| Wiscon 32 con report |
[Jun. 2nd, 2008|04:52 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | china, cons, east asia, friendships, gaming, glbt, language, politics, transgender, weird little observations, worldbuilding | ] |
The longer I let this stew, the more out-of-date and out-of-memory it gets. So here goes.
PanelsI went to many panels. Programming is one of Wiscon's strong suits, in spite of some glitches this year.
Mod SquadLast year, it was a panel of several people including ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) wild_irises; this year, it was just her. Many good insights on the difficult job that is panel moderation. Wish I'd written more of them down, though.
I remember something I came up with at a previous con: starting the panel off by giving the strong/extreme formulation of the basic debate, and then making it clear that we all know the answer is somewhere in the middle, and that we're looking for nuance. Another topic that we discussed was what to do when someone brings up something off-topic but offensive. Do you, as mod, address it and possibly take the panel into uncharted territory? Or do you let it pass? Or something in between? The answers are tricky, but worth thinking about.
Not Just Japan: Asian SF&FI was a little intimidated by this one, largely because I was moderating it. I did some pre-discussion by e-mail, and got a pretty good handout worked up. But we were dipping our toes into the ocean; a survey of all the SF&F from Asia, even excluding Japan, is a huge job, and to then add all the many issues we wanted to discuss means we had much more than 1.25 hours' worth of material. The discussion touched on many topics; as Vandana succinctly put it later on, it went sort of octopus-shaped.
If I had it to do over again, I would've shut up and let my fellow panelists talk more. Hopefully, the panel will generate lots of cool ideas for next year that will allow a more focused approach to some of the subsets.
Fanfic & Slash 101I'm not much into fanfic. I'm not at all opposed to it, but there are just too many cool hobbies out there for the limited time I have to pursue them. I got a good sample of the varieties of slash and fanfic that are out there, and then ducked out.
The Joy of Fat SexI ended up going to the tail end of this, I think because some people I knew were in attendance. It sounds like it was a very practical and useful discussion.
Critiquing Maureen McHughChina Mountain Zhang is probably my single favorite book ever, so I had to at least try this one. I assumed I would end up gagging on lit-crit terminology and then ducking out, but both of the presentations ended up being riveting. The first was about how McHugh's work (specifically Nekropolis) deals with the difficulties of life, specifically the difficulties of being a woman, and how cypertech doesn't make those difficulties easier or tougher, just more complicated. McHugh doesn't allow her characters to have easy endings, or easy choices, or even easy beginnings, really. And she also isn't easy on her readers. All of which serves to drive home the points she makes.
The second presentation was specifically about China Mountain Zhang, and how its structure serves to evoke the experience of diaspora: its divided narrative shows the sides of a many-faceted experience, while its unwillingness to give characters easy plot vectors shows the uncertainty of living in a complex world. Or something like that; I'm not doing a very good job of summarizing it. Being an academic paper, its point was subtle and nuanced.
About halfway through, a certain guest of honor snuck in. When the two panelists asked for questions, there was an awkward pause, so I asked Maureen "Were they right?" She gave a very Maureen answer, stating that she doesn't have any more authority to say what her stories are about than the readers.
As the panel was dispersing, I asked Maureen if she named one of the characters in Mission Child after me. (I had given her a little bit of advice in the writing of it.) She said no. Well, it's good to know, after all!
Here's Where the Story EndsAnother Maureen panel. This suffered because the basic points were established very early on: there are plot endings, and there are theme endings. Both are possible; authors do not have a contract with readers to provide any certain type of ending. It seemed to kind of flail around from there.
lyda222 appeared to be fading from consciousness as the panel went on; she later said she was waiting for me or one other person to ask a cool question that would move things along. I was thinking of asking if there's such a thing as a "character ending", where the character gets the resolution they need even when the plot and the theme don't, but it didn't seem to be on topic again. Appropriately, the panel ended without a clear wrap-up.
The Ship Who KnittedOne of the best panels I attended. Many great ideas came out of this. Perhaps we don't want our vehicles to be as intelligent as we are; maybe the ideal intelligence for a ship going to Mars is, say, the equivalent of a dog who knows how to play fetch, or a horse who's satisfied just taking people to and fro. But maybe human-level intelligence is a necessity for the complexity of running a starship? Maybe it's impossible to create a flexible intelligence that isn't at least human-level?
