John C. Wright's Journal

I just read this review of Jim Butcher’s latest book:

1 of 106 people found the following review helpful
1.0 out of 5 stars
I’m just going to rate this a 1/5 on principle…
By Zoe S. Galaitsis on October 6, 2015

I’m just going to rate this a 1/5 on principle, after Jim Butcher got nominated by Vox Day and his Rabid Puppies. Not sure what’s going on there but Butcher hasn’t come out and said a thing, not even to deny their platform of reviling women, gays, and non-Christians. I’m generally wary of reading anything by him or giving him any money at this point.

Hmm. Funny. I do not recall our platform reviling women, gays and non-Christians. I recall our platform was to support books on their merit and entertainment value, regardless of political correctness, and to give science fiction awards based on their skill at telling a science fiction story, not to give science fiction awards based on political party loyalties.

I do recall being in the receiving end of actionable libels from major international news organization, and I do recall thinking that no one was stupid enough actually to believe such obvious and clumsy lies, but in this case I overestimated the intelligence of the reading public. I thought that they would be smart enough to, you know, read.

Therefore the principle that this reviewer is upholding is the unreality principle, that principle that lies are better than truth, and outrageous lies are better than lies; the principle that injustice is better than justice, so judging books based on the fact that someone you arbitrarily and unjustly decided to hate likes those books is better then reading the book and judging on the merit.

Have you wondered why award-winning SFF books and stories, the kind sold to libraries and touted as best sellers, are all so bland and bad?

Consider the simple logic of it. A community must either judges stories on the merit or not on the merit.

If the community judges stories on the merit, then the most meritorious works will be lauded, assuming the community has any taste at all. (And if you do not agree with the tastes of science fiction readers, why read science fiction?)

If, on the other hand, the community judges stories not on the merit, as when, for example, you judge the story on the political correctness of the message or of the author’s private life, then not the most meritorious works will be lauded. Bland and bad stories will be promoted and feted, and your, the reader, will not hear if there are any good stories out there.

Do you want to know why brilliant hard-core science fiction like THE MARTIAN by Weir did not win awards but boring and predictable lecture-fiction with little science fiction in it, or none, won instead? It is because fairplay is not in fashion among the termites who have eaten their way into positions of influence in the award-nominating structure.

Envy the Morlock! How simple it becomes to live in a world with no right or wrong, which are subtle and silent and require a nicety of judgment and wisdom to discern: but party loyalty is obvious, self-aggrandizing and loud, and any idiot can see who is a member of the groupthink collective, and who is an unperson scorned by Big Brother.

Humans think. Morlocks hate.

They hate whoever the two minute hate says to hate. It does not matter whether Emmanuel Goldstein is real or not, or whether Jim Butcher writes well or poorly. The target is created for the sake of the hate; the hatred is not a reaction to some hateful thing, real or imaginary the target has does or is.

Be that as it may, this review was a sufficient incentive to buy a copy of Mr Butcher’s latest book. Money permitting, I shall buy two copies.

I don’t know and I don’t care what Mr Butcher’s political leanings, sexual preferences, denomination or race is. I have not examined his Ahenpass, or discovered is he has a quatroon as a greatgrandfather. I am not a Leftist. I care if he can perform the job for which I pay him, that is, write a good story in return for my hard earned book buying dollar.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Cinder-Spires-Aeronauts-Windlass/dp/0451466802/

• sciencemom posted on November 9, 2015
  Cool. I like it!
• Tom Simon posted on November 7, 2015
  You’re quite right. Mortuus fuero would be ‘I shall have been dead’, which, however, is a dandy construction for use…
• sciencemom posted on November 7, 2015
  Well, I was trying for the future perfect of morior, mori, mortuus sum V DEP Since it's deponent, the future…

Look at this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sad_Puppies

On the Wikipedia page concerning Sad Puppies, you will see Irene Gallo’s remark that we (and you) are sexist, racist, homophobes mentioned, but there is no mention whatsoever of yours truly, the author that the Puppy Kickers burned down the Hugo’s to stop.

Yet somehow, twice the allegedly neutral article manages to slip in the idea that the Sad Puppies objected to literary fiction — as if ‘One Bright Star to Guide Them’ were not literary, but ‘The Day the World Turned Upside Down’ was — and the source for the conclusion is two hostile hit-pieces of gutter journalism.

