I knew it! Only cranky old people would ever prefer SF to Sci-Fi! See? Change is good, people. Embrace ittttttt.
(In case you’re not aware, the post behind that link is meant to be funny. But I’m as welling as he is to engage in smart-alec young person vs. crotchety old person, RUMBLE!!!)
Apparently there are still people deeply scarred by the term SciFi and will jump on any poor soul who dares to ask: is this term really still derogatory? Jump on him and whip out the claws, apparently. Wow.
I have never really understood the vehement hate this term generates in people. SciFi or Sci-Fi (sometimes pronounced skiffy) has certainly been used by those who look down on our genre. But shortening it to SF and calling that more acceptable merely injects a rather nasty and unnecessary layer to the issue. With SF, you’re kind of hiding what you’re talking about except for those in the know. Does SF stand for San Francisco? (Don’t think people would be so silly as to assume? You’d be wrong.) Or, more importantly to us, does it stand for speculative fiction or science fiction? At least with Sci-Fi you know what one is talking about, as Jason said in his post.
At the risk of having Nick Mamatas say nasty things about me, I have to say that this whole Sci-Fi is derogatory/marks you as an outsider ish has always struck me as a bit of in-community snobbery. Like: “We don’t call it Sci-Fi. Pfft. That’s for clueless newbies!” with a full dose of huffiness and noses in the air. Thing is, if you’re a new person to the community and run across that attitude, why the fuck wouldn’t you just turn around, walk away, and never deal with the likes of SF fans again? Who the hell needs that level of bitchassness in their lives? If you’re going to be shunned for something, at least make it something important, like preferring Star Trek to Star Wars.
Also, I have noticed that the majority of people who raise hell about Sci-Fi vs. SF tend to be folks who are older or have been in the community for a while. Snobbery and disdain from the literary community about science fiction was, if I understand correctly, a lot more virulent in the past than it is now. I can see how that dismissiveness can hurt and make people feel really bad. Alan Bostick says Sci-Fi was used as a “nasty slur”, which is excessively sucky. But there’s no need to infect newer folks with that same mindset.
All other considerations aside, I like the term Sci-Fi better than SF for a simple reason: it’s easier to say and sounds better. Sigh-fie rolls off the tongue, EssEff is all angles and hard edges. So from now on I’m using it all the time and anyone who tries to claim that I’m not really part of this genre because of it will earn themselves a shrug. I’ll be sure to mention their objections every time I moderate a panel at a Sci-Fi convention. :P
Over on Tor.com I collated the stories, novels, and authors suggested in my ABW and FeministSF posts on mindblowing SF by women and POC. The list is quite long but is far from exhaustive. If you want to add more, do! Or just co-sign.
Due to the nature of my hectic existence, I’m often really tired when I get home and don’t cook. I’ve known this about myself for a long time, and long ago found a food I could make very quickly that was still healthy: frozen dumplings from Trader Joe’s. I love those things and will eat them every day. This weekend I decided that I am going to start eating them for lunch as it’s much less expensive and to break myself from my Hale & Hearty soups habit. That stuff is great, but expensive.
My dilemma is that if I eat dumplings for lunch, I don’t want to have them for dinner, too. Otherwise it would comprise 80% of my diet. At the same time, it’s hard to find food that can be cooked quickly (i.e. mainly pre-prepared) that is also good for you. No unnecessary preservatives and other junk. Would also help if it was inexpensive. I’m going to try to do more weekend cooking, but, oddly, my weekends are hectic, too. So, I need some other alternatives.
I beseech you, o readers of my blog, to offer some suggestions. My criteria: food that is ready within 15 minutes, that requires very little or no preparation, that is healthy, that isn’t expensive. I’m an omnivore, but I’m trying to limit my pork and beef intake. Fish and chicken are cool, though. I fear I may be asking too much, but I found the dumplings, didn’t I? There has to be more.
I’m feeling right now that this post on ABW is the only thing I’ll have to say on heath care for a while. I hate these stupid death panel people and others yelling about socialized health care who have never felt terror in their lives due to lack of health care and money.
Over on Tor.com I geek out over the future of electronic comic books and ereaders. My worlds are colliding.
Over on my Tor.com Star Trek post I noticed something that I often see but don’t always comment on: the dismissal of Captains Janeway and Sisko (and their shows) as being bad, or mediocre, or not as good as Kirk/TOS, Picard/TNG or even Archer/ENT (wtf?).
