Mercedes Lackey - What Do We Do Here?

 

There was an incident at this year's Nebula Awards, and I didn’t become aware of the situation until Sunday night, May 22^nd, when I got an email from SFWA. Here’s what the email said:

Dear Nebula Conference Participants and SFWA Members,

We learned yesterday that while participating in the “Romancing Sci-Fi & Fantasy” panel, Mercedes Lackey used a racial slur. First, we apologize to our attendees and the other panelists who were subjected to that slur. We’ve disabled access to the panel to avoid any additional harm being caused.

Second, we are immediately removing Mercedes Lackey from the conference and the additional panels she was scheduled for, in accordance with SFWA’s Moderation Policy. The use of a racial slur violates the instruction to “Respect all cultures and communities. Do not make derogatory or offensive statements even as a joke.” That applies to everyone in a SFWA space, at all levels of their career.

Third, we will be discussing with the other panelists for “Romancing Sci-Fi & Fantasy” how they would prefer we proceed when they are able and comfortable in doing so. We will be offering to edit out the offensive portion of the panel or hold the panel again at a later date, inviting back the other three panelists and moderator to again take part. We will respect their wishes on how to handle this issue while also sharing the invaluable expertise they offered during the discussion.

Thank you to our conference attendees and panelists who reported the use of the slur. We appreciate being alerted to it right away, so we could investigate and come to this decision as swiftly as possible.

The SFWA Board of Directors

Now, immediately I was curious. I thought, “Wait a minute, Mercedes Lackey? Isn’t she the same woman who JUST got named the new Damon Knight Memorial Grandmaster? What the hell happened? What racial slur could she have used? I mean, did she drop an N-bomb or something?” When you hear the words “racial slur” you assume the absolute worst. And it was impossible for me to tell because I hadn’t registered to attend the online conference, so I didn’t see the actual panel. I watched the awards ceremony, because that was free, but I didn’t see anything else. And the odds of something getting shared to YouTube when it was behind a pay wall to begin with and then yanked off the Internet afterward, were pretty small. So, I was behind the eight ball in terms of seeing what exactly took place

Oddly enough, right-wing outlets for sci-fi news were very forthright with what exactly happened because they felt that this was a classic example of cancel culture at work. I don’t know if I necessarily agree with that, but they at least reported it. Also, some people who were there shared their experiences on Twitter and Facebook and I was able to piece together more or less what happened. (Now, of course, most news outlets have since reported everything, but I’m talking about the first couple of days after the incident. Initially, and I’m talking the Monday or Tuesday right after the awards weekend, most news outlets were being very coy.) Basically, here’s what went down:

While on the panel “Romancing Sci-Fi & Fantasy.” Mercedes Lackey praised Samuel R. Delany, and rightly so, because he was and is a pioneering sci fi writer not only because of his writing style but also because he is black and because he’s gay. But then she slipped and referred to him as “colored.” Not “a person of color,” just “colored.” And of course, that term isn’t used anymore because of its historic association with oppression. The panel continued on, pretending like it hadn’t happed, maybe because people were a little shell-shocked.

Afterwards, the complaints went up the chain of command and SFWA reacted. They took the panel down from the internet. They censured Lackey, kicked her out of the conference, and removed her from all the other panels she was scheduled for.

To her credit, she apologized shortly afterward. Here’s Mercedes’ own apology which she put out on Tumbler on May 22^nd, a day after the incident occurred. She writes:

"I wish to Apologize

"On a panel at the 2022 Nebulas, I had the chance to celebrate authors who wrote positive gay characters long before me.

"Chip Delany is obviously a major player in that game. Because there are two Samuel Delanys–there’s one from Texas–I wanted to make sure people got hold of the right one. So, in my excitement, I got caught in a mental/verbal stumble between “black” and “person of color,” and as best I can remember, what came stuttering out was something like “spcolored.”

"I’m not an amazing speaker. I stammer, I freeze up, & I get things wrong. I am sorry that I bungled a modern term while bringing attention to an amazing black creator.

