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6/25/2008 5:21:39 PM
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themasterknitter
Posts 425
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I've been following this for awhile now. Apparently Strahan (and this is a Night Shade Books publication so you'd think those Communists would be on top of this but I guess not) failed to get a fifty fifty gender balance when he put together his latest anthology. A Standard Issue Tempest in a Teapot ensued and so here is his apology.
http://www.jonathanstrahan.com.au/wp/2008/06/25/eclipse-two-3/
I'm of two minds on this.
Should there be more women in the field? Sure. That'd be great. I'd be even happier if we had more folks like Nancy Kress and fewer folks like the helium blown Connie Willis (who gives me a migraine everytime I read her c r a p). But what I see most of the time is Willis clones in the field, ergo I end up reading something else. But for the sake of, "Should there be more women," the answer is, "Yeah, I'm with that."
On the other hand, if I were the editor of an anthology or a magazine (most of you should be Very Grateful that I do not aspire to be an Editor) would I have ended up with a "Gender Balanced List?" More to the point, just who is supposed to decide what, exactly, is gender balance? Fifty-fifty? Do a stat analysis of the extant writing population and adjust accordingly? Use a Strange Horizon Cloud Cuckoo Land standard and completely reverse the gender publication norm (a standard Asimov's is moving toward and has been for three years now).
It gets down to one very simple question.
Who is the Editor of the anthology. Is Strahan the editor, or a mob of the Perpetually Offended and the Permanently P i s s ed Off?
Why even have an Editor. Why not just throw the project out to a committee at Wiscon and let them decide.
So Strahan has gone and apologized but for my two cents, I think he made the wrong call. Here is what my response would have been if I were the editor of that anthology.
"I am the editor. I picked the best stories. You don't like it, don't buy it."
So which anthology editor will the PC Nazis hammer on next? Gardner and his YBSF?
edited by themasterknitter on 6/25/2008
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6/25/2008 5:39:54 PM
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WPreston
Posts 1275
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themasterknitter wrote:
"I am the editor. I picked the best stories. You don't like it, don't buy it."
But Strahan admits that that's not what happened. He didn't pick stories at all, nor does the collection represent a "best of" anything. He chose a focus, then he invited people, then some people dropped out (more women than men), and then he took one more step: To quote, ". . . when I went to solicit stories close to the deadline I went to writers I felt I could impose on, that I had a relationship with, and they were all male." He does not say that he would, in any case, have striven for some 50-50 "balance," only that he could have done a better job from the get-go of being more aware (given that the shift in theme, he believes, also created more gender disparity), though most certainly the final phase is what he most regrets.
Perhaps other people actually read Strahan's thoughtful comment and do not need me to clarify, but you're disseminating an utterly false take on the process.
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http://wmpreston.blogspot.com
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6/25/2008 5:53:31 PM
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Guest
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More of Murphy's "Jesus Complex" I see, oh deary me I'm being persecuted again.
It's more a problem of those who "perpetually" call foul on the inherent pressures
society puts on us to conform. Way it's been from the beginning of time until now.
I look at Murphy and his poor band of military weirdos and I think, what pictures of conformity they themselves are.
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6/25/2008 6:15:48 PM
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themasterknitter
Posts 425
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I don't see how I'm being persecuted, Sparrow. I'm not an NSB customer. Not ever going to be.
So Strahan picked people he could rely upon. Someone will surely have some heartburn about that, Bill. Is he saying that women are not reliable?
And I did read his comment. My point is that he shouldn't have come out and expressed any sort of opinion on the topic at all other than what I posted as my hypothetical reply. I think a more appropriate reply should have been as follows.
"I'm the editor. Get over it."
After all, that is what I get told about certain editors all the time. Then again, I have absolutely no intention of getting over a couple of things per certain editors so maybe I should let the P i s s and Vinegar Brigade bleed on without offering up a tampon.
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6/25/2008 7:26:06 PM
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WPreston
Posts 1275
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themasterknitter wrote:
So Strahan picked people he could rely upon. Someone will surely have some heartburn about that, Bill. Is he saying that women are not reliable?
No. Please try to understand. He didn't pick "people he could rely upon" and thereby suggest that women are unreliable, and it takes a corrupted imagination to read it that way. (And if you see someone reading his response that way, call them on it. I haven't been following this discussion before now.) He picked--read it--friends, people he knew well and who he could, therefore, burden. Those were men. It became about who he knew rather than about who might be--for the sake of the stories--the best choices. And all of this because of deadline issues, which of course makes sense. I'm quite impressed by his honest explanation. Since this wasn't simply a situation of "What the editor liked" (and I understand that that's not so "simple" either), he recognized that people shouldn't "get over it" but rather deserved a respectful response.
As a side-note to this, I tend to dislike (or just innately distrust without reading, due to experience) anthologies assembled in this manner. (I do like what I've read from the Gardner/Strahan space opera book, however. Exception that proves the rule?) I think commissioned writing is by its very nature less good on average than work people wrote without invitation and had to shop around to publish. Perhaps more women dropped out of the process because the ones he asked had a problem with that very process of production. I don't know.
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http://wmpreston.blogspot.com
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6/25/2008 7:47:21 PM
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themasterknitter
Posts 425
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Lord, he picked his friends, did he? Like the editors at SH don't do that. Gee, I guess Strahan should have made it a point to do an all female anthology. That would probably keep the tempests of b u l l s h i t under control and anyone who complained about that would simply be called a sexist pig.
I find myself wondering why one should bother writing anything for science fiction anymore. You can almost count on the fact that some self appointed Minister of Political Correctness will come along screaming at the top of your lungs that you violated the orthodoxy.
It'll get to the point where fiction is written by committee and it will read like a training plan for a sensitivity workshop.
There is a dystopian satire in that last sentence but you'd never sell it. Not these days.
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6/25/2008 8:04:07 PM
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WPreston
Posts 1275
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Never mind. I forgot what I was talking to.
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http://wmpreston.blogspot.com
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6/25/2008 8:08:34 PM
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themasterknitter
Posts 425
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Bill, let's face it. This situation exists because a brigade of self appointed nazis decided to go hammer on Strahan. I, personally, would have had more respect for the man if he had simply told them to go f u c k off.
In fact, more of us should be doing that with these people. If we don't, they'll end up writing everything by committee.
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6/25/2008 8:25:59 PM
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Berry
Posts 92
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Give it two weeks. Teh intarwebs is simply the biggest high school hallway in human history. Tempest in a teacup, indeed.
Two weeks.
Something else will pop up on the blogging radar of genteel readers and editors and have folks doing their little "Oh, noes!!!!!!" dancing and prattling.
Strahan is a better man than I'd be; I wouldn't go so far as a flat-out f*** you (see, did that one myself, naught little censors out there--beat ya to it!). In a similar position, I'd probably say, "Hey, folks, chill and let's be cool one to another. There'll be other TOCs, other chances, and in the grand scheme of things, across various anthologies and over an extended period of time, there's going to be a sliding 60/40 to 40/60 split by virture of a little thing called . . . probability." Or something similar. But, then again, I'm not an editor. I'm a writer for mere sandwich and gas money. So, there.
P.S.--I also think it would be somewhat amusing if, say, once an anthology has been printed, if a handful of the female writers happened to be guys writing under female pseudonyms and jumped out of the 'net going, "Har! Gotcha!" Heck, even the gals to do it in a bit of turnabout-is-fair-play. Or everyone could just choose handy, androgynous nom de plumes and be done with it. (I know, I know--pseudonyms are a threadjack. Mea culpa.)
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6/25/2008 10:40:16 PM
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Dave_Truesdale
Posts 645
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The very fact that Strahan thought he *had* to apologize is upsetting. He needs to grow a pair. I'm sick of this PC _forced_ gender balance issue. What he doesn't realize is that regardless of what he does, it will never, ever, be enough for these characters, and that he'll always be editing with an unconscious fear of them in the back of his editorial mind. Which is not the way to go.
If I weren't a reviewer? Every time I thought about purchasing a collection of new stories and saw a perfect gender balance in the TOC, I'd shove the book back on the bookstore shelf. SF, for God's sake, isn't a *PC* literature by its very nature, so why should its editors be??? Let the damn chips/stories fall where they may, and let the best ones get printed. I don't give a good goddamn who writes'em...and neither should any editor worth his salt.
