The Latest SFWA Controversy

MacAllister said:

Another good thing that I'm seeing is the number of terrific men I know who are just as appalled and offended, and are doing whatever they can to support and educate, and also let women know we're not alone in our objections to this sort of crap.

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Yeah. In a lot of ways this has only reinforced my impression that the vast majority of people in my circles are decent, thoughtful, good people, and that the very few who aren't are just amazingly persistent at pissing on everyone else's happy cake.

I've seen the phrase mentioned (not here) that "if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem" as a reason for joining SFWA. I don't agree that joining SFWA = being part of the solution, and that not joining SFWA = being part of the problem. My perception* of their forums has, for years, been one of a troll-infested pit. Why haven't those members been banned from SFWA? Why does having a certain number of pro sales mean that you are not held to a reasonable standard of maturity and decency? AW manages to keep order with many times more members.

I know that SFWA does a LOT of good work, and that's worth supporting. But all the other shite, that has been going on for decades, has been allowed to fester by giving the trolls a platform in the place where members interact with each other, and I don't want to be a part of an organisation that does that. It's 2013. They've had years of chances to fix it. There is no excuse.

My personal alternative is to support places like AW in whatever way I can, and try to help writers here. I'm not suggesting at all that this is the same as all the good that SFWA does for writers; only that it's within my current means, and I think does the most concrete good that I'm able to do.

I'm sorry for the rant, and I'm talking from a position of relative ignorance of SFWA. I admit this is an emotional post that could be picked apart and my assumptions shown to be wrong. I'd like to be wrong.

*Edited to add: Please see this post by MaryRobinette. I was ignorant of the fact that the official SFWA forums have been moderated for the past 4 years. My perception of them was based on the old forums on SFF.net, and is outdated.

Mary, thank you for posting, and that's good to know. My perception was based entirely on the old forums. I'll add to my post to link to your explanation and make that clearer.

I've been a member of SFWA since the mid nineties. To me it's always had two aspects, one good, the other annoying.

The Good: SFWA is kind of like a union for SFF writers. Except it isn't a union because -- reasons (seriously, some people's rants about this point have been annoying).

As a pseudo-union SFWA looks out for our interests. Writer Beware, GriefCom, the emergency medical fund etc, all the things others have pointed out, these are the reasons that belonging has been worthwhile. SFWA even used to have a health plan but that went through a lot of mess and eventually died on the vine.

SFWA also gave a place where SFF writers with an impulse to help each other could share the wealth of their experience in the field. Before sites like AW this was immensely valuable to people new to the field. The needs and difficulties of people who have been published for the first time are so different from those trying to be published that getting help during those times is a great boon.


Note: SFWA's awards occupy a nebulous space between the good and the bad.


The Bad: There are jerks in any field. SF jerks tend toward a certain grandiosity and bold sweeps of overconfident vision (yes, this is a self-referential claim). The clashes of personality can be a bit larger than life when dealing with people used to depicting entire universes that work as they wish them to. There is an operatic quality to this kind of clash.

When the SFWA forum was a printed zine these conflicts would pop up and be played out through various letters. When the zine stopped being published and everything shifted online I stopped paying attention. The signal to noise ratio could be pretty bad. I don't know how many others did the same. I also don't know whether participating would have made things better or worse.

For some years now the Bulletin has contained elements of both the good and the bad side of SFWA. To some extent I've looked for the good in the people I already knew from other venues and had reasons to trust outside of SFWA.

I've skimmed the Resnick / Malzberg dialogues, but gave up on them a few years ago as not being relevant. From what I recall, they were supposed to be about changes in SF publishing, useful histories for younger members to anchor themselves in. But the views they are expressing seem to be more views from their own youths and for themselves rather than for others.

The current debacle arises as an artifact of their time. They were both born around 1940 ('39 for Malzberg, '42 for Resnick). The SFF they grew up with was male dominated and it was possible to turn a blind eye to the many women in the field. I was born 20 year later and I grew up reading Ursula K. LeGuin and Marion Zimmer Bradley along with Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke, and Robert Heinlein. The idea of female SFF writers and editors and publishers was completely normal to me. It's pretty weird to me that anyone in this day and age is complaining about women writing SFF.

I think that if SFWA wants to continue to put articles in the Bulletin giving a sense of history they need to move a little forward and leave these two behind. They seem to have stopped caring about their audience and started treating their regular feature as two sages talking about how much better things used to be while everyone around them nods their head in appreciation.

Ann Aguirre's post has me wondering and worrying about two things.

1. I've been on panels at Cons for almost twenty years. I've seen that kind of prima donna behavior of panelists trying to dominate discussions far too many times. Most of the time the panelists doing this are men, but also most of the time they don't care if they are bullying or bowling over men or women panelists. It's annoying to be on the receiving end of, no matter what.

2. But it's very likely that I'm missing at least part of it by being unobservant.

Captcha said:

if the SFWA DOESN'T insist on this happening, doesn't make sure that someone takes responsibility for this serious error, then they are seriously failing in their duty towards a significant number of their members.

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To be fair, responsibility has been taken.