Worldcon Expels Truesdale
For anyone claiming the recording Truesdale made without anyone’s knowledge or consent somehow vindicates him, or that he only hijacked the first few minutes of the panel, here’s what I heard from Truesdale’s own recording:
- It begins with introductions
- Then Dave starts reading his “Special Snowflakes” treatise
- After five minutes of this, Sheila Williams cut in and began shooting him down
- Dave pipes in a minute later to try to ask, “But what about conservative SF?” Williams keeps going.
- About nine minutes in, Neil Clarke points out that they’re still off-topic, and gets yelled at by random loud dude in the audience.
- Eleven minutes in, Truesdale says he wasn’t finished. Gordon Van Gelder points out they’re off topic.
- Truesdale tries yet again to get back to the evils of political correctness. Sheila Williams shoots him down again.
- Fifteen minutes in, Truesdale goes off about “a certain group” of bullies who can’t stand disagreement and will crucify you for having other opinions.
- After another minute and a half of this, Williams and others once again try to respond and get back on focus.
- Twenty minutes in, Truesdale starts talking about this one anthology editor who produced a mostly/all-male anthology and got crucified, and why it wasn’t his fault, and–
- Several people try to respond and refocus.
- About twenty-two minutes in, Wiscon is mentioned. Predictably, Truesdale takes a jab at Wiscon.
- Jonathan Strahan defends Wiscon and talks about the goal of listening to *more* people, not fewer.
- Twenty-five minutes in, Truesdale continues to talk about how there’s too much intimidation “from the left.”
- Gordon Van Gelder points out, again, that the panel continues to be off-topic.
I stopped listening at this point, because I’d heard more than enough. Listening to his own recording, the man hijacked at least half the panel for his own personal crusade.
###
Follow-up blog post at http://www.jimchines.com/2016/08/more-worldcon-thoughts/ (You knew I’d end up doing a follow-up on this one, right?)
###
Updates since I posted this:
- A commenter at File770 gives another account, suggesting that this was a deliberate and preplanned hijacking on Truesdale’s part.
- Truesdale has announced that he recorded the panel (without permission), and will be posting it at Tangent Online, along with an article about his full remarks.
- This seems to confirm, if there was still any doubt, how much pre-planning Truesdale put into hijacking the panel.
- MidAmeriConII posted a brief statement about Truesdale’s expulsion, noting that he was kicked out for violating the con’s code of conduct. Specifically, he caused “significant interference with event operations and caused excessive discomfort to others.”
###
Just catching up on today’s Worldcon drama. It began when Worldcon selected Dave Truesdale to moderate a panel on the State of Short Fiction. Instead, it’s been reported that Truesdale used the first 10 minutes of the panel for “a 10 minute monologue on how ‘special snowflakes’ who are easily offended are destoying SF.” (Source) He was literally clutching bead necklaces that he called “pearls.” Some people walked out of the audience. Other panelists shot Truesdale’s assertions down and tried to get the panel back on topic. Basically, it sounds like a mess.
This morning, over on Facebook, Truesdale shared an email he says he received from the convention, revoking his membership for his “unacceptable behavior” during that panel.
To be clear, I’m not at Worldcon. I didn’t see first-hand what happened on this panel. (I have read multiple reports from folks in the audience and others on the panel.) It does sound like Truesdale acted like an ass, derailed the panel, and pissed off a lot of people who wanted to, you know, talk about the state of short fiction.
As you might have guessed, I have thoughts about all this…
- Who the hell thought it was a good idea to put Dave Truesdale in charge of this panel? He’s been doing these rants for years, if not decades. How can the convention turn around and pretend to be shocked by his pearl-clutching derail when that’s pretty much who he is and what he’s known for?
- I’ve seen panel derails and blow-ups before. People have gotten into shouting matches, walked off of panels, and so on. I’ve never heard of someone being kicked out of the con for it. (Not invited back as a panelist, sure. Kicked out? Maybe it’s happened, but it’s not a practice I’m aware of.)
- Right now, we have only Truesdale’s post about him being kicked out. It’s possible there’s more to this than just his ridiculous behavior on that panel.
- As Truesdale has gone public with this, I hope Worldcon will issue a statement clarifying why he was expelled from the convention, and whether he violated convention policies either on the panel or elsewhere.
- ETA: From the Worldcon Code of Conduct: “MidAmeriCon II reserves the right to revoke membership from and eject anyone at any time from a MidAmeriCon II event without a refund. Any action or behavior that … adversely affects MidAmeriCon II’s relationship with its guests, its venue, or the public is strictly forbidden and may result in revocation of membership privileges.“
I think we’ve all seen people derail panels for their own personal agendas. Truesdale’s moderation might have been an epic shitshow, but is it grounds for expulsion?
Like I said, we don’t have all the facts on this. Just people’s comments on the panel, and Truesdale’s own account of why he was kicked out. But it sounds like a mess.
Brad Handley
August 22, 2016 @ 2:48 pm
Glad your listening. I posted it because I know you like to be informed from the original sources.
Brad Handley
August 22, 2016 @ 2:53 pm
This is the section Dan B posted …
Personal Photography / Recordings:
Please be polite and ask before taking photographs or recordings of attendees and members whenever possible…. Video and audio recording and photography for personal archival use only is generally acceptable unless individuals make it clear that they do not want to be photographed or recorded. In that case, any photographing or recording them is expressly forbidden.
What was cherry picked? None of the people said they did not want to be recorded until after they found out that what they said was recorded and their words may be used against them and the false claims like his 2 minute opening and 2 minute expounding to a question would be called a 10 minute rant.
After 4 minutes he shut up and let Shiela have the floor. At that point I think the opening rant clearly ended.
Brad Handley
August 22, 2016 @ 2:55 pm
I agree that Dave should have been polite and told people he was recording this but what he did was not a violation of that section of the policy.
Brad Handley
August 22, 2016 @ 2:56 pm
In this column no. Others have said it elsewhere like on the MAC II Twitter feed. And they have retroactively said he could not record it.
Brad Handley
August 22, 2016 @ 2:58 pm
Here is the Missouri information. And the answer is Yes and Yes.
http://www.dmlp.org/legal-guide/missouri-recording-law
Jim C. Hines
August 22, 2016 @ 2:59 pm
Let’s start with the part about asking permission wherever possible. Dave chose not to do this. Is anyone arguing it was impossible?
For personal archival use only. As opposed to for publication on a magazine website?
Individuals did make it clear as soon as they learned of the recording that they weren’t comfortable with it. He posted it anyway.
