Actually, I don't think there were any winners in Jonathan-Ross-gate.
It may not be a crime to be stressed and triggered about potential harassment but the intensity of the reaction to Jonathan Ross had me wondering if I weren't misreading the name and Fred Phelps and his Church of Hatred had been invited to host the Hugos.
Don't get me wrong---I am in favour of trying to make our gatherings as inclusive as possible and also as safe. But the latter is possible only up to a point. If the idea of having to be within ten feet of someone who has made jokes at the expense of fat people---but has never done so to you personally---is enough to make you begin howling in outrage about being afraid to attend a function where you might---might---have to interact with said person, though in fact you have no idea whether this will happen because the nominating period is still open---
If this is the case, I don't think Jonathan Ross is the real problem. To me, that sounds like a really bad case of PTSD.
And I say that as someone who wasn't enamoured with the idea of Ross as host for completely different reasons but can tolerate conditions that I don't think are optimum.
I say it as a fat woman who has taken a fair amount of snark for twenty years, often from total strangers...but also from people who knew me when I wasn't overweight, who thought it was funny to say, "Oh, here's a BIG writer."
I say it as a woman who has been sexually harrassed, as a woman who has fought off attempted physical assault...but neither of the latter two things has ever happened to me at a science fiction convention.
no subject
It may not be a crime to be stressed and triggered about potential harassment but the intensity of the reaction to Jonathan Ross had me wondering if I weren't misreading the name and Fred Phelps and his Church of Hatred had been invited to host the Hugos.
Don't get me wrong---I am in favour of trying to make our gatherings as inclusive as possible and also as safe. But the latter is possible only up to a point. If the idea of having to be within ten feet of someone who has made jokes at the expense of fat people---but has never done so to you personally---is enough to make you begin howling in outrage about being afraid to attend a function where you might---might---have to interact with said person, though in fact you have no idea whether this will happen because the nominating period is still open---
If this is the case, I don't think Jonathan Ross is the real problem. To me, that sounds like a really bad case of PTSD.
And I say that as someone who wasn't enamoured with the idea of Ross as host for completely different reasons but can tolerate conditions that I don't think are optimum.
I say it as a fat woman who has taken a fair amount of snark for twenty years, often from total strangers...but also from people who knew me when I wasn't overweight, who thought it was funny to say, "Oh, here's a BIG writer."
I say it as a woman who has been sexually harrassed, as a woman who has fought off attempted physical assault...but neither of the latter two things has ever happened to me at a science fiction convention.