Disgruntled Janeway fans: try a carrot

[ronny]

I have a hard time taking the various Janeway threads seriously for a variety of reasons but this is at the top of the list right now. At least three the of the more vocal people complaining about Janeway didn't even have accounts until yesterday and they have posted anywhere from a dozen to over two dozen times in the same two threads.

I'm sorry but I'm just highly suspicious of this.

 

[David Mack]

Yo, Dayton! Keith! Mack! Bennett! Any of you give a shit about me or what I think?

Um... you're who again? And I give a crap because...?

 

[Semah]

I'm confused now. Is this the "We're all sexist" thread, the "We're all heartless" thread or the "We're all sexist and therefore heartless" thread? I'm having trouble keeping track?

 

[Hartzilla2007]

I'm confused now. Is this the "We're all sexist" thread, the "We're all heartless" thread or the "We're all sexist and therefore heartless" thread? I'm having trouble keeping track?

I think we need a score card.

 

[Thrawn]

I am not engaging in slander (which makes this very fair) because I am bringing up an issue involving the entire money-making system. And my attacks are not ad-hominem; they are speculative. Evidence is highly subjective in this case, as I've debated. I think we're done. Yep.

So, the fact that evidence in this case is highly SUBJECTIVE is evidence for your side how?

I just don't understand how you can claim this was in any way motivated by sexism when there are many possible alternate explanations. Why is yours correct?

And the burden of proof is on you for this one; it's you making the radical claim.

 

[Steve Roby]

In the interest of furthering civil discussion (seriously)....

Do you read your own posts before you hit send? Because I just read your OP again and not only is your idea inane (put it to any organized protester or unionizer and see how hard they laugh at you)

We aren't talking about a great political cause here. My post was in response to specific people here in this forum saying that Pocket would lose money because Janeway fans would boycott the books. But there were no more than three or four people at the time, posting essentially the same message over and over and over again, and at that time there was no sign of a large number of people who (a) were serious Janeway fans and (b) were buying the books regularly and (c) were upset enough to stop buying them.

I remember reading a few years ago that most copies of a Star Trek novel are sold in the first month or two that it's on sale. Consequently, it occurred to me that it wouldn't be hard for even a few hundred fans to generate a significantly anomalous spike in the sales for one particular book. That would be something measurable and it would also be a sign of commitment because it would require spending money instead of posting anonymously online.

but your attitude regarding the "3 or 4" Janewayphiles (taking potshots at J/C fanfic being one of them) is less than helpful. You decided to be snarky because you think we're insignificant. And you still do.

I don't think you've read all the discussions here on this subject, or you might have some understanding why a lot of the book fans grew frustrated. But let's look at my supposed attitude. Here's what I said:

"After all, for all anybody knows, the Defenders of Janeway are three or four people with a lot of time on their hands. For all anybody knows, the people who are complaining never bothered to buy Voyager novels because they're too busy reading J/C fanfic. For all anybody knows, the threats about boycotting the books are empty and idle posturing."

Now let me point out the important part: for all anybody knows. At the time I wrote that original post, there were people claiming a large following but that following was not in evidence. At least one of the Janeway fans who's upset about what's happening in the novels doesn't actually read the novels. That person's boycott is meaningless, because it doesn't result in a single lost sale that would have happened otherwise.

As for the snark that everyone reads into the fanfic remark, there may be a little snark there, but it's the result of frustration with one or two people in particular whose posts seemed to suggest that they've always preferred fanfic to the novels and in fact they rarely bothered with the novels. If said person(s) don't read the novels and don't like the novels, why care what happens to Janeway in them?

(Personally, I always thought J/C made a hell of a lot more sense than C/7. The Voyager crew didn't know if they'd get home in less than 70 years. The show should have been shipper heaven, with relationships forming all over the place, not just Tom and B'Elanna. And also wrt fanfic, I'm old school. I used to read fanzines but the amount of stuff online is overwhelming.)

 

[Semah]

I have a hard time taking the various Janeway threads seriously for a variety of reasons but this is at the top of the list right now. At least three the of the more vocal people complaining about Janeway didn't even have accounts until yesterday and they have posted anywhere from a dozen to over two dozen times in the same two threads.

I'm sorry but I'm just highly suspicious of this.

I'm glad somebody said something.

 

[Steve Roby]

You'd never know that I intended this thread not to be more of the same as the other threads, would you? My communications skills must be a hell of a lot worse than I ever imagined, judging by some of the things people are reading into what I've said.

I'm amazed the mods haven't shut this down yet.

 

[Sci]

You'd never know that I intended this thread not to be more of the same as the other threads, would you? My communications skills must be a hell of a lot worse than I ever imagined, judging by some of the things people are reading into what I've said.

I don't think there's anything wrong with your communications skills. Some people are just irrationally attached to the victim identity and refuse to acknowledge that a decision can be made without regard to their ideology of choice and without intent at malice or oppression. Some people are just hysterical reactionaries.

 

[elaithin]

What he said. It's very difficult to debate individuals who refuse to do so rationally. Mostly, it invalidates the entire process (and feels remarkably similar to arguing with my four year old daughter.)

 

[Rosalind]

I have a hard time taking the various Janeway threads seriously for a variety of reasons but this is at the top of the list right now. At least three the of the more vocal people complaining about Janeway didn't even have accounts until yesterday and they have posted anywhere from a dozen to over two dozen times in the same two threads.

I'm sorry but I'm just highly suspicious of this.

I'm glad somebody said something.

considering you guys are asking the new comers to not accusing the decision makers without actual evidence, let's not start accusing them of anything without evidence too.

