Tag: fisking

Without AI, I would probably not be writing

I recently got another anti-AI one-star review that I want to pull apart, because it’s pertinent to what I want to say. I actually came up with the title for this post before I received the one-star review, so I’m not just fisking this one for the sake of fisking. With that said, though, there is definitely a lot to pull apart.

I was prepared to rate this as 2 stars. It is repetitive with no real character depth or development and a sincere lack of dynamic or engaging writing. 

Two stars… so magnanimous! In all seriousness, though, it’s worth pointing out that in spite of all the book’s flaws, she did read it all the way through. That’s important for later.

Then I read the “author” note at the end of the book that was defending their use of generative AI in their writing process…. not only that but also seemingly insulting other writers who are anti-AI claiming that readers dont seem to care about it.

You know what’s insulting to any author, whether or not they are “anti-AI”? Putting scare quotes around the word “author” when referring to them Though I suspect that she did that on purpose, fully intending to insult me, whereas I did not intentionally insult anyone. For the record, this is the passage from the author’s note that she claims is “insulting” to authors by saying that “readers dont [sic] seem to care about [AI writing]”:

Besides which, after sharing The Riches of Xulthar with lots of readers, I’ve found that most of the rage and vitriol against AI-assisted writing is on the writer side of things, not the reader side.

The other thing is that I was not trying to “defend” my pro-AI stance through the author’s note, just explaining my writing process and sharing the story behind the story like I do in the author’s notes I write in the back of all my books. That’s not me being “defensive,” that just me sharing my story.

But there is something profoundly narcissistic about the way this reader is framing her review. Because I stated something about readers that contradicts her anti-AI worldview, I must be intentionally “insulting” her (or the anti-AI authors she’s white knighting for, which amounts to the same thing). Because I wrote about how I used AI to help write the book, I must be “defending” myself against her anti-AI views. This kind of narcissism can only really come from someone who lives in an echo chamber and is not used to having their worldview challenged.

Well Joe, you are wrong. This book was lifeless and dull and the use of AI showed. Everything was one dimensinal and flat. Word choises were even static. We (readers) get it… FMC had auburn hair. There are other words besides auburn to describe it….

I’m not going to deny, there is some legitimate criticism here. Rescuer’s Reward was one of my earlier AI-assisted books, when I was still experimenting a lot and learning how to incorporate AI into my creative process while still preserving my voice and writing multi-“dimensinal” [sic] characters and stories. So it doesn’t surprise me all that much that I missed the mark with this particular reader for this particular book. Lesson learned. Thanks for the feedback and the useful data point.

With all of that said, though… I can’t help but notice that she read the whole book.

I have yet to hear a compelling AI argument in the reralm of artistic expression and this “book” just exemplified everything yet again. No heart. No depth. Not good.

This is the crux of the issue, and the reason I wanted to frame this post as a line-by-line response to this review. Is there “a compelling AI argument in the reralm [sic] of artistic expression”? Or is any author who uses AI committing an unforgivable transgression against their art?

Here’s the thing: most of the other authors I know gave up writing a long time ago. We all started out with bright-eyed dreams about telling great stories and creating great art, but the hard truth is that it’s almost impossible to make it as an author.

There are many reasons for this: people don’t read very much in today’s culture (I personally blame the public school system for that), and the publishing industry has always been brutally rapacious and exploitive of writers (just read The Untold Story of Books by Michael Castleman—it’s a really fantastic history of the written word).

But the writing itself is also very hard. There’s a reason why even many succesful writers are like this guy, single and living in what amounts to a glorified shack. Most of my writing friends quit when they got married and starting having kids. I sincerely hope that they’re just on a 20+ year hiatus, and plan to get back to writing again someday, because some of the stuff they wrote was really, really good (I’m looking at you, Nathan Major!) But sadly, that won’t make up for the stuff they would have written, but never did.

My wife and I just had our third child. Writing with small children is very difficult, especially when your wife has a full-time job. I love them all to death, though. If I had to choose between being a single writer, or putting my writing on hold for 20+ years and having to restart my whole writing career from zero, just to be able to raise a family, I wouldn’t hesitate for a moment to make that choice. But it would put a huge burden of guilt on my wife, because my writing was one of the key things that drew her to me back when we were dating. And while our marriage is probably strong enough to survive that, I can’t deny that it would be an incredible strain.

Without AI, I probably would be facing this choice right now. Even though I had managed to streamline my writing process in the last few years, I’ve never been an especially fast writer. Without AI, it took me about a year to write each novel—and that’s before all the demands on my time and energy that come with having small children.

