Social Justice in SF&F

[Geralt]

I am amazed by the western obsession with gender in just about any fandom/art. I'm not a westerner so I look at it from the outside.
This social justice movement is so concentrated on literature, video games, fashion....any creative field, you name it and the gender within it.
To me anything creative involves imagination, fantasy and sprinkle of magic. Criticizing it, demanding things to be banned or taken down, pointing out flaws does nothing. At best it amounts to academic critique, but usually it's just a bunch of opinions being touted through the world wide web. If something violates your sensibilities and worldview, vote with your valet. Don't buy it, don't read it. You don't get to decide what should be made and what shouldn't. You are entitled to your outrage, but to me you look like a brat who didn't get the things the way the wanted.
Also, there is this strong disregard to context of when the work was written and by who. But I know why, that doesn't matter, it's all about getting your outrage out there in social media, stirring some water, and having your ego stroked, maybe getting some deals out of it too.
The real social justice movement I would like to see in the western europe and usa would concentrate on the poor and the middle class, distribution of wealth, and citizen activism. Working in those field would set a shining example for the rest of the world. But that actually takes work and entire lives. It's so much easier to read a book/play a video game or whatever and cry boo-hoo over twitter or blogs, this hurts my sensibilities.
I'm a woman and I read fantasy all the time. I don't care if the protagonist male or female. I don't care if the book is politically correct or not. If the setting is a shitty world, shitty things will happen to characters. All I want is great story.

[MikeB1972]

Originally Posted by HarryT

I find your sense of morals peculiar, in that you are disturbed by the depiction of the killing of animals, but not by the killing of human beings, which is surely a much worse act, is it not?

Nope. Both sides have a choice not to participate in a war.

I am standing up in defense of fluffy bunnies (I may need a badge).

Unfortunately, bunnies are delicious, huge evolutionary mistake, huge.

[MikeB1972]

Originally Posted by Geralt

If something violates your sensibilities and worldview, vote with your valet. Don't buy it, don't read it. You don't get to decide what should be made and what shouldn't. You are entitled to your outrage, but to me you look like a brat who didn't get the things the way the wanted.

Unfortunately, the type of people whose sensibilities are violated this this are not content until they have expunged all trace of anything they disagree with, not only from current society, but history as well.

Fortunately as with any extremists splinter groups happen very often so they also go at each other. Unless there is an Old White Man™ within range, of course, at which point they put aside their differences and attack.

[dickloraine]

Originally Posted by Geralt

I am amazed by the western obsession with gender in just about any fandom/art. I'm not a westerner so I look at it from the outside.
This social justice movement is so concentrated on literature, video games, fashion....any creative field, you name it and the gender within it.
To me anything creative involves imagination, fantasy and sprinkle of magic. Criticizing it, demanding things to be banned or taken down, pointing out flaws does nothing. At best it amounts to academic critique, but usually it's just a bunch of opinions being touted through the world wide web. If something violates your sensibilities and worldview, vote with your valet. Don't buy it, don't read it. You don't get to decide what should be made and what shouldn't. You are entitled to your outrage, but to me you look like a brat who didn't get the things the way the wanted.
Also, there is this strong disregard to context of when the work was written and by who. But I know why, that doesn't matter, it's all about getting your outrage out there in social media, stirring some water, and having your ego stroked, maybe getting some deals out of it too.
The real social justice movement I would like to see in the western europe and usa would concentrate on the poor and the middle class, distribution of wealth, and citizen activism. Working in those field would set a shining example for the rest of the world. But that actually takes work and entire lives. It's so much easier to read a book/play a video game or whatever and cry boo-hoo over twitter or blogs, this hurts my sensibilities.
I'm a woman and I read fantasy all the time. I don't care if the protagonist male or female. I don't care if the book is politically correct or not. If the setting is a shitty world, shitty things will happen to characters. All I want is great story.

Not that I have the same viewpoint as the author of the article, but I do think the concept of gender is important and authors today especially in Sf&F should at least think about it. At its core, gender just makes the important seperation between the natural sex and the social constuct of gender.

What I don't get in articles like this, is the demanding of actually deconstructing classic gender roles or even worse, like this article, just wanting to see the gender roles one would like to see or ar ours today (and also just a construct happen to change). And the unability to see that of course gender roles where different in different times.

One does not have to show different gender roles, but maybe show, how they define a person and how they restrict them. One good example would be Caitlin from Game of Thrones.

Beeing conscious about what defines a character and a society is important for authors, I think. Decisions should be deliberate. But they did not need to overlap with my world view, and that is were my point of view obviously differs from the one in the article.

[Geralt]

Originally Posted by MikeB1972

Unfortunately, the type of people whose sensibilities are violated this this are not content until they have expunged all trace of anything they disagree with, not only from current society, but history as well.

You know that reminds me of an enormous machine that run all censorship in East Europe during USSR period that was also keen on expunging all traces of anything they disagreed with. Including living human beings.