Brad Handley
August 22, 2016 @ 3:00 pm
The relevant section is
Public Meetings
Missouri law provides for “the recording by audiotape, videotape, or other electronic means of any open meeting,” though the public body may establish guidelines regarding the manner of recording in order to minimize disruption.
Jim C. Hines
August 22, 2016 @ 3:03 pm
Brad, can you please start including your credentials as a practicing lawyer when you post these comments? It will give more credibility to your interpretation of how Missouri law applies to a private function/event like Worldcon.
KH
August 22, 2016 @ 3:25 pm
That is not the relevant section of the law. You are citing the Missouri “Sunshine” law, which applies to meetings of governmental bodies (e.g., city council meetings). There are exceptional circumstances in which it can be applied to meetings of private entities, like when those private entities are effectively government-controlled, but none of them apply here.
Disclaimer: IAAL, but I don’t practice in Missouri.
Aaron
August 22, 2016 @ 3:34 pm
It wasn’t “[o]ne of the other panelists had also had this happen to them”. DT was describing the actual event that had happened to the other panelist. The other panelist was Strahan, who has stated that DT doesn’t speak for him, and has a very different take on the event in question than DT does.
szopen
August 22, 2016 @ 3:34 pm
I don;t get it. The topic was: ” short fiction is in a golden age, found in the magazine, online, in anthologies, and chapbooks. The field’s editors come together to talk about what they are seeing, and debate whether there is a short fiction renaissance. ” and it seems to me that truesdale’s point was that short fiction is not in a golden age, but rather is going down – he was on topic, IMO.
Rob
August 22, 2016 @ 4:14 pm
Yes. The relevant part is the wire-tapping part, but it gets more complicated because there is also the requirement that, with oral communications, the subject “exhibit” a reasonable expectation that the communications are not subject to being recorded. At this point, perhaps the convention policies comes into play, and maybe the fact that it is a moderator doing the recording could impact a party’s reasonable expectation. Given the prevalence of recording devices (i.e. phones) these days, it is arguably difficult to exhibit a reasonable expectation of privacy when speaking before an audience.
Rob
August 22, 2016 @ 4:20 pm
I don’t think so. It seems to me tangential, at best. And as a moderator, I don’t think he should have tried to co-opt the discussion from the outset by framing it in such divisive terms. In addition to that, he was way to melodramatic about the whole thing (though it would have been inappropriate if he wasn’t).
My only question is whether, had someone got up and made the same kind of 4 or 5 minute editorializing to promote a position we agree with (by we, I mean progressives, which I think represents most of us here), would they have been subject to the same penalty. If the answer is no, then he’s being punished at least in part for his viewpoint, rather than (or in addition to) actions, which I don’t agree with. If the answer is yes, then fine.
At the very least, I’d never have the guy back on a convention panel after this.
Paul Levinson
August 22, 2016 @ 4:27 pm
That last sentence, for me, is the crux of this matter: There’s a world of difference between not inviting someone to be a moderator again, or even on a panel, and throwing the person out of an ongoing convention. I hear nothing on the recording that warrants such action,
Scott Sanford
August 22, 2016 @ 5:22 pm
Jim – I’m afraid I was repeating reports from people who followed him online who’d posted in fora I read after his Worldcon tantrum and have no URLs to offer you or primary sources. Sorry.
Scott Sanford
August 22, 2016 @ 5:24 pm
Also, the “Reply” feature seems to be quirky. That post was in answer to Jim C. Hines asking, “Scott – Do you have a link to where he wrote about his plans?”
It’s a good question; I wish I had a more substantive answer.
Jim C. Hines
August 22, 2016 @ 6:19 pm
Thanks, Scott. Yeah, the comment threading plugin isn’t perfect. I’ve debated getting rid of it altogether, but I don’t know if that would be an improvement or just make things worse.
And thanks for checking.
Tamarind
August 22, 2016 @ 7:03 pm
Jim, I find your post distressing, and will be expelling your books from my store.
Congratulations.
KH
August 22, 2016 @ 7:04 pm
Agreed — the wiretapping analysis gets a bit hairy and fact-specific. I also agree that the rules of conduct become relevant if we get down to the question of whether the panelists “exhibit[ed] an expectation that such communication is not subject to interception under circumstances justifying such expectation.” And yeah, my gut tells me that’s a tough argument to win.
There’s a more fundamental issue, too which is that the wiretapping prohibitions generally relate to interception, and the statute defines “intercept” as the “aural acquisition of the contents of any WIRE communication through the use of any electronic or mechanical device.” (emphasis mine). Which looks to me like oral communications that don’t fall into the “wire communications” definition aren’t even covered by language barring “interception.” I can’t, however, square that language with later references to intercepting “a wire or oral communication,” and I’m frankly not interested enough to dig in to figure it out.
The question of legality strikes me as a sideshow. As is often the case, internet folks are using an overly technical counterargument (“was it legal”) to dodge the real question (“was it right”).
Rob
August 22, 2016 @ 7:11 pm
KH:
Yes, I agree with what you’ve said, above. Mo. Rev. State 542.402(2) adds oral communications to the statute, but the statute is not exactly written in a clear fashion (shocking, I know). I didn’t feel like digging any further than that, or taking more than a cursory look, and I practiced law in Missouri for eleven years (in CA now, and admitted in both states). I practice patent, trademark, and copyright law so what do I know about wiretapping statutes?
Yes, the legality is ultimately a focus on the wrong issue. Something doesn’t have to rise to the level of a criminal offense in order to say it was wrong, disrespectful, a breach of etiquette, or what have you.
Jim C. Hines
August 22, 2016 @ 7:12 pm
Do what you gotta do, you special snowflake, you.
Hezekiah Garrett
August 22, 2016 @ 7:25 pm
[I think we’ve reached the point of feeding the outright trolls directly to the goblins. -Jim]
KH
August 22, 2016 @ 7:29 pm
Thank you. All of the “Founding Fathers!” rhetoric in these comments is giving me a headache.
Puppies Prove Impotent – Death Is Bad
August 22, 2016 @ 7:31 pm
[…] (wherein Puppy-sympathizer David Truesdale, who was supposed to be moderating the panel, instead launched into a rant about SJWs ruining SF and hijacked the entire hour with shenanigans). It was one of two panels going at the same time that I was torn between attending, and I ended […]
Mark
August 22, 2016 @ 7:37 pm
For anyone who doesn’t wish to try the audio, there’s a transcription of the opening 5 mins or so, up until Sheila William’s first intervention, in the comments at F770.
http://file770.com/?p=30403&cpage=11#comment-471285
Lydy Nickerson
August 22, 2016 @ 7:47 pm
We were there, together. I remember it well. And I, too, had a lot of growing up to do, and hopefully have in fact done so well and not poorly.
