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General Battuta posted:Asimov was a groper, mostly. Yeah, I've heard many times that if you were a woman attending a con, you never wanted to find yourself alone in an elevator with Asimov. Asimov was a fairly typical New Deal liberal, although who knows if that would have held up if he'd lived to see today.
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May 30, 2019 16:28
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PupsOfWar posted:self-identified "futurists", which Brin is, are usually awful people it freaking sucks how everyone using the word futurist nowadays is a silicon valley slimeball instead of a hot blooded italian proto fascist hyped up on fast cars.
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Jun 1, 2019 07:12
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Isaac Asimov being a grope monster is depressing news to me. Carl Sagan is still alright .... right?
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Jun 1, 2019 07:15
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The only other hard science PHD turned sci-fi writer I can remember offhand is Robert L. Forward(no idea about his personal conduct). Vaguely recall RLF's books having a patina of plausible science tech ideas, but the actual stories in them tended to be re-badged public domain stories+fables set inside scifi frameworks. Doc EE Smith was a food sciences specialist, no idea if he was a real PHD, but holy hell he was all about eugenics in real life plus was Heinlein's BFF in real life too, so.....yeah my hypothesis about "hard science PHDs turned science-fiction writers = terrible people" is shakey but not invalidated so far.
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Jun 1, 2019 08:29
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Megazver posted:To be honest, judging only by that post, I would take any reports of unwoke ciswhite yikes-oofness from that person with a certain grain of salt. quote:Sara the Black is an introverted California native hermiting deep in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Proudly multicultural, this primarily Sephardic Jew/Kaldresh Romani was raised in Southern California. A Gender Queer, Asexual, Intersex disabled adult living with multiple chronic illnesses, Sara opted for retirement off-grid with a fiercely independent private contractor/writer companion and neurotic female feline minions. -She- is an unapologetically voracious reader with a healthy appetite for street tacos, good beer, and Hello Kitty As a hypothetical question is it more moral to uplift animals or create a 'servant' race is interesting and could make a good debate. i'd take her criticisms with a grain of salt while assuming brin is a bit of a dick. any other POVs from the day?
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Jun 1, 2019 11:07
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I don't get it - what about her self description raises red flags to you?
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Jun 1, 2019 11:56
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shrike82 posted:I don't get it - what about her self description raises red flags to you? It seems worth getting more than one person point of view and opinion before simply dismissing someone entirely on the basis of their being a chud or a eugenicist or something. Just as like a rule of thumb. Everyone has biases, hidden agendas and such.
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Jun 1, 2019 12:11
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shrike82 posted:Isaac Asimov being a grope monster is depressing news to me. the only sex stories i've heard about sagan are of him and his wife smoking weed in the shower together
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Jun 1, 2019 14:11
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1994 Toyota Celica posted:the only sex stories i've heard about sagan are of him and his wife smoking weed in the shower together Wasn't he a serial philanderer and poo poo to his kids? Also like, not really much of an actual scientist, who sort of misrepresented himself? *edit not sure which wife. Had three apparently.
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Jun 1, 2019 14:21
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shrike82 posted:I don't get it - what about her self description raises red flags to you? It screams of good mental health and a sense of proportion.
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Jun 1, 2019 14:49
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Drone Jett posted:It screams of good mental health and a sense of proportion. Yeah, gently caress off. She might be going extreme on the labels but that doesn't mean she's "red flag"-worthy unless you're a jerk.
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Jun 1, 2019 14:51
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Megazver posted:To be honest, judging only by that post, I would take any reports of unwoke ciswhite yikes-oofness from that person with a certain grain of salt. It's much easier to knee jerk post something like "Oooof" or "yikes" and immediately condemn him though and has the added benefit of showing your wokeness. StrixNebulosa posted:Yeah, gently caress off. She might be going extreme on the labels but that doesn't mean she's "red flag"-worthy unless you're a jerk. Yet you have no problem with a page long derail smearing Brin based off of one facebook post and a few vague anecdotes. Instead of you know maybe waiting for more information to come out like someone suggested. In book talk I'm about half way through Children of Ruin and really liking it so far. I didn't see the parasite creature on Nod coming at all. The pov from Lortisse where it takes him over reminded me of something from a Reynolds book. I do wish we could get a bit more from the Octopus point of view though like we did the Portids in Children of Time.
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Jun 1, 2019 15:04
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johnsonrod posted:It's much easier to knee jerk post something like "Oooof" or "yikes" and immediately condemn him though and has the added benefit of showing your wokeness. Why are you equating the two? Brin having some absolutely repulsive stances is not the same as someone labeling themselves. e: To be clear, I have nothing to say about Brin. If more information comes out and he's not a jackass, great!