Apologizing for a flippin' gender imbalance? Heaven help us all.
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"When any category of science fiction has become dull and repetitive, there is always a brilliant story waiting to be written by giving up the assumptions that made the story easy to write." -- Damon Knight
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6/25/2008 10:57:46 PM
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WPreston
Posts 1275
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Dave_truesdale wrote:
SF, for God's sake, isn't a *PC* literature by its very nature, so why should its editors be???
I love the convenient conflation here of the notions of feminism ("radical" or otherwise) and "political correctness." I'd say a lot of SF is profoundly conservative--narratively, in terms of what it expects from the audience, and in terms of its views of people. I'd argue that antiquated (and laughable) sexism lasted longer in SF than it did in the pages of probably any other genre--but someone would have to do a pretty comprehensive survey of texts to see whether that's so. If people are asking for some kind of absolute, mathematical balance based only on gender (and no other factor), then that's simply silly. Point to those people, and I'll laugh at them with you. But if people are pushing to change the status quo, your use of the term PC is merely the standard way to dismiss a challenge to something with which you're comfortable. When I was a kid, the goals of feminism seemed as imaginative--and as interesting to me--as a space station. How are those principles now conformist?
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http://wmpreston.blogspot.com
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6/25/2008 11:15:30 PM
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Dave_Truesdale
Posts 645
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Bill,
Issues of gender equality have become, over the years, very politically correct in nature. The issue of gender equality has become distorted from its original premise, and now extends itself (as we clearly see) into the psyche of editors who feel they must apologize for not having a perfectly gender balanced TOC. Men (and now editors) are being made to feel they've done something wrong, something not morally correct, something they've been taught to feel guilty about, if they don't toe the line with what some feminists happen to believe. They therefore act in a politically correct manner. I really don't think the original intention of those who espoused, and fought for (and rightly so), equal rights for women, had in mind that a TOC, by fiat, had to be gender balanced. But by buying into this absurd premise in the first place, Strahan has acted in a politically correct manner. This is what I meant.
Next thing you know, he'll get jumped by the PC element for not having enough female protagonists in his stories (gotta maintain that gender balance, after all), so should we expect another apology from him then?
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"When any category of science fiction has become dull and repetitive, there is always a brilliant story waiting to be written by giving up the assumptions that made the story easy to write." -- Damon Knight
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6/25/2008 11:36:36 PM
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WPreston
Posts 1275
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Dave_truesdale wrote:
Issues of gender equality have become, over the years, very politically correct in nature. The issue of gender equality has become distorted from its original premise, and now extends itself (as we clearly see) into the psyche of editors who feel they must apologize for not having a perfectly gender balanced TOC.
First, I want to challenge the term PC. It's a lame attempt, in most cases, to reduce progressive insights and queries to a set of dogmatically set directives. When insights and troubling questions and challenges to standard thinking become merely rules, rather than heuristics for constant reexamination, then you can say there's simply a new orthodoxy in town. But when people simply try to make you aware of something and question yourself, and they have no power to make you actually change what you've done, then you've got good progressivism doing what it ought to do. I read the comments to Strahan at SF Signal. It was a good discussion. His post on his blog represents a response to where those questions and challenges took him.
As for "extending into one's psyche," that's exactly where such things belong. If you're not deeply challenged, you're not challenged at all, you're pretending. And surely you aren't referring to Strahan's TOC as "perfectly gender balanced." It's 13 white guys and one white woman. Your point?
Dave_truesdale wrote:
Men (and now editors) are being made to feel they've done something wrong, something not morally correct, something they've been taught to feel guilty about, if they don't toe the line with what some feminists happen to believe.
Yeah? That's how an active moral life works. We take in new information and new views of the implications of our actions and we become better by being hard on ourselves. It doesn't mean someone's always right if they accuse you of doing the wrong thing, but perhaps you can better understand why exactly they're mistaken if your own moral positions have been deeply explored.
Dave_truesdale wrote:
Next thing you know, he'll get jumped by the PC element for not having enough female protagonists in his stories (gotta maintain that gender balance, after all), so should we expect another apology from him then?
