I would have loved to be able to rant about the stupidity of certain ideological literary types, the kind who think that disinviting someone from a guest of honor position because someone might get offended is perfectly acceptable, but sadly, my ability to produce a decent rant is horribly impaired by one simple problem.
These folks have plumbed depths of stupid so deep that to call them morons risks offending perfectly decent morons. If I called them flaming turds of stupid, that would be an insult to all the flaming turds out there – and let’s face it, flaming turds are capable of being useful.
I’d be willing to go with shrieking harpies, but I’d offend the actual harpies – the spirits that carried the souls of evildoers to their ultimate destination, not the questionable beings of purportedly female-ish gender who try to imitate them – and frankly, nobody with any sense wants to do that.
For those who are wondering just why it’s so incredibly idiotic (sorry, idiots) to disinvite a convention guest of honor without clear evidence of wrongdoing committed after the invitation was made public, well, aside from trying to follow said convention runners down the wormhole of brainlessness (sorry, everyone who lacks a functioning brain – you all never actually did anything wrong), you’re missing a very important point.
Once a convention announces a guest of honor, the convention organizers are saying “We have investigated this person and have decided that he (or she or pronoun of choice) is both worthy of the honor and will bring paying guests to our convention.” At minimum, rescinding the invitation is admitting to not doing one’s homework on a good guest of honor for the con. When it’s handled as incompetently as the latest exercise in what not to do was, it says that the people running the con would have trouble pouring piss from a boot if the instructions were written on the heel.
In short, the specimen (okay, yes, I’m insulting specimens) who did this has announced to anyone who cares to pay attention that he is so utterly and irredeemably incompetent that he should not be permitted to run his mouth, much less a convention. If he’d been competent, he would have either recognized that the guest in question was not a good fit for the convention (highly unlikely in this particular case, but not out of the question. For example, I can’t see anyone inviting say John Norman to be a Wiscon guest of honor unless they’re completely insane as well as stupid) or possessed enough backbone to stand up for the convention’s choices.
By trying to disappear evidence that the invitation happened, the convention committee moves into the realms of the various secret polices beloved by dictatorial regimes everywhere. Of course, they forget that the Intertubes are forever and there’s postings of screenshots all over said tubes to counter the removal of Facebook threads and the like. Trying to play Nacht und Nebel with the evidence just makes it look worse (of course, I suspect some of the folks involved think that an old-fashioned Red show trial would be just the thing – although I’d guarantee they’re also utterly convinced they wouldn’t be on the wrong side of said show trial, which again proves their complete lack of cogitative capability. Every dictatorial regime ends up turning on the loyal. The only thing in question is how long it takes).
So, congratulations. I’d say this… person has managed this year’s epic idiocy award except that Einstein was right. Stupidity really is the only thing in existence that has no limits.
Mad Genius Club 
90 responses to “There Are No Words”
And going to conventions is slowly dropping off my to do lists. Seems that they don’t want people like me attending at all. Oh well, there loss.
Same here.
Between the day job and everything else, I’m less inclined to head towards cons myself, although there are a few I enjoy.
This was the first year I hadn’t gone to Penguicon, the con I formerly considered my home in SF fandom. They got too overtly SJW for me. They haven’t disinvited anyone…yet, but I’m sure it’s coming.
I wrote about it on Medium. That was last year; I’m told the SJW wasn’t s overt this year, but I’m still not going back unless they show a real trend.
But aren’t you a homophobe that wants to round up and exterminate all the gays? Isn’t Kate a misogynist who wants to round up and exterminate all the women? Doesn’t Del Arroz want to wipe out the Hispanics? 🙂
I’d say you have no idea how hard I am laughing now, but chances are you do. Well met, sir!
If I did that and didn’t offend, I met both objectives. Well, I didn’t want to offend Jay or any of our regulars. Offending a social justice warrior would’ve been a positive.
Offending a social justice warrior…
…does not need any actual attempt. Exist as a rational being and they’ll likely be offended eventually without any further effort needed.
