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Orion on You Wonder What The Author Was Thinking at 00:38 on 18-02-2015 - link What does bi-cameral mean in this context?
Daniel F on We Need to Talk About Conan at 02:24 on 17-02-2015 - link So I will just cut to the whole heart of it. I don’t think that Conan is a bad guy at all. I don’t think that he is a self-centered bully or even a scumbag. I actually admire the character’s honesty and clarity.

This is probably the end of the line for us. In the few Conan stories I have read, I found Conan to be selfish, violent, criminal, and generally unpleasant. I actually suspect that he is supposed to be this way, and his self-centered, thuggish nature is supposed to be his core virtue. The barbarian who lives by his strength and takes what he wants, true to his own desires, independent and rugged, etc., as contrasted with the effete morality and general wussiness of civilised man. You certainly can’t argue that Conan is an altruist. The moral code that seems to motivate Conan is one where the strong do as they will and the weak suffer as they must. So he is strong, he is unashamed of his own desires, and he spends his effort acquiring things for his own pleasure. (Heh, I guess he’s a primitive Objectivist!)

One of the reasons I don’t enjoy the Conan stories is because I don’t buy into the fantasy on offer. There is a pretty clear element of wish-fulfilment and fantasy to Conan, but I don’t really like to identify with or fantasise about being the muscle-bound barbarian who lives by the sword and blah blah manliness strength whatever. Then you add in the really very nasty racist and sexist bits of Conan – which are surely meant to serve as vicarious wish-fulfilment for the assumed white male reader – and the whole package is one that I find repulsive.

Now, a word on recommendations…

You speak as if Arthur has done something wrong or committed some sort of foul play by writing a long criticism of the Conan stories and advising people not to read them. I would hope we can agree that there is no problem with the former? If I don’t like a book, I think it’s perfectly appropriate for me to try to explain why, even in the form of a very hostile review. Indeed, I’ve done that before! It’s true that someone might read Arthur’s article and decide not to read the stories on that basis; so? Is that bad? Someone might read a glowing review of Conan stories, decide to read them, and end up regretting the decision. Is that bad? I can’t see anything wrong with someone writing a strong negative review of a work.

As to advising people not to read a book… I’m sure you’d agree that on the personal level, it can make sense to advise people not to read something. “I don’t think you would enjoy X; therefore I’d advise you to read something else.” At times, I have given people that advice even for books that I personally really like, based on my knowledge of that other person and their tastes. I can’t imagine anyone would have a problem with this sort of advice.

But in the past I have also advised people not to read a book in an open and general sense. I’ve said things like, “This is a terrible book. Do not read it.” or “You should spend your money elsewhere; this book is not worth the cost.” I typically say that based on my judgement that the book’s negative qualities are such that either only a vanishingly small number of people could be expected to enjoy it on its own merits or that I expect there to be other negative consequences to that book being purchased and read widely. (e.g. it might promote loathsome ideologies; or it might be plagiarised; or so on.) I’m not going to try to put words into Arthur’s mouth about his reasons for advising people not to read Conan, but I would ask if you think it can be reasonable to advise a general audience not to read something.

You say “I just don’t like it when a person takes their negative opinion and tells others that they shouldn’t try something based on it.”

Does that apply to any of the other negative reviews on Ferretbrain? Should all of these reviews be taken down?
Orion on We Need to Talk About Conan at 11:10 on 16-02-2015 - link I wasn't going to look at the substantive discussion tonight, but this is an easy one: Wouldn’t a rapist, a person of low moral character, run at the first sign of any personal danger No.
Orion on We Need to Talk About Conan at 11:07 on 16-02-2015 - link I'm not sure I understand what you mean when you use to idiom "to hold feet to the fire." I always thought it meant "to criticize vocally, to call out." On that understanding, I'm with Arthur. There's no shortage of outspoken critics willing to make the case against feminism. It sounds as though you use the phrase to mean something more like "to limit, check, stymie." Is that fair? That's not a standard usage in my experience, but it's not a common idiom where I'm from anyway.
https://me.yahoo.com/a/A2uDAFBom5Q0GcmnP1T.GiRRs1WGGbA-#6bab2 on We Need to Talk About Conan at 09:15 on 16-02-2015 - link Hello Orion:

Please see the post above I wrote to Daniel as I extend to you the same appreciation for jumping in to an admittedly heated discussion.

And also see above for the heart of the reason that I really don’t like the article, (i.e. the element of purposeful mischaracterization and deception of the perceptions of people who may be new to the material and the recommendation to give up quickly as a result).

If you think that I am hectoring people into reading things they won’t like, maybe I came across poorly somewhere along the way. I tried to make it clear that my jabs are aimed at the arguments of the author and in the beginning of the video I made, I gave viewers a chance to read the story fully before I chimed in with my opinions to it. Again, if you think that I am bothering people to read them, that is not my intent. To state it clearly, what I want is for people to read them on their own and form their own opinions, even if they read an opinion piece about it, and even if that opinion is my own.

I think that your idea of telling what it is that I like about the stories is a good one too. So not to write an entire new article about it, some rough thoughts and impressions of FGD:

-One of the things I really like about this story is the dialogue. If you see some movies or books or games in recent times, there is a kind of stiltedness to the dialogue between characters when they are trying to sound formal and archaic. One example that springs to mind is Final Fantasy XII (don’t know if you are a gamer). But the point is that there is an authenticity to the archaic expressions and speaking styles of Howard. Conan will certainly never be mistaken for a scholar but there is a caginess and street-smartness to him that sometimes gets lost in the shuffle when he is just thought of as a barbarian. Also I enjoy the sharp dialogue of Atali. Her personality comes through quite clearly: proud and intelligent and certainly mischievous.

-The descriptions are also excellent. I am not usually a fan of authors who spend a lot of time describing the backgrounds and typically prefer a minimalistic approach that tells the reader the basics of what they need to know. Some of Howard’s descriptions really pull me in and paint great pictures and one of them is when he says that Atali’s beautiful body is “as perfect as the dream of a god.” Even if I can’t really clearly picture in my head what that is supposed to look like it still is a great description.

-I know that others on this post have said that they think it is boring, but I couldn’t disagree more. I think it is great. There is something romantic about the whole setting of two warriors on a battlefield left alive while everyone else around them has died. They are probably the most badass of them all. It is already something like being thrown into the final game of a tournament. Again I like their little dialogue together. Then it shifts to the fact that Conan is in a strange land and doesn’t know where he is or what he is in for. He doesn’t know the gods of the North and if they benevolent or spiteful. It is all part of the journey to find out. And Atali, again, while I maintain that she is certainly the villain of the story, she is an interesting villain. I wonder why she doesn’t look like her brothers. Is it all part of the spell? Would she look different and more giantish under different circumstances? Are they actually gods, or demi-gods, or just the children of gods and basically mortal. I wonder why they want to specifically cut out the hearts of warriors. Is it to give their father Ymir another faithful and strong retainer in the afterlife or is it simply capricious spitefulness? There are still questions at the end of the story that aren’t answered and that makes it more interesting to think about. (all of which, to me, occupied my thoughts far more than the easily explained rape attempt)
https://me.yahoo.com/a/A2uDAFBom5Q0GcmnP1T.GiRRs1WGGbA-#6bab2 on We Need to Talk About Conan at 09:11 on 16-02-2015 - link Hello again Daniel

I appreciate your efforts at wading into this admittedly heated discussion mostly between Arthur and I. I hope it is not off-putting and if what happens between Arthur and I sounds catty and vitriolic, I hope it doesn’t discourage you or anyone else from chiming in.

Well one thing I can say is that I have focused on rape so much because I was using FGD as one thematic example to illustrate what was wrong with Arthur’s article as a whole. The rape was used to point out the hypocrisy of saying rape makes something absolutely horrible, even when murders are happening as a ubiquitous matter of course with full graphic detail.

So I will just cut to the whole heart of it. I don’t think that Conan is a bad guy at all. I don’t think that he is a self-centered bully or even a scumbag. I actually admire the character’s honesty and clarity. So to me, Arthur’s article has many true and undeniable points in it like racism and rape and the like. But in an overall sense, it was like having someone make a lowlight reel of your favorite basketball player. Imagine if you like Michael Jordan and someone took all of his missed shots, all of the times that he was blocked, all of the important games he lost and then made the case that actually he was a terrible player. To me there was an element of deception involved, where the author is presenting a case that his overall experience with the character should inform him is absolutely untrue and in no case was this more apparent than FGD. So my big problem is that there would be people who come into it and because of the format, they are instantly sympathetic to the writer of the article and kind of just take him at his word that Conan is an absolute monster and then never give the books a chance on their own. In fact, Arthur states very clearly at the beginning of the article that he is in favor of people shunning Conan and Robert E. Howard. At the beginning of the video that I made, I was sure to show the book at the beginning and state that I think people should read them for themselves and form their own opinions by themselves. So that was the long and short of my problems with it. If you gave the books an honest chance on their own and came to the conclusion that you didn’t like it, then please roll along with my full blessing. I don’t have a word of reprimand for you at all. I just don’t like it when a person takes their negative opinion and tells others that they shouldn’t try something based on it.
https://me.yahoo.com/a/A2uDAFBom5Q0GcmnP1T.GiRRs1WGGbA-#6bab2 on We Need to Talk About Conan at 09:08 on 16-02-2015 - link Arthur:

“This is said with regularity in respect of Conan and is utter nonsense.”

The arguments you make after this sentence are well laid out and argued technically. You are again correct when you say that fiction of an immoral universe is not immune to moral considerations. I don’t know how to make it any clearer though. My big problem is that if you want to judge something based on morals, then you need to be consistent in your judgments or else it is meaningless. In other words, don’t tell me that rape is too heinous to countenance but murder isn’t. One of those two crimes punches your audience member ticket and the other gets you up on a soapbox. I know that you are using hyperbole because “utter nonsense” means that it is so impossibly outlandish that to believe it is foolish. The problem is that it happens to be true. Conan is different from other fantasy fiction like LOTR or Dragonlance or some such. It might belong under the same general category but not necessarily side by side on a book shelf. One is perfectly fine to let your young teenage nephew read, and the other certainly is not. I don’t agree at all that it falls within the bounds of a traditional adventure story and I don’t think at all that Conan is a traditional story protagonist. Howard created a world and character which has an originality and unique feel (probably you will argue that, but anyway). They don’t fit so well within the frameworks that you outlined.

And I still don’t agree at all that not having a character express remorse is tantamount to approval. Do you really think that it is in character for Conan to say, “Wow, I really shouldn’t have done that, because raping is wrong. I’m glad Atali got away before I committed a clearly vile act.” Conan is a character who lives on the sword’s edge and doesn't really express feelings so much. Just because he doesn’t say that something bothers him or not, there is no way of knowing how he really feels about it. The one time that he did clearly say that he never rapes anyone, you immediately wrote it off.

This is going to become a theme: direct questions that I asked you that you had no answer for. Again, if raping Atali is something the author thought was defensible and deserving, then why didn’t Conan get away with it? You can tell me all you want about offending readers and such but the fact is that it didn’t happen and your idea that the audience is meant to cheer Conan on and hope he rapes her is supported by no factual basis, just your own interpretation. I didn’t get that from the story at all and was in fact surprised that anyone would. I mean, you still haven’t acknowledged the fact that the story is modeled on the story of Daphne and Apollo, a story in which Daphne ultimately gets away from Apollo, who was hit by cupid’s arrow, being saved by her divine father. How does that figure into your equation? Are you going to tell me that only a depraved rapist would choose to work with such a vile story? Are you not going to admit that Conan’s out of character actions were part of a plot device? Are you not going to admit that even from the beginning of the thought process in the story, Atali was always meant to get away?

-“If you don't want to be associated with the ducks, don't waddle about and quack.”
-“For that matter, you are aware that what you elect to consider "the truth" is an inherently political decision, right?”
-“How can you not see that crusading against feminism to the extent that you are is the very definition of "playing politics"?”

