Roundup of Some “Anonymous Protesters” (#SFWA Bulletin Links)

“Our Warrior Woman protesters and enemies of the adjective (who unlike Ms. Dworkin will not identify themselves) fall into the category of what Right Wing radio talkers call “liberal fascists,” and I cannot disagree…” -Barry Malzberg

The latest issue of the SFWA Bulletin went out last week while I was at BEA, including both my article about cover art and treating women as people, and the Resnick/Malzberg Dialogues, arguing against censorship and suppression. I’m not going to rehash the points I made in my own piece, but one of the many fascinating things I found in the Dialogues was the idea that the people complaining were somehow anonymous cowards sniping from the shadows.

“Anonymous.” You keep using that word…

I’ve rounded up some of the people talking about the problematic aspects of the last few issues of the Bulletin. I won’t talk about the pages and pages of discussion from the SFWA Discussion Forums, but there have been a significant number of complaints there–all of which have people’s names attached. And then you have posts and commentary like these:

• Foz Meadows: Old Men Yelling at Clouds. “I could make a drinking game about this article: take a shot every time the author deliberately highlights the femaleness of the women he mentions, the better to explain how these ladies never said I was sexist…”
• Peter Brett: Why I’m Renewing my SFWA Membership. ” I won’t get into the details of their remarks here, save to say that having read them for myself, I agree they were unprofessional, inappropriate, and not representative of the SF industry as a whole.”
• Amal El-Mohtar: Responses to Sexism in SFWA’s Bulletin. “VP, Regional Directors, hosts of volunteers in @sfwa, all working hard, are made invisible by the effort it took Resnick/Malzberg to wank.”
• Kameron Hurley: Dear SFWA Writers: Let’s Chat About Censorship and Bullying. “Nobody has to agree with you anymore. Nobody is afraid of you anymore. I know this may come as a massive shock to folks used to a position of power, insulated by groups of people who are happy to stroke their egos and soothe their souls.”
• E. Catherine Tobler: Dear SFWA. “In all the complaints that were voiced, there was never a call for censorship. There was never a call for suppression. There was a call for respect.”
• Jess Haines: SFWA, Sexism, Misogyny, and a Call For Change. “Mr. Resnick, Mr. Malzberg, I am not an anonymous voice. I am telling you now: what you wrote was not okay.”
• Katherine Kerr: “Since when is good taste censorship?“
• Jamie Wyman: An Open Letter to John Scalzi. “It’s not okay. And the reactions–these men saying that they are being bullied or censored because they are being called out as sexist bigots–is not okay.”
• Natalie Luhrs: Linkspam, 5/31/13 Edition. “NOPE, NO SEXISM HERE. Also, a lady totally told them it was okay to write this stuff and as everyone knows, one lady speaks for all ladies.”
• Chris Gerwel: The SFWA Bulletin, Censorship, Anonymity, and Representation. “I have a huge problem with Resnick/Malzberg’s attitude. I consider it regressive, out-dated, and condescending.”
• SL Huang: More on SFWA and the Bulletin. “The people you really should be angry with are Resnick, Malzberg, and whatever editor(s) let their article through.  They’re the people who let down SFWA.  They’re the people who made your public face into sexist douchebaggery.”
• Trisha Lynn: How Jean Rabe screwed the pooch for the SFWA Bulletin and how the SFWA can make things better going forward. “I’m going to instead talk about how the entire mess could have been avoided in the first place. And to do that, I have to throw Bulletin writer/editor Jean Rabe under a bus.”