But AI has enabled me to continue to pursue my career and my art, even through this period of life. Not only does this help me to be a better husband and father (which is ultimately the most important thing), but it also means that my readers don’t have to wonder about the things I would have written, but never did. I can write those books now. I can give those stories to the world.

I’m not talking about AI slop. I’m talking about incorporating AI into the creative process deeply enough that it enhances, rather than replaces, my human creativity. We don’t have to be afraid of AI. It makes so many things possible—including running a profitable indie author business while raising (and soon homeschooling) 3+ small children. But it takes a lot of practice to get to that point. And generative AI is still so new that I don’t think there’s anyone who’s truly mastered the art of AI-assisted writing.

My Sea Mage Cycle books are mostly for practice. They’re meant to be fun, light reading. If it gives my readers a satisfying respite from all the doom and gloom in the world these days, I consider that book a success. The experience of writing each of them has helped me to be a better AI-assisted writer. And while the earlier ones may read like AI slop, that won’t be the case for long.

Fisking 1-star reviews bashing AI

They say that authors should never respond to one-star reviews. That’s generally good advice, and for most of my career, I’ve studiously kept it. However, I’ve recently begun to get a new kind of one-star review that baffles me—reviews that essentially say: “the book was good, but it was written with AI so I hate it.”

Here’s an example:

This book is written with AI. Incredibly disappointing as a reader to give a book/author a chance and then to get to the end of the book only for the “author” to then announce the AI card. If I could give zero stars, I would for this alone. I also didn’t appreciate that this use of AI was not announced until the ending Author’s Note. If “authors” are going to cut corners and put their name to computer-generated mush, they should be willing to put that information on the front cover. The book struggled to find its pace, and some parts read as though they were written for a child’s short story competition while others felt as though the writer was snorting crushed up DVDs of Pirates of the Caribbean as they wrote.

Let’s break it down:

This book is written with AI. Incredibly disappointing as a reader to give a book/author a chance and then to get to the end of the book only for the “author” to then announce the AI card.

Yes… but I can’t help but notice that you got to the end of it. In other words, you finished the book. Also, from the way you tell it, it seems that you didn’t realize the book was written with AI until you got to the very end. So based on your own behavior, it doesn’t seem that quality was the issue.

I also didn’t appreciate that this use of AI was not announced until the ending Author’s Note. If “authors” are going to cut corners and put their name to computer-generated mush, they should be willing to put that information on the front cover.

Okay… but if my book was just “computer-generated mush,” why did you finish it? And why were you surprised when you learned that it was written with AI-assistance?

I can understand the objection to books that were written solely with AI, with little to no human input. But that’s not how I write my AI-assisted books. Instead, I outline them thoroughly beforehand, write and refine a series of meticulously detailed prompts (usually using Sudowrite), and generate multiple drafts, combining the best parts of them to make a passable AI draft. And then I rewrite the whole thing in my own words, using the AI draft as a loose guide with no copy-pasting.

Why would I go through so much trouble? Because of how the AI drafting stage gives me a bird’s eye view of the book, allowing me to identify and fix major story issues before they metastasize and give me writer’s block. Before AI, that’s where 80% of my writer’s block came from, and it often derailed my projects for months, so that it took me well over a year to write a full-length novel. But with AI, I’m no longer so focused on the page that I lose sight of the forest for the trees. So even though generating and revising a solid AI draft adds a couple more steps to the process, it’s worth it for the time and trouble that it saves.

That’s the way I use generative AI in my writing process. But there are many other ways—and I hate to break it to you, but most authors use AI in one way or another. If an author uses Grammarly to fix their spelling and grammar, should they disclose that on the cover? If they use MS Word? What if they used a chatbot to brainstorm story ideas, but went on to write it entirely themselves? Should that also be disclosed?

The book struggled to find its pace, and some parts read as though they were written for a child’s short story competition while others felt as though the writer was snorting crushed up DVDs of Pirates of the Caribbean as they wrote.

Yes… but again, I can’t help but notice that you finished the book. And after you finished it, you were surprised to learn that it was written with AI. So with all due respect, I’m going to call BS on your objections here. I think you only decided you hated the book after you learned it was written with AI, and you came up with these objections after the fact. Whatever.

I think a lot of the people who object to AI are really just scared and angry. They claim to have principled, ethical objections to the technology, but few of them follow through to implement that principled stance into every area of their lives. After all, if you use Grammarly, Google Docs, or MS Word, you are using generative AI just as surely as I am using ChatGPT and Sudowrite. For most people, the ethical objections are just a smokescreen for their general fear of change. They’re fine with embracing the convenience the technology offers them in their own personal lives, but they insist that everyone else—including me—live according to their principles, no matter how inconvenient or difficult it may be.

