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From the The Guardian.
Introducing the Sad Puppies...
"The shortlists for the long-running American genre awards, won in the past by names from Kurt Vonnegut to Ursula K Le Guin and voted for by fans, were announced this weekend to uproar in the science fiction community, after it emerged that the line-up corresponded closely with the slates of titles backed by certain conservative writers. The self-styled "Sad Puppies" campaigners had set out to combat what orchestrator and writer Brad Torgersen had criticised as the Hugos' tendency to reward "literary" and "ideological" works.
Today's Hugos, Torgersen has blogged, "have lost cachet, because at the same time SF/F has exploded popularly – with larger-than-life, exciting, entertaining franchises and products – the voting body of 'fandom' have tended to go in the opposite direction: niche, academic, overtly to the Left in ideology and flavor, and ultimately lacking what might best be called visceral, gut-level, swashbuckling fun".
Twenty years ago, he writes, "if you saw a lovely spaceship on a book cover, with a gorgeous planet in the background, you could be pretty sure you were going to get a rousing space adventure featuring starships and distant, amazing worlds". Nowadays, he claims, the same jacket is likely to be a story "merely about racial prejudice and exploitation, with interplanetary or interstellar trappings".
And here we have the Rabid Puppies definitely not mentioning GamerGate:
Another group of allied rightwing campaigners, dubbing themselves the Rabid Puppies and led by Vox Day, real name Theodore Beale, have also added their voices to the block-voting campaign against what Day called "the left-wing control freaks who have subjected science fiction to ideological control for two decades and are now attempting to do the same thing in the game industry".
And finally a bit of Martin:
"Call it block voting. Call it ballot stuffing. Call it gaming the system. There's truth to all of those characterisations. You can't call it cheating, though. It was all within the rules. But many things can be legal, and still bad ... and this is one of those, from where I sit. I think the Sad Puppies have broken the Hugo awards, and I am not sure they can ever be repaired," he wrote.
"If the Sad Puppies wanted to start their own award ... for Best Conservative SF, or Best Space Opera, or Best Military SF, or Best Old-Fashioned SF the Way It Used to Be ... whatever it is they are actually looking for ... hey, I don't think anyone would have any objections to that. I certainly wouldn't. More power to them," he added. "But that's not what they are doing here, it seems to me. Instead they seem to want to take the Hugos and turn them into their own awards."
(Score: 2, Funny) by Runaway1956 on Monday April 13 2015, @12:04PM
Science fiction has never been politically correct. Don't like the awards? Boycott them. Just run along, and have your own merry little party. Call the the "Gay Fags Space Opera Awards", or whatever the hell you like.
Libs have been attacking some of the best known names in Sci-Fi for years now. Go read "Starship Trooper" again. It was written by a fucking LIBERTARIAN, with some pretty hard core attitudes. No, no, no - don't watch the MOVIE again. READ THE GOD DAMNED BOOK!! Yeah, I realize, you common core fanatics are probably not literate enough to read an entire printed book, but try anyway.
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 13 2015, @12:16PM
Hey look! A faux-libertarian unhappy about being marginalized by people acting in their own interests instead of his.
It's so much easier to be a libertarian when your group is on top.
(Score: 2) by Yog-Yogguth on Wednesday April 15 2015, @07:43AM
I'm not much of a writer but one thing I've learnt about books (or reading) is that any book etc. is written anew each time someone reads it. That's part of the magic.
The differences between the versions in each persons head might be minute and subtle or they might be enormous to the point of belonging to entirely separate universes with nothing in common and unerringly the differences in interpretation discloses information about the reader at the time they read it.
If they read it again, straight away or years later, they can end up with a completely different book (or even nothing at all). When this happens again and again and catches the reader a little off guard things get really interesting. I once had a common-law wife that possibly got that out of the Lord of the Rings trilogy of books (I don't) although I might be overestimating/misinterpreting her, maybe she just enjoyed soothing mi/e-ndless repetition, anybody can have that need. “I am not the same person I was a second ago” as the Buddhist thought goes.
When groups of people come to the same conclusions and stick with those conclusions as a group over decades (the “Heinlein is a fascist” leftist theme started right away all the way back in the seventies and eighties) it says something. Precisely what it says is up for debate in each case, from my point of view in this case it shouts “these people are acting like narrow-minded morons trapped in a deep pit of static/unchanging/dogmatic thought-suffocating ideology”, that's how I /read/ you ;) How /I/ read you. Did you get that twist/boomerang or was it lost on you? Can you comprehend the possibility of someone deliberately weakening their own argument for a purpose? Applying it to themselves? In addition to that there's the “when you're opened you're red” (paraphrased) and all that.
