John C. Wright's Blog, page 26

Best Product Review Ever

Please see: http://www.amazon.com/review/R3RP8IR1GBP75M/ref=cm_cr_dp_title?ie=UTF8&ASIN=B003G4IM4S&nodeID=165793011&store=toys-and-games

Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.

Two More

Anti-Puppy:

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2015/04/hugo-awards-assaulted-by-sad-puppies-who-really-should-be-called-whiny-babies/

A bawdlerized quote:

They call themselves the “Sad Puppies” without, it seems, a shred of Sexual Congressional irony.

Pro-Puppy:

http://reactionarytimes.blogspot.com/2015/04/sad-puppies-iii-behold-workings-of.html

My comment: Supposing one were a Man from Mars, let us say named Smith, dropped down to earth with no knowledge of the issues and history, would you notice a difference between the approach of the one versus the other?

* * *

Actually, we call ourselves the Evil Legion of Evil Authors. This particular ongoing campaign is called Sad Puppies, on the grounds that having what are alleged to be the foremost awards in science fiction controlled by brainmeltingly absurd uber-leftist ideological cliques and granted to mindnumbingly dull novels about body-swapping genderless AIs in space or dinosaur revenge fantasies is one of the foremost causes of puppy-related sadness syndrome.

We wish fewer big eyed puppies to cry warm tears, because we care about the children. Don’t you care about the children, my dear termagant?

You are correct that we have no shred of irony whatsoever. Our spokemammel, Wendel the Manatee, is as sober and serious as a hanging judge. We tolerate no mockery of our iron-faced humorless graveness of speak and demeanor. I will quote Wendel on this point:

WHOOOOOEEEEEEWOOO! WHEEK! WHEEK!

Well put, Wendel.

* * *

 

To establish my credentials as bigot, Raw Story, without speaking to me, quotes Daily Dot, who links to an publication called The Backlot,  who quotes a column where I complained about the self censorship of Sci Fi Channel, on the grounds that kowtowing to these mavins of Political Correctness emboldens them and puts those of us unwilling to bow the knee to Political Correctness in a less favorable position to make our living while living and letting live.

The original column, somewhat brusquely, posed two questions: 1) what makes sodomy different from all other sexual perversions? Why is it singled out for special treatment? 2) Why is the distemper of the love involved in sodomy different from the distemper of hatred involved in racism? Why is it immune from all moral reasoning?

I later apologized for the brusqueness, but the apology was flung back in my face, whereupon I realized that it was not the direct way in which I spoke the truth that offended them, but the truth. For that, no man can apologize even if he might.

The Backlot goes on to say that I cannot hide behind Catholic teaching to say that I believe one should love the sinner and hate the sin, because I am a bigot, whereas Catholics are not bigots. Then the Backlot says all Catholics are bigots. Logic is not their strong suit.

Now, contrast this acrobatic backflip of multiple links leading nowhere with how easy it would be to establish something that was true about me.

Anyone wishes to establish, for example, that I am Catholic need only link to any of the hundred of places where I say so, because I boast of it. Anyone wishing to establish that I am a one-eyed one-horned flying purple people eater, on the other hand, has to link through links to links to people talking about me being a purple people eater, without ever actually producing a quote, or a bit of evidence.

Or he could just talk to me, and get a direct quote. How hard is that?

For a journalist, it is not hard at all. For a gossip, impossible.

 

Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.

A Brief Open Letter to George RR Martin

Normally I would not ask impertinent questions of my betters in days like these, but in this case, there is cause. http://grrm.livejournal.com/420090.html

I left the following comment there.

* * *

Sir,

You commented “John C. Wright SIX TIMES!!! John C. Wright, a writer famed far and wide for having no opinions on politics, race, religion, or sexual orientation, and would never dream of injecting such messages into his Damned Good Stories.”

I assume here you are being ironic, and stating that I do indeed put messages into my fiction.

However, we have worked together in the past. You edited the anthology SONGS OF A DYING EARTH in which my short story, ‘Guyal the Curator’ appeared.

Were there or were there not pro-conservative messages in that story? You may not recall it, but I know you read it.

If, since you are an honest man, you will say that story had no overt political message in it, on what grounds do you assume I put overt political messages in my other stories?

