The Drink Tank 146 (2007).pdf

The Drink Tank Issue 146

Cover by Frank Wu!!!

don’t attend WorldCons, but there

was a strong Fanzine Fan presence

at LACon

I was asked onto a load of

panels, including ones about fanzines

(with over 70 people listening), I spoke

about numerous subjects to hundreds

of people, always introduced as the

Taff winner, I was kindly supported by

the worldcon, I was allowed to present

a HUGO, and in doing so, make much

mention of TAFF to thousands of

people and generally I did my best

to spread the word of Taff, fanzines,

running conventions, getting involved

and European conventions to as many

people as possible. I also helped raise

a load of money in a fan fund auction

and I met many people whom I am still

in contact with.

I could have done more, my

antipodean fund mate, Norman Cates

gave a video presentation in the main

hall to hundreds of people.

It's Worldcon programmers, staff,

tech, con com, area heads, gophers

and planners who gave us that space,

that stage.

It's Worldcon members who

funded it.

Worldcon is ‘fandomorientated’,

its run by fans, for fans, attended

by thousands of fans, covers many

fannish aspects and areas and

embodies many ine qualities that

many a small con can only aspire

to. Peter Weston was the FGOH for

And now, let’s hit some LoCs sent to

garcia@computerhistory.org,

starting with James Bacon!

Dear Chris,

Well I must admit that I would

go to the Moscow Eurocon, if you had

decided that was your Taff destination,

and you and Steve are correct to say

that candidates have every right to

state from the outset where they wish

to head to if they win.

The one big problem is I don’t speak

much Russian and it’ll be weird

being in a country where I didn’t

speak the language and didn’t

know anyone. I’ve always felt like

there was a de facto vibe that if you

say you’re going to another con,

folks won’t be happy. Then again,

that’s true about a lot of things.

But I am astonished that Steve

Green thinks that a Taff candidates are

‘showcased in some distant corner of a

Worldcon.’

This small minded and parochial

type of attitude does fanzine and

taff fandom no favours at all, and is

really quite unfair to the many people

involved with Worldcons, who go out of

their way to welcome and promote Taff.

I’ve talked to a couple of previous

winners who said they wished

they’d gone to smaller cons, but

there is a double-edged sword there.

The bigger the con, theoretically

the bigger the exposure for the

Fund. Conversely, there’s the slight

limitation of having such a huge

con that attention is severely split

and there’s little focus.

I have irst hand experience.

I am pretty sure I met many Corlu

attendees in the fan lounge (at the

centre of activities, IMHO) at two Fan

Fund receptions in 2004, and I was

lucky to have Mark Plummer, Guy

Lillian and Monsieur Hertz on hand

to introduce me to dozens of fanzine

greats.

There are regular CorFluites who

goodness sake at the time I was

TAFF’ing. I got loads of fanzines and

widened my fanish circle and to be

honest, I reckon that any worldcon

would support any decent fannish

initiative or idea, like what was wrong

with the Fan Lounge and programme

in Glasgow, I thought it was amazing.

I don’t mind someone making

CorFlu their destination of choice,

I would be interested to see how

that would pan out, I irmly believe

candidates can decide to do what they

want, but I ind it incomprehensible

that in supporting this correct and

notable assertion there is a necessity

to denigrate another convention. Sure

talk up CorFlu, why not, its a ine

convention, I believe, I would love to

know the reasons a small convention

would be a better Taff destination,

but on its own merits, not at the

sake of knocking a Worldcon to do it,

especially when its so inaccurate.

corner, indeed,

James Bacon

WorldCon has certainly been good

to TAFF recipiants as I’m sure

Bridget will also attest. There’s

not nearly as much person-to-

person contact as a con like a

CorFlu would allow, but that’s

unavoidable. There’s the trouble

of individual attention vs. bigger

exposure. It’s hard to say which is

the right way to go, as I’m betting

either would probably work well.

If you look up ine fan writers in

the dictionary, you probably won’t

ind it. But if you did, Claire Brialey

would be right there!

Dear Chris,

Once again I ind myself some

issues behind with several recent

issues on which I wanted to comment

when I irst read them.

It’s OK, I haven’t read any of my

recent issues either.

To start with there’s Frank

Wu’s synthesis of racism in YouTube

comments, for #143. And naturally I

found many of the comments quoted

to be offensive and unpleasant, as

did John Purcell and Steve Green

in their letters in #144. But, like

them, although I was shocked and

disappointed to see people openly

expressing those sort of views, I

wasn’t particularly surprised by

them. In fact, what surprised me the

most was that some people in the

comments quoted were challenging

the prejudice. My expectation (my

prejudice) about comments on general

internet forums is that most people

who get involved don’t have anything

worth saying: that they’re bullies who

hate everyone, people who have an

opinion about everything but can’t

adequately express any of it, or people

who want to pick ights and will

express any opinion likely to do that.

So it’s actually reassuring to see at

least some people arguing back and

airing more rational opinions. Mark

recently forwarded me a splendid

YouTube link to a sketch entitled ‘If

YouTube Comments Met Real Life

Situations’, which expressed very well

both the general tone of comments

on YouTube clips and the dichotomy

of this interaction and normal

conversation. Sadly I can’t use it to

help to demonstrate my point since the

link now goes to a page stating, ‘This

video is no longer available due to a

which may also say something about

YouTube.