(Also, sorry we’ve dropped out of touch. You can find me on Livejournal as lydy, if you care.)
Thadios
August 22, 2016 @ 7:50 pm
Why not leave and start your own social group?
Mathew Reuther
August 22, 2016 @ 7:55 pm
White, heterosexual, middle-class, cis male—who grew up on Heinlein and didn’t become a dick—reporting in to say:
I have no clue who this “Truesdale” guy is, or why anyone would give him the responsibility of moderating a panel.
Of course I got here from Whatever, so I suppose I’m somehow a part of the SJW-apocalypse ruing the world with remakes of Ghostbusters that my daughter is inspired by…
I know if he realized it was happening that Thomas Jefferson would surely have a slave whip him up some freedom tea and pen me a stern letter with his own pale hand, from the heart of his luxuriously appointed study (seriously folks, ever been to Monticello…MTV Cribs got nothing on that) were he to realize I was not following this “Truesdale” guy in breathless anticipation of learning just how wrong I am for believing that listening to a variety of voices promotes a healthy worldview.
Matt Beland
August 22, 2016 @ 8:03 pm
Hardly. What Stross said was that, given the severity of the response, he suspects there’s more to the story. His phrasing clearly indicates he’s speculating, as is appropriate.
Referencing Joseph McCarthy should be reserved for instances of attempted intimidation, strong-arm tactics, or insinuation along the lines of “others have claimed” or perhaps, at minimum, a comment like “clearly there must have been a incident of verbal harassment”.
Thadios
August 22, 2016 @ 8:04 pm
The opening “rant” of his seems to be less than 5 minutes or so based on the audio recording I’m listening to. (Not counting opening introductions and applause.) The part where someone tries to interrupt him and he responds with “let me finish, you guys will have your chance” is about 3 minutes into his opening introduction.
The part where he reads a (very positive actually) quote from someone, where he acknowledges that “science fiction has always been open to all types in fandom in, in the writing and the literature, and it kind of puts a lie to the myth that all these kinds of people have been discriminated against” is less than 5 minutes into the panel.
After that point a back-and-forth begins and he takes honest criticism from at least one panelist.
Paul Levinson
August 22, 2016 @ 9:22 pm
Here’s the text of what Stross said above:
“I suspect there must have been some sort of face-to-face harassment incident. But as various folks have noted on twitter, MidAmeriCon say they can’t comment further, so unless the target of such an incident feels like speaking out we’re not going to find out any more.”
The second sentence, the one that begins with “But,” shows he’s not speculating, but reporting on what one or more people have indicated, but whom he’s not willing or able to reveal the names of. In other words, a classic Joe McCarthy tactic (and if you doubt that, do a little research; as a Professor at Fordham University who’s been teaching about the origins and applications propaganda for years, I know McCarthy’s tactics all too well).
Dan
August 22, 2016 @ 9:24 pm
Mr. Truesdale’s point was demonstrated perfectly by his being kicked out of WorldCon. He had a disagreeing viewpoint, obviously, but he was extremely mild in his tone and comportment. This is an argument? Please! I have something worse with my wife at least every 24 hours and we have been quite stably married for 11 years.
If he was kicked out for this, then SF/F must be intellectually dead. If this extremely mild level of disagreement is not allowed then is this a rejection of our whole history of intellectual tradition? The Socratic method, the adversarial system of justice… argument has been at the center of intellectual life for millennia. What ever happened to overcoming bad ideas with better ideas? Are Mr. Truesdale’s opponents so cowed by the force of his holy truth that they regard it as irrefutable? What if the argument remains open and festering. So? Are we not adults? Can we not handle the presence of different factions? Is this North Korea?
And what on Earth is the point of a **panel discussion** if exceedingly mild disagreement is not allowed? Doesn’t ‘discussion’ pretty much mean that there are different viewpoints? Didn’t Truesdale choose exactly the forum where you are supposed to air such things? The topic was the state of SF/F. Someone could be accused of malpractice for failing to bring up the enormous elephant in the room.
Dan
August 22, 2016 @ 9:49 pm
The thing is, Truesdale has basically invested many decades of his life in SF/F and five or ten minutes of soft-spoken airing of his opinion is enough to get him banned. How are regular folks supposed to feel a part of this tiny, tiny club?
Or maybe that is the idea. Maybe this is like American Indian Tribes in the age of casinos. Every time they meet, they come up with reasons to kick out members, thereby increasing the value of each membership.
It’s brilliant, actually! Like a hot Manhattan nightclub or an Ivy League School, you have to reject tons of people keep the group exclusive and elite. But a dude that devoted his life to SF/F? That’s like axing a tenured professor for forgetting to put on deodorant.
Jim C. Hines
August 22, 2016 @ 9:51 pm
“Are Mr. Truesdale’s opponents so cowed by the force of his holy truth that they regard it as irrefutable? What if the argument remains open and festering. So? Are we not adults? Can we not handle the presence of different factions? Is this North Korea?”
You’re clutching those pearls pretty tightly there, Dan.
Jim C. Hines
August 22, 2016 @ 9:52 pm
“five or ten minutes of soft-spoken airing of his opinion”
That’s an interesting and blatantly dishonest description of what happened, given that he’s posted the recording himself.
Dan
August 22, 2016 @ 9:54 pm
“At the very least, I’d never have the guy back on a convention panel after this.”
All the more reason to have someone on the convention panel. Disagreement is what makes discussions, and life, interesting! American Idol without the contrary curmudgeon Simon Cowell would not have been interesting or worthwhile!
Dan
August 22, 2016 @ 10:25 pm
No, you are being dishonest, Jim.
He *is* soft-spoken, doesn’t shout, and allows many others to interrupt him and have their say, even when he isn’t finished. He is interrupted after a mere three minutes of talking, and he does *not* raise his voice.
Where in the recording is he shouting? Did I miss it?
Dan
August 22, 2016 @ 10:27 pm
“You’re clutching those pearls pretty tightly there, Dave.”
My name is Dan, if you please. You may also call me Daniel.
Jim C. Hines
August 22, 2016 @ 10:29 pm
You’re correct that he doesn’t shout.
But claiming it was only five or ten minutes is nonsense. And “airing his opinion” is a ridiculous attempt to soften what was a planned attack on “those people” and “the left” and so on. “Airing his opinion” suggests he was casually discussing the merits of different types of tea, as opposed to hijacking a panel to attack anyone who dares to complain about SF/F’s problems with inclusiveness and diversity and such.