Now excuse me as I keep riding my high horse into our mutual doom. I only tried to give your brain a friendly kick, it would be better if you realized you need to do that yourself just as much as everyone else needs to and isn't that a lot of what (at least) science fiction is about?
P.S. do /you/ also think every crime writer is a murderer? Or that any writer with characters of both/any sexes are themselves hermaphrodites or much more but certainly not “only” male or female? Give some thought as to why the questions are relevant/how they relate to your opinion of Heinlein.
Best of luck!
P.P.S. in my case I'm not a libertarian, I'm “far far right” (or something like that, either way much further to the right than you're likely to be able to conceive or identify when I say I consider Nazis to be on the far left) and not particularly enthralled by Heinlein (except maybe Stranger in a Strange Land), I'm much more fond of Phillip K. Dick and short fiction and microfiction/flash fiction [365tomorrows.com] science fiction although I can't indulge as much in it as I'd like to (I can remember how embarrassingly and naively shocked I was once upon a time when my excellent muslim fellow teacher/co-worker complained likewise (“I can't find the time to read any more”) and now I'm pretty much in the same place).
Bite harder Ouroboros, bite! tails.boum.org/ linux USB CD secure desktop IRC *crypt tor (not endorsements (XKeyScore))
(Score: 4, Insightful) by TheRaven on Monday April 13 2015, @12:28PM
Go read "Starship Trooper" again
Why? It was dire, though not as bad as The Cat Who Walks Through Walls or either of the two books that Heinlein wrote where the main character achieved his boyhood dream of building a time machine so that he could go back in time and fuck his mother[1]. If you want portrayal of Libertarian societies from someone who can actually write, Neal Asher does a fairly good job in a few of his books (though manages to write negatively about pretty much every political ideology, so it's quite entertaining reading the Amazon comments from people who got to the Owner trilogy and found their beliefs being attacked for a change).
No, no, no - don't watch the MOVIE again. READ THE GOD DAMNED BOOK!!
The movie was entertaining, though not particularly engaging, satire. The book was just bad. If you have to pick one, watch the movie - at least it's amusing.
Yeah, I realize, you common core fanatics are probably not literate enough to read an entire printed book, but try anyway.
The best thing about Starship Troopers was that it was short, which makes your claims that reading the entire thing require some unusual level of literacy quite entertaining.
[1] Number of the Beast and Time Enough for Love (where 'Love' seems to be a synonym for 'Eugenics'), if you don't believe me.
sudo mod me up
(Score: 4, Insightful) by microtodd on Monday April 13 2015, @12:42PM
I'm curious why you think Starship Troopers was bad. You don't really say. I personally enjoyed it. It was basically world-building with a specific political ideology in mind. So it was a look at a possible future (speculative fiction) if certain governmental and societal components occurred.
Was it realistic? I don't know. The psychological theories presented were interesting. To me, the two most interesting ones were a) corporal/physical punishment, often extreme, affects behavior in positive ways. The girl in Rico's H&MP class said she never got in trouble because she didn't want to get lashes. (would that happen in real life? history seems to say no...severe corporal punishment occurs in certain parts of the world and yet there are still "bad guys"). and b), that war is a form of controlled violence, of using force to achieve political objectives, up to that point *and no more*! So basically the opposite of total war.
It seems like history has said these ideas are wrong, but they were interesting to read about.
One part that was accurate, I think, was the training and military structure. "Train as you fight" is a real US Army motto, and there's the idea that if the training is really frickin' hard then the real thing will be easy. And the idea that a small, highly trained, well-equipped team is better than a large army of cannon fodder? Yeah, recent conflicts have shown that's true.
So no, I didn't think it was a bad book. Why did you? I'm honestly curious,
(Score: 2) by TheRaven on Monday April 13 2015, @01:02PM
sudo mod me up
(Score: 2) by fadrian on Monday April 13 2015, @01:22PM
Sorry son, but midlife Heinlein doesn't hold up that well. The characters are cutout and, although the story is well-paced, the plot has several holes, the dialog is constrained by the subject matter and has little place to shine. They exposition itself is fairly mid-20 cen pulp language - stereotyped scenes in generic places. Just not enough life in the story to keep me engaged as a story.
Sure the political ideas might be great (to some - not so much to me), but you need a story to keep the reader engaged while the exposition goes along. Bradbury could write; Asimov could write; Ellison didn't write - he fucked life into the dead corpse of his stories by dint of pure imagination; Heinlein? He was able to make a living writing, so I guess that's something. But I'd rather read his past history stories from earlier days of pulp when expectations were lower or his later work like Job or Friday, when he finally got a bit of a handle on writing dialog, even if he was trying to fuck his own mom all the time. The years when STroop came out was a wasteland for him, as far as I'm concerned.
