Archive for January, 2015

A Message from My Publisher Concerning Sad Puppies

Posted January 30, 2015 By John C Wright

From the pen of Vox Day:

Sad Puppies: the last day

These are the final hours to register for Sad Puppies 3: The Ensaddening. Here is why you might want to consider doing so even if the idea of spending $40 to poke a sharp stick in the collective eyes of the SJWs who are doing their level best to destroy the science fiction and fantasy literature you love for the next two years isn’t enough in its own right.

  1. Hugo Awards are worth around $13,000 to an SJW, according to one Kameron Hurley. For a fraction of one percent of that, you can deny multiple SJWs their ability to commit Pink SF and force them to spend their time delivering pizzas instead. (Have no fear, the awards are worth absolutely nothing to us in financial terms, because the gatekeepers who value them for marketing purposes won’t publish even national bestselling authors of the Right; they are far more driven by intersectional equalitarian ideology than by evil capitalist business sense.)
  2. Short of wiping their hard drives and deleting their current manuscripts, there is literally nothing you can do that upsets the SJWs more than putting the sort of right-wing writer they have spent two decades working very hard to suppress in the limelight that they seek for themselves.
  3. The more obvious our numbers, the more it encourages the moderate elements at the major publishers to rein in the left-wing inmates who have taken over the SF/F asylum. The Toad of Tor is no longer at Tor and it is unlikely that her dismissal would have taken place without the fact that people were finally standing up to her crude bullying, causing her to double-down and attract the attention of higher-ups at the publisher. Tor’s German owners don’t give a damn about politics or the imperative of strong female characters and they’re only beginning to understand how the SJWs running their subsidiaries have let them down.
  4. It’s very good value for the money. Last year, the $20 spent on a supporting membership got you the complete Wheel of Time series, the complete Grimnoire Chronicles, and sundry other works as well. Granted, it also got you a fair amount of Pink sludge, but no one is going to make you download it. The more of you that register, the more likely it is that there will be great stuff that you want to read as part of the Hugo Packet.
  5. Sarah Hoyt says: “I suggest we kick them while they’re down and make them fight for the awards and prestige they crave. Also, that we point at them and make duck noises.”
  6. We have the momentum. Last year, the Dread Ilk showed up in respectable force without me doing anything more than putting up a single post with a modified version of Sad Puppies 2. This year, we’re locked, loaded, and ready to be all that we can be. Trust me on that. About which more soon….
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Klavan on Gamergate

Posted January 28, 2015 By John C Wright

This is roughly two months old, but I only saw it today for the first time. Just in case my one fan or my six other readers has not seen it, I would like to pass it along.

Andrew Klavan with the revolting truth about Gamergate:

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Four Anecdotes about Racethink

Posted January 28, 2015 By John C Wright

I have heard people, or, rather, Morlocks who look a great deal like people, using the term African American to refer to Blacks from England and France and elsewhere in Europe.

I was in a time travel role playing game once, based on Roger Zelazny’s ROADMARKS. There was a mystical road through time the time travelers used, and branches and exits led to alternate histories. At one road stop hotel, the moderator of the game was describing to the players what some of the travelers from other timelines looked like, including Aztecs in Spanish armor and Eskimo astronauts and so on.

We saw a tall and stalwart Negro in a crew cut from a world where Prussia was inhabited by black men in the 1930s, and he was wearing a Nazi SS uniform. One of the players, a liberal, was surprised or perhaps scandalized, asked to hear the description once again, saying, “You mean an African American Nazi?”

The moderator raised one eyebrow and said, “No. He’s clearly from Germany.” Read the remainder of this entry »

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Notions and Inklings

Posted January 28, 2015 By John C Wright

A fascinating essay by Bruce G Charlton today on the Superversive blog:

http://www.ljagilamplighter.com/2015/01/28/j-r-r-tolkiens-unfinished-work-the-notions-club-papers/

Few people know that, just as the second world war was ending, JRR Tolkien broke off from writing The Lord of the Rings and spent about a year and a half working on a modern novel called The Notion Club Papers (NCPs).