The panel briefly moved to the topic of intelligent weapons, which are consistently portrayed in SF as a bad idea. It also went to the difficulty of describing a truly super-human intelligence; Iain Banks' Minds are not really ever shown satisfyingly in their full capacity. I brought up a bunch of other examples of intelligent vehicles in SF, all usually shown to be a bad thing. In retrospect, I probably should've shut up and let the panelists talk. (I seem to have done poorly in this respect; I talked when I shouldn't have in panels, and was quiet when I should've talked.)
A question that seemed to be coming up a lot was: Do we think that intelligence is ultimately a good thing or a bad thing? Is it a good thing to give our tools intelligence or not? And as a corrolary, are humans a curse or a blessing for the universe? Lots of well-informed people talking about cool ideas.
Male Feminists: You Don't Get a CookieThis unfortunately went down a path that I can already tell is too well traveled. It started well enough, with the panelists discussing how, as men, they deal with the emotions that sexism forces them to have, and how they view themselves as feminists or allies.
Someone asked what to do about a situation his wife had been put in. One panelist said to do X; another said to do Y; I said that he should ask her, while being fully prepared for the answer to be "Go away and don't bother me"; someone else said that asking her puts her in the position of having to be responsible for two people instead of just herself, and that instead he should come up with some possible solutions and present those. Had I had time or topic, I would've pointed out that that is largely an example of Male Answer Syndrome. I may have to propose "Dealing with your Male Answer Syndrome" as a topic for next year. The discussion otherwise went into what I felt were equally well-trodden areas. It certainly helped the man who asked the original question, I think, and the panel was therefore successful, but I feel like it could've made even more progress.
What If You Don't Want to Have Children? ReduxAn interesting discussion of the issues. Why do people who don't want kids have to deal with the crises of those who do? Why do women who want to be child-free (or is it childless -- there's apparently an important distinction here, but I came in late and missed it) end up doing the work of women who want to take care of their kids? Many of the panelists recognized that this is a very thorny issue, and that it's hard to both be a woman who wants to be recognized for her work and be a woman who wants to support others who want to take care of children.
There was a point when the panel went into issues of immigration and whether immigrants are a good thing or a bad thing. I think the moderator was dealing with the exact issue we dealt with in the Mod Squad: when someone brings up something offensive that threatens to take the panel on a big tangent, what should the moderator do? Addressing it allows the tangent to start flying; ignoring it means being complicit in offensiveness. The moderator addressed it, meaning there was about a 20 minute tangent, but it was good to get it out of our systems and deal with it.
A key point for me came when one audience member pointed out that these kinds of questions are often asked by men who feel they're having to lift the burdens of women who want maternity leave. How are the questions different when it's women asking them? A lot of the answers depend on how important we think it is for humanity as a whole to continue. Do we think humanity is ultimately something worth continuing, or something that would be best left to fizzle out?
Transgender People Discuss Transgender BooksI didn't go to this panel. There are apparently people who are disappointed that I didn't. (Boo, now I'm going to be known for panels I don't go to*.) Simply put: Programming glitches. I specifically asked not to be put on anything before noon (because I know how minuscule my ability to get up before noon during cons is), and still ended up on it despite several attempts to figure out what was going on. Sorry if you were expecting me to be on this. Programming is difficult at the best of times, and with database explosions it is even harder. I don't think anyone is really to blame.
Let's Build a WorldThis panel was almost worth the price of the membership all by itself. Wonderful wild fun. It started slightly serious: Hmm, oxygen/chlorine atmosphere, yes, interesting idea... What's that, the islands float around and collide with each other? Cats are the main form of currency and the nobility of the planet? Fire-breathing platypi inhabit the extradimensional tunnels? And let's throw in squid anywhere we can. It got weirder and weirder, until it started to actually make sense, in a scary but amazingly cool way. I suggested the last line for the novel: "I almost couldn't smell the meat."
Ben (the moderator) was brilliant, pushing everything to be funnier, deeper, more connected and just plain greater. Doselle kept coming up with the best lines, including a gaggle of portmanteau words (a "gaggleteau", if you will). I feel like some of naomikritzer's suggestions got trampled on in the excitement, but she got some of the key details (including the aforementioned platypi). The whole panel was brilliant; the whole hour was brilliant.
Revealing Your WorldHow do you clue the readers into all the amazing things you've developed for your world without boring info-dumping? One primary way is to "paint it a different color", as one of the panelists said; show something that's slightly out of the ordinary, so you can note what 'ordinary' is. The panel diverted to general world-building, and how to create worlds that are interestingly different, so there was discussion of learning languages, travel and generally exposing yourself to things you haven't experienced as prep for writing. I would've liked more about how to explain without "As you know, Bob"bing.
Faux Diversity vs. Actual DiversityThe second panel I was actually on. I originally proposed a similar topic focusing solely on Firefly. I started off by grinding my huge axe against the weak portrayal of China, Chinese people and the Chinese languages in Firefly. We went into a general discussion of why Hollywood so rarely makes anything with actual diversity, and how fans are often torn between our love for a show/movie and our hate for its dumbnesses. What do we do when Joss Whedon has some strong women characters, a totally un-diverse cast and some serious issues about women's bodies, along with his totally ass-kicking dialogue and character development? I almost suggested BitTorrent as a form of conscientious objection; I forgot until the very end to point out that I'm not actually Chinese.
Trans 101bcholmes suggested that, since I wasn't going to be on the TG Books panel, maybe I should be on this one instead. The cruelty of some humans towards their fellow humans almost didn't allow me to be on this panel, but (after plenty of danger and drama) I was. We got into some interesting areas -- basics on what gender and sex are, some of the interesting ways people have found to combine them, definitions for some of the many terms that get slung around, some of Julia Serano's points, etc.
I would've liked to take more questions from the audience, especially from those who really didn't know much about TG issues; as it was, I think the only really basic question we got was "How do I know which pronouns to use for someone?" sparkymonster had some really good things to say about this (namely, there's almost always going to be some awkwardness, and if you're cisgendered, you're just going to have to deal with that), and in combination with her comments from the Faux Diversity panel, I was rightly impressed.
PeopleI didn't meet as many people as I did last year. This was my second year, so that's just logical. But great people and great conversations were still everywhere.
It was good to talk with merovingian; I feel like I know him much better now. He's a really interesting guy, sagacious and compassionate in the same way his boyfriend is. I'd only known him from the mind-expanding and laugh-inducing stories on his LJ; now I feel that I know him, his boyfriend and their metal resin skull much better.
I only saw a small amount of sparkymonster but she seems really insightful. She's the kind of panelist I want to be: the one who doesn't say anything until she says something that totally brings everything into a new light, makes it all make sense, and pushes the conversation to a new level of awareness and interest.
heyiya ended up being one of my lunch companions one day. We talked about grad school, and how theory is both very important and very obscure. She seems really enthusiastic about her work, which is a very good thing; the world needs more academics who are actually interested in what they're doing and in making sense of the world with it rather than staying on ivory towers. And anyone whose LJ handle comes from Always Coming Home has just got to be cool.
It was also good to talk with bcholmes. We'd resolved to do so after last Wiscon, and made good on it this time. We first talked at dinner (along with merovingian and others) about the necessity but also uselessness of language, and the constant tension between maps and territories and our desire to make one into the other. Later, we talked about RPGs (Fading Suns, Hero system and others), Haiti, our jobs, relationships and many other things. I kept her up far too late Saturday night, but I don't feel too guilty about it, because it's good to know her better.
Earlier that night, I think it was, I hung out with lyda222 a bit. Not much, though; she's very popular and busy. She introduced me to Tim, one of her students, who as it turns out needs some advice about publishing in China. Maybe something will come of that. She also introduced me to xochiquetzl, who is her biggest fan and one of the best squee-ers in the world.
Seeing sevenmpls interacting with Wiscon for the first time was nifty. She really got into some of the programming, which was neat; it seems like Wiscon may be the first con whose programming really grabbed her.
cinnamyn77 asked me about the question I asked her last year, and we got talking about TG issues. She's very interested in the topic, and pointed us in some interesting directions at the Trans 101 panel.
naomikritzer and I talked about a million things as we drove to and from the con: Raising kids, Asperger's, socialization, writers' groups and the value thereof, LJ politics & the many drawbacks of LJ, Obama vs. Clinton, marketing & its disconnection with reality, the bizarre bridge over I-94 in St. Paul, the sense of rootedness & nuclear war, group morality, what panels we went to and many more things. We also hung out a bit at the con, partially cut short by my mysterious exit from the Guest of Honor speeches.
There were many other cool people I talked to briefly but not enough. There were many people I hoped to talk to more but didn't get a chance to. Well, future Wiscons.
Scattered NotesAs usual, there are small things worth noting but hard to categorize.
I walked to Netherworld Games with heyfoureyes. We discussed family, politics, relationships, gaming and other things. I got my only purchases of the con there: a bunch of used 80s gaming magazines. She had to take off, so I wandered back by myself. It was good to see more of Madison than State Street; I don't know a place until I see its neglected corners, I think. And I love the feeling of being in a place that's completely new to me.
There was more gaming going on this year. Some people got together a game of Arkham Horror one night; the Twin Cities folks were playing Zar in the Diversicon room; I saw a Cthulhu-based word game (hey, isn't everything better with Cthulhu?); I'm sure I saw other games, too. I talked about gaming with quite a few people, including John T., bcholmes and merovingian. But I didn't play anything, even though I brought What Game Should We Play? and paper for EPYC.
It felt like there weren't as many people as last year. Maybe that's because this was my second time, so the experience wasn't as intense; maybe I was managing not to be in the right place at the right time; or maybe it's because lots of people were laid out with the virus.
But opening ceremonies, the auction and the GoH speeches were very well attended. "Filk Music Ain't Got No Soul" was probably the highpoint of opening ceremonies for me. klages was hilarious, funny as could be while thinking on her feet, at the auction, as was Sharyn November. The raiders from Queso Grande were great, as was the epic Jan-Ken-Pon match. At that point, I had to duck out for a panel.
I also had to duck out of the GoH speeches because of the horrible events of that night. But what I saw was pretty interesting. I'm not convinced Alternate Reality Games are really all that new; I don't think Maureen has seen much of the indy RPG movement, for example. But it was great food for thought, and it will be cool to see what happens when "ARGs" become less a marketing tool and more a true artform. Plus, it's cool to know that Maureen is a gamer.
ThemesSometimes the collective unconscious** shows itself in interesting ways.
Octopuses & other tentacular creaturesMany times, in many independent places, the topic of octopuses came up. A panel went octopus-shaped; squid are the main form of transport on Carnitopia; and apparently Nomura's Jellyfish are one of humanity's primary antagonists. And there was the "Not Enough Octopusses" panel that I didn't go to, which may have set the whole thing off.
The trials of WisCon 32Database crashes; tornadoes; vomit & viruses; hateful cretins. If there weren't coincidences, that would be the strange thing. But there really were a ridiculous number of catastrophes this year.
Are humans a good thing or a bad thing?Is the universe better off with us or without us? This question also raised its head in many ways throughout the weekend. Deciding whether kids are a good thing to have, as discussed in the "Don't Want to Have Children" panel, partially depends on whether or not humans are a good thing. And whether or not to imbue our vehicles with intelligence (as discussed in "The Ship Who Knitted") depends on just how useful we think human intelligence is.
The issue became especially highlighted to me with the conflict and hatred of Sunday night. A lot has already been said, and hopefully the worst people have gone on to poopier pastures. But it hit me very personally; someone I know was hurt very deeply and directly by the hate. It's always painful when my illusions of fandom as a safe cocoon get violently shattered.
It all made me wonder, yet again, whether human nature is good or evil. Deliberately going out of your way to make other people suffer is, to me, evil -- and there was certainly a lot of that going around. My answer is what it has long since been: human nature, if you can even talk of such a thing, is complex. The reasoned, strategic, compassionate and just-plain-wise responses of many involved have shown me how it's possible to face up to that kind of hatred and survive. That is a skill I want to learn; I tend to talk a good talk but then react poorly when the real deal rears its head. I have a lot to learn, but luckily, I have friends who are good teachers, and I seem to be meeting more. 三人行，必有我師焉, 但吾能與之學乎？
* If, that is, I don't gain even more infamy for having the same first name as the infamous instigator.
** Or subconscious, or just the universe's tendencies towards coincidence -- whichever you prefer. |
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