Day 3 of Lovecraftian Social Justice Warrior Week heralds another digital item: Silvia Moreno-Garcia and Paula R. Stiles' anthology of Lovecraftian horror by an all-female roster of writers, She Walks in Shadows. Typically when a project like this comes to the attention of the Lovecraftian community, it is greeted with thoughtful interest and, for the most part, appreciation that editors are actively seeking to encourage diversity and inclusivity, as well as acknowledgement of the importance of both subverting Lovecaft's racism and sexism, as well as recognising the potential of mobilising his cosmicism in support of embracing difference in the context of contemporary identity politics.
There are, of course, those occasional bottom-feeders that usually flounder around the darkest recesses of the Lovecraftan internet who think otherwise, and who will troll you endlessly for not agreeing with their usually toxic brand of masculinity or racism - indeed, I've already encountered some of this in relation to Oscar Rios' forthcoming Heroes of Red Hook anthology, where the Lovecraftian equivalent of Gamergaters have been crowing about reverse sexism and racism, wholly failing to recognise how they as (usually white males) benefit from those embedded structural inequalities which operate to exclude POC, women and LGBTQ people. Or one encounters those who feel that the whole genre is somehow depoliticised, and that raising these issues in the first place is devisive and disruptive to the field. At which point, the term 'social justice warrior' starts getting flung about as a perjorative - perhaps (as I like to believe) as a means of deflecting self-interrogation of the possibility that, not only are these structural inequalities functionally extant, but that one's inaction regarding them might also make one complicit in their promulgation.
But I digress - if nothing else, She Walks in Shadows is excellent, so please buy it now.
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