As an example of that, check out this one-star review:

The arts! Whether visual, performance, or literary—my haloed experience has been the act of creating and sharing a connection to the profound or sublime. Why, then, would any artist—musician, dancer, sculptor, painter, or author—offload (abdicate) the act of creation to AI? Process versus product. Mr. Vasicek included an afterword for this volume, describing his workflow and the efficiency of collaboration with AI: a 6,624-word day! another volume completed! Mr. Vasicek obviously owns the skills to weave rich character development and scenes. Perhaps Mr. Vasicek’s AI collaboration explains why these characters, the plot, the narrative—and subsequently, the entire story— are so flat and undeveloped. Although his lead male shows some undeveloped promise, the mother’s too-oft used “dear” and “my love,” and the daughter’s clutching at her mother’s apron are cringe-inducing. Perhaps Mr. Vasicek might eschew AI-assisted writing, seeking a future of quality over quantity.

Let’s break it down:

The arts! Whether visual, performance, or literary—my haloed experience has been the act of creating and sharing a connection to the profound or sublime. Why, then, would any artist—musician, dancer, sculptor, painter, or author—offload (abdicate) the act of creation to AI?

Because for some of us, writing is more than a “haloed experience”—it’s an actual job. It’s what we do for a living. And if you want to do your best work, you need to use the best tools. We used to build houses with plaster and lath and wrought-iron nails, using hand tools and locally-sourced lumber. But today, you’d be a fool not to use power tools and materials sourced from a building supply store, or your local Home Depot. If that makes your building experience less profound or sublime, so be it.

Process versus product. Mr. Vasicek included an afterword for this volume, describing his workflow and the efficiency of collaboration with AI: a 6,624-word day! another volume completed!

I’m not gonna lie: there is a certain degree of tension between art-as-product and art-for-art’s-sake. But the two are not mutually exclusive. A house can still be a beautiful work of art, without taking as long as a cathedral to build it. Likewise, a book can still be a beautiful work of art, without taking as long as Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings.

Again, you’re trying to pidgeon-hole me into your “haloed” idea of what a “true artist” should be. Which would make it absolutely impossible for me to make a living at this craft. If all of us writers followed that path, there are a lot of wonderful books that would never get written. And I doubt that the overall quality of the books that do get written would rise.

Mr. Vasicek obviously owns the skills to weave rich character development and scenes.

Now we get to the interesting part. I checked this reviewer’s history, and this was the only review they’ve written for any of my books. Therefore, I can only assume that this is the only book of mine that they’ve read. But if that’s the case, how do they know that I have “the skills to weave rich character development and scenes”? If the book I wrote with AI was pure trash, why would they say that I obviously have some skill?

Once again, we’ve got a case of “I enjoyed this book, but it’s written with AI so I hate it.” In other words, it’s not the book itself that you hate, so much as the way I wrote it. You object to the idea of authors using AI, not to what they actually write with AI.

Perhaps Mr. Vasicek’s AI collaboration explains why these characters, the plot, the narrative—and subsequently, the entire story— are so flat and undeveloped. Although his lead male shows some undeveloped promise, the mother’s too-oft used “dear” and “my love,” and the daughter’s clutching at her mother’s apron are cringe-inducing.

Finally, some specific and legitimate criticism. And while I do think there’s a degree of retroactively looking for faults after enjoying the book, I’m totally willing to own that these criticisms are valid. This particular book (The Widow’s Child) was one of my first AI-assisted books, and I was still learning to use these AI tools as I was writing it. I did the best I could at the time, but if I were to write it today, I could probably do a lot better, smoothing out the annoying AI-isms that you’ve pointed out here.

But the book is currently sitting at 4.4 stars on Amazon (4.1 on Goodreads). And the other readers do not share your objections. Here is another review, pulled from the same book:

Since waiting a year or more to read the next book in a sequel is hard on my stress levels, I’m liking this AI. It means talented authors like Joe Vasicek can churn out an outline faster. Then he can bring in his talented ideas, such as the content of this heart-stopping adventure of The Widow’s Child, to fill out the nitty gritty in record time.

Clearly, it’s not the case that all (or even most) readers feel the same way about AI as you do.

Perhaps Mr. Vasicek might eschew AI-assisted writing, seeking a future of quality over quantity.

Why can’t we have both? Why can’t we have quantity with quality? Why can’t AI make us more creative, instead of replacing our human creativity?

