Okay, so two people I consider friends, Maurice Broaddus and Chesya Burke, have recently taken on something I hear a lot (maybe it’s my company, maybe it’s because I live in the South. I admit a lot of people I know are embarrassingly racist, however they’re also pretty honest and upfront about it, and in a weird way not hateful, just judging. Which isn’t right, but it’s not like they’re making crosses in their garages for Saturday night, you know?)

So the statement in question:

One would think that since we’ve come so far as to have a black president we wouldn’t need award programs where the winners have to be of a particular ethnicity. Imagine the hate and protest that would come if there was a White Entertainment Television channel and awards ceremony, or a White Miss America Pageant. Are these ethnic-centered events still needed? Are they racist? What are your thoughts?

So let me address a few things, from a poor white bisexual, non-Christian point of view (just so you know where I’m coming from). First, how exactly does having a black president mean we’re living in a post-racial world? We still have black kids being kicked out of swimming pools, laws being passed which make it legal for Hispanic-looking people (not just actual Hispanics) to be harassed, and gays and lesbians banned from the deathbeds of their partner of decades. We do not live in a world where everyone is equal just because Obama is president.

I ended up voting for Obama, not because he was black, but because Palin terrified the shit out of me. That is what politics has become, choosing the least evil. In a world where the least evil just happens to also be black, how is that a sign that racism is over and we can all wave our victory flags and pretend color doesn’t exist?

My second reaction is always “Wow it sucks to be excluded doesn’t it?” I can’t help thinking that this argument always comes from the universal ill feeling of being excluded from something, and often times it’s something the people complaining wouldn’t even need or be interested in.

My third reaction is “But they’re right, the shit would hit the fan if there was a white channel, or white only beauty show or white only scholarships.” (Let’s ignore for the sake of this that most other channels are predominately white already. I’m tempted to also joke that TVLand is White Entertainment TV, but they don’t show those funny as hell old shows like Mister Ed and Dick Van Dyke and Mary Tyler Moore anymore. Boo hiss!) The shit would hit the fan…kind of like people are already complaining about the black-oriented scholarships and beauty pageants and such. In other words it would be no real different than it is now, with some people heartily approving and taking advantage, and some people crying foul.

Fourth, the people fronting the money to these groups do have the right to say what that money is for. Have we lost so much control over our finances that we just throw money at things with no knowledge of how it’s going to be spent, of what the money is going for? (Oh yes, in many, many ways, we have, but that is a rant for another time.) On the scholarship front is it also unfair for scholarships to be designated for the low income? For students trying to become teachers? For those who maintain a certain GPA? Or members of the Armed Forces? Out of high school I received a scholarship that was specifically for a female of the advanced program and to keep it for the full two years I had to maintain a 3.25 or better GPA, yet I hear no one complaining about how unfair that one was. The way I see it, when it comes to education people if someone needs to or wants to be educated, then we should fucking celebrate and encourage them.

College is already a massive headache (as my attempts to re-enter have been nothing but a nightmare), filled with constant uncertainty, massive discouragement and an absolute insane price. (Again, another rant for later.) Education should be absolutely universal. It strengthens the whole community when its people are educated and no one should be complaining about programs that help people get educations.

And race-specific charities? I’m sorry, does PETA have any right to demand that Tiger Haven share its donations, because it’s unfair that people  give their money to charities with specific goals that don’t include another organization’s goals? I didn’t think so.

Ahem. Next, there’s the beauty pageants and awards programs. Again, these are funded by people who believe in that cause. That’s where they want to give their money, that’s what they want to see it do. If you want to give to an organization that give white power awards…well I’m sure you can find them.

And again, let’s, for good measure, take the race out of. For fun let’s insert a genre. So then is it also unfair/genre-ist for the HWA to give out awards only to horror books? And for the Hugos and Nebulas to go to SF/F works? I mean, don’t we live in a world where all these genres are accepted and they can stand on their own two legs without hand outs and genre specific grants, awards, programs, and heck, publisher imprints?

How are black beauty pageants any different from say, groups like the Suicide Girls, who celebrate beauty that doesn’t match the media-standard colors, shape and style? As an aside, can I just mention how much it means to me, as a big girl, that Dove runs commercials with larger women in them, as opposed to damn near everything else, but specifically Victoria’s Secret (where I was almost laughed out of a store because of my size), or those HORRIBLE Yoplait and Special K commercials which show really skinny, beautiful women and heavily imply they’re fat? With the tone of the Dove commercials the company is all but looking right at me and saying “Hi, we consider you a valued customer too.” Well then hell yeah I’ll give you my money, because I DESERVE to be a valued customer. We all do. And unfortunately in today’s world you are not guaranteed good customer service. I will gladly spend my money on places that appreciate me as a consumer. How do ethnicities other than mine not deserve the same?

