Oh, no, not again

[mme_hardy]

 WisCon has disgraced itself.

Inciting event (from memory) at 2013 WisCon:

• Two women, Lauren Jankowski and Elise Matthesen, report, independently, being harassed by Tor editor James Frenkel.   Elise Matthesen, has witnesses.  (I forget whether Jankowski does.)
• Both report the harassment to the ConCom.
• An online uproar ensues; eventually James Frenkel is fired by Tor.

Report from 2014 WisCon  by Natalie Luhrs (do read it, as well as Lauren Jankowski's Tumblr post):

1. Jankowski shows up at WisCon to find Frenkel as an official volunteer.
2. Frenkel spends the con explaining to people that he's there to prove he's "really a nice guy".
3. Jankowski complains to security.  She is told that (A) her report from 2013 has been lost and (B) Elise Matthesen asked that no further action be taken on her 2013 report.
4. Online anger at Frenkel's presence; WisCon ConCom promises to report back to attendees after everybody's been home and they can think it over.
5. Jankowski posts angrily on Tumblr.
6. Matthesen contacts Jankowski and says, no, she certainly did not withdraw her report.  Jankowski apologizes.
7. Luhrs posts angrily on her blog, Radish Reports.
8. WisCon issues an official statement full of waffle and minimizations.  "We could talk about how these reports fell through the cracks, and why we are dissatisfied with penalties in situations where penalties were imposed..."  Yes.  That would be a very good idea.  And it turns out that WisCon's official preparation for sexual harassment at this year's con was "Changes prior to the recently concluded Wiscon 38 included establishing a member advocate position as an ongoing liaison for the reporters, making the safety chair a year-round function to avoid losing track of reports which arrive just after a con during the transition to new chairs and a new committee, and setting up a standing harassment policy subcommittee to improve both our published policies and our internal procedures"  We note that in fact a report was lost track of, and that the subcommittee's and member advocate's positions don't seem to have materially affected what happened at WisCon 38.

So.  The "feminist" (sneer quotes intentional) convention WisCon not only "lost" reports of harassment but lied to one harassee about another attendee's attested complaint.

Fuck this shit.

Comments

[muccamukk]

I honestly don't get what their problem is! Why is this guy still there? I was at the con idk, six years ago? And he was an asshole then (never to me personally, but he was totally tone deaf about women and sexism on a panel I was at, and when I asked around everyone of longer attendance was just kind of "Oh, him. Yeah, he's an asshole.") Why on earth would he be invited at all, even before?

Thanks for the round up, anyway. I was about to go looking for one.

[mme_hardy]

Natalie Luhrs's post is the roundup you're looking for. http://radishreviews.com/2014/06/01/wiscon-and-harassment/

[kore]

Frenkel as an official volunteer.

holy shit WHAT

Jankowski complains to security. She is told that (A) her report from 2013 has been lost and (B) Elise Matthesen asked that no further action be taken on her 2013 report.

WTFFFFFFFFFFFFF wow I would hate to be their lawyer right now. Wow.

[julian]

I was hoping their official response would be less ... what it turned out to be.

[lizbee]

Continuum's ideal of harassment policies has moved from "don't be like Readercon" to "don't be like Wiscon". So that's a thing (as we spent an hour on Sunday determining what we'd do in this situation).

(Last year, N K Jemisin said Continuum was like a smaller Wiscon but better at intersectionality. I've been preening for a YEAR.)

[recessional]

Humans confuse me.

[viktor-haag.livejournal.com]

Oy. One wonders why this is so hard to do properly.

[mme-hardy.livejournal.com]

Because our friends are fundamentally nice people.

[viktor-haag.livejournal.com]

What ticks me off is the conflation of what people are with what they do.

For Pete's sake! This is elementary parenting here! Anyone with any ounce of parenting understanding here knows that you should always remark on the choices or the behaviour, but not the underlying character of the actor.

That is: it doesn't matter whether the person is fundamentally good, bad, nice, horrid, tolerable, intolerant, an ass, whatever. (Well, it does, but not in the realm of situations like this.)

What matters is that this "fundamentally nice person" seems to have committed actions that were unwelcome, specifically prohibited, potentially criminal, and certainly unpleasant and damaging.

It's the actions that are issue, not the person's character. The person should be held accountable for their actions.

(And it's also for this reason that I'm not personally a fan of zero-tolerance policies: as long as you address the actions/behaviour and not the person, you have to admit for the possibility of redemption, learning, and change, but still, that doesn't mean you foolishly give people free reign when they say "I've learned! I'm a new person!")

[mme-hardy.livejournal.com]

Amen, amen, and so let it be. As a parent, I was constantly saying "You're a good person, but you did a bad thing."

Nobody has an indivisible "character". Everybody reacts to individual situations. The person who is good and kind to you may be cruel and thoughtless to somebody else.

"Heroes or villains: we're all somewhere in between. The good do bad things and the bad are sometimes kind to their mothers." -- Lix Storm, The Hour

Another relevant Lix Storm quote

[mme-hardy.livejournal.com]

"Children, there will be tears." Anna Chancellor. Fabulous performance.

[athenais.livejournal.com]

I am ready to apply flames to Jim Frenkel, that odious, self-serving, delusional, vile creeper. But Wiscon, jesus. How can they? I am sickened.

[mme-hardy.livejournal.com]

There are plenty of cons I expect (but do not accept) to be assholes on this particular. But Wiscon? When the harassing behavior happened at last year's convention?

No. Your friends are not an exception.

[movingfinger.livejournal.com]

Fandom is cliquish and gives an enormous latitude to bullies so long as the bullies are perceived as sufficiently high-status. This is not news.

[mme-hardy.livejournal.com]

You are, as ever, correct. In this case I had genuinely expected better.

[vom-marlowe.livejournal.com]

Holy shit.

Pardon my French, but holy shit. Wiscon let Frenkel volunteer?!? Holy shit. Yeah, that's all I've got. *mouth remains dropped open*