When Discrimination Is Necessary to Achieve Equality

Attempts to correct unthinking prejudice with pro-active steps are always met with backlash. Science fiction author K.T. Bradford’s now-notorious “No White Male Authors” Challenge is no exception.

In an xoJane essay published last month, Bradford proposed that readers stop reading white, straight, cisgender male authors for a year, in order to focus on marginalized authors to support them and broaden readers’ horizons. The xoJane piece set off a firestorm of controversy from the moment it was published, starting in its own comment thread and quickly spreading to other platforms. Prominent support for her challenge came from fellow feminist genre writers John Scalzi and Saladin Ahmed, as well as from Neil Gaiman, the same white author whose book was featured with a large red cross-out sign on it in Bradford’s piece. Uncanny Magazine, a sci-fi/fantasy publication, offered free copies of its latest issue to anyone taking Bradford’s challenge.

Others in the literary world, however, were not so supportive.

Read more of my op-ed Is it time to stop reading books by white men? at The Daily Dot.

Main image via.

{advertisement}
When Discrimination Is Necessary to Achieve Equality
{advertisement}

14 thoughts on “When Discrimination Is Necessary to Achieve Equality

  1. 1

    […] As you may know, we had scheduled Heina Dadabhoy to join us this past week in our REASON discussion on feminism. Unfortunately, she had to cancel due to an illness. Since I was not too familiar with her work or opinions, I decided to take the opportunity to read her latest piece, “Is is time to stop reading books by white men?”, which you can find here. In it, she discusses theĀ “No White Male Authors” challenge recently presented by science fiction author K.T. Bradford. She titled the presentation of her piece “When Discrimination Is Necessary to Achieve Equality”. […]

  2. 2

    Blecch to the Trackback note there.

    Yay for taking action to correct systemic bias! WOOOOOooo!

    Your article at the Daily Dot seemed a little less pugilistic than your writing here can sometimes be. Do you alter your style depending on venue, and if so, in what ways?

    1. 2.1

      I altered my style as per the instructions of the editor there. I’m willing to go with the style of a site that’s paying me in money, exposure, and editor’s advice over my usual.

        1. What is really sad is that Larry Correia writes good female characters in his novels. And some are genre-warping, like “Tanya, Princess of the Elves”, although he’s following in the path of Ellen Guon, Mercedes Lackey and Rosemary Edgehill he took the “urban Elf” conventions and marched them right over a cliff

          http://www.baen.com/tanya.asp

  3. 3

    the daily dot editor picked so much on your word choice, they managed to miss a hiccup (“means to read mostly read white male authors”) :-p

    nothing else to add, since I already talked about this and agreed with you on this. it just amused me that the editors missed an actual mistake but worried about word choice so much.

  4. 4

    Heinous, I’d hate to burst your bubble, but equality is a lie, especially when only in historically white countries is the majority group expected to give up their historical inheritance to satiate the angry Johnny-come-lately groups, most of whom are immigrants.

    Global IQ averages are not equal; there can be and are great gaps between groups. Indeed, whites have markedly higher average IQs than Africans and Aborigines, and also have a large – but not as large – advantage over south/southeast Asian, Arab, and “Latino” groups.

    No amount of screaming at white males is going to change that.

    Indeed, THAT enduring inequality is precisely why you are screaming at white men to step aside and give you a bigger piece of what he’s designed and built; your own home country is such a low average IQ dump, your family fled from it like rats off the Titanic to migrate here.

    1. 4.1

      OH and I would strongly suggest your gender identity disorder (assuming you weren’t born a hermaphrodite) is a main – if not THE main – reason you’re an Atheist.

      That kind of thing reeks of bitterness and thus dishonesty.

      Sorry to offend you and “disrupt your narrative.”

      No, not really.

      1. The preferred term for people whose genitalia doesn’t fall within modern medical standards for male vs. female is “intersex” and no, I am not intersex.

        The majority of atheists are male or female rather than have non-binary gender identities, so your argument fails. Furthermore, I don’t have GID. I am non-binary identified. I am not bitter nor am I dishonest. In fact, I am open and honest about pretty much everything, to the point of TMI (: Thanks for stopping by.

        1. What I find most interesting there is that you didn’t deny having a gender identity disorder.

          Until DSM V came out which was apparently tainted by the increasing level of politics within the AMA, there was on distinction – and rightly so – between people with gender identity disorder and people with body integrity identity disorder.

          The idea of normalizing people who dislike the body they were born and in all too often seek a surgical remedy, either it the lopping off or breasts or penises in the case of gender identity disorder or with the cutting off of limbs or demand to be artificially paralyzed is the result of pernicious Left politics seeping into the APA as well as academia and the media.

          There is absolutely nothing normal or healthy about wanting to maim one’s body into something it isn’t.

          Does this woman look normal to you? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7xujgH_C2q8

          THAT is how screwed up people like you are. Sorry to break it to you.

          1. I literally said that I don’t have GID, actually. I do not plan to alter my body in any way, though some trans people do and there’s nothing wrong with that. Please refrain from hate speech against trans people who seek gender affirmative surgeries or, as per my commenting policy, you will be banned. Thank you.

      1. Thanks for letting us know you’ve never taken college psychology courses.

        You’re not only off-base, but grossly so. I understand the defensive mechanism in play that you wish to invoke to brush away uncomfortable facts, but it’s not like they aren’t easily visibly discernible as I mentioned.

        South Asia is a toilet and has been one for a very a long time.

        So what you’re saying is that IQ tests are invalid because they show south Asians in an unpleasant light, but they’re also valid enough to diagnose mental retardation? Are you saying that when IQ studies show that when men and women have very similar IQs, they’re accurate, but somehow they’re just inaccurate when they show certain other groups in a bad light which happen to coincide with causing you offense?

        And again, and lack of denying on your part that you are wholly dependent on white people for a better life.

        If you’re our “equal,” stop demanding racial hand outs and quotas. You ARE up to performing at a competitive level to earn your keep, aren’t you? Or not?

        I’m always amused at people who migrate here to live around whites for a better life turn around and bite the hand that feeds them.

        You’re a dime a dozen. Go back to Asia if you aren’t comfortable with white faces.

        1. Calling an entire section of a continent “a toilet” counts as hate speech. Please refrain from saying such things or, as per my commenting policy, you will be banned. Thank you.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *