DraftTrek Interview with David Gerrold
| Interviews by Fans | |
|---|---|
| Title: | DraftTrek Interview with David Gerrold |
| Interviewer: | Randall Landers and Tim Farley |
| Interviewee: | David Gerrold |
| Date(s): | interview conducted "a few weeks after" September 19th, 1985 |
| Medium: | |
| Fandom(s): | Star Trek TOS, slash |
| External Links: | entire transcript is here, Archived version |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
In 1985, David Gerrold was interviewed during the convention DraftTrek.
Gerrold expressed impatience with the whole concept of K/S and his distaste for slash fans, saying there are far bigger issues in the world, like AIDS, starvation in Africa and a blood donor shortage. He didn't consider K/S fans "real Star Trek fans".
In 1987, the transcripts were published in Power of Speech #3 (partial) and Orion #24 (full).
See the 2007 essay "There She is Again...Like a Turd in the Fandom Pool..." for similar concerns voiced a little bit more elegantly by a slash fan.
See List of Star Trek Fan Interviews.
Some Excerpts
Well, I can’t understand why I’m controversial. I always tell the truth. There’s the old saying, ‘the truth will set you free.’ Well, first it’s going to piss you off. I tell the truth, and some people get upset by it. One of the truths that I’ve been telling lately is that Kirk and Spock are not only lovers, they’re not even boyfriends. They’re just good friends. This has offended a whole subculture that is convinced they are.It’s bizarre! I was at a convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, a few weeks ago. This lady comes up to me with this stuff, and, after a thirty minute discussion, I finally said, "Stop! We’re arguing over whether or not two fictitious characters are getting their hands in each others’ pants!"
I honestly don’t care! I honestly don’t!! If you want to imagine that Kirk and Spock are going off and schtooping each other, that’s fine with me; I don’t care!!
Star Trek fans, the good ones that I consider my friends, went out to this small little convention and raised some 250 pints of blood. It was a tiny little convention timed each year before a long weekend so that there would be enough blood on hand for the Labor Day Weekend. And that’s not the only convention that has sponsored a blood drive; this thing has spread so that a lot of them now have blood drives. And some of them raise money for charities; I went to one in England and they raised something like $3000.00 for Muscular Dystrophy. When they told me what they were doing, I passed over my speaker’s fee. I’ve been lucky, and I don’t want to deprive someone. So I told them to give it to the kids. And there have been other cons, Equicon 1 for one, gave $3000.00 to the cancer fund of the Motion Picture Home and Hospital ... and there are these people who want to argue whether or not Kirk and Spock are schtooping each other?!
In the end, where do you want to have stood? When these so-called ‘Star Trek fans’ (and I don’t consider them Star Trek fans--I think they are fat ladies with a sexual dysfunction)[1] [2], when they come forth and want to prove their moral position, let them do something that makes a difference on the planet. As far as I’m concerned, the real Star Trek fans have demonstrated what they’re up to over and over and over again. Star Trek fans made the stars on the Hollywood Walk possible; they’ve given money so that children with terminal diseases can fulfill their fantasies (the Make-A-Wish Foundation).[3]So, yeah, I’m controversial! When creating Star Trek, from 1966 through 1969, we were not writing masturbatory fantasies for fat ladies with sexual dysfunctions, and those of you reading this can stick it. I think Human beings should not wallow. I tell people to stop peeing in the swimming pool and get out, especially when it’s not your pool in the first place. So yeah, I’m controversial...sue me. [Reconsiders.] No, no, don’t sue me!
I’m not a nice man; I’ve said this over and over. And I’ll tell you this much: ten or fifteen years ago when fandom was first getting started, I couldn’t understand why some people were saying such mean things about me. They’d say, "You’re not a nice person." And I’d say, "Yes, I am." And they’d say, "No, you’re not!" After a few years, it began to sink in. You know, maybe they know something I don’t. I really am not a nice person. And since I’ve begun telling everyone, "I’m not a nice person," my life has been a lot easier.
References
- ^ Gerrold appears to be fixated on female fans' weight. In the 1983 edition of The World of Star Trek he refers to a woman who allegedly went around various conventions -- reading to presumably unwilling listeners her 150-page single-spaced study of Spock and Vulcan -- as "a charter member of size-nineteen Star Trek fandom."
- ^ Also see Just for the record, I always assumed Sulu was gay. That was a lot more fun than assuming Kirk and Spock were lovers. (2016)
- ^ Given the clandestine nature of slash fandom in 1985, no slash writer or fan would have revealed herself as one when engaged in charitable acts. See Slash Controversies#Illegality of Slash.