Good grief.

Had I world enough and time, I could answer all the lies and omissions and libels and slanders. As it is, I cannot even raise Tom Doherty on the phone.

• nightfly016 posted on September 22, 2015
  They did it with the Neil deGrasse Tyson quote stories as well - basically they decided that the Federalist wasn't…
• apparition posted on September 21, 2015
  That is absolutely the case. And we have no idea how many people voted for a SP/RP nominated work because…
• Mary posted on September 21, 2015
  By the same token, you can only say that some works that happened to be on the slate happened to…

The Sasquan committee is refusing to release data that would obviate or confirm accusations of ballot fraud at the last Hugo elections.

http://voxday.blogspot.com/2015/09/sasquan-tries-to-hide-scandal.html

Vox Day quotes Glenn Glazer:

Unbelievable. I wonder what it is they are trying to hide? Tor buying supporting memberships for its employees?

Back at Sasquan, the BM passed a non-binding resolution to request that Sasquan provide anonymized nomination data from the 2015 Hugo Awards. I stood before the BM and said, as its official representative, that we would comply with such requests. However, new information has come in which has caused us to reverse that decision. Specifically, upon review, the administration team believes it may not be possible to anonymize the nominating data sufficiently to allow for a public release. We are investigating alternatives.

Thank you for your patience in this matter. While we truly wish to comply with the resolution and fundamentally believe in transparent processes, we must hold the privacy of our members paramount and I hope that you understand this set of priorities.

Best,

Glenn Glazer
Vice-Chair, Business and Finance
Sasquan, the 73rd World Science Fiction Convention

This is not acceptable. This is not even REMOTELY acceptable. If you voted in the 2015 Hugo Awards, I encourage you to contact Sasquan and demand that they released the anonymized nomination data.

I find it very difficult to believe they are refusing to release it because it might make the Rabid Puppies look bad; we already know that the SJW message that the Puppies voted in lockstep is completely false. So, the question is: what voting patterns tend to embarrass whom?

Read the remainder of this entry »

• Carbonel posted on September 10, 2015
  Thank you, Rainforest Giant, yes. Considering what has happened to every "Puppy" leader up to and including international mass media…
• Mrs. Wright posted on September 10, 2015
  Remember they weren't offering the info to quell doubters. They were offering it to the EPH guys to see if…
• Joshua Young posted on September 10, 2015
  I miss this, too =/

This is from the pen of Thomas Olde Heuvelt, letter to me, 2015

Let me state this: people who write different stories than what you know or like, not necessarily have “sad and narrow lives”. You glorify what you know. I glorify what I know. Stephen King glorifies what he knows. Whether it’s God, or a gay tentacle, or an evil clown – as long as they are good stories, who cares?

This is from THE PHOENIX EXULTANT, published in 2003:

The image of the Cacophile flopped its tendrils first one way, then the other. “What has that to do with us? Phaethon wants to fly to the stars. He wants to make worlds. I want to find a new wire-point to jolt my pleasure centers, maybe with an over-load pornographic pseudomnesia to give it background. Are his dreams any better than mine?”

While science fiction is not meant to predict the future, sometimes it does.

• robertjwizard posted on September 10, 2015
  I wouldn't accept the quote's premise in the first place. If we wrote (or glorified, which just makes an incorrect…
• robertjwizard posted on September 10, 2015
  Or that Christine is about an evil car. You can toss in The Tommyknockers as well since it is basically…
• Carbonel posted on September 10, 2015
  I must have been hanging around you and your wife too much, as the first thing I thought after reading…

I note that Mr George RR Martin calls for a return to civility in the Sad Puppies debate (http://grrm.livejournal.com/440444.html). I welcome the idea and would not be displeased if the Puppykickers were men of such character as to be able to carry through with it. But I applaud the gesture.

Myself, I would be more pleased by a return to basic honesty.

For one, Mr Martin would have seemed more sincere had he not parenthetically added “And too many people empowered VD and his slate… either by voting for the work he slated (often unread)…” Which says, in other words, that those who voted for my works in record numbers, giving me a record number of nominations, did not read those works.

