Recently I got a strong lesson in how hypocritical some people in fandom are. A while back, I said on a certain Discord channel, replying to an ongoing conversation, that everyone should boycott the China Worldcon because of the nation’s horrible human rights record. One person replied that it’s only necessary to keep quiet on sensitive issues while there and you won’t get into trouble. I responded that a Worldcon is about discussing sensitive issues. He wasn’t convinced, but fine, I don’t have to convince everyone.

More recently, I posted to the same channel a link to a File 770 news item reporting that the Orlando, Florida bid for the North American Science Fiction Convention had been withdrawn, leaving only the Winnipeg bid in the running. When a Worldcon is held outside North America, a NASFiC is held the same year for people who don’t want to travel so far.

The same person who said that ignoring China’s monstrous record is fine went on a rant that he would never set foot in a state as evil as Florida.

Certainly Florida has its issues. The File 770 article notes:

As the statement implied, they were already having to labor under the political baggage created by weeks of public acrimony between Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and Disney over the company’s opposition to a Florida law limiting how educators discuss LGBTQ issues in the classroom. That included the state legislature voting to revoke a special tax district created in 1967 to facilitate the operation of DisneyWorld.

The revocation of Disney World’s tax status was clearly retaliation against Disney’s political activism, and as such it was an attack on free speech. If anyone thinks both Florida and China are unacceptable because of their governments’ actions, I think it’s pushing the boundary too far, but I respect it as a consistent position. However, declaring Florida unacceptable while counseling ignoring China’s evils is utter hypocrisy. Reducing Disney’s autonomy in DisneyWorld may have a certain similarity to China’s destroying democracy in Hong Kong, but the difference in degree is huge. Florida hasn’t arrested journalists for publishing “seditious material.” Its so-called “Don’t say gay” law is mild compared to China’s national security law for Hong Kong. Florida isn’t putting ethnic minorities into concentration camps.

I don’t know what the motivation of people who pretend Florida is worse than China is. Maybe they think they’ll gain some kind of SMOF points. Maybe some of them personally dislike people on the Orlando bid committee. It doesn’t matter; worrying too much about such people just causes stress. By withdrawing, Orlando has given Winnipeg a clear path to the 2023 NASFiC and eliminated the “lesser of two evils” distraction, so it’s probably for the best. Hopefully Winnipeg will come through with a great convention that gives people a satisfactory alternative to China.