This is my fault for using a term and not explaining it clearly enough. When I say, “playing politics” what I mean is that, like I said and showed examples of in the video, a person gets locked into their politics and they will only consider things from their ideological point of view and lose the ability to simply get off of their high horse and say, “I was wrong” or “You make a good point”. They lose the ability to care about what the opponent actually says in favor of imposing malicious intents or straw-manning their arguments. It is like political suicide to be considerate of what the other party says. One tends to try and make everything the opponent says or does out to be, shall we say, “ludicrous”. You are demonstrating this tendency when I say to you repeatedly that I am not an MRA and you still insist on trying to label me such. Now to be clear, I don’t mind if you call me one. It doesn’t bother me if you get it wrong but I tried to explain to you why so you would understand me clearer. Go ahead and call me MRA Bob if you like instead of Girr.

So ever since I first met you and posted a comment (oh, it seems like only yesterday. …memories…) I was sure to demonstrate this idea by telling you specifically what it is that you got right even as I let you know with no ambiguity what I thought you got wrong. In all of my comments, the video and even this reply, I gave you credit where I think it was due: in other words, like Conan, I think it is best to judge everything on a case by case or argument by argument basis. In return though, you have almost never gotten off of your horse and acknowledged a good point that I made. Honestly it is getting wearying and here is an example of why:

“Now you're moving the goalposts…there's tons of people out there who are happy to hold feminists' feet to the fire even when they're right”

You see, I’m not moving the goal posts. Did you notice that in both sentences I was careful to add the qualifiers “effective” and “effectively”? That was your cue to take it that internet trolls aren’t really what I am talking about. I gave you several examples of real life legislation that was enacted in the real world by feminists. Your response was to say that you can list off several “politicians pushing for greater control over women’s reproductive rights.” Well, that’s nice. But, what the hell does that have to do with the MRM? The people who fight against access to birth control are religious groups who think it unethical or taxpayers who don’t want to foot the bill. And as for those politicians. Well, please, tell me which of them are MRAs. I gave you direct examples of heads of state, the US President, the Vice President and the Secretary of State who openly fight for feminism. I asked you the direct question of who can you name that holds comparable power among the mighty internet trolls, the masculinists or the MRM. You didn’t even try. I asked you the direct question of what laws have been passed directly due to MRM political efforts. Again, nothing. (those questions still stand by the way if you want to get around to answering them)

So here’s the thing: your actions are telling me that instead of just allowing that I correctly made the simple point that feminism is not like a usual political party, not like Republicans and Democrats who can somewhat keep each other in check, it is very powerful and almost impossible to challenge. When feminists get a head of steam in the political world, no one wants to be seen as standing in their way or else risk looking by default as a misogynist. Instead of just admitting the truth that such is the case, you would rather dig in your heels and present an argument that is just foolish (i.e. trolls on the internet). What you are telling me by this is that when I say the word “up”, you will say “down”. When I say “cold”, you will say “hot”. That is what I mean when I say that you are just playing politics. You have demonstrated no ability to make a concession to a fair point on my part and would rather make it out that I am all wrong and you are all right. So there is nothing at all in my posts, my video, that made any kind of sense? It was all wrong? OK, you win. You must be the world champion.

“There's no way I would win because the scoring system in question is completely ludicrous.”

Yes, the scoring system that asks you to directly put your claims to the test. Again, you are the one trying to convince me that Conan is a rapist, so why would it be so hard to find him actually raping someone? Yes, Red Nails gets a pass if he doesn’t rape anyone. But it shouldn’t be a problem, right? Conan is definitely a rapist, right? I mean, if you think that saying that he will rape someone, as in PBC, is a crime, then will you also say that when I get mad at my neighbor for playing loud music and I say, “I will kill you if you don’t turn that off!” should land me time in prison? Of course the little wager should just be actions. I am giving you 2 freebie points for non-rapes and you know you will end up with a 2 point score. What is so hard about it? It is an action for action comparison and I think it would speak volumes for the actuality of the character and not just your opinion.

“Plenty of people commit rape and do all sorts of nice things for people as well and see no contradiction in it.”

This is such a weird sentence. OK, Arthur, let’s run with it for a second. Do you happen to know any rapists? What are those “nice things” that you are referring to? Well, are any of those things comparable to risking their life by wading into combat against a monster or horde of enemies to defend someone? Wouldn’t a rapist, a person of low moral character, run at the first sign of any personal danger because in actuality a rapist only thinks of their own life, their own gratification at the expense of others? I mean, you say that “it doesn’t fucking matter how often Conan defends women”. But why on earth wouldn’t it matter? I thought the point of the exercise is to determine what actions are more normal and in character for Conan. I don’t recall saying anything about erasing wrongdoings. Why should we only look at the bad things a person does to judge their moral character? Good things are irrelevant? Even if they far outweigh the bad? If a quarterback throws two interceptions in the first half, but later comes back to score the game-winning touchdown, we have to say that he had a bad game? Or that he is a bad player? Please don't waste time by making such untrue assertions. Of course it matters.

And the best for last: I asked you two times to tell me whether Atali is or is not the primary villain of the story. I wanted to see if you would show me you are fair in your assessment of her. Your priceless answer was:

“As for Atali, she's obviously engaged in supernatural banditry.”

Again, I’m not trying to be overly mean, but that response was an absolute crackup. “Supernatural banditry”, you say? Supernatural banditry… I don’t know if that is a British term but for us in America, banditry typically involves some sort of robbery, usually armed. So, yes, I guess she was trying to rob someone… of their freshly carved and still-beating heart. I mean, really, is it that hard for you to just call an awful person an awful person? Is it that hard for you to say murderer, or at least willing accomplice to murder? You follow up “supernatural banditry” with the sentence that rape is not at all an appropriate punishment for, …ahem, …banditry. (I agree with you completely on this, by the way) And then you turn it right back to Conan and the Aesir’s hiring policies… That was it. That was your holding Atali accountable for being a murderess. Now a part of that is understandable, after all, your article is called “We need to talk about Conan” not Atali. But do you see what I mean about it seeming to be harder for society at large to hold a bad woman’s feet to the fire? Or, no, I guess you wouldn’t. After all I did say “up” so please, go ahead and let me know why it is actually “down”.
Arthur B on We Need to Talk About Conan at 21:00 on 15-02-2015 - link Orion, congratulations for posting the 200th comment on this topic. :D
Orion on We Need to Talk About Conan at 20:57 on 15-02-2015 - link Girr,

Isn't there a sense in which the moral argument you're making is irrelevant? I mean, the ultimate point of this post is to inform readers about whether they are likely to enjoy reading Conan as leisure/escapist fiction. You could certainly have a conversation about the imbedded ideologies and whether Conan is in some way dangerous to cultural progress or whatever, and we seem to be doing so, but that's actually pretty explicitly not what the OP was doing.