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Jun 1, 2019 15:12
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StrixNebulosa posted:Why are you equating the two? Brin having some absolutely repulsive stances is not the same as someone labeling themselves. The fact you're willing to base your opinion about him on that one facebook post and some vague anecdotes speaks volumes about you. Considering nothing else has come out about this "inccident" and its been about a week since the con. StrixNebulosa posted:e: To be clear, I have nothing to say about Brin. If more information comes out and he's not a jackass, great! Except that he has "some absolutely repulsive stances" and we need more information to prove " he's not a jackass". No, nothing at all. I'm done with the stupid derail though, have fun.
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Jun 1, 2019 15:24
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johnsonrod posted:The fact you're willing to base your opinion about him on that one facebook post and some vague anecdotes speaks volumes about you. Considering nothing else has come out about this "inccident" and its been about a week since the con. Coward. You want me to write you a whole effortpost on why I think it's believable that Brin could have some awful ideas? That I'm not believing this in a vacuum? Let me know you actually want to talk about this and I will. What I'm objecting to is that other poster calling the facebook lady insane because she applied a bunch of labels to herself. That's hosed up.
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Jun 1, 2019 15:29
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StrixNebulosa posted:Coward. Yes do tell. I don't like his Canadian optimism, so I'm desperate for some reason to be dismissive of him. I want the only true hard sci-fi author from Canada to be Watts because of my predilections.
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Jun 1, 2019 15:43
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Jeff Vandermeer posted this several days ago in a Facebook thread where he originally stated that he does what he can to avoid Brin, and in direct response to this situation.Jeff Vandermeer posted:Just so it's clear: I hadn't heard of this kind of behavior before. What I did know was him being dismissive and condescending to women, insufferably egotistical in ways that were derailing and seriously a problem for other people, and some other things of that nature. And I have warned people in private about him. Then about two years ago it apparently got back to him and Ann got a bizarre phone call from him with a message for me that the "social media outrage" of the future would be about gossip and I should be careful, that future social media outrage wouldn't be about diversity but about gossip. Which I took as a kind of warning, obviously. Even as I thought it very weird and stupid. Sometimes when you get something like that it does make you stop short in terms of saying something publicly. Anecdotal, of course, but the more you dig at this, the more a pattern starts to form.
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Jun 1, 2019 15:55
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Which David Weber book should I read if I hated the ending of Out of the Dark? He's got a lot of novels...
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Jun 1, 2019 16:28
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johnsonrod posted:The fact you're willing to base your opinion about him on that one facebook post and some vague anecdotes speaks volumes about you. Considering nothing else has come out about this "inccident" and its been about a week since the con. Brin's been an idiot for a while, there's more in the comments here : http://file770.com/pixel-scroll-5-28-19-pix-el-last-scroller-of-krypton
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Jun 1, 2019 16:30
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GreenBuckanneer posted:Which David Weber book should I read if I hated the ending of Out of the Dark? He's got a lot of novels... Assuming not reading him isn't an option, start with On Basilisk Station and keep reading in order until you don't want to read any more. For me, it was when she hosed her mentor and his wife was fine with it.
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Jun 1, 2019 16:37
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Beachcomber posted:Assuming not reading him isn't an option, start with On Basilisk Station and keep reading in order until you don't want to read any more. It's the only book I've read of him and I'd hate to write off an author on a single book. Thank you!
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Jun 1, 2019 16:49
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Beachcomber posted:Assuming not reading him isn't an option, start with On Basilisk Station and keep reading in order until you don't want to read any more. I absolutely buy that relationship in a future society of Evolved Mores; they were all in clear emotional communication, nobody did anything without permission from everyone involved, and Honor's friendship/platonic romance with Emily read as strongly (or stronger than) her connection to Hamish. Kind of a Professor Marston and the Wonder Women situation — though in real life the Honor/Emily equivalents weren't platonic and stayed together for decades after Marston's death. Of course, if these were real people, it would probably fall apart in some horrible clusterfuck of poly drama within the next 8-12 months, ruining everyone's lives and making all their future professional interactions unbearably awkward. But Weber writes hagiography of morally impeccable individuals, which, y'know, I can understand the appeal of, even if I don't find it very interesting. And there's empathy/telepathy involved, and supportive extended family. I believe a trio of 60+ year old adults could absolutely make it work. What I can't stand is the goddamn missile porn. How could he have figured out that war between near-peer opponents with rough moral equivalence is more interesting than a one-sided technological victory by the righteous...and then gone right ahead and written the Manticore/Solarian conflict as a series of absolutely one-sided technological victories by the righteous? What a waste of effort and words.
