1) Drama is a nice thing to major in during college, but not one of those things I'm interested in.
2) I doubt anyone on
Talk of sex, stereotypes, and worse truth below.
Feel free to explain this one to me. I'm dying to hear it.
Things thou should know:
1) From your lips (or keyboard) to everyone's ears:
You may have been under the impression that only prayer moved that fast. You're wrong. The publishing industry gossip-net works with a speed that shames any high school gaggle of incrowders and their hangers on. Anything you say can and will be turned in half a million different directions and spun with an ease rivaled only by the spin masters in D.C. in a million more.
2) Funny, they didn't look important
That's right, they didn't. Where ever you are in professional circles, or the internet there are probably at least three people with some sort of stroke there who you don't know, don't recognize and as a rule don't want to offend. That doesn't change the fact that they are important. Most of the people I know in this industry remind me of college professors, accountants and librarians, several of them are or were in fact just those things. Of the handful with vast amounts of presence, you'll almost never see them in one place, it just works that way.
3) Fans are crazy
Yes, I love them. But ask around the con circuit, ask about Tazer Con and Sprinkler Con, or The Boskone From Hell and for some of the other war stories. Better still, go read the things Mercedes Lackey went through regarding a stalker, its right there on her website in all its many colored glory. That aside, the fans are the reason you get paid to lie to people. Fans (and pros) have long, long memories and will repeat what they experience of you for quite some time.
4) Patience isn't a virtue, it’s a necessity.
In some businesses things run about willy-nilly with events happening at a nearly glacial pace, this one isn't nearly so fast. So patience isn't a virtue, it’s a lifeline to what sanity can be claimed for anyone who makes up entire worlds to keep the little voices in their head distracted and then falls far enough under the sway of their hubris to believe other people will want to read their inventions.
5) Oh no they didn't!
Well, yes they did and no they didn't. They obviously don't have the wit to appreciate the quality of your pearls, and the probably did say or do something about if that makes no sense to you. Take note Sherlock, you're now in their shoes.
6) The Bigger they are titled
The less you can figure out from the title. Take royalties for instance, really, it won't take much room. The more grand the name of something in the industry, the less sense it may make. Is that Executive Production Assistant Editor the one doing the work and the one with the stroke or are they the glorified coffee toter, who knows, see numbers one and two.
7) Musical Chairs is a way of life
When you were seven musical chairs was a game you played at birthday parties, and any other time your parents wanted to wear you down in a controllable fashion, you probably aren't seven any more. Do you remember that editor you met who worked at publisher #2 six months ago? Well by now, they may be an agent, an editor at another house, a full time writer, or they might have gone on to do something at loosely connected to the degree they spent years laboring to get. But don't worry, they could be back.
8) The SMOF's rule the (fan) world
Secret Masters Of Fantasy is not (usually) an insult, it too is a way of life, there's even a convention for them. These are the people who either do have as much stroke as a peeved editor or think they do, you probably can't tell which group they are in. Assume they do have the stroke to damage your career. Just because you meet them running a con in San Diego, doesn't mean they aren't engaged so someone who runs cons in Philly, see numbers one, two and seven.
9) There are no new spins
If you have produced something publishable, you probably haven't created something original, or innovative, or heaven help us all never been done before!. You've hopefully managed a way of executing a story it that is entertaining, and well done. That's it, deal with it. As soon as you say of those things or there equivalents you lose credibility faster than a toddler with crumbs on their lips who claims not to have eaten the missing cookie.
It should come as no surprise to anyone that I enjoy studing human nature. I also greatly enjoy discussing it. The title article will probably kick off a touch of an arguement.
It should be noted that people who are not arguing with logic and facts but with venom and emotion will have their comments deleted.
Teasers here, whole article here.
1) Men like blond bombshells (and women want to look like them)
Long before TV—in 15th- and 16th- century Italy, and possibly two millennia ago—women were dying their hair blond. A recent study shows that in Iran, where exposure to Western media and culture is limited, women are actually more concerned with their body image, and want to lose more weight, than their American counterparts. It is difficult to ascribe the preferences and desires of women in 15th-century Italy and 21st-century Iran to socialization by media.
2) Humans are naturally polygamous
The history of western civilization aside, humans are naturally polygamous. Polyandry (a marriage of one woman to many men) is very rare, but polygyny (the marriage of one man to many women) is widely practiced in human societies, even though Judeo-Christian traditions hold that monogamy is the only natural form of marriage. We know that humans have been polygynous throughout most of history because men are taller than women.
3) Most women benefit from polygyny, while most men benefit from monogamy
When there is resource inequality among men—the case in every human society—most women benefit from polygyny: women can share a wealthy man. Under monogamy, they are stuck with marrying a poorer man.
4) Most suicide bombers are Muslim
According to the Oxford University sociologist Diego Gambetta, editor of Making Sense of Suicide Missions, a comprehensive history of this troubling yet topical phenomenon, while suicide missions are not always religiously motivated, when religion is involved, it is always Muslim. Why is this? Why is Islam the only religion that motivates its followers to commit suicide missions?
5) Having sons reduces the likelihood of divorce
Sociologists and demographers have discovered that couples who have at least one son face significantly less risk of divorce than couples who have only daughters. Why is this?
6) Beautiful people have more daughters
It is commonly believed that whether parents conceive a boy or a girl is up to random chance. Close, but not quite; it is largely up to chance. The normal sex ratio at birth is 105 boys for every 100 girls. But the sex ratio varies slightly in different circumstances and for different families. There are factors that subtly influence the sex of an offspring.
7) What Bill Gates and Paul McCartney have in common with criminals
For nearly a quarter of a century, criminologists have known about the "age-crime curve." In every society at all historical times, the tendency to commit crimes and other risk-taking behavior rapidly increases in early adolescence, peaks in late adolescence and early adulthood, rapidly decreases throughout the 20s and 30s, and levels off in middle age.
8) The midlife crisis is a myth—sort of
Many believe that men go through a midlife crisis when they are in middle age. Not quite. Many middle-aged men do go through midlife crises, but it's not because they are middle-aged. It's because their wives are. From the evolutionary psychological perspective, a man's midlife crisis is precipitated by his wife's imminent menopause and end of her reproductive career, and thus his renewed need to attract younger women. Accordingly, a 50-year-old man married to a 25-year-old woman would not go through a midlife crisis, while a 25-year-old man married to a 50-year-old woman would, just like a more typical 50-year-old man married to a 50-year-old woman. It's not his midlife that matters; it's hers. When he buys a shiny-red sports car, he's not trying to regain his youth; he's trying to attract young women to replace his menopausal wife by trumpeting his flash and cash.
9) It's natural for politicians to risk everything for an affair (but only if they're male)
On the morning of January 21, 1998, as Americans woke up to the stunning allegation that President Bill Clinton had had an affair with a 24-year-old White House intern, Darwinian historian Laura L. Betzig thought, "I told you so." Betzig points out that while powerful men throughout Western history have married monogamously (only one legal wife at a time), they have always mated polygynously (they had lovers, concubines, and female slaves). With their wives, they produced legitimate heirs; with the others, they produced bastards. Genes make no distinction between the two categories of children.
10) Men sexually harass women because they are not sexist
An unfortunate consequence of the ever-growing number of women joining the labor force and working side by side with men is the increasing number of sexual harassment cases. Why must sexual harassment be a necessary consequence of the sexual integration of the workplace?
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Thoughts?