There first had to be women who demonstrated as individuals that they deserved respect and would not surrender their dignity in the face of abuse. They did this on their own, against a prevailing point of view (even in other women) which figured they got what they deserved.
Nick said this better, but my reaction to this was: Hasn't it already been demonstrated that women deserve respect? Even by women, as individuals, standing and saying something? And I guess I wonder why it would have to happen again in the SF field before it's okay to have a wider conversation about these issues. I don't think there's a big enough difference between the SF field and that nebulous "rest of the world" that it would need to be proven again.
And, actually, reading some people's blog posts about their experiences at cons, some people have directly addressed gropes and grabs, but that doesn't mean the behavior has stopped (I'm thinking in particular here of the woman who grabbed Harlan's shoulder and shook him when he was acting inapropriately toward
( ... )
I guess I wonder why it would have to happen again in the SF field before it's okay to have a wider conversation about these issues.
I don't think anybody's saying it wasn't OK to have this conversation before. I'm not, at least. People tend to be reactive (not to say reactionary), and I think there's sort of a perfect storm of factors here--the public nature of the act, the participants, the video documentation, and the Internet holding it all together and the blogosphere re-iterating it all over the place.
And the thing about social change, and beliefs about acceptable actions in public (or private) spaces, is that it may start with individuals, but it has to end with community.
I agree. But I think that something like bellwether_talk has more chance of doing something with this than SFWA does.
I think perfect storm is a great way to describe this - though I think it's also what tends to happen in terms of events of social change, whether in large or small groups. There's a slow build on the side pushing for change, and then something finally comes in and ignites everyone. Which does leave the poor folks on the other side sort of flabbergasted, because they were just responding to events like they have in the past, and here's this radically different result staring them in the face
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Not because "SFWA" isn't saying anything, but because its members aren't saying anything. No one's obligated to make a stand for anything. But it's depressing when people who could be addressing the issue, people who are in a position of status, are saying nothing, and privately dismissing the behavior. If they were dismissing it somewhere public, then at least there could be conversation about differing points of view, but to remain silent publicly and privately dismiss... is just depressing. Because that's the behavior that enables the status quo to continue. I read comments such as this and wonder what world the poster is living in, that is such an alternative reality from my own, where almost every member of SFWA has been discussing little else than this incident, publicly and privately, all over the internet
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You know, I'm increasingly coming over to the idea that we're all seeing a paroxysm of culture-transfer, as SF-lit culture meets the internet, and brushes up more and more against media-fandom and related internet-based cultures. Because, and I've been working this out very slowly over the course of 3 years of con-going, SF-lit is a different culture from media-fandom, and the interaction is head-spinny.
I try to participate in both worlds, and sometimes end up doing translation from one to the other, and what I've seen in the past few days is internet-based cultural practices -- shunning, shame, exposure of private discussion -- occurring in SF-lit spaces. What strikes me about it is people being shocked at it, till I remember that SF-lit isn't necessarily used to acting like that, as a whole.
And, I mean, SF-lit has been on the internet for a long, long time, right? But maybe hasn't been used to the idea that the internet isn't just in-person plus -- it's inevitably going to be a different cultural experience.
Actually, for a bunch of "futurists" and such-like, the bulk of SF-lit pros have been extremely slow to take advantage of/learn the net. Witness the number of crappy author web sites, riddled with broken links, that haven't been updated since 1998. There is Strange Horizons and there are the bloggers, but with some notable exceptions these tend to be younger writers, and not the Big Names.
SF-lit is a COMPLETELY different culture from media-fandom, despite the overlap. I think that the divide is probably more visible from the lit side, though. There's some snobbery there and there's some bemusement and there's a sense, I think, that media SF isn't very representative of the genre. But I think the lit folks could learn some things from the media fans . . .
Nick said this better, but my reaction to this was: Hasn't it already been demonstrated that women deserve respect? Even by women, as individuals, standing and saying something? And I guess I wonder why it would have to happen again in the SF field before it's okay to have a wider conversation about these issues. I don't think there's a big enough difference between the SF field and that nebulous "rest of the world" that it would need to be proven again.
And, actually, reading some people's blog posts about their experiences at cons, some people have directly addressed gropes and grabs, but that doesn't mean the behavior has stopped (I'm thinking in particular here of the woman who grabbed Harlan's shoulder and shook him when he was acting inapropriately toward ( ... )
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I don't think anybody's saying it wasn't OK to have this conversation before. I'm not, at least. People tend to be reactive (not to say reactionary), and I think there's sort of a perfect storm of factors here--the public nature of the act, the participants, the video documentation, and the Internet holding it all together and the blogosphere re-iterating it all over the place.
And the thing about social change, and beliefs about acceptable actions in public (or private) spaces, is that it may start with individuals, but it has to end with community.
I agree. But I think that something like bellwether_talk has more chance of doing something with this than SFWA does.
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I read comments such as this and wonder what world the poster is living in, that is such an alternative reality from my own, where almost every member of SFWA has been discussing little else than this incident, publicly and privately, all over the internet ( ... )
Reply
I try to participate in both worlds, and sometimes end up doing translation from one to the other, and what I've seen in the past few days is internet-based cultural practices -- shunning, shame, exposure of private discussion -- occurring in SF-lit spaces. What strikes me about it is people being shocked at it, till I remember that SF-lit isn't necessarily used to acting like that, as a whole.
And, I mean, SF-lit has been on the internet for a long, long time, right? But maybe hasn't been used to the idea that the internet isn't just in-person plus -- it's inevitably going to be a different cultural experience.
Reply
SF-lit is a COMPLETELY different culture from media-fandom, despite the overlap. I think that the divide is probably more visible from the lit side, though. There's some snobbery there and there's some bemusement and there's a sense, I think, that media SF isn't very representative of the genre. But I think the lit folks could learn some things from the media fans . . .
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