Read the post entitled RT/Hyatt Author Targeted here!
If it's been a while, it's the May 1st post.
Let me start by saying that I wasn't at RT this year, but I know a lot of the people involved in this, including Laura Baumbach, Kate Douglas, Lucynda Storey and Stephanie Burke. Let me further say that I HAVE one of Laura's ManLoveRomance magnets on my fridge...in a house with three school-aged children.
Why? Because there isn't an offensive thing about it, IMO. It's a beautiful guy chest with the site information on it. Nothing more. Heck, the kids see worse in Disney films. Not to mention the fact that two of my best friends are a gay couple. As my oldest sometimes says, when she hears of gay bashing and other forms of intolerance: "What business is it of theirs?" I have to agree.
So, what do we have here?
It seems that we have Mr. Lance Barnes on a power trip. There's no other excuse for it. There was nothing offensive about Laura's promo. Having stuffed 300 bags for EPICon with her latest materials...both personal ones and ones for ManLoveRomance, there wasn't a single one I objected to putting in the bags, and we have a PG-rating at EPICon that doesn't exist at RT! At RT, you're GOING to see promo material that is NC-17, at least. Expect it.
You have RT, that absolutely refuses to take a stand on behalf of their conventioneers. This shouldn't be a huge surprise, considering the fact that they also accept ads for M/M romances (which RWA and EPIC both recognize as a genre) but will not review them, though they provide reviews for all other books placing paid ads, up to 5 books per ad page. And, when approached to host a panel on the GROWING genre of M/M, in various forms, RT absolutely would not hear about it. Hmmm... Seems like this is a trend with them.
Here's what I find really interesting. Some of the bestselling and most popular authors at RT2006 were M/M authors. What do they think Morgan Hawke had with her in 2006? It was, as memory serves, two Yaoi and one Manga.
Futher, not ALL M/M promo was removed and not all tasteless promo was removed. Considering how tasteful Laura's are, "targeted attack" sounds precisely right to me. It must have sounded right to others there, as well...considering the uproar I've been hearing about it for the last few days.
Well, it took RT years to accept e-books as viable, and this year, we had panels on them. A whole track, which was great. I'm glad to see it. Wonder how long it will take them to catch up on this one? Longer, I'm sure, even though...ironically...RWA is behind on recognizing e-books but has recognized M/M romance.
Still, I would love to hear RT's excuse for not supporting one of their paying attendee's rights to display her promo, promo which was more than comparable with other offerings at the convention.
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