Talk:Marion Zimmer Bradley/Archive 1

Lesbian?

Was MZB a lesbian or bisexual? Because she was married a few times.

My mother, Marion Zimmer Bradley, considered herself to be a lesbian. She lived with her longtime partner, who I will not name here, for the last 22 years of her life. (added by User:Moiragreyland 6 May 2014, restored by User:Argyriou with formatting)

Or did she just have sympathy for the plight of lesbians in her writing? I'm a little confused, as she's listed under "Lesbian Writers" (as if she is a lesbian herself).

See MZB and Marion Zimmer Bradley On Writing SF&F: "Now connected to a bi-sexual support group. Admits has always been attracted to women, always written for lesbian publications under own name." Shsilver 16:29, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, --Tom 17:30, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Dates

According to this page:

http://www.nndb.com/people/068/000044933/

the marriage and divorce dates are different. What's going on with this?

Darkover

I cannot see that the early Darkover novels are any less (or more) science-fictional than the later. Darkover was always a place that earthmen reached by spaceships and a place where psi-powers reached almost magical proportions. Cdixon 17:35, 13 September 2005 (UTC)

Fixation

Um... what's with 203.221.31.205 's fixation on the pedophilia thing? Granted the case against Breen seems legit, but the article's not about him. Mhari 01:26, 20 October 2005 (UTC)

Falcons of Narabedla was actually first published in the May 1957 issue of Movie Magazine. The 1964 date often attributed to this work is the year Ace Books reprinted it. Falcons of Narabedla is MZB's first novel-length (127 pp in the Ace edition) submission to see print and as such is a surprisingly good read. In the Foreword to it (Ace edition) she cites the stories of Kuttner, Hamilton, and Brackett as being the primary inspirations for this novel. I am updating the main page's bibliography and descriptive section only as needed.

Actually, Falcons of Narabedla was published in Other Wolrds (see here for instance). This is confirmed by MZB herself in A Darkover Retrospective, published in the 1982 reprint of The Planet Savers/The Sword of Aldones by Ace Books. I've fixed this in the article, as well as the publication date of The Planet Savers (1958 in Amazing Stories). By the way, the bio on nndb is full of mistakes. Fabrice Rossi 13:28, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

Paul Edwin Zimmer

I realize his books are all out of print but a mention of MZB's brother and fellow-author might be appropriate. He is credited, and properly so, with being the co-author of the survivor series. He was a very fine writer and an important SCA figure himself. Will in New Haven —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.186.154.139 (talk) 23:58, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Feminist?

I find this rather odd. I'm just getting into MZB's works, enjoying them a great deal, but I can't find anything feminist about them. They correct a common imbalance in fantasy fiction - male-orientation - by bringing a balanced perspective to bear. What's feminist about that? Feminism is a political ideology, not an authorial style. Did MZB call her works "feminist" or is this just a label being applied after the fact by others? -a puzzled Kasreyn 05:35, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

I agree. I think MZB is considered feminist because of the contrast between her first works and the main orientation of sience-fiction and fantasy at this time. However, some of her novels (Darkover Landfall for instance) are far from feminist pamphlets. Those works received a lot of criticisms by feminist groups. MZB is also considered as gay friendly, but again some of her works (e.g., The Heritage of Hastur) were criticized by gay groups. In "A Darkover perspective" MZB never call herself feminist and tend to have strong words against feminist. Fabrice Rossi 08:32, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

I disagree. Yes, not all her writing is feminist but their is definitely a lot (which is not a bad thing!!!). She has a lot of short stories and random Darkover books with very strong female leads + more importantly story plots that raise up feminist issues. On a side note, it would be really nice to see this article reach a FA. I am going to start working on this next month (hopefully). (Blacksun 06:54, 24 March 2006 (UTC))

I agree on strong female characters and feminist issues, however I think you should reread Darkover Landfall for instance. The way Camilla Del Rey is depicted is quite unpleasing: she is for instance considered a freak because she doesn't want children. Here is a quote from "A Darkover perspective":

Darkover Landfall stirred up a furor because some outraged feminists objected to the stand I took in the book, that the survival of the human race on Darkover could, and should, be allowed to supersede the personal convenience of any single woman in the group. I have debated this subject ad nauseam in the fanzines, and I absolutely refuse to debate it again, but to those who refuse to accept the tenet "Biology is Destiny" I have begun to ask them to show me a vegetarian lion or tiger before they debate the issue further.

