Update: Tiptree Award renaming is in progress

[jesse_the_k]

The Motherboard listened, and they're changing the name.

We’ve read your thoughtful and pain-filled emails, tweets, and Facebook posts. We are sorry for the harm that’s been done, especially to some of the most marginalized members of our community.

We recognize that the award is necessary to the community, but can’t go on under its existing name. Now we need to figure out what to do next and how to do it. We’re working on it. And we’ll say more within a month.

They're accepting suggestions! The Twitter account is now named "Speculative Gender."

- Gender Blender
- Gender Bender
- Beyond Binaries
- Otherwise

That last one is supported by Ashon Crawley's great essay in Interfictions.

I'm sure you've got a better idea.

M.L.Clark takes us through the process of listening, understanding, and changing one's mind: "Letting Go of Our “Heroes”: Ongoing Humanist Training and the (Ex-)James Tiptree, Jr. Award"

For 32 years, then–almost my entire life–Sheldon’s achievements have been celebrated with that final, violent act set to one side. And why set to one side? Why brushed off as merely unfortunate? In large part, because in our culture there is a tremendous amount of what’s now called “ableism” and “ageism”: the tacit valuation of able bodies over disabled bodies, that is, and of young bodies over old. So when Sheldon’s version of the story argued that her husband was losing his sight and becoming fully dependent upon her for survival in his older years, this broader social cushioning for prejudice against more dependent bodies made it easier for many folks in dominant social positions to sympathize with her making no more than a “hard decision” for the couple on whole.

Comments

[gloss]

It sucks that I'm actually surprised they listened and are making changes. I'm really glad they are! But I'm so used to things never changing, except for the worse...

[jesse_the_k]

...that damn familiar pessimism is a pervasive fog.

[staranise]

Oh, thank goodness.

[jesse_the_k]

<3

[cynthia1960]

I’m liking “Speculative Gender” that the Motherboard is using as a display name on Twitter.

[jesse_the_k]

Yeah -- it supports the Schroedinger's Gender quality that the Tiptree history evoked.

[cynthia1960]

And that is a great post by Clark.

[jesse_the_k]

I appreciated the step-by-step journey with no defensiveness.

[chanter1944]

Is it wrong to say that I'm... completely thrown by all this? Not because of the reality of the name change, or the reasons for it... now that I'm aware of them. Simply because I had no idea, zip zilch nada, about anything in Alice Sheldon's personal life before talk of renaming the award started swirling in earnest. I simply hadn't gone looking. I don't tend to, with authors and musicians for whom I'm fannish. The same holds true for actors, which has come back to knock me over more than once when someone's turned up in a behind-the-scenes look at X or Y show, and has been out of character...! I wasn't willfully misreading history in this case, I simply was not aware.

Now I'm gobsmacked, and horrified, and trying to reconcile the work of a formative author (The Starry Rift at age roughly twelve, anyone else?) with what that author committed in RL. It's... going to take a while, especially as someone who is herself blind.

On a less somber note, my vote is for Otherwise as a name.

Separating artist and art is HARD

[jesse_the_k]

I also imprinted on Tiptree young: Houston Houston Do You Read appeared as I was trying to understand why I mistrusted men so much.

She had an amazing life. I bet you'd find Julie Phillips' biography as engrossing as I did: James Tiptree, Jr.: The Double Life of Alice B. Sheldon.

I'll admit that I found her later published stories to be so grim, so fascinated with death, that I set it aside.

[cathexys]

I really like Otherwise, because it keeps the categories that will be bent and challenged open and expanding.

(Still sore that Unkindness of Ghosts didn't win because I found the actual winner quite underwhelming...)

[jesse_the_k]

I agree that "Otherwise" is deliciously suggestive and open.

Someday I'll write the full story...but I've finally realized I no longer have the cognitive skills to read Tiptree-level fiction.

*sob*

on suggested names

[brainwane]

Hey all - I'm a member of the Motherboard that oversees the award currently known as the Tiptree.

jesse_the_k: just want to check -- you mentioned four suggested names. Are those names that you are suggesting, have seen other people suggest, or something else?

Thanks!

Re: on suggested names

[jesse_the_k]

I have no receipts!

gretchening mentioned the wonderful essay supporting "Otherwise", and the others just seem to be floating around in my head.

Re: on suggested names

[brainwane]

Understood! Thanks. :)