The claim is not correct, but it is politically correct, that is, this is the narrative convenient for SocJus, and the mere fact no one could possibly know this is a matter of sublime indifference.

Often unread, indeed, Mr. Martin? And how, praytell, would you or any mortal man know such a thing? The Hugo committee does not quiz the voters on their reading comprehension.

I suspect they were read. I have heard from hundreds of fans who voted and who expressed regret that my stories did not win. It seems to me odd that anyone would send a personal note of condolence to a writer whose stories one did not read: but even if Mr. Martin were privy to my private letters, he would have no basis for a firm conclusion as to how many, or even if a single, vote were cast for my stories by someone who did not read my stories.

So why add these two dishonest words to the sentence? It would seem an oddly undiplomatic gesture to make in the middle of a sincere proffer of a truce: that is, if this were a sincere proffer of truce, and not merely more of the same.

Morlocks live in darkness and consume human flesh for their holiday feasts. I can indeed be civil to them if they return the courtesy, but I cannot change their nature.

The basic nature of SocJus is dishonesty.

They addicts of Social Justice seek forever to be outraged at some nonexistent injustice, so that they can paint themselves as martyrs and crusaders in a righteous cause, but without the inconvenience of suffering martyrdom or the travail of crusade which would accompany any fight against a real injustice.

One sign of Morlockery is to pen a missive asking one’s foes to abandon their arms and surrender in the name of compromise or civility or somesuch hogwash, while offering nothing, nothing whatsoever, in return, not even basic honesty.

Nor is Mr. Martin in a position to offer anything. Like the Sad Puppies, his side is a loose coalition of likeminded but independent members.

If he refrains from incivility, but his allies do not, I gain nothing by forswearing the use of such colorful terms as ‘Morlocks’ or accurate terms as ‘Christ-haters.’ If I wanted to be bland and inaccurate, I would adopt the flaccid language of political correctness.

And, by an entirely expected coincidence, during the same fortnight as Mr. Martin’s call for civility, we find other members of the SocJus movement busily not being civil or honest:

The surrealistic sensation of finding oneself subject to the two-minute hate for things one did not say by  eager Witch-hunters (leveling silly, false and negligent accusations apparently in hopes of gaining a reputation for zealotry) is not one I would wish on any unstoical soul. In this week’s episode, we find that I call men bad names not because they betray my trust, ruin my favorite show, and seek to worm their sick doctrines into the minds of impressionable children, but because I do not like women befriending women. Who knew?

https://quoteside.wordpress.com/2015/09/05/the-weekly-round-up-592015/

• apparition posted on September 10, 2015
  You are reading all kinds of things into my post which are simply not there. My "argument" is that Legatuss'…
• Andrew Brew posted on September 10, 2015
  You need to be rather more nuanced in your understanding of Christian theology before attempting such an equivalence as: 1)…
• apparition posted on September 9, 2015
  "Have you noticed that neither Legatuss nor anyone else here, has argued that sodomy is wrong because the Bible says…

I received a letter from a stranger who said he was a preparing a scholarly paper on the Sad Puppies phenomenon. I agreed to answer a few basic questions, whose answers I give below, for the edification and entertainment of my readers.  

1. Any general thoughts on the Hugo controversy this year?

At one time, the Hugo Awards reflected the honest opinion of the consensus as to what was the most popular science fiction of that year. It was an award given to science fiction works based on their science fiction appeal.

The process was corrupted over the last fifteen to twenty years by a small but vocal group whose first love was political correctness, not science fiction.

By their own admission, they sought successfully to deliver the award, particularly in the short form categories, to authors based on victim-group status, to works based on politically correct themes, rather than on merit, on the theory that science fiction serves a social role whose primary duty is to propagandize the reader, and condition the reader to accept the political and social maxims currently fashionable among advocates of Orwellian politically correctness.

Seeing the award given to stories which had little merit as stories and no elements even arguably related to science fiction or fantasy, Larry Correia, Sarah Hoyt, and yours truly formed a literary movement dedicated to opposing this degeneration and degradation.

In jest, we called our movement the Sad Puppies (the term was coined by Larry Correia) on the tongue in cheek theory that science fiction awards going to poorly-written works based on political correctness was the leading cause of sadness in puppies, and asking readers to vote for meritorious science fiction works out of compassion for the tiny canines, and restore the dignity and meaning to the award.

Theodore Beale, who writes under the pen name Vox Day, joined us as an ally, but disagreed with the goals. He thought the award could not be salvaged and restored to its former glory; indeed, the only thing that could be done would be to force the politically-correctness faction (which he calls by the mocking title Social Justice Warriors, at one time their own name for themselves) to reveal their true purposes. His plan was to make it clear to any honest onlooker that the awards were being given out not based on merit, but due to politics. For this reason, he promoted his own slate of suggested works for his fans to read and vote upon, called the Rabid Puppies.

The Social Justice Warriors did in fact react precisely as Mr Beale predicted, and after the Sad Puppies unexpectedly swept several categories in the nominations, the SJWs used their superior numbers to vote NO AWARD into that category rather than give the award to whichever work was most worthy among the candidates.

This was done purely and openly for political reasons. The mask is torn. No honest onlooker can doubt the motive of the Social Justice Warriors at this point, or ponder whether the claims made by the Sad Puppies were true or false.

Read the remainder of this entry »

• John C Wright posted on September 10, 2015
  I am not offended, nor am I being sarcastic, merely polite, expressing myself in such a way that threw no…
• Altse Hashke posted on September 9, 2015
  Actually, I'm not changing the topic, nor the definition of anything, I was merely pointing out that the argument you…
• John C Wright posted on September 9, 2015
  Save your sighs. If you are allowed to change the topic when you say you are taking up another man's…

“Every normal man must be tempted, at times, to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats.”

I have already spit on my hands.

I would like, as a matter of form, for the Morlocks to be told we are prepared to Death Star the planet — Dantooine is too remote to make an effective demonstration — so that later, when THEY LIE and say they were not warned of the coming storm, they can have the punishments divine justice pours down on falsifiers in the Eight Circle of Hell in addition to the punishments they have earned as Flatterers, Hypocrites, Evil Counselors and Sowers of Discord.

(for the record, the penalties include being buried in excrement, forced marching in lead robes, burning with tongue of fire, and being severed eternally by a demonic swordblade. Falsifier are plagued with scabs or turn on each other as beasts.)

If our side does not make this gracious gesture, the punishments they bring on themselves will be less.

And we cannot have that.

Look — I hate to get emotional. It is bad for my Vulcan digestion. But the Hugos used to mean something, and now they don’t. A little bit of light and glory have departed the world.

Those who snuffed that light, hating a brightness they could not ignite themselves, must pay.

• Legatuss posted on September 14, 2015
  Laser weapons, given modern capabilities, are “ridiculously inefficient”. We’ll almost certainly never see them anywhere but maybe on nuclear-powered battleships,…
• nightfly016 posted on September 8, 2015
  You will note carefully that none of the beings you list is a member of the Federation, Klingon Empire, Cardassian…
• Legatuss posted on September 6, 2015
  Odd, I never even thought of, what would the rebels do, or the Sith do,or the Borg or dominion do,…

Please recall that wrath is a sin, and to receive the calculated insults of illwishers with grace is a sign of good breeding.

After midnight, Martin announced that for the first time (and hopefully the last) he was bestowing his own awards—dubbed “The Alfies” in honor of Alfred Bester, whose book The Demolished Man won Best Novel at the first-ever Hugos in 1953. “This year all of us were losers,” Martin said, explaining that the Alfies, each made from a streamlined 1950s hood ornament, were his attempt to take a little of the sting off.

Late Saturday, Worldcon released data from a parallel universe, one in which the Puppies hadn’t intervened. That let Martin give trophies to the people who would have been on the ballot, as well as some extra winners decided “by committee, and that committee is me,” Martin said.4 Sci-fi writer Eric Flint got an Alfie for his “eloquence and rationality” in blog posts about the Puppy kerfuffle. So did legendary author Robert Silverberg, who has attended every Worldcon since 1953, just for being himself.

