Liz · Williams: · journal

You know, if you changed the genre to Romance and the gender to Male you could probably write exactly the same comments about the RITAs...

You're probably right!

I'd been thinking about posting on this subject, too: it seems to have come round again, certainly. What occurs to me is that there are male writers out there who are pretty romantic -- Charles de Lint springs immediately to mind, not to mention a lot of Heinlein's output, but that this seems not to be an issue (unlike the prejudices against Catherine Asaro -- I don't like her books, but not because of the romance and physics thing, they just aren't my cup of green tea). But when a male writer produces a relationship-driven skiffy novel (The Crow Road, Strangers by Gardner Dozois, Ken Macleod's The Stone Canal -- there are lots) it is often lauded to the skies for its sensitivity. This isn't so with the female writers, perhaps because its seen as their 'sphere', perhaps because science is perceived as masculine. There's also the fantasy ghetto thing, too: it remains the case that fantasy is still seen as the lower form, and romance/relationships is seen as more appropriate to that arena.

Yes, fantasy is to SF what SF is to 'lit' - if it's SF/fantasy it can't be good, and if it's good, it can't be SF/fantasy....!

The 'damned if you do, damned if you don't' approach to lit crit!

I;m not sure that Asaro is a good example to be using tho'. I think she is a really lovely person, but I found her sf romance unreadable. It isn't sensitive, it's soggy. (and I write that as a person with a mall stash of cheap romances for rainy days).

I can't bear romance in any form (literary, I mean!), so it isn't my thing. But she shouldn't have to put up with attacks on the basis that she combines it with physics. Any failings in the writing itself are fair game, just as they are for the rest of us!

I fear I may be one of those who has criticised Catherine Asaro's romance + physics writing. But I hope I have stopped short of vilification. I just found it really didn't work for me, as it didn't for farah_mdx.

I would also have to say that I think Asaro is a very nice person - she was good enough send me several of her books in an effort to make me change my mind. (Unfortunately it didn't work!) So I would hate to think that I was perceived as vilifying her.

Granted, I'm on the little fish end of this pool, but I haven't seen any particular *industry* bias toward women. It's by far the closest thing I've seen to a meritocracy of any industry I've ever worked in. (Do not get me started on higher ed. ;-)

I wonder if the issue with the disparity in the awards (and that's been pretty obvious for many years) is more about how men and women vary in their approaches to selling themselves than quality of work or industry bias. I see this in a lot of the women writers I know; they're more hesitant about "putting themselves forward" than the men are. I'm certain *this* is cultural conditioning. It's not just writers, it's everywhere. We're supposed to 'work for the good of all' rather than for our own betterment. Men, on the other hand, are strongly encouraged to be individually successful. A woman who does that is often viewed as selfish and self-centered, while a man is viewed as strong and independent.

Just a thought.

I think it's a good thought. One might also turn it around and say that women are often less ego-driven and write for themselves rather than for public acclaim! My mother still writes, but she has relatively little interest in being published.

Again, though, if we weren't given the message throughout our lives that we're 'not good enough', how many more would pursue publication?

I remember being horrified by an obituary in my college's ALUMNAE QUARTERLY. One of her classmates praised a woman who had spent her whole life writing meticulously researched, carefully written and well documented histories. As soon as she finished one, she put it carefully away and went on to the next.

The author of this obituary seemed to take it as a given that her putting away her books was somehow a finer, nobler thing than seeking publication.

Granted, these ladies were -venerable- at the time: possibly centenarians, which isn't uncommon for our alumnae.

But I'm wondering if this fear of putting oneself forward, taking rejection, and continuing to put oneself forward isn't something we still have with us in some way, shape or form.

Coupled by a harsher standard as relates to the female "careerists" who market themselves aggressively.

It's the same old double standard that says, given the exact same behaviors, men are "assertive" while women are "aggressive". Or if a man makes a mistake, he's just human, but if a woman makes a mistake, she's incompetent.

I think a great many women still do have that, yes. We had a discussion after the panel and there is a tendency for women who get rejected to think they must have done something wrong, whereas the men tend to think 'bastards, I'll show 'em!"

I think that the "women working for the good of all" fang is all about the fact that nature or nurture in the societies where women are writing, brings on the good of all ethic.

The ultimate function of biological organisms is to survive and breed. Human females have no choice but to share their body for nine months, if the shoe was on the other foot the race would die out...can you see a man sharing his body for 9 months? Your lucky if they share their little fellah for more than 20 minutes!!

Pregnancy is more than enough sharing, then following the birth of the brat, the bond tends to lead to them carrying on this sharing of time, substance, and resources.

Human males and individual success seems to be the same in most species. Be the most successful..usually the most violent..and guarantee your contribution to the gene pool..and lotsa honeyz.

If there are more male writers possibly its because they have more time to write (no real parental responsibilities e.g.) and are arrogant enough to put forward a proposal because of their belief in themselves. They don't care what people think, nature made them risk takers...they are not as important to a species survival, so the self preservation is not as strong.

That will do for now, sorry its a bit long.

Nope, never have bought the biological "social nurturer" vs. "hunter" crap people try to use to support inequality between the sexes. It's far too black and white and doesn't account for the vast range of human behaviors. I've known far too many men who were the at home nurturers (including some full time writers) while their wives were out working to pay the bills. By the same token, I've known far too many women who don't have a nurturing, cooperative bone in their bodies. That explanation does nothing but support the same systems that keep women 'in their place' and allow men the 'freedom' to be jerks, cuz, y'know, it's just biology. It's also that argument that supports the idea of homosexuality as 'deviant' since, *obviously* g/l/b folks aren't being 'true to their real natures'.

Sorry obviously a raw nerve!!

So you think that with all other species on this planet displaying marked gender roles that the vastly superior "mankind" can buck the trend. Well you believe that if you must friend.

Either way you cannot deny that for 9 months a female human ape has to share its body and resource with a parasite. Do you really believe that such a burden can have no psychological effect on the subject?

Granted we seem to have the ability to break our programming and maybe thats why the world is in the state it is, we have strayed from the grand plan. Free will is hell isnt it? The freedom to be jerks is equally demonstrated by females as well as males, unfortunately.

Different human behaviours are evident but we don't know all that there is to know about all animal behaviour, just what little we observe in chosen species.

You say you know too many men who are nurturers, statistically what proportion of the worlds approximately 3 billion males do these people consist of? If you were a busy lady who "knew" 10000 males thats 0.000003%!! and a similar arguement stacks against female non-nurterers.

I dont know why you have to drag homosexuality into it. Homosexual deviancy occurs in other species too you know. So a pointless statement. Dont be so emotive it will be your undoing.

The support of systems keeping women "in their place" mmm. Right or wrong the physical strength threat of the male in many species is the reason for keeping others in their place. A Yorkshiremans "Wheres me tea Woman" is about biology and roles. "Put my dinner on the table honey or I will slap you!"

As I see it if nature has given us roles we go about things without conflict. If we question those roles we introduce a new variable into the life equation. Both sexes competing for dominance is that good? Competing for equality is a false statement. Where is that equality? Who sets the benchmark? One must win eventually.

I congratulate you on the eloquent use of the word "crap". Well done, clever you.

You've just succeeded in painting yourself completely into your bigoted corner. And anonymously, too.

When we started Clarkesworld, I was keen on publishing women and have found it to be simplicity itself to do so. Indeed, we're running a female majority, and also a "new writer" majority (first or second sales).

The difference between Cworld and other magazines is that I like excellent writing, and valorize it over other literary values, like that mythical construct "story." In my slush pile, at least, women are much better writers. It's not even a contest, and holds true even when the name is obscured through use of initials and I discover that the author is a woman after sending an acceptance.

But what these women anyway, are doing, is just NOT what van Gelder et al. want. Not only is there a lower bound for writing quality (i.e., not quite shite) there also appears to be an upper bound.

I don't think it's as much overt sexism as "exceptions to the rule," "queen bees" and reverse snobs, but I'd really rather not have that discussion online.

That's entirely fair and I do know what you mean. Although I think it's slightly less prevalent in British SF, for whatever reason.

I wonder if it's because the group is smaller.

I don't have much experience with British SF, except the individual pros I've met and enjoyed meeting tremendously.

However, early in my alleged career, when a trilogy of mine sold British reprint rights to Pan and Pan made a fuss over me and brought me over for the Brighton Worldcon, I remember one male writer raising one hell of a shitfit, and the concom putting me on fan panels.

I hate flying and don't have to take a plane to be made to feel nykulturny. It seemed a failure in hospitality.

Guy wears, or wore, a ponytail, wrote in a universe I think was called Viriconium and could never get into, but was considered highly intellectual by all who spoke of him. Myself, I thought it was a case of the Emperor's New Clothes and find it highly ironic that I had to come to F&SF to be considered an intellectual lightweight.

Quote "Well, yes, quite often the person is being discriminated against - for writing shite." Unquote.

Excellent stuff. People will be claiming that they are being descriminated because they don't meet the quality threshold.lol.

"wot I engish good not, that is unpossible!"

The Locus Poll closes for voting on Sunday. You don't have to pay to vote. You don't have to be a member of anything or a Locus subscriber. How's about we actually all vote and see if we can get some women authors winning?

https://secure.locusmag.com/2007/2007PollAndSurvey.html

Cheryl

Hi, I'm new and I ended up here in an incredibly roundabout LJ way.
I don't really care whether women publish exactly as much as men do. I'm reasonably certain that there is equal opportunity in SF/Fantasy and as long as the selection process if fair, I'm not calculating percentages.
What annoys me is the overabundance of male protagonists in a certain kind of hard SF mag. Analog is the biggest culprit, with Asimov's coming in second. Most of their MC's seem to be male, especially when they're doing the traditional "male" stuff: engineering, detectiving, thinking hard. Does thinking hard take lots of physical strenght? because these mags make it look like it does.
Part of this is their focus on "scientific types" which admitedly may influence some writers to make their protags male (traditionally scientists have been male) which may in turn increase the male protag ratio in the slushpile, but I'm not buying it.