We Have Real Political Problems with Puppies

[4est_4est_Gump]

...

In a highly unusual move, Hugo voters declined to name a winner in most of the major fiction categories, instead voting “No Award” for Short Story, Novella, Related Work, and Editor (both long and short form).

The unprecedented vote is the latest round in an ongoing science fiction culture war that has taken on an apocalyptic cast, with parties on both sides worried that the underlying dispute might ultimately destroy the Hugos, and perhaps even wreck science fiction as we know it. But what this year's Hugo awards really prove is that there's no need to worry.

“No Award” awards have been presented very occasionally before, but never in this number. The reason for the rejection of all the nominees in so many categories was that many voters felt the nomination process had been manipulated by an outspoken faction within the fan community known as the Puppies. The Puppies are really two related, overlapping factions—the Sad Puppies, organized by science fiction writers Brad Torgersen and Larry Correia, and the Rabid Puppies, led by a writer, editor, publisher, and video game designer who goes by the name of Vox Day (real name Theodore Beale). What both groups did this year was to rally Hugo award nominators around block voting slates—recommendations for who should be nominated in each award category.

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What were the Puppies after? That depends on who you ask. Detractors say the groups were both reactionary movements, driven by conservative white males angry about recent Hugo awards going to stories by and about a more diverse group of individuals. Last year’s Best Novel winner, for example, was Ann Leckie’s book Ancillary Justice, a space opera revenge story set in a colonialist society that does not distinguish between genders and uses only female pronouns; the winning short story was about a Chinese man who reveals to his family that he’s gay. Puppy opponents argue that these sorts of stories are praiseworthy, necessary, and valuable if science fiction is to expand its audience beyond the educated white male cohort that has traditionally dominated science fiction readership.

The two groups of Puppies see themselves differently. The Sad Puppies tend to argue that their aim is not really political at all—that instead they generally prefer stories without intensely political messages, and want to see the Hugos award fiction that emphasizes science and adventure and reader enjoyment, rather than a more literary emphasis on social and political themes. In an interview with Wired, Correia said that the group’s name comes from the joke that “at the leading cause of puppy-related sadness was boring message-fic winning awards.” He and Torgerson have argued that too much focus on diversity becomes a goal unto itself, and can distract from the true quality of a work.

The Rabid Puppies take a more aggressive approach, one that is openly hostile to the idea of diversity, and which is often laden with sexist, misogynist, and homophobic over- and undertones. As Wired’s story makes clear, Vox Day’s approach is intentionally designed to be outrageous; he says that he that wants to offend people, to stir up trouble, to cause chaos and destruction. He also admits that some of his followers are not really science fiction fans, but people who agree with his political agenda and want to help him wreck the awards system. “I wanted to leave a big smoking hole where the Hugo Awards were,” he told Wired before the awards were announced.

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Science Fiction just got strange...

http://reason.com/blog/2015/08/24/science-fiction-fans-are-fighting-about

 

[Sean]

Welcome to 2014.

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

I wonder what the reaction will be by sanguine kittens?

 

[LadyFunkenstein]

Oh man I read a short story that won a couple of lessor awards and was nominated for a Hugo... hoo boy what a piece of shit it was.

 

[Sean]

Oh man I read a short story that won a couple of lessor awards and was nominated for a Hugo... hoo boy what a piece of shit it was.

The Hugos have had a problem for the last couple of years. A rather well organised campaign by a bunch of homophobic/ racist/ misogynistic gamergate types.