[Morgoth]

Cole doesn't really blame alcohol in his apology I think. He certainly points to it as a contributing factor, and thus something he keeps away from during cons, but my read was that he took full responsibility for this being a problem with him and his interactions with women, and that he has since gone into therapy.

This post has been edited by Morgoth: 25 June 2020 - 12:20 PM

[QuickTidal]

Cas Anvar who plays Alex on THE EXPANSE. Oof.

[QuickTidal]

 Morgoth, on 25 June 2020 - 12:17 PM, said:

The accusations against Sykes started as complaints that he knew of Coles behaviour and tolerated it, though he did step in on occasion, but seemes to have developed into direct accusations of misogyny. Exactly what it was he did I don't know, but it seems to have made people uncomfortable.

No, Sykes is accused in a very direct way now...

[Cyphon]

Not great, and I largely enjoy their interaction in twitter - though I've not read any of their stuff. My feed has been a flutter with this the last 24 hours and more seems to come out.

A lot of talk of what the consequences should be, but no really consensus on that either.

https://twitter.com/...9735062528?s=19

Mark Lawrence now being named too.

This post has been edited by Cyphon: 25 June 2020 - 02:50 PM

[Cause]

So fantasy authors get more fan girls at conventions than I realize? I suppose fame corrupts.

Never really had fanboy tendencies but I suppose I could see how a few positive interactions with fawning fans could lead you to see it as your due and which in turn could lead to them crossing the line.

I remember once a friend of a friend won a competition to have dinner with some band. She was supposed to invite a few people. She didn’t have enough people. So she invited my friend, my friend invited me. Except for the winner herself And one or two of her closest friends we didn’t really know or care about the band. We were there to make up the numbers for dinner. They were famous but not necessarily mainstream. I remember how disappointed the band was that many of us were not fawning over them. Game and the attention it brings I think can be like a drug to some people.

[QuickTidal]

 Cyphon, on 25 June 2020 - 02:10 PM, said:

https://twitter.com/...9735062528?s=19

Mark Lawrence now being named too.

I stared seeing him mentioned and I was like...oh no!... It's also, we should be clear, not REALLY fodder for this thread as none of it is sexual that I can see...but seeing as it's surfaced amongst all the other bad actor names today in the SFF industry, it's worth talking about it as a lot of us read his work.

Also, for some further reference beyond that, here are some tweet screenshots that seem to refer to Kel in Schwab's Shades of Magic series in what can only be called a derogatory way. Which is strictly an "optics" thing...but still.

It should also not escape attention that the FIRST other author who asks Schwab what book she's talking about in her 2014 "I didn't like this book and people came at me for it" tweet thread was...Sam Sykes.

This post has been edited by QuickTidal: 25 June 2020 - 04:26 PM

[Cause]

Perhaps off topic as you say because he is not accused of sexual harassment however after going through that thread the primary complaint seems to be that Mark Lawrence describes rape in his books. As early as our 19!

The synopsis of prince of thorns reads:
When he was nine, he watched as his mother and brother were killed before him. By the time he was thirteen, he was the leader of a band of bloodthirsty thugs. By fifteen, he intends to be king...

It’s time for Prince Honorous Jorg Ancrath to return to the castle he turned his back on, to take what’s rightfully his. Since the day he hung pinned on the thorns of a briar patch and watched Count Renar’s men slaughter his mother and young brother, Jorg has been driven to vent his rage. Life and death are no more than a game to him—and he has nothing left to lose.

But treachery awaits him in his father’s castle. Treachery and dark magic. No matter how fierce his will, can one young man conquer enemies with power beyond his imagining?


Saying you personally find the book distasteful or at least not to your taste is fine. It’s not proper literary criticism to say that rape makes it a bad book.

Can’t speak to if he set his fans on her since after scrolling down a ways still didn’t see the screenshots.

[QuickTidal]

 Cause, on 25 June 2020 - 04:35 PM, said:

Perhaps off topic as you say because he is not accused of sexual harassment however after going through that thread the primary complaint seems to be that Mark Lawrence describes rape in his books. As early as our 19!

Saying you personally find the book distasteful or at least not to your taste is fine. It’s not proper literary criticism to say that rape makes it a bad book.

Can’t speak to if he set his fans on her since after scrolling down a ways still didn’t see the screenshots.

Actually it seems like the problem isn't what his books are about and how they are critiqued, but what Schwab says occurred to her when she mentioned out loud she didn't like it and the people who came at her for it, and how Lawrence supposedly retweeting her negative review, seems to have opened the floodgates for that to occur? That's what I got from it anyways. And then after that I believe came the comments about Kel being a "cross dressing pirate"? I don't know the timeline of events.

I think the conversation to be had here is whether it's a good idea for an author to retweet a bad review of their work (by another author in this case too) to his/her followers on a social medium like twitter (known to be a pretty rough cesspool on the best of days) due to the fact that some of those followers won't take it well and would certainly go after the tweeter in question. Is it therefore the responsibility of the Author to make sure they don't do that by either not retweeting the negativity to their fanbase at all, or specifying that she's entitled to that view of the book so let her be? Like why engage with the person who made a negative review at all?

At least that's what I'm getting from it. I can't speak to it more than that...other than to say I like both these authors and both their works so I'm trying to find what the middle ground is here and navigating that as a reader of their work or not going forward.

[Macros]

I'm confused (genuinely) as to what has happened here.

Someone complained to Mark about a rape scene in the book and he syked superman's on them or someone complained about a rape scene and mark proceeded to mock them?

