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Lurker #32 ([info]lurker32) wrote in [info]otf_wank,
@ 2005-08-20 18:33:00


Previous Entry  Add to memories!  Tell a Friend!  Next Entry
Current mood:Cliquish

Litwank!
Patrick and Teresa Nielsen Hayden, editors, have a blog, which is often interesting and usually wank-free. They do get occasional trolls, which are dealt with by having their comments "disemvowelled", e.g. "mg y sck".

In an entry entitled "Story for beginners", Patrick writes about a book reviewer who doesn't seem to get that sometimes a zombie is just a zombie, and an author who doesn't get why he doesn't get it.

People comment and all is fine until a poster called Cija takes umbrage:

It's really great that admitting in print that you don't quite get something but like it anyway inspires such a terrific sense of superiority in everyone who does get it, and by great I actually mean problematic and off-putting.

And continues in this vein for several ensuing comments, until:

Patrick: Over here on Earth-1, I was pretty sure this discussion hadn't actually been primarily about whether Michael Knight's review was nice enough to Kelly Link or not.

Cija: I didn't have any difficulty understanding that you (and Westerfeld) knew it was a positive review; I just thought that you characterized its tone, and the reviewer's powers of understanding, unfairly, most particularly in the assumption that we can tell from that review that its writer isn't a sf reader or doesn't get the fantastic.

Patrick: Not to put too fine a point on it, fuck you. On what basis do you accuse me of any such characterization?

Cija protests that she wasn't complaining about him, Patrick continues snitty, and Teresa steps in to request that everyone take a chill pill. Several comments later, Patrick apologizes to Cija, and everything simmers down, until Yonmei decides to chip in her two cents:

So, for future reference, given that Patrick's comment has not been disemvowelled: "Not to put too fine a point on it, fuck you" is now to be considered a polite response?

And they're off again.



(Post a new comment)


ealusaid
2005-08-21 12:03 am UTC (link)
OMG. I should not have stopped reading that commenthread!

PNH's been kinda snippy lately in the comment threads. One must wonder, so wonder I shall.

(Reply to this)


(Anonymous)
2005-08-21 12:13 am UTC (link)
Ah, Yonmei, always there to pour gasoline on the sparks of a dying fire.

Frequentmouse

(Reply to this)(Thread)


ealusaid
2005-08-21 12:30 am UTC (link)
I love how Yonmei was barely in the opening discussion, but kept it going long after Cija had taken her bat and ball and gone amicably home.

So, if my cat were to mysteriously die, how many flamewars am I allowed to stir up before I'm allowed to be called out for it?

(Reply to this)(Parent)


dracothelizard
2005-08-21 12:13 am UTC (link)
If the first post can boil down to 'stop trying to see symbolism in everything, you pretentious literaty asswipes', I like it. Also, zombies. What's not to love.

(Reply to this)(Thread)


[info]funwithrage
2005-08-21 05:34 pm UTC (link)
I'm with ya--and can understand the snippiness. Hell, I got snippy when I just had to deal with Serious Lit Dumbasses in college creative writing--"Dude. The next time you tell me that my fantasy stories need more social significance, I'm going to start requesting more zombie ninjas in your terribly meaningful Suicidal Teenager fics"--and can only imagine how pissy I'd be dealing with them on a semiregular basis for years.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)


dracothelizard
2005-08-21 05:50 pm UTC (link)
I study English, I have to deal with Serious Lit Teachers, which are worse. Really, when Twain said that anyone who was going to analyse the symbolism in Huckleberry Finn should be shot, he didn't mean 'oh, please, DO analyse the symbolism of the Mississippi!'

Or maybe it was another major river, geography was never my strong point. Symbolism is over-rated.

And I can totally see how a zombie could work in a meaningful suicidal teen story.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)


[info]msmanna
2005-08-21 06:31 pm UTC (link)
And I can totally see how a zombie could work in a meaningful suicidal teen story.