The draft novel material can be found on pages 143-327 of the Sauron Defeated, which is The History of Middle Earth Volume Nine, edited by Christopher Tolkien and published twenty years ago (1992) – and in addition there are a further hundred pages of drafts of the history of Numenor which was intended to have been integrated into the story. This is a big chunk of writing, done at the peak of Tolkien’s powers, so it may be surprising that it is not better known – but of course the Notion Club Papers forms merely one part of a scholarly volume also dedicated to charting the evolution of Lord of the Rings, so few Tolkien fans are even aware of its existence.

An elfish time travel story telling about dreams and quests to bring the fiery wine of Faerie back to the vinegar of the dreary half-dead modern world! If someone else does not write it first, I surely must.

Hm. I should write it even if a dozen folks write it first. My elves would be different.

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A Sad Puppy Speaks!

Posted January 28, 2015 By John C Wright

This is a nice, concise, well written column over on Sarah Hoyt’s blog, written by Charlie Martin. His point: do not let MiniTru rewrite history, and make out Science Fiction to have somehow been anti-female, despite the large number of top notch female writers and despite the extremely large number of admirable female characters.

http://accordingtohoyt.com/2015/01/28/be-the-bojum-charlie-martin/

The money quote:

… the majority of award-winning writers for the last 20 or 30 years had actually been women. People of vaginitude. Oppressed womyn under the heel of the patriarchal publishing establishment.

Thinking about people I’d known personally: Connie Willis. Marion Zimmer Bradley. Karen Joy Fowler. Joanna Russ. Other big names, like Ursula K LeGuin, C. L. Moore, Leigh for Gods’ sakes Brackett, who not only wrote SF but wrote what I think may be the best screenplay of all time, Rio Bravo.

Ah, but they didn’t address sexual roles — well, no, Joanna Russ’s The Female Man. LeGuin’s The Left Hand of Darkness — except that wasn’t, somehow, really “groundbreaking” enough. (Hey kids: I was there. If you don’t think LHoD was groundbreaking, it’s because you’ve been plowing and replowing that same patch of ground that LeGuin took the arrows for breaking.)

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Sad Puppies 3: The Ensaddening!

Posted January 26, 2015 By John C Wright

sad_puppies_3_patch

Yea, verily, yea, it is that time of year again, dear friends and comrades, when once again the war for the soul of Science Fiction is at hand, or, rather, for those of us lacking hands, at hook.

It is that time when we lay aside our personal differences and take up arms against the foes of common sense, human happiness, and good, clean fun, namely, the Morlocks who are trying to ruin Science Fiction in the same way they have successfully ruined the Oscars.

They want to turn your space yarns and tale of speculative fiction into social commentary on leftwingnut non-issues and Democrat Party talking points. They want to turn your entertaining stories about star fleet captains and space princesses needing rescue into social justice message lectures about ending nonbinary gender.

They want to steal your cake and give you boiled cabbage.

And we here in the Evil Legion of Evil say NAY! We say ‘nay!’ because we talk in a Faux Shakespearean dialog first concocted by Stan Lee for Thor comics. Because that is how we rolleth, forsooth! You may not have my pulp copy of Amazing Whizz Wonderbang Space Stories until you pry it out of my cold, dead, fingers.

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If I Were the Devil by Paul Harvey

Posted January 24, 2015 By John C Wright

I heard on the radio today a Paul Harvey column from 1965, found a recording, which I offer to my readers. It shows a man of ordinary insight possessing no prophetic gifts, merely by grasping the point of the teachings of Christ can see insights and utter prophesy entirely beyond the reach of any intellectual. (And I say that as an intellectual myself). Clarity of heart, not complexity of brain, is the key to understanding.

There are several different versions of this column, since Paul Harvey published it more than once, but each contain basically the same warning.
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Word Fetishes

Posted January 23, 2015 By John C Wright

A reader with the abstract yet addictive name of Concept Junkie leaves this comment regarding the case in favor of marriage, now, for some reason that does not bear close examination, called traditional marriage. (As if a three-sided triangle needed to be called a traditional triangle to distinguish it from all those square triangles with four sides):

Our gracious host has made the case better than anyone I’ve ever seen, but I don’t think his arguments, however sound and logical would change the vast majority of minds.

