among other things. He also talked about how when he helped write the criteria for Semi-Pro Magazine category he deliberately helped set it up so that Clarkesworld would soon be “Weighted Out” of the catagory (boxing term, meaning they were too big to qualify anymore). I found that rather noble of him. It’s hard to disqualify yourself for a catagory while you still try to hold down a full-time day job as well!

My first WorldCon I didn’t go to any Koffee Klatches or Literary Beers, as I was scared as hell about what I’d say around someone famous like that. I’m super glad I went to two this year, and I plan to go to them again next year.

Speaking of things learned from my first con – find a con spouse! My first time I hung around with Anaea Lay a lot, and took her as my date to the award ceremony. This year my con spouse was Danielle, we checked in a few times, shared several meals, and went to the ceremony together. (As a note – for those who aren’t familiar with the term “work spouse”, a “con spouse” is just someone you share a lot of time with, absolutely nothing sexual or romantic about it). It made everything easier and more enjoyable, and she managed to “track down” (ie: coincidentally bump into) one of the Hugo Awards, so we got to TOUCH THE HUGO! And take pictures with it!! Aaaaaaah!

My hotel was baller as hell, with AMAZING service!! I will try to always stay at Holiday Inn’s, I recommend them highly. When I tried to book my hotel I was dissapointed that the con hotel was already booked up, but now I feel I dodged a bullet. That thing was built at the nadir of American Architecture. The hallways are cramped, the roof is no more than six inches above my head, and the whole place looks like it came out of the 60s. Ugh. My Holiday Inn, OTOH, looked like a freakin’ castle, and was perfect and accomidating in every way.

One of the HIGHLIGHTS was getting to meet Seth Dickinson in person! Yes, the guy whose writing I ADORE and can’t stop talking about. We had dinner together, and drinks too, I got to talk with him for like FOUR HOURS across two days!! We talked fiction, his stories, rationality, the Rationalist movement (Anaea was there for most of this too, she’s not as enthusiastic about the rationality scene, so that was an interesting conversation. That’s her on my right), pets, and so forth. OMG it was so cool! If you can buy your idol dinner and drinks, do it, it’s so worth it! Insights from Seth #1: If a sentence doesn’t work, the problem is generally a few paragraphs up. Good fiction progresses naturally, and if you can’t get it to flow right, you probably messed up something upstream. Insight from Seth #2: Blindsight is proof that the SF genre of fiction is necessary. Most stories can be told in any genre, even most SF/F could be recast as Earthfic with some work. But Blindsight could only be done in SF, and it is an essential work.

I got to walk through a cool park whenever I went to/from my hotel. The entire con area was a nature wonderland, very asthetically pleasing! :) The nearby forest fires were a nuisance though. On the third day the smoke was so thick that not only was there a permanent haze, but the entire city smelled like the inside of a smokering room. It got to be nauseating, I had trouble eating dinner that day. A few times there was ash in the air, and yes, it even got into the convention center. It was really striking on the flights in/out, when you looked from your airplane window and saw smoke covering the landscape for hundreds of miles in all directions. Damn.

Oh, another thing I learned from previous cons that I put into practice in Spokane – before you do anything else, walk the entire con from front to back. Get a lay of the land, so you know where things are, especially in relation to each other. Schedule 30 minutes for this (more if you need it). I swear it’s one of the most important steps to enjoying any con, and well worth your time.

I went to both the Brandon Sanderson and John Scalzi readings, where they read from upcoming works. You guys are in for a treat in the near future. :) In addition to reading, John joked with the audience a bit and was all around charming and hilarious. Brandon talked about how he writes and some history, which was fascinating. Insights from Brandon #1: When you write, the novel/story is not the product you are creating. The product you are creating is a better author. You are upgrading you. The story/novel is a side-effect of this process. If it sells, great. If not – no worries. There will be more such side-effects as you keep working on yourself.

