The Rot in SF/F Fandom Cannot Be Ignored Anymore

Cataline Sergius wrote and published a post last Sunday about the rot--the child-rape and enabling thereof--in the Science Fiction/Fantasy scene (focused on books, and further on the con scene- something trying to carry over to better cons like PAX) that's been going on for decades. You can read it here in its entirety.

But here, let me excerpt a key piece for you:

It is the subject you must never speak of in Con circles. You can condemn rape culture all you like. You can play little Pol Pot as Scalzi does if a Con refuses to accept the latest self-contradictory Codes of Conduct. You can scream, obfuscate and misdirect as Darrell Schweitzer does.

But you must never acknowledge, let alone do anyting to actively prevent IT.

The question is...Why? For the love of god, why?

The only answer I think must come down to Identity.

Identity trumps reason every time.

After Star Wars came out Science Fiction and Fantasy merged into something very approachable by the masses.

Before then it was safer to be caught in public wearing ass-less chaps and a posing pouch than it was to be seen in a Star Fleet uniform.

The people that went to the cons never fit in anywhere else. Most were at least one standard deviation above the norm in terms of intelligence but it didn't do them any good. Instinctive knowledge of social mores was impossible for them. The truth is their efforts to raise their status among their peers with frequent displays of superior intellect, annoyed the crap out of everyone around them. They paid for it socially and a failure loop was established. Today we would think of these people as high functioning autistics. The truth is that a normal life was always beyond them.

Most of them were poor. The money to get a hotel room and pay for Con registration was a major investment for them.

Loneliness infected every facet of their lives. Sex was limited to self help. No one shared their interests or if they did, those people had the damn good sense to keep that shit to themselves. Sharing those interests with nerds was nowhere near worth the ensuing pariah status in high school.

When the Cons came along, these defectives could wrap themselves in a world where they could pretend that they were secret kings. The Identity of the TrueFen was established along with their lords and leaders the SMOFs. It was their safe space. It was their only social outlet It was their escape.

Their real lives were lived entirely in support of this secret identity. An identity that gave them worth and eased the pain of loneliness. The real world turned into the Mundane World and became even more hated than it was before.

And the secret horror beyond imaging was being forced out of it. The SMOFs had that power.

So what happens when a SMOF turns out to be an unspeakable abomination?

Simple, you don't let yourself think about it. And you scream until your lungs blown completely out at anyone who tries to make you.

Anything is better than risking the Identity of the Secret King.

There you have it, folks. The Hugos fight of last year? This is where the SocJus cultists in SF/F base their opposition: it's a clear, present, and immediate threat to their Identity. Their opposition this year? The same. It's why they so often bite the hands that feed them when someone adapts a SF/F book to film or television (and why they try so hard to get their claws into those scenes), and there is one additional bit- it threatens to expose a core pillar of their Identity to the public at-large, which would result in their downfall (and they should fall).

This is NOT a scene worth saving, worth reforming. This is something that deserves the Judgement of Sodom & Gomorrah. Because wrapped up in this wretched Identity is the practice of, and apology for, the predation upon children. (Go on, read the linked post, or the expose at the Castallia House blog that prompted it.

No more "safe spaces" for this corruption. Purge it. Purge with fire.