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Originally Posted by fjtorres
It's not that I think the genre actually is dying...
But between the "the book is too good to be SF" and "SF is just a label" memes the genre *is* in danger of losing its limited but hard won respectability, especially with the increased proliferation of luddites and science illiterates in government and media.
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I just don't get where you're coming from at all.
A) I'm not sure SF
ever had this "limited but hard won respectability" you're attributing to it.
And B) I'm not sure why it
needs to have this "respectability" in order to survive as a genre. Clearly respectability has no bearing on success (or readership) in this day and age.
And C) why would anyone really
care if the types of books they enjoy reading are viewed as "respectable" by others?
And finally D) Why the current "anti-science" movement in govt. and media would have any impact whatsoever on the publishing and writing of novels. Books of fiction. It's not like the increase in fundamentalist/evangelical inclinations ever put a dent in Pullman or Rowling or anyone else they chose to rail against. Quite the opposite in fact.
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I've had lots of good times in the worlds of SF and it... annoys me... to see the hard work of the good ones devalued by association with sloppy wannabes.
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That's silly. Good books
can't be devalued by association with bad ones -- any more than a bad movie adaptation can retroactively devalue the great book it was based upon. What you're talking about are outsider
perceptions; and not liking those perceptions. But let's face it; the only people who are going to dismiss great works of SF because it was lumped in with "bad" SF are people who didn't really give a damn about SF in the first place.
Seriously, though... given your opinions on the current publishing landscape in general, I'm a little surprised by your attempt to "Special Snowflake" Science Fiction.
This coming form a guy who LOVES Science Fiction: your kind AND all the kinds you choose to exclude from the official snowflake club.