I see your concerns about lethal violence vs. sexual violence and the ways they're constructed in society and what-not, but I think it's worth noting that in the context of a review/recommendation, the justification for people's reactions aren't actually on point. There's a large audience of fantasy readers who are able to read and enjoy stories about murderers. Many of them are unable to enjoy stories about rapists or attempted rapists. Even if you are a cultural critic whose goal is to change the way people think about violence in art, hectoring people in reading things they won't like probably isn't a useful approach.

I don't see Conan as a useful way to open the discussion you want to have about the aesthetics of violence, so I'm not personally that interested in the project you're doing here. If you do want to talk about Conan, I personally would be more interested in hearing you describe why you like Conan than in why you think Arthur's reasons for disliking it are wrong.
Daniel F on We Need to Talk About Conan at 13:44 on 15-02-2015 - link (...you can drop the F, you know, guys? I won't mind!)

I haven’t read the story People of the Black Circle. I quickly scanned it for the word rape and only “parapet” showed up. Can you give me an approximation of what page that occurs on please.

I originally read it in an anthology, so I'm not sure that would help. There are a few pages near the end: I believe you can read them on Google Books here.

It seems pretty cut-and-dry to me. Conan explicitly states his intention: he is going to kidnap Yasmina and make her his queen by force. She flatly refuses.

Regarding my question about sexual violence, it may help to think about it this way. Okay, you suggest that murder is worse than rape. I'm sure we're all agreed that Conan is a murderer. The character of Conan is a murderer, a thief, a petty thug, and a hundred other unpleasant things beside. Why have you focused so strongly on the question of whether Conan is a rapist; or at least, an attempted rapist? We can agree that Conan seems to think that he can take what he wants by force, even if that involves killing, theft, and so on. Sexual violence hardly seems out-of-character for him.

You say that you are not trying to clear Conan of the charge of sexual violence. Okay! I'm glad we've cleared that up! What's your problem with Arthur's article again? We seem to agree on Conan's character: he is a violent and self-centered bully. Surely the disagreement we have is about the quality of the Conan stories? As opposed to the quality of Conan's character? It is, after all, theoretically possible that Conan might be a scumbag but stories about Conan might still be entertaining and worth reading.

Based on my limited sample I rather doubt that they are, but I hope you'll allow me that judgement. It seems to me that Howard generally intends for us to respect Conan's admirable qualities (whatever those may be), and to be sufficiently invested in the character to root for his victory. Howard does not intend for us to hate his protagonist, or for us to wish that Conan would get his well-deserved comeuppance. As Arthur points out, the Conan stories do not read as if they're meant to be about horrible people doing horrible things in a horrible world. We are meant to, on some level, approve of Conan.

I do not. I would actually quite like to see Conan get his comeuppance. I suspect that there are some pretty substantial moral disagreements between me and Howard that account for this. And so I do not want to read Conan stories. Is that a reasonable judgement on my part, do you think?
Arthur B on We Need to Talk About Conan at 12:43 on 15-02-2015 - link
Howard’s writing is different from other fantasy settings like Lord of the Rings, etc. It is realistically gritty and the violence is very visceral and graphic. When one reads a lot of Howard, they are demonstrating the ability to read something in which immoral things are happening (i.e. the killing of many people) and being able to say to themselves, “Yes, I know that killing is wrong, but I can still roll with it.”

This is said with regularity in respect of Conan and is utter nonsense.

The Conan series falls squarely within the bounds of traditional adventure stories, as does more or less all of the comparable material Howard wrote prior to developing Conan, as does almost all of Howard's peers writing similar material at the time, as does almost all the sword-and-sorcery work that drew on Conan in later years. There absolutely is a morality coded into the Conan stories - in this case, a sickening one.

Simply because you present a world in which immoral things occur does not mean your fiction deliberately exempts itself from moral considerations. Terrible things happen in Middle Earth all the time, after all, and it's still a highly moralistic universe. It's such a moralistic universe, in fact, that it tends to enforce its own morality on stories, which is why I suspect fantasy fans sometimes misidentify works as being amoral simply because they take place in a universe which doesn't actively enforce that morality. (So far as I can work out, we're living in an amoral universe right now, but that doesn't mean we can't develop ethics and morality and treat each other right and make the best of it.)

Moral judgements can be exercised by an author during a story in innumerable different ways, even if they are writing in a harsh kill-or-be-killed universe. The most obvious way is in how the author handles their protagonists - both in terms of how the actual narration tackles what the protagonists are up to and what they feel about what they have done. In The Frost Giant's Daughter the narrative doesn't give a hint of disapproval of Conan's intentions, and his major concern about his behaviour seems to be that it's a non sequitur in the context of the aftermath of a battle - he doesn't seem to be morally appalled by what he tried to do.

In the context of adventure stories, which are generally understood by author and audience alike to be yarns about good guys in dangerous situations who might have to get into a scrap or two to survive but basically have their hearts in the right place, this is tantamount to approval.

Now, it is entirely possible to write stories which genuinely are about amoral characters doing as they will in a shitty, horrible world. Michael Moorcock has written several stories like that, for instance. They don't look or work like Conan precisely because they require either stepping outside of the old timey adventure story tradition or directly turning on and criticising it.

In much the same way, I don’t understand why people can’t say again that “Yes, I know that rape is wrong, but it’s just a story. I can roll with it.” Especially when one understands very simply that Conan is under a spell and his chasing Atali is a plot device. It doesn’t mean that they defend the act of rape or support the act in any way.

