Due to the effort of Cheryl Morgan and Kevin Standlee I’m aware of these proposed changes to the Hugo Award rules —
Agenda Section 4 – New Business
WSFS members may submit new business for consideration by the Business Meeting. Motions submitted prior to the convention will be published here as they become available.
4.1 – Constitutional Amendments
- 4.1.1 –Â Short Title: No Cheap Voting
- 4.1.3 –Â Short Title: Deleting Best Fanzine, Best Fan Writer, and Best Fan Artist from the WSFS Constitution
— to be discussed at the WSFS Business Meeting at the Worldcon in September.
In what’s probably going to be a very popular post over the next week, John Scalzi explains why he think deleting the fan categories is a stupid (and possibly vindictive) idea.  For me the better post on this issue is this one by Jonathan McCalmont, which was posted more than a week ago.
In regard to the ‘No Cheap Voting’ issue Seanan McGuire has posted thusly.
And then there’s Cheryl’s thoughts on both these issues.Â
I’m sure there’s a bevy of well thought out diatribes and rants on the interwebs defending both these resolution. Â I can’t be bothered the look for them but feel free to link to them in the comments and I’ll add them to this post.
My thoughts – well I don’t think the categories noted above should be deleted and I also believe that having a cheaper voting membership is a great idea.  But to be honest the first thing that popped in my mind when I became aware of this mishigas was Nick Mamatas explanation as to why he doesn’t write SF anymore:
The Readercon sexual harassment debacle was one, as was overhearing disgusting pig commentary about the event at Worldcon later that same year. Naturally, last week’s SFWA sexism controversy is proof to me that I should just stay away. In addition to sexist culture and patriarchy and all the politicized rhetoric used to explain such phenomena, it all rather hints to me that SF is basically full of people in a state of emotional arrest. You know, social simpletons. I don’t want to write for these people.
[snip other good stuff]
But what about the controversies in the field? The shitty stories, the sexist attacks, the bankruptcies, the bad deals!?
Let it all burn.
And yes, I know, chucking the towel in is always frowned upon. Â And maybe it means I’m no longer a serious fan. Â But when you have a young family who are your top and generally only priority, the idea of fighting for fan institutions and voting rights seems like a complete waste of emotions energy. Â Good luck to the people who attend the WSFS meeting to knock down both these amendments, I genuinely wish you well, but I’m not sure I’ll be rending my garments if both these amendments get up.
Having been to one Worldcon, and finding it – despite much strong work behind the scenes by many lovely people – to be pretty much the most tedious and repellent con experience of my life, I personally don’t give a rat’s arse what they do to the Hugos.
That’s essentially my position. They want to undermine their institutions and make the Hugos an insular award where only people who can afford to get a membership do so, then fine. Whatever. Fill your boots as my old boss used to say,
That was a good round-up of posts Mondy and I am pretty ambivalent about the whole thing. In that I don’t really have a stake in it. I agree with the push to be more inclusive and to adapt but its unlikely that I will ever have much invested in the awards other than seeing friends and acquaintances get nominated – but then I was also never part of the fanzine fandom. More pressing things on my mind like creating content 🙂
Yeah but you’re precisely the sort of fan writer that the Hugo Awards should recognise. You review books, you make others aware of the scene in Australia, etc etc. The fact that you don’t seek awards just means you’re a decent bloke.
I just secretly pine for them in the dark hours of the morning when my editing software has crashed 😀 – Awards that is.
Thank God you said those last three words.
🙂