That is all.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Jeremiah Cornelius on Monday April 13 2015, @04:27PM
Ellison didn't write - he fucked life into the dead corpse of his stories by dint of pure imagination.
Great take! And delivered with perfect Ellison tone of profane aggression, mixing contempt and admiration.
And? He's not dead.
REPENT!
You're betting on the pantomime horse...
(Score: 2) by fadrian on Thursday April 16 2015, @04:30PM
Hey, Ticktockman, I didn't mean to imply he wasn't still doing it... Thank whatevs.
That is all.
(Score: 2) by Jeremiah Cornelius on Thursday April 16 2015, @10:02PM
I know. Internet shorthand. :-)
You're betting on the pantomime horse...
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday April 13 2015, @03:06PM
Have you read Tom Kratman? His books are available on Amazon Kindle - I don't have a Kindle, so I have them delivered to Amazon Cloud, and read them with a browser. I've liked all of his books so far, and he uses that philosophy extensively in his writings. He has done a separate little essay on that subject, and I believe it is free. Let me find the link . . .
http://www.amazon.com/Training-War-Essay-Tom-Kratman-ebook/dp/B00JQI9TH2/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1428937515&sr=1-1&keywords=training+for+war+tom+kratman [amazon.com]
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 4, Interesting) by tadas on Monday April 13 2015, @05:23PM
I'm a person on the Left of the political spectrum - literally a card-carrying member of the ACLU and NAACP (I had to ask to get a physical card). I disagree with must of Kratman's political philosophy -- and I'll automatically buy any of his novels because he's a great storyteller (I accept the politics in the story in the same way I accept the "science" - for the duration). Same goes for a lot of David Drake (don't like his Belisarius books for some reason). Same for even a flaming Libertarian like L Neil Smith.
Same goes for Heinlein - but only the "juvies" - Citizen of the Galaxy, Tunnel in the Sky and Starman Jones to name a few. TheRaven's summary of the midlife Heinlein "adult" books is pretty much right on. I think the universe gave him a giant karma payback when the hippies picked up on "grok" and Stranger in a Strange Land and spent the decade of the 60's annoying him mightily....
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday April 13 2015, @01:14PM
The best thing about Starship Troopers was that it was short, which makes your claims that reading the entire thing require some unusual level of literacy quite entertaining.
Insults are like that.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Jeremiah Cornelius on Monday April 13 2015, @04:35PM
Starship Troopers? Crypto-Fascist love poem to the sacred homoerotic sublimation of military boot camp.
But Heinlein was a decent human being - a man who changed many of his assumptions and judgements over the course of his life. He was as many worlds apart from Philip K Dick as a man could be, but was helpful when most needed, without being asked or expected.
"Several years ago, when I was ill, Heinlein offered his help, anything he could do, and we had never met; he would phone me to cheer me up and see how I was doing. He wanted to buy me an electric typewriter, God bless him — one of the few true gentlemen in this world. I don't agree with any ideas he puts forth in his writing, but that is neither here nor there. One time when I owed the IRS a lot of money and couldn't raise it, Heinlein loaned the money to me. I think a great deal of him and his wife; I dedicated a book to them in appreciation. Robert Heinlein is a fine-looking man, very impressive and very military in stance; you can tell he has a military background, even to the haircut. He knows I'm a flipped-out freak and still he helped me and my wife when we were in trouble. That is the best in humanity, there; that is who and what I love."
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Philip_K._Dick [wikiquote.org]
You're betting on the pantomime horse...
(Score: 2) by tadas on Monday April 13 2015, @07:10PM
Starship Troopers? Crypto-Fascist love poem to the sacred homoerotic sublimation of military boot camp.
I'm surprised that nobody has yet mentioned one of Science Fiction's great touchés - Joe Haldeman's The Forever War. In it, the troopers' sacrifices turn out to be the result of a great misunderstanding. A great "answer record".
(Score: 2) by Jeremiah Cornelius on Monday April 13 2015, @09:19PM
Yes! Haldeman and Harrison. Worth a mountain of Spinrad and Ellison.
You're betting on the pantomime horse...
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Monday April 13 2015, @09:40PM
Starship Troopers? Crypto-Fascist love poem to the sacred homoerotic sublimation of military boot camp.
So, It's just like 300, but without Gerard Butler or all the Greek nonsense?
(Score: 2) by Jeremiah Cornelius on Tuesday April 14 2015, @12:10AM
The racism is directed at ACTUAL inhumans - not anti-historical, dehumanized stand ins for racist "clash of civilizations", like 300. ;-)
You're betting on the pantomime horse...
