coalescent: (Default)
Niall ([personal profile] coalescent) wrote2007-08-29 10:18 am

Who's missing?

[Poll #1046886]

Actual answer here. Vote before you click.

EDIT: See also [livejournal.com profile] jlassen's two entries, and Andrew Wheeler here.

FURTHER EDIT: Commentary from [livejournal.com profile] rosefox here and [livejournal.com profile] cristalia here.

Re: The real answer

[identity profile] mroctober.livejournal.com 2007-08-30 03:29 pm (UTC)(link)
Granted, I am male, but I am not bothered when all the cover names are heterosexual and there's a gay man in the TOC.

I'm less interested in the gender, ethnicity or orientation of author when I'm reading. Of character, sure, of situation and themes, yes.

Re: The real answer

[identity profile] jamiam.livejournal.com 2007-08-30 03:33 pm (UTC)(link)
Sorry, I fixed a missing negation while you were responding. My comment is just below.

Re: The real answer

[identity profile] jamiam.livejournal.com 2007-08-30 03:59 pm (UTC)(link)
Though I do know quite a few people who would be bothered by that.

But regardless of whether or not you are bothered by a lack of inclusion of your particular minority group, apparently there are quite a lot of people out there who ARE bothered by this particular exclusion. And we can argue all day about whether or not they should be upset about it--the point is, they ARE upset. And I can pretty much guarantee that they will continue to be upset about it the future, and that they will actually in increase in their representative fraction.

The job of the publisher selling a book is not to say: you female SF readers shouldn't be upset! The job of a publisher is to decide whether or not the existence of a large number of angry female SF readers actually impacts their sales.

Re: The real answer

[identity profile] ktempest.livejournal.com 2007-08-30 05:02 pm (UTC)(link)
Oh so YOU'RE not bothered by it, then? PHEW! I was about to be kind of annoyed. but now that this man has come along to tell me what doesn't bother him, I can go back to caring about shoes and hair.

Re: The real answer

[identity profile] mroctober.livejournal.com 2007-08-30 05:30 pm (UTC)(link)
I live to serve.

Re: The real answer

[identity profile] ktempest.livejournal.com 2007-08-30 05:45 pm (UTC)(link)
and to suck! You're special :)

Re: The real answer

[identity profile] mroctober.livejournal.com 2007-08-30 05:47 pm (UTC)(link)
Aww, thanks. It's nice to be admired.

Re: The real answer

[identity profile] la-luna-llena.livejournal.com 2007-09-01 04:24 am (UTC)(link)
dude, I'm a lesbian.

women represent 50% of the population. homosexuals, maybe 10$ if we're lucky. this doesn't just represent overlooking the one homo that turned up in a lottery; it represents overlooking 50% of the population. and it represents the ways we've been overlooked numerous times.

yes, queers get kicked in the ass too. but if you looked at the odds represented here, a gay man might end up on the cover; a lesbian wouldn't.