I’m used to Janeway hate. Voyager started shaky, founds its footing, then fell on its face when a blond in a skin-tight jumpsuit wandered by. There were many individual moments of great television, but nothing that truly cohered. Plus, Janeway is a woman, and the sexism-laced commentary about her being too manly or too feminine or too whatever have flowed since the show began.
What I don’t understand is the lack of love for Sisko, who was by far the best Star Trek captain since Kirk. Deep Space Nine was the most ambitious and complex of all the shows, and explored issues that were sometimes touched on in the original series but rarely approached in The Next Generation. I realize that Star Trek began as Wagon Train in space, but is there no room in the franchise for a show that required a bit of deep thought?
What I’ve always wanted to do, and am now taking the chance to do, is to ask: what exactly do you dislike about Janeway and/or Sisko? And let’s not pussyfoot around here: I want concrete examples, not vague “she was too feminine!” bullcrap. I want to know in what way did Janeway’s femininity made her worse or negatively different than Kirk or Picard or Archer, if that’s your stance. Whatever your issue, bring it on.
Or so says Claire Light:
…how do you — not “become a good editor” but — change the way you do business so that your editing becomes more than an exercise in futility? Here are some steps:
If anyone was looking for a primer on this subject, they would do well to read the whole post.
Every time I get involved in some drama online I am sure to hear from someone who thinks I’m just an awful, awful person who should shut up. This is not uncommon amongst people who post about race/gender/sexual orientation/etc. shenanigans. I have my special box of trolls just like most other activists do.
I got a note from a newish detractor back during the RoF cover stuff who left a comment that was nothing more than trolling without even the appearance of trying to have a conversation or be a useful member of the conversation. I usually just delete these, but in this instance I wrote him an email explaining why I would not be releasing his comment and being snarky at him (my tolerance for stupidity was low at that moment). The reply contained what one might expect, but also contained two curious elements.
#1: I’m rather glad you didn’t post the comment and replied via email, as now I can be rather more honest than I would be in a blog posting (which is more public, after all).
#2: you’re a person whose principal interest lies not in addressing substantive matter of the various levels of discrimination that exist in the SFF community, but in scoring points off people. You appear to take pleasure in misrepresenting, insulting and ridiculing others–essentially inflicting pain on them.1
This commenter — Euan Harvey — seems to be under the impression that it’s perfectly okay to abuse me in private email but not in public.2 But while claiming that he’s allowed to be as nasty as he likes, he also condemns me for being MEEN myself. Perhaps he feels it would be more acceptable if I were meen in private. I’m not sure.
The phrase “scoring points off people” is an oft-used one by a particular selection of my trolls, but variants of it crop up all over. Again, I’m not unique in this regard. We wild unicorns always have someone talking about how what we do is just to satisfy our own need to be angry, or to inflict pain on others, or whatever else.
But this email struck me in particular and made me think about exactly what this scoring points thing was really about. I finally grokked what was going on after some thought. It’s something I’ve always understood on a subconscious level, but never really articulated before. It’s something along the lines of: how dare I use these people’s own words and attitudes against them? How dare I, in public, on well-read blogs and in the company of influential and intelligent people, repeat what they have said or written and expose it for the crap it really is?
This is part of the tone argument — because how often have you heard people say that if only POC would take white folks aside, privately, and explain to them where they went wrong instead of getting angry in public, everything would be okay. We’d be listened to, respected, etc., if only we went about things properly. It’s a square on the BINGO card.
There’s also an element of: you can’t possibly mean the things you say because they are so unfavorable toward me. Instead, you must just hate me for irrational reasons and wish to destroy me. It’s all about me.
And: this is just a game to you. I cannot fathom how this could be an important issue to you because it’s not an important one to me (I’m not affected by it, I’m white/male/straight). No, it’s really that you just enjoy a good hate-on and keep a scoreboard of all the people you’ve hurt.
If I have to explain all the ways in which those things are totally wrong, then you have not been paying very close attention to things I say.
Anyway, having all of that crystallize in my head was an interesting moment. It never fails to boggle me, the notions that people will hold. Or the grudges. Some people really do seem to think I do all of this for my health. I’ll leave them to their fantasies.
Today on Tor.com I’m mourning the loss of the Prime Star Trek Universe. You know, the one that now only exists in Spock’s memories? It saddens me, because I think Universe Prime deserves a good send-off at the very least. We have yet to see Captain Sisko’s return, perhaps many years later when Admiral Janeway and Captain Picard are on one last mission. sigh I can only dream, I fear. Anyway, if you feel the way I do (or think I’m a nutter) go chat on Tor.com about it.
