NOTE: I’ve since changed my views and retracted many of the things I said in this blog post. You can find a link to the retraction here.

Oh, boy, has there been a lot of drama in the science fiction & fantasy community recently.  From the trouble with the SFWA bulletin to the revelation of accusations of serial sexual harassment by a senior editor at Tor, it seems like the whole community (or at least, the part that sees itself as part of a wider community) is up in arms.  And while a lot of the response has been balanced and civil, I’ve also seen some things that I find troubling.

For the benefit of the doubt, let me just say that I support the people who are coming forward with stories of harassment and abuse.  It’s clear that this is a problem, and that it needs to be addressed in a way that brings about real change.  Also, I agree that the community has a history of demeaning or undervaluing the women within it, making it a lot more difficult for female writers to earn the same level of respect as their male counterparts.  That, too, needs to change.

But guys … can’t we get along?  Can’t we come together and get back to what this community is really about–sharing and telling good, fun stories?

Don’t get me wrong–I’m not trying to minimize any of the problems causing this drama.  They need to be fixed, and it’s going to take time to do so.  But are they going to become the focus of everything we talk about, or are we going to turn back to the things that unite us, and pull together as a stronger and better community than we were to start out with?

Right now, I get the impression that the majority of members who are active in the SF&F community mean well and want it to be a welcoming space.  They may have their faults, but they’re working on them.  And most of their faults are not causing direct harm to others.

Then there’s a small but outspoken minority who wants change, wants it now, and wants it so badly that they see problems everywhere.  Many of them have legitimate concerns, and people from the less outspoken majority are coming out and confirming that.  But many of them are dangerously overzealous–and since we have in this community some of the most imaginative minds in the world, it doesn’t take much for people to start projecting onto people they disagree with, or reading things into comments that aren’t actually there, or seeing those who question or disagree as The Enemy.

I cannot control how others perceive me.  I cannot speak without risking that someone is going to misconstrue my intent and feel “silenced,” or “afraid,” or whatever.  I can reach out to people privately, though, so if you feel like I’m part of the problem, please contact me and let me know.

This whole thing reminds me of my time from ’03 to ’05 as a Mormon missionary.  Oh boy, was there drama.  Imagine a couple hundred sexually repressed, 19-21 year-old boys (and a couple dozen young women) in a rigidly structured environment, with tremendous emotional pressures and very little direct supervision.  There was drama, and I hated it.  The best times on my mission were when I never saw anyone but my companion (Mormon missionaries live and work together in pairs) and maybe the four or six other members of the district once a week or so.

But the way things are playing out right now, I wonder if the outspoken minority is so determined to reshape the SF&F community in their own image that they’re tearing it apart.  Orson Scott Card, for example, has been tarred and feathered multiple times and thrown out of the community on a rail.  And yet, Ender’s Game is still one of the best (and bestselling) science fiction books ever written.  Mike Resnick, for all his chauvinism, has written a lot of really good books and stories too.  Jim Frenkel, for all his creepiness, has been instrumental in bringing us great books from Tor.

Does this excuse their faults?  Of course not.  But guys, these authors and editors aren’t The Enemy–they’re part of the community just as much as you are.  And you deal with offenders within the community differently than you do with offenders who are not.

A lot of people are congratulating themselves and saying that we’re doing a good job rooting out these problems and dealing with them in an open and reasonable way.  And to an extent, I think that’s true. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned from all this drama, it’s that the SF&F community is a lot more fractious than I’d previously realized, and that the ties that bind us really aren’t that strong at all.  And that makes me wonder if it’s better just to forget the whole thing–forget the conventions, forget SFWA, forget the major blogs–and just do my own thing independently of everyone else.

And honestly, it would appear that a large number (perhaps even a majority) of SF&F writers are doing just that, especially the self-published ones who don’t really care about courting publishers or winning awards.  For these guys, it’s all about the readers–and isn’t that the way it should be?