The Hugo Winners Versus the Hugo Awards Ceremony

Lots of people have commented on the disaster that was the Hugo Awards 2020 last night. What became starkly clear to me was that there is an enormous chasm between what two competing visions of the future of SFF: one is inclusive, radical, anti-racist, anti-fascist, queer. The other is atavistic,  moribund, and even hostile to the vision of the other.

Toastmaster George R. R. Martin, needless to say, represented the latter. There were several moments in the awards ceremony when the two visions were juxtaposed side by side, highlighting the differences. Martin repeatedly listed as “greats” old white men — Heinlein, Silverberg, Tolkein, even Campbell — mentioning women grudgingly, if at all, and mentioning a Black person only once during the time I watched (about two hours). Meanwhile, the lists of finalists and the winners were incredibly diverse, featuring people of color, women and non-binary people, and queer people. It was almost as if Martin existed in a completely different universe. His irrelevance has never been more obvious.

For a little while, this contrast was, to me, simply funny and pathetic. But then the Astounding Award was announced. The award’s name was changed from the Campbell Award in reaction to Jeannette Ng’s acceptance speech last year in which she denounced Campbell (correctly) as a fascist. But Martin never mentioned that when he brought up what a prominent editor Campbell was in sort of a weird, disgusting eulogy.

Then Martin mispronounced the name of the winner, Rebecca Kuang (this was not the first, not would it be the last, name he mispronounced). 

She said, in her pre-recorded acceptance speech: 

“…the Astounding Award is the award for the best new writer. But if I were talking to a new writer coming to the genre in 2020, I would tell them, ‘Well, if you’re an author of color, you will very likely be paid only a fraction of the advance that white writers are getting. You will be pigeonholed, you will be miscategorized, you will be lumped in with other authors of color whose work doesn’t remotely resemble yours. The chances are very high that you will be sexually harassed at conventions, or the target of racist microaggressions, or very often just overt racism.”

 

People will mispronounce your name repeatedly, and in public, even people who are on your publishing team. Your cover art will be racist – you will have to push against that. And the way people talk about you and your literature will be tied to your identity and your personal trauma instead of the stories you are actually trying to tell. And if I had known all of that when I went into the industry, I don’t know if I would have done it. So I think that the best way that we can celebrate new writers is to make this industry more welcoming for everyone.'”

As if to underscore her point, Martin mispronounced her name once again after her speech. And mentioned Campbell again.

That’s when it stopped being funny for me. This was not only embarrassing and painfully boring, but it was hostile. He refused to acknowledge that SFF had changed, that the community had turned away from Campbell and his ilk. 

Once again, though, this attitude of valorizing the “canon” was rebuked when the award for Best Related Work went to none other than Jeannette Nh for her searing “Campbell was a fucking fascist” acceptance speech.

Martin’s dismissiveness towards the creators we were gathered to celebrate became unbearable and disgusting. Instead of highlighting accomplishments of the finalists, Toastmaster George R. R. Martin spent more time reminiscing about his own award wins and the history of the Hugos, taking time to name “the greats” — with hardly a woman among them, let alone a person of color. He mispronounced names so frequently it could be a drinking game. 

The fact that made of these segments were pre-recorded means that this was a choice. This was the awards ceremony the chairs wanted to put on, the one they thought would represent the Hugos. 

This morning the CoNZealand issued a vague and inadequate apology, without really detailing what they were apologizing for exactly, and to whom, and what they would do better in the future. The apology feels very pro forma, and in not at all in proportion to the real harm that was done. I’m not convinced they really understand the scope of the disaster they created. 

But there’s hope, because all the WorldCon members voted for the amazing winners. The community wants this future, a future that is queer and diverse and exciting and anti-fascist. Con committees need to wake up to this, or be left behind like the irrelevant relics they have proven themselves to be. 

 

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