I'm amazed the mods haven't shut this down yet.

I thought about shutting this down yesterday, since the same arguments seem to occur in all three threads, but I keep hoping this one will get back to topic.

 

[Johnhead99]

It's a case of putting your money where your mouth is. If there really are a lot of Voyager/Janeway fans being represented by you, Brit, kimc, et al., show Pocket your economic clout.

No. Please don't. Pocket would then decide to pull the plug on everything then -- Please, buy everything. Buy it multiple times if you want. But no boycotting.

 

[captcalhoun]

Rosalind, you're a cock-eyed optimist...

 

[KRAD]

^ Yes, but that's why we like her!

 

[Rosalind]

thank you.

 

[Trent Roman]

Okay, exercise in sympathetic imagination. From Monty's perspective, this is what I see: there are only a handful of leading lights, the bright stars of the series, in the Star Trek firmament, the captains and the status that comes with it. Of this handful, only one is female, an already unrepresentative state of affairs. Then, a hand reaches up and snuffs it out (in rather violent and demeaning fashion, might I add); the remainder, whether or not you count Kirk amongst that firmament (which one probably should, where Shatner's has died but Pine's is ready to come roaring back into the public consciousness), are all male. This action occurs against a backdrop of persistent social inequality that devalues the capacity, labour and autonomy of women, particularly (and I don't know your nationality, but I'll assume North American) women in positions of material, hierarchical power, unless they're Jerry Falwell in drag. The suspicion, then, is that an entertainment industry which, if not conservative in and of itself, does pander to such sentiments (and makes idiotic statements like female leads aren't viable in action films), has acted to curtail the visible representation of an empowered woman, in the belief that this appeal to a kind of sexist, lowest common denominator will gain back an audience presumably alienated by allegedly feminist elements. If nothing else, the elimination of Janeway sends a negative message, intentional or otherwise, to the audience of the fictional construct about the parity of gender.

The problem here, I'd say, is that such a perspective is really an outside imposition; seen from such an angle, the decision to kill off Janeway seems suspect because it is always already framed within a (somewhat overdetermining, if you ask me) metanarrative of gender struggle. But that is not the perspective from which the decision-making took place, and I think you should try a sympathetic imagination exercise of your own to see if you couldn't view this from the internal perspective. Therein, gender parity has long ago been achieved with any number of television and original characters occupying positions of power, up to and including the presidency, not that such is considered remarkable in-universe since, of course, discrimination is largely a dead thing in Trek; issues of gender, sexuality, work/family are all present routinely for individuals of a variety of sexes (since the fiction has far more than the usual male/female binaries) in any number of novels, and there is no need (indeed, no credible way) for a single character to act as the locus of such question. Neither the first nor most powerful female character in the setting, there is thus nothing unique about Kathryn Janeway other than the fact that she has the unique personality of Kathryn Janeway (which I certainly think was worth preserving, but this is not my rant). Nor is the thrashing of the character any kind of top-down corporate or social dictate; the decision was taken at the editorial level, and it was actually the licensing department at CBS who asked for an 'out' to be written into the book to lessen the finality of Janeway's death. There is zero need to agree that this decision was for the best creatively--I certainly don't--but I can't see any angle within this perspective wherein any form of sexism, intentional or sublimated, is at work. Bad decisions? Quite possibly. Biased decisions? No basis for such a claim.

Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman

 

[donners22]

(Personally, I always thought J/C made a hell of a lot more sense than C/7.

I think T/7 or J/7 made far more sense than C/7. Indeed, I think there's a fair bit of fanfic on those two as well.

 

[Steve Roby]

It's a case of putting your money where your mouth is. If there really are a lot of Voyager/Janeway fans being represented by you, Brit, kimc, et al., show Pocket your economic clout.

No. Please don't. Pocket would then decide to pull the plug on everything then -- Please, buy everything. Buy it multiple times if you want. But no boycotting.

If you go back to the first post in the thread, I was suggesting that they show their clout by buying a lot of copies of a book that represents the stuff they do want to see, rather than boycotting. Positive reinforcement.

 

[donners22]

No. Please don't. Pocket would then decide to pull the plug on everything then -- Please, buy everything. Buy it multiple times if you want. But no boycotting.

The distribution of Trek books is nothing like it was a decade or so ago. I think people are already voting with their wallets.

 

[Jolaris]

being there for hubby

Now... I am new to this thread, but I just had to read it through all the way. And I just have to ask, but in what way is that sentence not demeaning to women?

Feminism is about equality and all that other shit. If he is there for you as well, then congratulations! But if I understand that sentence right, I sincerely hope I misunderstood it, if you are a feminist then what are you doing in a relationship where you are not equals?

Besides if you feel so strong about feminism, what are you doing here in an internet forum? Which arguably is a place where you can never win in anything. (On the other hand, here I am reading the entire thread and responding to it.)
You should be out on the barricades like the rest of us shouting until your throat runs dry, both men and women!

Yes, I understand you feel strong about her death, but if you want to rid the world of sexism, start somewhere where you can do a difference.

Sexism is everywhere, yes. But don't look for it in places where there is none, that won't help any kind of struggle.

Aaaanyways, rant mode off.

Whatever I might think about killing of Janeway, which I can't really say much about since I haven't read the book, I can in no way see any kind of sexism from the editors and the writers just because she was killed off.

Janeway is my favorite captain as well, and I'm a man (as if that has anything to do with it), but if she dies a hero saving everything she loves and believes in, in what way does that demean her life or that she is a woman. If they refused to kill her off, because she is a woman, now that would be sexist.