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redneckgaijinCaveat: I did not vote or participate in any way in Sasquon, the 2015 Hugo Awards, or anything associated with either. The reasons I did not vote are: (1) I didn't feel like reading all the things nominated for the awards, and I don't feel qualified to vote in awards polls without some knowledge of all the options; and (2) I regard the Hugos as an unimportant popularity contest, not worth more than an occasional hour or so out of my free time. I'm only writing this because of the incredible stupidity and insanity involved with the Sad/Rabid Puppies movement.
To the supporters of Sad/Rabid Puppies: You are all insane.
Having said the single most important thing in this post, I will now explain why I say it.
First, you went to extreme lengths this year to pack the nominations process of the Hugos, ensuring that three-quarters of the people who sent in nominating ballots were screened out by a tidal wave of artificial support for your preferred works.
Second, you did this, you claimed, because "social justice warriors" (i. e. liberals) were in conspiracy to block conservatives from winning the Hugos.
Third, despite being VERY explicit that the purpose of your movement was to block liberals and restore conservative dominance of science fiction and fantasy, you claim that your movement is apolitical because a few of the creators on your slate were women or people of color. (A number of whom declined their nominations, by the way, rather than be associated with your bigotry.)
Fourth, you expected other people to believe this, and also to believe that your movement is not directly tied to various forms of bigotry espoused by your leader, Theodore Beale aka Vox Day, and his close friends Brad Torgersen and Larry Correia.
Fifth, that most of the works on your slate had a common theme: "Anything that is different is inferior and subhuman, and must be fought and destroyed lest it destroy true, pure humanity." This was especially true of John Wright's writings and Theodore "Vox Dei"'s editing and publications, which dominated the Puppy nomination slate. Despite how this runs counter to many of the great classics of science fiction (especially Star Trek), you claim that this is merely returning science fiction and fantasy to its true roots, bringing back "fun storytelling."
Sixth, that you are actually surprised that people who are angry at how you gamed the rules and rigged the nominations combined their votes with people who just plain don't like what you nominated and overwhelmingly rejected your slate in all categories but one. (And that one you won because the winner was fandom's biggest blockbuster movie of 2014.)
Seventh, that despite being so thoroughly rejected by more Hugo Award voters than have ever participated before (it wasn't even close), you are claiming victory, saying that your defeat proves that the system is rigged and that you were right all along. (Because, in your world, it is simply impossible that anyone could honestly dislike the things you like.) However, at the same time you are screaming that, in the words of one particular Twitter poster, "you are literally burning books by doing this."
(Note: for the non-Puppies reading: I told you so.)
Eighth, that you defend the nominations as "playing by the rules so they weren't rigged" and attack the final outcome as vote-rigging when the vote was conducted by the SAME RULES.
Ninth, that you do this in the SAME CONVERSATION, without batting an eye.
Tenth, that you seem willing to follow Vox Day, who refers to you as, and I quote, "vile faceless minions—the hardcore shock troops—who are sworn to mindless and perfect obedience."
(Seriously. Vox Day thinks of you all as being on this earth solely to obey your betters (i. e. him) without question. This is the man who has vowed, in response to the No Award results, to utterly destroy the Hugos just to anger and annoy liberals.)
Eleventh, and second most importantly of all: you engaged in all of this patently assholish behavior, the kind of behavior a nine-year-old schoolyard child would be ashamed to own up to, in the belief that it would help you and your political allies win a popularity award.
News flash: you can't force people to love you. It's insane to even try. You can, however, quite easily make people hate you and anything associated with you, if you act like an asshole hard enough and often enough.
Twelfth, last, and most important, you did all this- you went to the effort, you expended the energy, you endured the emotional extremes- not over a law or a person or a cause, but over a goddamn popularity contest. Because, apparently, the Hugos are just such Serious Business that it's worth getting as worked up over them as it would be over gay marriage or healthcare or the Charleston shootings or the Iranian nuclear deal or the TPP, etc. etc.
Honestly: the Hugo is a pretty little statue for someone's shelf and a little blurb for the back of a book. That's all it is. Its effect on the real world is negligible. It's nothing more than fans coming together to celebrate things they love... or, at least, it was until you came in determined to rule or ruin.
So next year you'll do something truly malicious and attempt to destroy the Hugos for all time, since it seems you can't abide the notion that other people like different things from you. And, having destroyed the thing you spent so much time and energy trying to take control of, you will again declare victory. Because, apparently, you can only find joy by depriving others of their joy.
This is why I don't just think you're assholes; you're insane.
Only assholes do things for the primary purpose of making other people angry.
And only insane people think they can do asshole things and have their victims love them for it afterwards.
To the supporters of Sad/Rabid Puppies: You are all insane.
Having said the single most important thing in this post, I will now explain why I say it.
