You may recall my post of a few weeks ago summarising recent events in SF fandom. It started off as a discussion on race and cultural appropriation but is now being characterised by attacks on participants and the silence of a good portion of the SF world.

Before I get into the developments, I want to point out two things. The focus of the debate has shifted quite a bit (probably why I thought it was initially quietening down). In addition to what I’ve already mentioned, it has changed from a discussion of Elizabeth Bear’s book to a complex, multilayered discussion of a number of issues as well as a huge “just shut up already, I’m not racist!” on the part of some white participants. The other thing is that this is not some silly debate that has come out of nowhere and will hopefully die down soon, as some people appear to think. It’s a flare-up of a long, horrible struggle that POC and allies have been having with science fiction since the genre began. Remember, science fiction is widely acknowledged to be a genre based on colonialism. Much of it is about exploring and conquering and fear and the other.

With that in mind, here’re some of the best resources I can find on recent events and also some marvellous new things to come out of it. This follows on from my previous post, so most of my recommended reads are in there. Although you should also keep in mind that I haven’t been intimately involved here, just watching a bit from the sidelines, so you should go have a look for more if you want to learn something. And is there ever a lot to learn.

Recent events:

• Seeking Avalon has a timeline of events.
• rydra_wong, as ever, has a linkspam of win. She also has a good summary of the most recent events, including the unscrupulous outing of noted LJer coffeeandink.

Amazing outcomes:

• There’s a new community on LJ called Fighting the Derail. Here’s their introductory post. You could do worse than start here.
• Another new comm, Talking about the hard stuff, about racism 101. It looks good so far. Via Bene on Twitter.
• There’s a new press called Verb Noire which is ‘looking for original works of genre fiction (science fiction/fantasy/mystery/romance) that feature a person of color and/or LGBT as the central character.’ No, really. How excellent is that? karnythia has a call for submissions up at The Angry Black Woman. Exciting stuff. I hope they do well. Please promote them!

Never let them shut you up, keep going. In related news, there’s a post up at Alas called Why White People Think Manga Characters are White referring to an essay by Matt Thorn. As he notes, there are gaps, as widened by time, but there are some very interesting thoughts which I found of use.