The ornery ramblings and occasional fiction of a former political science professor turned author
The Week 7 of the More Odds Than Ends prompt challenge brought me back to a prompt from late last year. I have always liked straight up swords and sorcery fantasy. You know, the kind that feels medieval but with real dragons and magic. These two prompts have joined together in my head and appear to be forming the basis of a short story at least. I will have to take some time and follow this thread to see where it leads.
Continue reading “Dragon Invasion”
Alive and REALLY hope to do a chapter of Witch’s Daughter, but RL has ambushed me as it does.So in the meantime, I’ll leave you with some stuff: This was written by a friend. I don̵…
Source: I’m Catching Up On Some Stuff
The title is not descriptive of the post. More on being told that someone is doing something to you for your own good. Be very wary of those folks.
Did you hear about Ted Cruz? Man went to Cancun while Texas froze…because of course, if he’d stayed in Texas, the snow and ice would have melted, and the power would have been restored within minutes. Well, that’s how the media would like you to view the situation. A couple of weeks ago the story broke that Cuomo and his office really did lie about the number of nursing home deaths and the governor’s responsibility for those deaths. That’s not a good look for the Dems however, so while it was reluctantly covered, the media went searching for something shiny with which to distract the American public. Again. Lucky for them, Texas froze, and Cruz went on a planned vacation with his family. Phew! If Cruz had been a Democrat, you KNOW that Cancun trip would never have come up on mainstream media except to claim “fact-checking” (Nancy in hair salon throws owner under the bus, Newsom in French Laundry, mayor of San Jose in Mexico, on and on. Rules for thee, but not for me and never covered by the press).
Continue reading “Distractions”
Source: You Won’t Like It When Texas Gets Angry – Nocturnal Lives
The situation in Texas has been used for political gain and simply to score points. And, Texans are done with that.
Anyone who has read my blog or who knows me, knows of my deep and abiding affection for Baen’s Bar, which led me to Baen Books. This week, a ham-handed and libelous attack was made on …
Source: Baen Books
Here’s another look at the attack on Baen Books. Cancel culture is indeed alive and well and it is a weapon of small-minded, petty, and vindictive little people who enjoy smashing everybody else. As mentioned elsewhere, cancel culture is emotional abuse.
I get really twitchy when somebody tells me they are doing or saying something to me for my own good. I am a fully competent adult, thankyouverymuch, and I can make my own decisions. I get even twitchier when I’m told that some policy or governmental action is for the greater good. Governments rarely, if ever, do things purely for philanthropical reasons. Governments are filled with politicians. And politicians have but one goal, and that is to remain in a position of power. I wrote before about fear and how the powers that be will make sure that we are afraid. Now, I want to talk about how they’re going to make sure that we will be happy. And we will be happy as we are instructed. It’s for our own good.
Continue reading “The Greater Good”
EDIT: I’ve added the responses from Toni Weisskopf and David Weber at the end. Baen Books is a sci-fi/fantasy publishing house that has been around since the early 1980s. They’ve published thousands of titles from hundreds of authors. Baen is notable in our current time period because it is one of the only traditional publishers … Continue reading Publishing House Baen Books Attacked by Cancel Culture →
Source: Publishing House Baen Books Attacked by Cancel Culture
Cancel culture is real.
This is total bullshit. I’ve been on Baen’s Bar only once or twice, but it’s a multi-forum site for fans of Baen writers. Some guy (who likely got a manuscript rejected by Baen) has decided to try to cancel the publisher and force them off the web. Baen publishes science-fiction/fantasy and does so without regard to the writer’s personal political views. Baen also hosts the Baen Bar a site where fans can go to find free books (yes, the publisher gives away some books), talk with other fans, and sometimes talk with authors. There is no hotbed of political violence as this douche-canoe alleges. Yes, there are some strong opinions, but if that causes butt-hurt, you should just go back to your mama’s basement and cry.
We all must fight against cancel culture wherever we find it and no matter how small or large the incident.
And now, I’m on my way back to Baen’s Bar to show my support.
This week’s book review is Alma T.C. Boykin’s Knowingly Familiar. It is Book 16 in the Familiar Tales series. And, until this week, was the latest in that series of stories about the magical community in Riverton. I like to think that the Riverton of the familiars is the Riverton my grandparents lived in and I visited frequently as a small child. The weather and some of the town features are similar…hmmm….but, back to the book.
Continue reading “Book Review: Knowingly Familiar”
It’s been a week of snow and ice storms, which makes perfect weather for writing. For Week Six of Odd Prompts I got this one from Fiona Grey: “…plenty of swimming trees in the lake, as you can see,” the realtor said with a sweep of her hand toward the picture window. “They don’t bother anyone, but prefer to be left alone. Now, the kitchen is a real treasure…” The prompt brought to mind the level of blasé some realtors can call up when dealing with features in a house that make most of us go, huh? I have a few friends who are real estate agents and I could actually visualize them waving off swimming trees and just a fun quirk of the property.
But what if it was a defense mechanism by the house?
Continue reading “Prompt: Trees”
And now we bring them all together. Fear is the thing that ties cancel culture and censorship together. Yes, cancel culture and censorship are essentially the same thing, but there are differences. I’ve talked about censorship before. Can a non-governmental organization censor an individual? Yes, it can. The constitution prohibits the government from censoring speech, but it does not mean that a non-governmental organization cannot do so. Just because it’s legal does not mean that deplatforming or removing a website from your servers because you don’t like their political views is not censorship. Of course it is. Declaring it to be a legal action done by a private company does not make it any less censorious. Especially when said company has set itself up as a tech version of the public square.
Continue reading “Cancel Culture, Fear, and Censorship”