I'm gonna say something that might be outrages for some of you, but it's just my opinion of something I've noticed. I'm pretty much between western world and middle east and I've come to believe that both are gender obsessed and both worlds put too much emphasis on the issue.
In western world feminists constantly pursue the issue of women, emphasise the issue of women, separate the women from men in this.
In middle east they do the same, only on the different side of the spectrum. Male and female culture is separate, people are separated from the time they are children in daily lives. They grow up surrounded by one gender prevalently and as a result they have no idea how to behave around women when they go outside of their country. (not all middle east countries are like this, but heavily religious ones are)
I grew up in a culture where you are all together. When I was a kid my friends were both boys and girls. Nobody cared what you had between your legs. If a boy climbed a tree, you better be sure there was a girl right behind him. Or vice versa. Only thing that mattered was the courage to be outrages and free and run amok. We were outdoor kids
When I was in highschool, all cliques was mixed again. We separated into groups by our shared interests (music, clothes, sports, movies) not by gender.
When I was in university, undergrad, we all hanged together, went for coffees and bitched about how hard the exams are or how the professor asks too much from us.
As a result I never developed this sense of being separate from the male world. I never judged guys by their gender. I never felt I was judged by my gender. I don't care about it. It's there, we have differences and preferences in life, but it doesn't really matter that much.
I judge people by what they do, their achievements and accomplishments.

I'm sorry for writing my personal history, but as I said it just amazes me that people are so obsessed by this. And on top of that this obsession is funneled into areas of life that are fantasy based (creative works).
One more thing that bothers me is this victim mentality that so many people are eager to accept on themselves. But that might be too long to post about so I'll stop.

[Geralt]

Originally Posted by dickloraine

Not that I have the same viewpoint as the author of the article, but I do think the concept of gender is important and authors today especially in Sf&F should at least think about it.

Is the author of the article an Sf-F writer? No? Then why should her opinion/critique matter to any writer? Or any commonly accepted norm?
I'm not trying to be obtuse on purpose but why should an author succumb to writing something along the lines of PC if they alone didnt come to that conclusion?
The only valid answer to this is to make money by pleasing the SJ demands. I find that understandable and reprehensible at the same time.
Fantasy and sci-fi writers, good ones at least in my opinion are first and foremost there to tell a great frickin' story. That's no.1.
Number 2, if they have enough talent, they'll use it to shake things up, question the norm, or make a political statement, without, and this is important, ruining the story.
They are not there to correct social injustices or pander to SJ on twitter.
They write because they have things bottled up inside them that need to come out.

[Geralt]

One more thing and I'll stop.

If anyone can answer this that'd be great.

How can you enjoy any story, really get into it, forget everything around you and enjoy the pure blissfulness of being transported into another world, if you judge every paragraph, every word by your prism of gender issues or political correctness?

[MikeB1972]

Originally Posted by Geralt

The only valid answer to this is to make money by pleasing the SJ demands. I find that understandable and reprehensible at the same time.
Fantasy and sci-fi writers, good ones at least in my opinion are first and foremost there to tell a great frickin' story. That's no.1.
Number 2, if they have enough talent, they'll use it to shake things up, question the norm, or make a political statement, without, and this is important, ruining the story.
They are not there to correct social injustices or pander to SJ on twitter.
They write because they have things bottled up inside them that need to come out.

That's kind of the problem though, the SJW's are very vocal about what get's written (and by whom), but more people seem to be buying the non-pc stuff, so you would probably make more money writing what you want.

Well, you'd probably make more money writing about a suicidally depressed 17 year old being taken sexual advantage of by a much older man with substance dependency and anger issues (That's the plot of Twilight if you missed it)

[dickloraine]

Originally Posted by Geralt

Is the author of the article an Sf-F writer? No? Then why should her opinion/critique matter to any writer? Or any commonly accepted norm?
I'm not trying to be obtuse on purpose but why should an author succumb to writing something along the lines of PC if they alone didnt come to that conclusion?
The only valid answer to this is to make money by pleasing the SJ demands. I find that understandable and reprehensible at the same time.
Fantasy and sci-fi writers, good ones at least in my opinion are first and foremost there to tell a great frickin' story. That's no.1.
Number 2, if they have enough talent, they'll use it to shake things up, question the norm, or make a political statement, without, and this is important, ruining the story.
They are not there to correct social injustices or pander to SJ on twitter.
They write because they have things bottled up inside them that need to come out.

Because it can result in a better story, mainly better characters. As I said, demanding that authors should describe a "better world" is stupid. But just because some people misuse a concept (gender describes social behaviour. You can look at books and sometimes see, how gender was constructed at the time, the book was written.) doesn't mean the concept has no merit. At least it helps to avoid clichés. Things like the test in the article are just useless. And confusing character views with authors views is stupid too.

But I do think, it makes a book better, if an author at least thinks about this. What you descibed in your other post is exactly, what gender tries to show: that there are social behaviors in cultures, that make arbitrary distinctions between genders. It is important to be conscious about the arbitrary nature of that. Because normally we aren't. It is just like it is, and we just repeat it in literature.

