Fail here there and everywhere

[sqbr]

I am feeling sick and grumpy but also chatty. So, some links from metafandom with rambly commentary.

Failboat! The Cruise Ship of the Damned Sails On summarises a bunch of stuff.

veejane asks what sff fandom is going to do about this crap.

On safe spaces talks about, well, safe spaces.

Re the Will Shetterly/Kathyryn Cramer vs coffeeandink thing(*): outing someone under their real name because they disagreed with you and banned you from their lj? Is unbelievably low. Dismissing the opinions of everyone who disagrees with you "because all their IPs come from Ivy league colleges"? Low and stupid. Arguing against the use of pseudonyms on the internet? Just..argh. The stupid burns.

Also, given that Worldcon is in Australia next year I find myself putting together my opinions on aussie fandom with all this stuff going on in international fandom. I feel a bit stymied about what I can do personally to try to cut down on the fail, though, apart from trying not to contribute to it myself and encouraging anti-fail.

So since coffeeandink asked people to focus on positive things: I am currently reading "Devil in Blue Dress" by Walter Mosley after being recced it on 50books_poc. It is quite good, even if it's not spec fic :)

(*)People are avoiding saying their names because apparently they google stalk and harrass them, but if NOONE says their names noone will know whose been talked about. I feel too obscure to be worried, but incase they do: seriously, you're going to pick on a no-name australian rambling while sick? This will not help your PR.

Comments

Re: A burst of predictable curmudgeonry

[strangedave.livejournal.com]

Its my bias from the central Australian experience. Racism is nowhere near an issue in fandom to the extent that it is an issue in Alice Springs, seriously, and having recent experience of ugly unpleasant brutal overt racism makes it much harder for me to be alarmed by the whiteness of fandom. Given the choice between racism in fandom (that mostly seems to make some people upset or uncomfortable in some social events), and the sort of racism that makes people die decades earlier than the national average, I find it hard to justify to myself spending too much time and effort trying to fight the former that could be spent fighting the latter.

Of course, this is only a valid argument from me if I am spending time and effort on the latter, which I currently am not as much as I feel I should be. And it is an argument from my point of view, which is to say from someone who doesn't experience racism directly — I'd certainly be more inclined to fight racism that was directed against me personally.

This doesn't mean that I think racism in fandom should be ignored, but I think more in terms of trying to do what we do in a less racist way, rather than spending a whole lot of effort on the issue directly. I'm happy to talk about race in fannish discussions, happy to read fiction from other cultural viewpoints, happy to make addressing issues of race one of the many issues we deal with in planning fannish things. But I'm not really inclined to see large time-consuming debates about the issue, often (not always, but often) very inward looking and very focussed on the attitudes of other people already within fandom, as being something I think is a particularly valuable use of my time.
Maybe it would be more of an issue if I felt a target of racism within fandom personally.

I think if we care about issues of racism, then if we focus ourselves on fighting racism and addressing our own biases in more outgoing ways, and in ways more connected with general society than fandom, and bring that experience back to fandom, not only is it pretty that we will we have done more good in the long run, but we will probably end up doing at least as much to fight racism within fandom as well. Maybe this reasoning only applies to people who have less direct experience of racism personally -- but I also think fandom is pretty focussed on middle-class issues even from those who do have direct experience of racism.

Which isn't to say I have any issue with someone being interested in the issues — there is plenty to talk about, plenty of interesting debate to be had, plenty of value to be had from challenging ourselves, plenty of ways in which we can change our culture to be a little less blind on the issues. But I think the issues are more to be explored and quietly addressed, rather than urgently to be confronted. I have other issues to do with race I'd rather be urgently confronting.

Re: A burst of predictable curmudgeonry

[alias_sqbr]

I'm going to get to your points when I'm more awake but since this is my lj:

Do not tell someone who experiences racism that it's not that big of a deal, or imply that them focussing on it is somehow selfish or insular.

Especially when said person talks about wider issues of racism all the time. But even if she didn't it would still not be acceptable. I've had people tell me my experiences of sexism weren't valid/that big of a deal, and I cannot express how horrible it was.

Re: A burst of predictable curmudgeonry

[strangedave.livejournal.com]

Do not tell someone who experiences racism that it's not that big of a deal, or imply that them focussing on it is somehow selfish or insular.
I specifically said it was I was speaking from my position as someone who doesn't experience racism, and that I'd feel differently (and by implication act differently) if I did. And I meant that. I'm certainly not arguing that focussing on racism that affects you personally is in anyway wrong -- that would be both callous and pointless. And I also made it explicit that my greater interest in focussing on central Australian issues than fannish ones is a result of my personal experience, and I put most of the arguments specifically in terms of what I personally thought was worthwhile for me, and please don't try to deny the validity of my personal experience, thanks.

I do think that focussing on racism in fandom will always be the middle class focussing on the issues that effect the middle class. And while I acknowledge that people will always want to focus on issues that effect them and this personal connection to the issues is vital, and while there is no perfect answer to the general issue of the progressive middle class focussing on the issues that effect the progressive middle class (and there has always got to be some appropriate balance, these issues can never be ignored), I do think it is a big problem with progressive movements generally, and I'm hardly alone in this, and focussing on issues within fandom seems to pretty clearly be an example.

And I certainly have personally experienced the way being middle class can focus you on issues that effect the middle class (given my past in student politics and my work with the EFA, you could argue that its pretty much all my activist activity so far) and I, personally, am trying to break out of that. I'm not arguing that everyone else should, just being curmudgeonly about having my attention dragged back to my own backyard.

Re: A burst of predictable curmudgeonry

[alias_sqbr]

First off, see Point 2 here (the pdf is also very good)

Noone is saying your experiences aren't valid. The point is, they're not relevant, not to this conversation (feel free to write a post about it on your on lj if you want). And your opinion (and mine) is less valid than Stephie's. White people simply don't get to decide if things are racist or not.

Also:
I think it's important to fight racism in fandom as well as other sorts of racism. While I think the racism suffered by poor POC is extra specially in need of attention, I get annoyed at the way left wing people think fighting racism=fighting class and ignore the racism suffered by middle class POC and POC associated with the middle class like asians. I've spent much of the past few years getting past the narrow if well meaning attitudes towards race I got from my working class socialist family, and get annoyed when I feel like others are acting the same way.

Imagine this:
You write a post about how people should get more involved in helping remote aboriginal communities.

What I would do:
Either say something supportive or helpful, or say nothing.

What I would not do:
Reply saying I think our energy would be more effectively spent fighting racism in fandom.

An aboriginal person comes in to say that racism in remote aboriginal communities is pretty bad and deserves more attention.

I reply saying that ok, yes, I'm white, but afaict the issue is more to do with blah(*), and I get annoyed at the way anti-racism gets taken over by socialist agendas.

Can you see how wrong that would be? Can you see how your statement is equivalent?

(*)I would have to make up something I don't believe here, and I don't have the stomach for it.

Re: A burst of predictable curmudgeonry

[delux-vivens.livejournal.com]

Given the choice between racism in fandom (that mostly seems to make some people upset or uncomfortable in some social events),

Really?

but I also think fandom is pretty focussed on middle-class issues even from those who do have direct experience of racism.

Again I say. Really?