An understatement. My reasoning will change NO minds, zero, nada, zip, simply because those who uphold the perverse as equal to the decent, the sick as equal to the hale, the unwholesome as equal to the wholesome were never reasoned into that worldview, no, not one, not ever.

You cannot reason someone out of a stance he was not reasoned into.

A Leftist is not someone who has an alternative political philosophy to yours, or different reasons. He is someone who, in the realm of politics, has decided to eschew philosophy and abandon reason.

Leftism is what you get when you stop reasoning, kill it dead, and substitute word fetishes instead.

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Tens of Thousands of Invisible Men

Posted January 22, 2015 By John C Wright

I Google’d the words MARCH FOR LIFE today, January 22nd, and clicked the ‘news’ tab. The results were fascinating: articles from Fox News, from Vatican Radio, Breitbart News, Patheos Blog, Newbusters, WTOP‎ (our local Christian radio)  the Catholic News Agency, and Channel 7, the local ABC affiliate. Notice anything odd about that?

Someone with more mathematical alertness than myself, and more patience to comb through the articles, should puzzled out what the ratio of mainstream media coverage to niche market Christian, conservative, and Catholic media coverage. So a sex hundred thousand man march, far larger than most political movements, simply is not news? I invite you to compare it to the anti-Ferguson marches and protests, accusing an innocent policeman and deifying a stoned thug, and how much news coverage they received.

Here is one of the columns:

From https://cocacolaman.wordpress.com/2015/01/20/12214-650k-will-march-on-washington-but-you-wont-hear-anything-about-it/ This is written by Ryan M. Adorjan, seminarian for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Joliet-in-Illinois. Read the remainder of this entry »

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Superversive Art Imitates Life

Posted January 22, 2015 By John C Wright

A column from my beautiful and talented wife on the real nature of realistic stories. She dreamed she wrote this column, and, when she woke, decided to write it in real life.

http://www.ljagilamplighter.com/2015/01/21/superversive-art-imitates-life/

Sometimes people say that stories of wonder and magic are unrealistic. Because they never happen in real life.

But this isn’t true.

You just have to know where to look.

Below are just a few examples of real life stories where people lived the kind of experience that Superversive stories strive to imitate.

1) I answered my doorbell one day, and a nice-looking young man asked for some directions. I told him what he wanted to know, and as I turned to go back into the house, he shoved me forward into the entry, followed me inside, and slammed the door shut.

I found myself facing a pistol he had thrust at me. First he told me he wouldn’t hurt me or my baby. Then he forced me into a back bedroom where he ordered, “Take off your clothes.”

Stunned and horrified, I answered, “No, I can’t do that. Please, let me talk with you.”

“No!” He jerked at my blouse and gestured angrily with his gun. “Lady, you’ve got five to start undressing. One!”

No human means of protection or rescue was at hand, and I couldn’t succeed in engaging him in some sort of dialogue through which I might dissuade him from his intentions. Our big collie was out “protecting” the back yard. My husband was at the office. And even if the man was bluffing with the gun, I could see no chance of overpowering him, since he was built like a football player.

Struggling to keep my thinking above hypnotic waves of fear, dismay, and hopelessness, I mentally gave myself—and my situation —up to God. I shook my head at the man’s demand.

“God is my Life,” I managed to say.

“No, He’s not. Two!”

“Yes, He is.” The strength was returning to my voice. “And He’s your Life, too.”

“Three!”

“God loves me, and God loves you.”

“Four!”

“God is my Life. God is my Life.

I never heard him say “five,” but I heard a click as he pulled the trigger, and the gun did not fire. The man smiled and shook his head in disbelief. He reached out and patted me on the head. Then he said in a subdued voice, “Lady, you’re great. I’m sorry.”

He turned and started to walk out, and as he did, I felt a tremendous surge of compassion and love for this individual, who perhaps had recognized something of the ever-presence of Christ, Truth.

“Wait,” I called. “I have something for you.”

He turned at the front door. “Lady, all I need is love.”

And that, folks, is what we want to do with our fiction.

Superversive stories, at their best, will do to their readers what prayer did in the testimonies above, what laughter did for my son:

Catch the darkness unaware and lift it out of itself into something higher, something glorious.

