From the Pen of Jeff Duntemann

A balanced view and trenchant insight in a column from an interested onlooker to the ongoing world-shattering Holy War and  foodfight-in-a-phonebooth between the subterranean Morlocks and the lachrymose Sad Puppies

http://www.contrapositivediary.com/?p=3402

Some of the more interesting observations from Mr Duntemann are in his comments below the column.

SP authors have nothing to lose in the conflict, and AP authors have nothing to gain. It’s pretty much that simple.

My comment:

He hits the nail on the head.That is why I reject calls for reconciliation and a return to the status quo ante with umbrage and scorn.

Even with the utmost of humility and meekness I can summon up, I cannot honestly believe my work is inferior to tales which have won awards in recent years, prose poems with not a scintilla of science fiction present, or genre-free drolleries dwelling on politically correct messages but lacking both a sense of wonder and a competence of storytelling craft.

Even if peace terms were offered, what could the Morlocks offer me?

What purpose do semi-unpublished lacktalent lackwits like Damien G Walter of the Guardian or interstitial poetasters like Alex Dally ‘nonbinary’ MacFarlane of Tor.com (whom together, in their whole careers, have sold fewer works than I sold in the last twelve months) — what purpose, ask I, do such peripheral figures  serve in the Science Fiction field, except to drive out the science and the fiction, the storytelling and sense of wonder, to make room for dreary finger-wagging lectures about the alleged glories of yet one more sexual deviancy or other morbidity?

To win their applause is no goal of mine.

I do not want the harpies to cook or wait tables. I merely want them to cease befouling the feast.

No one has offered me peace terms. No one has opened negotiations with me. No one has apologized, retracted, or condemned the outrageous libels offered in major media outlets. Instead, one or two rare voices, speaking in measured tones rather then hysterical screams, has asked for all parties to remain calm, and for the Sad Puppies to concede the field and withdraw, in return for which we are offered … nothing.

What we want is science fiction. That is our demand.

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