In other words, you are accusing me of hypocrisy, I, who have never said a bad word about you in public or private to anyone, and who have always hitherto held you in the highest esteem. What is the factual basis for the accusation, please?

If there is no factual basis, why make the accusation?

John C Wright

Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.

Two More

Anti-Puppy:

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2015/04/hugo-awards-assaulted-by-sad-puppies-who-really-should-be-called-whiny-babies/

A bawdlerized quote:

They call themselves the “Sad Puppies” without, it seems, a shred of Sexual Congressional irony.

Pro-Puppy:

http://reactionarytimes.blogspot.com/2015/04/sad-puppies-iii-behold-workings-of.html

My comment: Supposing one were a Man from Mars, let us say named Smith, dropped down to earth with no knowledge of the issues and history, would you notice a difference between the approach of the one versus the other?

* * *

Actually, we call ourselves the Evil Legion of Evil Authors. This particular ongoing campaign is called Sad Puppies, on the grounds that having what are alleged to be the foremost awards in science fiction controlled by brainmeltingly absurd uber-leftist ideological cliques and granted to mindnumbingly dull novels about body-swapping genderless AIs in space or dinosaur revenge fantasies is one of the foremost causes of puppy-related sadness syndrome.

We wish fewer big eyed puppies to cry warm tears, because we care about the children. Don’t you care about the children, my dear termagant?

You are correct that we have no shred of irony whatsoever. Our spokemammel, Wendel the Manatee, is as sober and serious as a hanging judge. We tolerate no mockery of our iron-faced humorless graveness of speak and demeanor. I will quote Wendel on this point:

WHOOOOOEEEEEEWOOO! WHEEK! WHEEK!

Well put, Wendel.

* * *

 

To establish my credentials as bigot, Raw Story, without speaking to me, quotes Daily Dot, who links to an publication called The Backlot,  who quotes a column where I complained about the self censorship of Sci Fi Channel, on the grounds that kowtowing to these mavins of Political Correctness emboldens them and puts those of us unwilling to bow the knee to Political Correctness in a less favorable position to make our living while living and letting live.

The original column, somewhat brusquely, posed two questions: 1) what makes sodomy different from all other sexual perversions? Why is it singled out for special treatment? 2) Why is the distemper of the love involved in sodomy different from the distemper of hatred involved in racism? Why is it immune from all moral reasoning?

I later apologized for the brusqueness, but the apology was flung back in my face, whereupon I realized that it was not the direct way in which I spoke the truth that offended them, but the truth. For that, no man can apologize even if he might.

The Backlot goes on to say that I cannot hide behind Catholic teaching to say that I believe one should love the sinner and hate the sin, because I am a bigot, whereas Catholics are not bigots. Then the Backlot says all Catholics are bigots. Logic is not their strong suite.

Now, contrast this acrobatic backflip of multiple links leading nowhere with how easy it would be to establish something that was true about me.

Anyone wishes to establish, for example, that I am Catholic need only link to any of the hundred of places where I say so, because I boast of it. Anyone wishing to establish that I am a one-eyed one-horned flying purple people eater, on the other hand, has to link through links to links to people talking about me being a purple people eater, without ever actually producing a quote, or a bit of evidence.

Or he could just talk to me, and get a direct quote. How hard is that?

For a journalist, it is not hard at all. For a gossip, impossible.

 

Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.

Did I Get Too Many Nominations?

John C Wright has had six Hugo nominations in his career. Let us compare:

Patrick Hayden: 15 nominations (one declined)
Charles Stross: 15 nominations
Mike Glyer: 50 nominations (nine for fiction)
John Scalzi: 9 nominations
Alexis Gilliand: 8 nominations (four wins)
Theresa Hayden: 5 nominations
Seanan McGuire 5 nominations in one year….

I am not so impertinent as to dispute the tastes or judgment of the fans who ponied up the money and took the time to nominated me. They are my employers; their word is my law.

So far, in this tempest in a teardrop (it is too small for my teapot) there has been exactly one of my detractors who claimed my work was undeserving of notice, but countless detractors calling me a racist misogynist bigot ballotbox-stuffing flying purple people eater.

