Sarah Hoyt, a one-time member in the SFWA, tells her tale the way writers have been doing since the dawn of mankind: In gifs.

Another writer (I think) describes the meltdown at the SFWA in text. Warning: Contains sexist, offensive language such as "Glittery Hoo Haa Brigade" and "Whiny Tw*T."

Oh and she's a she, I think, but you know, Patriarchy.

Both writers make a point: The people doing all the kvetching, agitating, and purging are mostly n00bs without many books to their credit who are using political correctness to go after older, more established people in the field.

More: Another writer (I think) digests some of this meltdown. Apparently the SFWA wanted to shut down its quarterly magazine Bulletin until it could guarantee that nothing that wasn't up to its "standards" -- by which it means was PC-approved -- would be published therein.

Here are some of the writers who signed a petition objecting to this censorship:

Notice who has signed the petition, names included at the bottom of the petition. They include (but arenÂ’t limited to) Gregory Benford, David Brin, Amy Sterling Casil, C. J. Cherryh, Jack Dann, Harlan Ellison, David Gerrold, Janis Ian, Nancy Kress, Mercedes Lackey, Barry N. Malzberg, Jack McDevitt, Larry Niven, Dr. Jerry Pournelle, Mike Resnick, Robert Silverberg, Norman Spinrad, Allen Steele, Harry Turtledove, Vernor Vinge, Gene Wolfe.

Maybe youÂ’ve heard of a few of them?

Only some of the biggest names in the field.

The only name I recognized (other than Gould) who has come out publicly in favor of the oversight committee is C. C. Finlay. The rest are people like Natalie Luhrs (who?) and Angela KorraÂ’ti (again, who?). No disrespect to these ladies intended, but IÂ’ve never heard of them, and I make an effort to keep up with new authors in the field. Obviously, there will be some new authors that I miss.

What I do find interesting (and disturbing) is that there seems to be a generational war going on in SFWA. At least it appears that way from the outside. (IÂ’m not a member, have no desire to be a member, but thatÂ’s a post for another day.)

The generational war, it seems, is less about the generations than the values each generation holds dear. The older writers are liberal in temperament (by which I mean, they object to censorship, and believe in free expression), and the newer writers appear leftist (and they believe speech must be managed and censored by a Oversight Committee of some sort, say, a Vanguard).

Thanks to TV. No not the TV. I'm just calling the tipster TV.

Correction: It was not the SWFA's "bulletin board" which was shut down, as I claimed; it was their quarterly magazine Bulletin.

Thanks to @rdbrewer4 and a guy who claims to be a pirate for that correction.
More: Merovign offers some thoughts below. more...

Posted by: Ace at 09:29 AM | Comments (396)
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We discussed James Poulos' assertion that the right is making "everything" political on the podcast (which will be posted tomorrow).

I have a few thoughts. First, we generally tend to make fun of the left for reading a Political Message into every mundane act. Mary Katharine Ham related a story of a FaceBook friend who had -- oh no! -- been forced to buy Barilla pasta because it was the only gluten-free brand available. He had the vapors as he attempted to seek advice as to which gay cause he should donate to, to expunge himself of sin. (Barilla's CEO said a half year ago that he wouldn't feature gay couples in their ads, as the brand has a brand identity of traditionalism and traditional families.)

But are we following the left in this nonsense by ourselves overreading politics and ideology into things we, of all people, should know are fundamentally human in nature?

That is to say: It is the left which asserts -- or believes -- that people are essentially their ideology. The left asserts that someone is "good person" simply due to that person believing the right things; the ideology requires no actual action, just belief.

Thus, the left conceives people's primary identity as one of ideology, and conceives of humanity as being primarily ideological beings.

One the right, we generally say that ideology is important, but is hardly the sum of any man or woman. Chiefly ideology is important to the extent it creates real world goods, freedom of thought, freedom of worship, freedom to pursue a gainful trade without interference, and so on.

Freedom, in fact, to pursue happiness.

The right has been, historically, against this idea of humans' highest aspiration being a matter of purity of ideology -- that "The personal is political," as I think Gloria Steinem asserted -- and has championed at least three aspects of humanity as being more important than ideology (the metaphysical/religious, the familial/generational, and the ethical/moral; others may add the philosophical and intellectual).

Ideology, in fact, is chiefly important to the right to guarantee freedom to pursue these other aspects of human endeavor.

Sonny Bunch has also written on the emptiness of an entirely politicized life.

I do agree, as you know. One of the reasons -- you've probably gotten sick of me saying this -- but one of the reasons I post Honey Badger videos, or encourage people to post sci-tech stuff, or why I love the book thread, and the gardening thread, and so on, is that I do find a life which is full of nothing but politics is, sadly, empty of anything else.