Jim C. Hines
August 22, 2016 @ 10:32 pm
Fixed.
Richard
August 22, 2016 @ 10:36 pm
Maybe I’m missing something here. For me the problem isn’t that he elected to make a relatively long-winded statement that disturbed many folks, but that he was making a long statement at all. He’s listed as the moderator of the panel. His job is to facilitate the discussion between the panelists, and possibly some of the audience, not to become a panelist himself.
KatG
August 22, 2016 @ 10:40 pm
Truesdale, having been given moderator duties, which expressly means not making speeches himself, decided that the editors on the panel should not be allowed to speak. So he spoke over them, he spoke for them, he interrupted them constantly when they tried to speak, he forced them to deal with his temper tantrum instead of talking about the topic of the panel — not allowing them to speak as they wished to speak and forcing audience members to leave. He didn’t “derail” the panel, he stopped the panel. He disrupted the operation of the convention. He was antagonistic and harassing to the panel members and to people in the audience, trying to scare and intimidate the audience and tell them that they were unwelcome at the con. He broke multiple rules of the Code of Conduct he agreed to follow, knowing full well that doing so would mean expulsion. He wasn’t simply an asshole. He sabotaged the con.
And why did he do so? Because Truesdale believes that SFF authors dealing with business issues of discrimination that impact their careers in the industry and fans dealing with problems of access to cons and other events are lying, making stuff up and being overly dramatic — pearl clutching. He doesn’t want them to talk about these things, challenge discriminatory problems and try to get them changed. He is worried that efforts to change very clear and present discrimination in the industry will be of distress to white guys because then not only do they lose a rigged system that favors them, but they have to endure angry criticism — dissenting opinions — for both deliberate and accidental but biased discrimination issues. And white guys shouldn’t have to go through that, especially when Truesdale doesn’t believe women are equal human beings anyway.
Some of those very real pearls, real business issues (some of which our host is famous for tackling):
*Whitewashed book covers of stories with non-white protagonists
*Over-sexualized or feminized book covers given to women authors
*Women being told by editors that hard SF and military SF from women doesn’t sell so
go away
*Women authors receiving only 10-20% of the major review coverage despite making up half the field
*Women authors receiving substantially less promotional support from their publishers than male authors even when they outsell the male authors
*Women and non-white authors being kept to a tiny percentage of participants in anthologies and many magazine publications
*Asian authors being told by editors that their work doesn’t sell so go away
*Black authors being told by publishers that they already have one black author on the list, so can’t buy their stuff as one is all that’s allowed and they are niche by being black people writing about non-whites
*SFFH being 90% white authors published, which is even worse than fiction overall, which is at about 70% white authors published
*Gay authors and black authors still finding their SFF books being shuttled into gay and African-American sections of bookstores instead of in the SFF sections
*Women authors being sexually harassed and physically assaulted at conventions when trying to do their jobs, or having to not go to conventions because it’s not safe so they can’t do their jobs and promote
And on and on. These are serious BUSINESS issues and they’re bad, right in present day. They impact authors’ careers. They drive fans away from SFF and fandom. And Truesdale knew that at this panel about the state of the short fiction market, mention of some of these issues might come up. And so he decided that there wouldn’t BE a panel on the state of the short fiction market, that he wouldn’t allow the editors on the panel to talk about what they came to talk about. And indeed, because of him, there was not such a panel. There was Truesdale — lying, making things up and being overly dramatic.
Truesdale doesn’t want a discussion of disagreeing opinions. He wants people dealing with real issues to shut up about them and he has actively attempted numerous times to try to shut them up. But more to the point, he tried to stop programming at the con from being able to proceed. He tried to stop the panelists from being able to talk. And that was against the rules, same as if he’d been drunk and raving in the aisle, and the consequences are the same.
So now he can play great white martyr. Nobody has silenced him in the least. Instead, he tried to silence others and turn WorldCon into his own little toy. And the real pearls some authors have to deal with remain and will be talked about no matter the efforts of people like Truesdale to shut them up.
Thadios
August 22, 2016 @ 10:41 pm
I wonder what they’d do if a half-dozen like-minded people (of the alt-sf) in that audience decided to take his side by disrupting the proceedings or staging a sit-in. And if they kept doing that at other panels. It wouldn’t be that hard to disrupt the entire con.
Dan B
August 22, 2016 @ 10:45 pm
I’m presuming no such thing. In the phrase “Video and audio recording and photography for personal archival use only…”, the word “for” is not about intent; it’s about usage.
By way of semantic elucidation: If I have certain materials to which I own the copyrights, and I give you copies “for your personal use”, they’re for your *personal use* — not for you to post on the internet. If you _intended_ to use them only for personal use when I gave them to you, but circumstances changed, you’re _still_ not allowed to post them on the internet.
The question of whether, at the time Dave made the recording, he had the sincere intent to use it only for his personal archives, is irrelevant as to whether he is allowed to post that recording on the internet. That’s not why he was allowed to make the recording — even assuming he _was_ allowed. The fact that his circumstances changed does not provide him with special new permissions.
P. Aaron Potter
August 22, 2016 @ 10:56 pm
What part of “ask before” is unclear in that policy? He didn’t ask. He violated both the spirit and letter of the policy. Unwelcome recording has gotten many people kicked out of cons before this.
VCarlson
August 22, 2016 @ 11:24 pm
I think I will refer to him as “Crazy Uncle Dave” should I ever have occasion to refer to him. Which is unlikely, but it’s nice to be prepared.
Thank you.
Dan B
August 22, 2016 @ 11:28 pm
As I discussed above, intent is irrelevant. That’s not what the word “for” means in the phrase “for personal use.”
Worldcon Report 2016 | Graffiti on the Walls of Time
August 23, 2016 @ 3:19 am
[…] business. I don’t know about anything that happened outside of the panel, but I do know that he made the statements about “special snowflakes” that are attributed to him, and he did dump a load of “pearl” necklaces on the table so […]
Paul Levinson
August 23, 2016 @ 3:57 am
I’ve listened to the recording, and I’d have disagreed with organizers of future conventions if they didn’t choose Dave to moderate a panel – but that would be their prerogative, no one’s entitled to moderate a panel or even be on one. But thrown out of the convention? That’s totally unwarranted and an outrage.