I will leave the flying purple people eating accusations unanswered for now, because they are trivial, irrelevant and stupid.

As to those who claim that we are introducing foreigners, gamergaters, or the unwashed masses into the pristine tower of science fiction, the numbers speak for themselves. We can take the Amazon rankings of books as a rough measure of the popularity of a work.

AVERAGE AMAZON RATINGS for Best Novel category

4.60 = Rabid Puppies

4.64 = Sad Puppies

4.46 = 2015 shortlist

3.90 = 2010-2013 shortlists

NUMBER OF HUGO NOMINATIONS

15: Patrick Nielsen Hayden

15: Charles Stross

12: Isaac Asimov

12: Robert Heinlein

09: John Scalzi

08: Jerry Pournelle

07: Arthur C. Clarke

Ask yourself who has delivered more quality work, more popular, to the Hugo shortlist? The Sad Puppies, or the previous cliques? The numbers prove objectively that our suggested slate better represents the tastes of the SF public.

As to the one and only one fellow who thought my science fiction writing in general was inferior  to the social justice fiction he and his prefer. On what this was based, you are as free to speculate as I, since he had read none of the works.

To him, I have but one reply.

Read. Compare. Judge.

Here is the list. (I will provide links as soon as my publisher makes them available.)

One Bright Star to Guide Them
Pale Realms of Shade
The Plural of Helen of Troy
Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus
The Parliament of Beasts and Birds
Transhuman and Subhuman

 

 

Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.

AAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGGGH! My Eyes! MY EYES!

Would that I had been struck as blind as Oedipus before ever I saw this hideous, excruciating headline:

Phillip Noyce to Remake Captain Blood

has signed to develop and direct “Captain Blood,” Warner Bros.’ long-gestating remake of the swashbuckling 1935 classic. The Academy Award-nominated pirate movie starred Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland and Basil Rathbone and was based on a novel by Rafael Sabatini. Set in the 1600s, it tells the story of a doctor who is convicted for treason against the King of England, sold into slavery and escapes to high seas as a pirate.

Here is who will not be in the remake:

Olivia de Havilland will not be playing Arabella Bishop

Read the rest of this entry »

Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.

No Tarring Tor

Larry Correia, International Lord of Hate, has a remark it is in my financial best interests to share, and also a matter of honor:

http://monsterhunternation.com/2015/0...

The Sad Puppies campaign isn’t mad at Tor the publishing house. We have nothing against Tor.

In fact, one of our suggestions for novel is by Kevin J. Anderson, and is published by Tor. One of our nominees is John C. Wright, and he is published by Tor. There are other Tor authors who are secret members of the Evil Legion of Evil. And there are some Tor authors and editors who have reached out to us this week, and who have told the angry mobs to calm the hell down and knock off the asinine defamation, both in public and in private.

Don’t threaten to boycott anybody because of their business associations, because that’s exactly the kind of boorish behavior that’s been done to us.

Don’t post links to a torrent site and suggest that people pirate stuff instead of giving a publishing house money. Do you have any idea how offensive it is to do that on a professional author’s feed?

For those just joining us, if you are wondering where this is coming from, there are a couple of reasons many Sad Puppies supporters are leery of Tor.

There are a few Tor editors who have accused my people of some vile and outlandish things recently, but the Nielsen Haydens are only a couple of the editors there. Sure, they’ve been insulting, but I’m not going to tar the other editors by association, especially since most of them haven’t said anything, and some have been very nice to us.

Tor.com has posted some asinine stuff on this subject, talked a lot of trash about us, and run some absurd, preachy, social engineering, wannabe literati wankery articles.

However, Tor.com isn’t Tor the publisher. From what I’ve been told by some Tor employees, they are kind of their own thing. Most people don’t know that though. On that note, I don’t know who the marketing person is over there, but seriously, some of the stuff posted on Tor.com is ridiculous and has left a lot of people on this side of fandom with a bad taste in their mouth.

So, to the Sad Puppies supporters, be cool. There are a bunch of good folks over there, good authors and good editors, making good books, and some of them even agree with us.

Read the rest of this entry »

Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.

The War of Ignorance versus Faith

Hmph. I just came across another antieducated sophophobe who declared there to be a war between science and faith, especially the Roman Catholic Church.