I don't wish to define myself in such a manner -- I am ideological, but I am more than just ideological -- and will actively fight against being defined as nothing more than a vessel for ideology, for transporting it one from the ideological wellsprings to others' buckets (so that they may in turn deliver ideological water to others).

Is ideology important? Again, of course it is.

But is everything ideological? Surely not.

It occurs to me that attempting to be more than walking poster-board of ideological beliefs is a far more useful political posture in terms of outreach and persuasion. "LIVs" and swing voters and independents pride themselves on not being overly ideological -- they tend to scorn what they detect is "just ideology" from a party or politician -- and so anyone who permits himself to be defined as purely ideological has no chance whatsoever of persuading someone who prides himself on being ideologically flexible.

As silly as we find Barilla Panic Guy, an outside observer would find us pretty silly in asserting that virtually any evil that befalls a man is due to "liberal values" or the like.

We know better than that. We know human beings are more complicated than that -- which is part of the reason we resist so vigorously the One Size Fits All model of the leftist state. There are too many things going on in the human mind and human experience to say "This is due to liberalism" or even "This is largely due to liberalism."

As in many things, there may be some truth here -- may be -- but a little bit of truth can be so overstated as to become false.

I'm told that Ben Shapiro, who wrote the piece Poulous complains of (laying Phillip Seymour Hoffman's death at the feet of "liberal values" or "Hollywood values"), is one of the smartest people alive, and I believe that.

I do think he's misfired here, though. I know he's smarter than this, and I think his readership is smarter than this too. I think 80% of the movement is smarter than this (and 95% of this site's readers). So I don't think we should sell ourselves short in the brains department. I don't see what good it does anyone to pretend to be less smart than he actually is.

Some will say "But some people respond to this." And that is so. But so what? They'll also respond to a more nuanced piece. They may read all the nuance out of the piece, but, having done so, they will then respond to their version of the piece.

And of course this isn't just Ben Shapiro; most on the right (in fact, most anyone who's ever done anything political) are guilty of this. I'm guilty of this (though, like an alcoholic, I'm employing a One Day At A Time recovery strategy).

At the risk of offending people, when I was young and moving towards a right-leaning ideology, I rolled my eyes when Newt Gingrich traced Susan Smith's murder of her two children to the liberal ideology. I mean, come on. This is every bit as ridiculous and overreaching as the left's (and the media's) determination to claim that Jared Loughner's murderous, lunatic rage about English grammar was somehow traceable to Sarah Palin's "anti-government rhetoric."

There may be the glimmering of a point in this statement, but it's only a glimmering; how much weight shall we put on it? I don't think the structure is solid enough to bear but an ounce or two.

I've said this before, I think, but it's important to keep our humanity and our individuality front and center at all times. We may be fighting a political battle, but it's important to always return to why we are fighting it: we're fighting the battle to preserve our dignity as human beings, our freedom which is our right as thinking -- or ensouled -- beings, and our basic individual identity which is surely more than a series of bullet-point slogans and "COEXIST" bumper-stickers. (And for those whom this is not true: I truly pity those such as these.)

I believe -- though I'm not sure -- that part of the reason the military sends soldiers back home periodically is to remind them, tangibly, of what it is, exactly, they're fighting for in the first place. That the fight is not fought just for the fight; the fight is fought for something else again.

I think we're better than this and smarter than this, and I don't think we should be shy about letting people know that.

BTW: I know why people make these connections, because I know why I have often made such connections: Because writers write, and speakers speechify. The pressure to produce results in people putting out material that they might not have bothered with, if they didn't have a speech to give,or a number of columns or posts to write in a week.

So I'm honestly not really slagging either Gingrich or Shapiro (or myself) all that hard.

This stuff falls into the category of "easy content," and writers (or speakers) love no other category more than that of easy content.

That's human nature. Everybody does it. And no, seriously: Everybody does it.

Still, I think it's a tendency that is better checked and restrained than indulged.

Newt Gingrich is, I think, a genius.

Ben Shapiro is, I think, a genius.

And it's hard for geniuses to work at a genius level at all times -- only some of us are blessed enough to make it look easy -- but still, our geniuses should keep, mostly, to genius-level stuff. Or, when they want to take a break, they can slum it all the way down to the superior-IQ gutter.

There's plenty of non-geniuses for this other stuff, this shaky stuff.

Apologies: I had a clear memory of Limbaugh making this Susan Smith connection to liberalism, but Rockmom says my clear memory is clearly false:

BTW, Ace, it wasn't Rush Limbaugh who said that about Susan Smith. It was Newt Gingrich, when he was still Speaker of the House. And it was the day he jumped the shark. The backlash to those comments was tremendous.

Apologies to Rush Limbaugh for misattributing this to him.

As for Newt Gingrich -- I think he's a genius too. (I know he thinks he's a genius.) So the same caution to him as well.

