Hugo Awards controversy

[Zardnaar]

Where I draw the line is when in Rome.... Don't like it don't go.

There's a difference between being a tourist and events however. Events have to cater to everyone not just yourself.

So basically don't hold events where you're going to get censored.

If it's just you doesn't really matter just keep your mouth shut if you disagree with local mores, laws and customs (or don't go ymmv).

 

[Clint_L]

Indeed I have talked with Zhao on twitter before it imploded. One has to try to look at it from the Chinese side though.

One doesn't have to look at it from the Chinese government's side, though. And that's where the Hugos went wrong. They are fond of claiming xenophobia when challenged on their abysmal human rights record and lack of basic political freedoms. My hot take is that authoritarian regimes are always bad, wherever they occur.

 

[EKovarr]

That's the thing, though. In the report they insinuate right at the beginning that alot of the votes for China had just email addresses and no physical addresses attached to them as well, which is the norm. I don't think they have proof that there was some vote pumping here, but I think that's notable.

It was excellent writing, insinuating something wrong with those votes, setting readers up with the feeling that no votes can be trusted.

Slight problem: they were setting you up with something that isn't true. The truth is pretty boring: the ballot wasn't translated into Chinese perfectly; my recollection is that it said address, not home address. Physical addresses are the norm here, there it's more often an email address. The result using their email address on the ballot. The "consternation" was someone panicking; he was one of the few who saw the votes rising; the team doing research, sorting out what was going on, and making the call that they were valid; and people, especially the losers, flatly disbelieving that China could have gotten that many votes and it turned into "They stole our vote!"

And wouldn't listen to the simple fact is that China has more fans per capita that any other country. They really wanted a chance that Worldcon, the World Science Fiction Convention, the best and most important of convention would be in their country. They'd never get to go otherwise and here they could meet and talk with people from all over the world. Mutually share cultures and how they impacted writing, differences in the publishing world, and so much more. And all these fans! So word spread and Chinese fans voted.

Sorry for the length, it's just that facts don't have any chance against insinuations and there's no way to change public opinion. Now and then I try anyway.

 

[dragoner]

One doesn't have to look at it from the Chinese government's side, though. And that's where the Hugos went wrong.

The Chinese Government did not have anything to do with it, it was done by McCarty. There has been a lot of speculation, such as over LGBTQ+ considerations, and that it was because of that, except it isn't illegal there. Kuang issued a statement about being undesirable on Bluesky, and others have commented it was social considerations, and in a lot of countries, being seen as being touched by the west is undesirable, tainted. For example, a friend's Mother is from Japan, she casually mentioned she has lived here to long, and could never go back because they would not consider her exactly Japanese there anymore.

 

[EKovarr]

Ah, but note - "Worldcon" is not a standing corporate organization.

At each Worldcon, there's the "business meeting" (typically, it happens on three consecutive mornings at the convention). And anyone who has paid for a membership to attend the convention can show up and vote on the issues before the business committee.

If the fans, the people who attend Worldcon, really cared about the ethics of site choice, they could go to the business meeting, and get something done about it.

The people who are members of Worldcon get to vote on the business, get to vote on where the future cons will be, and get to vote on the Hugos (there are "supporting memberships" that allow you to vote on the Hugos, but not attend the convention and vote on business matters). So, in the long run, it is hard to place responsibility to fix things on "the organization" when most of its decisions are the results of member voting processes.

Yup. The Worldcon belong to the fans, fans make the decisions. If you want one in this or that place, with these or those people running it (more obscure) vote. If you want more information first go to the bid tables, usually near Exhibits or something. The voting area isn't far away and folks will show you where it is. (There's a 'voting fee' which isn't but I've forgotten the purpose.) Influencing where the Worldcon will be takes about an hour away from other things.

Thanks for the push for the Business Meeting. More people involved means the Worldcon is better represented. And lot of people are actively friendly as well as willing to help. I expect a lot of proposals about how to write ethical considerations into the constitution this year, if you're care about ethics go to the Business Meeting. It's where you learn what is going on, hear the problems with various choices - some of them here, get to think about them, and vote for or against.

People put on Worldcons, investing a tremendous amount of time and effort, all the way down to where a trashcan or water station should go. They do the work, they put on a Worldcon, you're the people who own it.

 

[EKovarr]

Ah, but note - "Worldcon" is not a standing corporate organization.

At each Worldcon, there's the "business meeting" (typically, it happens on three consecutive mornings at the convention). And anyone who has paid for a membership to attend the convention can show up and vote on the issues before the business committee.

If the fans, the people who attend Worldcon, really cared about the ethics of site choice, they could go to the business meeting, and get something done about it.

The people who are members of Worldcon get to vote on the business, get to vote on where the future cons will be, and get to vote on the Hugos (there are "supporting memberships" that allow you to vote on the Hugos, but not attend the convention and vote on business matters). So, in the long run, it is hard to place responsibility to fix things on "the organization" when most of its decisions are the results of member voting processes.

The Chinese Government did not have anything to do with it, it was done by McCarty. There has been a lot of speculation, such as over LGBTQ+ considerations, and that it was because of that, except it isn't illegal there. Kuang issued a statement about being undesirable on Bluesky, and others have commented it was social considerations, and in a lot of countries, being seen as being touched by the west is undesirable, tainted.

I've seen the emails the report was ba

Yeah. This is absolutely nuts. And they just got done with the various bigoted “puppies” controversies. Daniel Greene has been doing some coverage of this. He talks about the leaked emails in the most recent video on the topic.

