Virtue and virtue-signaling in science fiction & fantasy, Part V: Isabel Fall, attack helicopters, and why we can't have nice things
Isabel Fall. In the last couple of weeks, the worlds of politics and literature have intersected as several authors have drawn the attention and ire of virtue-signalers for the controversies courted by their books, but I read sci-fi and fantasy. When I first conceived of this series, Isabel Fall was not on my radar, but there couldn't be a better person to demonstrate why I have spent my Sunday mornings writing these posts than Isabel. Today, we'll delve into her story-- the one she wrote, and the one that became the story of her, and next week, I think, I'll write the coda for the series, as I try to work out my assessments of my favorite author, N.K. Jemisin, given her role in the Isabel Fall mess.
As I so often do, I shall write circuitously, because I find it fun. My blog, my rules.
How long has it been since you read 1984? Emmanuel Goldstein. Goldstein was the state's enemy, around whom the public observed the ritual of Two Minutes Hate. Who was he and what did he do? That wasn't really important, and he could even be completely fictitious. The point was that Big Brother needed an enemy, and the people needed to hate that enemy, and to have that hatred serve as both a unifying force, and a way of establishing loyalty to Big Brother through their hatred of Big Brother's enemy.
You will, on occasion, encounter people who claim not to hate anyone, but... no. Hatred is an emotion that everyone will feel at some point. Emotions just... exist. Actions are choices, emotions are just there. You can do things to direct your thoughts in healthy ways. Dwelling on the negative is not a good idea, and everyone needs to find positive ways to channel negative emotions, and all of that, but you will, inevitably, hate someone. Anyone who claims otherwise is lying. Yes, that means Nancy Pelosi was lying when she said she doesn't hate Trump. It doesn't matter how devout she is-- her religion does not counteract basic, electro-chemical reactions in the brain.
Should you hate bigots? Should you hate child molesters? I'm not going to get into some stupid, pseudo-intellectual debate over whether or not one should hate people who are hateful, tolerate the intolerant, or some such nonsense. I'm just going to point out that hatred is. It simply is.
Also, it can be manipulated.
On that cheerful note, let's deal with the literary scandal that has been the cause of much consternation within the science fiction and fantasy world for the last bunch o' weeks.
So, attack helicopters. There's a stupid meme about this. It goes a little something like this. There are people who respond to transgender statements of identity by saying, "well, I identify as an 'attack helicopter,' and if you reject my right to kill people, you're a 'heli-phobe!'" It's a thing.
Because of course it is.
Enter Isabel Fall, who recently wrote a short story for a magazine called Clarkesworld-- "I Sexually Identify As An Attack Helicopter."
You think you know where this is going. You are very, very wrong. So horribly wrong.
Maybe before you cast judgment, you should read it. Ya' think? Maybe?
There's a teeny, tiny, little problem with that, though. I'll get to that. You can read it here, rather than Clarkesworld.
If you don't want to take the time to read it, and just want to have me spell it out for you in short form, here's the deal. Fall's story actually took gender identity and gender dysphoria seriously, and did what science fiction is so perfect for doing: it used technology as a metaphor for human experience. Fall wrote a story in which the POV character really did experience dysmorphia, addressed by, well, becoming an attack helicopter via futuristic technology, and the story wrote about the experience of being trans-something in the way that transgender people describe it. In other words, the story was legit. Fall's goal, essentially, was to claim the slur for the trans community.
As a point of reference, you know the term, "Chicano?" Depending on where you live, maybe not. It is a term of preference in California, but not so much outside of California. It is the shortened form of the Spain-Spanish pronunciation of "Mexicano," where the "x" is pronounced as a "ch." But... it was the Spanish slur for Mexicans. Then, over time, some decided to claim it as a name of pride. Words are funny that way. Or to quote James Brown, "say it now, say it loud, I'm black and I'm proud."
Anyway, that was Fall's goal. Say it now, say it loud, I'm an attack helicopter, and I'm proud.
