Hugo Wars, Part CCXVIII
I debated whether to join the conversation about the recently announced Hugo Awards Ballot. I eventually said the following on Twitter, and figured that would be the end of it for me:
- I know awards have always had an element of popularity contest to them, and that any system can be played. (1/5)
- Likewise, there have always been people who want to cheapen them for jealousy, bitterness, politics, attention, or whatever. (2/5)
- Call me naïve, but I want the Hugos to be about the best authors, artists, & editors in our field. That’s what I’ll be reading for. (3/5)
- Yeah, there’s been some annoying hypocrisy and chest-thumping. There are also some amazing people and works on the Hugo ballot. (4/5)
- I’m not interested in letting anyone turn the Hugos into their personal political statement. I’m interested in celebrating awesomeness (5/5)
I didn’t originally plan to say more than that, but I’ve been reading along, and feeling more and more bummed about the fallout. So I finally decided I needed to get a few more things out. I’ll certainly understand if you’re burnt out on Hugo-related posts and choose to skip this one.
In an ideal world, I think the Hugo ballot would reflect the best work of the previous calendar year. No campaigning necessary, no politics, no grudges, no systemic handicapping of any groups or individuals, etc. I suspect we can all agree we don’t live in an ideal world.
Recommendations and word-of-mouth: People recommending things they’ve read/seen and loved is a good thing. It’s one of the most important factors in the success of any author or artist. Whether it’s one story you’re passionate about and want everyone to vote for, or a full list of stories and books and shows and editors, saying, “Hey, this stuff is really, really cool!” is kind of what fandom is all about, yes?
Eligibility lists: I think Amal El-Mohtar had a very good post about the importance and value of sharing your list of award-eligible work with the world. I know there are some people who believe this sort of thing is tacky, and any whisper of “Hey, I wrote this thing that’s eligible” counts as campaigning and is a huge insult to the spirit of the awards. Obviously, I disagree, both for the excellent reasons Amal mentioned, and because to be blunt, I can’t remember all of the good stuff I read or saw last year. These reminders are helpful to me as a potential voter.
Campaigning for yourself: When do you cross the line from making voters aware of your work to actively campaigning for it? I don’t know, and I suspect that line is different for everyone. I personally find it tacky when people email me unsolicited copies of their work. But how many eligibility posts and reminders are too much? It depends on a lot of individual and larger factors. For example, I’ve noticed a trend where female creators get attacked for too much self-promotion a lot faster than men do. It’s a mess, and I don’t pretend to have an answer here.
Voting for the work: Nowhere in the Hugo rules, or in other award rules that I’m aware of, does it say you must consider only the work when casting your ballot. I don’t think there’s be any realistic way to enforce doing so, short of somehow removing author names from everything published in a given year and not crediting authors until after the awards season. But ideally, yes, I think we should be voting for the work.
Now, I’ll admit I get a kick out of seeing my friends on the ballot. I wouldn’t vote for them purely because they’re my friends, but given that I’m more likely to be reading stuff by them, those friendships probably do have at least an indirect impact on my nominations. And I understand the devil-on-the-shoulder whispering, “Ooh, if person X gets on the ballot, that’s really gonna piss off person Y. Cool!”
That said, if you’re voting purely or primarily because you want to make a certain group’s heads explode, as has been stated recently? Yeah, you’re pretty much an asshole, and you’re cheapening the experience for the authors you voted for. See, most authors like winning awards because they wrote something awesome, not because they’re being used as a tool so you can piss on a group you don’t like. But there’s nothing in the rules prohibiting you from being an asshole, either.
Likewise, trying to get on the ballot through a false victimhood narrative? That strikes me as tacky as hell. But again, it’s not against the rules, and human history shows how effective it can be to win support by manufacturing a war. (This will, I imagine, immediately spiral into a futile back-and-forth of “But they started it!” and “They’re the ones making stuff up!”)
Separating personalities from the work: Remember, this is my opinion only. Based on my interactions and reading of Larry Correia online, the man strikes me as a pretentious blowhard playing the role of asshole to rile up and entertain his followers. He is also, from everything I’ve seen and heard, a pretty entertaining and successful author of fiction. I think some of his tactics are tacky as hell, but — much as I might not like the man — I don’t have a problem seeing his book on the ballot. He has a lot of passionate fans of his fiction, many of whom have said flat-out that yeah, he can be a dick, but he writes really fun books.