It would certainly solve the problem of who narrates once your POV character has offed themselves.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)


flightstothesea
2005-08-22 06:38 am UTC (link)
I totally want to write that now.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)


[info]msmanna
2005-08-22 10:04 am UTC (link)
You could title it 'My So-Called Death'.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)


flightstothesea
2005-08-22 10:09 am UTC (link)
*dies* You win.

(Reply to this)(Parent)


[info]funwithrage
2005-08-23 11:17 pm UTC (link)
That's awesome. Like, I thought my post-apocalyptic eating disorder idea was cool, but that beats it hands down.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)


[info]msmanna
2005-08-24 12:14 am UTC (link)
By a very freaky coincidence, I was actually editing a post-apocalyptic eating disorder scene in a fic when your comment notification popped up in my mailbox. I'm sure that's a sign of...something.

(Reply to this)(Parent)


[info]charmian
2005-08-21 02:56 am UTC (link)
Amusing comment by one Xopher on the long thread:

"whh, Ynm gt pt frml in hr plc. ll hl Trs, whs rgn s jst nd gnrs! "

(Reply to this)(Thread)


[info]meril
2005-08-21 07:54 am UTC (link)
He doesn't normally get that treatment either...I'm just assuming PNH is having a really freakin' bad year because I got into it with him on LJ over goodness-knows-what a few months ago, too.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)


[info]charmian
2005-08-21 09:02 am UTC (link)
Yeah. It seems that he has some issues of some kind. Well, at least he isn't trying to make everyone feel sorry for him and make excuses in that direction. -_-

(Reply to this)(Parent)


[info]cleolinda
2005-08-22 04:34 am UTC (link)
Man, it took me forever to decipher that.

(Reply to this)(Parent)


(Anonymous)
2005-08-21 06:50 am UTC (link)
"Disemvowelled." Well, that's not sickeningly cloying or anything.

(Reply to this)

I want a tshirt!
[info]zing_och
2005-08-21 12:24 pm UTC (link)
</i>I deconstructed a zombie and all I got were these dusty bandages.</i>

The rest is too complicated for me, but that bit I really liked.

(Reply to this)


[info]pyratejenni
2005-08-21 04:13 pm UTC (link)
What the hell was wrong with Cija's post in the first place that PNH went all nasty? Comment threads go off on tangents; happens everywhere.

(Reply to this)


[info]squib
2005-08-21 04:14 pm UTC (link)
Good grief. I've never read Making Light before, but at least one of my friends thinks it's the closest thing to God since Neil Gaiman. Frankly, I don't get the love, I'm too busy being scared out of the room by the amount of pretentiousness on that thread.

Oh, and puppy blood is yummy, Patrick should try it sometime.

(Reply to this)


(Anonymous)
2005-08-22 04:38 am UTC (link)
Oh holy god, that's me. I understand that it is what they call 'wanky' to comment on one's own behaviour in these things, but what is described as me protest[ing] that she wasn't complaining about him was actually me abjectly apologizing. No protests, no fighting.

that is all,

--Cija

(Reply to this)(Thread)


[info]lurker32
2005-08-22 05:20 am UTC (link)
Meh, seemed like more or less the same thing to me. Sorry.

I really think Yonmei's the prime wanker here, actually -- you were just dissenting, and PNH gets points for admitting to his bitchiness. :)

(Reply to this)(Parent)


ealusaid
2005-08-22 05:38 am UTC (link)
I agree with [info]lurker32--your discussion with Patrick made me wonder who pissed in his cornflakes that morning, but Yonmei made the thread go splodey.

(Reply to this)(Parent)


[info]smo
2005-08-22 04:22 pm UTC (link)
"Not to put too fine a point on it, fuck you" is now to be considered a polite response?


Perhaps he should change the latter half of the sentence to "say I'm the only bee in your bonnet?"

(Reply to this)

Tangentially,
[info]kadath
2005-08-22 05:51 pm UTC (link)
Scott Westerfeld is a great writer, terrifically funny, and way hot. So is his wife.

(Reply to this)


 
   
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