A Matter of Principle and Practicality

I have decided, that as of today, I will no longer support any publisher or editor of erotic anthologies, who engages in gender discrimination. I will not submit to them, purchase them, link to them or publish excerpts in my podcast. This might look like rallying cry. It's not, and for this reason I will not list the publishers and editors to which this applies. It is simply a statement of preference, one I'm posting because I was asked to by a friend.

If you are involved in the erotic publishing world you've seen calls for submission roll by with gender-based provisions. Some of them explicitly state that only female-identified authors may apply, regardless of the ostensible gender of their pseudonym. Some are more ambiguous, and leave the possibility of submissions under a female name as an open question. None of these calls for submission openly state that men are welcome to submit, as long as a female pseudonym is used.

In many situations, the authorial persona behind stories is itself fiction. In the case of the "Castle" mysteries (a spin-off of the television series) it's obvious that the author is a fictional character. In the early days of speculative fiction, female authors often published under male or non-gendered pseudonyms in order to navigate a publishing world which was very male-dominated.

But it's not 1965 anymore. We live in a more enlightened age, when the idea that any given gender is incapable of achieving something is to be challenged, not used as a marketing angle. I know that my fiction appeals to women, at least enough of them that the majority of my feedback comes from them.

Ultimately, these anthologies help to perpetuate the idea that a male sexuality is threatening or even dangerous, and that people of all genders need to be protected from it. Protecting men from other men's sexuality is a subtle form of homophobia. Protecting women from it is no better. I have no problem with the editor wishing to maintain a particular tone in all the stories in the anthology they are editing. I also understand that seeing a male name on an author will color the reader's perception of that story. But to state that men are not welcome to submit to an anthology, that they should not even try, is wrong.

Furthermore, as a podcaster, it is difficult if not impossible to conceal my gender. I like to promote the anthologies where my stories are accepted. If I write under a female pseudonym, if I'm required to keep my association with that pseudonym secret, then I can't do that, and I feel less valued as an author for it. I have better uses for my time.

And so, for reasons of both principle and practicality, I have decided that I do not need to have business relationships with these editors and publishers. I hope that they understand that I am not trying to coerce what is a largely economic decision. I really don't care whether they change or not. Instead, I will hope that the world will come to judge stories based on their contents, rather than prejudices arising from the gender of the author.