It's quite simple: whilst it is expected in a traditional adventure story that the hero will have to fight to protect his life or the lives of others, it is not expected that he will try to rape someone, and consequently asking us to accept Conan trying to rape someone on the one hand and Conan as an adventure story protagonist on the other is a big ask. The former comes under the category of "you gotta do what you gotta do", the latter typically doesn't.

And that is not me just being mean to you, you actually did make some good points and I will explain them briefly, but overall, there is almost nothing you said that I can’t find a simple counter for.

If you are sufficiently dogmatic about a subject you can usually drag a simple answer out of your catechism to any argument.

What is the modern day equivalent to the skirmish in FGD (Frost Giant’s Daughter)? Would you say it is more like military war or is it like gang war? If four score men killed each other in a modern day setting, would no survivor be charged with a crime?

What an absurd question: it is quite clear from the story that Conan is taking part in a war between the Aesir and the Vanir.

When Conan kills a guardsman who betrayed him, like in Rogues in the House, would he not be charged with murder if caught? It is true that Conan usually kills people who threaten him, but there is no getting around it: he’s a red-handed barbarian and the stories provide plenty of examples of him doing what is known as murder.

Which I believe I mentioned? (Of course, I'm not 100% convinced that Howard would have condemned this murder or expected his audience to. "Stop snitching" is not a recent sentiment, after all.)

As I said to Daniel F above, it is easy to conflate defending an author’s choice to put rape in a story with saying that someone defends rape itself or believes rape to be good or deserved.

And it is correct to do so if the fictional rape in question is presented as defensible or deserved by the author in question.

Well let me just say that I started the account to express how I felt about issues. But even if it might be hard for you to believe, I am not an MRA, I told you the truth of the matter.

Right, OK, you're not an MRA, you're just a guy who is very invested in giving long YouTube speeches about how you think feminism is wrong.

If you don't want to be associated with the ducks, don't waddle about and quack.

I can understand and relate about what you say about declaring oneself apolitical but all I can say is that it really is how I feel on the issue. I think that joining a political party, in and of itself, may provide benefits, but makes it hard to stay on the side of the truth.

You are aware that it is possible to have nuanced political opinions that you promote without being a member of any party, right?

For that matter, you are aware that what you elect to consider "the truth" is an inherently political decision, right?

…(sigh) …Arthur, just think for a second about what you are saying. You are saying that “hordes of misogynistic trolls on Twitter” is an effective counter-balance to the influence of feminism.

Now you're moving the goalposts. You were saying that "when feminists do get it wrong, there is almost no one to hold their feet to the fire and effectively challenge them". I was pointing out that there's tons of people out there who are happy to hold feminists' feet to the fire even when they're right.

If you want to talk about legislation in the US, I could cite all sorts of politicians over there pushing for greater control over women's reproductive rights, including folk willing to wreck the whole affordable care thing entirely just for the sake of restricting access to contraception. I am sure when we have the grotesque circus of the Republican nomination process plenty of characters will come out of the woodwork and make themselves known. Just because the political tide happens to be (or appear to be from your perspective) against antifeminists doesn't mean that antifeminists don't exist and aren't presenting their arguments as effectively as they can - it might just mean that the antifeminists just don't have the facts on their side.

In addition, a whole lot of the things you cite are beneficial to men as well as women, or are outright myths. For instance, despite its title, the Violence Against Women Act aims to protect men who are victims of domestic violence as well as women.

And as someone who actually knows the inside story on the divorce courts, let me tell you that a whole lot of alleged "mother bias" arises from factors which are in place well before cases come to court. For instance, statistically speaking when a couple splits up it is almost always the man who walks out of the family home leaving the children and mother behind. The so-called "mother bias" arises when the courts, based on their duty to decide based on what is best for the children, decide that "what is best for the children" equates to "what causes the least disruption to the children's lives", which all else being equal means that the children should be allowed to stay at the home they are used to living in rather than moving out or being split up. As such the courts' hands tend to be tied well before cases reach them because of the decisions the parents have already made.

Lastly, this part is really rich:
I did it for you several times and haven’t had it reciprocated at all. It seems you think everything I said is total nonsense or are just unwilling to stop playing politics.

How can you not see that crusading against feminism to the extent that you are is the very definition of "playing politics"?

Now even as I say this, I can pretty clearly predict your obvious answer of hell no. You will probably tell me how you don’t want to waste another minute reading the Conan books anymore or some such. But you don’t have to tell me reason number 2 because we both know it. Reason number 2 is because there is no way you would win.

There's no way I would win because the scoring system in question is completely ludicrous.

First off, you've got cases like Red Nails, which under your scoring system comes up clean because Conan never actually rapes anyone in it, even though he is constantly pawing at Valeria without her consent there.

Secondly and more importantly, it doesn't fucking matter how often Conan defends women or murders people compared to how often he rapes or sexually assaults them (or threatens to). Doing a good deed or committing a worse crime doesn't undo a rape or wipe it off your ethical scoresheet (unless you are playing a CRPG with a particularly absurdly designed morality system or something). Plenty of people commit rape and do all sorts of nice things for people as well and see no contradiction in it.

You know, the point that you think a story is reprehensibly immoral because it involves a rape that didn’t happen, and yet are willing to look the other way and have no words of moral condemnation for the graphic killings of 80 men and the attempted murder on the part of a beautiful woman.

Now you're outright imagining stuff: whilst 80 men died on that battlefield, the story doesn't include "the graphic killings of 80 men" because almost all those killings happen offstage.

As for Atali, she's obviously engaged in supernatural banditry. But rape isn't an appropriate or proportionate punishment for banditry (or even murder) by any stretch of the imagination. Likewise, Conan's decision to work as a mercenary in a foreign war might be morally dubious, but the war is over just as the story begins - the meat of the story is his encounter with Atali and his reaction to her and that's what the story gives us to judge Conan on. Perhaps there were profoundly good moral reasons for him to join that fight, perhaps the Aesir paid better, it's impossible to say but also not really relevant to the story beyond a device for putting Conan in the story in the first place.
https://me.yahoo.com/a/A2uDAFBom5Q0GcmnP1T.GiRRs1WGGbA-#6bab2 on We Need to Talk About Conan at 08:22 on 15-02-2015 - link Hello Arthur

I asked you to give me some well-thought out and reasoned arguments and… for the most part I really think that you fell short. And that is not me just being mean to you, you actually did make some good points and I will explain them briefly, but overall, there is almost nothing you said that I can’t find a simple counter for.