However, remember that post I wrote about bad faith readers? When bad faith readers and virtue-signaling mix, the results are about as toxic a brew as you can get.
All one has to do is mention "attack helicopters," and SJWs go on high alert. OK, I suppose when I put it that way, attack helicopters do kind of make you nervous, don't they? But, you get my point. My point is that simply writing a story called "I Sexually Identify As An Attack Helicopter," meant that the SJWs didn't even read it. They didn't read past the title.
They checked their watches, and it was time for the daily Two Minutes Hate. Isabel Fall became Emmanuel Goldstein.
Despite the fact that Fall was writing a clearly pro-transgender rights story if you bloody well read it, the hate started mounting. And conspiracy theories. You see, "Isabel Fall" was not a known person. All that was out there about her was the year of her birth-- 1988.
A-HA! "88!" That's code! You see, the eighth letter in the alphabet is "h," so "88" is code for "HH," which stands for "heil Hitler!" "Isabel Fall," is a pseudonym for some nazi troll!
Get Emmanuel Goldstein!!! Come on, SJWs! That's Emmanuel Goldstein!!!
I'm not joking. This happened. Clarkesworld retracted the story, at Fall's request because she was getting so much hate, which is why my link above was to an external site. Why was there no information about "Isabel Fall?"
Here was the kicker. "Isabel." She wasn't always "Isabel." She was a transgender woman, in the process of transitioning, and she hadn't come out yet. She was writing under the name that she would be using post-transition, but she hadn't come out yet. In order to defend herself against the SJW pile-on as they practiced the ritual of Two Minutes Hate, she had to come out before she was ready, based on the premise that the only way the SJWs would listen to her, or even just back off, was if they knew that she, herself, was transgender.
So let's deal with the term, "identity politics." Practitioners of it don't like the term, but here's what it means. It means reducing people to their basic demographics, and conditioning their right to say something on those demographics. That's exactly what happened to Isabel Fall. Her story was about the transgender experience, and it was on the pro side. But she wasn't allowed to be heard without outing herself. That's identity politics in its ugliest form. If you ever hear anyone deny the existence of identity politics... remember Isabel Fall.
And throughout this process, Fall was going through the psychologically difficult process of transitioning. She was working that through with writing. The SJWs responded by bullying her, through the practice of Two Minutes Hate. Reading the story would have been too much work, whereas they can signal virtue to each other by joining in the ritual. So that's what they did. Has there been any concern for Fall, at any point? Even after the truth was revealed? None that I have seen. The point of the ritual of Two Minutes Hate is never Emmanuel Goldstein. It's Big Brother and showing loyalty to Big Brother. If Emmanuel Goldstein turns out to be both real, and innocent... who cares?
Not the SJWs.
Let's just recap, in chronological order here. Isabel Fall wrote a short story as a transgender person, explaining feelings of gender dysphoria, using technology as a metaphor, and claiming an analogy that had been used in the past against the transgender community for the transgender community. The SJWs bully and harass her, with insane conspiracy theories, traumatizing her during a transition, forcing her to come out before she was ready, forcing a retraction of a story that was from their own ideological perspective. And the only way any of them will listen to her is if she signals her virtue by announcing, before she is ready, that she is trans. Because they won't read in good faith. Instead, they signal virtue to each other by joining the Two Minutes Hate.
Who's the attack helicopter here?
I'm going to be very serious for a moment. There is a level at which I worry about writing this. There is no way that anyone in good faith could take this post, nor anything else on this blog, as hostile to anyone just living their own lives. Yet, the whole point of bad faith reading is that it is intellectually dishonest, and the point is to twist something around and attack for the sake of attacking. (Any bad faith readers out there, looking for an excuse?) That's what happened to Isabel Fall, who was trying to write, as a transgender person, and was attacked by anti-intellectuals who ostensibly support transgender rights because they didn't want to bother looking past the very mention of "attack helicopters." They were too committed to the ritual of Two Minutes Hate.
And yet, to not say something-- to be silent-- how problematic would that be? I am a tenured professor, and I have tenure so that I can speak truth on political matters. If someone like me can be silenced by the processes that force the retraction of Isabel Fall's story, then what hope does discourse have?
The political correctness movement has a few favorite lies it likes to tell. There's no such thing as cancel culture, or political correctness, or anything like that. There's just being respectful, or disrespectful.
Isabel Fall got bullied during her transition, by the very people who claim they are for transgender rights. She got canceled. And she got picked on by much bigger names, like N.K. Jemisin. Yes, that's punching down, in every way. Jemisin punched down, and I'll get to her.
And any time someone tells you that the first amendment only prohibits governmental infringements on speech... yeah, that's a) true, and b) totally un-comforting to those whose speech has been limited by non-governmental processes. If you believe in the principle of free speech, then you should oppose people who try to cancel it. And Isabel Fall was canceled. And more than that, she was forced out of the closet before she was ready by the intensive bullying of SJWs who care more about her identity than the content of the story, which they were too lazy and anti-intellectual to read.
I am still mulling over N.K. Jemisin's role in this. She didn't start the pile-on, but she happily joined in, without reading Fall's story, and without fully taking responsibility. By her telling, one of her associates asked her to join the pile-on, so she did, without reading.
This is not OK. And it happened.
The SJWs will have a couple of defenses here. For example, deflect. Talk about discrimination and mistreatment of the transgender community elsewhere in society. In other words, what I did may have been bad, but other people are doing worse, so stop talking about that time we SJWs bullied Isabel Fall. The SJWs don't like it when others use this rhetorical device. They even have a name for it: "what-about-ism." And they think that as soon as they utter the incantation, "what-about-ism," they have won the argument.
So don't let 'em do it here.
There's also the excuse about meaning well. If you are trying to stand up for the transgender community, it's the thought (crime) that counts. Well, here's the problem. Was the motivation behind what happened to Isabel Fall really the defense of the transgender community, or was it the ritual of Two Minutes Hate?
That ritual is not unique to right-wing politics. Hatred is simply a human emotion, and it can be exploited.
If you haven't noticed here, I'm stickin' up for Isabel Fall. Dispositionally, that puts me on the side that the SJWs think they're trying to support. They just fail. Why? Because they're more focused on the Two Minutes Hate than on any actual goals. They are signaling their own virtue to each other, while waiting for one of their own ranks to slip, so that one can signal even more virtue by calling out the heretic in the ranks. Rat out your family to the Stasi, and be richly rewarded.
This is the problem with SJW culture. The justice isn't the goal. The virtue-signaling is, and that has gotten mixed up in the ritual of Two Minutes Hate.
Wait, Joe Rogan said what? And Bernie Sanders accepted his endorsement?! Hang on, I better go back and re-write this whole post. This changes everything.
...
So, did that crack make it possible for me to be an Emmanuel Goldstein? Let me break this down for you. I speak/write lightly about Joe Rogan and Bernie Sanders. Joe Rogan is persona non grata for his comments on trans women in MMA, so when I speak lightly of Joe Rogan, by the transitive property of tonal weight, I am guilty of everything Joe Rogan has ever said. Burn the heathen!
Likely? No, but not impossible. I've spent this post sticking up for Isabel Fall, but if the SJWs can go after her because they're too lazy and anti-intellectual to read her story, then no one is safe, and that's the problem. That's why we can't have nice things.
Yet, it is also time to step back and take some perspective.
While the what-about-ism defense would be hypocritical and inappropriate, let's keep a few things in mind. First, I am employed in academia. Second, I pretty much block myself off from most of pop culture, as you have no doubt noticed.
Few people interact with a representative sample of the country, or the world, in their daily lives. I, as a statistician, though, am aware of the bias created by my profession, and the structure I have created in my life. In academia, the big thing right now is the issue of transgender rights and gender identity. Not just political science, but across academia. At the last meeting of the American Political Science Association, when we registered to pick up our name tags 'n stuff, we were offered buttons to announce to everyone "our pronouns." Minor example of a bigger trend. This stuff is big in academia right now.
And as I have been writing, it is big in science fiction and fantasy. Part of the shift to the new blog was writing more about fun stuff, like the books I read and their political/social relevance rather than the drudgery/tragedy of ongoing daily politics. And even before I started the "Virtue and virtue-signaling" series, I was writing about how these books address issues of gender because it's the hot trend. So, I wrote about Jacqueline Carey, Ann Leckie, and I keep meaning to write about Ada Palmer, and maybe someday, I'll get around to that, but my point is that this is just big stuff in my little, odd, corner of the world.
But I know how odd my corner of the world is. Most people don't just work in environments vastly different from academia. They also don't read. Like, at all. So, the Isabel Fall fiasco hits my corner of the world because I relax at the end of the day by reading science fiction and fantasy, and I follow some of the communities online. And in academia, if you "misgender" someone, it will be treated as though you called someone the n-word, while working for the NAACP.
Outside of academia, things work differently. The truth about bathrooms is that the threat of violence is to transgender people. If someone is physiologically male, but manages feelings of body dysmorphia non-invasively by wearing attire that is socially coded as female, there are large swaths of the country where that person is at risk of physical violence.
I just don't live there or work there.
So instead, my obscure corner of the world focuses on Isabel Fall. And media attention falls to... Joe Rogan.
OK, I get why I'm focused on Isabel Fall. I read and live in a bubble. I'm just aware of the bubble.
There's real work to do, for people who truly want to achieve something. Federal hate crime laws are not effectively protecting trans people, which means they are dependent on local police. That means local political activism, and the ritual of Two Minutes Hate doesn't win any allies.
What does the ritual do? It signals virtue to one's fellow SJWs. And sometimes it bullies a trans woman out of the closet before she's ready. Trauma and all.
The next time someone tells you that there's no such thing as political correctness, no such thing as identity politics, cancel culture or anything like that... the next time someone tells you that they're just trying to create a society where everyone is respectful to each other, remember Isabel Fall. Her story stands out to me, as a science fiction reader, but it is also emblematic of what happens when an audience demands virtue-signaling, and the author doesn't send that signal.
The result is the daily ritual of Two Minutes Hate.
Next week, I'll wrap this up with some thoughts about N.K. Jemisin, and her role in this mess. (And yes, I'll keep reading her books. Obviously.)
As I so often do, I shall write circuitously, because I find it fun. My blog, my rules.
How long has it been since you read 1984? Emmanuel Goldstein. Goldstein was the state's enemy, around whom the public observed the ritual of Two Minutes Hate. Who was he and what did he do? That wasn't really important, and he could even be completely fictitious. The point was that Big Brother needed an enemy, and the people needed to hate that enemy, and to have that hatred serve as both a unifying force, and a way of establishing loyalty to Big Brother through their hatred of Big Brother's enemy.
You will, on occasion, encounter people who claim not to hate anyone, but... no. Hatred is an emotion that everyone will feel at some point. Emotions just... exist. Actions are choices, emotions are just there. You can do things to direct your thoughts in healthy ways. Dwelling on the negative is not a good idea, and everyone needs to find positive ways to channel negative emotions, and all of that, but you will, inevitably, hate someone. Anyone who claims otherwise is lying. Yes, that means Nancy Pelosi was lying when she said she doesn't hate Trump. It doesn't matter how devout she is-- her religion does not counteract basic, electro-chemical reactions in the brain.
Should you hate bigots? Should you hate child molesters? I'm not going to get into some stupid, pseudo-intellectual debate over whether or not one should hate people who are hateful, tolerate the intolerant, or some such nonsense. I'm just going to point out that hatred is. It simply is.
Also, it can be manipulated.
On that cheerful note, let's deal with the literary scandal that has been the cause of much consternation within the science fiction and fantasy world for the last bunch o' weeks.
So, attack helicopters. There's a stupid meme about this. It goes a little something like this. There are people who respond to transgender statements of identity by saying, "well, I identify as an 'attack helicopter,' and if you reject my right to kill people, you're a 'heli-phobe!'" It's a thing.
Because of course it is.
Enter Isabel Fall, who recently wrote a short story for a magazine called Clarkesworld-- "I Sexually Identify As An Attack Helicopter."
You think you know where this is going. You are very, very wrong. So horribly wrong.
Maybe before you cast judgment, you should read it. Ya' think? Maybe?
There's a teeny, tiny, little problem with that, though. I'll get to that. You can read it here, rather than Clarkesworld.
If you don't want to take the time to read it, and just want to have me spell it out for you in short form, here's the deal. Fall's story actually took gender identity and gender dysphoria seriously, and did what science fiction is so perfect for doing: it used technology as a metaphor for human experience. Fall wrote a story in which the POV character really did experience dysmorphia, addressed by, well, becoming an attack helicopter via futuristic technology, and the story wrote about the experience of being trans-something in the way that transgender people describe it. In other words, the story was legit. Fall's goal, essentially, was to claim the slur for the trans community.
As a point of reference, you know the term, "Chicano?" Depending on where you live, maybe not. It is a term of preference in California, but not so much outside of California. It is the shortened form of the Spain-Spanish pronunciation of "Mexicano," where the "x" is pronounced as a "ch." But... it was the Spanish slur for Mexicans. Then, over time, some decided to claim it as a name of pride. Words are funny that way. Or to quote James Brown, "say it now, say it loud, I'm black and I'm proud."
Anyway, that was Fall's goal. Say it now, say it loud, I'm an attack helicopter, and I'm proud.
However, remember that post I wrote about bad faith readers? When bad faith readers and virtue-signaling mix, the results are about as toxic a brew as you can get.
All one has to do is mention "attack helicopters," and SJWs go on high alert. OK, I suppose when I put it that way, attack helicopters do kind of make you nervous, don't they? But, you get my point. My point is that simply writing a story called "I Sexually Identify As An Attack Helicopter," meant that the SJWs didn't even read it. They didn't read past the title.
They checked their watches, and it was time for the daily Two Minutes Hate. Isabel Fall became Emmanuel Goldstein.
Despite the fact that Fall was writing a clearly pro-transgender rights story if you bloody well read it, the hate started mounting. And conspiracy theories. You see, "Isabel Fall" was not a known person. All that was out there about her was the year of her birth-- 1988.
A-HA! "88!" That's code! You see, the eighth letter in the alphabet is "h," so "88" is code for "HH," which stands for "heil Hitler!" "Isabel Fall," is a pseudonym for some nazi troll!
Get Emmanuel Goldstein!!! Come on, SJWs! That's Emmanuel Goldstein!!!
I'm not joking. This happened. Clarkesworld retracted the story, at Fall's request because she was getting so much hate, which is why my link above was to an external site. Why was there no information about "Isabel Fall?"
Here was the kicker. "Isabel." She wasn't always "Isabel." She was a transgender woman, in the process of transitioning, and she hadn't come out yet. She was writing under the name that she would be using post-transition, but she hadn't come out yet. In order to defend herself against the SJW pile-on as they practiced the ritual of Two Minutes Hate, she had to come out before she was ready, based on the premise that the only way the SJWs would listen to her, or even just back off, was if they knew that she, herself, was transgender.
So let's deal with the term, "identity politics." Practitioners of it don't like the term, but here's what it means. It means reducing people to their basic demographics, and conditioning their right to say something on those demographics. That's exactly what happened to Isabel Fall. Her story was about the transgender experience, and it was on the pro side. But she wasn't allowed to be heard without outing herself. That's identity politics in its ugliest form. If you ever hear anyone deny the existence of identity politics... remember Isabel Fall.
