This is my intro to the WisCon Chronicles 9; I’ve been meaning to get it up for a while now, but Nalo Hopkinson’s GOH speech last night held similar themes, and spurred me to action. It is an intro to the book, but it’s also a small essay in its own right. I hope it speaks to you.
“Many people are “turned off” by social justice discussions today, to the extent that some of them use the term SJW, or social justice warrior, pejoratively. Some of my students have called those discussions “toxic” and see them as something to be avoided entirely. One might argue that much of the force behind some of the more reactionary movements, such as the Sad Puppies, is generated through resistance to what they see as jargon: exclusionary language that reflects an exclusionary liberal elite. Perhaps it’s unsurprising that science fiction and fantasy readers, many of whom, myself included, were something of outcasts in childhood and adolescence, find ourselves sensitive to exclusion.”