From what I've read of this (substantial parts have been from conservative and libertarian sources), the whole business looks to be the kind of political feud that's been endemic in fandom since the banning of the Futurians from the first Worldcon. That is, it's largely driven by in-group/out-group. And so of course both in-groups have mythical descriptions of it:
Myths about the other group and why their own group is better: "We want science fiction to be fun and they want to take away other people's enjoyment of life" versus "They're all straight white men who want to exclude everyone who's not like them" (this part is a lot like the two claims in GamerGate, so I think the comparisons are unavoidable);
Myths defining their own group: "We're upholding critical standards of good writing" versus "We're speaking truth to power, as members of a group that's excluded and held in contempt."
I don't think any of them is strictly true. At best they all seem like convenient oversimplifications, useful to mobilize people for a two-sided conflict.
As a hard-core libertarian, I find fandom a bit unrelievedly progressive (though of course that's been true since the days of Wells and Gernsback), and I sympathize with the political urge to shake things up and have more ideological diversity (as well as ethnic, sexual, and sexual preference diversity); see Jonathan Haidt's discussion of academic political culture for a parallel. On the other hand, I'm not a fan of most of this year's nominees; my literary tastes run in different directions, and I wouldn't vote against my own personal tastes for the sake of political advocacy. On the other other hand, the No Award proposal sounds a bit too much like "scorched earth."
But perhaps, if there are still Worldcons seventy-five years from now, the current clashes will sound as strange as the banning of the Futurians does now, and be as little remembered except by people with a peculiar interest in fannish history.
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Date: 2015-04-14 06:47 pm (UTC)Myths about the other group and why their own group is better: "We want science fiction to be fun and they want to take away other people's enjoyment of life" versus "They're all straight white men who want to exclude everyone who's not like them" (this part is a lot like the two claims in GamerGate, so I think the comparisons are unavoidable);
Myths defining their own group: "We're upholding critical standards of good writing" versus "We're speaking truth to power, as members of a group that's excluded and held in contempt."
I don't think any of them is strictly true. At best they all seem like convenient oversimplifications, useful to mobilize people for a two-sided conflict.
As a hard-core libertarian, I find fandom a bit unrelievedly progressive (though of course that's been true since the days of Wells and Gernsback), and I sympathize with the political urge to shake things up and have more ideological diversity (as well as ethnic, sexual, and sexual preference diversity); see Jonathan Haidt's discussion of academic political culture for a parallel. On the other hand, I'm not a fan of most of this year's nominees; my literary tastes run in different directions, and I wouldn't vote against my own personal tastes for the sake of political advocacy. On the other other hand, the No Award proposal sounds a bit too much like "scorched earth."
But perhaps, if there are still Worldcons seventy-five years from now, the current clashes will sound as strange as the banning of the Futurians does now, and be as little remembered except by people with a peculiar interest in fannish history.