The biggest cheers, though, broke out when Martin honored two people—Annie Bellet and Marko Kloos—who’d been first-time Hugo finalists this year until they withdrew their names. The new data showed Bellet would’ve been on the ballot anyway; the Alfie clearly stunned her. “I want these awards to be about the fiction,” Bellet said, “and that was important enough to me to give one up.”

The final Alfie of the night went to Kloos, a German-born writer (now he lives in New Hampshire), for turning down his Puppy-powered nomination and making room for the winner, The Three-Body Problem. “I may get nominated again,” he said after shaking Martin’s hand. “But knowing why I got this and who gave it to me—tonight, this beats the shit out of that rocket.”

• GiveEmBothBarrels posted on September 2, 2015
  Did not realize Eric Flint's was a socialist but I really enjoyed his Belisarius series. This is what differs Sad…
• Tamquam posted on September 2, 2015
  What's it all about, Alfie? JRR Martin's warm personal regard. Oo! Oo! Where do I get mine? I love hood…
• Zaklog the Great posted on September 2, 2015
  The really interesting question would take some time to sort out, but it would be the difference in sales between…

Sarah Hoyt Reads the Riot Act to Mary Robinette Kowal, with amusing gifs.

Mrs Kowal apparently thought it expedient (for she did not think it true) falsely to accuse Mrs Hoyt of being a racist on the grounds that Mrs Hoyt used the word ChiComs to refer to Chinese Communists.

http://accordingtohoyt.com/2015/08/28/fauxtrage/

The absurd lie was followed by an insincere yet smarmy nonapology and a restatement in stronger terms of the exploded, untenable and absurd position, which is commonly known as doubling down. SJWs always lie, and they always double down.

How is it that these mackerels have gained hegemony over our cultural institutions, down to and including such trivial corners of life as the Hugo Awards?

These are the same people who did not comprehend that obscure nuance of the English language known as a “nickname” was when used in my Hugo-nominated story One Bright Star to Guide Them. Instead it was generally agreed by the consensus that I had forgotten the name of my own character, on the grounds that she was a woman, and therefore hated by the author. I wish I were kidding. These people are deranged. It is not due to a physical damage to the brain, but to spiritual. Pride and ire darken the intellect.

• luckymarty posted on September 5, 2015
  There's a remarkable range of beliefs in historical Buddhism -- and of course they usually tried to read their ideas…
• John C Wright posted on September 4, 2015
  Your argument has the advantage of being aware that other men of other times thought as they did, not as…
• Stephen J. posted on September 4, 2015
  Purely for devil's advocate purposes, wasn't refusal to acknowledge the supremacy of the Emperor cult a crime in the Roman…

I promised myself that after I heard two hundred people make this comment, I would publish it. Unfortunately, I lost count after twenty, because I am innumerate.

So I have no idea how many times I have heard remarks like this, from Joe Doakes over at Vox Populi:

In my youth, Hugo and Nebula on the cover meant “Good.” Since about 1990, it’s meant “Politically Correct.” But the point of reading SF/F is to escape the relentless political correctness of modern American life so I quit reading it.

He goes on to say

I’ve been digging back through the last couple of decades of Hugo and Nebual winners, trying to find something worth reading to change my mind. “Among Others” won both in 2012 and the library lends Kindle books free, so why not? The heroine is a SF/F reader herself so every page lists SF/F titles she’s read, which is fun because I’ve read most of them and found a few others to try.

But get this . . . the SF/F books listed in the story are our kind of books, written long ago and mostly by White men exploring fascinating intellectual concepts.

For crying out loud, even the Characters in modern politically correct SF/F hate modern politically correct SF/F.

Let me ask my readers to take the Joe Doakes challenge. Look at the first twenty years of the Hugos, and in your mind assess the worth of the books. Weigh whether or not they are imaginative, well crafted, and form the backbone of any well read SF reader’s library.

Read the remainder of this entry »

• Scholar-at-Arms posted on September 4, 2015
  Concedes on both counts. Silent Planet and Eifelheim have excellently alien aliens. I still maintain that holding them as a…
• robertjwizard posted on September 4, 2015
  I chose THE SCAR because his description of the sea at the beginning was very well done. I am very…
• John C Wright posted on September 4, 2015
  China Mieville is a skilled writer. If you dislike him, I suspect it will be because of what he portrays,…