Weirdly converging thoughts after the twin debacles of ALSC and the Hugo Ceremony yesterday:

if you want to be an actual organization, you have to do the work of structure so that checks are built into the process

you have to move beyond your personal likes/dislikes/friends/enemies to consider your membership/base

it is NOT ENOUGH to rely on nostalgia or personal experience if you are not willing to take those emotions and use them to create empathy and space for people with less social capital than yourself

it is NOT ENOUGH to treat a major platform as the place to work out your stuff without considering the effect of your words on others

On an organizational level it is not acceptable to foster systems and a culture where this happens regularly

If you want to be an organization, you must consider who you are giving a platform to.

And I do not care whatsoever about BNF or disclaimers, or weak non-apologies after the fact. You can't simultaneously want to be recognized as The Voice in a field and also disclaimers responsibility.

If you care about nothing else, consider that you're making yourself irrelevant.

You should be caring about the colleagues who are hurt by the words you're tacitly endorsing, disclaimer or not. You should be caring about the colleagues who are experiencing microaggressions from someone who doesn't understand that it's not about him.

But if you don't, then at least care that people will see this and say something and your organization loses value as a result.

(I know WorldCon and the Hugos are in a weird category because of the messy overlap of fan/professional and the setup of the con. And yet, you can't trade on the prestige and then use the "but volunteers!" excuse as a shield.)

Behind the scenes, systemic change is work. I understand that. It's necessary. Do it now.