These are people who don’t know what to do if they aren’t being offended by something.
Some people just aren’t happy unless they’re unhappy.
They have shown themselves to be dishonorable men. We don’t do business with dishonorable men because they lack the intestinal fortitude to live up to the obligations.
Precisely. Announcing a guest of honor is a commitment. Decent people keep their commitments.
Don’t hold back Kate, tell us how you really feel! ~:D
One gets the feeling from the Origins organization that they are a bit dim, really. The con would most likely be a titanic clusterfudge of conflicting schedules and miscommunication. Larry dodged a major bullet here.
The overall con owner, GAMA, also is coming across as seriously dim. This will no doubt show up on their balance sheet in a big way, quite soon. If they f-ed up this bad over something so small, imagine them trying to negotiate a printing contract.
What I love about this situation is how all the lurkers and foul denizens have come to the surface and self-identified. We can seeeeee you, idiots.
Er. You really don’t want me to do that. If I tell you how I really feel, it would break obscenity filters worldwide, spew sufficient vitriol to melt monitors, and utterly destroy the Federal Safe Sarcasm limits.
Surely there are times you need to let loose your Aussie Heritage! I mean, proudly displaying bits of your cultural heritage is all the rage these days… LET THE RAGE FLOW. LIKE LAVA. *VBEG*
(hubby adds: FROM A STREWTH VEIN FROM BLIMEY HILL)
Oh, geez, if I tap that vein nobody will understand me. Except possibly you and your hubby.
Or they’ll learn a whoooooole buncha new swearwords.
And long, hilarious, pithy angry descriptions. ^_^
Is that ‘sposed to SCARE me? Methinks you misspelled “delight.”
Reblogged this on fallingdownthecreativewell.
Just wanted to say, I ❤ your username!!!!!
Another day where the family is going to wonder why I keep on breaking out in cackles of evil laughter.
John Norman, WisCon GoH.
[Edited to say cackles of evil laughter. Just realized that they are cackles after two more minutes of them. Ah, Kate…]
It would be . . . glorious. Brief, but glorious.
I’ve read enough of John Norman’s prose to know that it would not either be brief. Save perhaps in geological terms.
Actually, John Norman sounds like he’d be a very interesting character to invite as a guest to a conservative symposium. I’d love to read his PhD dissertation (see Wikipedia reference) as it touches strongly on the basis of morality, and seems like it illustrates why the SJWs are running in every direction condemning everything under the Sun except for what they personally are doing. But for WisCon? Oh yeah, I’d actually enjoy the hell out of that combo!
Him and Kratman and perhaps John C. Wright would be a fascinating panel on moral centers, natural law, and belief, and how they appear or do not appear in fiction.
So who do I throw money at to make that happen?
W.O. is an evil, evil man. 😀
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Norman#Academic_career
Not only does it look interesting…. it appears he’s absolutely correct.
Couldn’t find a copy online, but worldofgor.com exists… tho whois is private and I can’t get the contact form to work. Oh well.
John Norman at Wiscon! https://youtu.be/ZD24VY0YWdQ
Awwww, maaaan! There’s not enough popcorn in the US inventory for the entertainment that John Norman at WisCon would provide. Although I feel sorry for the paramedics having to deal with all the cases of the vapors that would ensue. *evil kitty smile*
Vapors nothing. Imagine the shrapnel from all those heads exploding!
It would be GLORIOUS!
Orvan, someone softheaded enough to be a Leftist doesn’t produce shrapnel….
I dunno, they seem to have skulls far thicker than mine, even.
Thankyew, thankyew… I was looking for a really obvious example of someone whose reputation would be a singularly bad fit for a specific con. It sounds like I chose well.
That boot analogy is spot on. It also almost made me spit coffee all over my keyboard and caused me to startle the dog.
