ATTN JMS: Your SFFWA position--is this accurate?

[B5JMS Poster]

Subject: ATTN JMS: Your SFFWA position--is this accurate?
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 No. | DATE        |  FROM
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s  1: Sep 25, 1996: sixstrng at wolfenet.com
*  2: Sep 26, 1996: jmsatb5 at aol.com (Jms at B5)

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From: sixstrng at wolfenet.com
Lines: 31

I tried posting this a few days ago, but I don't think it ever showed
up.

Dear Mr. Straczynski:

Thanks for saying I could quote from your online post about the SFFWA.
This is what I am planning to put in my article about the current
state of science fiction literature and the attitudes of those who
guide it:

"J. Michael Straczynski, creator of Babylon 5, resigned his membership
in the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America because of what
he considers to be their condescending attitude toward television and
motion picture SF writers." 

Is this accurate, as far as it goes, or would you prefer a different
summary?  I'm not trying to open a cargo-hold full of worms, but some
things need be said, and this quote pretty well summarizes the theme
of my article.  (I'm looking for as much ammuntion as I can find.)

BTW, If you would like a copy when it's finished, let me know how to
get one to you.

Thanks,

Terry Burlison






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From: jmsatb5 at aol.com (Jms at B5)
Lines: 93

 ...sigh...I'm gonna regret this, I know it, I just know it....

C'mere.  Siddown.  Lemme 'splain.

I resigned SFWA (back before it became SFFWA) for the reasons you cite,
and over the whole Dramatic Nebula issue, which was for me the defining
moment and the proverbial straw across the equally proverbial camel's
back.

A number of us -- me, D.C. Fontana, David Gerrold, Mike Cassutt, Harlan,
others -- attempted to get SFWA to restore the Dramatic Nebula, which had
been dropped for a number of years.  In the course of this, I received
more abusive, vitriolic, hateful pieces of mail and email than I can begin
to describe to you.  It rivals or exceeds *anything* ever sent to me in
any flame war.  All from other SFWA members.  One quote I remember vividly
is emblematic of the whole: "I work my ass off writing for pennies a word,
while all you hacks in TV churn out crap for thousands of dollars a page. 
You and your LA buddies will never get a Dramatic Nebula as long as I'm
alive."  

And that was the nicest letter I got.  

It was explained to me, in mail, email and the SFWA journal, that
scriptwriting wsan't really *writing*, it was just typing.  That TV
writers weren't really writers.  That you can't read a script unless
you're trained, so you can't vote on it.  That since TV/film is often a
collaborative form, you don't know who contributed what, so how can you
give a nebula?  And there's George Martin's argument, that SFWA should
give Dramatic Nebulas to scriptwriters when WGA allows prose writers to
join.

And the responses to this...it *is* writing, you *can* read the script
easily, it's just the margins that are different.  Editors often
contribute structure and ideas and other material to the books they edit,
but I don't see that stopping regular nebulas.  And SFWA was built around
a particular *genre*, anything in that genre is or should be acceptable;
WGA is built around *form*, the script, and any genre within that form is
acceptable.  We're talking apples and oranges here.

I was even willing to remove myself from all future DN consideration to
remove the notion that I was doing this to get one myself.  It was the
principle, for one vital reason:

At that time, SFWA allowed scripts to qualify you for membership in SFWA. 
Scripts were fine as far as SFWA was concerned as long as it brought in
more in the way of membership dues.  If it brought money INTO SFWA, then
it was writing, and qualified script writers to join SFWA.  But when it
came time to give out the dramatic nebula...nope, suddenly it ain't
writing no more.

It was a clear contradiction, and a bald-faced double-standard.  Hypocrisy
at its most blatant.  

So finally, when the move to restore the Dramatic Nebula was vetoed, I
quit.  The final irony being this: over the 10 years or so I'd been a
member, I'd written maybe 7 or 8 letters to be published in the SFWA
Journal, which appears quarterly or monthly, I forget now.  There were
(and are) people who had something in almost every issue, often for pages
at a time.  I sent my letter of resignation to the Journal, and it has
never to this day been printed.  Because once it became clear that I was
no longer going to continue paying dues (though I was still a member at
the time of the letter, and for several months thereafter, until my prior
payment ran out), they really had no interest in hearing anything from a
scriptwriter.  They later tried the exuse that it was too long, but it was
exactly the same length as the majority of letters that appeared in the
Journal. 

In fighting for the rights of script-members of SFWA on  the DN issue, and
the perception of scriptwriters in general, I was insulted, abused,
targeted, slandered, ridiculed, threatened and harrassed.  While there are
many fine individuals who belong to the group, as an organization is is
provincial and small minded and insecure and jealous.  Any John Norman GOR
novel would theoretically be eligible for a Nebula, but 12 Monkeys would
not.  If an SF novel sells 35,000 copies, it's a great thing; 100,000 is a
*terrific* thing, much ballyhooed by the SF establishment.  B5 has a
hardcore audience of between 10 and 15 *million* people.  

So bottom-line...yeah, I left SFWA because I got tired of the contempt the
organization and many of its members held (and still hold) for
scriptwriters.  When it came time to accept the Science Fiction Weekly's
award for "The Coming of Shadows," I stepped into the SFFWA suite (where
they were to be given out) just long enough to find the guys involved, and
get out again.  And the award was presented out in the hallway, because I
didn't want it to happen there.  As I told the organizer, I wouldn't go
into the SFFWA suite for this if I were dying of lung cancer and they were
offering free chemotherapy at the door.



 jms



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