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posted by LaminatorX on Monday April 13 2015, @11:30AM   Printer-friendly
from the Livejournal-still-works dept.

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."

 
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  • (Score: 2) by Reziac on Tuesday April 14 2015, @02:16AM

    by Reziac (2489) on Tuesday April 14 2015, @02:16AM (#170158) Homepage

    Yep, no argument there.

    As I point out above, in fairness one should also read Correia's response to Martin:

    http://monsterhunternation.com/2015/04/09/a-response-to-george-r-r-martin-from-the-author-who-started-sad-puppies/ [monsterhunternation.com]

    I've tried to keep up with both sides, but it very quickly became apparent that only one side was a "safe" place to post a dissenting opinion, and as you say, that's with the 'conservative' side. You might get argued with, mocked, or called a moron, but you won't be shouted down, disemvoweled, or silenced.

    --
    And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
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  • (Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Tuesday April 14 2015, @03:27AM

    by Hairyfeet (75) <bassbeast1968NO@SPAMgmail.com> on Tuesday April 14 2015, @03:27AM (#170187) Journal

    This is why the conservatives have earned a LOT of respect from me, because most of their beliefs may be "trickle upon" dumb as a bag of hammers but ya know what? They DO allow other opinions and go out of their way NOT to censor the opposition! What we are seeing is the ones banning dissent, erasing posts, and calling for people to be attacked and even be jailed? It AIN'T the right wingers folks, its the left. Their so called "diversity" doesn't apply to thought or speech.

    And talk about fucking racism! That is all the progressive stack is, its racism just putting different races in the "good" race and "shit" race columns. We that grew up in the 70s believed that ALL races should be equal, that a man should be measured by the content of their character, but fuuuck that says the new radical left, its ALL about what race and sex you are! Do you have ANY idea how many I've talked to that have said "Yay Hillary is running!" and when I say "Can you name me ONE, just one, policy she has that you support? Can you even name ANYTHING that you like about her other than her gender?"...crickets. Say what you will about the right but everybody I talked to that wanted to vote Romney could actually tell me of at least one policy of his they supported! But don't you dare point that out, or you are a misogynist pushing white male privilege and should be banned!

    That is why I have to give the props to the conservatives, I may think they are full of shit but they allow me to say it without trying to erase me from the net.

    --
    ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
    • (Score: 3, Touché) by aristarchus on Tuesday April 14 2015, @05:48AM

      by aristarchus (2645) on Tuesday April 14 2015, @05:48AM (#170236) Journal

      OK, Hairy, we get it, you are officially old and so are settling into the "conservative" camp, in spite of being all hippyish in your younger days. Nothing to be ashamed of, as long as you're honest about it. I truly hope you enjoy watching Fox News from now on, and saying "Benghazi, Benghazi!" a lot. But I have to ask, why do you think any of us need to know this? And what does it have to do with the Hugo awards? Does Micro$erf actually pay you when you go "off the reservation" like this?

      • (Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Tuesday April 14 2015, @07:32AM

        by Hairyfeet (75) <bassbeast1968NO@SPAMgmail.com> on Tuesday April 14 2015, @07:32AM (#170259) Journal

        Oh go and fuck yourself you damned SJW! I believe in universal healthcare, that every person should be treated equally, that all deserve a home, food, clothes, and access to medical care no matter what race or income, I believe that gays should be given the same rights as straights, that we should not go to war for "national interests" but only to actually protect ourselves against those that attack us directly....where in the fuck does that make me a "conservative"?

        Just because I refuse to believe that some races and sexes are better than the others, refuse to believe in an "oppression scale" that allows those that have been oppressed in the past to be oppressive now, and will never EVAR in a million fucking eons will I EVAR support censoring or even jailing people for speech...but THAT is what an SJW considers "progressive" so if you consider everyone that isn't a member of the PC police a "conservative"? Then I hate to break the news to ya but a good 90% of the planet must be right wing.

        --
        ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
        • (Score: 2) by aristarchus on Tuesday April 14 2015, @07:40AM

          by aristarchus (2645) on Tuesday April 14 2015, @07:40AM (#170262) Journal

          Please continue, Sir! (My god this is getting tiring. Hairy, just admit it already, you have crossed the great divide, you have bought the right-wing media portrayal of the left that you used to be part of. And now you are defending racists and sexists because they, too, have a point of view. Next, Nazi's weren't so bad? We won't censor you, but your rants are becoming less coherent, and definitely less interesting. So, who is your favorite Science Fiction author?)

          • (Score: 3, Insightful) by cubancigar11 on Tuesday April 14 2015, @08:53AM

            by cubancigar11 (330) on Tuesday April 14 2015, @08:53AM (#170278) Homepage Journal

            This is ridiculous. The problem with claiming 'All nazis are bad people' is not that all nazis are not bad people, it is that you can pretty much call anyone bad by calling them nazi without proving why they are bad. For example, this is exactly what you have done. People like you ruin left. It is like that moron who read one book on newtonian physics and now goes around calling all physicists a pseudo-scientists for believing in relativity.

