The background to this story is that Vox has a long-standing feud with renowned author John Scalzi, whose success Vox clearly envies. Like a mean-spirited adolescent, Vox finally crowned all of his attacks on Scalzi by publishing a pseudo-parody of Scalzi's latest work, The Collapsing Empire. But this time Vox went too far---even copying the cover of Scalzi's work, repackaging the title as The Corroding Empire and the author as 'Johan Kalsi'. Many believed this was done intentionally as way of spamming Scalzi, who recently signed a multi-million dollar deal with Tor Books---a legitimate publishing company based in the US (unlike Castalia House which is based in Finland).
After he was caught red-handed in this shameful ploy, Vox tried to claim that his book was intended to be satire; although he earlier wrote at the Vox Populi blog:
"After all what would be more amusing than for 'The Corroding Empire' to outsell and outrank 'The Collapsing Empire'? This isn't a lame parody; it is, quite to the contrary, a 'Foundation'-style novel that effectively demonstrates how hapless Tor's latest imitative mediocrity is by comparison."
So much for being a satire. And Vox---who's spent the last three days complaining that he was the target of some nefarious conspiracy within the Amazon corporate infrastructure, is now howling that the Castalia copy is getting panned by reviewers (whom Vox suspects are all stooges of Scalzi's).
It should be noted that, among the Science Fiction community, Vox' reputation as a writer seems to be somewhere near the absolute bottom and his character is regarded even lower. His nominated works for the prestigious Hugo Award have scored lower than 'None of the Above' for the past three straight years---in spite of numerous allegations that Vox and his Red Pill disciples were manipulating the ballots. In 2013, he was unanimously expelled from the Science Fiction Writers Association for using their official Twitter feed to make personal attacks against other SFWA members. This was shortly after he lost the election as head of the SFWA to noted author Stephen Gould by a 90-point margin. Vox has held a grudge against Twitter, Gould, and the SFWA ever since.
The lesson from this latest fiasco instigated by the Red Pills is that they are hardly the 'masculine archetypes' that they represent themselves to be. Are there problems in the publishing industry? Certainly. But as men---and as Conservatives---we need to hold ourselves to more mature standards of behavior. Ask yourselves whether or not Vox and others like him are what you'd want your sons to be. The kind of narcissistic and spiteful behavior that the Red Pills engage in shows again that they aren't part of anything that represents real Conservatism.
Tragic, isn't it? Something that strikes me as bizarre, VD and his minions actually behave as caricatures of all that is negative or sinful about women. Totally feminized behavior. It is so weird, a few of us ladies have actually pondered the conspiracy theory that VD is really a poe, perhaps a feminist lesbian hiding behind the avatar. What else are you to think when you see the behavior of spoiled teen age girls, the passive/aggressive attacks, the vicious sexual competitiveness, the strange obsession with Scalzi, the defiance, constant rebellion, and rampant immaturity?
ReplyDeleteThis is the behavior of women, of broken and wounded little girls, not of men at all! Men are actually awesome and wonderful, "Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you like men, be strong."
Good comment---I was wondering if any women had noticed the things that you mentioned too. The Red Pills are also 'drama queens' in addition to those things.
DeleteThere are some men who suspect that these guys are latent homosexuals. Gay guys act like spoiled teenaged girls when they're angry too. In fact, looking at that picture of Beale, there seems to be something feminine about it. It's not the kind of face you'd expect to see in, say, an episode of 'Gunsmoke' or 'Combat!'. It looks more like 'Queer Eye for the Straight Guy' material.