Hauser
August 23, 2016 @ 6:58 am
“The second sentence, the one that begins with “But,” shows he’s not speculating, but reporting on what one or more people have indicated, but whom he’s not willing or able to reveal the names of. In other words, a classic Joe McCarthy tactic […]”
I suspect that you may find attempting to argue that the defining characteristic of McCarthyism is a refusal to name names a little tricky. It could be fun to watch, though, so please don’t let that stop you.
Notwithstanding, that’s a deeply odd reading of that sentence, which says:
“But as various folks have noted on twitter, MidAmeriCon say they can’t comment further, so unless the target of such an incident feels like speaking out we’re not going to find out any more.”
The people Stross is not naming are not expressing any opinion about Truesdale – they are certainly not being claimed by Stross as supportive of his suspicion that there may have been a further aggravating incident. Stross is simply noting that a number of people on Twitter have said that AmeriCon has stated that it will not comment further.
Stross is saying that he suspects that there may have been an aggravating incident, as he feels it would be unlikely that Truesdale would have been ejected merely for hijacking the panel. However (he continues), since Americon is not going to comment further (according to several people on Twitter), if there was such an aggravating incident it is not going to come to light unless someone directly involved in it speaks out.
You seem to be imagining that Stross is saying that several people on Twitter have reported that there was such an aggravating event. It is impossible to extract that meaning from the words as they are written.
Michael Burton
August 23, 2016 @ 9:51 am
I’m fond of “SIWers” (Social Injustice Warriors, as they seem to be opposed to SJWs, and also, sewers).
From A Snowflake of Science Fiction | Birds Before the Storm
August 23, 2016 @ 10:10 am
[…] Last weekend in Kansas City, at the 74th WorldCon, women swept the fiction categories of the Hugo Awards. Last weekend in Kansas City, at the 74th WorldCon, Dave Truesdale clutched his pearls. […]
Hauser
August 23, 2016 @ 10:35 am
Well, the simple answer to that is that they weren’t half a dozen like-minded people in that audience, from reports – so, the question is academic. It sounds like some effort was made to advertise this plan beforehand, and there was clearly an expectation that people would want to take the “pearls” and express their solidarity. Some popular movements just aren’t that popular.
The obvious answer to “what they’d do” as a hypothetical if the imagined disruption happened in the future would be to respond the way “they” – the con organisers – explicitly say they will respond to attempts to disrupt the convention or ruin it for others. They would suspend or cancel the disruptors’ passes, possibly after some attempt at negotiation.
The disruptors would then be asked to leave, and if they refused the venue security would probably get involved. It would be stressful for the con organisers, in the sense of being another thing to deal with, but how it would be dealt with is pretty well defined. So, they would not be available to keep doing it at other panels. You’d need more disruptors.
In terms of disrupting the whole Con… A relatively small number of Internet activists, mobilised to act together, can exploit a system not designed to deal with them quite effectively, with a relatively small amount of expense and effort – at least until the system is patched.
But how many of those activists would be up for travelling to another country or state, buying a ticket and turning up at the con with the express purpose of getting thrown out? How many of those who did turn up would actually go through with it? And how many panels are there at a WorldCon?
Those numbers probably do not add up to total disruption, or even significant disruption, although “annoyance” might be an achievable goal.
Greg
August 23, 2016 @ 10:36 am
Are you, by chance, a professional hand-wringer? A paid pearl-clutcher? Cause that strawman of your was just the best, and I think you could make a good living at it, if you arent already.
Greg
August 23, 2016 @ 10:42 am
Rupert, your understanding of first ammendment free speech protections fails miserably. Allow me to barge into your house while youre trying to eat dinner and I will explain it to you.
Matt Beland
August 23, 2016 @ 10:51 am
Says the guy who isn’t signing his name to his comment.
(Yes, my pronouns here make an assumption about gender, but, well…)
Greg
August 23, 2016 @ 11:02 am
Except he wasnt talking about the actual writing. He was talking about the readers, and how they dont like bigotted stuff anymore, and how he thinks the readers are so wrong for not liking bigotted stuff anymore.
Greg
August 23, 2016 @ 11:58 am
Harold: “Because you do-gooders can’t tolerate anyone having different views.”
Yes, yes, this points to the exact problem: people like Harold want to call folks names like “do gooders”, people like Truesdale want to call folks names like “social justice warriors”, and they want those folks to thank them for it. But when some of those same folks call them names like “jerk”, suddenly the entire world is unfair and no one tolerates different views anymore.
Boo hoo.
Greg
August 23, 2016 @ 12:22 pm
Dan, look, if someone wants to rant about how SF is a bunch of overly sensitive SJW’s, then let them advertise it up front and see who comes to their talks. What people like Truesdale want is to be able to hijack someone else’s audience and someone else’s topic and turn it into something else entirely.
If you want more “SF is all SJWs”, you can always go to the various sad puppy bigot sites. There are plenty of them out there.
Dan
August 23, 2016 @ 12:42 pm
“Well, the simple answer to that is that they weren’t half a dozen like-minded people in that audience, from reports – so, the question is academic. ”
Of course there weren’t. Most like minded people (and are is a considerable number that I can name) have already been removed over time or else made to feel unwelcome so that they don’t come.
Paul Levinson
August 23, 2016 @ 12:47 pm
Thanks – but I’m already doing quite well as a professor and an author. But, back to the importance of evidence, where’s yours that I created a “strawman”?
Paul Levinson
August 23, 2016 @ 12:50 pm
It’s not that complicated: attacking someone on the basis of unidentifiable sources is McCarthesque. It’s also classic propaganda, as identified by the Institute for Propaganda Analysis, whose analysis of what Goebbels did in Germany is the classic on how to spread big lies.
Dan
August 23, 2016 @ 1:11 pm
Jim —
“planned attack” … “hijacking” ….
Overdramatize much? I imagine the dead and wounded, tragically piled against the wall of the conference room. The reality is a single guy making a few minutes of comments, and not very loudly.
“attack anyone who dares to complain about SF/F’s problems with inclusiveness and diversity and such”
Lol. That is rather dishonest on your part because that is pretty much the opposite of what Truesdale was saying. His argument, which is pretty much correct, is that SF/F has been basically welcoming of everyone the whole time.
SF/F has always happily collected the oddballs who don’t fit in, and Truesdale gives a long list of the kinds of people who found a home in SF/F who might not have found a home elsewhere.
To hear people talking, you’d think SF/F has a history of slavery and lynchings, when in reality its SF/F has always accepted all comers.
The comedy is that today is the time when SF/F is less accepting of different types than it has ever been in its history. There are rather a lot of unpersoned people on the SF/F periphery, to put it mildly.