• Samantha Henderson: Re: SFWA Bulletin #202. “I am not sure if I’m done with SFWA, which is more than its Bulletin and members with 1960s sensibilities.”
• Michael Capobianco: “As a further indication that the R/M dialog doesn’t represent #SFWA, Barry Malzberg isn’t even a member.”
• Silvia Moreno-Garcia: Oh, Bulletin. “In their latest Bulletin rant, Mike Resnick and Barry Malzberg insist, among other things, that they appeared on an issue with a Warrior Woman on the cover. They lie … They appeared in an issue with Sexy Cheesecake Lady. If they can’t tell the difference, maybe that explains a LOT.”
• Catherine Lundoff: “Ongoing egregious sexism in the Bulletin, which is @sfwa’s official membership magazine.”
• Dean Gilbert: “Finally found out what the SFWA controversy is. Wow. Will not be buying any Resnick or Maltzburg books again for sure.”
• Patrick Hume: “As far as Resnick and Malzberg go, well, I imagine it must be very frightening being dinosaurs. Misogynistic, irrelevant dinosaurs.”
• Alisa Krasnostein: “What I see is several issues that have caused offense, incl a ridiculous cover, and no stand from the SFWA in light of complaints.“
• Jenny Thurman: “Why, @sfwa, do you need a task force to determine if your own members should be given professional respect within your own publication?“
• Ross E. Lockhart: To SFWA or not to SFWA? That is the question. “Recently, when it comes to respecting female authors and editors, SFWA has chosen a counterproductive path, giving a platform in the official SFWA Bulletin to a handful of male authors who have decided to wear their sexism outrageously…”
• Ursula Vernon: SFWA — Housebreaking a Puppy or Abusive Relationship? “…let me just say that it’s sad when you finally get to interact with some of the Big Names of science fiction and they turn out to be old men yelling at clouds.”
• A. J. Fitzwater: “I don’t want to join a union that majority men in power think women have no place amongst them. So sad to have a dream destroyed.”
• Ann Kopchik: “I really have no words about the whole #sfwa thing. Except that I’m tired of needing a dick to be respected.”
• Rick Novy: “Those who don’t get the uproar over the SFWA bulletin article, read it replacing words meaning ‘female’ with words meaning ‘black.’“
• Jenn Reese: “SFWA is the most backwards-looking organization I belong to. We can write the future, but we can’t even live in the present.“
• Damien Walter: “The issues with the bulletin are not acceptable, but don’t change my sense of the SFWA as a whole as very hardworking and useful.”
• Kay Holt: “Not saying SFWA is bad. Just that we shouldn’t put up with embedded misogyny just because we otherwise benefit from an organization.”
• Kyle Weems: “Shame on you @sfwa. That’s hideous, backwards, and strangely atavistic for an org that writes about the future.”
• Patrick Nielsen Hayden: “An underreported aspect of being around for a long time: the horror of watching your once-admired elders turn into blithering nincompoops.”
• Ann Aguirre: “I’m sad SFWA published antiquated dogma, then a defense of it. I’m tired of being made to feel like I’m so cute for thinking I can write SF.”
• Rachael Acks: Dear Barry Malzberg and Mike Resnick: F*** You. “If I hadn’t already had a lot of positive experiences with the older male membership of the organization, I would honestly be really wondering about that as well, since the attitude Malzberg and Resnick display with such pride belongs in an era that thankfully ended before I was born.”