I've scrolled through the Twitter thread and looked at the screenshots and I'm still genuinely unsure in what is trying to be conveyed

[Macros]

Crosspost, and superman- super fan

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

 QuickTidal, on 25 June 2020 - 04:53 PM, said:

 Cause, on 25 June 2020 - 04:35 PM, said:

Perhaps off topic as you say because he is not accused of sexual harassment however after going through that thread the primary complaint seems to be that Mark Lawrence describes rape in his books. As early as our 19!

Saying you personally find the book distasteful or at least not to your taste is fine. It's not proper literary criticism to say that rape makes it a bad book.

Can't speak to if he set his fans on her since after scrolling down a ways still didn't see the screenshots.

Actually it seems like the problem isn't what his books are about and how they are critiqued, but what Schwab says occurred to her when she mentioned out loud she didn't like it and the people who came at her for it, and how Lawrence supposedly retweeting her negative review, seems to have opened the floodgates for that to occur? That's what I got from it anyways. And then after that I believe came the comments about Kel being a "cross dressing pirate"? I don't know the timeline of events.

I think the conversation to be had here is whether it's a good idea for an author to retweet a bad review of their work (by another author in this case too) to his/her followers on a social medium like twitter (known to be a pretty rough cesspool on the best of days) due to the fact that some of those followers won't take it well and would certainly go after the tweeter in question. Is it therefore the responsibility of the Author to make sure they don't do that by either not retweeting the negativity to their fanbase at all, or specifying that she's entitled to that view of the book so let her be? Like why engage with the person who made a negative review at all?

At least that's what I'm getting from it. I can't speak to it more than that...other than to say I like both these authors and both their works so I'm trying to find what the middle ground is here and navigating that as a reader of their work or not going forward.

When I first glanced at the Twitter thread, I thought this was referring to him: 'When I was 22, I asked a fellow male author if they wanted to trade manuscripts. He told me he'd send me his, but he didn't want mine because "pretty girls were meant for pictures" instead. That was my only value to him. His art. My body.'

In context, it's not.

I generally don't care (much) if authors are nice to people on the internet.

This post has been edited by Azath Vitr (D'ivers: 25 June 2020 - 05:10 PM

[QuickTidal]

Like I said, I'm not trying to take a side in this one, but to understand the issue from all angles.

Though I'm not a fan of anything that incites online bullying, which is why this seemed to stand out to me as it seems to be what's at play here.

[Cause]

I dont think was refering to her as a cross dressing pirate (Dont know the author or the books so dont know if their is deep meaning hear). I think he was saying their criticism was that his work was not progressive enough and nothing he could write would satisfy that complaint. Which i think given what I have sometimes seen is a fair point in regards to these things.

The discussions have become so polarizing. Note that the poster fo the screenshots refers to the people asking for them as asshats for not just taking her word for it.

This post has been edited by Cause: 25 June 2020 - 06:03 PM

[QuickTidal]

Yes, I should be clear again I'm not taking sides here (I have everything that Lawrence has ever written, and I have only 2 Schwab books; 1 of which I haven't yet read), and I really can't find enough about Lawrence to make any judgements one way or the other...

The "cross dressing pirate" thing just rubbed me a bit wrong is all. I wasn't about to get rid of his books for it.

And oh man, and here's some sauce for the goddamn fire with Schwab being accused of doing exactly what she is accusing Mark of doing herself.

[Cyphon]

https://twitter.com/...6530194432?s=19

This isn't pleasant reading for Myke Cole.

[Cause]

These peoples minds don’t work right. The tweet where she set off her followers on a queer brown girl was literally just saying that in a fantasy book set 200 hundred years in the past relationships between 17 and 20 year olds are not that wierd.

I mean if nutjobs than choose to attack her based on that I’m not sure we can blame the author and if the girl in question happens to be brown and queer that seems irrelevant to the original post.

[Morgoth]

 Cyphon, on 25 June 2020 - 06:27 PM, said:

https://twitter.com/...6530194432?s=19

This isn't pleasant reading for Myke Cole.

Uuugh. I quite enjoyed his twitter, and his banter with Sykes.

[QuickTidal]

 Cyphon, on 25 June 2020 - 06:27 PM, said:

https://twitter.com/...6530194432?s=19

This isn't pleasant reading for Myke Cole.

Yeah, I caught that too, and this doesn't just make the stuff he apologized for in 2018 seem worse, it actively paints him as a drunken, sexist, racist, transphobic jerk who has not learned anything in his regular ass life.

And it looks like he noped off twitter a few minutes ago too as a result.

[Cause]

I confess I have never heard of Myke cole or the other one. Have they written anything particularly notable?

[QuickTidal]

 Cause, on 25 June 2020 - 06:31 PM, said:

These peoples minds don’t work right. The tweet where she set off her followers on a queer brown girl was literally just saying that in a fantasy book set 200 hundred years in the past relationships between 17 and 20 year olds are not that wierd.

I mean if nutjobs than choose to attack her based on that I’m not sure we can blame the author and if the girl in question happens to be brown and queer that seems irrelevant to the original post.

Right, but I think the point is that Mark didn't "Send" his followers after her either. From what I can glean, he retweeted her tweet about PoT to them, and they did the nasty stuff on their own. We can argue about the optics of that retweeting all day, but if she wants him held responsible for the subsequent behaviour of those followers, then she must follow suit when her followers descend on someone. I think they are just pointing out the hypocrisy of it calling it out.

There are also others on that thread who say that they've have poor interactions with her at Cons...