no subject

[lotesse]

I don't really go to Neil Gaiman as a fandom, never have. It sounds I-told-you-so-ish to say that his smarmy demeanor and cutest-guy-at-the-geek-thing vibe put me off. Well, even if we spot some, we never spot 'em all. This one doesn't hurt me personally, but that's just the luck of the draw. The next one very well might.

But there's not been enough noise, imo, in SFF spaces about the sexual assault allegations that are coming out against him. Unfortunate that it's been leveraged in the anti-trans wars, but Gaiman did some really fucked-up stuff, damn. manipulative crap that fucks you up deep. taking advantage of fawn responses, creating crazy-making circumstances.

Gnarly-ass rapist.

I believe his victims and don't respect his bullshit responses.

Comments

[princessofgeeks]

It's a mess.

I haven't been following it closely; how has it figured into anti-trans propaganda?

[lotesse]

The podcast, Tortoise Media that released the allegations seems to be UK-based and anti-trans. I guess there was some nasty reporting about the Tavistock Clinic? Caveat, I'm not a regular listener. The main host, Rachel Johnson, is Boris Johnson's sister, which seems not great. & Gaiman and the Good Omens leads, notably Tennant, have been loudly pro-trans. So their coming for Gaiman's scalp may be motivated by that?

But the interview with Gaiman's victim seem well-conducted, and the situation at large doesn't seem very ambiguous. Just because it's politically inconvenient in the Gender Wars doesn't mean he's not a rapist and an abuser. It does make a shitty situation that much more unpleasant and fraught.

[princessofgeeks]

Thank you for the background; I was not aware.

[aflatmirror]

Ugh, his responses are so disgusting in themselves. Like come on, all but literally saying one woman imagined it because she's crazy? Saying general text messages are evidence of categorical consent somehow? Jesus christ.

I totally agree with you in being more disappointed in the community at large's response than with him. Rape culture is just as much of a thing in SFF fandom as it is everywhere else. If it's someone popular and beloved doing it, people will engage in all the same wretched excuses they see right through when the rapist is someone they hate.

[lotesse]

It's such a tellingly manipulator/abuser way to react to bad behavior being discovered. Those responses alone convince me that he did the thing. Skin-crawling.

[sophia_sol]

yes, fully agree with everything you say here. ugh.

[starlady]

I feel like it was all over BlueSky, although unfortunately there was way more of the "I never liked his books anyway!" and the "he wrote about sexual assault in his books, obviously he is a predator!" variety of response than I would have hoped.

[lotesse]

I haven't moved over to Bluesky. I wish conversations over there echoed more in the mainstream!

Agreed that it's not the time for literary criticism. One sees why it's tempting, but you can't actually spot abusers from their fiction, it turns out.

[rachelmanija]

I am a fan and I've met him multiple times (at signings and such), so all the talk on Bluesky about how everyone in the publishing business has known all along was an extra punch in the gut. I sure as hell didn't know!

Every single bit of it is appalling, but to me one of the very worst parts is that he raped a deeply vulnerable person who was much younger than him and his employee, in circumstances where she literally had nowhere else to go, then didn't pay her for months while having sex with her that was at best predatory, then only paid her wages when she was suicidal and in a hospital... on the condition that she sign an NDA dating to her first day of employment, which was also the day he first raped her.

If it really is true that a big chunk of the publishing world has known all along, then I sure hope that not only do many more women come forward, but that we find out who amongst them knew and was fine with it (as opposed to knew but didn't dare to say anything.)

[lotesse]

I agree that all the circumstances -- employment, geographical isolation -- make whatever sexual encounters a problem from the get-go, regardless of verbal or written "consent." Sexual harassment and assault are structural problems. There are some situations where we know, as earnest and sincere people, that harm is just too likely. It really does sound like such a nightmare scene for the victims, in a way that happens too often in and around the arts. She wasn't even getting paid!!

[highlyeccentric]

I love much of his writing. I did not pick up some of the issues with American Gods, because I was young and dumb and white when I read it (I clued up when The Cemetery Book got him cancelled. Oh look, cancellation doesn't last). I DEFINITELY remember being very creeped out about the way he talked, in interviews, about the genesis of his relationship with Amanda Palmer (vis, they collaborated, she does a lot of creative work in the bath... so... inevitable sex???), and the fact that I ended up thinking even LESS of him given, well... Amanda Palmer... doesn't mean that bit wasn't creepy.

[lotesse]

Yeah I remember that "cancellation," lol. and AFP is ... mess. I feel so sorry for the bright young things impacted by the mess of both AFP and Gaiman. It's so easy to get rolled by artists you look up to, when you think that they, and they alone, might really "get" you ....

[anghraine]

I agree strongly, and I am extremely disappointed in a lot of SF/F creatives and media spaces right now. Tor is only talking about it in German (???), File 770 apparently deleting everything about it, Ursula Vernon, etc. The fact that so many people can't meet the bar of decency set by John Scalzi is just ... wtf.

I also appreciate the acknowledgment that while you found Gaiman off-putting, it's not an occasion for celebration and sometimes that's how things fall. I've never been into him fannishly either, but of course knew who he was, and it's like ... I don't need to be personally invested in this specific case to be horrified for his victims and for his fans (at least one of whom was both).

His response are pretty grotesque, too—both what he acknowledges and how he denies the rest.

[lotesse]

There's so much more at stake here than my personal feelings -- this is a sign of a needed community-wide reckoning with sexual and interpersonal ethics. This kind of thing can't be what we do to people in and around sff, or allow our "stars" to do.

But, also, I have been the girl or woman desperately begging the unkind and pain-causing manipulative man not to end the relationship, and romanticizing the pain and intensity of it all to cope and exert some sense of control. And I really do feel so intensely for the victims here.