Gravity defying levels of stupid – I’d laugh, because that’s been used as the punchline to an 8-Bit Theater joke or three – but when one realizes that we’re actually seeing it in action, the reaction I’m having instead is sort of “I wonder how much further this guy will spectacularly screw it up.”
I think I heard of LBJ using that line. If he didn’t, it’s only as he had something even more… uh… earthy. (This is NOT an endorsement of LBJ.)
It’s a fairly common analogy, and one of the milder ones in my vocabulary.
“inviting say John Norman to be a Wiscon guest of honor”
I think you just thought of probably the only way to get me to attend Wiscon. I’d have to bring a truckload of popcorn, though.
People seem to think this is something that has started recently, and by recently I mean within the last year or two. So far, I’ve not seen anyone mention the Worldcon in London a few years back (2013? 2014? too lazy to look it up) where Seanan McGuire (among others) had a meltdown on Twitter and got the Toastmaster, a personal friend of Neil Gaiman, removed. I don’t remember his name, but he was a British comedian who was a genuine fan. The trouble was he had a Don Rickles style of jokes, and some thought he _might_ make jokes about them. (For all you whippersnappers reading this, Don Rickles was the original insult comic.)
Right. Pre-crime fat jokes. It could happen!
People need to be able to laugh at themselves.
And this reminds me that in the offending fisk (that the girl friend is still angry about) the original article started with a thing about how the author walked into GenCon and immediately knew that no one there looked like him.
And Larry said, “What? You’re in good physical shape?” Or something like that.
I laughed, despite being sort of tubby and trending older because honestly, come on people, science fiction conventions are disproportionately attended by large people with disabilities. That’s not a criticism, either. It’s just a fact. And probably a good reason for con-coms to spend at least some time on accessibility issues or at least make sure there’s lots of chairs around for people who need to get off their feet and maybe looking into ways to avoid having long lines.
I cheerfully admit that I often fall short of expectations. Literally, no less! ^_^
I live in Reno so went to Renovation. Biggest little city to host a Worldcon. I was amazed to be around so many people further out of shape than me. Was totally appalled by how many Leftwingloonies were in attendance.
Biggest highlight was a Kaffeeklatch sitting next to Larry.
Norman’s done lots of writing about feminism, he’d be a perfect choice. 😉
AAAAA *snort* *snort* try to breathe, choke down laughter. If it happens, I’ll bring the popcorn. try to breathe
“I think you just thought of probably the only way to get me to attend Wiscon. I’d have to bring a truckload of popcorn, though.”
Better yet, get yourself set up as a popcorn vendor. You’d make a fortune.
That’s an excellent idea. *goes to look up person responsible for programming at Wiscon*
Nah. That’s Evil Commerce. I don’t think Wiscon is in favor of that.
Don Rickles had class. NONE of the current insult comics have any class or ability for that matter. Including the SNL cast.
Correct. Point taken.
I recall that event being discussed either here, ATH or MHN. Or maybe VP when I was following that. So there has been awareness of this being a longer term trend. Precisely how long depends on what exactly it is.
Is it simply a new flavor of the same old Leninist tactics being used for leftist objectives? Then about a hundred years.
Or is it that due to increasing Leftist cultural influence, the Leninist organizational weapon and other techniques have entered the mainstream and are now being used by those who are not hardcore left for personal instead of ideological reasons? Probably a decade or more, but not a century.
I’ve been thinking about that London Worldcon situation through all this, too – that’s why it makes me really sad to see Gaiman quoting all the wrong accusations about these kinds of things – Sad Puppies and everything else. I get it, he’s reading all the wrong news sources, and you have to dig deeper to know the real story, but he’s seen the harpies (and yes, apologies to real harpies) in action before.
Someone remind me to start going to cons so I can cease.
Start going to cons so you can cease. ♉
I already ceased, if only because I moved too far away. Should I consider moving back?
Naw. Moving is way too much of a pain for that.
Strangely, I’d noticed this.
Well, Miscon is a mere five hour drive… phhbt. Almost as bad as moving.
Thank you.
My criteria for cons, symposiums, concerts, etc:
– I find the venue entertaining.
– there’s someone there I want to meet.
– there’s something there I need to see before buying.
– it’s within 3 hours of where ever I am that day/weekend/week.
– it doesn’t cost a fortune to get into.
+ if my wife wants to go too!
Mine is “will I make money as a vendor?” So I want to find a place with a spendy crowd, and enough good guests to pull them in, but not so many A-list celebrities that their signing fees consume all the attendees’ money and they don’t buy from me (which is why I don’t do the Supercon family of cons, or Wizard World cons — they tend to be autograph mills).
I’ve noticed that I’m doing a lot better at the anime, comic and media cons than the traditional sf cons. Just last November I had to give the permanent cut to one of the last few sf cons we still do, because I barely made my table costs back, and didn’t make hotel, gas or cost of goods sold. It’s sad, because literary sf cons were were I got my start in fandom, but more of them leave me in the red than the black, and I need the income.
“I’ve noticed that I’m doing a lot better at the anime, comic and media cons than the traditional sf cons.”
Leftists are notorious cheapskates and bad tippers.
And also that the traditional con population is skewing older, which means a lot of them have competing bills to soak up money. Finally, there’s “What do you get the man who has everything” phenomenon: they already own a lot of stuff. Especially if they’re moving into smaller quarters, why would they want more?
What sort of stuff do you sell as a vendor?
It varies according to the type of convention. We used to be primarily a book dealer, but now we only take them to a very small number of shows (InConJunction and Archon mostly, since we lost money spectacularly at Windycon last year and won’t be returning). We were having success at t-shirts, but the market for them got saturated and the profit margins are too thin, so I haven’t been restocking them as they sell. Right now we’re having some good success at selling figurines, but they take forever to pack at the end of a show, so I’m cutting them back and moving to doing more of the Asian porcelains (tea sets, sake sets, etc) which come in display boxes which just stack in our shipping boxes, and the squishies and Japanese bells and erasers.
You can check out our business site to see what we’re selling, along with a list of our upcoming events. After having so many people asking if they could order books online, we decided to go through and relist them when we had an extended period with no cons. However, the sales are so pathetic that I’m really wondering if we’re going to end up shutting things down again, not because of troublemakers, but because we aren’t even making our pro-merchant fees (right now we’ve got our listings all on vacation hold, since we’re leaving on Saturday for a week-long outdoor event and I finished loading the van today, but we should have them active again shortly after Memorial Day, once we get back home and I have time to unload).
I’ll probably resume the relisting efforts again after we get back (we can’t just upload the existing inventory files, because there are problems with the data that mean we need to examine each book and verify its condition), although I really need to balance that with giving all my websites a major overhaul. Several of them are very badly outdated.
just discovered a problem — the link is malformed. It should be a href=”http://www.starshipcat.com/ “>http://www.starshipcat.com/ — one of these days I will need to move to secure transfer protocols, since it’s becoming the norm, but right now I’ve got too much else on my plate.
I was just curious because doesn’t everyone wonder if they could sell fun stuff at conventions? It’s maybe a bit like how everyone has a dream bookstore with a cat. (Don’t tell me they don’t!)
For whatever it’s worth, if I were wandering a dealer room and caught sight of sake sets and Japanese bowls, you’d probably make a sale. 🙂
I actually set up an Etsy store once for jewelry with natural stone beads. omg. It almost took longer to list one necklace than it did to make one. I decided that it was a fools errand of the first order and impossible to make any money at all unless a person used precious stones and *at least* real silver and charged accordingly or even better, mass produced simple designs that only had to be listed once for hundreds of sales.
The economy has been SO bad, though. Maybe people will start to have more spending money now.
Regarding flaming turds, those are in fact quite useful.
