I’m not quite so satisfied because the raising of the issue of copyright here still falls into a very common problem I’ve seen time after time in discussions of racism and sexism. It’s a distraction from the issue at hand and derails the focus on the problem of racism and sexism. After all, there are legal grounds to consider when hate speech is issued in a professional context, so why focus on the problems with copyright here instead? Why address the copyright issue and not the problem with the racist speech here?

Sheila, Jo Walton likened the publishing of the letter to whistle blowing. I do define it as an act of whistle blowing. Why do you not consider it to be that?

Thanks, E. Well said.

The problem with Asimov’s is the lack of moderation that allows the sort of thing S.F. Murphy has been doing recently.

With my herbal tea and cats and meditation, and shit. *eye roll*

You’ve taught me a lot. Most of the time I do try to shut my mouth so my ears can open.

My discussion of the copyright issue has, to some extent, been taken out of context. Separate to this discussion, a number of people seemed to be unaware of the copyright protections that extend to our correspondence. After too many years of figuring out whether I can run letters, song lyrics, poetry, and homages in Asimov’s, I’ve become more of an expert on the subject than I ever set out to be. I’ve deeply admired a number of people who have engaged in civil disobedience, but I considered those people brave because they knew they were breaking a law and were prepared to deal with the consequences. Someone compared the act of publishing a letter containing hurtful and racially charged language to whistle blowing. That isn’t why this letter was initially published. It is a very good point, though, and it is why many subsequent discussions have arisen. Many people have resolved that they would publish such letters in full knowledge of the law. Doing so can be considered akin to civil disobedience’s noble tradition, but it is certainly much braver to take such actions wittingly than without the realization that, while perhaps remote, there could be legal consequences.

If I have three times as many shirts as Jo, that doesn’t mean I have a higher percentage of blue shirts. It may not even mean I have a higher number of blue shirts than she does. Conversely, if we know that she has a higher percentage of blue shirts than I do, that doesn’t tell us which of us has more actual blue shirts. It just tells us that if we each grab a shirt at random and, get dressed, she’s more likely to be wearing blue than I am.

If none of your letters are bigoted, the percentage of bigoted letters will be 0 when you’ve only sent three letters. It will still be 0% when you’ve sent 3,000.