I’m not saying you should or shouldn’t vote for him. Only that seeing him on the ballot doesn’t strike me as a Problem.
So what about Vox Day making the ballot for Best Novelette? My opinion of the man isn’t exactly a secret. If he got on the ballot for writing an awesome story, great. But unlike Correia, I’ve seen very few people trying to defend Day as a good author. He did post his novelette online for potential voters, so I downloaded it and started reading. I can honestly say that even if I knew nothing about the author as a person, I would have tossed this into the rejection pile after the first couple of pages.
Maybe that’s just a matter of personal taste, and Day’s followers are truly enthusiastic about his fiction, not just his attitudes and politics. But I have a very hard time taking his nomination seriously as anything but an attempt to piss in people’s Cheerios.
Buying votes: I’ve seen accusations of people buying $40 supporting memberships in order to stuff the ballot. Which … I’m sorry, but isn’t the primary point of supporting memberships to allow more people to nominate and vote? If folks are buying memberships just to piss people off, then yeah, we’re back to asshole territory … but it’s still legal asshole territory.
The other accusation I’ve seen is of individuals buying multiple supporting memberships in order to get themselves and their preferred slate on the ballot. Basically, a kind of voter fraud. I haven’t seen any concrete evidence for this, though.
My takeaway: I’m not trying to tell anyone else how they should or shouldn’t react. I’m just laying out my own thought process here.
- There are some amazing works and people on this year’s Hugo ballot. This makes me happy, and is totally worthy of celebration.
- Some authors are assholes. That doesn’t mean they don’t have fans who genuinely like their stuff.
- I think it’s pretty clear that there were some voters who voted just to Make a Point and to Piss Off The Enemy. Yes, these people are also assholes. But that doesn’t mean all people who voted for That Thing are assholes who just wanted to make a point.
- It’s not my job to police who is and isn’t a real fan of someone’s work.
- The run-off voting system should minimize the effects of ballot-stuffing.
- The Hugos are not perfect. No system is. People can and will try to game the system.
- Maybe the Hugos don’t truly recognize the best work in any given year, but they do celebrate a lot of awesome stuff.
- My guess is that we’ll see a significant rise in Hugo voters next year, and that’s a good thing.
2014 Hugo Nominations – the reactions | Far Beyond Reality
April 21, 2014 @ 11:51 am
[…] Hugo Wars, Part CCXVIII (Jim C. Hines) […]
translate or die | Aktuelles: Phantastische Netzstreifzüge 14
April 21, 2014 @ 12:00 pm
[…] Der höchst sympathische Autor Jim C. Hines (“Die Goblins”) hat einen sehr treffenden Beitrag zu der ganzen Hugo-Geschichte […]
Diana Pharaoh Francis
April 21, 2014 @ 12:16 pm
I’ve never done the make people aware of my books thing. I think it’s more I’ll feel like I’ll be laughed at than anything else. But I absolutely loved a book this last year that I wish had received more attention (Delia’s Shadow by Jamie Lee Moyers–go read it!!!) and I wish I’d actively made a point of getting the word out to potential nominators (I did nominate it). I think next year I’ll work harder to bring myself and writers that I love to readers’ attention that time of year.
Jim C. Hines
April 21, 2014 @ 12:17 pm
I not only read it, I blurbed it! Because it was an awesome book! 😀
Sara
April 21, 2014 @ 12:45 pm
As a voter, I really appreciate the eligibility posts. I read over 100 books a year. And I’m a bookseller, so I get lots of things in ARC format months before they come out. Sometimes, it’s hard for me to remember that that book I read in November actually came out the next year.
Also, I don’t do a word count on every piece of literature I read. It’s immensely helpful for me to know what goes in novella vs novelette. Or even that there are related works that I’d forgotten or not known about.