First, you went to extreme lengths this year to pack the nominations process of the Hugos, ensuring that three-quarters of the people who sent in nominating ballots were screened out by a tidal wave of artificial support for your preferred works.
Second, you did this, you claimed, because "social justice warriors" (i. e. liberals) were in conspiracy to block conservatives from winning the Hugos.
Third, despite being VERY explicit that the purpose of your movement was to block liberals and restore conservative dominance of science fiction and fantasy, you claim that your movement is apolitical because a few of the creators on your slate were women or people of color. (A number of whom declined their nominations, by the way, rather than be associated with your bigotry.)
Fourth, you expected other people to believe this, and also to believe that your movement is not directly tied to various forms of bigotry espoused by your leader, Theodore Beale aka Vox Day, and his close friends Brad Torgersen and Larry Correia.
Fifth, that most of the works on your slate had a common theme: "Anything that is different is inferior and subhuman, and must be fought and destroyed lest it destroy true, pure humanity." This was especially true of John Wright's writings and Theodore "Vox Dei"'s editing and publications, which dominated the Puppy nomination slate. Despite how this runs counter to many of the great classics of science fiction (especially Star Trek), you claim that this is merely returning science fiction and fantasy to its true roots, bringing back "fun storytelling."
Sixth, that you are actually surprised that people who are angry at how you gamed the rules and rigged the nominations combined their votes with people who just plain don't like what you nominated and overwhelmingly rejected your slate in all categories but one. (And that one you won because the winner was fandom's biggest blockbuster movie of 2014.)
Seventh, that despite being so thoroughly rejected by more Hugo Award voters than have ever participated before (it wasn't even close), you are claiming victory, saying that your defeat proves that the system is rigged and that you were right all along. (Because, in your world, it is simply impossible that anyone could honestly dislike the things you like.) However, at the same time you are screaming that, in the words of one particular Twitter poster, "you are literally burning books by doing this."
(Note: for the non-Puppies reading: I told you so.)
Eighth, that you defend the nominations as "playing by the rules so they weren't rigged" and attack the final outcome as vote-rigging when the vote was conducted by the SAME RULES.
Ninth, that you do this in the SAME CONVERSATION, without batting an eye.
Tenth, that you seem willing to follow Vox Day, who refers to you as, and I quote, "vile faceless minions—the hardcore shock troops—who are sworn to mindless and perfect obedience."
(Seriously. Vox Day thinks of you all as being on this earth solely to obey your betters (i. e. him) without question. This is the man who has vowed, in response to the No Award results, to utterly destroy the Hugos just to anger and annoy liberals.)
Eleventh, and second most importantly of all: you engaged in all of this patently assholish behavior, the kind of behavior a nine-year-old schoolyard child would be ashamed to own up to, in the belief that it would help you and your political allies win a popularity award.
News flash: you can't force people to love you. It's insane to even try. You can, however, quite easily make people hate you and anything associated with you, if you act like an asshole hard enough and often enough.
Twelfth, last, and most important, you did all this- you went to the effort, you expended the energy, you endured the emotional extremes- not over a law or a person or a cause, but over a goddamn popularity contest. Because, apparently, the Hugos are just such Serious Business that it's worth getting as worked up over them as it would be over gay marriage or healthcare or the Charleston shootings or the Iranian nuclear deal or the TPP, etc. etc.
Honestly: the Hugo is a pretty little statue for someone's shelf and a little blurb for the back of a book. That's all it is. Its effect on the real world is negligible. It's nothing more than fans coming together to celebrate things they love... or, at least, it was until you came in determined to rule or ruin.
So next year you'll do something truly malicious and attempt to destroy the Hugos for all time, since it seems you can't abide the notion that other people like different things from you. And, having destroyed the thing you spent so much time and energy trying to take control of, you will again declare victory. Because, apparently, you can only find joy by depriving others of their joy.
This is why I don't just think you're assholes; you're insane.
Only assholes do things for the primary purpose of making other people angry.
And only insane people think they can do asshole things and have their victims love them for it afterwards.
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no subject
Date: 2015-09-02 08:22 am (UTC)Eighth, that you defend the nominations as "playing by the rules so they weren't rigged" and attack the final outcome as vote-rigging when the vote was conducted by the SAME RULES.
This isn't true as you've phrased it. The nominations process is first-past-the-post; the top 5 vote-getters are what end up on the final ballot, which makes it easily gamed by a relatively small number of people voting in lockstep.
The votes from the final ballot, however, are tabulated by Instant Runoff Voting (aka Australian voting), in which voters rank their choices and it often takes multiple rounds of vote-counting to produce a winner. This system is much harder to game.
This year a proposal was presented at the Business Meeting to change the nominations process to something more like the voting process, but in a way that would be transparent to the people nominating. It passed, and if ratified in 2016 will go into effect the following year -- and that will be effectively the end of the puppies being able to pull this particular trick.