And throughout this process, Fall was going through the psychologically difficult process of transitioning. She was working that through with writing. The SJWs responded by bullying her, through the practice of Two Minutes Hate. Reading the story would have been too much work, whereas they can signal virtue to each other by joining in the ritual. So that's what they did. Has there been any concern for Fall, at any point? Even after the truth was revealed? None that I have seen. The point of the ritual of Two Minutes Hate is never Emmanuel Goldstein. It's Big Brother and showing loyalty to Big Brother. If Emmanuel Goldstein turns out to be both real, and innocent... who cares?
Not the SJWs.
Let's just recap, in chronological order here. Isabel Fall wrote a short story as a transgender person, explaining feelings of gender dysphoria, using technology as a metaphor, and claiming an analogy that had been used in the past against the transgender community for the transgender community. The SJWs bully and harass her, with insane conspiracy theories, traumatizing her during a transition, forcing her to come out before she was ready, forcing a retraction of a story that was from their own ideological perspective. And the only way any of them will listen to her is if she signals her virtue by announcing, before she is ready, that she is trans. Because they won't read in good faith. Instead, they signal virtue to each other by joining the Two Minutes Hate.
Who's the attack helicopter here?
I'm going to be very serious for a moment. There is a level at which I worry about writing this. There is no way that anyone in good faith could take this post, nor anything else on this blog, as hostile to anyone just living their own lives. Yet, the whole point of bad faith reading is that it is intellectually dishonest, and the point is to twist something around and attack for the sake of attacking. (Any bad faith readers out there, looking for an excuse?) That's what happened to Isabel Fall, who was trying to write, as a transgender person, and was attacked by anti-intellectuals who ostensibly support transgender rights because they didn't want to bother looking past the very mention of "attack helicopters." They were too committed to the ritual of Two Minutes Hate.
And yet, to not say something-- to be silent-- how problematic would that be? I am a tenured professor, and I have tenure so that I can speak truth on political matters. If someone like me can be silenced by the processes that force the retraction of Isabel Fall's story, then what hope does discourse have?
The political correctness movement has a few favorite lies it likes to tell. There's no such thing as cancel culture, or political correctness, or anything like that. There's just being respectful, or disrespectful.
Isabel Fall got bullied during her transition, by the very people who claim they are for transgender rights. She got canceled. And she got picked on by much bigger names, like N.K. Jemisin. Yes, that's punching down, in every way. Jemisin punched down, and I'll get to her.
And any time someone tells you that the first amendment only prohibits governmental infringements on speech... yeah, that's a) true, and b) totally un-comforting to those whose speech has been limited by non-governmental processes. If you believe in the principle of free speech, then you should oppose people who try to cancel it. And Isabel Fall was canceled. And more than that, she was forced out of the closet before she was ready by the intensive bullying of SJWs who care more about her identity than the content of the story, which they were too lazy and anti-intellectual to read.
I am still mulling over N.K. Jemisin's role in this. She didn't start the pile-on, but she happily joined in, without reading Fall's story, and without fully taking responsibility. By her telling, one of her associates asked her to join the pile-on, so she did, without reading.
This is not OK. And it happened.
The SJWs will have a couple of defenses here. For example, deflect. Talk about discrimination and mistreatment of the transgender community elsewhere in society. In other words, what I did may have been bad, but other people are doing worse, so stop talking about that time we SJWs bullied Isabel Fall. The SJWs don't like it when others use this rhetorical device. They even have a name for it: "what-about-ism." And they think that as soon as they utter the incantation, "what-about-ism," they have won the argument.
So don't let 'em do it here.
There's also the excuse about meaning well. If you are trying to stand up for the transgender community, it's the thought (crime) that counts. Well, here's the problem. Was the motivation behind what happened to Isabel Fall really the defense of the transgender community, or was it the ritual of Two Minutes Hate?
That ritual is not unique to right-wing politics. Hatred is simply a human emotion, and it can be exploited.
If you haven't noticed here, I'm stickin' up for Isabel Fall. Dispositionally, that puts me on the side that the SJWs think they're trying to support. They just fail. Why? Because they're more focused on the Two Minutes Hate than on any actual goals. They are signaling their own virtue to each other, while waiting for one of their own ranks to slip, so that one can signal even more virtue by calling out the heretic in the ranks. Rat out your family to the Stasi, and be richly rewarded.
