BSFA AWARDS
So a twitterstorm of protest, followed by a flood of non-electronic congratulations, all the way up to funniest-thing-I've-ever-seen-at-a-convention (from a distinguished foreign visitor). All reactions to my stand-up routine at the awards ceremony.
Clearly some folk missed things like: Dave Lally and I are both leprauchans from the same gene pool, and Meaney-Lally insults are a con tradition (but he wasn't there! No cheery "Oi, Meaney!" from the Lally); or that Justina Robson and I are old, old friends. Or that all four members of that women writers panel are good friends, and I was there to support them...
I don't know Lavie well, though, and I didn't catch up with him the next day. So massive apologies, Mr Tidhar, if you weren't amused. (And how sadly ironic if that turns out to be so, as loyal readers might appreciate.) We can disagree on what's funny or is a valid topic for humour, but at a deeper level our shared goals are inclusivity and diversity: my underlying presupposition is that every reaction was well meant.
And for the (literally) dozens of Monday-morning hugs and that-was-funny messages, and to the tweeters who said "Oops, sorry," multitudinous thanks.
Inhale. Exhale. And onwards, everyone in the same direction.
(And back to work.)
So a twitterstorm of protest, followed by a flood of non-electronic congratulations, all the way up to funniest-thing-I've-ever-seen-at-a-convention (from a distinguished foreign visitor). All reactions to my stand-up routine at the awards ceremony.
Clearly some folk missed things like: Dave Lally and I are both leprauchans from the same gene pool, and Meaney-Lally insults are a con tradition (but he wasn't there! No cheery "Oi, Meaney!" from the Lally); or that Justina Robson and I are old, old friends. Or that all four members of that women writers panel are good friends, and I was there to support them...
I don't know Lavie well, though, and I didn't catch up with him the next day. So massive apologies, Mr Tidhar, if you weren't amused. (And how sadly ironic if that turns out to be so, as loyal readers might appreciate.) We can disagree on what's funny or is a valid topic for humour, but at a deeper level our shared goals are inclusivity and diversity: my underlying presupposition is that every reaction was well meant.
And for the (literally) dozens of Monday-morning hugs and that-was-funny messages, and to the tweeters who said "Oops, sorry," multitudinous thanks.
Inhale. Exhale. And onwards, everyone in the same direction.
(And back to work.)
posted by John Meaney at
10:02
2 Comments:
John, I wasn't there but I listened to it, and it was very painful. Comedy is hard, and comedy in front of a very heterogeneous audience is harder. Also, comedy by its nature skims the hedge of the offensive, and if it's not good enough, it falls right in.
This was a large convention, a more inclusive convention than usual, a convention full of first timers, and a convention full of tempers already frayed by the "we value quality above equality" unfortunate blurtings earlier on. It really really REALLY was not the right con to start with in-jokes and progress to jokes about babes.
Of course you mean well. Of course you are about inclusivity. And hey,we all had our foot in mouth moments. I told Farah a Jewish joke once.
But you should probably listen more to the friends that were not amused than to the ones that tell you you were the funniest thing. And yeah, Lavie Tidhar was not amused.
Anna, you are so right. And I'd missed those earlier blurtings... that wasn't the right con to joke about anything at all, in the circumstances.
I apologized directly to Lavie, and we are cool. (Next meeting: he teaches me Bao, I buy him his bodyweight in beer.)
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