Hauser
August 23, 2016 @ 1:24 pm
As explained, the “unidentifiable sources” are, if one actually reads the sentence, not attacking anyone, nor being used in an attack, but merely reporting that the con authorities have said they will say nothing more on the matter. This is basic reading comprehension rather than history of propaganda.
Let’s try again:
“But ***as various folks have noted on twitter***, ***MidAmeriCon say they can’t comment further***, so unless the target of such an incident feels like speaking out we’re not going to find out any more.”
Hopefully the asterisks help to identify which parts of the sentence are referencing each other.
Now, you might want to argue, independently of that basic reading comp issue, that Charles Stross is attacking Truesdale by implying that there was another incident. That makes a lot more sense – although the comical escalation to McCarthy and thence Goebbels now leaves you only one more, Godwinesque step available.
It’s odd, though, because what Stross is actually saying – again, if you read it – is that it doesn’t seem reasonable to him that Truesdale would be ejected simply for having derailed the panel. Hence the hypothesis that there may have been another incident.
That is to say, if you actually read what’s written, you and Stross are actually agreeing that this incident on its own doesn’t seem like enough to justify a ban. Mirabile dictu.
However, the Con has said that it currently has no further comment (as Stross understood – and we have come full circle here – from the accounts of a number of people on Twitter). So, there we are.
Greg
August 23, 2016 @ 1:28 pm
“pretty much the opposite of what Truesdale was saying. His argument, which is pretty much correct, is that SF/F has been basically welcoming of everyone the whole time.”
Do you live in a cave? Of course SF hasnt always been inclusive, just like much of america wasnt inclusive. Most early protagonists were straight white males and attempts to have women or people of color or gays be a hero were often whitewashed away or met with outrage.
A thousand black American fighting men landed on the beaches of Normandy on DDay. Ever see a black person in a WW2 movie? Its not just SF that has been uninclusive, its all of America.
Anyone saying SF, or any segment of America, has ALWAYS been welcoming of minorities, is lying.
Dan B
August 23, 2016 @ 1:31 pm
These are true statements:
—-
It’s not that complicated: attacking someone on the basis of unidentifiable sources is McCarthesque. It’s also classic propaganda, as identified by the Institute for Propaganda Analysis, whose analysis of what Goebbels did in Germany is the classic on how to spread big lies.
—-
And yet they have nothing to do with what Charlie wrote — at least, not the part of what he wrote that you’ve chosen to focus on. When he wrote “I suspect…”, he was clearly voicing an opinion, not making a statement of fact. And that opinion was at least as much about the concom, and why they reacted as they did, as it was about Truesdale.
McCarthy isn’t infamous for _suspecting_ anything. He’s infamous for making substantive and brutal claims of fact that he couldn’t back up.
Dan B
August 23, 2016 @ 1:34 pm
Since I left this part dangling: “… at least, not the part of what he wrote that you’ve chosen to focus on…”, let me flesh that out a bit. Charlie wrote:
—
(Truesdale has been an “anti-PC” gadfly and general nuisance presence on the net for a long time — I remember crossing swords with him on the Asimov’s reader fora back in the late 90s/early 00s before they turned into an utter cesspit no sane human would go near — and my impression is that he’s been getting more outspoken over the years.)
—
Now _that_ is a claim of fact that could be challenged as pure propaganda! You could certainly try challenging him on those grounds. However, I _suspect_ that enough people have enough stories to tell that it won’t be hard for Charlie to back up these assertions.
WorldCon goes full CHORF, bans panelist for wrongthink
August 23, 2016 @ 1:39 pm
[…] Hines gives a hilariously one-sided account of the panel (“Truesdale tries yet again to get back to the evils of political correctness. Sheila […]
Paul Levinson
August 23, 2016 @ 1:41 pm
To Hauser (in the Stross thread, but I’m posting here because there’s no Reply option after his last comment):
You’re over-parsing this. The blame is 100% on Stross, for citing unidentified sources as the sources of his suspicions about Truesdale doing “face to face” harassment. I’m not saying either the Worldcon people who allegedly said this, or the Twitter people who reported it, did anything wrong – I’d need to see or hear exactly what those statements and tweets were to make that judgement. But Stross, by tying Truesdale in his comment here to face to face harassment, with no identified sources, did something very wrong. And if you find the comparison to McCarthy or Goebbels far-fetched or funny, suit yourself. I’m a strong believer in calling attention to the roots and methods of suppressive, anti-democratic society, wherever I see them.
Jim C. Hines
August 23, 2016 @ 1:48 pm
This would be the “All or Nothing” argument. If it’s not a deranged killer blowing up the convention hall, it’s nothing. If it’s not slavery and lynchings, then of *course* SF/F doesn’t have a problem with racism.
And no matter how many people tell you they haven’t been welcomed in the SF/F community, you’re just going to keep insisting they’re wrong about their own experiences, aren’t you.
Stop wasting everybody’s time.
Jim C. Hines
August 23, 2016 @ 1:49 pm
“I’m posting here because there’s no Reply option after his last comment”
Yep, the threading only goes so deep before it becomes ridiculously illegible. Most of the time it works fine, but when comments blow up like they have here, it can get messy. Sorry about that.
Paul Levinson
August 23, 2016 @ 1:52 pm
To Dan B (also in the Stross thread, but I’m posting here because there’s no Reply option after his last comment):
McCarthy is infamous for smearing people on the basis of no evidence or identifiable sources. So, for that matter, are Nixon and Trump (“some people say that … “) Stross did far more than merely speculate about why Truesdale was ejected from the con. Stross speculated that Truesdale committed “face to face harassment”, and he based that speculation on unidentified sources. Such speculation would immediately be ruled out of order in a court of law, and it should be immediately called out in public discourse.
Paul Levinson
August 23, 2016 @ 1:54 pm
No problem 🙂
Total
August 23, 2016 @ 2:13 pm
Stross did far more than merely speculate about why Truesdale was ejected from the con. Stross speculated that Truesdale committed “face to face harassment”, and he based that speculation on unidentified sources
McCarthy did not speculate — McCarthy announced that he knew of specific people in the State Department who were Communists (the infamous list). Goebbels’ “Big Lie” tactics were about telling the lie with certainty; the word “speculate” would get nowhere near one of his propaganda pieces.
Stross speculated, based on his own knowledge of how cons happen that there was more to the story than was being released. He then noted that we were unlikely to hear more about it because the con organizers wouldn’t talk about it. That he did not put in “if an incident happened,” before that part may be imprecise. The sentence you are obsessing over (that starts with “But”) is only a citation of unnamed sources talking about whether the con would talk about such an incident, not whether an incident actually happened. You are reading way more into this than actually exists in the comment.