"We don't really blame people for killing if they are in a genuinely kill-or-be-killed situation"

Here is a point with some truth to it. Truly if someone is in a kill or be killed situation, then it can be a harsh necessity and some leeway can be given. Is it not important, however, to consider how that person came to be in that situation in the first place? What is the modern day equivalent to the skirmish in FGD (Frost Giant’s Daughter)? Would you say it is more like military war or is it like gang war? If four score men killed each other in a modern day setting, would no survivor be charged with a crime? When Conan kills a guardsman who betrayed him, like in Rogues in the House, would he not be charged with murder if caught? It is true that Conan usually kills people who threaten him, but there is no getting around it: he’s a red-handed barbarian and the stories provide plenty of examples of him doing what is known as murder.

"I can't think of a single rape-or-be-raped situation"

Here is another very good point. In fact, there is nothing to be said. You’re right. I wonder if it is understood, though, that I never disagreed with that point. I think my actual words in the video were something like “Let’s award Arthur full points for saying that Conan is definitely trying to rape Atali.” And you were “putting the screws to a guilty man (Conan)”. As I said to Daniel F above, it is easy to conflate defending an author’s choice to put rape in a story with saying that someone defends rape itself or believes rape to be good or deserved.

"…whether or not you call yourself an MRA this really is all about your ongoing personal crusade against feminism, isn't it?"

Well let me just say that I started the account to express how I felt about issues. But even if it might be hard for you to believe, I am not an MRA, I told you the truth of the matter. And I explained clearly my problem with politics and especially how it relates to Conan. If you don’t believe me, well then I guess that’s where we will stay on the matter. I can understand and relate about what you say about declaring oneself apolitical but all I can say is that it really is how I feel on the issue. I think that joining a political party, in and of itself, may provide benefits, but makes it hard to stay on the side of the truth.

"Are you kidding me? The whole Men's Rights Movement, the whole Gamergate debacle, the hordes of misogynistic trolls on Twitter and other mediums - all those forces are constantly holding feminists' feet to the fire"

…(sigh) …Arthur, just think for a second about what you are saying. You are saying that “hordes of misogynistic trolls on Twitter” is an effective counter-balance to the influence of feminism. Please tell me, what policies, what legislation has been passed due to the efforts of those mighty trolls? What true political influence has been established by any of them, MRM included? I can think of the Violence Against Women Act, the Equal Pay Act, any number of sexual harassment policies, Primary Aggressor laws in domestic violence cases, mother bias in divorce courts, and the list goes on. Please, tell me, what are the major political changes enacted by the influence of masculinism or the MRM or those scary trolls? Just give me one. Who is the most politically prominent and powerful MRM you know? Do you have any cards that you can lay on the table that trump Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton? I’m sorry Arthur, but that argument is just nonsense. If I’m right, then just leave off of it or admit that it is a salient point. I did it for you several times and haven’t had it reciprocated at all. It seems you think everything I said is total nonsense or are just unwilling to stop playing politics.

"…you're going to miss the forest for the sake of gazing at one particular tree"

I explained why I chose FGD as a particular point of focus early on in the video. And at the end I pointed to another section that I could have spent just as much time deconstructing. It is more of a time and space issue than anything and even as such, you still complained several times about the length of it. I mean, what do you want me to do? It is not about gazing at one tree to avoid the forest, but rather using that tree as an analogy for the forest.

"it's much more difficult to write off a pattern of behaviour which is exhibited across a whole range of stories"

Thank you Arthur. Perfect. Now comes your chance to prove it. I think that statement is absolute nonsense and endemic of your whole assessment and mischaracterization of Conan and a perfect example of using the tree as an analogy. The section of your article which you entitled “Conan the Rapist” deals with one story alone which is FGD. So you are telling me now that rape is a “pattern of behavior (sorry, you must be British, behaviour) which is exhibited across a range of stories”. So let’s make this little wager. You go into the stories and count up how many times Conan rapes a woman. And I’ll even give you a free point for FGD and People of the Black Circle even though he didn’t rape in FGD and according to Daniel F in PBC only talks about it but doesn’t do it. Scour them high and low and tell me of all the incidents of Conan raping a woman. Now PBC is the only freebie I will give you. After that words don’t count but actions. I will put that up against all of the times Conan leapt into action to defend a woman. Or, if you like, all of the times Conan killed someone in a situation that would be called murder by a court of law. You are telling me that it is easy to find, that it is supported by the source material. So put your money where your mouth is. Don’t worry, I know that you got rid of all of your Conan books but they are public domain now and I will gladly pastebin them all for you.

Now even as I say this, I can pretty clearly predict your obvious answer of hell no. You will probably tell me how you don’t want to waste another minute reading the Conan books anymore or some such. But you don’t have to tell me reason number 2 because we both know it. Reason number 2 is because there is no way you would win.

"…there's a wealth of ways that a man enchanted by the divine beauty of a demigoddess could react to her. He could fall to his knees in supplication"

You see, the problem with this is that the argument, while not totally untrue, is basically masturbatory. Sure, he could do it that way, but who is to say how much of his true will is present. If you read it recently, at the end of the story, the old man who tells us Atali’s name says that he saw her when he was young and half dead on a battlefield. And his response to seeing her was that he lay and “howled like a dying dog because I could not crawl after her.” Immediately. Just looking at this woman. She has that powerful an effect on someone. So you can claim that it would be better if he didn’t rape and sure that’s true but I can just as easily claim that a Cimmerian has no personal business in a tribal skirmish between the Vanir and Aesir and need not have killed anyone. And any other time that he killed someone I can just as easily say that a truly moral man wouldn’t be in so many kill-or-be-killed situations.