Here's the final sign that you're on thin ice (and Murphy does it more than once above; it's an easy "tell" for a losing position): pulling the rhetorical device of "Next thing you know." Let's deal with what's actually in front of us, not trying to scare people with your own misplaced fears.
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http://wmpreston.blogspot.com
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6/25/2008 11:41:14 PM
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Berry
Posts 92
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Just wondering. And maybe I should check the romance genre blogs, too, though I'm going to step out on a limb here.
But do you think that romance editors get brow beaten in-field over not having enough gender equity in their largely and obviously female-dominated market share?
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6/25/2008 11:51:31 PM
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Dave_Truesdale
Posts 645
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Bill: "And surely you aren't referring to Strahan's TOC as "perfectly gender balanced." It's 13 white guys and one white woman. Your point?"
Just the contrary; you've misread. That the TOC wasn't perfectly gender balanced (which is what a certain radical element wanted), led him to believe he had done something wrong, that he had something to apologize for.
I'll comment tomorrow on your other comments, but it's late, I'm pooped, and I want to post when I have more time.
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"When any category of science fiction has become dull and repetitive, there is always a brilliant story waiting to be written by giving up the assumptions that made the story easy to write." -- Damon Knight
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6/25/2008 11:55:06 PM
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WPreston
Posts 1275
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Berry wrote:
But do you think that romance editors get brow beaten in-field over not having enough gender equity in their largely and obviously female-dominated market share?
It's certainly a different test case, genre-wise. Are there men (or many men) who would want to write for the genre? Would women read it if men wrote it? (Arguably, they do, just outside the genre imprints: see Robert James Waller, I guess. There must be other examples.) As a genre, it's pitched to women. SF isn't pitched to either gender, though perhaps (some) writers imagine one gender or another--obviously in the past that would have been so. The reasons the "romance" genre came about, historically, would be interesting to explore, but almost certainly its a genre that, from its beginnings, had a target audience in mind, while SF began with ideas, wouldn't you say? Later, it took some of the same shape, with "romances" that followed identical arcs in order to satisfy what it believed were audience expectations. But the idea has really been the motivator.
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http://wmpreston.blogspot.com
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6/26/2008 12:01:15 AM
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WPreston
Posts 1275
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Dave_truesdale wrote:
Just the contrary; you've misread.
No, you miswrote. To say the complaint is that the TOC isn't "perfectly gender balanced" is to suggest, by addition of the adverb, that it was balanced enough for your taste but not "perfect" enough for these hard-core people. The TOC was not even remotely "balanced." No one should apologize for "not having a perfectly gender balanced TOC." But one that's way out of line with expectations? Yes. You're suggesting people are on edge and waiting for a slight misstep. That isn't what happened.
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http://wmpreston.blogspot.com
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6/26/2008 1:15:39 AM
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John E. Rogers, Jr.
Posts 2077
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The Comment is a deft political move, designed to defuse an explosive situation, and cement future relations with a bloc of writers and industry insiders he obviously feels will play an important role in upcoming projects. This is business, after all, and the relationships between the talent, the promoter, and the bank, are of paramount importance. Here, the aggrieved parties cannot continue to complain - as that would betray poor taste in the face of contrition. Blame is artfully diverted from the corporate overseers, and - nicely - from the irresolute contributors. Most importantly, the Commentator himself has displayed both honesty and humility. A masterstroke, I think. Exceptionally well executed.
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6/26/2008 6:53:02 AM
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WPreston
Posts 1275
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So John: You believe Strahan's being dishonest? I think if he'd merely wanted to be diplomatic (not that that's a wrong thing to aim for, and I agree that he's achieved that), he wouldn't have had to lay out quite so byzantine a sequence of events.
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http://wmpreston.blogspot.com
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6/26/2008 9:15:57 AM
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John E. Rogers, Jr.
Posts 2077
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It's not that I think he's being dishonest, it's that I choose to view the event in Machiavellian terms. And I don't mean to be disparaging by that statement. It was a finely crafted, game-ending move. Part its genius was its complexity and breadth. A lesser statement would not have sufficed; would have left cracks that a dedicated opponent could exploit. Was it sincere? I imagine so. Was it a pure expression of a deeper commitment to the cause? I guess. Is the cause itself meritorious? I'll leave that to you and Murph and Dave Truesdale to hammer out.
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