Jon Del Arroz bubbled up in my news again — you may remember him as the self-aggrandizing fellow who bills himself as the “Leading Hispanic Voice in Science Fiction” and who last rose to my attention as yet another rabid puppy whimpering about SJWs with made-up statistics and bad analyses. He’s making noise again, not for the excellence of his writing, but because he had his membership to WorldCon revoked.Oops. It’s hard to lead from the rubbish bin.
But his complaining provoked Jim Hines to catalog all the reasons he was banned. That’s going to leave a mark. I can’t say that I’m sorry to see an anti-feminist, anti-social justice friend of Vox Day get a public spanking, but it’s kind of sad to see someone who works so dang hard at self-promotion accomplish the reverse of what he intended.
“I’m a vocal Christian and Hispanic Trump supporter.”
That’s really all I ever need to know about this idiot.
@Alt-X:
No, it really actually isn’t.
See, a huge chunk of his schtick is to portray himself as a victim; that people are discriminating against him because of his ethnicity/religion/politics. And the whole point is that no, he’s a harassing asshole who targets people for repeated harassment, and asserted that he was going to violate the code of conduct of the private suite for the SFWA at Worldcon (and he has targeted other SFWA members for harassment before now).
There well may be other Christians, Hispanics, and even Trump voters at Worldcon. It is Jon del Arroz’s behavior, and his behavior alone, that got him banned. His religion, ethnicity, and politics were not the reason. Please don’t feed his victimization narrative by implying that they might have been.
Even a decade or two after their deaths, the voices of Lester Del Rey and Philip José Farmer resound more powerfully.
And A. Lee Martinez is actually fun to read.
Maybe he could go on a joint tour with Paul Ryan. They could call it Arroz con Pollo.
Re: A_ray @ #4…
I read that post to my wife. She burst out laughing. (She has a degree in Linguistics so she has a *lot* of languages at her beck and call.)
Owlmirror, I read Alt-X differently (more generously) than you: to me, Alt-X’s response “That’s really all I ever need to know about this idiot” is less a response to the quoted material “I’m a vocal Christian and Hispanic Trump supporter” than it is a response to the fact that the idiot thought that saying that about himself explained his being banned (whereas, of course, he was banned for all the reasons catalogued by Jim Hines); in other words, I think Alt-X isn’t feeding the idiot’s “victimization narrative”, but rather making fun of it.
A_Ray @ 4:
I’m with Jim Hines on this one:
It’s also very immature and stupid. As someone who had a highly ‘teaseable’ surname growing up, having people (in this case, children) making fun of my name and me, I’ll offer up a fuck you. Unless someone has created their own name and had it changed legally, this is not something a person can help. There’s a hell of a lot to say about Jon Del Arroz and this situation, but mocking his name would not be one of them. FFS.
Also, Rice is an incredibly common surname, so are you going to start mocking every person with that surname, thinking that ‘rice with chicken’ is oh so fucking clever?
Pierce R. Butler @ 3:
Wikipedia confirms my memory that Lester Del Rey’s birth name was Leonard Knapp, and Farmer’s middle name was a tribute to an aunt, Josie.
Del Rey did have a tendency to make up ever more florid lists of Spanish names for himself.
Caine: get a fucking grip. Must you take offense on others’ behalfs for absolutely every little perceived misstep?
Christ, calm down and try exploring reality once in a while.
The Very Reverend Battleaxe of Knowledge @ # 9 – Thanks for setting me straight!
Fwiw, the comments in the Jim Hines post cited by our esteemed host list quite a few thoroughly Hispanic sff-author names I now feel a need to look for in the library. (CN: that thread also includes a lot of trolls.)
@10
Nah, Caine is right, making fun of names is shitty, carries spalsh damage, and in this case carries a distinctly racist tinge.
Mock him for one of the hundreds of vaid reasons, not because of his name.
This.
Making fun of names is schoolyard bully 101. It’s also pretty lazy when there’s so many actual things about the guy that are just plain horrible.
Oh, why Dave Grain is fully in favour of plucking low-hanging, rotten fruit. I am destroyed with astonishment to hear it.
Uh, dudes, I wasn’t making fun of the name Arroz or Rice. I was making fun of Paul Ryan (“chicken”).
You know, there are books out there that can explain humor to you.
spoing
I think his self-promotion has worked very well, actually. He’s a crappy, unknown writer. But now I know his name, and so do a lot of other people.
BTW, he’s also very angry he’s not being let into SFWA after threatening to harass the members.
Apropos of nothing, does anyone know where del Arroz (or his family) is from? (His first name suggests Basque Country.)
Yeah, I know his name, but I’ve never read any of his books, nor am I likely to.
Do they include the principle that “if people laughing, maybe it isn’t funny?”
They probably work as well as those that are teaching you how to ride a bike.
+++
Yeah, but while I might have given an unknown author a shot I wouldn’t buy his books now.*
*Waiting for people to tell me how that is the worst crime ever
@leerudolph: Given that Alt-X removed all of the context except for that one line, I think that it’s reasonable to infer that it was that line that was being responded to, rather than your more charitable interpretation. And even if the inference is wrong, the optics of that line and Alt-X’s response are deeply problematic at best.
Caine, Giliell and Porivil: FFS, there’s a clear difference between making fun of a name and using it in word play. The latter could be offensive, but what is inherently offensive about a cereal grain? Yeah, if I’d seen Dubya’s Secretary of State get angry, I might well have made an observation about “Steamed Rice”. The only mockery in arid’s pun was in calling Ryan a chicken. And that’s an insult to fowl.