Pic stolen shamelessly from Rachael Acks
I went to the Business Meeting on Saturday. It’s a three-hour commitment right in the middle of peak con hours! I thought it would be a chore, but considered it an important duty. Boy was I wrong! This was among the highlights of the con for me! It is fascinating to watch the process happen. It feels like you are in a small Puritan village during the early colonial period. All the adults have gathered and are doing the best they can to keep society running because this is all the government there is. We are the only adults around, and who the hell thought that was a good idea? :) The strict adherence to Parlimentary Rules was charming, and I felt like I was turely part of a small community family. People were jovial. Apparently there are “regulars” who are well known for coming to these year after year after year. There was an informal Bingo game that listed the names of the 14 most common speakers, Whenever one stood up to make an amendment or challenge or speak for/against a motion their name would be marked off (and 5-in-a-row gets Bingo, of course). One person who spoke multiple times about the “YA Hugo” proposal was put onto the YA Hugo Committee by executive order. :) It felt like what governments SHOULD be. If only humanity could live in groups of a few thousand, rather than the hundreds-of-millions that nations consist of. /wistful

Most votes were done by raising of hands and estimation by the chair (most votes weren’t close and a count wasn’t needed). When a count was requested, everyone For stood up and counted off one by one as they sat down. Then repeat for Against. It was terribly exciting! Especially when I was sitting right next to the proposer of one of the motions (who was also the committee chair! Recused himself for that particular motion and sat down next to me) and voted against him! Later there was a presentation of EPH (E Plubris, Hugo) which cleared it up greatly for me and moved me from the “Voting against it, too complicated” to “This is brilliant!! I’m all for it!” camp. I hope they make that presentation available online at some point.

Anyway, the Business Meeting was great, and I encourage everyone to go! The sense of community was palpable. I only went for one (there were four, one each day Thurs-Sun), but I’m glad I did, and wish I had time to go to others as well. My friend Rachael Acks live-blogged all four days at her blog, here.

I think it’s awesome that gender-bent Immortan Joe cosplay has become a thing. :)

[No pic here of Panel or Scott Andrews, sadly. I am a dumb.]
The Future-Of-Short-Story-Publishing panel was fantastic. Especially because they had an old-timer (Mike Resnic) moderating the panel. He brought in stark contrast, when he spoke several times of “these things are run by Profit-and-Loss” and so forth. I asked about this, because I knew for a fact that at least half the panel still had dayjobs(!) and one of them is set up as a non-profit because it’s the only way it can afford to run. These are works of passion, not capitalist endevours. IMHO. The panel itself was good, but as I sat in the front row I was now able to recognize John Joseph Adams and Scott Andrews on sight. This came in SUPER HANDY when I went to the airport to fly back home on Sunday. I saw Scott Andrews sitting at my gate, waiting for the same flight! Not talking to anyone or reading anything either. So, after about a minute of working up my nerve, I went over to talk to him. And OMG we talked for 20 minutes!! It was fantastic! He explained Science Fantasy to me, we talked SF and podcasts and several other things. And it turns out he is ALSO a huge fan of Seth Dickinson! Hell yeah!!

Anyway, I had one of the best vacations of my life. I can’t wait for next year!

Why I Try To Engage Distasteful People

Musings On Present Day, Personal 14 Responses »

Aug 262015

Someone recently asked me why I try to defend people who I disagree with on moral issues. Their point was that ‘If someone wants to publicly deny the rights of my friends or family I am not going to debate. I am going to tell them to shut up.’ (paraphrased)

While I agree that denying rights to people is awful, I think telling others to shut up for voicing opinions is a bad idea. There are four reasons I’m against shouting down idiots.

1. I may be wrong. I have many beliefs, and I’m sure that I’m wrong about at least one of them. For me to be completely correct about everything is simply impossible. I’m probably wrong to various degrees about quite a few things. If I shout down everyone who disagrees with me, I lock in my current opinions and never have the chance to learn, grow, and modify them. I’m hurting myself by shutting down all dissenting views.

2. Shutting down dissenting views is the tactics of The Enemy. They were used to suppress every minority there is. They prolonged the Dark Ages. Not too long ago, WE were the ones that were being shut up. People who spoke for the rights of black slaves were murdered. People who spoke for the rights of gays were beaten into comas. Atheists were executed by the state. This changed slowly, and one of the biggest reasons for the change was greater respect for dissenting speech. Once people could put forward arguments without being lynched for them, the truth was able to rise to the surface. As such, I don’t believe the truth has much to fear from freedom of expression. You say you’re worried that people’s rights will be taken away if we let others speak freely. We only won those rights *because of* the ability to speak freely. If our position is so weak that the majority of people who are exposed to our argument, and the opposing argument, side with the opposing argument… perhaps we should take a second look at our argument and make sure it isn’t flawed. I’m not afraid to let the crazy homophobic uncle make a fool of himself. It strengthens our position. That there will always be a minority of hateful fanatics is unavoidable, and we won’t make anything better by resorting to their tactics.

3. An idiot who is shouted down is not persuaded, only intimidated. It will leave him feeling wronged, and justified in his anger. We have done nothing to make the situation better, we’ve only boosted our egos by delivering a smack-down to our enemy. It feels good, but it helps nothing. On the other hand, if we engage our opponents we show that we don’t dismiss them out of prejudice, we have considered their views and found them lacking. Furthermore, we can present counter evidence, or point out flaws in their reasoning. No one is ever convinced in a single debate. Heck, most people won’t even admit to being swayed slightly. But over time, usually months or years, they can be taught. If you shout them down you are robbing them of this, and denying yourself the opportunity to help them and thus make the world better.

4. It’s aggressive and rude. Being a dick isn’t just a terrible strategy at spreading your values, it’s also unpleasant. It makes the world a crappier place.

For those who wish to read about this opinion at length, I would point to Scott Alexander’s posts on this topic. He says it much better than I can.

Puppies – All Bark, No Bite

Personal, WorldCon 24 Responses »

Aug 232015

Lets get the awards themselves out of the way first. As you’ve all heard by now, the Puppies were shut out. The community managed to successfully defend themselves at the first level. Congrats to all of us, I’m proud. :)

I had thought it possible there would be some disruption of the awards. Not necessarily anything physical, but maybe booing or chanting or yelling, which would slow things, stop the proceedings, and need to be dealt with. Before I arrived in Spokane I had been half-expecting it. There was not a peep. If there were any puppy supporters in the audience they were well behaved. I will admit that I am partially impressed that they managed to keep their civility about them. The entire thing went off without a hitch.

But by the time I actually walked into the auditorium, I no longer expected the Puppies to be a problem, because this was just the continuation of their entire week-long trend.

Long time readers may be aware I’m a bit of a drama-chaser. I don’t like it personally in my life, cuz who has the time for that shit? But I love to watch it. So I was seeking it out. I made many of my panel choices based on things I thought may draw puppy ire. I went to John Scalzi’s reading, which was hilarious and delightful. There was not a single bit of contention. No boos or hisses or people standing up to ask jerk questions. Maybe this is because John Scalzi is razor sharp and intimidating to anyone without genius-levels of charisma and IQ, and they were scared to speak out. Maybe they were intimated by such a large room full of huge Scalzi fans. I don’t know.

I went to the panel on “Writing About Controversies” which was unofficially THE panel to discuss the Sad Puppy/Rabid Puppy situation. I thought maybe here, of all places, someone would stand up to ask a challenging question during the Q&A. Nothing.

I went to a handful of social justice panels, thinking maybe someone would boo or challenge there. The rooms were more intimate, the audience smaller, and the panelists fairly low-level and unthreatening. I left early out of boredome in several cases.

I attended the business meeting where the rules changes were discussed to address the puppy problem. Here, I thought, is a perfect place for them to strike. It is a very formal, palimentary system (more on this later, it was fascinating!), and it would have been pretty easy to sabotage. I saw one issue run off the table just because it was contentious and there was enough bickering and debate that time ran out on it. A group of less than a dozen puppy-supporters could have thrown a serious monkey wrench in the whole thing simply by exploiting rules without doing anything against the letter of the law (as they like to do). They could have tried continually calling points of order, or offering amendments, debating rulings, objecting to proceedures, etc. They could have run out the clock on everything. I’m sure there’s some way of dealing with this, but it would have gummed up the works if they did it smartly. Nothing at all. It’s like they weren’t even there.