I have deleted the references to Limbaugh, except here, in this correction, and replaced his name with Gingrich's.

Apologies once again.

Posted by: Ace at 08:19 AM | Comments (434)
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Dramatic video below the fold of protesters carrying riot shields, being fired upon by government troops.

Hot Air digests the end of the very brief truce. It is now estimated that somewhere between 25 and 50 people have been killed; most of these (if not all) would be protesters.

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Posted by: Ace at 07:21 AM | Comments (429)
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Sorry, got caught up doing other things. more...

Posted by: Open Blogger at 05:40 AM | Comments (207)
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Being married and having a child at age 23 is now an "alternative lifestyle".

Well done, NBC. Well done.

Posted by: andy at 02:59 AM | Comments (345)
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Result: a draw.

This article reviewing this series on honey badgers describes the animal as "a souped-up weasel."

Hilarious: The music. The music.

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Posted by: Ace at 06:34 AM | Comments (193)
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Quote of the Day

Those who turn away from fighting evil need to be aware, that the notion of evil as dark is actually the opposite of the truth. Evil is so bright, that people can't stare at it with their eyes. It's blinding; so people look at other things. Instead of fighting evil, they fight carbon emissions.

-- Dennis Prager

The International Passions of Barrack Obama

In the years since his election, Obama has reacted strongly to only three international issues:  climate change, gay rights, and Libya.  The first two are pet issues of the Left.  As for Obama's enthusiasm about invading Libya . . . well, that continues to mystify me.  Obama's silence has been most pointed and damaging when it comes to naturally occurring democratic movements within a despotic state.

The weekly 10% EPA-mandated Cuteness

Posted by: Maetenloch at 06:46 PM | Comments (691)
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First the oil companies and now the cows. Soon we'll have everything they love.

The severe drought in California is forcing ranchers to thin their herds and sell off to buyers in Texas and Oklahoma. Both states are still dealing with drought conditions too but not nearly as severe as what's happening out west. Rainfalls in the Lone Star State and that ballcap Oklahoma have been better the past couple years which means grass is growing and can support hungry cows.

Because of historically dry conditions, California’s soil moisture — a key ingredient for the forage that cattle graze on — is low throughout the state. With feed costs high and weeks of dry weather in the forecast, ranchers are already selling off parts of their herds as normally green grazing pastures have turned brown.

“We’re in the drought now, so a lot of these are going back to Texas,” said rancher and auction house co-owner Monty Avery, gesturing to a pen packed full of cows. “We usually sell about 100-150 animals per week. Now we’re seeing 800-1,000 per week, so the volume’s jumped up.”

The bad news for everybody is the cost of raising cattle, even migrant cattle shipped where there's water is driving up beef prices. Oh, In N Out Burger has opened up a bunch of joints here too. Tried one last week. Not bad.

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 04:58 PM | Comments (393)
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You guys just totally ignored this when it was in the French open thread (fil ouvert) yesterday, but you're not getting away with it that easily.

Deal with it.

View co-host Jenny McCarthy asked Walters if she has "more self-confidence and more self-love" given her age.

"Self-love?" Walters asked.

"Barbara, are you talking about that vibrator of yours again?" Whoopi Goldberg chimed in. "I can't handle it."

“How did you know? You know what it's called?" Walters replied. "A selfie."

Yeah I don't get this. Not the vibrator part, but the fact that about six years ago, everyone in the Media Class (and those who take cues from that class) decided that it was about time we all started talking about vibrators a whole heck of a lot.

I guess people think it's a little bit of naughty honesty, and not much different than a guy saying something along the same lines.

I dunno, though. I kind of want to throw a yellow flag on this particular play by Tastemaking Society Types.

I don't think anyone should be ashamed to use a vibrator. But there is a whole category of things which we are not ashamed of, per se, and yet we don't talk about publicly with strangers. With friends, sure. But with strangers? No.

I pooped earlier today. I would not mention this except that it falls into this category of "Not shameful, but also not really fodder for casual conservation." I'm not ashamed of my poop, and if pressed, sure, I could even be persuaded that my poop was Empowering or whatever.

But -- absent using it as a "for instance" in this category of Things Which Are Not Shameful But It's A Bit Self-Indulgently Narcissistic to Overshare This TMI with People -- I also don't think people really want to hear about my poop, and, this post and its dark turn towards the fecal aside, I generally respect people's wishes about remaining ignorant about my netherous voidings.

There is a certain social protocol which announces something like this: You will not discuss anything in public, with strangers, if 20% of the population is uncomfortable with it. This is part of why I say that racial jokes are a breach on the site -- more than 20% of the population is uncomfortable with them, so such jokes, even if a racist intent is proven by a panel of Bishops to be absent, still make a big chunk of the room uncomfortable.