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Jun 1, 2019 17:04
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What always bothers me about Honor Harrington is that she's narratively perfect: whatever choices she makes, for whatever reason, it turns out afterwards that her enemies we're perfectly evil and everything she did was therefore justifiable. Also everything is always perfect for her as a special flower. Everyone else has to work at it: she does everything perfect the first time by instinct. Her magical space cat is uniquely specially magical. So on, so forth. She can't actually make a mistake. The universe shifts to accommodate. Also godammit Rob s Pierre
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Jun 1, 2019 17:41
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yeah, I read On Basilisk Station after seeing that book (and series) on a bunch of "best of" space sci-fi lists. It was an enjoyable book but I couldn't be bothered to get the next one in the series. It wasn't really special in any particular manner. Honestly it struck me as better for like, a teenage girl than a general audience. Role models and all that.
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Jun 1, 2019 17:52
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Yeah you're much better off just reading the Aubrey-Maturin series which has actual living breathing characters who gently caress up plenty but still pull through.
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Jun 1, 2019 18:00
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here's the "anecdote" I was referring to earlier. read it yourself. https://www.rifters.com/crawl/?p=4937
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Jun 1, 2019 18:01
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Rob S. Pierre owns Oscar St. Just owns the brazen extent to which Haven is just weber's bad Schoolhouse Rock rendition of Revolutionary France is... one of the few things in those books that's really fun, I'd say Haven getting taken over by the Just and Rational Coalition of the Honourable Admiral and the Sexy Commissar is when the series got really interminible w/r/t the Honor/Hamish/Emily polycule: I don't mind it in principle Weber did do a couple books' worth of work to establish Honor and Emily's relationship (yeah Honor gives little prior indication of being attracted to women, so her suddenly having a wife comes sorta out of left field, but sexuality is a spectrum, ain't no rule, etc) the real issue with it is that Honor and Hamish are the two most boring motherfuckers in literature so navigating things with Emily is invariably way more interesting than anything in Honor and Hamish's sex-haver relationship, which takes up way more space. it would have been better if Hamish got exploded one book into that subplot you could then have some real drama with Honor and Emily trying to work out whether they've got a relationship that works without the fulcrum of their triad there, kinda like the final Vorkosigan book but weber is not capable of or interested in exploiting the opportunities for character drama he sets up pmchem posted:yeah, I read On Basilisk Station after seeing that book (and series) on a bunch of "best of" space sci-fi lists. It was an enjoyable book but I couldn't be bothered to get the next one in the series. It wasn't really special in any particular manner. Honestly it struck me as better for like, a teenage girl than a general audience. Role models and all that. On Basilisk Station is almost certainly the best honorverse novel. Swashbuckling tone, actual problem-solving, some dramatic tension, no baggage, no missile spam. So if you didn't enjoy Basilisk Station, there is definitely no reason to read any further. PupsOfWar fucked around with this message at 18:17 on Jun 1, 2019 |
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Jun 1, 2019 18:12
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General Battuta posted:I absolutely buy that relationship in a future society of Evolved Mores; they were all in clear emotional communication, nobody did anything without permission from everyone involved, and Honor's friendship/platonic romance with Emily read as strongly (or stronger than) her connection to Hamish. Kind of a Professor Marston and the Wonder Women situation — though in real life the Honor/Emily equivalents weren't platonic and stayed together for decades after Marston's death. I really hate that it's her mentor since she was a very young woman.
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Jun 1, 2019 18:19
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Dude she’s like...fifty plus, maybe past sixty. I mean it’s not ideal, but they do go to great pains to avoid acting on their feelings until they’re out of the same chain of command and any direct military hierarchy.
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Jun 1, 2019 18:23
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Beachcomber posted:I really hate that it's her mentor since she was a very young woman. Honor was like 45 by the time any of this happened tbf Like...I don't want to apologize for Weber, who is bad, or for the Honor/Hamish relationship which is also bad There is definitely a problematic power imbalance there as there would be with any senior officer/junior officer relationship in a military context and moreover it's...suspicious that weber would decide honor's Final Destined Love Interest is a wealthy, much older white male who is a nerd about naval history but Honor's actual mentor was the guy that got blown up in book 2
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Jun 1, 2019 18:26
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:What always bothers me about Honor Harrington is that she's narratively perfect: whatever choices she makes, for whatever reason, it turns out afterwards that her enemies we're perfectly evil and everything she did was therefore justifiable. So she's basically Jack Bauer.
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Jun 1, 2019 18:26
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pseudanonymous posted:So she's basically Jack Bauer. She checks more Mary Sue boxes than any other character I've ever read or encountered anywhere. A golden corral chocolate fountain except the chocolate is perfection fantasy cliches.