As for WET/BET keep in mind that BET does not have the best reputation with all the members of its target audience. It’s not some channel that as a non-black you can’t watch. There aren’t secret messages being passed around on its programs. There is no universal black solidarity. Or universal gay solidarity. Or universal anything solidarity. There is no racial/minority agenda that is threatening your way of life. (Not only can most people not plan that far ahead, but most people also can’t get along that well.)

And while I’m ranting let’s completely obliterate the term “reverse racism” because racism is racism, whether it’s white vs black, black vs white, Vietnamese vs Chinese, whatever. We have been making decisions based on physicality for eons. African tribes warred against one another. The Gauls fought the Romans, the Huns fought everyone, and China currently controls Tibet. Racism is everywhere. We all still live in a world where decisions are made on race, feeling are hurt by race and people are held back, or vaulted forward because of their race.

If you can take a statement like the one above, and change the racial keywords into something else, let’s say something like:

One would think that since we’ve come so far as to have a horror president we wouldn’t need award programs where the winners have to be of a particular genre. Imagine the hate and protest that would come if there was a Horror Entertainment Television channel and awards ceremony, or a Horror Miss America Pageant. Are these genre-centered events still needed? Are they genre-ist? What are your thoughts?

And it sounds absurd or outright silly, then maybe leaving the racial language in is just as silly too.

So here’s what happened to us today. We have been visiting the YMCA twice a week for open swim. The kids are doing very well, are becoming very comfortable with the water, and furthermore with the pool rules and locker room rules. In fact, both kids are really enjoying swim time not just as exercise and recreation, but as social time as well. If there aren’t other kids to play with they will play games with each other.We’ve been having lots of fun, and the kids have been making single serving friends, or at the very least been learning how to deal with other kids/people in this situation, which for ASD kids is a BIG deal.

Today super lifeguard (who was pacing the edge of the pool, getting onto everyone for everything, to the point of waving a laminated copy of the pool rules in people’s faces) was in residence. (There were issues with bigger kids splashing and practically jumping in on people too, but…) While I was hanging up my purse on the wall my kids went a head and got into the pool. They’re comfortable with it, the stairs are all of three feet away from where I leave my purse and it takes me all of ten seconds to hang up the purse and be right behind them. Super Lifeguard yelled at them, and me, telling me I have to be in the pool with them. Well duh. I’m in a bathing suit, with goggles and dive rings on my arm, right behind the kids. But apparently I have to be in the pool first.

Then a few minutes later my daughter wanted me to race her swimming. So we do laps short ways across the pool and when I turn for a lap back I see the lifeguard scolding my son and removing him from the pool. There’s never been a problem with his behavior in the pool, other than the occasional jog, so I’m wondering what the hell. The lifeguard tells me my son was stealing toys from another kid (a rubber ducky that my son had been playing with when I moved all of three feet away to do laps with my daughter). The thing is there were three duckies, so both kids could have had one without any of them “being taken away”. The lifeguard then said that my son was squirting the other child and the parent complained. (Almost immediately after this incident, by the way, the parent in question had a very friendly conversation with me. Nothing significant was said, but it was absolutely friendly, no sign of this parent being upset at all.) So my son was removed from the pool and put in “time out” and threatened with getting kicked out altogether because he squirted another kid…in a swimming pool. (With several thirteen year olds nearby having a “who can splash the biggest” contest” about five feet away.)

I tell the lifeguard that my son is autistic so he doesn’t understand all the social rules like other people. My mouth is open to explain to him that things need to be explained in a way he understands when the lifeguard tells me that if my son is autistic then he needs to be at my side the whole time period. And he goes on to say that the pool is very busy and if it’s too much for my son we can go into a swim lane (which are all of three feet wide) to swim away from the other kids.

Now let me tell you something, Autistic does NOT mean incompetent. There are issues like sensory issues, OCD and yes, mental retardation are co-morbid (that refers to disorders that commonly occur together, I like it, so I use it a lot) but every mental issue, from depression to OCD and PSTD and autism is a RANGE of issues. If a child is Autistic it doesn’t immediately mean they are are stupid, or incapable. It means they have communication problems.

My son is perfectly capable of functioning normal, with a bit of aid, and the #1 thing he needs is help with communicating. You cannot pull him out of a pool and start chiding him and be vague about it. “You can’t do that” means nothing, but “You can’t squirt people” does mean something. Specific statements are easier to understand.

We almost went to complain right there, but the lifeguard backed off and as it turned out my son had been trying to play with the other little boy. They were playing with the ducks together and yes, my son squirted the other boy. Initiating social play is a huge deal to ASD kids, and in a way they make themselves very vulnerable when doing so. This is the time when they are most likely to be rejected by other kids for being weird or different. ASD kids do communicate, and therefore interact, differently, so yeah, it can come off as weird if you don’t see that they are simply trying to reach out to you. (My son for example, will sometimes go up to people and monologue a story. He’s trying to get attention and interact, and he doesn’t really know how to converse, so he monologues.)

So here’s what was done:

Boy plays with other boy by squirting him with a rubber ducky in a pool. Lifeguard jumps in, scolds older boy in vague language about the boy being wrong and misbehaving, makes him get out of the pool and sit in time out, then spends five minutes arguing with his mom about the boy’s behavior, ending with telling both that the child should stay right at his mother’s side.

What should have been done:

Lifeguard sees older boy squirting younger boy in a swimming pool with a rubber ducky. If the younger boy or parents were upset or complained the lifeguard should have gone to the child and said “He doesn’t want to play like that.”

That’s it. Or “Please don’t squirt the other kids.”

So how do you tell if you’re dealing with a special needs kid? Does it matter? Is it really that hard to be specific when correcting a child? Furthermore, if the child’s parent is right there, isn’t easier to just tell them if there’s a problem and let them parent their own child?

But instead pulling my son out of the pool and lecturing him about how wrong he was without him understanding exactly what it is that he did wrong (he thought he was being scolded for trying to play with the other child) led to twenty minutes of my son crying to me that he himself was a jerk and a horrible person and he had to leave the pool because the other kids didn’t like him. And the lifeguard’s instant assumption that autistic=incapable led to me leaving a rather angry message with the aquatics director.

I don’t like to be a bitch, but my son has every right to be in that pool, to play without me hovering over him at arms length. My daughter deserves to get to lap race with me, even if her brother doesn’t want to. I should not have to fight for these things for them, especially since no one was in any danger (my son is chest arms and head over the water in the shallow end and the other child was being held my his mother with a floaty strapped to his back).  If he had talked to me everything would have been fine and there would have been no issue at all. Not even a reason to point out to the whole pool that my son is not like the rest of them.

So if you find yourself in a situation like this there are the things to do:

1. Leave it to the parent to parent.

2. Make sure you are communicating clearly and efficiently. All kids people deserve it, special needs or not, and clear communication diffuses all kinds of situations and resolves all kinds of issues, usually harmlessly. All it takes is a little effort.

3. Don’t assume that a disability makes someone incompetent, stupid or incapable. It’s insulting, belittling and infuriating. If you don;t know what to do when someone says “My son is autistic” there is nothing wrong with asking “Then how do I help” or “then what do you suggest”.

Bonus points: No one responds well if you start a conversation by telling them they’re bad and threatening them.

Have a little consideration, and keep in mind that not everyone is like you. That’s all it takes.

Writers and authors being aware of their genre is the same as being aware of their audience. It’s a simple way to say “I know my audience”. Genres and audiences are tools of selling, not tools of writing.

You did not invent a genre any more than your editor invented a genre or your agent invented a genre.

And that goes for you “Teh genre is dying!!!” people too.

If, for some reason, you haven’t heard yet romance megalith Harlequin announced this week that they are opening a self-publishing branch of their company. This is so very wrong, but don’t just believe me. Here’s a short index of who is saying what:

• Mystery Writer Allison Brennan
• Writer Beware
• Nora Roberts
• Ashley Grayson Literary Agency
• Jackie Kessler
• Suvudu
• Mystery Writers of America
• Lee Goldberg
• SFWA
• Smart Bitches
• How Publishing Really Works
• Ann Aguirre
• Agent Kristin Nelson
• Dear Author
• Preditors & Editors (who now lists Harlequin as a vanity publisher)
• Teddy Pig
• Emily Veinglory
• Absolute Write’s Thread on the topic
• Shiloh Walker
• Agent Jennifer Jackson
• Nathan Bransford
• Paula Guran

My issues break down like this:

1. The cheapest package is $499 and you still only get 50% of net profits. If I am going to pay someone to publish my work I am going to also get all the profits myself.

2. Harlequin is billing this as “Be published by Harlequin” which is deceptive, predatory and a slap in the face to the authors who fought through the slush pile to be “traditionally” published by Harlequin.

3. Harlequin has included in their announcement that when they send rejections they will include flyers for or special offers for their self publishing program. This skews the business to the point where Harlequin could easily make more money from rejecting and funneling would-be authors to the self publishing imprint than from publishing books as a legitimate book publisher (rather than just a book printer). This is the kind of BS that led to reading fees for agent being deemed scammy.