            • (Score: 2) by Vanderhoth on Tuesday April 14 2015, @04:11PM

              by Vanderhoth (61) on Tuesday April 14 2015, @04:11PM (#170435)

              I'm in agreement there. In the early days of GamerGate the FIRST thing the media and opposition did was, "GAMERGATE IS MOSIGYONIST, GAMERGATE IS THE KKK, GAMERGATE IS WORSE THAN ISIS, GAMERGATE ARE LITERAL NAZIS" and people sucked it up.

              Go to just about ANY game site and say you feel ethics are a good thing for journalists, or professionals in general, to strive for and it's, "STFU YOU GAMERGATE GOON!!"

              It's all guilt by association. Make your opposition such a taboo that anyone fence sitting will be afraid to accidentally fall on to their side.

              --
              "Now we know", "And knowing is half the battle". -G.I. Joooooe
            • (Score: 2) by aristarchus on Wednesday April 15 2015, @06:21AM

              by aristarchus (2645) on Wednesday April 15 2015, @06:21AM (#170795) Journal

              OMG. Let's do the math. You are a Nazi. Now, you may not buy into that whole "superior Race" thing, but you are loyal to your nation that seems to have bought into it. And rounding up Communists, Socialists (other than the Nationalist kind, of course), Homosexuals, Jews, Gypsies, and actual Catholics, you did not agree with any of that, even though you participated in it. And the whole work/death camp thing of the "final solution", yes you acceded to it but it always seemed a bit extreme to you. Couldn't we just send these aberrant writers of science fiction to another country instead of killing them all? Of course, as a "good" Nazi, you would never dare say such a thing, and so by silent tacit consent, you are responsible for the entire Nazi program. That is what it means to say there are no good Nazis, if they were good, they would be in the camps as a political prisoner. not still wearing the uniform and bearing arms. So what of the Sad Puppies? Good Nazis, or Bad Nazis? Not so bad right wing fanatics and Mormons, or just Science fictions writers who want to be able to have a hard-on and conquer evil lesser races, like Slavs? Let's not go all Godwin at once, since I really think it is possible to get there by slow steps. "Service guarantees Citizenship! Want to know more?" Fascism, pure and simple, only redeeming quality is that it is fiction, after all.

              • (Score: 2) by cubancigar11 on Wednesday April 15 2015, @09:10AM

                by cubancigar11 (330) on Wednesday April 15 2015, @09:10AM (#170863) Homepage Journal

                What do you mean by 'You are a nazi'?

                You are a woman. Now you may not have a vagina, or you might even like girls... ugh.. the brain is already hurting by imitating your strenuous reply. Just. Keep it simple stupid.

                • (Score: 2) by aristarchus on Thursday April 16 2015, @09:05AM

                  by aristarchus (2645) on Thursday April 16 2015, @09:05AM (#171485) Journal

                  Evidently I did not keep it simple enough for you. I would give you a "whoosh", but I am afraid that would go right over your head as well. Stay cool, bro, don't ever change!

                  • (Score: 2) by cubancigar11 on Saturday April 18 2015, @11:56AM

                    by cubancigar11 (330) on Saturday April 18 2015, @11:56AM (#172365) Homepage Journal

                    You can't make so many assumptions and keep it is generalized. I don't know what your personal experiences are but most things don't happen with so much planning or are how things run. At some time you need to stop looking at rest of the humanity under discovery channel - as if there are certain 'type' of people and this or that is their behavior.

          • (Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Tuesday April 14 2015, @09:24PM

            by Hairyfeet (75) <bassbeast1968NO@SPAMgmail.com> on Tuesday April 14 2015, @09:24PM (#170558) Journal

            Kiss my hair ass SJW, you can't find a single fucking conservative blog, not a single fucking website, that supports even HALF of what I just listed, because because I won't grovel and beg like a beta male like yourself "I MUST be X" because you are sooo damned programmed to grovel and beg anybody that doesn't MUST be the enemy!

            Go and kiss the feet of a woman and cry about your CIS white male privilege somewhere else SJW, your kind is an ass cancer on the ass of society and the only nice thing I can say is thank the Gods I do not believe in that no woman will give your kind any pussy so you'll die off in a single generation, probably caring for some woman's half a dozen kids by other men while she fucks around on you.

            --
            ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
            • (Score: 2) by aristarchus on Tuesday April 14 2015, @10:19PM

              by aristarchus (2645) on Tuesday April 14 2015, @10:19PM (#170593) Journal

              So you have read "Fifty Shades of Gray"!
              Accusations that someone may not be able to control the fertility of their female is very misogynist, by the way. And what makes you think I am male, anyway?