I know there were some around. I ran into one at my hotel’s breakfast bar, and we had a good little discussion. It was very civil, and we went away with respect for each other as human beings. I talked to a couple friends who also ran into a puppy or two. But all in all, it was like they weren’t there. Turns out they are cowards in real life, and only strike out at others when they can do so comfortably from behind the safety of their keyboards.

One may think “Isn’t it possible they are just good people, who don’t want to disrupt a party and ruin the days of other people for no reason? Why are you Saying they are cowards, rather than that they are civilized people?” Nay, I reply. When they can hide behind screens and keyboards, and don’t have to see the faces of the people they are hurting, they are more than happy to destroy someone’s day. They are *gleefull* about it. They cackle about how good it feels to see an anthill and start stomping it (which is a direct quote from a puppy commenter on my blog, I’m not making shit up). I don’t do Twitter myself, but I hear you can see all sorts of abuse on there right now.

But lets grant that those online comments are from the worst fringes of the movement. The fact remains that the puppy supporters were excited to vote a slate so they could hijack the Hugos for their self-aggrandizement. And as I predicted in “Why Vandals?” none of them bothered to show up for the actual party. If the party was left just to them, they’d have a nearly empty convention hall and no one to run it. They do not care about the con, or the people who attend it. They didn’t attend the business meeting to try to make things better. They didn’t put forward any bids to host the 2018 WorldCon. That they didn’t try to further mar the convention by ruining things in person isn’t a mark of civility, it’s simply the modus operandi for internet cowards.

It really dawned on me just how worthless the Puppies are when I went to the business meeting, and during the watching of the fan-recognition part of the award ceremony. These are people, later on in their years, who have been SF/F fans for significantly longer than I’ve even been alive. They’ve spent *decades* of work putting together these conventions. They are dedicated, and in love. They aren’t the authors, they don’t get the accolades themselves. They’re just passionate about SF. I really came to realize how much WorldCon is by and for the fans. I was very disappointed that more puppies didn’t come to the con in person. I was very disappointed that ALL the puppies didn’t come to the con in person! They would have seen that joy and passion for themselves. Maybe that is part of the reason why the puppy supporters who did come didn’t boo or shout or try to disrupt anything. They saw the love and the passion for themselves, and couldn’t bring themselves to be assholes any more. The ones who stayed home, safe behind their keyboards – they are the ones who will continue to be dicks. Because they were cowards, and wouldn’t come to see what they were vandalizing in person. Assholery feeds on cowardice, which leads to further assholery, in a neat little circle. It’s fitting.

The true realization of just how awful they are didn’t hit until the nomination stats were released afterwards. Before that point, it was just a theoretical “Man, I wonder how the year would have been different.” Afterwards, you could see exactly which stories were obstructed by the Puppy’s spite. Which authors were denied the recognition for great work. There are some truely fantastic stories that would have gotten nominations if not for the Puppy’s vandalism. Most tragically, a story by Eugie Foster would have received a nomination. Eugie Foster died tragically last year. By all accounts, she was an amazing person and a great writer. Who knows if she would have won? But now she’ll never have the memorium of “Hugo-nominated author” that she should have received. Because of the Puppy’s butthurt. I’ve tried to engage them before, and be reasonable. After today I’ll go back to that. But for today, I’m allowing myself to be angry. Fuck those guys.

Manufactured Outrage vs Worthy Opposition

Personal, WorldCon 14 Responses »

Aug 122015

The last few days everyone in Hugo-ville has been in a tizzy about Lou Antonelli contacting the police in Spokane. I’ve seen it referred to as a SWATing. Guys… no. Chill the fuck out. A SWATing is when the SWAT team actually breaks into your house. It’s terrible for a number of reasons, but primary among them the fact that American police are notoriously reckless and an innocent person could be killed. This is a SWATing. What Lou did isn’t SWATing. He wrote a letter, asking for extra police protection at a public event.

Yes, he’s crazy, and he used paranoid language that shows how off-the-deep-end he is. But police do occasionally get such letters from crazy people, it’s not a big deal. And let’s be real for a second – wouldn’t we all feel a bit better with extra security around this year? I’ve heard similar worries from the non-Puppies (called Happy Hippogriffs from here on out for brevity) – they’re also scared that the Puppies fans are dangerously emotional and a few lunatics on the fringe might try to start trouble. I’ve had this expressed to me in private, and seen it online as well. We’re all a bit nervous. Lou just had the misfortune of letting his fear show in public, and targeting the Master of Ceremonies with lunatic accusations while doing so. Cut the guy some slack.

Everyone is quoting the Aug 1 episode of the Superlative Livestream. This is a roundtable discussion by a number of Puppies & Sympathizers, and I think very few people have actually listened to it, because there’s some far more interesting stuff in there! I’ve now listened to it, so you don’t have to. ;) Here’s some highlights.

At ~27:40 someone complains about how many people “shelled out forty bucks just to vote a spoiler vote”, which at first I thought showed crazy amounts of obliviousness. The entire Puppy movement is just one big backlash of the aggrieved, uniting to shell out forty bucks for the satisfaction of casting a spoiler vote! That is their raison d’etre! And now they’re trying to take the moral high-ground, saying that’s dirty pool? Then I realized it was John C Wright talking, and I laughed. The man knows exactly what he’s doing, he just has more chutzpah than anyone currently writing. :)

An interesting insight into the Puppies’ view of us: at ~1:17:25 one complains that “the thing with a lot of these people is that they don’t know people of faith”. Which… wow. Is the problem really that the Puppy voters simply don’t know any Hippogriffs? How else could you imagine that the Hippogriffs don’t know any people of faith? A large portion of them are people of faith! Of the remainder, I guarantee close to 100% know people of faith. We live in America, the most religious first-world country on the planet. It’s nigh impossible to NOT know someone of faith. We are all very much acquainted with people of faith, and the fact that you think we aren’t makes me suspect you’ve been being told some very interesting stories about us.

He then goes on to say that this makes having a chaplain protagonist “non-PC.” I don’t understand how this follows, even in the abstract. If any Puppy is reading this, and agrees with his sentiment, can you clarify what he means?

The same Puppy at ~1:20:15 says that he lives in Texas where they “are very different” because “you don’t have to apologize if you mention God or you say “God-bless-you” when someone sneezes”. Again, I want to know where the hell he’s getting his opinions about the outside world. Generally, mentioning God is not something anyone apologizes for. I mean sure, it may be considered rude to start arguing Religion and/or Politics depending on the situation, but that’s normal social convention. There’s an old saying about it. That’s just not starting shit at the dinner table. Simply mentioning your God is never something I’ve seen anyone have to apologize for – more often than not it meets with approval.

But seriously, the BIG kicker here is his assertion that anywhere in the US someone would have to apologize for saying “God-bless-you.” That’s ludicrous, to the point that I wouldn’t have believed a Puppy had made that claim if I hadn’t heard it with my own ears. It doesn’t even have religious connotations anymore! That he thinks there are places where you’d have to apologize for saying that means his view of people who are outside his group has been so twisted and distorted that we must be little more than baby-eating mutants! He feels that his in-group is so persecuted outside of his enclave, that the outside world would turn on him for a simple wish of health after a sneeze! NO WONDER the Puppies are so happy to part with $40 to spoil the award party of the enemy side! They have a conception of us as truly awful people. This is the thing I was talking about in Defense Against The Dark Arts. What kind of person thinks it’s ok to distort the worldview of those who respect his opinion to turn them on their fellow citizens in this way? Ugh.

Which brings me to John C Wright. I kinda love this guy. He’s extremely intelligent, and well-spoken, and he has this wonderful, rich voice. He’d make such an amazing Quirrell. And he is *passionate*, which I really admire. I loved it when he was crazy Libertarian, and I still love it now that he’s crazy Catholic. This guy does not give one fuck about what his opposition thinks, because they are wrong. He’s a dyed-in-the-wool Warrior, and he’s amazing to watch. Have I mentioned that I like to watch that kind of thing? I loved reading PZ Myer’s blog for the same reason. Intelligent, passionate, and a warrior. PZ would be what the Puppies call a “Social Justice Warrior” (SJW). John C Wright is the right-wing equivalent. He is absolutely a Conservative Justice Warrior (CJW?), and his fiction screams it. Hell, HE screams it, he doesn’t hide it for a second. He starts off the livestream acknowledging it! But the real fireworks come near the end, and for some reason I haven’t seen it referenced anywhere else.

Starting at ~1:18:00 John Wright says that “they’re an enemy religion to our religion. They know it.” Followed at ~1:18:45 with “They worship Moloch by means of abortion, and they worship Baphomet by means of sodomy.” He’s obviously talking in metaphor, but damn, that is some awesome metaphoring! That’s straight-up biblical. And it’s refreshingly honest. None of this namby-pamby bullshit about “You can say God-bless-you without apologizing for it.” Jesus, that argument is just plain sad, it crumbles as soon as anyone bothers to spend five freakin’ minutes with the opposition. But the claims that we support access to abortion, and we’re cool with sodomy? Entirely true. You think those things are bad, we don’t. That’s something real. That’s something worth engaging. Huzzah to Wright, for cutting past the bullshit and getting right to the beating heart of the divide. You, sir, have my respect. In the odd way that one respects a strong opponent.

Print Prestige?

Personal, Speculations, Writing No Responses »

Aug 042015

Tldr: What really matters is connecting to our readers. And you can’t connect to people if they can’t even read your work.

There are three major Speculative Fiction periodicals in the USA that still print on dead trees – Asimov’s, F&SF, and Analog. They’ve been around for a very long time, and due to their longevity and physical presence, they are considered the most prestigious to be published in. Most of the authors I know want to be published in them more than anywhere else, and send their new works to them first.

I respect this and I’m impressed when friends make sales to them.

But they are not my first choice for publication. None of them are even in my Top 3. Because when I get published in a print magazine NONE OF THE PEOPLE I LOVE CAN READ MY STORY!

It isn’t easy getting a copy of one of these magazines. I have to find a Barnes & Noble in my area (or one of the very rare non-B&N brick-and-mortar bookstores), root around in the neglected corners of their hidden magazine racks for a half hour (seriously, the SF lit stuff is almost impossible to find), only to find out that the June Issue of the magazine doesn’t actually come out in June!! (wtf print publications?) I’m too late! Then I find out I have to pay an amount approaching the cost of many eBooks for what is in effect a single short story, since I don’t care about any of the other stuff in there. And then on top of all that, I’m doing all this for a story I haven’t even read yet. I may not even LIKE it!

And no, I can’t buy an e-copy of a single issue, at least not without spending a half hour trying to figure out how to do that without buying a full-year’s subscription as well, and I’m not gonna be hassled into that.

So, how many authors am I willing to go through this process for? Exactly three: Chiang, Watts, and Dickinson.

I hate that I can’t recommend some of my favorite stories to my friends, because there’s no way for them to read them. I didn’t bother posting about “Three Bodies at Mitanni” at /r/rational, because how would anyone there get to read it anyhow? I have the same problem with “Liking What You See”. I am insanely happy that I can recommend “The Things” to everyone, because that’s available online! I do so all the time, and it always makes me all excited inside, imagining what they’ll be feeling the first time they read it.

For that reason I generally go with the online publications first, whenever I can. Clarkesworld, Lightspeed, Tor.com, Apex, Beneath Ceaseless Skies. If I get published in one of these, I can actually link to it. I can tell my friends, my family, my podcast listeners, and even the sometimes the guys on /r/rational, that I have written something, and here it is! Come take a look! :) I can’t do that with the Big Three paper publications.

Perhaps even more to the point – paper disappears quickly. It’s on the shelves for one month, and then it’s gone forever. The internet offers some modicum of permanency. Your story will still be available for people to read after two months, or two years, or even fifteen years later!

So yes. I respect the prestige of the paper publications. I am honored to have been in one. But I think that given another decade, maybe two at the absolute outside, paper and subscriptions will lose their luster. More and more authors choose to have their works appear in the free-to-read online publications whenever they can. Because for most of us, what really matters is connecting to our readers. And you can’t connect to people if they can’t even read your work.

All of which is to say – now that the rights for the story I sold to Asimov’s have reverted to me, I’ve put it online so that people can read it.

Although I will give print publications this – they are willing to look at works longer than 7,500 words. It is really hard trying to find a home for anything longer than that online. :(

“Three Bodies At Mitanni” by Seth Dickinson

Book Club Review, Personal, Speculations 6 Responses »

Aug 012015

I just read “Three Bodies At Mitanni” by Seth Dickinson.

Oh my god.

At first you think it’s about Hanson-style Ems. Then you think it’s about p-zombies. Then you think it’s about pathological altruism. Then you make the connection to Meditations on Moloch. Then you realize it’s the story-fication of the picture to the left. And then, in the end, you realize it isn’t about any of those things. Or rather, it isn’t *just* about those things. It is about you.

This is Rational Fiction by a Rationalist that is a Cautionary Tale About Rationalism. And it’s really fucking good. Seth Dickinson continues to be one of the most important writers of our generation.

I only wish it was available in a format that people in my generation could ACTUALLY READ. Right now you can only get it by tracking down a June 2015 dead-tree copy of Analogy Science Fiction (the special 1000th issue!).

But if you get a chance, I highly recommend it. Hopefully Seth will make it available online someday.

[EDIT 8/23/22] – This is now available online in epub form, from Forever magazine, issue 67. Still gotta pay for it, but at least it’s super easy! Thank you Ross Presser!

I also created an audio version with Seth’s permission

A stupid little confession

Personal No Responses »

Jul 072015

It bugs me a lot that I generally cannot answer the question “Why am I even here?” Last week’s series of posts was me taking another stab at that question, which – I know – has been bugging people since people became people. There’s been no shortage of times that I’ve wanted to just ragequit the entire thing. Part of the problem is that I don’t want to be evil.

What I want to do is write fiction. I come from a working-class family, and it was pretty well hammered into me that fiction is a waste of time. It doesn’t create anything of value, it simply steals the time you could be using to make your life better. It is wireheading. I’ve spent my whole life feeling guilty about reading fiction, watching fiction, or playing video games, and 20+ years feeling even more guilty about wanting to make it. I’ve always felt like a drug-pusher. I want to create a destructive thing that makes people feel good temporarily at the cost of their own well-being.

The subverting of this guilt is perhaps the thing I like most about Rationalist fiction. The stated purpose of HPMoR (and supposedly all Rationalist fiction) is to teach the reader how to better apply Rationalism in their own life. This is a thing I think will make all of humanity better. It was like a huge carbon-offset for fiction. It’s not a drug that hurts the reader, it’s a tool that makes them better, so it’s OK!

But when I actually read Rationalist fiction, what I like most isn’t that which teaches the best, it is that which makes me feel emotions the best. (Although the teaching is a huge bonus.) And when I write, while I incorporate themes of the Rationalist movement, I don’t actually set out to try to teach something. I’m just trying to make people feel emotions. Which means that at best I’m a drug pusher that says “Using my drug correlates with decreased heart-disease!” when I damn well know my intention is to get people high.

Unless, of course, feeling emotions is the raison d’etre of humanity. In which case maybe what I’m doing isn’t so bad. Maybe it’s even something valuable, in its own way.

I would like to think that. So I’m gonna try thinking that for a while, and see how that works out.

Removing The Person From The Output

Personal, Speculations 2 Responses »

Jul 022015

Recent comments about the previous post regarding valuing how brain-states are achieved are deserving of reflection and reply.

Rowan:

how is the process of playing Doom without cheat codes distinguished from the process of repeatedly pushing a button connected to certain electrodes in your head that produce the emotions associated with playing Doom without cheat codes? (Or just lying there while the computer chooses which electrodes to stimulate on your behalf?)

If it’s just the emotions without the experiences that would cause those emotions, I think that’s a huge difference. That is once again just jumping right to the end-state, rather than experiencing the process that brings it about. It’s first-order control, and that efficiency and directness strips out all the complexity and nuance of a second-order experience.

See Incoming Fireball -> Startled, Fear
Strafe Right -> Anticipation, Dread
Fireball Dodged -> Relief
Return Fire -> Vengeance!!

Is strictly more complicated than just

Startled, Fear
Anticipation, Dread
Relief
Vengeance!!

I think the key difference being that in the first case, the player is entangled in the process. While these things are designed to produce a specific and very similar experiences for everyone (which is why they’re popular to a wide player base), it takes a pre-existing person and combines them with a series of elements that is supposed to lead to an emotional response. The exact situation is unique(ish) for each person, because the person is a vital input. The output (of person feeling X emotions) is unique and personalized, as the input is different in every case.

When simply conjuring the emotions directly via wire, the individual is removed as an input. The emotions are implanted directly and do not depend on the person. The output (of person feeling X emotions) is identical and of far less complexity and value. Even if the emotions are hooked up to a random number generator or in some other way made to result in non-identical outputs, the situation is not improved. Because the problem isn’t so much “identical output” as it is that the Person was not an input, was not entangled in the process, and therefore doesn’t matter.

Billy:

I may be misunderstanding how you use the term “wireheading”, but a sufficiently advanced machine could stimulate the right parts of your brain at the right time to give you the experience of watching a movie, and there would be no way to distinguish between the “real” experience and the “wired” experience. (Or substitute any of your other examples.)

So before we start, I want to state that I don’t think there’s anything bad about simulated experiences per se. “Wireheading” is commonly defined as directly activating the end-state that is desired. In the classic example, by running a wire to the joy-parts of the brain and stimulating them. What you seem to be describing is more of a Matrix-style full sensory replacement.

I actually don’t have much of a problem with simulated-realities. Already a large percentage of the emotions felt by middle-class people in the first world are due to simulated realities. We induce feelings via music, television/movies, video games, novels, and other art. I think this has had some positive effects on society – it’s nice when people can get their Thrill needs met without actually risking their lives and/or committing crimes. In fact, the sorts of people who still try to get all their emotional needs met in the real world tend to be destructive and dramatic and I’m sure everyone knows at least one person like that, and tries to avoid them.

Of course I think a complete retreat to isolation would be sad, because other human minds are the most complex things that exist, and to cut that out of one’s life entirely would be an impoverishment. But a community of people interacting in a cyberworld, with access to physical reality? Shit, that sounds amazing!

Perhaps you meant something different? A “Total Recall” style system has the potential to become nightmarish. Right now when someone watches a movie, they bring their whole life with them. The movie is interpreted in light of one’s life experience. Every viewer has a different experience (some people have radically different experiences, as me and my SO recently discovered when we watched Birdman together. In fact, this comparing of the difference of experiences is the most fun part of my bi-weekly book club meetings. It’s kinda the whole point.). The person is an input in the process, and they’re mashed up into the product. If your proposed system would simply impose a memory or an experience onto someone else wholesale* without them being involved in the process, then it would be just as bad as Rowan’s “series of emotions” process.

I have a vision of billions of people spending all of eternity simply reliving the most intense emotional experiences ever recorded, in perfect carbon copy, over and over again, and I shudder in horror. That’s not even being a person anymore. That’s overwriting your own existence with the recorded existence of someone(s) else. :(

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