(Thanks to Mike Glyer for helping me track down some of the info of these events)
Gregory Benford thought he was just speaking on another panel, something he’d done dozens of times over the last 40 years of his career, especially after his novel Timescape won the Nebula Award and has since been hailed as one of the greatest science fiction novels ever written. The topic is The New Masters of Sci-Fi, letting panelists know who in the current day takes on the mantle of the greats like McCaffrey, Heinlein, and Pournelle, and having a robust discussion among authors and friends alike.
It should have been a fun time had for all, as LosCon had a wonderful line up of panels this year that many other conventions could do well to take note of, but for those who attended this panel at LosCon, they’ll only remember one thing for the rest of their lives– a moment soured by identity politics. Another convention ruined by outrage culture and the extreme left doing anything but allowing people to have a good time.
In the context of the discussion, Bedford made an innocuous statement, not to anyone in particular, but talking to himself about what makes science fiction great. He simply uttered the words,”If you write sf honey, gotta get the science right.”
Most of us reading along will nod our heads along with that statement. Of course, the science is important to at least maintain a certain veneer of accuracy. But for a woman in the audience, Bedford’s words triggered her.
She started ranting about sexism, about the word “honey” as if it were some kind of insult. Even though nearly all of the new modern classic authors mentioned by the panelists were women, somehow women couldn’t get their fair shake with this panel. A long time champion of fandom, Barbara Landsman described the incident: “I couldn’t believe it. My heart started pounding and I knew nobody else was going to say anything. When I caught Benford’s eye I knew that I was just going to do something.Somebody had to stop her. But it didn’t work. She came in there with a political agenda. She wasn’t happy with anything that anybody on that panel said.”
But she didn’t stop. She took over the panel. Ruined the atmosphere. Ruined several fans’ times who were just there to debate who’s the greatest of the great authors. This is what the religion of social justice and their alt-left extremists do wherever they go. You can’t just have a convention. You can’t just have a panel talking about science fiction. They have to make a scene, they have to destroy the fun.
It’s unfortunate, because while most convention committees have given into this political terrorism that festers in sci-fi fandom, LosCon actually had a slate of panels mostly FREE from identity politics. Other than inviting Literally Wu, it seemed like a pretty good slate. It was just going to be a fun weekend. But people remember when their fun gets ruined by these crazies, and the people stay away from conventions. I don’t know what occurred at years past, perhaps such outbursts or commentaries were commonplace, but LosCon is suffering now due to this ever-outraged political tyranny. Their attendance was reported as low to begin with.
This kind of energy doesn’t help. Readers want fun. Fans want fun. If they can’t get that, they leave. It’s a simple statement in every scenario. In this case, people wanted to listen to what an accomplished author like Mr. Bedford thought qualified as a “modern master” of sci-fi. They wanted to think of their favorite books, not get riddled with some feminist rant.
The scenario escalated, and, according to one of the greatest authors working in the field today, David Weber, “someone with the con had felt justified in marching Greg Benford out of a con — out of a SIGNING, in fact — and telling him he he had to leave the con immediately because of an alleged incident in a panel discussion.”
Someone, probably the shrieking woman herself, went to the con comm and demanded his removal. And like every instance when someone is accused, they send security to deal with someone. I can’t fault the con comm too much, and it does turn out that they rescinded that decision, but the heartache, the pain, the hassle they caused Mr. Benford is unacceptable in any context. This is what happens when the feminists get out of control– because they are in control of these conventions at the end of the day.
It’s going to be hard for us all to get back into fun in 2018. The political is the personal now, and vice versa. The rabid fake news media has sent us all into spirals of anger and panic over everything. Nothing can be left untouched. We even have a man who is probably going to be the next president of SFWA calling Tolkien “racist” in recent days. The absurdity of this kind of behavior from the leaders of the field is to blame, and it’s why so many reasonable people walk away, turn to comic cons and indie books on Amazon, rather than deal with these dying establishments.
For Mr. Benford, it settled down, but did anyone really do anything to repay him for his time and effort he put into the convention? The man has been quiet and saintly through this, and he deserves your reader support at the very least.