This is all giving me flashbacks to the big debate between tradition vs. indie publishing, back in the early 2010s. Back then, the debate was between purists who said that indie publishing would destroy literature by flooding the market with crappy books. Indies argued that removing the industry middlemen would create a more dynamic market that would give readers more choices and allow more writers to make a living. Both were right to some degree, and both were also wrong about some things. In the end, we reached a middle ground where “hybrid publishing” became the norm.

The same kind of debate is happening right now between human-only purists and AI-assisted writers. The biggest difference is dead internet theory. In the early 2010s, the ratio of bots to humans on the internet was still low enough to allow for a lively debate. Today, there’s so much bot-driven outrage on the internet that most of us are just quietly doing our own thing and avoiding the debate.

That same bot- and algorithm-driven outrage is driving a lot of peole to be irrationally angry or afraid of AI. With that said, I can understand why so many people are upset. And I do think there are a lot of valid criticisms about this new technology, including its environmental impact, copyright considerations, how the models were trained, and the societal impact it’s already starting to have. But if we don’t have an honest and good-faith debate about these issues, we can’t solve any of them. And we can’t have a good-faith debate if one side is coming at it from a place of irrational anger or fear.

In any case, I find it super annoying when readers who clearly found some value or enjoyment in my books turn around and give it a one-star review merely because they don’t like how I used AI. And at the risk of going viral and soliciting more one-star anti-AI reviews, I think its worth voicing my views on the subject and opening that debate. So what are your thoughts on the subject? How do you feel about using AI as a tool to help write books? Can we have quantity with quality? Can AI help us to be more creative, not just more productive? What has been your experience?

Why I won’t be watching Amazon’s Rings of Power

Believe it or not, I actually did not have an opinion on Amazon’s latest boondoggle, the Lord of the Rings TV series called “Rings of Power,” until about three days ago. I expected it to be a disappointment, partially because I expected it to be woke, but mostly because all the major TV series seem to suck these days and I didn’t have any reason to believe that this one would be an exception. Amazon doesn’t strike me as being as insufferably woke as Disney or Netflix, though I did hear a lot of things about their Wheel of Time series (didn’t watch it, just because I haven’t read the books yet and plan to read them soon), but when people started complaining about the wokeness in Rings of Power, it didn’t surprise me either.

With that said, it seems that most people aren’t complaining that the series is overly woke, but that it’s just badly written. Kind of like how the thing that made Star Wars VIII: The Last Jedi was so terrible just because the storytelling was so bad. A lot of people also hated it for being woke, but I’ve also heard it argued that the movie wasn’t woke at all, and if you really dig into the underlying message you’ll find that it actually repudiates many key woke tenets. But whether or not that’s true, it was just an objectively terrible movie, with plot holes large enough to drive a Death Star through and protagonists so unlikeable they make Jabba the Hutt look like a sympathetic figure. But I digress.

So anyways, I didn’t really have an opinion about Amazon’s Rings of Power yet, and was actually planning to watch the first two episodes… until I read the show’s official response to all the negative reviews it’s been getting.

Just for fun, let’s fisk it together:

We, the cast of Rings of Power, stand together in absolute solidarity

“Solidarity” is a lefty word. The left tends to favor certain words more than others (for example, they could have used “support” here instead). Also, they’re constantly trying to twist words in order to give them some advantage, however slight it might be. So right away, this word choice was a yellow flag for me.

and against the relentless racism,

Yeah, but is it really “racism” though?

threats, harassment, and abuse

Again, I can’t take these accusations at face value because most of the time, “harassment” is just lefty-speak for “someone who disagrees with me.” These people claim that speech is violence, and then turn around and use violence to try to silence—or worse, compell—the speech of everyone else.

Also, what about the fans who came to this show in good faith and were genuinely disappointed? Every book, movie, game, or TV show gets at least a few one-star reviews. Even the best ones do. Some people just have different tastes. Are you seriously lumping all of those fans into the same box with the trolls and the racists?

some of our castmates of color

Every time I read “X of color” now, I inwardly hear “colored X.” The two phrases mean the exact same thing, but one of them signals woke virtue, while the other will get you banned from the Nebulas hours after they name you a Grand Master (and against the express objections of the supposed victim, no less).

But honestly, “people of color” is just the lefty way of saying “people who aren’t white.” Which is often just another way to be racist against white people.

are being subjected to on a daily basis. We refuse to ignore it or tolerate it.