ULTRAGOTHA
April 21, 2014 @ 1:14 pm
Sara – I, too, wish that not only every creator but also every publisher would do an annual eligibility post. Those posts really help me during the nomination phase.
wendy
April 21, 2014 @ 1:31 pm
I very much appreciate ‘this is what I wrote this year that is eligible’ posts – mostly because I read a LOT and forget what was published when. I’m also utterly incapable of remembering the difference between a novella and a novelette.
I also appreciate it when people recommend works that they like one works that I think I might like. Because that’s what being a fan really means. I actually read.Cat Valente’s ‘Six Gun Snow White’ because Seanan squeed about it on the Squeecast.
That said, I’m rather glad to not be voting this time around. Because icky.
Erica
April 21, 2014 @ 4:05 pm
Me also. I don’t read as fast as I used to, so the number of books I read each year is relatively small. I don’t generally notice the year a book is published when I read it either (though I’ve been focusing on stuff that’s relatively recent). This is one reason I’ve never bought a voting membership worldcon–I’m just woefully uninformed about which, if any, of the books I’ve read over the past year or so would actually be eligible for nomination.
So I appreciate lists by publishers, authors, and anyone else. Heck, I’d appreciate a list of books that would be eligible for next year’s Hugo awards so I can start reading them now 🙂
The 2014 Hugo Awards » L'esprit d'escalier
April 21, 2014 @ 4:08 pm
[…] go ahead and read (Hugo-nominated!) Kameron Hurley, John Scalzi (two posts), and Jim Hines on the matter. Okay? […]
Uncle Byron
April 21, 2014 @ 7:01 pm
I think this is great for the Hugos. The voters brought in by LC and VD mean more money for WorldCon. I’m even thinking of buying supporting membership myself.
And what did you expect? The Hugos have always been a popularity contest. What goes around comes around. Last year Scalzi got his fans to vote for him. This year LC did the same. In a year or two maybe Martin or some other bestseller will do the same.
I see nothing wrong with eligibility lists or slates. It’s the American way. If you can’t sell your works no one else will.
Pam Adams
April 21, 2014 @ 8:21 pm
An interesting exercise for folks interested in Hugo voting is to read Jo Walton’s series on the Tor.com website on Hugos and other awards. She looked at awards for each year from the beginning through 2000, and discussed who got on the ballots, who won, and also who didn’t win/make the ballot/etc. In a lot of years, some books that we now think of as amazing won, and in lots of other years, we today can look back and say ‘What the hell were we thinking to have missed Book X?’
Jim C. Hines
April 21, 2014 @ 8:56 pm
As I said pretty clearly in the blog post, I have no problem with eligibility lists either. That’s not really what the conversation here is about, though.
Laura Resnick
April 21, 2014 @ 9:03 pm
There have always been nominees on the Hugo ballot who campaign to get there, and/or who had personalities that some people find offensive/repellant, and/or whose nomination some people thought completely unmerited or absurd.
I suppose what’s different on this occasion is that there are individuals on the ballot who, in addition to be perceived by some as fitting all three of the above parameters, have also made a point of publicly expressing what some see as open contempt for the Hugos and their value, and who have already indicated in their blog comments that they intend to be very poor losers if they don’t win… But then again, this really goes right back to “offensive/repellant” personalities, doesn’t it? So although it’s a permutation I don’t recall seeing before , this still may be a case of same-old same-old getting more attention than it deserves on this occasion.
I think what’s much more interesting than Correia or Beale/Day being on the ballot is that a whole -series- is on the ballot for “best novel,” competing against nominees that are individual books rather than immense multi-volume bodies of work. I’ve never seen that on a ballot before, and I think it presents a problematic choice for voters.
Nomineringarna klara till Hugo Awards 2014 | bearbooks
April 22, 2014 @ 12:02 am
[…] […]
Terry O'Brien
April 22, 2014 @ 12:49 am
I remember back 30 years ago (the 84 LACon) where Battlefield Earth got on the Hugo ballot. Not hard to guess how or why.
I also remember reading the final voting results, which the con published after the Hugo ceremony. Battlefield Earth came in below No Award, possibly the only time it ever happened in Hugo balloting.
Just sayin’.
Diana Pharaoh Francis
April 22, 2014 @ 1:31 am
Amazing, isn’t it? I so wish it would get the recognition it deserves. I’ve read Barricade in Hell and it’s even better.