Another aspect of it is of course, looking if books incorporate some of the findings. This is were it becomes difficult and often ideological. Sometimes there are good reasons, why a book focuses on characters of one gender and of course books can lack in one compartment but excell in others. One observation is that often books show a narrow view on society. Misrepresenting certain genders. For example never having gay characters, even if there must be some. Or having women only as objects. Not that such a book couldn't be good.

Of course there is a social movement, that often goes to far, but at its core it has merit in my opinion.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by Geralt

I'm sorry for writing my personal history, but as I said it just amazes me that people are so obsessed by this. And on top of that this obsession is funneled into areas of life that are fantasy based (creative works).

.

What is going on behind the posturing is an aging orthodoxy trying to institutionalize its ideas and its mores so that it will survive past their lifetime. This cannot be achieved without "cleansing" creative works of non-compliant thinking.

And since in the western world government's power to coerce through its monopoly of force is limited in those areas, especially in the US with its strong First Amendment protections, the orthodoxy gets pushback so the campaign gets noisy and contentious. The entrenched powers can't do as China and other repressive states do and send out troops to round up dissenters; they are limited to trying to shout them down or shut them out of influential positions.

Which only results in the dissenters getting louder and taking their message to other venues. Prime examples being the rise of FoxNews network as counterprogramming to CNN and the broadcast networks or the recent Hugo catfight over the declining tradpub share of the growing SF&F book world.

It is no accident that the vast majority of the anti-Indie tradpub message is coming from the avowed leftists like LeGuin because they are not only being hit in the pocketbook but also in their "legacy" if the marketplace of ideas (their own words) slips out of the control of tradpub.

The issue really boils down to the control of ideas more than the ideas themselves. Thus the promotion of tradpub gatekeeping and litmus tests; censorship of ideas can't begin until access to ideas is restricted and we are moving in the opposite direction, happily enough.

This mightily annoys the aspiring censors and encourages the anti-orthodoxy resistance. Historically, orthodoxies always overeach and plant the seeds of their own demise. In this case, by squeezing "offensive" ideas out of the traditional channels into the new unregulated ones.

Griping about the lack of sensitivity of old titles is too little, too late; half the market is already beyond their power to control at the source and more escapes every passing day. That only leaves them the thankless task of trying to convince readers not to buy stuff they like solely because it isn't being vetted and validated by the establishment. Good luck with that SJWs.

It makes the catfights, in SF at least, amusing but meaningless.
A lot of sound and fury signifying very little.

[dickloraine]

I think it is a little bit strange and offensive using the term Social Justice Warriors. It is a stupid label given by people who are offended by the ideas of some people. It makes it sound, as if there were an organization behind it, which is ridiculous. Also there is a tendency, to just throw anyone, who thinks diversity in literature could be a good thing into an extremist niche.

There are many not extremist, constructive discussions about the topic. It mostly becomes toxic, if extremists of both sides get into the discussion.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by dickloraine

I think it is a little bit strange and offensive using the term Social Justice Warriors. It is a stupid label given by people who are offended by the ideas of some people. It makes it sound, as if there were an organization behind it, which is ridiculous. Also there is a tendency, to just throw anyone, who thinks diversity in literature could be a good thing into an extremist niche.

It is called a "grassroots movement".

There are many not extremist, constructive discussions about the topic. It mostly becomes toxic, if extremists of both sides get into the discussion.

That is perhaps why they aren't Social Justice Warriors, they are normal human beings with opinions.

[MikeB1972]

Originally Posted by dickloraine

I think it is a little bit strange and offensive using the term Social Justice Warriors. It is a stupid label given by people who are offended by the ideas of some people. It makes it sound, as if there were an organization behind it, which is ridiculous. Also there is a tendency, to just throw anyone, who thinks diversity in literature could be a good thing into an extremist niche.

There are many not extremist, constructive discussions about the topic. It mostly becomes toxic, if extremists of both sides get into the discussion.

TBH, I believe SJW is only used as a label for the extremists, I don't think anyone that actually entered into a discussion has been called one - except, possibly, by the extremists from the other side.

And it's not used for people who are offended by the ideas of some people, it's used for people who actively target people who don't agree with their ideas.

(for an example, as near as I can tell, if I was an SJW I wouldn't of wrote the above if I had disagreed with you. I would have simply called you a cis white male privileged misogynist and invited a twitter mob against you.)

[shalym]

Originally Posted by dickloraine

There are many not extremist, constructive discussions about the topic. It mostly becomes toxic, if extremists of both sides get into the discussion.

Originally Posted by Jane Goodall

There's an awful lot of extremists and fundamentalists...that's really what's gone wrong with the planet right now. Whether they're right, left, center or whatever, they're dangerous.
--Jane Goodall

Shari

[Cinisajoy]

My opinion on books and life in general.
Why should the size of what one uses to pee with matter?
Same anatomy, different proportions.
I have had typical female jobs and I have held a couple of male jobs. I can only think of one thing a female can't do and one thing a "true" male can't do naturally. (Unless we are talking seahorses)

I know two women that have usually boy names. On the second one, she was named long before we knew her sex. Didn't find that out until she was born.