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Science has proven the the leading cause of sadness in puppies is the Leftwingization of the Hugo Awards, so that awards are being given on the basis not of their merits, but on the basis of their political correctness.

And since political correctness requires that storytelling be smothered and smug yet whiny preaching arrant nonsense be exulted, politically correct stories suck like an industrial strength shop-vac.

In other words, the award for the best novels and short stories has been highjacked to serve the social justice warriors, screaming meemies, cultural Marxists, and nyctalope cannibal troglodyte Morlocks, and their stories are poorly conceived and poorly executed trash. Novels are getting awards not because they are good, but only because they are Leftist.

Here is the announcement of he announcement:

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The Nature of the Andromeda Realm is Abstract and Fluid

Posted January 20, 2015 By John C Wright

I was looking for the correct demonym for Andromeda. (Is it Andromedan or Andromedean or Andromedian? Andromedahin? Andromedaneese? Andromedine? Andromedaoi? Andromedishman?)

So I typed in the word Andromedan, and I found this: Read the remainder of this entry »

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Want Ad

Posted January 20, 2015 By John C Wright

I met one of my two fans at Marscon last weekend, much to my pleasure and surprise. The other fan wanted my help spreading his Help Wanted Ad around the science fiction world, so I am posting here so that the other fan will also see it:

Need some more artists for a game project a partner and I are looking to kickstart over the next year. We need 1 more artist who is skilled at
drawing human figures and portraits. We’re offering to pay up front for approximately 3 works with more to be commissioned if the kickstart is successful. Please send examples of your work as well as a preferred rate.

Email Garak at

simplegarak at gmail dot com

 

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Sf Signal post: A Blind Man’s Journey Through Hell

Posted January 20, 2015 By John C Wright

My beautiful and talented wife was asked to contribute a guest essay at SF SIGNAL:

http://www.sfsignal.com/archives/2015/01/guest-post-special-needs-in-strange-worlds-l-jagi-lamplighter-on-meditations-on-a-blind-mans-journey-through-hell/

Some choice quotes to whet your curiosity:

[GUEST POST] Special Needs in Strange Worlds: L. Jagi Lamplighter on Meditations on a Blind Man’s Journey Through Hell

When I was preparing to write this article, I discussed the idea with a few folks who are sight-impaired. The comment that most stuck with me came from Day Al-Mohamed, co-author of the charming Baba Ali and the Clockwork Djinn. She made quite a few insightful observations, but the one that struck me was: “I am not your metaphor.

[…]

As a writer and a reader, I am not against the use of blindness, or anything, as metaphor if it fits the story. Nor am I against blindness going hand and hand with inner vision. And yet, I felt Day had a point. At least occasionally, it would be nice to have a blind character who simply happened to be blind, the way other folk happen to be lame, or deaf, or have a bad heart or unusually short, or even red-haired, or freckled.

Metaphors and spiritual gifts are not the only difficulties blind characters face. Kody Keplinger is a YA author who also happens to be blind. Participating in a blog called Disabilities in KidLit, she wrote on the subject of blind characters in stories for children:

The characters are either completely ruled by their disability – physically and emotionally – constantly breaking down about the struggles they face, fearing the outside world, struggling to adapt, etc. Or, they don’t seem fazed at all. In fact, you might never know they were blind because they are independent and fearless and nothing – NOTHING – holds them back. … Presenting disabled characters as weak or fragile is problematic and unrealistic when the vast majority of us live full, happy lives. But the second option, the disabled person who isn’t even fazed, that’s not honest either.

Her observations made sense to me. On one hand, any character fails to be a real character if they only have one quality—such as a disability. On the other hand, if a character is not affected at all by a particular characteristic, then it might as well not be there. Why bring it up?

[…]

As I worked on the Prospero’s Daughter series, a question arose: Was it realistic to take a blind man to Hell? Would it push the reader’s credulity too far? What if the reader responded: Oh come on, a blind person couldn’t really do all that, right?

After some contemplation, I thought: Well, is it realistic to take anyone to Hell?

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Myself, my ugly belly, and my lovely wife, will all be appearing at Marscon this weekend.

My belly which, is the size of the Jovial moon Europa, will arrive Friday evening, but I myself will only arrive on Saturday.

Here is my schedule:

Saturday, January 17

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