Do you remember when “tolerance” was supposed to be a virtue, and anyone who was “intolerant,” for any reason whatsoever, was considered a terrible person? But one of the key tenets of wokeism is that rules that apply to non-woke people don’t apply to you.

Also, whatever happened to being “diverse”? Because if diversity is truly the goal, then there are going to be people who genuinely hate your show—and that’s okay. It doesn’t make them racist. It just means that they have a diversity of tastes.

So once again, why are you calling everyone who hates the show a racist, abusive harasser?

JRR Tolkien created a world which, by definition, is multi-cultural.

He created a fantasy world with a lot of different cultures. That’s completely different from being multi-cultural, or promoting the ideology of multi-culturalism.

I’ve only read Lord of the Rings twice, but I don’t remember it being political or ideological. Why are you trying to make it out to fit your own political views? Have you read the books at all?

A world in which free peoples from different races and cultures join together, in fellowship, to defeat the forces of evil.

Yeah, but that’s not multi-culturalism. When the US invaded Iraq in 2003, we made a coalition with many different “free peoples from different races and cultures,” but that wasn’t multi-cultural because 1) we organized the coalition outside of, and actually in contravention of, the UN Security Council, and 2) the multi-culturalists condemned the invasion at the time, and still condemn it to this day.

It sounds to me like these people are twisting the word “multi-cultural” into pretzels to suit their own rhetorical ends. Which is typical of how leftists twist language.

Rings of Power reflects that. Our world has never been all white, fantasy has never been all white, Middle-earth is not all white.

Actually, Tolkien’s explicit goal with creating Middle Earth was to provide England with a founding mythology that was free of all Norman French influence. So that’s debatable.

But more importantly, who ever said that the goal is to make Middle-Earth, or the fantasy genre as a whole, “all white”? Are you seriously implying that everyone who hates Rings of Power is somehow a white supremacist?

BIPOC belong in Middle-earth and they are here to stay.

Yep, that’s exactly what you’re saying. Everyone who hates Rings of Power, for whatever reason, is actually just a white supremacist. Way to piss all over the Tolkien fans who just don’t like your show.

Finally, all our love and fellowship go out to the fans supporting us,

…but not to the Tolkien fans who don’t like the show. They can fuck right off.

especially fans of colour

…because if you don’t like our show, you obviously aren’t black.

who are themselves being attacked simply for existing in this fandom.

As you have just demonstrated by literally accusing all of the disappointed Tolkien fans—including the black fans—of being white supremacists. How dare those people exist!

Accusation = projection = confession with these people. In every case. No exception.

We see you,

No, you don’t.

your bravery,

No, you really don’t.

It’s much braver to speak up and be honest about what you think about shows like this, especially when all of the Big Tech and social media sites censor you and falsely accuse you of being a white supremacist for your opinions.

and endless creativity. Your cosplays, fancams, fan art, and

In all fairness to the publicity folks who wrote this, they did use the Oxford comma properly. So kudos for that.

insights make this community a richer place and remind us of our purpose.

The inverse of this is that when you call everyone who disagrees with you a white supremacist, your community becomes a poorer place, your creativity dies, and you ultimately forget your purpose. Which is exactly what is happening right now with every corner of the arts that has gone woke.

You are valid,

Once again, the left seems to favor this word. Not sure why.

you are loved,

Sorry, but I don’t turn to corporations or TV shows for love and affection. When I do need love and affection, I turn to the actual people in my life, thank you very much.

and you belong.

Unless you disagree with us, of course.

You are an integral part of the LOTR family—

Fandom is many things, but it is not and should not be a substitution for family. And frankly, given how toxic most fandoms have become, if I needed to find a new family, why would I choose such a dysfunctional one?

thanks for having our backs.

And thanks for stabbing us in our backs, you woke corporate shills.

So yeah, I won’t be watching Rings of Power at all now. Any show that turns on their fans and calls them all racists and white supremacists for not liking the show is totally undeserving of my time, attention, or respect.

But it wasn’t a total loss. We did get this from it:

Fisking Hysteria

So a couple of days ago, I finished revising “The Freedom of Second Chances” and started looking for places to submit it. That was how I found this anthology call, for a pro-abortion anthology titled Aseptic and Faintly Sadistic: An Anthology of Hysteria Fiction. The guidelines were so unbelievable that I just have to fisk them on this blog. Here we go!

Hysteria

Interesting title for an anthology. I’m sure this will feature only the most thoughtful and enlightening stories that the speculative fiction field currently has to offer.

Irrational.

Okay.

Frenzied.

Uh, okay.

Unreasonable.

Oookay.

Unable to speak their own experiences. 

