The hallmark of the inferior

Laura Resnick proposes a simple test, and in doing so, inadvertently demonstrates why it is so hard to take people like her seriously:

I would propose the following simple test for everyone who wants to threaten someone else with rape and death:

Do =you= intend to rape, murder, and/or cause the death this person? Not in a “wishspeak” way, but in an “yes, it’s on my calendar for tonight” way?

If the answer is “yes,” then turn yourself in to the authorities, because you are a danger to society.

If is “no,” then just don’t say it. Not ever. Because threatening someone with a felony isn’t cool or funny or macho or a way to release your anger or express your disapproval; it’s just a good reason for the cops to find you and question you about your stated intent to commit a felony.

And if you want to call someone a “bitch,” slut,” “whore.” etc… Oh, come, ON. How LAME. How childish. How unimaginative. Why not give yourself a CHALLENGE? Replace every hostile schoolyard name you want to call a woman with a phrase that begins with, “The reason I don’t like your actions” or “my argument with what you’ve said is” or “what I dislike about your position on this matter is” and then finish the sentence with a substantive comment that’s devoid of sarcasm and facetiousness (because of you’re a name-caller, than these conversational techniques are WAY beyond your skill set) and completely eschews threats.

And if you can’t do THAT… then say nothing, because you clearly have NOTHING TO SAY.

It sounds nominally reasonable, if more than a little naive, and in truth, it is nothing more than the usual bien pensant posturing.  The important thing to note here is how Miz Resnick is firmly asserting that one should never joke about harming others, because it isn't cool or funny or macho.  Which is a little ironic in light of Miz Resnick's own admittedly felonious fantasies of last summer.

Whever I think “alpha male”… my daydream quickly becomes a Sweeney Todd nightmare in which I’m serving the remains to my dinner guests, disguised as some sort of heavy-seasoned stew beneath puff pastry, because I wound up killing said Alpha Male in sheer exasperation before sundown and need to get rid of the body….  Laura Resnick, August 17, 2012 at 1:12 pm

In addition to this, while Miz Resnick was more than eager to criticize unknown people on the Internet, she didn't see fit to criticize our fellow SFWA member, Lee Martindale, who wrote: "When I decided to run for re-election as SFWA South-Central Regional Director, someone asked me what I would do if Mr. Beale won the Presidential election. I replied, "Ask my friends to start a bail fund."

And yet, are we not reliably informed that threatening someone with a felony isn't cool or funny?  Are we not told that it is grounds for being questioned by the police.

The hallmark of the inferior being is not hypocrisy, or the mere appearance of hypocrisy.  Everyone with ideals fails to live up to them at some point or another.  One's failure to live up to a standard is not at all the same thing as denying the standard applies to oneself.  The hallmark of the inferior, the sure sign of the self-admitted inferior, is the individual who demands others live up to standards that he refuses to accept for himself.

If you do not hold yourself accountable to the same standards you apply to others, you are not only an anti-equalitarian, you are a self-declared and admitted inferior to those to whom you hold to those higher standards.

I don't know if Ms Resnick is a hypocrite, a failure to live up to her own standards, or a self-confessed inferior being.  But rather than speculate or call her names, I shall simply follow her advice.  The reason I don’t like her actions is that she purports to be my equal, and yet, she appears to hold me and many others to a standard she does not appear to apply to herself or to her fellow SFWA member.