Samantha Mills and Adrian Tchaikovsky, who both renounced their Hugos, tell Upstream Reviews why they did it . . . and why they still have hope for the award's future.
"That the same people took this to a situation which had none of the active malice of the ‘puppies’ is a bigger problem of because it comes from “inside the house” so to speak. "
There's probably the big problem. They think that there was "active malice" with the Puppies. (the Rabid Puppies, maybe, but that was far later).
That level of delusion is impressive. The "Active Malice" was within the Hugo structure AGAINST the Sad Puppies, and the later active malice of the Rabid Puppies was in RESPONSE to the Hugo committee's active malice.
The Sad Puppies didn't orchestrate hit pieces on their opposition to falsely label them as bigots. (That was the people behind the Hugos status quo)
The Sad Puppies didn't get those hit pieces so widely reused by other outlets that even when the original articles were withdrawn when the SP demonstrated the falsehoods, not of the dozens of places that copied the articles verbatim removed them, admitted they were false, or even made the corrections/rebuttals that the original hosts did. (That was the people behind the Hugos status quo)
The Sad Puppies didn't bully minority & LGBTQ writers, who had LEGITIMATE high quality work as reason for being nominated, into withdrawing their nominations, just because the "wrong people" like their works. (That was the people behind the Hugos status quo, who were supposedly their allies).
The Sad Puppies didn't have roughly 1000-2000 ballots ALL MARKED THE SAME down the line suddenly arrive at the voting tabulation in the last week before the voting closed, all designed to ensure that the BY THE RULES nominations (which were mostly by the two puppy groups) got "No Award" for the category. Or have an accounting firm so dense as to not recognize blatant voter fraud.
I was a proud member of RWA, joining in 2017 when I began writing romance, and attended all my local chapter meetings. RWA was so supportive of newbie writers. They had a strong educational component and wanted to foster careers. Romancelandia is vast!
Then, and it seemed very fast, the crazies who'd always been with us, mutated into something stronger. It culminated in accusations of racism and bigotry, the forums descended into flame wars, and at the end of 2019, RWA imploded with its own board of directors refusing to follow their own rules.
And they kept shooting themselves all over in their circular firing squad.
You can find plenty about RWA imploding but the most even-handed, detailed essay I know about is at Quillette. It's paywalled now but my God! What the organization did to itself while chasing purity tests.
Other people had commented in these comments on a SFWA article I'd written a while back about what happened at the RWA. It's amazing how quickly it spun out of control to the degree that it did.
I'd like to see that article! So much of what was written about RWA imploding flatly refused to see the bad behavior of the crazies. They were fully justified and the rank and file members were obviously racist. The Quillette story is one of the very few that seemed even-handed.
Two other points you may not know. RWA shot itself AGAIN when they launched the Vivian award to replace the Rita (supposedly less racist). The first winner in Inspirational Romance (i.e., usually heavily Christian although it didn't have to be) was a longtime writer who'd won before in this category. Her book made it past all the gatekeepers and when award time came, it was discovered that she'd used genuine historical fact. The screaming started and IIRC, the writer was refused the award and she left RWA in a huff and still more of the rank and file left.
Secondly, and this is only speculation, the reason RWA is still limping along is the command structure meant that when a chapter like ours folded, RWA got whatever monies were in the chapter treasuries. As chapters folded right and left, this meant a big infusion of cash UNLESS you were a big enough chapter with lawyers in your ranks and could afford the lawsuit and could afford to go it alone.
We couldn't. We were also having issues with the bank so we let RWA argue with THEM over the few thousand bucks in our account.
Teresa, my heart goes out to you. One of my consultants is a Romance writer, and we have discussed the devastation in the Romance Community. I consider WATCHER of the DAMNED to be a Romance as well as a Sci Western, and I would never attempt to join either the SWFA or the RWA - they both became so toxic.
I quite understand! I won't go back. Top management did so much wrong in the initial accusations and it just kept getting worse.
I'll have to look for Watcher of the Damned. Like you, my science-fiction romance doesn't fit into any real category. Mine is more like Jane Austen (for the romance) and Charles Dickens (for the complicated, multiclass world) in space. It is NOT part of the "I was the alien's love slave" subgenre. Not, not, not!
Rules for participation - post them. Not posted? Not a rule.
Turn the nomination process, ballot population, vote collection, and vote tallying over to an independent third party firm who does this kind of thing as a profession; firm must be unconnected to the Lumber Mill Industry or SF/F Fandom.
Have the processes and results audited by a professional firm.
Make all these processes, to include the data collection, the tallying, and the award decision fully open and auditable by anyone who chooses to do so. No hidden processes or data. Identifying data removed and open to the public.
This will cost money, and will remove many of the incompetents from the process.
To repeat an interesting question, many of the same people were handling ballot counting in a series of recent years. Were 2015 and 2023 uniquely irregular, or were the ballot counts in the intervening years also manipulated? Most of the involved people might well have been honest, but perhaps some others were not.
In my completely biased opinion, the Prometheus Award is the last one of the Big Three left standing - The Hugos have fallen, and the Nebulas are a more or less internal Big Publishing Love Fest. But we shall see what happens next; the censorship and rigging spreads far beyond the Hugos and Chengdu, and the Handlers for the next big Indie Org are being prepared now...
"That the same people took this to a situation which had none of the active malice of the ‘puppies’ is a bigger problem of because it comes from “inside the house” so to speak. "
There's probably the big problem. They think that there was "active malice" with the Puppies. (the Rabid Puppies, maybe, but that was far later).
That level of delusion is impressive. The "Active Malice" was within the Hugo structure AGAINST the Sad Puppies, and the later active malice of the Rabid Puppies was in RESPONSE to the Hugo committee's active malice.