Certain primitive cultures living on plains and steppes and tundra where trees are few and far between have little choice but to utilize dry animal dung as cooking and heating fuel. The waste of herbivores mainly consists of undigested plant matter packed into convenient pellet form. It does add a certain pungency to the camps of such peoples.
As for this current clusterflock, having won what they surely must consider victories with Arroz, Ringo, and now Correia the social justice bullies will certainly continue with the same tactics. This is much of a piece with the radical left who consider it their duty to shout down and disrupt any speaker with a viewpoint they disagree with. We really do need to find some reliable way to terminate such actions, preferably with extreme prejudice.
As for the convention committees that yielded to such extortion, it needs to be made crystal clear to them that they either need to grow a pair or kiss their nice little conventions farewell. And that is not a threat, but merely an observation that once you pay the Danegeld the Dane remains until you’re bled dry. Or in the case of such conventions: Oh, yeah, we used to enjoy going to that one, but they turned all left wing preachy and it stopped being fun.
Threats aren’t necessary, just a sincere expression that their stupid mistakes have managed to sour you from attending.
Will also note that unless I missed it dear Kate never once mentioned the sharpening of stakes. A+ for a remarkable display of restraint.
But recall the great Bugs Bunny and perhaps also Popeye
One incident was a forgivable fluke. Two were an unfortunate coincidence. Three just might be some bizarre accident. But a fourth? That was WAR. And the terms are these and these alone: Unconditional Surrender.
“Threats aren’t necessary, just a sincere expression that their stupid mistakes have managed to sour you from attending.”
I’m already boycotting them as hard as I possibly can. Unfortunately, if Marvel and DC Comics are representative of the type, even immanent bankruptcy won’t make them change course. They will throttle up to ramming speed when the iceberg nears. In the future, all restaurants are Taco Bell, and all cons are Wiscon.
I suggest a different sort of revenge: success! We write what people WANT to read, and thereby crowd the creepers out of the SF/F space entirely.
That’s what Larry Correia is doing, after all. Ignoring all their beloved theme and causes, to focus on telling a great story. Why can’t there be a hundred authors out there doing that? Answer, no reason why not.
Go forth, and produce the result, ye horde of tigers!
Success, yes. But constructing new cons that are (WARNING!) genuinely inclusive and welcoming of anyone who’s a fan, gamer, cosplayer, competitor, etc. regardless of race, creed, color, national origin, age, disability, sex, gender, species, political leanings, as long as they can afford the entrance fees and behave themselves (i.e. don’t get their jollies actively making others around them miserable – if you’re miserable just because I’m there, too bad.)
LibertyCon sounds excellent; but perhaps too restrictive due to the limited number they can handle. And growing the size would change the culture of the small, conservative nature of the convention. Better to model it, only in a larger size, elsewhere and elsewhen. In New England, PorcFest is too far up in the boonies of northern New Hampshire, is an outdoor location, and seems to draw a lot more anarchists than conservatives. Granite State ComicCon in Manchester might work, but has an awful lot of liberals and proggies. Boskone of course, is in Boston, with all that goes with it. Ditto, ComiConn in Connecticut. Another half dozen or more cons around in Maine, Vermont, etc.
Mike, SJW jerkoffs didn’t use to be a problem because they were one flavor at Baskin Robbins. Currently they’re a problem because they infiltrated Baskin Robbins, and it is now 51 flavors of Haggis ice cream. Nobody likes haggis flavor, they don’t care. That’s what you get.
New technology! Now -everybody- can make ice cream.
Stop hiding. Come out, sell some chocolate ice cream. Watch them freak out, melt down and burst into flames because you DARED to sell chocolate. Which everyone loves. Then try pistachio, and green tea, and all the other flavors, while they go f-ing broke still selling haggis flavor. Or not, maybe there’s enough mutants to keep them going. Doesn’t matter, they are no longer a problem. 51 flavors, baby. That’s the ticket.
Everbody still wants their Nutty Nuggets. So sell Nutty Nuggets! There will be a Nutty Nuggets convention soon enough, with Nugget Man selling Nugget merch.