I asked him to name the Papal Bull or Encyclical, or any other official document of the Church prohibiting or condemning the practice of scientific inquiry. He did not know what a ‘bull’ was.

I asked him if he knew anything about science and the history of science, and he said yes. I asked him for the evidence of any Catholic interference, or even lack of enthusiastic support, for any scientific inquiry of any kind, in any time or place?

He mentioned Galileo. I asked him if he knew the circumstances of Galileo’s trial, or what Galileo was accused of? He said no. I asked him if he knew who Cardinal Bellarmine was. He said no.

I asked him if he had read Dialogues Concerning Two New Sciences? He did not even know what the book was, much less who the characters in it were, or what positions in the contemporary debates they represented.

(Do I need to mention that I read this book in school? I went to a good school, where the education is what mathematicians call a ‘positive sum game’ that is, I ended up more educated than when I went in. His school left him with less education than when he went in.)

I did not bother to ask him if he knew what, precisely, Galileo had discovered, or what proofs he gave to support his various theories.

I did not ask him to tell me what the Galilean satellites were, much less name them (off the top of my head: Io, Europa, Callisto, Ganymede. If I am wrong, and Amalthea is one of them, shame on me. If got them in order, more to my glory.)

Calibrating my questions to the level of someone without a Saint John’s College level of education,  I asked him if he knew who Abertus Magnus, William of Ockham, Roger Bacon, Nicholas Steno were. He said no.

I asked him who invented the mechanical escapement used in clockwork. Or when. He did not know what mechanical escapement was. (Villard de Honnecourt circa 1237, in case you are wondering.)

Recalibrating my question to the high school level, I asked him if he knew who Pascal was, Copernicus, Descartes. He said no. Mendel. No. Still no.

He then told me that all the European inventions in mathematics and medicine came from the Muslim world. I asked him if he knew where Andalusia was, or when the Reconquista happened. Did not recognize those terms. I asked him what religion the people were in the lands conquered by the Muslims in the Seven, Eighth, and Ninth Centuries, et cetera? He guessed that they were some sort of pagans.

I did not bother to ask him if he knew who Abu Hamid al-Ghazali was.

He did not even know enough to raise and throw intro my face the old, tired, false and oft-refuted slander about Hypatia the neoplatonic philosopher (always described as a female scientist) being flayed to death by a Christian mob wielding sharpened clamshells for being a female scientist.

In other words, I could have argued in favor of the War between Science and the Church better than he. He had not even memorized his side’s own talking points.

He was a disgrace to the forces of evil.

Another ignoramus, far less ignorant (but still woefully uniformed), told me that it was fortunate that Newton lived in a Protestant nation, or otherwise his work would have been suppressed by the Church.

Yes, the same Church that invented, maintained and supported the university system, invented and defended the idea of Academic Freedom, founded every major university in the Old World, and funded, supported, published and spread every major scientific accomplishment of the Continent, not to mention all the progress, scientific, social, or otherwise from the Fifth Century to the Fifteenth. That is the Church this ignorant man was breathing a sigh of relief Newton had escaped.

It is appalling to me that in the modern age, when anyone with the touch of a button can read any book in the public domain back to the Epic of Gilgamesh could not bother to inform themselves about the basic facts of the world in which they live.

It is not merely the ignorance that bothers me. It is the ingratitude. It is like a sullen and empty-eyed princeling spitting in the face of a king on his deathbed, the the wars he fought and the kingdom he won to give to his son, the ungrateful brat does not even know where any of it came from.

As a public service, I would like to list other people who, if only I could, I would call to the witness stand to give their opinion about the war between Science and the Church.

I would even call Giordano Bruno to the stand, if he would tell us the reason why he was burned as a heretic. It was not for his scientific work.

Let us rank them in alphabetical order, with links, shall we?

Read the rest of this entry »

Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.

