The Readercon sexual harassment debacle has been discussed on a couple of podcasts recently. Gary and Jonathan had Genevieve Valentine as a guest on Coode Street at the weekend, and a good part of the episode was given over to the Readercon issue. I thought it went very well. Kudos to a couple of old, white, cis, straight males. 😉
The latest episode of the SF Signal podcast also discussed the issue. The ladies on the podcast did a good job of explaining the issue, including mention of a truly awful story from a previous World Fantasy that Jeff VanderMeer rightly jumps all over here. However, I do with that Patrick Hester had done some research before the show. And I also wish that they’d had someone on who was more closely involved in running conventions. While I’m very keen to see conventions adopt good anti-harassment policies, I’m staring to lean more towards the view that the smart thing to do is to get out of con-running.
While I don’t blame you for thinking conrunning is becoming too risky, I think the real take-away is that more people need to get involved in conrunning so they can learn that it’s not a bunch of Nibelungen hiding under the surface making things happen for them at cons.
That would be good, but the overwhelming impression I’ve been getting from discussions of the ReaderCon incident is that They are at fault, and They should do better so that We will feel safe at Their events. It’s not a community thing any more.
I thought the SFSignal panelists showed remarkable restraint in not calling Patrick Hester a jackass when he briefly veered into “will no one think of the socially awkward men” territory.
Well yes, but they didn’t really get the point over either. The whole “socially awkward” thing is a derailing tactic because it equates general cluelessness with what Rene actually did, which was far worse. If you react to that sort of tactic by saying that people shouldn’t be socially awkward it just reinforces the idea that anyone is liable to be banned for life from conventions for an unguarded comment. You have to be so careful with this stuff, and podcasts are perhaps not the idea venue because you have to think on your feet.