And who really cares what they get up to at Wiscon? It isn’t even interesting as a freak show. I expect even the freaks are bored with it.
I went to Wiscon once, never again.
But the thing is the SJ bullies aren’t staying on their own turf. Instead they’re coming to our parties, where they have always bee welcome so long as they behaved, but they’re coming and trying to change our rules to suit their sick twisted vision of how things ought to be.
I have considerable experience in hosting a variety of conventions in the past and can assure you that they all operate on a razor thin margin. Conflict, in particular the threat of violence or other illegal activity, is anathema to any sane concom, so it’s a point of vulnerability that can be effectively attacked.
Never fails, the bullies really do think that they are in the majority, and when they drive away all us ignorant unwashed trash, well then they can reign over the right people. And it always astounds them when attendance falls below a sustainable level. Having helped Sad Puppies out WorldCon and the Hugo Awards for their malfeasance and shenanigans with the nominations and voting I suspect that convention to slowly die from it’s own waste products. Real shame, as the awards have a noble past history, but as is often the case all it takes is a few smarmy self important pissants to spoil things for the rest of us.
Many of those smarmy self important pissants have been taking a victory lap the last couple of days in all the usual places. All those people who created that noble history seem to have moved on, leaving the off-scourings of U Cal english departments to run the place into the ground.
I’m proposing that instead of wasting time burning the village down and sowing the fields with salt (which sounds like a lot of work for lazy me) we let -them- burn it down and build a superhighway around it.
Lots of good stories that SJWs can frigging lose it over every time one of us publishes a new one. Free publicity, free market research. If they hate it, normal people will like it. ~:D
I am not a chocolate ice cream fan, but I like a number of other flavors:
#s 4, 5, and 12, in particular.
c4c
Once upon a time, I attended a convention (I think Arisia) at which John Norman was a guest. He gave an author session, a one man panel. He made a point of asking everyone to stand for a moment of silence, to show our support for Salman Rushdie, (iirc) who was under a death sentence from some Iranian religious leader for writing a book. At the time, Norman was switching over from writing Gor novels to writing something else, the not-Roman Empire in outer space.
I think for the Satanic Verses.
The support Rushdie got over the Fatwa for the Satanic Verses was a good thing, and kudos to Norman for highlighting that.
These days that book wouldn’t get published because it’s offensive.
(Personally, having waded through the damn thing, I think it’s offensive because it’s entirely too much self-indulgent twaddle – but that’s my opinion and I’m not trying to say it shouldn’t be published. I just don’t plan to reread it. Ever.)
A DJ had a comment about that book. “I got about halfway through, and then I tried to contact the Iranians to say I heard he’s hiding in Toronto”.
That was my approximate reaction when I read it. Very nice word-smithing, but so… gilding the turd.
Further to my comment to Uncle Lar above, some supporting detail: http://phantomsoapbox.blogspot.ca/2018/05/what-have-i-been-saying-modern-music.html
More at the link, but the executive precis is that happy, up-beat music sung by cute girls is what makes a hit, according to a large data-mining study. According to the same study, over the last 30 years music has been getting darker, slower and sadder.
Meaning, the public is not being served what it wants. The public is being served what some publishing entity/entities think they -should- want. This sounded quite familiar to me, being a Sad Puppy.
In 2010 I stopped listening to broadcast radio entirely. In 2008 I cut my TV cable. About 4 years ago I stopped buying books and started writing them instead. Back in 1993 I ceased collecting comics. My personal boycott of mass media is fairly complete. With the exception of the odd movie, I don’t purchase any of it. I know about it, but I do not -pay- for any of it.
Because I don’t -like- it. Most of it is designed to insult me and my culture, and it is boring as well. Drooping sales and cord-cutting indicate I’m not the only dude with this opinion.