(Score: 2) by TheRaven on Tuesday April 14 2015, @09:31AM
sudo mod me up
(Score: 2) by naubol on Tuesday April 14 2015, @04:21PM
I read "Starship Troopers" as though it were satire, and that made it quite interesting. Or, maybe it was Heinlein being Heinlein, screwing around with big ideas to see how they tasted. I quite like that.
Personally, I feel that the idea of "tasting" big ideas is so anti-conservative as to be the polar opposite of what they intend, which is why it is so strange that Heinlein ever gets brought up as a conservative author, to me.
So much else of what he wrote would make them gag. Telescopic view of the world, I suppose...
(Score: 2) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Monday April 13 2015, @03:34PM
OK I'm confused. Is that "libs" as in "libertarians" (How the American left insultingly refers to the hardcore right) or "libs" as in "liberals" (The apparently derogatory term applied by the right to the left.)
Will you guys across the pond just buy a thesaurus already [giantitp.com]?
(Score: 1, Redundant) by Runaway1956 on Monday April 13 2015, @03:50PM
Sorry, Auntie - we don't need or want a thesaurus for our in-house fighting. So far, since midnight, I've been called a religitard, I've learned that Christians in the Mideast should just leave despite the fact that their forefathers were living there before Mohammed was born. I've learned that those Christians in the mideast "deserve" to die because of religitards like me. So many libs, so few bullets . . .
Your second guess was right though. "Lib" is a derogatory name for the self styled liberal left in the United States. When I am talking about libertarians, I spell that out, so as not to confuse anyone. Libs know and expect that - they understand that libertarians deserve that courtesy, while liberals do not.
As I said about Sci-Fi, I have never been "politically correct", and I shall never be.
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 13 2015, @04:47PM
> OK I'm confused. Is that "libs" as in "libertarians" (How the American left insultingly refers to the hardcore right)
I've never heard "lib" used that way.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 14 2015, @11:49AM
I've never heard it used either way. Libs are what you pass to the linker.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by naubol on Monday April 13 2015, @04:08PM
I wanted to respond, but someone has already written better words, namely GRRM at this link... http://grrm.livejournal.com/420090.html [soylentnews.org]
[[CORREIA: Hypothetical question, if Robert Heinlein wrote Starship Troopers in 2014, could he get on the Hugo ballot now? Or would he be labeled a fascist with troubling ideas, and a product of the neo-colonial patriarchy? And before you dismiss that question, maybe you should read up on what the voting clique that shall not be named says about Heinlein now. Sadly, I suspect the only way Heinlein could get on the ballot today would be if my horde of uncouth barbarian outsiders got involved and put him on our suggested slate.]]
Kind of ironic that you should bring up Heinlein, since it was the Puppy slate that knocked William Patterson's Heinlein biography off the Related Works shortlist this year. But to answer your question, I don't think Heinlein would write STARSHIP TROOPERS in 2014. If you know Heinlein, you know that he was a man who changed with the times throughout his career. He was always trying new things, new techniques, new challenges... and his political views changed HUGELY over his lifetime. He wrote much of STARSHIP TROOPERS and STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND at the same time, yet one book is beloved of conservative military buffs while the other became a hippie bible. I have no idea what he would be writing in 2014... but if he were still at the top of his form, I would love to read it.
For what my opinion is worth, I can imagine Heinlein being rather disgusted by the sad puppies, because the only political constant I can find in any of his works is that he hated people who reasoned poorly and he hated demagoguery.
(Score: 2) by choose another one on Tuesday April 14 2015, @09:09AM
I dunno, for the bible belt conservative fan there is a fairly constant support of the scared institution of marriage* even in moral/ethical frameworks thousands of years hence, particularly in his later work.
*Albeit one marriage to as many people as possible with a bit of peadophilia and incest thrown in, but thats ok because... starship troopers
(Score: 2) by Nobuddy on Monday April 13 2015, @07:07PM
While you are slobbing Heinlein's knob in a fit of Libertarian ecstasy, perhaps you should educate yourself. He wrote "Stranger in a Strange Land" at the same time. You should read it.
(Score: 3, Touché) by Runaway1956 on Monday April 13 2015, @07:38PM
Perhaps you should read the comments above. 'Stranger' was appropriated by the hippes - it wasn't meant to be anything that liberals would like.
Remember TANSTAAFL?
Oh, that slobbing knobs business? That is mostly for liberals. I suppose that Heinlein was into that too, but I'm not THAT libertarian. You go ahead though, enjoy yourself. Some people like tube steak, some of us don't.
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz