Journalist – Historian – Speaker
A few years ago, my wife spent every other week or so working in Boston. It was a hard year, but a good one for her career. While spending lots of time in a hotel, she started binging through years of the show Supernatural and became a fast fan. It’s a show with a large …
I like TV shows, books, and movies that are imperfect matches for my values. They are produced in societies that are, likewise, imperfect, and few cultural creations can withstand any kind of purity test. That doesn’t mean that you just get to ignore the problem. It also doesn’t necessarily mean you have to stop enjoying …
Lock In is the newest book by the well-known sci-fi author John Scalzi. In my review at Huffington Post, I wrote: On a certain level, this is a story about “wheelchairs,” or rather assistive mobility devices. That’s unusual. While many science fiction stories depict advanced technological responses to plagues or injuries, such stories usually involve seemingly …
And that no one may wonder that this sex laboured at warfare, I will make a brief digression, in order to give a short account of the estate and character of such women. There were once women among the Danes who dressed themselves to look like men, and devoted almost every instant of their lives …
I’ve taken off the Hugo nominee pin that I’ve worn proudly on my lapel since my Doctor Who episode, The Doctor’s Wife, won the Hugo in September 2012, and, for now, I’ve put it away. It isn’t Neil Gaiman’s fault that people worship him. Heck, before deconstructing his reaction post, which I find highly manipulative, let …
I decided to weigh in on the Jonathan Ross/Hugos story because of what I saw as gendered discourse in the backlash to the backlash, and because Seanan McGuire is someone I know (and I make music with her girlfriend) and deeply respect for her non-fiction writing on feminism, sexual orientation, and representation in fandom and fiction. Her …
Lately, thanks to a long and thoughtful thread on Steve Brust’s blog (which you should read), discussions about sexual harassment in fandom, the fake geek girl issues, and so forth – I’ve been thinking a lot about online bullying, gender, power, and the speculative fiction community. Especially in the SFWA (Science-Fiction Writers of America), issues pertaining to …