Kristine Kathryn Rusch has apparently brought out a new SF/F anthology of women writers, focusing on older and classic SF, called Women of Futures Past. Apart from the idea that Lois McMaster Bujold and Connie Willis count as past writers, this is pretty laudable: most people in science fiction fandom are aware of the pushback against female writers which resulted in anthologies like Women Destroy Science Fiction. Witness Christie Yant’s editorial for that book:

The summer of 2013 was a rough one for women in science fiction. Every few weeks there was a new reminder that to a certain subset of the field, we’re not welcome here. There were multiple articles returning to the tired accusation that women (still) aren’t writing “real” SF; disputes about the way the field is represented by vintage cheesecake art on the cover of a professional trade publication; the glib admonition that if we are to succeed, we should be more like Barbie, in her “quiet dignity.”

Gah. But reading the introduction of Rusch’s anthology, written by Rusch herself, there’s a rather odd assertion. Ready?

The idea that women are discriminated against in science fiction is ludicrous to me.

There’s a special sense of cognitive dissonance arising from the fact that the very same introduction goes on to give example after example of discrimination, minimisation and ignorance. As discussed in this thread starting with Rachel Swirsky’s tweet, it seems in a way that there’s a sense of grievance about modern women in SF/F fandom not knowing about the women who came before them. Never mind “The Women Men Don’t See” or the “Women Fen Don’t See”; the complaint seems to be about the women women do not see.

I think it probably is true that women in SF/F fandom today don’t know about all the women who came before them, and those women deserve to be celebrated — though there’s not a single name in the TOC of Rusch’s book I don’t recognise. Her introduction does add somewhat to that, speaking about female editors, which is great.

But if there’s an issue that women now aren’t aware of women who wrote before them, it’s not that they’re not interested, it’s not that they’re not looking for it — and it’s not that the writers Rusch is including have actually been forgotten, because they were definitely the safe picks. Ursula Le Guin, really? She’s amazing, but hardly invisible.

Talking about the struggle for female writers to be taken seriously in SF/F fandom now is not to say that there weren’t women before now, and I think plenty of the current crop of female writers and editors would agree that a light needs to be shone on the invisible female writers who came before. I’m not convinced Rusch’s book is doing it, and I’m not convinced by her assertion that she has seen little discrimination in science fiction fandom. It seems to me that it’s a bit like the Dark Ages: things happened (women wrote books), but we don’t know what they were (who they were), because the records are sparse. And that definitely is due to discrimination, like it or not.

We can but work on it. Personally, I’d love to check out some of these forgotten award winners Rusch mentions — any recommendations on where and how to start for a broke, freelance keyboard monkey?

This discussion post was somewhat inspired by Chuck Wendig’s rant about the idea that writers and creative types should keep their political opinions to themselves. It’s Chuck Wendig, so, uh, expect profanity. I know that from the reader side of things, people often don’t want to know what the opinions of authors they like are — who wants to think about the fact that the man who wrote Ender’s Game is a homophobic, racist asshat?

But the thing is, we can’t have it both ways. We can’t interact with authors on twitter, get excited about them interacting with us and RTing silly pictures of cats, and then get annoyed because they’ve expressed an opinion on Brexit or the US elections. If we want them to be humans we can interact with, then we’ve gotta accept that they have opinions too — and also, of course, that they will make mistakes, say the wrong thing, and otherwise be flawed humans like the rest of us. We’ve got to accept that they live in the same world as us, and that by giving them an audience we’re also giving them a voice. It’s not a voice we have to listen to, but it is a voice they can use, if they so choose.

As for where I stand on whether I’ll read books by people I disagree with, it’s complex. I don’t want Orson Scott Card to profit by me, for example. But I do accept that authors are going to make mistakes and say things I find less than palatable — I’m thinking, for example, of Elizabeth Bear’s involvement in the fandom discussions called Racefail ’09, or Robin Hobb’s rant about the medicating of mental illnesses. In the end, for me, it’s a matter of degree, and also heavily ruled by gut feeling, and tempered by whether the person seems to have learned from or changed since a given meltdown or argument or horribly expressed opinion. I’ve bought Bear’s books, and I will probably buy more of Hobb’s in future (though goodness knows I’m behind on reading her series). I can’t foresee myself buying Card’s books, though. And I’m on the fence about Benjanun Sriduangkaew.

This is getting away from the point, and I’ve covered it before in my post about Liking Problematic Things. The thing is, I would never contest that people have the right to decide that someone’s politics preclude supporting them financially (by buying their books or tie-in merchandise, or whatever). Likewise, I wouldn’t contest that you have the right to say you like something anyway, and you’re not going to make your escapism a political act by buying or not buying particular books based on the authors’ views. Or any part of the spectrum between those two.

The thing now is that people are saying authors shouldn’t express their opinions. They’re interested only in their art and they don’t want to know what they think of feminism or gay marriage. Well, okay, that’s totally fine — so just read their work, and don’t follow them on social media. If someone turns out to be unpleasant as a person on social media, unfollow them and keep reading their books, or never pick up another again, it’s up to you. (Me? I don’t follow Nnedi Okorafor or Ekaterina Sedia anymore, for various reasons; I still read their books.)

But it’s surely not revolutionary to point out that authors are people, who have to live in the same world as us. If they have any influence, any platform, it’s what we give them by being interested in their lives outside the pages of their books. Of course they’re going to use that to get across their opinions — and it’s our responsibility to opt out if we’re not interested.