"Too often, I am called a pioneer, but I’m not–I’m just who some readers heard of first. I wanted to make sure Delany got all the proper credit that he is more than due, and maybe new readers would be inspired to read his work.”

And then she included a note from Chip Delany which he posted on Twitter in which he stated that he had no problem with the word “colored,” and stated that Mercedes Lackey has permission to speak about him any way she sees fit.

Now, including that last statement from Samuel Delany was probably an unnecessary triple underscore. You know, sort of like spiking the football when all the player did was catch a forward pass after fumbling the ball on the previous possession.

So what do we do, here?

Now, I won’t try to pretend it’s not a big deal, because it is. I won’t try to belittle the slur by saying it’s not so offensive as racial slurs go, because I don’t necessarily think the hierarchy of severity of racial slurs changes the fact that one was made, even accidentally. This isn’t a free speech issue, because Mercedes signed her name on the dotted line where she promised she wouldn’t say things like this, and then said it anyway. That makes it a violation of the convention’s code of conduct, so freedom of speech doesn’t apply. She made a promise and then she broke that promise. But I think it’s equally obvious that she didn’t mean to break that promise. Clearly, Mercedes Lackey did not intend anyone any harm. This was a plain, old mistake. A slip of the tongue. But unintentional or not, it happened. She said it, and now it’s out there, so we have to deal with it.

What I’ve said before, on my blog and on other podcasts, and what I’ll say again (because we all need to hear it), is that forgiveness is not just for scary religious people. Forgiveness is a guideline for everyday living, secular and parochial. We ALL fuck up from time to time. The majority of Americans are no longer church goers. We, the people who don’t take religion too seriously, are now in the majority. But a few of us are struggling with how we hold each other accountable in a world with no God, and so they tend to write people off permanently over a single offense. They simply don’t know how else to handle it.

But cancellation is something you do to people who are proven evil. It’s a last-ditch resort when reasonableness is no longer effective. It is NOT meant for ordinary, every-day fuck-ups. It’s not even meant for people you disagree with politically (although January 6^th and the Big Lie and cancelling Donald Trump are lines carved in stone and we can brook NO compromise, there). You cancel someone when you have exhausted all other options. This incident with Mercedes Lackey was an unintentional mistake.

I think some people are behaving like this is a Freudian slip and not an ordinary slip. I disagree. This was an ordinary slip. Mercedes Lackey is clearly not a closet racist, and we embarrass ourselves if we behave like she is. She’s a 71 year old woman whose childhood took place in an era when racial oppression was the norm. But she rose above, embraced equality, embraced diversity, made all the right adjustments – maybe had some growing pains along the way, but rose above – shook off the structural racisms prevalent during her upbringing, lived correctly, and then, on day three of a long conference, probably tired and worn out, while singing the praises of a black author no less, made one slip and then was summarily given the boot. All the correct adjustments she made during her long life didn’t matter, one outdated word and out the door she went. She’d gone from Grandmaster to goat in the space of a few hours. I ultimately can’t blame her for being a little bit pissed – and as a result rubbing Samuel Delany’s statement in all of our collective faces. And I also can’t blame her husband. He’s clearly furious, and has made no bones about saying so on social media.

But I also see the other side of this. Too many black people have suffered and died in race riots, in poverty, in police brutality, in segregation, for a racial slur to be uttered, even accidentally, by a Grandmaster of our genre, and have the power structure say nothing. Something had to be done. Too much blood has been shed. Too many lives have been lost. If we are to have black authors and content creators move forward as partners in a united and diverse future of sci fi and fantasy, we couldn’t turn a blind eye. Something needed to be done about this. I see that side of the argument, too.

So with that in mind, here’s my pronouncement regarding Mercedes Lackey, speaking solely as a cis het white dude who wasn’t even there: I say let’s forgive her. She was booted from the remainder of the SFWA conference, and clearly that stung her badly. We can sentence her to time served and be reasonably satisfied. We don't need to remove her Grandmaster status.

Mercedes Lackey should be forgiven – not just because forgiveness is important as a general rule, and not just because it is the right thing to do in this case, but for the most important reason of all, and that is….

The next person who needs forgiveness might just be you.

Eric

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