Added 6/3/2013:

• Mary Robinette Kowal: My Very Complicated Reaction to Issue 202 of the Bulletin. “I’m furious, because they can undo all of the good that SFWA does. And like it or not, people are right to be angry. The column is deeply offensive.”
• Kate Milford: Kerfluffle Watch, SFWA Edition: Call Your Detractors Liberal Fascists, Lose the Argument. “…I had learned this much: the authors consider that either those who objected to the cover and dialogue in Issue 200 are at best stupid and at worst censorious.”
• Alma Alexander: The Issue 202 Controversy. “This might involve biting the bullet, calling one tradition’s tenure in the Bulletin a day, and dropping the Malzberg/Resnick conversations … It might even be time to start letting the WOMEN have a turn at having a Conversation.”
• Lilith Saintcrow: I Hope Gandhi is Right. “…this sort of shit makes me so. damn. tired.”
• Tracy Cembor: Genre Drama. “Writers should be respected as partners in the process, and writers should treat one another as professionals and equals.”
• Ferrett Steinmetz: Achievement Unlocked: Women’s Rights Advocate. “You’ve got more work to do.   You’ve got to see that calling them ‘lady editors’ is actually diminishing them, that women in chainmail bikinis may be a long tradition but so are grinning Negro lawn jockeys…”
• Steven Saus: What to Do About Sexism In Our Official Publications. “This is a matter of being professional and treating all sf/f authors professionally.”
• Benjamin Rosenbaum: Dear Barry & Mike. “Please cut it out. You’re better than that. Act like the men you want to be.”
• Kelly McCullough: “For the record, the sexist dippery in the recent SFWA bulletin makes this male author & SFWA member very unhappy. Not OK Resnick & Malzberg.“
• K. Tempest Bradford: Demanding the Best. “What needs to happen is that the all of people who belong to and run SFWA need to demand the best of their community. Demand that sexism no longer be treated lightly, that it be called out and put down and not tolerated.”
• Shiloh Walker: I’m no Barbie. “Being a woman very often means you’re going to be insulted, ignored, condescended, treated as insignificant, devalued, viewed as an object, and the list goes on and on and on…we get so blind to the shit that comes our way at times.  Maybe the problem is that we carried on with quiet dignity for too long.”
• Harry Connolly: SFWA Bulletin and Sexism in the Genre. “Speech has consequences. Speech sways the opinion of others, and maybe–just maybe–that might have an effect on your life. Resnick has that power; he’s going to have to get used to the idea that others have it, too.”
• Juliette Wade: This Feminist’s Thoughts on SFWA and Cultural Change. “…they were performing a culture that is sorely out of date, and I’m sure they realize that because they are defending their right to do so. Fine (though the context was inappropriate, and I’ll address that below), but they deserve the heat they are getting in response to those ideas.”
• Stina Leicht: Feminist Monday. “This whole thing has been building up for three issues which is why there’s so much noise being made over it … And sadly, this controversy is just the tip of the misogyny iceberg.”
• Amy McLane. Attack of the Liberal Fascists. “It is bad enough to read old men rating the hotness levels of various writers and editors and then getting indignant about being called out on it. It is gross, but you can almost sort of see how those two have gotten to the point of thinking that they’ve earned the right to be gross…”
• Andrea Phillips: Barbie’s Quiet Dignity and Progress. “And that’s just one more drop in what seems like a never-ending stream of sexism.”
• Selma Wolfe: Choose to be Better. “The men that endlessly defend their own sexism could choose not to defend it. They could choose to focus on women’s opinions, rather than their appearances.”
• T. M. Thomas. SFWA in the News. “And it’s why I think, perhaps deluded and defensive and not malicious at first, why the dinosaurs of the SFWA need to offer immediate apologies and stop trying to make themselves the victims of the piece.”
• Lindsey Bieda. “‘Hey, this thing you are doing is shitty’ is not censorship and free speech does not mean freedom from consequences or criticism.“
• Jeaniene Frost: SFWA – Not Today. “I’m glad Scalzi agrees these are legitimate concerns that affect all SFWA members/associates and isn’t falling for the ‘but it’s just whining from a few liberal fascists!’ defense, but I also heave a weary sigh of agreement with author Jenny Truman’s Tweet: ‘Why, @sfwa, do you need a task force to determine if your own members should be given professional respect within your own publication?'”
• Matt Yaeger: Space Sexism. “If you can’t defend yourself without wrapping it up in an irrelevant conclusion that people who disagree with you must be censorship Nazis (hows that for loaded terms?) then you’ve already lost your position.”
• Karina Cooper: Damned If You Do(n’t). “We live in a world where men are judged by the quality and quantity of their bodies of work, and women are judged by their bodies; where men are called writers, authors, artists and creatives, and women are called lady writers and authoresses and ‘beauty pageant beautiful’.”