From the Harvard Divinity School

This is from the “This Week in Science and Religion” column. http://cosmologicsmagazine.com/this-week-in-science-religion-13/

Sci fi and social battles. The stories and perspectives of women and people of color have long been marginalized in science fiction, and some social conservatives want to keep things that way. Despite some exciting gains (all of the winners of the 2014 Nebula awards were women and people of color), one group of people is attempting to make sure that the Hugo Awards (sci-fi’s most prestigious honor) go exclusively to white heterosexual men. Since votes for the Hugo Award can only be cast by those who have paid an annual membership, one group of conservatives calling themselves “The Sad Puppies” have placed a slate of homophobic, sexist, and racist authors onto the ballot. The most prominent of these is an obscure writer named John C. Wright, who has publically called same-sex partnerships “an aberration” and “a filthy phallic idol,” and has referred to writers who depict GLBTQ characters as “termites” and “disgusting, limp, soulless sacks of filth.” We at Cosmologics sincerely hope that these vicious attitudes do not receive the honor of a Hugo Award.

I hereby announce a contest to see how many false, libelous or inaccurate statements exist in this paragraph of four sentences.

And, before you ask, no, no one from the publication spoke to me in preparation of the article. Their one link goes to Slate magazine.

And, before you ask, yes, I totally believe the press when they say Gamers are dead. That all these news organs come out in the same moment with the same story is totally believable. The press are neutral and objective, reporting only on facts.

And, before you ask, no, I will not be suing anyone for libel. I will turn the other cheek instead. It makes life easier and it drives them batty.

As a matter of logic, however, I cannot be both obscure and prominent at the same time and in the same sense.

As a matter of fact, I cannot by any stretch of the imagination be said to be more prominent a science fiction writer than Kevin J Andersen or Jim Butcher.

Perhaps the semiliterate authoress penning the sentence means merely that I am obscure among science fiction authors but nonetheless the most prominent of the sexist, racist, and homophobic science fiction authors? But, again, that would either mean (1) that Mr Andersen and Mr Butcher are not in these categories (in which case it is inaccurate to include them in the sentence when the whole slate is condemned) or (2) that I am more prominent than they.

Either one is a libel to them, but for different reasons.

As a matter of journalistic ethics, the article in Slate to which they linked in support of their propositions has this to say:

This post originally misspelled Brad Torgersen’s last name and misstated that the creators of the Legend of Korra revealed that a male character liked men. They revealed that two female characters liked women. It also misidentified Teresa and Patrick Nielsen Hayden as the founder of Tor Books. They are the founders of Ansatz Press. Finally, a sentence was  updated to clarify that the WSFS, or World Science Fiction Society, administers the Hugo Awards.

Emphasis mine. Mr Doherty is not pleased, I am sure.

However, please note, that the accusations by Katy Waldmanm, the Slate hack, of racism, sexism, homophobia, baby-eating and devil-worship and being reactionary filth leveled heedlessly at innocent strangers and bystanders, all of them souls unknown to her, have not been removed from the Slate article.

As a matter of logic, again, my attitudes are not up for the Hugo Award, nor my opinion about injecting leftwing agitprop into the children’s show LEGEND OF KORRA, but my stories and other written works are.

As a matter of logic, those who called Larry Correia a liar for saying that the Hugo Awards were denied to writers espousing unpopular, pro-Christian or pro-Conservative views (such as the view that one should not use a children’s cartoon, aimed at children, to promote the homosex agenda) have never yet withdrawn their remarks, recanted, or apologized.

Question: has or has not the Harvard Divinity School publication here voiced the preference that the attitudes — my personal political opinions — are sufficient grounds to deny me an award, which is allegedly an award given not for ideological purity, but instead for craftsmanship in science fiction writing?

Question: Is or is not Larry Correia correct in saying that there is a bias against rightwing or conservative or Christian authors haunting the science fiction field? If statements from Slate Magazine echoed uncritically in the Harvard Divinity Review do not constitute such a bias, what would?

Would, for example, statements asking all readers not to read anything by a white, straight, man for a year constitute such a bias?

Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.

And Now For Something Completely Different!

Mrs Wright holds forth on the most preeminent social issue of the day: buxom bustlines!

http://www.ljagilamplighter.com/2015/04/08/superversive-sf-the-bosom-jiggle-factor-index/

[image error]

Actually, she is writing on the Needs of Culture versus the Needs of Drama, which is the tension between the competing needs of the duty the artist owes the audience and the duty he owes the muse.

Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.