One of those things is not like the others. One of those things just doesn’t belong.

Seriously, if you are free to be as irrational, frenzied, and unreasonable as you wish, then what exactly is preventing you from being able to “speak [your] own experience”? If you are still free to do this:

…then you are not being silenced by the pro-life crowd.

(As a side note, you would not believe how difficult it was to find that video. YouTube search would not bring it up, no matter how many combinations I tried. Even Brave search mostly brought up music videos and disgusting sex tapes. I had to go to The Comments Section by Brett Cooper, look up the video where she briefly reacted to it, freeze the frame, and scroll through a couple pages of search—not on YouTube, or on Google, or on Duck Duck Go (all of which are “curated” now), but on the Brave browser’s native search engine.

But tell me again how your side is the one that is “unable to speak their own experiences.” I’m sure that’s why this hilarious and eminently meme-able video about a story in the current news cycle has only received 10k views in the four days of its existence, and no mention on Know Your Meme at all. After all, it’s not like conservatives are the ones being censored and shadowbanned.)

In the case of abortion specifically, we have been told for decades in the United States that Roe v. Wade was safe

No, I’m pretty sure that was just something that you people told yourselves.

and that we were overreacting, illogical, needlessly aggressive—hysterical.

Actually, “safe, legal, and rare” was pretty much the majority viewpoint until Trump became president and all of the masks came off. So tell me, was “safe, legal, and rare” a lie from the very beginning?

Now look. We were none of those things. 

Then why is the title of your page literally “Hysteria Submission Call”? Because it seems to me that all of those words—”overreacting,” “illogical,” “needlessly aggressive,” and “hysterical”—describe you people perfectly. As further evidence:

Aseptic and Faintly Sadistic:

It is so wonderfully fitting that the title of your anthology invokes the Marquis de Sade, the man who asked why everyone else’s pain should be more important than his pleasure. After all, why should 60 million dead babies—a death count that would make Hitler blush—be more important than your freedom to have promiscuous, irresponsible sex?

An Anthology of Hysteria Fiction,

I have literally never considered the combination of those two words until I saw them in your anthology call.

which is presented by CHM and will benefit the Chicago Abortion Fund, is seeking dark speculative fiction from anyone directly at risk as a result of the Supreme Court’s ruling on Roe v. Wade, defined inclusively. 

But exclusively of, you know, actual women. After all, I noticed that you never mentioned the word “woman” in that sentence. Pretty weird, considering that Roe v. Wade was supposed to be about “a woman’s right to choose.” Or was that always a lie, too?

Guidelines

Genre: Dark speculative, widely defined. Don’t self-reject!  

Oh no, honey. It’s not me that I’m rejecting when I say that you people will never see any of my work. Though I was tempted to troll you by submitting “The Freedom of Second Chances,” since it’s the most pro-life story I’ve written so far in my career. But I decided to fisk your anthology call instead.

Theme: 

Hysteria. 

Interpret the theme broadly. You don’t have to beat me over the head with the connection.

But how can it be “hysteria” if we aren’t beating you over the head? After all, that’s what the Trump years were all about: beating the narrative over all our heads until morale improved.

I am willing to look at everything from retellings of “The Yellow Wallpaper” to sci-fi space opera rockstars. Feel free to take on one of the many faces of the monstrous patriarchy directly.

Isn’t it curious how “the Patriarchy” totally isn’t a crazy conspiracy theory, but the Wuhan lab leak theory, or the efficacy of ivermectin in treating covid, or the reports of alarming menstrual irregularities and increased rates of myocarditis in people who took the covid vaccine all were. But since the pandemic, the difference between conspiracy theory and conspiracy fact has been between 4-6 months—except for the truly crazy conspiracy theories, like the idea that the moon landing was a hoax. Or the Patriarchy.

Because if you can’t now, when the heck can you? 

Well, your anthology call is certainly taking this “hysteria” theme seriously. So points for consistency, I guess.

Open To: Anyone directly at risk as a result of the Supreme Court’s ruling on Roe v. Wade, defined inclusively

But once again, defined exclusively of actual, you know, women. And by “women,” I mean adult female humans, because those are, you know, the only people who can actually get pregnant (emojis notwithstanding) and therefore, you know, the only people who can actually get abortions.

Seriously, though, it is amazing what sort of knots these people will tie themselves into in order to avoid having to answer the question “what is a woman?”

(Also, this is a knitpick, but it’s worth pointing out that there’s a typo in that sentence, since it ends without a period. Pertinent because the anthology call was supposed to be written by a professional editor.)

Word Count: Maximum 5,000 words, no minimum. 

Reprints: No.

Multiple Submissions: No.

Simultaneous Submissions: Yes! But please alert us immediately if the piece is accepted elsewhere and needs to be withdrawn.

In all fairness, I have to give these people credit for allowing simultaneous submissions. In this era of digital publishing, it is insane for publishers to expect writers to give them exclusivity when deciding whether or not to purchase publishing rights. It’s also inconsiderate, but that was true before digital publishing.

Simultaneous submissions are one of my industry hobby horses. Maybe I’ll write a blog post about that, though it may get me blacklisted from a few of these magazines. Then again, I’ve probably already been blacklisted for writing stories that are pro-life. Remind me how Dobbs v. Jackson makes you “unable to speak [your] own experiences” again? Oh, right.

Pay: 

6 cents/word (USD)

As this is a charity anthology, authors who would like to contribute more and who are safe to do so may waive pay. This is completely optional, and we will never ask you to do this; you can only request it upon acceptance. 

Except you kind of just did ask, in a passive-aggressive sort of way.

Date Open: July 18

Date Closed: August 1

Format: 

Shunn-ish. I don’t need your home address or phone number, we haven’t even met.

The sentiment is mutual.

https://www.shunn.net/format/story.html

No need to stress about the cover letter, but if you are a member of a marginalized community underrepresented in discussions of reproductive justice, feel free to note that if you are comfortable. 

Notice again that they never actually mention the word “woman.” Which is incredible, because in the very act of discussing “marginalized” and “underrepresented” groups, they are literally erasing and marginalizing half of the people on this planet. Never forget: accusation = projection = confession 100% of the time with these people.

Submissions: AsepticAndFaintlySadistic@gmail.com

Please use this format for the subject line of your submission email.

Last Name; Story Title; Word Count

Other Stuff

The Editor Likes:

Forward-thinking,

Translation: pro-trans propaganda that refuses to acknowledge the existence of women.

expertly crafted

Translation: the sort of thing an English major would write.

speculative fiction. Work that uses innovative forms,

Translation: the sort of thing that wouldn’t appeal to people who like fun, entertaining stories. Because that would be wrongfun.

original voices, 

Translation: “We’re looking specifically for a previously unpublished writer who checks all the right intersectional boxes, so that when xe becomes an award-winning darling of the field, we can say that we were the first ones to publish xer.”

broken timelines, 

I actually had to look this one up. Apparently, they want to publish the next “Unknown Number,” because if an artist can duct tape a banana to a wall in a gallery and call it fine art, then a writer who checks all the right intersectional boxes should be able to win the Hugo with a Twitter thread. Or something.

metafiction, 

Translation: post-modern garbage.

etc, but is still legible.

But will you accept my submission if it’s written in crayon?

Think Carmen Maria Machado, Nadia Bulkin, Mona Awad, Rivers Solomon, Angela Carter, Emily M. Danforth, Caitlin R. Kiernan. 

The only one of those writers I’ve actually heard of is Rivers Solomon, and from what I can tell her faer main claim to fame is that she fae checks all the right intersectional boxes.

Absolutely Not: 

TERF-y, gender-essentialist fiction. 

Lest you think I exaggerate when I say that these people want to erase and marginalize women, we have it right here, straight from the horse’s mouth. No trans-exclusionary radical feminist stories, aka anything that defines “woman” as an adult human female, no matter how feminist it might otherwise be.

Trans activists talk big about how everyone who opposes them treats them like they “don’t exist,” but that is exactly what they are doing to women: erasing them. Once again, accusation is ALWAYS projection is ALWAYS confession with these people.

Gratuitous sexual assault, gratuitous violence, and unchallenged -isms and -phobias (body horror welcome). 

I’m not surprised. Abortion is the ultimate body horror.

The Title Comes From: Margaret St. Clair’s fantastic short “Brenda” (Weird Tales 1954). 

Thanks for the tip. I will certainly avoid that one.

Why the Chicago Abortion Fund: It looks like, for the foreseeable future, Illinois is going to be the only state with abortion protections in place serving a very large section of the country.

And by “protections,” of course they mean that there will be no protections in Illinois for the unborn.

Abortion funds are especially critical at this time, as they provide financial assistance to directly cover the costs of abortion. 

Because those abortionists really need their lamborghinis!

The Chicago Abortion Fund provides grants from between $100 to $300 dollars to those seeking abortion services, and they attempt to provide this grant for 100% of the people who contact them. They also provide assistance in locating additional funding, as well as with travel and associated expenses. 