Added 6/4/2013:

• Lauren Roy: Being Part of the Solution. “It can make newbies feel quite unwelcome when you see that someone out there — someones who are big names! — think you’re not a writer but a lady writer, as though my gender puts an asterisk beside anything I do.”
• Barbara Barnett: Not that the Intrawebs Need Another Post on the SFWA Kerfuffle. “…the publication of a professional organization should not serve as a megaphone for speech that disrespects a large portion of the organization’s membership.”
• Alisa Krasnostein: Observations from the SFWA Bulletin Fiasco – Part 1. “But here’s what really gets me annoyed. How does freedom of speech, the concept, mean that it only applies to you?”
• J. N. Duncan: “Dear SFWA, it’s not your job to be sexism-free (you can’t), but you do have obligation to pursue awareness and act on it with due-diligence.“
• Alan Baxter: SFWA, Sexism in SFF and Missing the Point. “…members of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America wrote a piece in the official publication, the SFWA Bulletin, that is astounding in its prehistoric approach to gender and dealing with justifiable complaints.”
• Jane Little (Dear Author): SFF Old Guard. “…the official bulletin of the Science Fiction Writer’s Association for the last three months has kind of been an embarrassment to SFWA, at least to those of us looking from the outside in.”
• Ilona Andrews: “I’ve looked at their Bulletin talks and they are out of touch.”
• Ann Laurel Kopchik: My Letter to SFWA. “But the continuing problems with blatant sexism in an official publication of SFWA makes me wonder if I’ll be treated as an equal when I do meet the requirements to join SFWA.”
• Shaun Duke: SFWA, Sexism, and Progress. ” Sexism is … bullshit.  We should call it out when we see it, no matter our genders.  And we should definitely make sure it no longer uses the voice of the various professional organizations in our field…”
• Thomas Pluck: Everyday Sexism and Giant Space-Dicks. “…if science fiction writers can imagine unheard-of future civilizations, they can unshackle their brains from the ’60s when they were cocks of the walk, and start treating women as equals…”
• M. E. Garber: Are We Still Here? Really? “What woman wants to become part of an organization that objectifies her, and belittles both her and her ability to work and achieve?”

Added 6/5/2013:

• Liz Argall: Thank you for Your Disappointment. “It’s like other sexist fiascoes that have happened elsewhere. Even if you believe men will always pinch bottoms in elevators, it’s still more useful to be appalled and talk about it.”
• Terra LeMay: “I’m not sure I’ll have time to write a longer post about SFWA, but count me among those members disappointed by the recent Bulletin issues.“
• Cora Buhlert: Revenge of the Girl Cooties. “Sorry, but people saying ‘This is kind of sexist’ is not censorship, sorry.”
• Tansy Rayner Roberts: Why It’s Important. “…this is why it matters that a professional industry journal should not publish a piece, even a deliberately backwards-looking opinion piece, which belittles and patronises women.”
• Eric Zawadski: That SFWA Thing. “There is a commonly-held Internet fallacy that any negative response to your opinions is a form of censorship, and this article is thick with it.”
• Catherine Shaffer: Just Because You’re Not Offended Doesn’t Mean It’s Not Offensive. “Other people being offended by things I am not actually generates useful conversations and improves the world for us all.”
• Kat Goodwin: You Be Ladies Now, Ya Hear! “And voices like Resnick, Malzberg and Henderson are not ignored, nor evil, nor do they have nothing to contribute as members and authors to the field. But because their viewpoints on women are so exclusionary, they can’t be the main voices speaking for the Bulletin or SFWA…”
• Stephanie Leary: The SFWA Bulletin. “…the very fact that Ad Week picked up on the story illustrates why SFWA’s teacup tempest is a big deal: the Bulletin is one of the primary ways the organization presents itself to the public.”
• Larry Kollar: Writing Wibbles. “I find this head-desking incredible. I’m a middle-aged whitebread dude, and I have my issues, but I fracking try to do better.”

Added 6/6/2013:

• Seanan McGuire: Sexism, the current SFWA kerfuffle, and “lady authors.” “…that’s what happens when the background radiation of your entire life is a combination of ‘men are normal, human, wonderful, admirable, talented, worth aspiring to,’ and ‘bitches be crazy.'”

One final related link, from Laura Resnick. Thoughts from a Different Resnick.

This is just a sampling, and includes SFWA members, past SFWA officers, at least one three Hugo award winners, editors, aspiring writers, experienced writers, bestselling writers, and more. There’s a lot more out there.