Dan B
August 23, 2016 @ 2:19 pm
Plenty of things are out of order in a court of law that are acceptable and/or commonplace in public discourse. I don’t understand why speculation should be considered out of bounds in public discourse if it’s labeled as such. I _suspect_ that you’d have a hard time getting a majority to agree with you on that.
And as others have said, I believe you’re missing the point about Charlie’s speculation. I don’t know Charlie and I certainly don’t speak for him, but the way I read what he wrote isn’t ambiguous at all: He’s working on the assumption that the ConCom wouldn’t toss _anyone_ out based on the known facts of the case. That assumption is made fairly plain in his statement. Implicitly, but also fairly clearly, he’s also saying that if his assumption is wrong then blame is properly assigned to the ConCom, not to Truesdale. And if his assumption is right, then Truesdale certainly isn’t being slandered, because he would in fact have done more than is currently known.
If Charlie’s comment puts Truesdale in a worse light than the ConCom, it’s because he’s inclined to give the ConCom more benefit of the doubt at this point. He may or may not be right to do so, but he’s well within his rights to do so.
(Does my explication here also stoop to the level of McCarthyesque propaganda? Why or why not?)
Paul Levinson
August 23, 2016 @ 2:22 pm
Actually, all I’ve doing here is responding to the people here who are taking issue with my point that Stross was McCarthy-esque in his linking of Truesdale to “face to face harassment”. If there’s any “obsessing” going on, it’s among you. But on Goebbels – actually, certainty was not the essence of the big lie. It was about making the lie so out of variance with reality, and repeating it often enough, that no one would dare question it. And its basis was not fact, but the implication of fact – which is exactly what unidentified sources leads to.
Greg
August 23, 2016 @ 2:23 pm
Paul, give it a rest. Your first attempt to blow this up was to strawman what Stross said into accusing Truesdale of physical assault with no evidence and then ask if his middle name is Joseph McCarthy? You overreached from the start and pride keeps you from admitting it, so instead you keep harping on something that isnt there.
If you seriously think that subpeoning people to be questioned about their alleged communist ties and destroying lives as a result is on par with some private citizen making conjecture statements on a blog are the same, you’re an idiot. If you seriously think you are going to convince anyone on this blog they are the same, you are a fool.
At this point, if you are incapable of admitting your mistake, then your next best strategy would be never broach the subject again. Anything else you say on the matter is a reflection of no one but yourself, because clearly you have no idea what you’re saying when it comes to stross.
I would recommnd you cut your losses.
Paul Levinson
August 23, 2016 @ 2:25 pm
There’s nothing wrong with speculation. There’s plenty wrong with speculation of wrong-doing based on unidentified sources.
As to your last parenthetical question: your explication here is incorrect, but it has nothing whatsoever to do with McCarthy, or citing unidentified sources. Why would you think anyone would view your explication as McCarthy-esque?
Greg
August 23, 2016 @ 2:29 pm
Again with Goebbels?
Wow.
Paul Levinson
August 23, 2016 @ 2:29 pm
Greg – I’m not the least bit interested in your recommendations, thanks 🙂 And I always feel it’s a gain, not a loss, to point out modes of arguments, like Stross’s and McCarthy, which undermine democratic discourse.
Paul Levinson
August 23, 2016 @ 2:31 pm
“Wow” – nothing like a nice, logical, refutation.
Greg
August 23, 2016 @ 2:36 pm
“There’s nothing wrong with speculation. There’s plenty wrong with speculation of wrong-doing based on unidentified sources”
Oh. My. God.
Stross never said that “unidentified sources” told him that Truesdale committed face to face harrassment, you idiot.
His entire sentence about it begins with “I suspect” which couldnt be more of a indicator that speculation is about to follow.
Everything you have been arguing here is flat out wrong.
Greg
August 23, 2016 @ 2:39 pm
You mean point out modes of arguments that people arent actually using here?
You said there is nothing wrong with speculation, thats exactly what Stross did, speculate with “I suspect”. You said it is wrong to speculate based on “unidentifed sources” but Stross never actually used that mode of argument, so you’re just off the rails at this point.
Paul Levinson
August 23, 2016 @ 2:41 pm
“as various folks have noted on twitter, MidAmeriCon say they can’t comment further” = unidentified sources
Dan B
August 23, 2016 @ 2:44 pm
My explication may well be wrong, but the only person who can credibly say so without offering any evidence is Charlie.
And you didn’t answer my question. Assuming that I _did_ correctly interpret what Charlie wrote, is there anything McCarthyesque about what I wrote?
Dan B
August 23, 2016 @ 2:47 pm
Those are not sources who might testify about Truesdale’s behavior. Those are sources on Twitter — whom you can search for if you care to, so as such they aren’t totally anonymous — commenting on ConCom’s handling of the case. Those are totally different things. Charlie did not say or suggest that the Twitter sources know a damned thing about Truesdale.
Greg
August 23, 2016 @ 2:54 pm
So, the issue is you have a reading comprehension problem?
MidAmeriCon made a brief announcement that Truesdale was expelled, and MAC has not given any further details. When asked by various people, MAC says they wont say more. Those various people then go onto twitter and say MAC wont give more details.
Stross isnt referring to those unidentified people as saying Truesdale committed face to face harrassment. He is referring to them as evidence that multiple people have asked MAC for more details, but MAC refuses to give more details. But that is public knowledge, not secret accusations from unidentified sources. If MAC had released more info, it woulr already be linked here.
You’re barking up the wrong tree.
Stross’s entire post starts with “I suspect” and the one time he mentions face to face harrassment, he starts that sentence with “I suspect”, which makes it clear to everyone who does NOT have an axe to grind that he is doing pure speculation. You are the only person who took the mention of twitter folks confirming MAC wont give further details and pretzel logic twisted that into the anonymous twitter people were somehow his source for the face to face harrassment thing.
You are totally parsing this wrong.
Dan
August 23, 2016 @ 2:54 pm
“Most early protagonists were straight white males and attempts to have women or people of color or gays be a hero were often whitewashed away or met with outrage.”
This is pure nonsense and you know it. You make allegations with no evidence. Of all the Sci-Fi I read in my youth, race wasn’t even an issue. These are books. There is no visual aspect, no pictures. Anyone can construct the mental imagery however they please and project whatever sex life they wish onto the characters. As an adolescent, I certainly did. Who cares?
This is an effort to make the past seem worse than it is, to create the illusion of progress.