The Sad Puppies didn't orchestrate hit pieces on their opposition to falsely label them as bigots. (That was the people behind the Hugos status quo)
The Sad Puppies didn't get those hit pieces so widely reused by other outlets that even when the original articles were withdrawn when the SP demonstrated the falsehoods, not of the dozens of places that copied the articles verbatim removed them, admitted they were false, or even made the corrections/rebuttals that the original hosts did. (That was the people behind the Hugos status quo)
The Sad Puppies didn't bully minority & LGBTQ writers, who had LEGITIMATE high quality work as reason for being nominated, into withdrawing their nominations, just because the "wrong people" like their works. (That was the people behind the Hugos status quo, who were supposedly their allies).
The Sad Puppies didn't have roughly 1000-2000 ballots ALL MARKED THE SAME down the line suddenly arrive at the voting tabulation in the last week before the voting closed, all designed to ensure that the BY THE RULES nominations (which were mostly by the two puppy groups) got "No Award" for the category. Or have an accounting firm so dense as to not recognize blatant voter fraud.
I was a proud member of RWA, joining in 2017 when I began writing romance, and attended all my local chapter meetings. RWA was so supportive of newbie writers. They had a strong educational component and wanted to foster careers. Romancelandia is vast!
Then, and it seemed very fast, the crazies who'd always been with us, mutated into something stronger. It culminated in accusations of racism and bigotry, the forums descended into flame wars, and at the end of 2019, RWA imploded with its own board of directors refusing to follow their own rules.
And they kept shooting themselves all over in their circular firing squad.
You can find plenty about RWA imploding but the most even-handed, detailed essay I know about is at Quillette. It's paywalled now but my God! What the organization did to itself while chasing purity tests.
Look for https://quillette.com/2020/03/31/romance-race-and-retribution/
None of what SFWA is doing is new.
Other people had commented in these comments on a SFWA article I'd written a while back about what happened at the RWA. It's amazing how quickly it spun out of control to the degree that it did.
I'd like to see that article! So much of what was written about RWA imploding flatly refused to see the bad behavior of the crazies. They were fully justified and the rank and file members were obviously racist. The Quillette story is one of the very few that seemed even-handed.
Two other points you may not know. RWA shot itself AGAIN when they launched the Vivian award to replace the Rita (supposedly less racist). The first winner in Inspirational Romance (i.e., usually heavily Christian although it didn't have to be) was a longtime writer who'd won before in this category. Her book made it past all the gatekeepers and when award time came, it was discovered that she'd used genuine historical fact. The screaming started and IIRC, the writer was refused the award and she left RWA in a huff and still more of the rank and file left.
Secondly, and this is only speculation, the reason RWA is still limping along is the command structure meant that when a chapter like ours folded, RWA got whatever monies were in the chapter treasuries. As chapters folded right and left, this meant a big infusion of cash UNLESS you were a big enough chapter with lawyers in your ranks and could afford the lawsuit and could afford to go it alone.
We couldn't. We were also having issues with the bank so we let RWA argue with THEM over the few thousand bucks in our account.
Teresa, my heart goes out to you. One of my consultants is a Romance writer, and we have discussed the devastation in the Romance Community. I consider WATCHER of the DAMNED to be a Romance as well as a Sci Western, and I would never attempt to join either the SWFA or the RWA - they both became so toxic.
I quite understand! I won't go back. Top management did so much wrong in the initial accusations and it just kept getting worse.
I'll have to look for Watcher of the Damned. Like you, my science-fiction romance doesn't fit into any real category. Mine is more like Jane Austen (for the romance) and Charles Dickens (for the complicated, multiclass world) in space. It is NOT part of the "I was the alien's love slave" subgenre. Not, not, not!
OOOOOOOH Jane Austen + Charles Dickens💖💖💖
Do you have a Book link?? Into my TBR Pile is goes RIGHT NOW!! YaY
Really serious about making this a real award?
Rules for participation - post them. Not posted? Not a rule.
Turn the nomination process, ballot population, vote collection, and vote tallying over to an independent third party firm who does this kind of thing as a profession; firm must be unconnected to the Lumber Mill Industry or SF/F Fandom.
Have the processes and results audited by a professional firm.
Make all these processes, to include the data collection, the tallying, and the award decision fully open and auditable by anyone who chooses to do so. No hidden processes or data. Identifying data removed and open to the public.
This will cost money, and will remove many of the incompetents from the process.
Won't happen. Popping more corn.
To repeat an interesting question, many of the same people were handling ballot counting in a series of recent years. Were 2015 and 2023 uniquely irregular, or were the ballot counts in the intervening years also manipulated? Most of the involved people might well have been honest, but perhaps some others were not.
I'd be thrilled to pieces!
The Bride From Dairapaska (yes she's a bride despite her three children on the cover) is first.
The White Elephant of Panschin has one carry-over character from Bride.
The Vanished Pearls of Orlov, followed at once by Escape To HighTower must be read in that order but are only loosely connected to the other two.
I'm currently working on the Bitch Queen of Atto, which takes us back to the domed city of Panschin.
I've gotten better since Bride. I also write (like Dickens!) big doorstops.
In my completely biased opinion, the Prometheus Award is the last one of the Big Three left standing - The Hugos have fallen, and the Nebulas are a more or less internal Big Publishing Love Fest. But we shall see what happens next; the censorship and rigging spreads far beyond the Hugos and Chengdu, and the Handlers for the next big Indie Org are being prepared now...
Govern yourselves accordingly.
A class act from both, and a really wholesome conclusion.
I found my discussion with all of them to be a real breath of fresh air. Maybe the more these places die, nature will heal.