From their website: The mission of the Chicago Abortion Fund is to advance reproductive autonomy and justice for everyone by providing financial, logistical, and emotional support to people seeking abortion services and by building collective power and fostering partnerships for political and cultural change. We envision a world where everyone has the freedom and autonomy to create lives, families, and communities that are healthy, safe, and thriving and where the full range of reproductive choices, including abortion, are accessible and affirmed. 

If these people are truly “pro-choice,” why are they so obsessed with shutting down crisis pregnancy centers? Just look into the crazy eyes of Elizabeth Warren as she talks about it, and then ponder on the fact that dozens of crisis pregnancy centers have been firebombed and vandalized by the left-wing terrorist group Jane’s Revenge in just the past month. Why?

Because the “pro-choice” crowd only really believes in one choice: abortion. But having only one choice means that you have no choices at all, meaning that “pro-choice” is actually a lie. Just like “safe, legal, and rare.” Just like “a woman’s right to…”

Which brings me back around to the most incredible thing about this anthology call: the fact that the words “woman” and “women” do not appear anywhere, even though this is supposedly a pro-abortion anthology. In fact, the anthology call goes out of its way to discourage submissions that are “gender essentialist,” meaning that they affirm the scientific, biological nature of sex. In a pro-abortion anthology call!

It is impossible to satirize these people. They are so possessed by their radical ideology that they satirize themselves without realizing it. In a sane and healthy world, the anthology would be a failure, the publisher would go bankrupt, and the stories themselves would quickly fade into cultural irrelevancy—

—which may happen yet. The cultural tides are turning, and these people are so devoid of self-awareness that they are totally blind to it. That is precisely why the overturning of Roe v. Wade caught them so flat-footed. And instead of responding to this setback with introspection and reflection, they immediately jump to hysteria, not realizing that doing so wins no converts and turns away many who would otherwise be sympathetic.

They are losing.

They are losing HARD.

Moreover, they have no idea how hard they are losing.

In their arrogance, they will fall.

And after they do, future generations of readers will look back in wonder and bewilderment at anthologies like this one that were products of their insane (and interesting) times.

I don’t usually do these fisking articles, but in my efforts to find more traditional markets to send my short stories, I’ve come across some truly insane submission guidelines. Since none of these markets is likely to publish anything by a conservative straight white cisgender Latter-day Saint Christian male such as myself, I don’t see much harm in fisking a couple more of them. What do you guys think?

2019-11-14 Newsletter Author’s Note

This author’s note originally appeared in the November 14th edition of my author newsletter. To subscribe to my newsletter, click here.

So the latest controversy in SF&F fandom is the stripping of John Campbell’s name from the Campbell Award. The latest issue of Locus magazine has an op-ed from Cory Doctorow defending that decision, and it was so deserving of a fisking that I went ahead and fisked it myself. You can find it on my blog.

That said, I do think there were some good things in Doctorow’s piece. The message in the second half of the article, that people are neither wholly good nor wholly evil, and that we should learn from our misdeeds and set them right, is a message that I think we really need to hear, especially in today’s cancel culture that defines everyone by the worst thing they’ve ever said or done.

However, the good parts of the article are completely contradicted by the bad parts, where Doctorow argues that Campbell’s entire legacy is tainted and therefore needs to be cancelled. He also (surprise surprise) brings up the Sad Puppies and calls us all “white nationalists,” “Nazis,” and “the misogynist/white supremacist wing of SF.”

It’s not that I want to defend Campbell’s sexism and racism. I’m sure he had many odious views. I could even be convinced that it’s appropriate to retire the Campbell Award and replace it with something else, similar to moving offensive Confederate statues out of the public square and into museums instead.

The problem is that Campbell’s detractors are just as odious in their worldviews as he was, if not more so. When accusing someone of being “male” and “white” is enough to get them cancelled, how can that be anything but sexist and racist?

Which brings me to the ugly parts of the article: the naked hypocrisy. Doctorow stops just short of calling for the digital equivalent of a book burning, but he left me with the impression that he’d be the first to light the match. I don’t think that’s a misread either, because of this line:

Campbell’s impact on our field will never be truly extinquished (alas), but

Yep. And all the moderates, conservatives, libertarians, and old-school liberals in the field are part of the “misogynist/white supremacist wing of SF” too. Who’s the fascist again?

That’s about as far into politics as I care to go. I know you probably aren’t into science fiction for the politics, but if you want to read a more detailed fisking of this ridiculous article, you can find it on my blog. In the meantime, I’ll be back to more important things, like writing.