The Sanity Project

In memoriam: Leslie Fish 4

This entry was posted in Music News and tagged fandom filk music obituary on by

Leslie Fish, one of the best-known members of the filk music community, has died. She was talented, opinionated, outgoing, and just weird (in the best sense of the word). I didn’t know her well, but I’d seen, heard, and talked with her on many occasions. Other people who knew her better will write about her, but I should give my perspective here.

She appeared on the fannish scene around 1975. With a group called the DeHorn Crew, she produced a vinyl LP called Folk Songs for Folk Who Ain’t Even Been Yet. Another, Solar Sailors, came out the next year. The songs focused on Star Trek and space travel. In addition to being a fan, she was an anarcho-syndicalist, associated with the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), aka the “Wobblies.” She was no fan of central economic planning, and her politics often ran in a libertarian direction.
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Answering the “Nazi-punchers” 2

This entry was posted in Commentary Writing and tagged fandom filk liberty writing on by

Social media can be hugely deceptive in judging how popular ideas are. One side can be noisy while the people who disagree feel too intimidated to dissent. An example is the self-declared “Nazi punchers.” They’re self-righteous in their advocacy of violence, and they like to distort a footnote of Karl Popper’s into a “paradox of tolerance” that says they must be intolerant to be tolerant. But we don’t routinely see news reports of assaults of this kind, which is a clue that they’re more noise than action or few in numbers. Probably both.
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The zero-sum fallacy 2

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Authoritarian thinking of the right and left often relies on the assumption that “your gain is my loss.” The supporters of ICE think immigrants are taking jobs away from them. If enough people are deported, they think, there will be fewer people competing for the same jobs. The left’s version is that there’s a fixed amount of wealth to go around, and if the people who make the most are taxed heavily, that’s more money for everyone else with no downside.

These are both cases of zero-sum thinking. They assume that the amount of a resource, such as jobs or spending power, is a given and that the only question is who will get it. They think that taking resources away from others means more for them. In some cases, there’s a factual underpinning to that kind of thinking. The conservation laws of physics say we can’t create matter or energy out of nothing. The amount of air and water in the world is pretty much fixed. But most of the things we rely on are the products of human effort. Many didn’t exist till someone invented them.
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Anti-ICE activity in New Hampshire

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ICE has its claws in New Hampshire, even if not as obviously as in some other places. The secret police force has abducted people on multiple occasions. Local politicians are collaborating with ICE in exchange for a little federal money. But New Hampshire residents are pushing back. A new movement called Sanctuary Communities is forming to protest and monitor ICE’s brutal actions.

In my area is the Seacoast Interfaith Sanctuary Community. I’m still finding out what it’s all about, but it looks interesting. It’s been around since 2017 and says its members are “working together to support people facing the threats of immigration detention and deportation.” I’ve sent an email asking to sign up for their mailing list, and I’m still waiting for a reply. Hopefully the person running the list was just away for the weekend. (Update, Nov. 18: Yay! I’m now on the mailing list!)

These groups have been targeted by a campaign of lies. New Hampshire has a law against “sanctuary cities.” It requires law enforcement in every municipality to cooperate with federal immigration officials. The MAGAs are trying to claim it bans private activity protected by the First Amendment. If it did, that would just make the law null and void. Americans’ freedom to gather information and speak out takes precedent over Trump’s wishes.
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The Montreal Worldcon code of conduct 1

This entry was posted in Commentary and tagged Canada conventions fandom on by

I’ve registered as an attending member for the 2027 Worldcon in Montreal. Even though it’s in another country, it’s an easy day’s drive from my home. I hope that crossing the border won’t be too dangerous to consider by then, but today I’m here to talk about its code of conduct. There have been better ones and worse ones. I have concerns, but they weren’t enough to scare me out of registering. Let’s take a look, as I have with other conventions.
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