@23
Being used in a mocking context is what makes it offensive. I don’t really give much of a shit over the semantic “making fun of a name vs making fun of him using his name” quibble.
Since Paul Ryan was absolutely not part of this conversation but del Arroz wasb it’s simply a thin excuse for making a cheap dig at a name.
Ye gods, how often do we have to have this discussion?
Azkyroth,
Except in this case, as #5 demonstrates, they are laughing. And I do apologize to chickens everywhere and to fowlkind in general. I was taking advantage of a saying and in no way meant to suggest that Paul Ryan could ever live up to the standards of chickenkind.
BTW, after Gary Hart was brought down by an affair with Donna Rice on a boat called “Monkey Business” (no, I didn’t make this up), a waiter asked him if he’d like a little rice on the side. Is it seriously your contention that the target of that joke was Ms. Rice?
But hey lets derail a conversation about a serial harasser with another iteration of dudes explaining humour to (mostly) women.
I’m not likely to read him either. But one can make money stirring up the audience whose main priority is “fuck you, queer people, women, brown people, [ad infinitum],” and he’s gotten their attention through the harassment. Part of that is making sure the people you want to harass and people like them know who you are. There are very few ways he could have as effectively made himself a discussed figure.
Well, he could have been a good writer, with dedication, who had good luck. But that requires actual work.
My (worth what you paid for it) suspicion is he’s fly-by-night, and will eventually realize that doing this requires sustained work, too, and it gets difficult and boring.
I get the word-play on arroz/rice, I don’t get the word-play on ryan/chicken.
Gilliel,
Whatever, dude.
Wow, going to explain how misgendering me is objectively funny next?
Giliell,
Nothing about you is intentionally funny. And “dude” is used to refer to both males and females informally, especially when used with “whatever”.
Would you like some of those book titles?
Minor note – I catalogued some, not all, of JDA’s behavior and harassment. It’s definitely not a complete list.
You forgot to drop my book link so people can see for themselves why everyone’s so excited about my work:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B071JNR9HB
Fixed!
Re: people’s names.
Messing with a person’s name is getting personal. Sure you might have content attached to it but don’t lie to yourself, you defaced their name. I’m not saying don’t do it, I dropped my own modifications of Trump’s name after the election and find myself reconsidering that. But don’t pretend that every way of doing is the same or that someone can’t question your defacement of a name.
Basic rhymic alterations count too, don’t tell me children don’t do that shit.
Humor is no excuse. In this context it’s a social weapon. Don’t get oversensitive just because you feel threatened by analysis if the thing you use to transform your feelings about things.
Brony @35:
“Arroz” means “rice”. Where is the “defacement”? If Abe Vigoda’s character in Barney Miller had moved to California and joined the Highway Patrol in a spin-off called Fish and CHiPs, would that be a defacement?
Who’s pretending that? Are you addressing this to anyone in particular?
What analysis? Simply asserting that a name used in a pun is somehow unfair isn’t analysis.
arids‘ pun was OK, but this nonsense is hilarious.
@Rob Grigjanis
Symbolic attachment of a food object to the name. It’s overt casual use of a person’s name. It works as a dominance display. Simple pattern, shows up pretty early in development.
“You” is general here because I see people get oversensitive about criticism of humor too often (as well as up thread). Loads if bigotry work though such humor. I didn’t look at anything by you so you will have to point me to something that has you concerned and relates to my comment.
I have been given to understand that brain injury can cause personality changes.
.
Anyone here had a recent blow to the head?
chigau,
Paul -> pollo
Beatrice
huh
That should have occurred to me.
Just curious. When was the last time you guys actually laughed?
I laugh when I find something to be funny.
Brony @37: If you’re saying that a food-name association can be demeaning, well, of course it can. It could run the full gamut from benign and affectionate to horribly abusive. If you’re saying it’s always about dominance, I think that’s nonsense. For example, giving someone with the surname Herring the nickname “Kipper” (see the Jeeves stories) can actually be conferring status within a group. Given from outside a group, it could be demeaning, depending on the connotations associated with the food.
The only one directly demeaned in arids‘ pun is Ryan. “chicken”=”coward”. Arroz is indirectly demeaned by association with him, not because his name means “rice”. Unless rice has some connotations I’m not aware of.
chigau @38: Ahah! That’s what arids should have done. Rather than use Arroz’s name in a food pun, he should have simply suggested that Arroz has brain damage! Who could possibly find that offensive?
1. I think I got bingo
2. I cannot speak for the guys, but I laughed heartily at this, but what do my fluffy pink ladybrains know?
Grigjanis
Bless your heart and have a nice day.
Giliell @45: Yep, even damaged manbrains find that hilarious.
“If I can’t dance at the revolution, I won’t come.”–Emma Goldman
Same goes for laughter.
The most disappointing thing is that you ain’t even original
Good to know my brain damaged self isn’t free from mockery, either! Boy you people sure are hilarious! Haha, brain damaged people are the worst, right? Hahaha.
Giliell,
Human history goes back thousands of years. Over that time, billions of people have confronted follies, tragedies and triumphs much the same as we confront. Some of them have come up with trenchant observations on that experience. If i is not possible to say it better and more succinctly, why not use an appropriate quote.
Your choice to remain ignorant of your species history does not invalidate the value of learning it.
kupo @50: I apologize for my casual reference to brain damage. It was insensitive and uncalled for.
arids, you got your degree in explaining things to women. You can stop now.
You also got the one in “if people don’t find my joke funny it’s because they’re humour-free harpies” one.
As well as the “the best way out of this hole is to keep digging” one.
As I said, you ain’t original.