This is just another example in the culture war we’ve been fighting since I called out a convention in 2017 for their absurd identity politics, but we’re here to Make Science Fiction Fun Again. No one tells me what I can and can’t write. No one tells me what I can and can’t do. And I’m going to bring readers fun, and when I speak, I’ll bring fans and audiences fun as well. Ain’t no harpy ranting about words like “honey” gonna stop me.
Make sure to pre-order my short fiction collection, Make Science Fiction Fun Again. Out Thursday. It’s bound to trigger the SJWs so badly they might not want to inhabit this planet anymore.
This is disgusting. They win because we never make a fuss and so they get away with bullshit like this.
‘They’ win because what Benford did violated social mannerisms (namely, how to address a woman he doesn’t know) that he should’ve know about decades ago. Nothing more, and nothing less.
It’s getting to the point that any author who goes to a Con probably needs to get a psych eval. Because it’s become nothing but an endless political game. It matters not that the con rescinded its decision. They made a decision without all the facts and acted on it, sullying the reputation of a master writer and the con itself. That’s all most people not deeply into the event will remember.
I know you like attending cons, but I just can’t see any value in it anymore.
Yeah. I won’t go to one without my wife or some back up/witnesses at this point. It’s absurd but these are the days we live in.
Nobody will miss you if you don’t go to them, and if you or other like you want the ‘fun’ you think and feel is missing, you can always set up your own con to act and carry on as you like (however, if you allow people like Benford to carry on as they’ve [likely] been doing in previous decades at World Cons and other literary sci-fi cons, you might find it hard to get women to come to it.)
These people are evil.
What a coinkydink, ‘these’ people (probably) say the same about people like you. 😉 The concom of this con wasn’t/aren’t ‘evil’, they were acting according to a complaint about safety. Perhaps the concom was overzealous, but the concom has to act on a complaint if somebody feels unsafe.
The entire con committee isn’t fit to shine Benford’s shoes.
Yikes, that’s terrible, but not surprising in an age when a liberal female author gets ejected from a con for being “pro-Nazi.”
I hope Benford didn’t attempt to apologize. When I’m famous (which will be soon) I have vowed to never apologize. Because, as VD puts it, “SJW’s always double down.”
The lunatics are running the asylum.
^Since when?🙄
I am honestly afraid to attend anymore, despite the fact I’m a semi regular, because I tend to call people sweetie.
SWEETIE?!?! OMG YOU ARE LITERALLY HITLER!
A woman at the coffee shop called me “honey” yesterday. I am literally STILL shaking.
Already contacted my lawyer, state rep, and therapist.
You shouldn’t be calling anybody those kind of endearments unless you know the person (man or woman) intimately. At best, Benford should have used the word ‘sister’ or lady.
HE. WASN’T. TALKING. TO. ANYONE. He was giving an example, as I understand it, of what he COULD say.
No, they DO deserve shame for not investigating before acting. And for acting that way at all.
You have an unidentified problem and you need to remove someone. Do you remove:
A: One of the biggest names in the field, award winning, best selling, who is certainly a draw for dozens or even hundreds of your attendees, or
2) Some blithering femorrhoid who is obviously outraged because she’s a perpetually failed wannabe who wants “feminist” science in her fiction, whatever the @#$ that is?
Choose carefully.
Also, I didn’t realize that hack nobody was going to be SFWA president. But then, after 8 years of membership I realized the entire organization was utterly worthless, and that dozens of the biggest names don’t belong, and some of the older BNWs only belong because they bought life memberships, and give not a crap about it.
You do know that such feminist literary sci-fi most likely exists, right? You neocons are something else, again.
I’m not going to defend what happened to Benford, but all of the same your hyperbole-laden statement sounds over the top.
By forcing them to destroy the Hugos by predictably doubling down, Vox has gifted us with the thrice Hugo’d one. No old white man in fandom, even the nominal focuses of said fandom, will be safe from banishment to “ist”-island. Speak no ill of the full savage or you must be educated, any push back on your education process is harrassment and prima facie evidence of being a racist.
Calling a woman ‘honey’ when they’re not your wife, girlfriend, daughter, or niece is a big faux pas, and shouldn’t be done.Again, I don’t approve of what happened to Mr. Benford, but he’s in the wrong and he has to deal with it, like it or not.
Sorry babe you aren’t respecting the culture of different parts of the country or the world sweetie, I mean honestly darlin’ you can’t just dismiss all my beloved honeypies and dump on their traditional speech patterns you sweet summer child. The joyless grey is in your heart and mind and I hope sunshine penetrates soon.
So … not ignoring the incident with Bedford, terrilble and stupid though it is … nevertheless I am left wondering this about the panel: _who_ are the modern sci-fi greats in the same rank as Heinlein, McCaffrey, and Pournelle? Because, no offense to the host here (whose novels/stories I’ve quite liked) or any of the other indies of today (whose novels/stories I’ve quite liked) … but Heinlein? Asimov? Pournelle? Clarke? Niven? Pohl? McCaffery? Bester? Dick?
Best I can come up with is Stephenson.
http://delarroz.com/2018/11/30/who-are-the-modern-masters-of-sci-fi/
My grandfather graduated from West Point in ’32 and stayed in the army for 30 years before retiring and running for Congress. He fought in Europe throughout the war mostly with 3rd Army. His friends always called him honey because he refused to use his first name and with a middle name like his, it was honey or king.
I’ve never been to a con despite being a fan for over 50 years and I will never go to a con. I think if authors were smart they’d simply get together and boycott them all until the con people pulled their heads out of their asses and banned intolerant shrews, rascist bigots like Jemesin and the other haters instead of making the con something like going with one’s mother to the church christmas social.
This is the post that broke me. I…got nothing. What has happened to this world? My only complaint was the bit about science. I’m more into Pataphysical science fiction, so for me, science is not really that important. But for God’s sake, I wouldn’t become a triggered cry baby!
A POV of somebody that was on the Concom of this particular convention:
http://file770.com/loscon-45-incident-what-happened-and-the-committees-update/comment-page-1/#comment-927394
If that’s your choice, then fine, you don’t have to, but while at a convention or any other social gathering, you don’t ever call a woman you don’t know (or anybody else, male or female) a pet name like ‘baby’,’honey’, ‘darling’/’darlin’, ‘sweetie’, ‘cookie’, ‘angel’ unless you know them intimately. That’s been plain basic manners for quite a long time as long as I or anybody else’s been alive, and Benford should’ve know that from when he was a boy.
If there were a ton of authors as old as Benford still around, that might or could work, but authors of today are likely to agree with what the convention committee of this con did in having him kicked out (of course, as somebody advised Jay ‘The Tron Guy’ Maynard once,he and others like him can always set up their own convention, where they can act like they want to and be who they want to without having to hear or see what they despise (although getting others to attend-younger people in particular-might not be easy.)
What happened to your grandfather in WWII was what happened to your grandfather in WWII; obviously nobody in his platoon gaybashed him for having the nickname ‘honey’ or made his life hard otherwise (and obviously they could’ve done so back in those days, so he was lucky in that regard.) What happened here in the late 2010’s was a woman feeling offended by being called a pet name by an older man in a dismissive way (and most likely with the feeling of being mansplained to), and she wasn’t going to put up with it, so she told the con staff, and Benford got ejected, Then was then, and now is now, and people like yourself and Benford have to get used to that fact and deal.
“While at a convention or any other social gathering, you don’t ever ….”
Well that’s your personal view, but what if I happen to enjoy being called “darling” ? What if the casual use of such harmless terms of endearment amongst strangers is part of my culture ? Where I grew up it’s perfectly common for either sex to refer to the other using terms such as “love”. It’s a meaningless word that denotes friendliness, nothing more.
Is it reasonable to throw a person out of a convention for merely lacking “basic manners”, as you put it ? Would you therefore eject someone for not saying please or thank you ? Would you eject someone for casually referring to a male stranger as “friend” or “buddy” ?