SF/F is not in its golden age at the moment; every neutral observer knows that. Even Wikipedia happily discusses the “Golden Age of Science Fiction”, a time when SF/F became genuinely popular and when there was a supernova of creative imaginings. Virtually all of the participants in the SF/F golden age are now in the ground.
I am not simply a curmudgeon. I do appreciate a good golden age, and we are in one now in TV production and cinematic work. Some of the Netflix series’ are so good, it is hard to believe. This renders older TV and movies much less watchable.
Not so with SF/F, where the best of the Golden Age continues to outsell output of a more recent vintage. As long as the current obsession with identity groups completely overshadows the stories, there will not be another Golden Age.
Paul Levinson
August 23, 2016 @ 2:58 pm
I did answer question – did you miss this?
“As to your last parenthetical question: your explication here is incorrect, but it has nothing whatsoever to do with McCarthy, or citing unidentified sources. Why would you think anyone would view your explication as McCarthy-esque?”
Dan B
August 23, 2016 @ 3:10 pm
Saying it has nothing to do with McCarthy is hardly the same as saying it is or is not McCarthyesque. But I’ll take this pair of responses as a long way of saying “no”.
Which means, by my reckoning, that you’re now acknowledging that Charlie’s post wasn’t McCarthyesque either. To argue that point, you’ll have to show how there’s a significant difference in meaning between what I said Charlie meant, and what Charlie actually wrote. You’ve already indicated that you believe there is, so this shouldn’t be hard.
Paul Levinson
August 23, 2016 @ 3:21 pm
Dan B: Your “reckoning” is wrong. Again, Stross links Truesdale to commission of “face to face harassment” on the basis of unidentifiable sources. You’re discussing what Stross plainly said here. There’s no appeal to unidentified sources (so, again, I think your analysis is wrong, but it’s not McCarthyesque).
Total
August 23, 2016 @ 3:37 pm
If there’s any “obsessing” going on, it’s among you
What’s even more entertaining, is that you’re obsessing about something that Stross didn’t even say. You’re creating your own interior version of the big lie to tell to yourself.
Dan B
August 23, 2016 @ 3:37 pm
The “unidentified sources” are basically a footnote in Stross’s post. He *does not* embue them with any authority regarding what Truesdale may or may not have done, only regarding what the ConCom may or may not say about the matter. This has been explained to you multiple times by multiple people, yet you persist on following this train of thought past the point of derailment.
Suppose Stross had omitted that sentence, and said only this: (For brevity, I’m omitting the 3rd paragraph, which seems to be unrelated to your point.)
—
I suspect there’s more to this than meets there eye.
Derailing a panel isn’t that unusual; and while I could see Programming quietly telling a disruptive panelist that they’re not required on any subsequent panels, that’s as far as I’d *expect* it to go. (And that would be a real pain in the neck for Programming because then they’d potentially have to find a bunch of substitutes at very short notice.)
Kicking him out of the convention completely is much more serious and I suspect there must have been some sort of face-to-face harassment incident.
—
The meaning is virtually unchanged, and yet you no longer have an argument.
Dan B
August 23, 2016 @ 3:38 pm
Sorry; I should have written that I was omitting the 4th paragraph.
Bri
August 23, 2016 @ 4:19 pm
@ Thadios Considering I was a member of the social group long before you or her were born…she is more than welcome while pathetic asses like you can leave. I saw people like you denigrate, try to excluse female authors and fans to the point where they had to use psuedonyms like Andre Norton so they didn’t have to put up with your B.S.
So no, it is time for people like you to leave.
Greg
August 23, 2016 @ 5:30 pm
Paul: “Stross links Truesdale to commission of “face to face harassment” on the basis of unidentifiable sources.”
Wow.
“I suspect there must have been some sort of face-to-face harassment incident.”
End of sentence. No third party sources, named or unnamed, are mentioned.
“But as various folks have noted on twitter, MidAmeriCon say they can’t comment further,”
End of first independent clause. Third party people are sourced unnamed as saying MAC wont comment further on the incident beyond their brief statement given. They are not sourced for any other information.
This is actually reinforced by the second independent clause of the same sentence:
“so unless the target of such an incident feels like speaking out we’re not going to find out any more.”
We’re not going to find out anything more. Everything, therefore, beyond the press release, and any statements by the parties involved that we’ve alreary seen, is unknown.
The only reason I can fathom that you could possibly misinterpret what Charlie said so grossly, and to continue doing so after multiple people have attempted to explain it to you, is because you have a dog in this fight. Either you agree with Truesdale in some respect, or you have a grudge against Stross. I dont believe someone could be as obtuse as you’ve been unless they were invested in being wrong, pretending they’re right.
Put another way: MidAmeriCon refuses to comment further, various unnamed sources have mentioned on twitter.
To tie those unnamed sources to face to face harrassment, after explained by so many people that its not the case, requires some kind of personal investment on your part, or tinfoil lining your bedroom. And Im starting to lean towards the tinfoil explanation.
Dan
August 23, 2016 @ 5:32 pm
“As a Canadian, I’m always amazed/disturbed by the number of Americans who seem to think that:
a) the 1st Amendment applies to private organizations and/or is valid internationally
b) “traditional individualistic liberalism” shields you from *being criticized for the stupid things you say.*
”
Regarding (a), the First Amendment is a good idea that stems from the understanding, thousands of years old, that the clashing of different opinions is positive because it brings you closer to truth and better solutions. Nobody is claiming a legal violation of the First Amendment around here, but the idea of open discourse is much, much older than the First Amendment and is foundational to the life of the mind.
Regarding (b), criticism is one thing. Blocking contrary viewpoints through censorship and banning is entirely another.
The chap in question bought an airline ticket and got a hotel room just to attend a con and was kicked out for airing different views for a few minutes in a normal volume. He should have screamed and uttered a bunch of profanity and insulted everyone’s mother, since his attempts at politeness were evidently pointless.
Dan
August 23, 2016 @ 5:36 pm
“and freely refuse association with someone who upsets the apple cart to give himself a private soapbox”
Goodness, the topic of the panel was the state of science fiction. Anyone talking about that while ignoring the hundreds of elephants dancing around the room is not properly addressing the topic.
Jim C. Hines
August 23, 2016 @ 5:40 pm
Dan – People are upset about the content, not the tone in which it was delivered. And having listened to half the recording, I would argue that Dave was anything but polite, regardless of his lack of shouting or profanity.
Hauser
August 23, 2016 @ 5:48 pm
..or weren’t interested in the panel?
I mean, that would involve less breathy declaration about North Korea and Joseph McCarthy, and I know how attractive drama is, but sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.