This is the problem with SJW culture. The justice isn't the goal. The virtue-signaling is, and that has gotten mixed up in the ritual of Two Minutes Hate.
Wait, Joe Rogan said what? And Bernie Sanders accepted his endorsement?! Hang on, I better go back and re-write this whole post. This changes everything.
...
So, did that crack make it possible for me to be an Emmanuel Goldstein? Let me break this down for you. I speak/write lightly about Joe Rogan and Bernie Sanders. Joe Rogan is persona non grata for his comments on trans women in MMA, so when I speak lightly of Joe Rogan, by the transitive property of tonal weight, I am guilty of everything Joe Rogan has ever said. Burn the heathen!
Likely? No, but not impossible. I've spent this post sticking up for Isabel Fall, but if the SJWs can go after her because they're too lazy and anti-intellectual to read her story, then no one is safe, and that's the problem. That's why we can't have nice things.
Yet, it is also time to step back and take some perspective.
While the what-about-ism defense would be hypocritical and inappropriate, let's keep a few things in mind. First, I am employed in academia. Second, I pretty much block myself off from most of pop culture, as you have no doubt noticed.
Few people interact with a representative sample of the country, or the world, in their daily lives. I, as a statistician, though, am aware of the bias created by my profession, and the structure I have created in my life. In academia, the big thing right now is the issue of transgender rights and gender identity. Not just political science, but across academia. At the last meeting of the American Political Science Association, when we registered to pick up our name tags 'n stuff, we were offered buttons to announce to everyone "our pronouns." Minor example of a bigger trend. This stuff is big in academia right now.
And as I have been writing, it is big in science fiction and fantasy. Part of the shift to the new blog was writing more about fun stuff, like the books I read and their political/social relevance rather than the drudgery/tragedy of ongoing daily politics. And even before I started the "Virtue and virtue-signaling" series, I was writing about how these books address issues of gender because it's the hot trend. So, I wrote about Jacqueline Carey, Ann Leckie, and I keep meaning to write about Ada Palmer, and maybe someday, I'll get around to that, but my point is that this is just big stuff in my little, odd, corner of the world.
But I know how odd my corner of the world is. Most people don't just work in environments vastly different from academia. They also don't read. Like, at all. So, the Isabel Fall fiasco hits my corner of the world because I relax at the end of the day by reading science fiction and fantasy, and I follow some of the communities online. And in academia, if you "misgender" someone, it will be treated as though you called someone the n-word, while working for the NAACP.
Outside of academia, things work differently. The truth about bathrooms is that the threat of violence is to transgender people. If someone is physiologically male, but manages feelings of body dysmorphia non-invasively by wearing attire that is socially coded as female, there are large swaths of the country where that person is at risk of physical violence.
I just don't live there or work there.
So instead, my obscure corner of the world focuses on Isabel Fall. And media attention falls to... Joe Rogan.
OK, I get why I'm focused on Isabel Fall. I read and live in a bubble. I'm just aware of the bubble.
There's real work to do, for people who truly want to achieve something. Federal hate crime laws are not effectively protecting trans people, which means they are dependent on local police. That means local political activism, and the ritual of Two Minutes Hate doesn't win any allies.
What does the ritual do? It signals virtue to one's fellow SJWs. And sometimes it bullies a trans woman out of the closet before she's ready. Trauma and all.
The next time someone tells you that there's no such thing as political correctness, no such thing as identity politics, cancel culture or anything like that... the next time someone tells you that they're just trying to create a society where everyone is respectful to each other, remember Isabel Fall. Her story stands out to me, as a science fiction reader, but it is also emblematic of what happens when an audience demands virtue-signaling, and the author doesn't send that signal.
The result is the daily ritual of Two Minutes Hate.
Next week, I'll wrap this up with some thoughts about N.K. Jemisin, and her role in this mess. (And yes, I'll keep reading her books. Obviously.)
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