Entry tags:

have some fucking decorum!, person: winterfox, publishing, sj means never having to say you're sry, social justice, transfail

Your one-stop shopping for trolling and bullying disguise as social justice!
Blatantly cut and pasted from wank_report. Hat tips to the mice.

Requires Only That You Hate (http://requireshate.wordpress.com/) - Requires Hate for short - is a Thai Chinese lesbian blogger who has been ripping various sexist and racist science fiction/fantasy books apart in her online reviews. She's also better known as winterfox.

About 10 days ago, in one of her posts, Requires Hate posted a link to another person's review of the Inspector Chen books written by Liz Williams: http://requireshate.wordpress.com/2012/07/22/more-links/ (top paragraph).

Liz Williams - mevennen on livejournal - clearly dd not appreciate this. When Catherynne Valente posted about the sexual harassment at Readercon, mevennen's response was to ask whether she feels the same way about Requires Hate as she does about Rene Walling:
http://catvalente.livejournal.com/678836.html?thread=21468596#t21468596

"I don't think ANY of this is acceptable. I don't care whether it's puppy-eyed, I'm-sowwy leching American men, or wannabe sociopathic Chinese women."

Posting in the thread was not enough for Williams, however - she went on to write a long and ranty LJ post calling Requires Hate an "an aspiring fantasy serial killer" and announcing that "in the unlikely event that she is a potential psychonerd like the guy in Aurora, I’ve passed her details on to the relevant authorities and they can act if they see fit. Hey, if I’m going to be accused of being an Evil British Imperialist Whore [Tm] whatever I do, I might as well make the most of it": http://mevennen.livejournal.com/889924.html (comments now screened)

Valente posted a response:

"I believe that people should be able to voice their opinions, even if I disagree with them. Even if I agree sometimes and other times think that in a quest to answer injustice and be heard, they step over the line into cruelty."
http://catvalente.livejournal.com/679023.html

There's some humor in the comments, particularly in the threads involving Nick Mamatas (nihilistic_kid), who is also very outspoken about his likes and dislikes and who listed Requires Hate as an example of a "superior sort of reader" recently: http://nihilistic-kid.livejournal.com/1777161.html

In Caitlin R. Kiernan's journal:
http://greygirlbeast.livejournal.com/900453.html?thread=13564261#t13564261

Important background: a previous discussion in Valente's journal and follow-up twitter exchange with Requires Hate which led Kari Sperring (la_marquise_de_) to attempt suicide:

http://catvalente.livejournal.com/677154.html?thread=21396770#t21396770

https://twitter.com/KariSperring/status/206049221864980481
https://twitter.com/KariSperring/status/206048663041089539
https://twitter.com/KariSperring/status/206048219225006080
https://twitter.com/KariSperring/status/206047696480505858
https://twitter.com/KariSperring/status/206046672311156736

Nick Mamatas's comment on this today - "Apparently, Twitter makes people suicidal."
http://nihilistic-kid.livejournal.com/1781261.html?thread=27024397#t27024397

An annoyed friend of Mevennen and previous fan of Cat Valente posted to denounce Winterfox. It's a bit tl;dr but makes many good points. He cites FFA and quotes Cat's infamous line, "I, too, can, have, and will again write a book which communicates the Japan I can make up in my head - it's far better than the real thing."

http://tyrell.livejournal.com/847819.html

Meanwhile, Cat Valente continues bawwwwing on LJ and Twitter, sadly with a great deal of support from fans, friends, and minions.

http://catvalente.livejournal.com/679023.html

Some more info here: http://fail-fandomanon.livejournal.com/38277.html?thread=172264837#t172264837 Including links to Winterfox's infamous death and torture threats/wishes to other people.

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keleri
2012-08-08 06:21 am UTC (link)

Alright, not going to lie, I raised my eyebrows at the thought that someone attempted suicide over an internet kerfuffle-- but I read through the exchange and I'm actually strangely appalled. In what universe is it okay for a grown-ass woman and professional author to sic her fans and her husband on someone for making an incredibly politely-worded and deferential request not to treat their country like a storybook land? How does Valente handle edits on her books?

I think I'm focusing on this instead of Winterfox, since Winterfox is Winterfox and can't be expected to do any differently; but I was previously under the impression that Valente was, y'know, a functioning adult who would not suddenly veer into crying softly into her handkerchief because someone harshed her ~*~*~magic specialness~*~*~.

(Reply to this)(Thread)

realitydeviant
2012-08-08 12:30 pm UTC (link)

You obviously missed Winterfox's little kefluffle with R.A. Salvatore then. Too bad most of that vanished when the old candlekeep site went boom when Dungeons & Dragons was sold to (I think) Wizards of the Coast. That one was truly epic, with Winterfox and Salvatore competing to win the Asshole Olympics and giant zergs of Drizzt fanboys Behaving Badly.

...Oh hell, I just noticed she has a slap at Salvatore on the front page of her journal atm. Woman can hold a grudge, I'll give her that.

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	wook77 2012-08-09 04:54 am UTC (link)
	I missed this - do you have a summation of what happened? (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

Ancient Drow Tales

realitydeviant
2012-08-09 03:01 pm UTC (link)

Candlekeep was (I think officially) the main Forgotten Realms D&D fansite, and one of its main claims to fame was a bunch of the designers and official writers would pop in there. Salvatore was a regular, and had a massive fan cult of personality thing going on. This didn't help Salvatore's ego, which was already the size of the Abyss (seriously, we *get* that you're a New York Times Bestselling Author (TM), and you doing us a huge favor gracing us with your august presence, we get it, you can shut up now Bob.) Add to that the fact Salvatore doesn't take criticism well, or at all, really. I once watched him almost start a fistfight at DragonCon with a fan who said something negative about one of the mercenaries books.

Then add Winterfox and her cronies and stir. And get the hell away from ground zero.

Someone (it wasn't me and it wasn't Winterfox, that's all the years, Lyrica, and migraine meds will let me recall,) posted a bit about how Drizzt had started off as an interesting character, a basically good drow forced to the surface and made to deal with the surfacers' reactions and prejudices, and then turned into a preachy Mary Sue in later books. Ok, fair enough, I don't even read the books and I've heard all that before. Salvatore shows up in the thread in full on attack mode, with fanboy supporters. And that was waving a red flag at a bull as far as Winterfox was concerned. She posted several lengthy reviews of his books and discussion of Drizzt as a character. If you've seen her reviews, you have an idea of what they were like. (As I recall, they were a bit more scathing than her usual.) Salvatore utterly loses his shit, sics the fanboy horde on her and her buddies, which got unfunny fast( I heard that several of them stalked and harassed her online for years,) accused her of being a bitter, failed poet who was jealous of his success, which was hilarious because it came out of nowhere, and then epically flounced. And then one of the site maintainers ( who'd been getting a lot of mileage out of "Dude, I hang with BOB SALVATORE a lot!!!!11!!!") posted a pissy screed about how they'd chased Salvatore away and ruined it for everyone! OMG! And banned Winterfox and a ton of others.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: Ancient Drow Tales sarahfrost 2012-08-10 01:18 am UTC (link)
	Thanks for sharing that history. :) Old epic wanks are the best wanks! (Reply to this)(Parent)

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