Can you also explain if there’s a statute of limitation on such offense-taking, because I vaguely a girl I didn’t know greeted me with a “hey, handsome” when I was at a party in my late teens and I’m wonder if it’s too late to track her down and get her cancelled ?
More generally, why are you so intent on pushing your own cultural standards onto everyone around you ? Isn’t diversity supposed to be a positive thing, and if so why should I bow to your authoritarian view of how everyone should behave ?
Hello, Lefty:
Wow, such ignorance and arrogance all together in one place! Let’s start unpacking this, shall we? You say that someone your ELDER, and MUCH more successful in your field, should toe the line of SJW femorrhoids (Thank you, Mr Michael! 😎😎) who are too busy pissing and moaning over NOTHING than taking an opportunity to learn from one of the acknowledged masters in the field! You said:
“If that’s your choice, then fine, you don’t have to, but while at a convention or any other social gathering, you don’t ever call a woman you don’t know (or anybody else, male or female) a pet name like ‘baby’,’honey’, ‘darling’/’darlin’, ‘sweetie’, ‘cookie’, ‘angel’ unless you know them intimately. That’s been plain basic manners for quite a long time as long as I or anybody else’s been alive, and Benford should’ve know that from when he was a boy.”
Primus: Dr. Benford CERTAINLY is older than you are; he’s older than I am, and I am CERTAIN that I am older than you are. Your assumption of “plain basic manners” dates only from the past few years; as a Southron Man, the notion of gallantries and polite endearments would have been, and in much of the culture, STILL ARE, quite common. As the junior, it is YOUR responsibility to show respect and deference to your elder’s culture, not his to yours.
Secundus: The femorrhoid was not being addressed; by the description, he was speaking to himself. The femorrhoid had a chip on her shoulder the size of Rhode Island; to favour the convention, she should have been bounced out on her arrogant, entitled ARSE. How you can defend this is beyond me.
So what we have here is an arrogant, entitled femorrhoid who had the unbridled TEMERITY to ruin a board discussion for EVERYONE because “she wasn’t being respected….” by one of the great writers in the field. Somehow, you find it appropriate to defend the same femorrhoid rather than the SUCCESSFUL Nebula award winner. Explain yourself, sir. The ones who need to learn to deal are the ones like you and her; there are cultures other than your own, and they are no less valid because they do not cater to your prejudices. You trumpet diversity; the most important diversity is a diversity of IDEAS and thoughts, a diversity which you sorely lack.
A ‘diversity of ideas’ is not calling a woman a pet name in a disparaging manner (and no, I’m not the ignorant one, you are.
I don’t give a flying frak how old Benford is, manners are manners, and if he can’t treat a lady with them, then he should be reprimanded for not doing so. I also don’t give a flying frak about him being from the South, either, or what they do in the South; what happens there and is done there, should stay there. Also, the woman isn’t ‘an arrogant, entitled femorrhoid’ but a woman, and she doesn’t have to be called a pet name if she doesn’t want to be called one. As I said above, you, everybody else commenting here, Del Arroz, and Benford are on the wrong side of history here, and aren’t going to win this round.
I’ve just finished reading TIMESCAPE and if you honestly believe that this sexist and poorly written trash is worthy of respect, then I can only assume that you’re just as much of a misogynistic pig as Benford is and that you likely unbuckled your pants along with Benford when the bookstore clerk surrendered to sexual harassment or the Japanese wife — described as “thin” and “attractive” and given ZERO agency whatsoever — entered the narrative to be ogled at. No amount of commitment to physics (the book’s ONLY strength) can excuse Benford’s abominable misogyny and his tin ear for dialogue and other human beings. I look forward to writing this motherfucker’s obituary. You, sir, have no taste and no standards and no decency. I’m certain that a mook like you chokes his chicken to Tucker Carlson and the “good ol’ days” — given the way you paint this critic as a “shrieking woman.” What’s the matter, Jon? A woman raised her voice when a wildly overrated sexist windbag belittled her? Heaven forfend, you worthless fossil.