(I say "20%" arbitrarily -- you cannot literally live by the rule that no one can ever be offended by what you say, because there's always someone willing to be offended by anything. So "20%" is my way of saying a "significant minority.")

Commenters have likewise been warmed about using overly graphic sexual language. It didn't really bother me personally, not in that I was scandalized, but I was bothered that the person wasn't observing the normal rules of decorum.

Now I don't know what the percentage is on discomfort with vibrator talk, but I imagine it's more than 20%.

And so while I'm not really offended, per se, I'm sort of annoyed to see a social breach going on, as if the 20% (or more) who might be uncomfortable about this matter just doesn't count.

Well I think they should count. My objection here isn't about sexuality per se, or about naughtiness; it's more about social boorishness.

Maybe I'm too inhibited, but I think this sort of basic politeness, avoiding making people uncomfortable, is part of good behavior, or at least ought to be.

One Defense for Babs: She didn't offer the information; Jenny McCarthy and Whoopi Goldberg kept asking her about it, probably to embarrass her (in a friendly way).

But that defense of Babs would just shift the breach to the other two.

And, Open Thread.
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Posted by: Ace at 03:32 PM | Comments (498)
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Yesterday, thugs did what thugs do. The protesters did something unwise in retaliation-- they set a fire.

With hundreds of riot police officers advancing from all sides after a day of deadly mayhem here in the Ukrainian capital, antigovernment protesters mounted a final desperate and seemingly doomed act of defiance late on Tuesday evening, establishing a protective ring of fire around what remained of their all-but-conquered encampment on Independence Square.

Feeding the blazing defenses with blankets, tires, wood, sheets of plastic foam and anything else that might burn, the protesters hoped to prolong, for a while longer at least, a tumultuous protest movement against President Viktor F. Yanukovych, a leader who was democratically elected in 2010 but is widely reviled here as corrupt and authoritarian.

“It is called the tactic of scorched earth,” said a protester who identified himself as Andriy.

The police reported earlier in the day that at least nine people, including two police officers, had been killed, but then raised this to 14, making it by far the worst day of violence in more than two months of protests and, for most Ukrainians, the bloodiest in living memory. The final death toll appears certain to be higher.

Doctors and nurses treating protesters in a temporary medical center in the Trade Unions building on Independence Square reported gunshot wounds and evidence that the police had doctored percussion grenades in order to inflict more serious injury. By early Wednesday, the union building had caught fire and the blaze raged out of control, with flames spreading to adjacent buildings.

Yesterday's death toll is now put at 26.

An opposition leader said the situation was precarious, but despite the burning fires and police lines, a strange calm pervaded central Kiev -- even as security officials rebranded the protesters as terrorists and announced a nationwide security operation to restore order.

Meanwhile, European and U.S. leaders threatened quick sanctions against the Ukrainian government over what French President Francois Hollande called "unspeakable, unacceptable, intolerable acts."

While insisting that "peaceful protesters (should) remain peaceful," U.S. President Barack Obama made a point in saying that the Ukrainian government carried an especially big burden for what's happened so far and what's to come.

The EU is "weighing" sanctions, which seem useless, given the whole point of Russia's influence/control over Ukraine is to bring them further into the Russian fold anyway.

Following failed talks overnight, Kiev's Independence Square was quieter Wednesday even as the opposition moved to retake the square after thousands of police armed with stun grenades and water cannons rushed at protesters in a camp Tuesday.

That standoff led to stories of individual brutality including that of Vyacheslav Veremiy, a journalist with daily Ukrainian newspaper Vesti. He was returning home from the newsroom around 2 a.m. Wednesday when his taxi nearing a police station was attacked by a group of armed thugs.

The driver and a fellow passenger were beaten. Veremiy was pulled out of the car and shot in the chest. He died shortly after.

Veremiy is one of the victims of roving bands of paid government "helpers" directed to cause disorder, who are currently roaming the streets with bats and guns, according to witnesses of the violence.

As I said, thugs do what thugs do. The Ukranian government is now calling protesters "extremists" and "terrorists," just as Morsi did in Egypt, and just as Erdogan did in Turkey.

The security authorities in Ukraine offered the first indication on Wednesday that the deadly political violence afflicting Kiev had spread far beyond the capital, announcing a crackdown on what the Interior Ministry called “extremist groups” that had burned down buildings and seized weapons nationwide.

The Interior Ministry announcement of an “antiterrorist operation” across the country came a day after Kiev was gripped with the deadliest mayhem since protests erupted in November, leaving at least 25 dead, including nine police officers. The Health Ministry said that 241 people had been wounded but Ukrainian news accounts put the number at more than 1,000.

Below, one face of the opposition.
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Posted by: Ace at 12:25 PM | Comments (338)
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