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wiscon! Which proudly bills itself as a feminist science fiction/fantasy con, and yet in the last couple of years has shown that they have issues actually acting like a feminist con.
Short version: Jim Frenkel, formerly an employee of Tor Books (one of the largest and best SF/F publishing houses in the US, is a serial harrasser. As in, he's been behaving badly towards women for twenty years, but mostly what's been done is that women "in the know" warn other women to keep away from him. In 2013, he harassed a woman who a) made a complaint, b) followed through on it, and c) called outwiscon when they let her report fall through the cracks. Lots of feminist SF/F bloggers take up the call. You can read about it on the Geek Feminism Wiki.
Jim Frenkel lost his job over the incident, which shows that Tor Books took it seriously. Not so,wiscon, which allowed Frenkel to come to the 2014 con and even had him slated to moderate panels, on the original schedule. Cue righteous wrath. (They apologized pretty nicely for letting things slip through the cracks such that the 2013 concom knew about him and the 2014 concom didn't. It was a pretty good apology, taking full responsibility for screwing up. Pity it wasn't followed by a genuine turnaround on behavior.)
The final decision is that Frenkel is banned for four years for sure--and if, at the end of those four years, he can provide evidence that he has changed, he can come back. Note that he can appeal, but it has been made quite clear that his victims can't. Cue even more righteous wrath in the SF/F blogosphere, and as usual Radish Reviews has both good commentary and a good link roundup of other responses. I particularly like Sigrid Ellis's post on procedure and how, you know, a con disciplinary committee is not a court of law and why the differences matter.
Which got me thinking. I am a pastor. Churches are also places that should be safe where trust has often been abused. And our councils are also not courts of law. So, here's what "best practices" are for churches for handling predators once they have been identified. First, we have to protect their victims from further harm. That's number one. But we also, as churches have an obligation to everyone--including predators--to spread the Good News of God's love to all people. When Jesus told his followers to visit the people in prison, he didn't say "but only the nice people who are falsely/wrongly accused." So we can't just throw the predators out. But at the same time, our first priority has to be protecting the victims and possible victims. So here's the compromise when we know there's a serial predator: they can attend worship, but not any other event (Sunday School, picnic, work day, whatever) where the predator's target group will be present. And they can only arrive ten minutes before worship and must leave immediately after it--they can't hang around. And any time they are on the church property, the church has a couple of designated people to stay with the predator and make sure they behave themselves. If they have already preyed on someone within the congregation, a church may well work with neighboring congregations to find someplace else the predator can attend where the predator will be watched to ensure no further harm is done but the victims don't have to deal with them. The chances of the predator harming someone are minimized. That's what you should do when you can't just throw the predator out.
But a con is not a church, and if there is a deep moral imperative to allow anyone (even predators) at a con, I've never heard it. If there is a deep moral imperative for why it has to be one con in particular and not another, I've never heard it. And if there's any procedure in place for what to do if Frenkel appeals after four years, gets a couple of character witnesses to swear he's reformed, and gets back in, and how to handle him to make sure he doesn't revert to type, I haven't heard that either.
wiscon! Which proudly bills itself as a feminist science fiction/fantasy con, and yet in the last couple of years has shown that they have issues actually acting like a feminist con.Short version: Jim Frenkel, formerly an employee of Tor Books (one of the largest and best SF/F publishing houses in the US, is a serial harrasser. As in, he's been behaving badly towards women for twenty years, but mostly what's been done is that women "in the know" warn other women to keep away from him. In 2013, he harassed a woman who a) made a complaint, b) followed through on it, and c) called out
wiscon when they let her report fall through the cracks. Lots of feminist SF/F bloggers take up the call. You can read about it on the Geek Feminism Wiki.Jim Frenkel lost his job over the incident, which shows that Tor Books took it seriously. Not so,
wiscon, which allowed Frenkel to come to the 2014 con and even had him slated to moderate panels, on the original schedule. Cue righteous wrath. (They apologized pretty nicely for letting things slip through the cracks such that the 2013 concom knew about him and the 2014 concom didn't. It was a pretty good apology, taking full responsibility for screwing up. Pity it wasn't followed by a genuine turnaround on behavior.)The final decision is that Frenkel is banned for four years for sure--and if, at the end of those four years, he can provide evidence that he has changed, he can come back. Note that he can appeal, but it has been made quite clear that his victims can't. Cue even more righteous wrath in the SF/F blogosphere, and as usual Radish Reviews has both good commentary and a good link roundup of other responses. I particularly like Sigrid Ellis's post on procedure and how, you know, a con disciplinary committee is not a court of law and why the differences matter.
Which got me thinking. I am a pastor. Churches are also places that should be safe where trust has often been abused. And our councils are also not courts of law. So, here's what "best practices" are for churches for handling predators once they have been identified. First, we have to protect their victims from further harm. That's number one. But we also, as churches have an obligation to everyone--including predators--to spread the Good News of God's love to all people. When Jesus told his followers to visit the people in prison, he didn't say "but only the nice people who are falsely/wrongly accused." So we can't just throw the predators out. But at the same time, our first priority has to be protecting the victims and possible victims. So here's the compromise when we know there's a serial predator: they can attend worship, but not any other event (Sunday School, picnic, work day, whatever) where the predator's target group will be present. And they can only arrive ten minutes before worship and must leave immediately after it--they can't hang around. And any time they are on the church property, the church has a couple of designated people to stay with the predator and make sure they behave themselves. If they have already preyed on someone within the congregation, a church may well work with neighboring congregations to find someplace else the predator can attend where the predator will be watched to ensure no further harm is done but the victims don't have to deal with them. The chances of the predator harming someone are minimized. That's what you should do when you can't just throw the predator out.
But a con is not a church, and if there is a deep moral imperative to allow anyone (even predators) at a con, I've never heard it. If there is a deep moral imperative for why it has to be one con in particular and not another, I've never heard it. And if there's any procedure in place for what to do if Frenkel appeals after four years, gets a couple of character witnesses to swear he's reformed, and gets back in, and how to handle him to make sure he doesn't revert to type, I haven't heard that either.