I'm out of the loop on this - where can I find his videos?

I've seen the emails and it was only one thread, McCarthy asked people on his team to flag anything that might require attention. At least in that thread it was concern was for people who'd published things being in danger from the Chinese Government. But in the flash storm after the report came out an author - I don't remember if she was up for a Hugo or not - said that yes, if she won her acceptance speech would have been vitriolic. We only have that one thread but maybe later they weren't just worried about the work, they were worried about what might happen to people who gave that sort of speech in the PRC? I'm not defending anyone, I'm trying to figure out what happened. And if there were more emails I'm missing a lot.

 

[dragoner]

I've seen the emails and it was only one thread, McCarthy asked people on his team to flag anything that might require attention. At least in that thread it was concern was for people who'd published things being in danger from the Chinese Government. But in the flash storm after the report came out an author - I don't remember if she was up for a Hugo or not - said that yes, if she won her acceptance speech would have been vitriolic. We only have that one thread but maybe later they weren't just worried about the work, they were worried about what might happen to people who gave that sort of speech in the PRC? I'm not defending anyone, I'm trying to figure out what happened. And if there were more emails I'm missing a lot.

I saw where McCarty mentioned laws, not exactly the gov't. I have been following since the awards as people who were there mentioned some irregularity. Though I can also imagine that some vitriolic speech might not have gone down well with the fans either. I know people who have lived in China, and said the gov't is a lot less intrusive than the news makes it seem, however the people are. The general feelings are that the west has treated them badly, esp during "the century of humiliation".

Edit: I'm not defending anyone or anything either, though tbh it looks like all speculation, Scalzi is the only one who has come out, and he seems to be blaming McCarty. I'm a big fan of science fiction, I remember Aldiss saying that Hugo Gernsback was the worst thing to happen to science fiction, not sure I agree. Though the way of peacefulness is through understanding, and that takes listening to what others have to say.

 

[EKovarr]

I saw where McCarty mentioned laws, not exactly the gov't. I have been following since the awards as people who were there mentioned some irregularity. Though I can also imagine that some vitriolic speech might not have gone down well with the fans either. I know people who have lived in China, and said the gov't is a lot less intrusive than the news makes it seem, however the people are. The general feelings are that the west has treated them badly, esp during "the century of humiliation".

Okay, pulling up what McCarty said:

"In addition to the regular technical review, as we are happening in China and the 'laws' [note the quotations] we operate under are different . . . we need to highlight anything of a sensitive political nature in the work" to determine if there's a law against it and requires an administrative decision.

There was a reply which started, "Fan Writer potential issues:
"This category has the potential to be problematic . . . for most non-Chinese fan writers.
. . .I'm putting out examples of both [things that might be 'negatives of China] I can find for these fan writers out of an abundance of caution because I'm assuming we're talking about the safety of our Chinese con-running friends."

The people at a Worldcon don't have the same reaction to the West, they're trying to connect Eastern and Western fandom. I think the relative part the abundance of caution so as not to endanger our friends and fellow con-runners. Which they are.

Obviously I'm a conrunner and have been writing from that point of view. I wasn't involved with Chengdu but can put myself in someone's place and think about how I'd handle it. Totally new place, new customs, a form of gov't I'm not familiar with, also knowing fans I'm not going to entirely believe the friend who breezily said, "Oh, I'll be fine!" just before the same sort of thing showed up in a newspaper. And they might be fine with everything they're doing and I'm being insulting. Nevertheless they've never hosted a Western convention before, for all I know they may be affected by political changes, and it's a balance between knowing they've put on a lot of conventions and worry that we Westerners may get them in serious trouble. I'd go for a - perhaps - overabundance of caution.

 

[EKovarr]

I saw where McCarty mentioned laws, not exactly the gov't. I have been following since the awards as people who were there mentioned some irregularity. Though I can also imagine that some vitriolic speech might not have gone down well with the fans either. I know people who have lived in China, and said the gov't is a lot less intrusive than the news makes it seem, however the people are. The general feelings are that the west has treated them badly, esp during "the century of humiliation".

I walked out of the Hugos during an impassioned acceptance speech by a well known author who was so ignorant about his subject he didn't know he was ignorant. He vilified a group of people he knew nothing about. And he totally undid a lot of quiet, calming down in various places all week to heal things. And that was that. He had the bully pulpit.

But at least he was talking about things going on in the community. Others have used that bully pulpit to spew vitriol all over the place. If they won it China it would be about China.

 

[dragoner]

I walked out of the Hugos during an impassioned acceptance speech by a well known author who was so ignorant about his subject he didn't know he was ignorant. He vilified a group of people he knew nothing about. And he totally undid a lot of quiet, calming down in various places all week to heal things. And that was that. He had the bully pulpit.

But at least he was talking about things going on in the community. Others have used that bully pulpit to spew vitriol all over the place. If they won it China it would be about China.

That is really cool to go, I would have loved to see some of the panels. I agree that there needs to be caution, saying stuff about China can provoke a hostile reaction, just from regular people. It is kind of a hard place to be put in, trying to figure it all out. Also my feelings are somewhat colored by discussion from mastodon, or other places, which people were like "it's political" and then reading, and seeing that that is not exactly how it was. I read a lot of science fiction, so it is high on my interests list.

Here I am on masto: https://spacey.space/@Robert_Brandt