Everything Old is New Again
Apr. 8th, 2015 11:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tbutlerSo... on the whole Sad Puppies thing.
As a friend of mine put it, while it's easy to form certain impressions about Sad Puppiators - and the egos involved - from all the commentary swirling around, doing the kind of detailed deconstruction a blog post deserves would require a lot more research and reading than I feel up to. And I really don't need the kind of stress and frustration that would build up.
However, I think I have seen enough comments on the kind of SadPuppyBadStories they dislike to comment myself. I think you can take the kind of complaints that have been tossed around (modded for language shifts) and put them right alongside the condemnations of Dangerous Visions and the whole 60s New Wave; they'd fit right in.
The same "It's not really SF!" The same "They're taking away our stories!" The same complaints about ideological agendas being pushed by the 'hippie counterculture'|'Social Justice Warriors'/etc. The same complaints about artsy elites dominating the awards.
And you know what? SF survived the New Wave. More, it thrived. Even the kind of stories favored by critics of the New Wave. Indeed, whatever you felt about the New Wave - and I have very mixed opinions, both on the movement and on the stories - I think most people would have to admit that it improved the genre. Neuromancer, Snow Crash, and the whole cyberpunk movement owe a huge debt to the stylistic experimentation in the New Wave. I love Cherryh's Union/Alliance/Compact universe, as an example of relatively hard SF worldbuilding and even space opera - but I think it was also enriched by the legacy of the New Wave. From what I've read of Jim Butcher, one of the Sad Puppy choices, his writing owes a lot to the New Wave's promotion of stylistic writing. And on, and on.
So... what goes around, comes around. Before you start complaining about stories you don't like, and screaming about 'the death of SF!', take a look back. Remember that tastes change, and change again; and while you might not like what's popular now, it doesn't mean what you like is gone forever. And the current movement - whatever it is - might even end up improving what you like, even if you don't like the movement itself. So give people the right to like what they like, instead of trying to drive it out.
As a friend of mine put it, while it's easy to form certain impressions about Sad Puppiators - and the egos involved - from all the commentary swirling around, doing the kind of detailed deconstruction a blog post deserves would require a lot more research and reading than I feel up to. And I really don't need the kind of stress and frustration that would build up.
However, I think I have seen enough comments on the kind of SadPuppyBadStories they dislike to comment myself. I think you can take the kind of complaints that have been tossed around (modded for language shifts) and put them right alongside the condemnations of Dangerous Visions and the whole 60s New Wave; they'd fit right in.
The same "It's not really SF!" The same "They're taking away our stories!" The same complaints about ideological agendas being pushed by the 'hippie counterculture'|'Social Justice Warriors'/etc. The same complaints about artsy elites dominating the awards.
And you know what? SF survived the New Wave. More, it thrived. Even the kind of stories favored by critics of the New Wave. Indeed, whatever you felt about the New Wave - and I have very mixed opinions, both on the movement and on the stories - I think most people would have to admit that it improved the genre. Neuromancer, Snow Crash, and the whole cyberpunk movement owe a huge debt to the stylistic experimentation in the New Wave. I love Cherryh's Union/Alliance/Compact universe, as an example of relatively hard SF worldbuilding and even space opera - but I think it was also enriched by the legacy of the New Wave. From what I've read of Jim Butcher, one of the Sad Puppy choices, his writing owes a lot to the New Wave's promotion of stylistic writing. And on, and on.
So... what goes around, comes around. Before you start complaining about stories you don't like, and screaming about 'the death of SF!', take a look back. Remember that tastes change, and change again; and while you might not like what's popular now, it doesn't mean what you like is gone forever. And the current movement - whatever it is - might even end up improving what you like, even if you don't like the movement itself. So give people the right to like what they like, instead of trying to drive it out.