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Jun 1, 2019 18:32
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pseudanonymous posted:Wasn't he a serial philanderer and poo poo to his kids? Also like, not really much of an actual scientist, who sort of misrepresented himself? Carl Sagan did plenty of science, he worked on Apollo, and Venus and Mars robotic missions among others. Later on he did more of the science communicator thing (I guess he's pretty much the first person you could actually call that) and was an advisor, but I think his science bona fides are fine. General Battuta posted:I absolutely buy that relationship in a future society of Evolved Mores; they were all in clear emotional communication, nobody did anything without permission from everyone involved, and Honor's friendship/platonic romance with Emily read as strongly (or stronger than) her connection to Hamish. Kind of a Professor Marston and the Wonder Women situation — though in real life the Honor/Emily equivalents weren't platonic and stayed together for decades after Marston's death. I agree with the Future Evolved Mores thing (see also: Culture) but I always thought it was based on the real life story of Lord Nelson and Emma Hamilton since so much of Harrington is also based on Nelson. Polikarpov posted:Yeah you're much better off just reading the Aubrey-Maturin series which has actual living breathing characters who gently caress up plenty but still pull through. This is the real answer.
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Jun 1, 2019 18:34
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imo the biggest indictment of Weber as an author is that Honor builds up this large ensemble of consistent supporting characters - her household retainers and the junior officers she consistently works with - yet there is never, ever any interesting personal drama among them I could accept any number of bad dry battle scenes if he...wrote...stories most authors have things they'll go on a weird over-detailed tangent about, so in theory I've no objections if Weber wants to spend 16 pages talking about missile logistics when geraldine brooks taks a detour to talk about how gables were shaped in house construction in the 1660s it's fine imho weber however is uniquely uninterested in doing anything else it's a singular phenomenon i have never encountered in any other novelist for instance in book1 there's a bit of tension set up between Honor and McKeon McKeon's sort of an interesting, ambiguous figure there...older officer, competent but unremarkable career, suddenly finds his fortunes welded to this younger upstart who he resents. This is a bit humdrum but it's a solid foundation if you're gonna build some sort of arc. However, it then proceeds to not come up at all for the rest of the series nor is any similar underlying tension set up with any other supporting character several books later when McKeon gets exploded it's like..."alistair my buddy, I get that this is meant to be sad but you really haven't done anything in like 7,000 pages other than be in the background of staff meetings" Hieronymous Alloy posted:Also godammit Rob s Pierre General Battuta posted:What I can't stand is the goddamn missile porn. i appreciate all of our shared contempt for books weve all clearly read at least several of for some reason PupsOfWar fucked around with this message at 18:45 on Jun 1, 2019 |
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Jun 1, 2019 18:43
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Oh I read like twelve Honor Harrington books in a single weekend The man can do pacing
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Jun 1, 2019 18:50
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why don't they just make the whole superdreadnought out of the impeller wedge
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Jun 1, 2019 18:54
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Oh I read like twelve Honor Harrington books in a single weekend Also you could (probably still can) legally download and read them for free, at least the earlier ones in the series. I would have stopped much more quickly otherwise. I think the thing is On Basilisk Station seems like a pretty good start to a Hornblower in Space series (better than, and less a blatant rip-off, than David Feintuch's version, for instance), but though the immediate sequels still sort of hit the marks they go rapidly downhill. By the time you've got to Honor the Super Mary Sue with the Magic Telepathic Hobnob fucked around with this message at 19:11 on Jun 1, 2019 |
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Jun 1, 2019 19:01
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Started reading the book Sixteen Ways to Defend a Walled City. Its like someone went out and decided to pretty much write a book about someone defending Constantinople in the not Byzantine Empire with the serial numbers filed off. Enjoying it so far, I also finished Children of Time and that book was good however weaker than the first one. Hobnob posted:Also you could (probably still can) legally download and read them for free, at least the earlier ones in the series. I would have stopped much more quickly otherwise. Honestly the "Mary Sue" aspect creep in even on Basilisk Station, its just as the series scale expands it gets more egregious.
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Jun 1, 2019 20:30
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Hobnob posted:By the time you've got to Honor the Super Mary Sue with the Magic Telepathic That starts in book two, which is probably the most frustrating book of all to me because she fucks up by the numbers and nobody ever calls her on it.
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Jun 1, 2019 23:11
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I was once talking to a guy who didn't think the Honorverse was political. I mentioned the scene in which the only self-identified "Liberal" character in the series proceeded to make a strawman declaration about how the two warring Christian fanatic groups should "just make peace" and kept refusing to engage a proper military solution until Honor punched him in the mouth. He didn't think that was a political statement, just that one guy being an rear end in a top hat. So it is very possible to completely ignore Weber's lovely politics, especially if you personally believe political problems can be solved by just shooting the right bad mans.
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Jun 1, 2019 23:58
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