4. Harlequin has stated that the self publishing imprint won’t have Harlequin anywhere on it, and the distribution, book quality and such will depend on what you pay. This is a bait and switch as they are using the Harlequin name to draw in writers, but the people buying the books will NOT see Harlequin products. In fact, since most bookstores do not order or stock self published books consumers aren’t entirely likely to see products at all.

5. Harlequin hints that they *might* pick up a successful self published title for their normal lines. This preys on those people looking to circumvent the slush pile, or those who have well received but still unpublished novels. It gives them false hope and again Harlequin gets paid to reject people rather than getting paid to publish, market and sell books. And, because of #1 they also get paid TWICE to reject people.

This whole deal is like a strip club. Harlequin is selling the fantasy of being a published, Harlequin author but the price is high and in the end it’s just the fantasy they’re selling. They ain’t gonna sleep with you.

Does Harlequin, in this corporate age, have the right to do this? Well some of these things are a little fuzzy and definite fall into “Read the fine print and know what you’re getting” category, but yes, they have the right to do this. And MWA, SFWA, and RWA are all absolutely right in saying “If you want to go down that path you no longer qualify as a non-vanity publisher to us”.

I’ve also seen others say that the Apex readers are funding my ‘hobby’. I won’t lie. I *love* doing Apex Magazine. I love reading the great short fiction we publish. As do our editors. All of us are genre fans and love science fiction, fantasy, and horror. We are delighted that others enjoy the product we produce. But giving people the option to contribute monetarily to help us continue to publish a free product as ‘funding a hobby’ is, again, silly.

So here’s my two cents.

Dear Fuckos Poor misguided persons,

No. Donating to a magazine, buying a book from a small press, a huge press, a new author, an old favorite, Stephen King or Joe-fucking-Blow that you’ve never heard of is NOT fund their hobby. It’s funding YOUR hobby.

YOU are the fan. YOU are the reader. If YOU like the product be don’t be a goddamned leech, show the people involved in producing the product you love your approval by sending them money so they are encouraged to, and have spare time to produce more.

What the hell makes you think that a person or a group of people are not entitled to support from their readers? What makes you think that you have the right to read their hard work for free, to enjoy it (or else why would you keep reading?) but should have to support the project at all?

Now, I understand if you don’t have the money (Really though, a lot of places like Apex, GUD, Skullvines, etc try to meet you halfway by having sales, promos, reduced price opportunities and ebook editions available for less. I recently bought TWO of Apex’s books in ebook form for under $5 thanks to a combined promo.) and I understand if you don’t like Apex’s fiction. I would never expect anyone to hand over money for a product they don’t think they’ll enjoy.

But what the hell kind of community to we work/live in where it’s okay for people to send out messages saying “Please buy my book so I can feed my family” then dismiss supporting other authors and publishers.

I am not saying this specifically happened. I don’t know who made this sort of remark about Apex. I just know that I am getting a lot of Facebook and GoodReads demands for my money. I have authors who instead of communicating with me as a reviewer take m email address off my BookLove site and add it to their list of people to hit up for money. I see people who I have read, and who I think are putting out substandard work shilling all over the net, in incredibly obnoxious volumes which reads as “Buy my book!!”

With Rot I have worked  to raise awareness that it exists, and tell people what it is about and where they can get it if they are interested, but not to tell them they should buy it, not to guilt them or con them to pull the “support the genre” card. I have tried to make it easy on the consumer by convincing my own publisher to make the cheaper ebook version available (PS to you naysayers, the ebook version is outselling the print version.) I’ve made two excerpts of a 60 page book available. I’ve targeted independent reviewers to give neutral opinions on it, so people can decide if it’s the kind of thing they wish to read or not.

And every “Fan me!” request and message board post that is nothing of substance but a link to the person’s latest book and whine about “I need money and wanna be a successful writer so please buy my self published book is a stomp on the toes of the hard working writers out there trying to meet their audience’s needs.

Those of you out there who take everything for free that they can get, and can’t even bother to leave a good word or an Amazon review, who think you are entitled to free fiction because it’s the internet, or because you are a fan well you are not a fucking fan if your contribution is to suck down the efforts of authors and editors and publishers and cover artists and PR people and denounce requests for fiscal support as “funding someone’s hobby”.

Fuck that. Authors and publishers are funding YOUR hobby. You wouldn’t expect a hobby shop to just give you paints for miniatures, or puzzles, or coins to collect. So why the hell do you expect authors to give you all their work for free.

Stop being an entitled, greedy parasite and start being a fan. Start by admitting that good fiction (good meaning YOUR idea of good) deserves support. Believe me when I say we all understand if you can’t be a collector or can’t afford something right now. We even understand if you don’t like the work.

What we don’t understand is the horrible selfish attitude and the greed behind it.