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Western Star, issue 4, September 10, 1950
Page 7
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convention program which was a work of pure genius. The bite of its satire can be measured by the fact that approximately forty persons walked out during the performance. They did lay it on thick. Aside from a bit of incidental political commentary (also quite appropos) and a few cracks at sex in science fiction, they did a biting parody on various soapy speeches Sturgeon had made at the convention, and also satirized Dianetics as being a crude mixture of sex, humbug, religion and hypnotism. It was your editors opinion that that act all by itself was better than any or all other parts of the program combined. NEW ORLEASNS, DENVER, THE LEPRECON --- AND WM SYKORA. . . . . . . The next convention will be in New Orleans. We personally couldn't think of a much worse Place for it, what with the general sub-human level of most Southern cities and a few of their inhabitants. We thought their "we are misunderstood" pleas at the convention were nothing short of sickening, particularly, in the light of the Ku-Klux type statements accompanying their pleas. (Just in case someone things I'm prejudiced against the South, I am. I grew up there. 19 years in Texas prejudiced me indeed. I might add that members of my own family were members of the K.K.K.) However, I do have hopes of attending the convention. New Orleans is a city I would like to see. A last minute bid was made by the Detroiters, but they got less than one third of the vote. An earlier bid might have been effective, but recent rumors of Michigan feuds (somesuch highly innacurate rumors were carried in the first issue of this publication) possibly cut down their support. However support is lining up for Detroit in '52. And we are laying definite plans for the Bay Area for 1953. It seems to have become customary for William Sykora to put in a bid for New York, wither or not he had the backing of any New York club. He put in his bid at the NORWESCON, and received exactly two votes, one of which was presumably his own. We might make a few recommendations to Mr. Sykora on the subject of strategy. Since Bill is one with whom we often find ourselves in agreement, we can only say that certain of his tactics pain us. First we would recommend that anyone wishing to gain the convention nomination for their own city (and we would definitely like to see a convention in New York) would be well advised to devote less of their energies to vicious and paranoic attacks on other leading fans and professionals of the same geographic area. Second, we would recommend anyone hoping to get a convention site to first rally support in their own back yard. And third, we should prefer to see much less of crap like HORNET'S NEST (an assinine, four page printed attack on Moscowitz and New York professionals, distributed by Sykora at Portland.) Last, on this topic, we find it hard to get excited on the subject of the ESFA - Hydra Conference. Sorry, but we see no reason why the East Coasters can't put on a regional affair, and we see no reason for insisting on such technicalities as limiting regionals to one day. The next WESTERCON is going to be a two day affair. It is our opinion that any conference put on by the New York professionals will be a credit to science fiction, and that's more than we can say of certain past and present performances of many of the fans. ---8 ---
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convention program which was a work of pure genius. The bite of its satire can be measured by the fact that approximately forty persons walked out during the performance. They did lay it on thick. Aside from a bit of incidental political commentary (also quite appropos) and a few cracks at sex in science fiction, they did a biting parody on various soapy speeches Sturgeon had made at the convention, and also satirized Dianetics as being a crude mixture of sex, humbug, religion and hypnotism. It was your editors opinion that that act all by itself was better than any or all other parts of the program combined. NEW ORLEASNS, DENVER, THE LEPRECON --- AND WM SYKORA. . . . . . . The next convention will be in New Orleans. We personally couldn't think of a much worse Place for it, what with the general sub-human level of most Southern cities and a few of their inhabitants. We thought their "we are misunderstood" pleas at the convention were nothing short of sickening, particularly, in the light of the Ku-Klux type statements accompanying their pleas. (Just in case someone things I'm prejudiced against the South, I am. I grew up there. 19 years in Texas prejudiced me indeed. I might add that members of my own family were members of the K.K.K.) However, I do have hopes of attending the convention. New Orleans is a city I would like to see. A last minute bid was made by the Detroiters, but they got less than one third of the vote. An earlier bid might have been effective, but recent rumors of Michigan feuds (somesuch highly innacurate rumors were carried in the first issue of this publication) possibly cut down their support. However support is lining up for Detroit in '52. And we are laying definite plans for the Bay Area for 1953. It seems to have become customary for William Sykora to put in a bid for New York, wither or not he had the backing of any New York club. He put in his bid at the NORWESCON, and received exactly two votes, one of which was presumably his own. We might make a few recommendations to Mr. Sykora on the subject of strategy. Since Bill is one with whom we often find ourselves in agreement, we can only say that certain of his tactics pain us. First we would recommend that anyone wishing to gain the convention nomination for their own city (and we would definitely like to see a convention in New York) would be well advised to devote less of their energies to vicious and paranoic attacks on other leading fans and professionals of the same geographic area. Second, we would recommend anyone hoping to get a convention site to first rally support in their own back yard. And third, we should prefer to see much less of crap like HORNET'S NEST (an assinine, four page printed attack on Moscowitz and New York professionals, distributed by Sykora at Portland.) Last, on this topic, we find it hard to get excited on the subject of the ESFA - Hydra Conference. Sorry, but we see no reason why the East Coasters can't put on a regional affair, and we see no reason for insisting on such technicalities as limiting regionals to one day. The next WESTERCON is going to be a two day affair. It is our opinion that any conference put on by the New York professionals will be a credit to science fiction, and that's more than we can say of certain past and present performances of many of the fans. ---8 ---
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