I’m sorry but the killings can’t just be hand-waved away. Some of the killings? Sure. All of it? Nope. You are still just making a theoretical argument but not really facing the reality of jamming a broadsword into an eyeball in the same way that you want me to get upset at the reality of a rape. Every time you tell me that I am not taking the rape seriously enough, I will tell you that you are not taking the killing seriously enough.

And what is your basis for claiming that the reader is supposed to “support the rapist”? Or that Howard presents it as a situation where she gets “what she richly deserves”? If that was true, wouldn’t Conan have gotten away with it scott free? Or for that matter why do you say that he “chose” to rape her? How do you know to what degree Conan is in control of his emotions and how much is it part of the spell? Really. I am really asking you how do you know those things. Because it seems to me a projection of your own thoughts onto it. Honestly speaking, when I think of this story, I hardly even consider the element of rape. It is not really about rape to me but about meeting the, well, Gods of the North and surviving. But again, we are looking at the same picture and seeing two completely different things. When I read the part about Atali’s description and Conan’s reaction, I pretty much immediately understood the spell and kept on with the main story and I thought just about everyone else would do the same. I was genuinely surprised that anyone would get so hung up on that one element, you know, not seeing the forest to gaze at one bad tree.

So finally Arthur, there were many points that you didn’t really answer satisfactorily or just ignored wholesale. Of course you don’t want to acknowledge the Greg Burgas stats because they blow up your points very clearly. Of course you don’t want to talk about my “weird thing” about whether rape is worse than murder. Even though you say I barely tie it back to Conan, well, it was central to the whole idea. You know, the point that you think a story is reprehensibly immoral because it involves a rape that didn’t happen, and yet are willing to look the other way and have no words of moral condemnation for the graphic killings of 80 men and the attempted murder on the part of a beautiful woman. I mean, talk about “intrinsic, needless cruelty” which is “not necessary for the preservation of one’s own life”. Atali has it in spades and your use of the term “victim-blaming” in your article makes it perfectly apparent who you think is the bad guy of the story. You still didn’t answer my question about why is Conan NOT the primary victim just because he is a strong man and why is Atali NOT the villain just because she is a beautiful woman.

I’m sorry for the slowness of my replies but the weekend is usually my free time. But I will be here I am willing to wait until you can find those answers though.
https://me.yahoo.com/a/A2uDAFBom5Q0GcmnP1T.GiRRs1WGGbA-#6bab2 on We Need to Talk About Conan at 08:14 on 15-02-2015 - link
Daniel F
I haven’t read the story People of the Black Circle. I quickly scanned it for the word rape and only “parapet” showed up. Can you give me an approximation of what page that occurs on please.

In either case, I think that your use of the word “apologetic” is problematic in and of itself. I have the same issue with the term “rape apologist”. What are you saying exactly with this word? Does it mean that you think I am trying to apologize for the racism or for the occurrence of rape? Because if I am defending the use of such, isn’t that exactly the opposite of apologizing? If I apologize, I am saying something like “I’m sorry Howard put that in the story. That was wrong and on behalf of the deceased, I apologize.” But that is not really what I am saying at all, is it?

I am aware that in the historical use of the term, it just means “defender” but the problem is that whether that is the correct meaning or not, I think people know that the word “apologist” or “apologetic” carries a negative connotation with it. It is like a quick, effective jab at the character of the target implying a sort of guilty hesitancy, a person trying to defend something that they know is bad. And therein lies the simple conflation that renders a lot of wasted time in explaining one’s actual position. “Rape apologist” seems to imply that there is a person who is trying to defend rape, as if the rape itself is a good thing, or something that they believe is deserved.

"I am curious as to why there is this immense emphasis on clearing Conan of the charge of sexual violence."

I actually went out of my way to say that Arthur was correct in assessing that Conan was trying to rape Atali and that Conan is guilty of it and wrong to do it. I am by no means trying to clear Conan of the charge of sexual assault. He tried to do it and he was certainly wrong. Here was my issue with it:

You are reading a story which opens with the violent deaths of 80 men. This is not vile. Public attitude may not accord with it, but actually killing is, at the very least, just as bad a crime as rape. One woman, who is not actually a woman, is under the threat of being raped. Now the story is vile. If one is going to make the claim that rape is reprehensible, fair enough. But if one doesn’t get just as upset at the graphic killing of a human being, much less several human beings, or at least make some clear caveat every time it happens to let readers know that they think killing is bad, then I’m going to say that their moral preaching doesn’t really mean anything.

Howard’s writing is different from other fantasy settings like Lord of the Rings, etc. It is realistically gritty and the violence is very visceral and graphic. When one reads a lot of Howard, they are demonstrating the ability to read something in which immoral things are happening (i.e. the killing of many people) and being able to say to themselves, “Yes, I know that killing is wrong, but I can still roll with it.” In much the same way, I don’t understand why people can’t say again that “Yes, I know that rape is wrong, but it’s just a story. I can roll with it.” Especially when one understands very simply that Conan is under a spell and his chasing Atali is a plot device. It doesn’t mean that they defend the act of rape or support the act in any way.
Arthur B on Warhammer 40,000's First Flight Into Fiction at 20:28 on 14-02-2015 - link True enough, though to be honest I suspect Watson selected Callidus because it suited his needs and then came up with a story to fit rather than the other way around.
Craverguy on Warhammer 40,000's First Flight Into Fiction at 20:05 on 14-02-2015 - link Well, none of the other Imperial assassin types can shapeshift, so if he wanted to do a story about one infiltrating a xeno cult, he had to use a Callidus assassin.
Arthur B on Warhammer 40,000's First Flight Into Fiction at 20:00 on 14-02-2015 - link Sure, though it was still Watson's decision to specifically use that package deal rather than any of the other assassin types on offer in the setting.
Craverguy on Warhammer 40,000's First Flight Into Fiction at 19:45 on 14-02-2015 - link
but at the same time there is absolutely no fucking reason for Meh'Lindi to be a death hooker, just as there is absolutey no reason for her to be one in what I have read so far of the Inquisition War series, so I have no idea why Watson even raised the detail unless it was for the sole purpose of titillating the reader.

While that almost certainly is the reason why Callidus assassins are usually portrayed as "death hookers," in Watson's defense, he didn't create that portrayal, the game designers did. In fact, it used to be canon that women took better to polymorphine, so almost all Callidus had to be women. Shapely, athletic women, naturally, since they were far-future ninjas, after all.