Therefore, what we have here is an opportunity to make a bunch of money. People still want what they’ve always wanted. Amazing tales to astonish, cute girls singing nice songs, movies where the good guy wins and the bad guy loses, and you can tell one from the other.
That’s how you beat SJWs. The more they scream, the more they lose. Give them something to scream about. Fun stories with good guys and bad guys. They’ll go berserk, and probably do most of your marketing for you.
That’s my hope anyway. If I can get my cover artist to frigging well ART a little faster, we’ll see how that plan works out. (Fricking artistic types. So… artistic!)
Which matches the on-going high sales of the Shikari and Familiars books. Light adventure with large to medium amounts of humor (mostly clean). People want to read that, not long navel-gazing meditations on the evils of humanity.
Because we can get enough long navel-gazing meditations on the evils of humanity from the evening news, or listening to Progressive politicians.
Well Kitty, you cats Can’t do art.:)
The thing is, as far as publishing is concerned, and in particular SF&F, the SJ Zealots are already beat. Why else do you think they’re screaming so loudly and going so far as to actually threaten violence to con committees? That is precisely why ConCarolinas and John agreed that he not attend, because the concom was told in no uncertain terms that John would be attacked should he appear.
See this silencing of dissenting voices has been working for them on campuses across America and abroad. Now that tradpub has lost its stranglehold on what fiction gets published all they can do there is post bogus nasty reviews on Amazon and make up schite about Sad Puppies. Oh, and do their best to see that if they can no longer get their way they’ll see that we cannot enjoy getting together and having a bit of fun at conventions.
They’ve all studied Alinsky’s manual. It’s asymmetrical warfare, a few lies, threats of violence, find a weak link in the chain and intimidate the hell out of them, much like we dealt with in Sad Puppies, really just a small group of nasty spoiled children who cannot stand that we don’t need them to tell us what is permitted to do.
Who largely turn out to be impotent and rather sad when confronted. Which does not make them any less dangerous.
I’d like to both agree and disagree with your statement about what a convention is saying when it selects a Guest of Honor.
Your claim is that a convention is saying, “We have investigated this person and have decided that he (or she or pronoun of choice) is both worthy of the honor and will bring paying guests to our convention.” — and, while I agree completely with the first part, I’d feel I need to disagree with the second. Many conventions, for example, have Fan Guests of Honor — and, to a pretty good approximation, a dozen is about the most number of people any FGoH is likely to attract, and it’s usually a lot fewer than that.
But the choice of a GoH — particularly an FGoH, who is chosen to show what it is that you’re honoring — allows the convention to say what the convention’s underlying culture is. And that culture — not the individual chosen to display the qualities that culture values — does bring in paying members.
So it’s messaging — but it can be complicated messaging. But I agree completely — the first part of the message is always that this person has accomplishments that the committee feels are worthy of honor.
You’re right that the “bring money to the convention” aspect is rather less of a consideration for fan guests of honor. I honestly didn’t even think about fan GoH when I was writing this because from what I’ve seen the fan GoH is usually a way to honor someone who’s been both a fan and a stalwart of the local con scene for a long time (something I fully support, I might add. People who put years into convention running and helping other fans deserve recognition even if a good chunk of the attendees couldn’t care less who they are).
I think that fan guests of honor are all about getting people in the door, just not any *particular* fan guest of honor. It’s the fact of having one at all. It’s a way to tell the fans that they’re a super important part of the show, ultimately.
Exactly. The message of having any FGoH is that fandom and fan activity in general are important to the convention. And the choice of a specific person to be the FGoH says that this person is being honored for exemplifying the characteristics that this convention feels are appropriate to honor.
It’s why having Archon uninvite Uncle Timmy as FGoH a few years ago was so hurtful to many of us in the community. Besides the general issues I have with uninviting a GoH in general (as Kate indicated), there’s the specific issue that, for many of us, he would be a worthy choice for almost any general convention (I’d exclude, for example, Westercon, whose bylaws indicate that GoHs should come from the Western region — which explains the “almost” in the above sentence).