Bastards! The only group I’m openly

prejudiced against is copyright

holders! I think we should line them

up and then release the hounds!

What also struck me about the

quoted comments – although, again,

not unexpectedly – was the range of

prejudice revealed. In the irst batch of

comments quoted, there is both some

anti-Iraqi sentiment and some anti-

Bush (or anti-US?) sentiment; then,

as well as three comments which were

expressly racist or supportive of racism

– and one overtly challenging that

– there was one which seemed anti-

Islam, one claiming that another poster

was ‘retarded’, and another claiming

that an earlier comment was ‘gay as

hell’ and that the situation in Iraq was

now ‘a pussy war’. And I do realise that

‘gay’ is now often used as a generalised

derogatory comment – but I don’t see

that as any sort of positive progress.

It was the casual racism of

the anti-Japanese posting in Frank’s

third batch that I found actually

scarier than the illiterate and ignorant

racist ranting of some of the others.

Doubtless the latter sort of bigotry is

scarier in practice, if you meet such

aggressive racism head-on in public.

But it’s the casual, implicit prejudice

of unchallenged assumptions that can

prevent people from getting decent life

chances (education, jobs, housing as

you mentioned in your comments after

the article) while all around people are

saying, Things are much better, fewer

people get beaten up now and we all

know that the people who beat others

up are just ignorant racists.

That’s an interesting point and one

that gets overlooked far too often.

We tend to associate racism with

violence, particularly in America

where we strongly documented our

violence against various races in

photographs and ilm. Now things

are much different, but it’s still

an under-current. There’s a whole

lot to be said for city planning as

a form of racial segregation, but

that’s another article.

There’s been some interesting

research in recent years on equality,

diversity and prejudice in the UK,

which has found that p rejudice here

is still widespread although often

against targets different from those

who experienced most discrimination

in previous generations. For instance,

people in Britain seemed least

concerned about expressing prejudice

against Muslims and against gay men

and lesbians , and most concerned

about being seen to be prejudiced

against older people or disabled

people. People’s attitudes towards

different groups seem to be based on

stereotyped perceptions of each of

these groups, and on the perceived

‘threat’, whether cultural, physical or

economic, posed by each. It’s clear that

relatively few people in Britain would

now publicly express negative feelings

towards someone else because of, say,

their race or disability; but in practice

public behaviour doesn’t entirely

relect what people really think. So I’m

inclined to think that opportunities

to express views anonymously, such

as the YouTube comments, would

be inclined to bring out prejudice

precisely because social norms are now

less accepting of it; if you feel you can’t

usually get away with such statements,

what warped freedom must anonymity

offer?

The veil, while somewhat thin, is

enough to allow your deeper sides

to show.

Meanwhile, in the rest of #143

and the next issue, in the parts that

were boobs, wrestling, and stories

about drinking – all those boobs

are there because women, like men,

deserve respect even when they keep

their clothes on and regardless of how

they look, right? Right? (You can print

as many pictures of cute squid as

you like, though. I know you respect

them for their brains. Except that I

ind in #144 and #145 respectively

that Frank and John both want to eat

the squid, which isn’t very respectful

either.) Respect and acceptance have

a lot of strands, and that’s something

I still ind dificult when I encounter

views radically different to my own;

indeed, I haven’t entirely been able to

shed the viewpoint that people who

don’t understand mutual respect and

acceptance should have their heads

repeatedly beaten against a wall until

they do.

I once had a woman speciically

say that she was only into me

because of my brain. That actually

hurt. I’d much rather be wanted

for my body! In fairness, I have

tremendous respect for women even

when they do keep their clothes on

(and in some cases Because they

keep their clothes on, but that’s

another article). I happen to have

a slightly over-driven appreciation

for the female form. And if I am

ever accused of respecting women

equally with the way I respect

men, I should be locked up because

I so unfairly treat men! On the other

hand, Squids...Man, I can’t talk

too much about them. There’s a lot

to be said. Jason Schachat has a

theory that Cephlalopod is actually

an Olde English word meaning

Onion Sack because old ishermen

would stuff onions in the mantels of

these squids and that ifty pounds

of onions could ill the larger ones.

I’m not sure that’s accurate, but he

does live closer to the ocean than I

do...

And then I found myself beating

my own head against the wall, when

I saw John Purcell’s comment that

his letter to you in #144 was his 150 th

LOC of 2007. (And you’ve done at least

50. And I gather that Lloyd Penney

is around the 200 mark for this year

already.) Whereas I was congratulating

myself the other day on having written

more letters to fanzines so far this

year than in the whole of 2005, when

I had a longer commute on which to

read and write to fanzines, and twice

as many as during all of last year; and

do you know how many LOC s that is?

Including this one? Twenty. This year

I’ve written precisely twenty fanzine

letters of comment. And six of them

were to you. Still, at least I ind John

in #145 noting that it feels like every

other LOC he writes is to you too…

Well, that’s why I’ve only managed

maybe 70 LoCs this year. I don’t

have the GarciaZines to LoC!

Steve Green will probably

overtake me in the LOC stakes in the

next few weeks, judging by his letters

to you as well as writing columns. (You

might think, what with chairing the UK

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