So, it does suck that a story about an Imperial Temple Assassin infiltrating a Genestealer cult had to involve a courtesan-assassin in a catsuit, but the two were a package deal before Watson brought his...um...idiosyncratic style to the product.
Arthur B on He's a Night Lord, She's a Psyker, They Don't Fight Crime at 01:00 on 14-02-2015 - link The major problem with the Inquisition's Ordo structure is that often it won't be apparent what sinister force is behind something an Inquisitor is investigating until the investigation is actually complete.

You could probably fruitfully split the Inquisition into a different set of Ordos based on what the Inquisitors in that section do, rather than the targets they investigate (since in practice all Inquisitors are meant to be able to deal with everything anyway). You could have an undercover Ordo for investigate-y sorts, a very loud and public Ordo for running show trials, an Ordo for running the Black Ships and so on.
Craverguy on He's a Night Lord, She's a Psyker, They Don't Fight Crime at 00:00 on 14-02-2015 - link I guess I get the reasons for why the Ordo Xenos is favored for drawing protagonists from. It just seems funny to me that authors pick the Ordo dedicated to fighting aliens and then (with the exception of Amberley Vale) have them tend to spend their time fighting heretics, daemons, rogue psykers, and Chaos Space Marines -- you know, the enemies that the other two Ordos are supposed to specialize in.
Arthur B on He's a Night Lord, She's a Psyker, They Don't Fight Crime at 22:48 on 13-02-2015 - link Yeah, I think "average people don't know about Chaos" is sort of the 40K's setting equivalent to Fantasy's "only people who've directly encountered them believe the Skaven exist".
Shimmin on He's a Night Lord, She's a Psyker, They Don't Fight Crime at 22:45 on 13-02-2015 - link
I think the Ordo Xenos are very well-placed to provide protagonists because they spend the less time mass-murdering human beings on a just-in-case basis, which both the Hereticus and Malleus have to do to a certain extent as part of their work.

Sort of related to that, I think the Ordo Xenos are also more flexible in the way they relate to the 40K material. Even without hobnobbing with aliens, their alien-based outlook means they spend a lot of their time looking at alien stuff, rooting out alien influences, and travelling around the fringes of the Imperium. This lets authors play with the less-codified parts of the setting, which gives more scope for creativity, or at least seems to do so. It lets authors bring in parts of the setting that aren't all about the Imperium.

Or, if you look at it another way: writing Ordo Xenos means you don't have to engage too deeply with working out what, when you get right down to it, life in the Imperium actually looks like. Honestly, I suspect this is a significant part of the appeal. Almost all 40K fiction, and fluff, is about warzones, travelling or the fringes. Protagonists pass briefly through hives and agri-worlds, attending a banquet here or taking on a gang there, but in my (less extensive) reading, it's very rare for people to delve into the ordinary. The Enforcer series is the closest thing to an exception, and as I recall, even that spends a lot of pagecount on battles, psyker conclaves, and other fairly unusual parts of the setting.

A Hereticus storyline really cries out to focus on being a witchfinder general-cum-McCarthian mixing it with folks from all levels of Imperial society, ruthlessly rooting out treachery and corruption. Sure, there’s going to be heresy on fringe worlds, but it’s also less important and much harder to deal with there. Much of it will be xenos-related, too. The meat and drink of heretic-hunting ought to be down amongst the roiling masses of humanity on the populated worlds, or if necessary, the equally roiling masses of the Imperial armed forces. And it involves being even more unpopular than the Ordo Xenos.

The problem is, that means sitting down to write a novel where you really delve into Imperial life, and try to work out what it all actually looks like before the weirdness kicks off, for more than a couple of pages at a time. While there is enormous scope for that - as I said, the fringes seem to give more scope, but are actually probably better explored - it's going to be hard work to do it convincingly and canonically.

I don’t have a clear idea what I’d do with Malleus, to be honest. It feels like it would need to be a very hunter-y sort of thing, but I dunno. And let’s be honest - so much of the rest of 40K is already about fighting Chaos and demons, I really don’t feel like there’s much call for it.

Incidentally, while researching this, I noticed the 40K Lexicanum entry for Ordo Malleus is sticking with the claim that nobody knows about demons or Chaos or the Ordo Malleus or the Grey Knights, and even Space Marines who serve with them are mindscrubbed afterwards to keep it a secret. Because obviously, in the 40K universe, nobody knows about Chaos or demons, and it’s not like everyone spends most of their time openly fighting the forces of Chaos. Like, Space Marines. Or any Imperial Guard unit mentioned in any piece of fiction. Or Rogue Traders. Or mercenaries. Or completely ordinary citizens who are nonetheless scared of demons.
Arthur B on He's a Night Lord, She's a Psyker, They Don't Fight Crime at 22:16 on 13-02-2015 - link He starts off in the Ordo Malleus, then the Illuminati get him to infiltrate the Ordo Hydra, then he's basically rogue.
Craverguy on He's a Night Lord, She's a Psyker, They Don't Fight Crime at 21:45 on 13-02-2015 - link Do you recall what Ordo the guy from The Inquisition War was from? That was written before Dan Abnett got involved in Warhammer.
Arthur B on He's a Night Lord, She's a Psyker, They Don't Fight Crime at 21:14 on 13-02-2015 - link Depends whether Grey Knights/Sisters of Battle count, I guess. I certainly can't think of any off the top of my head otherwise.

I think the Ordo Xenos are very well-placed to provide protagonists because they spend the less time mass-murdering human beings on a just-in-case basis, which both the Hereticus and Malleus have to do to a certain extent as part of their work.

OK, there's the whole Genestealer cult thing, but that's eminently easier to test for than Chaos taint. Aside from that, most of the Ordo Xenos' enemies can't be mistaken for human - plus if you want your Inquisitor protagonist to be even more sympathetic, you can have them be the sort of Xenos who is willing to work with the more benign strains of the Eldar and other less-psycho aliens.

Also there's the fact that a lot of Black Library authors use Abnett as a model, of course.

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