Colette H. Fozard’s flouncing away from being co-chair of Discon III over at File 770 is a beautiful example of bad faith.
In my years of growing responsibility of working for Worldcons, I have become increasingly alarmed and upset at the level of abuse and vitriol spewed at the all-volunteer staff. So much so that I have now abruptly walked away from probably the best chance I had to improve matters ‘from the inside.’
After plonking down her credentials as a fan and conrunner, she opens with this beauty of a statement. Here she positions herself not just as a victim, but as somebody ‘alarmed and upset’ at how fandom apparently treats all Worldcon volunteers. It sets the tone for the rest of the post, which will keep bringing up general accusations of harassment but is light on specifics. What is also does is set up a juxtaposition between the “all-volunteer staff” and the rest of fandom, only presented here as a nebulous mass of complainers and harassers. Finally, it of course implies that it was harassment, not legitimate criticism that led to her resignation.
The proximate cause of her resignation was of course the Hugo Awards kerfuffle, in which Discon III announced by tweet that it would limit the number of people to be listed on the award to four in total. That Fozard describes it as “for the first time ever, all contributors to a Hugo finalist work would be listed and recognized as Hugo Finalists” is suspect and more than a little bit self serving. First, it’s obvious that this isn’t the part that anybody disagreed with. Second, this was not how this policy change was communicated. From what I remember (because of course the tweets in question have been deleted since), it practically lead with the restriction on the number of names allowed on the actual Hugo Award plaque. Though I understand from the ongoing debate since that limiting the number of names has been unofficial policy of multiple Worldcons, this was still the first time it was announced as official policy. Understandably this would upset people. To then to characterise the backlash like this:
NOT GOOD ENOUGH, said some of the worst abusers of Hugo Admin staff over the years. They twisted the announcement to meet their selfish ends and I had to watch my staff despair that people were yelling at us for a misunderstanding. Because there were concerns about the readability of the ballot (most vote electronically, but paper ballots are required by the WSFS Constitution) and the physical ability of how many people we could fit together in reception and ceremony spaces, we were accused of stifling BIPOC creators. A rich accusation from the white editors/gatekeepers who pride themselves on being performatively abusive, in a social media community where this is not just tolerated but rewarded.
Not. Helpful.
There are a lot of bald statements in this paragraph that needed, but didn’t get a citation: “worst abusers”, “twisted”, “white gatekeepers”, “performatively abusive”. The reality of it is that a) critics responded to the statements as put out by Discon III itself, b) it was both respectful and justified rather than abusive while c) the critics were a mixture of all kinds of fans, rather than some mythical white gatekeepers. In fact, some of the voices arguing the loudest against it where the same fans of colour who had reason to mistrust Worldcon already, what with how CoNZealand treated them last year. As I argued on Twitter, you have to put this faux pas in the context of the failures of CoNZealand to treat its Hugo finalists right. So much went wrong last year that Discon III had promised to do better and then they came out with this? Is it any wonder that people were vocal and public in their criticism?
Speaking of CoNZealand, it turns out that Fozard was involved in that fiasco as well.
If this were the first time The Internet rounded on Worldcon staff, I would be less worried, but it happens over and over. As a member of CoNZealand’s committee, I saw how upset the staff were when numerous Hugo Finalists loudly and publicly proclaimed how upset they were with their programming, did not give CoNZealand a chance to make modifications, and then ran their own programming scheme attaching the convention’s name to it without asking, and finally had the gall to remind everyone at the end that their programming might be eligible for a best related work Hugo Award.
Some sour grapes there, again being economical with the truth. Let’s be blunt here: CoNZealand fucked up and fucked up badly. It failed to include a large number of the Hugo Finalists in its programming despite many eager volunteers, it failed to respond to numerous attempts to correct this and only once the programming schedule went public leading to an equally public backlash did it finally try to put things right. All at the same time as it let George R. R. Martin and Robert Silverberg shit all over the finalists. Fozard should be embarrassed, not angry that it came so far that a fringe convention had to be set up to try and mitigate some of the damage. A fringe convention partially ran by CoNZealand staffers, I should add.
Worldcon staff are people. People who are working hard to do the right thing and put on a convention where all feel welcome. Worldcon staff should be, must be, and are held responsible to ensure their work is welcoming and inclusive as possible, but the endless cycle of assume-bad-faith, attack-without-mercy is wearying, toxic and destructive to the very community these people claim to be a part of and care about.
Let’s be clear: the one being “wearying, toxic and destructive” here is Colette H. Fozard, not some never mentioned by name group of people who get their jollies from oppressing innocent Worldcon staffers and I resent this continuous attempt to create and us vs. them situation of Worldcon staffers vs fandom. The criticism is coming from inside the house. I’ve volunteered on both of the physical Worldcons I’ve been to, even if not in such an exalted position as Fozard. I’m not the enemy. It’s an old, old trick to paint your critics as interloopers, only interested in destroying your community. That Fozard feels the need to use it makes it clear her resignation is for the best. We don’t need a Worldcon chair who sees fandom as her enemy, criticism as attack. Even as a volunteer you have a duty to do your job to the best of your abilities, to be able to handle justified criticism: if you can’t do that, you’re better off not volunteering in the first place. Certainly fandom is.
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