Tasha Turner
April 23, 2014 @ 11:48 am
This. I read some 200+ books a year many of them ARCs. It’s helpful to get reminders of what works are eligible for nomination for which category when it’s nomination time.
Ellen S.
April 23, 2014 @ 6:39 pm
Yes Yes and Yes. What Sara says. Even if it’s a single link to a bibliography listing all a writer’s works by publication date and a note about which are eligible. Because so.much. gets published in a given year there’s no way I can remember, let alone read it all.
David Langford
April 25, 2014 @ 6:47 am
Terry O’Brien: Several people seem to remember Battlefield Earth being shortlisted for a Hugo, which never happened. It was Hubbard’s Black Genesis (from the awful Mission Earth dekalogy) that reached the final ballot, in 1987.
http://www.sfadb.com/L_Ron_Hubbard
Scott Kennedy
May 1, 2014 @ 11:14 pm
I’m appalled to read that Vox Day was nominated … ugh. I don’t even have words for that.
But I think Larry Correia’s another bag altogether. His blog postings and political views aside, he first came to my attention when I was reading reviews on Fangs For Fantasy, which specifically review fantasy from a social justice perspective. His books on that blog regularly receive very positive reviews for the female and POC characters, even as that is mixed with manly gun-worship plots (and monsters!). He seems to have a wide spectrum of fans.
Brad R. Torgersen
May 2, 2014 @ 12:53 pm
I think what’s happened is that the internet has dissolved the old gentlemanly notion that it was uncouth to push for an award nomination or an award win — or, at least, you couldn’t openly push. These days there are various ways authors promote themselves on-line and the clear demarcation between standard self-promo and “pushing” for an award, is pretty much gone. I think Larry’s chief sin (in the eyes of plaintiffs) is that he’s openly pushing for the sake of making some political sport at the Hugos this year. Which, given the political outspokenness of past Hugo-winning editors or writers, shouldn’t be a surprise. Sooner or later one of us from the (conservative) Baen pool was going to do this. Larry’s just the guy who decided the time was nigh. Good for him. And good for Worldcon, really, if it reminds a few usual suspects that SF/F is not their personal property alone.
AmyCat / Book Universe
May 4, 2014 @ 12:06 am
Correct spelling is Jaime Lee Moyer according to my wholesaler’s website; if people are trying to look up books you rec., it helps to have the right name to search!
AmyCat / Book Universe
May 4, 2014 @ 12:24 am
Brad, I think there’s a big difference between an author saying “Just FYI, if you liked {my book/novelette/short story/whatever}, it’s eligible for Hugo nomination” and someone saying “Hey, let’s nominate this story by a racist, misogynist rabble-rouser just so we can give those PC liberal fangrrls a conniption!”… especially if the story’s crap. And saying this “reminds a few usual suspects that SF/F is not their personal property”… well, it looks to me like a lot of the fuss is from the more reactionary old-school fans who’re pissed off that THEY are being told to share their sandbox with new kids (many of different races or gender or whatever).
I also question your categorizing “the Baen pool” as “conservative”; a lot of my favorite Baen authors (Bujold, Eric Flint, Spider Robinson, Mercedes Lackey, etc.) aren’t what I would call “conservative”, either politically or socially/culturally. Just because Baen’s “pool” also includes authors I know are more conservative (e.g.: David Weber, John Ringo) and authors who are considered “old school” now (Heinlein, who was actually considered fairly radical in his earlier years), that doesn’t make Baen as a whole a “conservative” group.
AmyCat / Book Universe
May 4, 2014 @ 12:35 am
I was at that WorldCon, and remember the Elronners trying to buy favor by hosting a ridiculously lavish hospitality suite, among other things. Some of us actually competed to see how fast we could get in, snag a full meal’s worth of food and a bar drink, and escape, preferably without being proselytized by the Scientology drones.
BATTLEFIELD EARTH wasn’t as bad as “Eye of Argon”, but I couldn’t get more than a few pages in. From what I’ve heard via a few folks who’ve braved VD’s site and read his nominated work, it may end up losing to “Noah Ward” too…