The first part is questionable, I guess (interestingly, the very same issue happens in Battlestar Galactica (new version, second season)), but the second part is clearly non feminist for many people. Fabrice Rossi 13:43, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't think that writing a realistic story makes her a non feminist. Their are dozens of other books where her female characters question the characterizing of females as "baby machines" in the society. However, darkfall landfall is a very unique story and rather believable in context. Their are scores of real life examples to support the plot. --Blacksun 08:26, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

The issue is not about the story being realistic or not, but more about how much the author seems to agree with the idea that women are actually "baby machines" and that all of this boils down to "biology is destiny", which is to me a major stupidity and, of course, the very opposite position to feminism. Anyway, I think that a complete and neutral biography of MZB must include that her feminist label has been and is still debated. Fabrice Rossi 12:35, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

Ofcourse, any criticisms should be included. However, I still do not agree with you :P. I agree with bradley that under the special context of darkover landfall, one cannot hope to maintain the same standards of individual rights (feminist, or whatever else) as in an established society. I do not think that taking this stand makes one a non feminist. People who think that, in my opinion, live in a lala world and do not have the sole right to definie feminism. Finally, it is an entirely different (but significant) case that Bradley's work has probably done more for empowerement of women all over the world than most of her critics. Just my two cents. --Blacksun 21:13, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

I would say that MZB showed a strong feminist consciousness that later became quite radical. The difference in her 'coming of age' stories when the protagonist was girl as opposed to a boy is highly interesting. In 'Heritage of Hastur' Regis learns to give up his private ambitions to fulfill his duty to Darkover. Magdalen Lorne on the other hand is depicted as being perfectly justified in abandoning her commitments to the Terran Empire, the Renunciates, the Forbidden Tower and to her own children in order to pursue personal enlightenment in 'City of Sorcery'. Magda and Jael are freemates, (a form of marriage) and have carefully arranged matters so the fathers of their daughters have no legal claim to them. This makes Jael's decision, and later Magda's, to abandon the girls to further their own feminist enlightenment particularly despicable. --- Roxana

I could use some guidance please, if anyone is inclined. I have a copy of the Winter 1954 Thrilling Wonder Stories containing a 'letter to the editor' MZB wrote that might apply here. It's rather long and I don't feel comfortable excerpting it on my own, but it discusses birth control, specifically 'young females who believe themselves eminently qualified to judge for themselves how many children they ought to have and resented my implications that their squallings might be motivated by selfishness.' Here are two more sentences: 'America is swinging, slowly but surely, toward a matriarchy -- and decadence. Women, in their present emotional muddle, are NOT SUITED (sic) to assume important positions in the commanding of the world...my personal preference is for today's generation of mental eunuchs to recover their lost manhood and give today's women a good swift kick in the seat of their mass-produced pants!' Grey mouser (talk) 17:39, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

Huh?

What does it mean, "for a long time she refused to disclose the titles"? That makes no sense. Rocinante9 17:02, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

It means that people didn't know which pseudonyms she wrote the books under, and what their titles were.--Prosfilaes 19:11, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Episcopalian?

Could someone please explain to me how this Christian hating feminazi could possibly be a Episcopalian?

My mother, Marion Zimmer Bradley, told me she attended the Episcopal church for the music, and would have preferred to have been performing rituals in Stonehenge. She identified as a pagan, and for some time, ran the Darkmoon Circle, now known as the Covenant of the Goddess. --Moira Greyland (added by User:Moiragreyland 6 May 2014, restored by User:Argyriou with formatting)

FTR I rarely use the term feminazi but hey if the jackboot fits..... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 132.241.246.111 (talk • contribs) 5 October 2006

Although I reject your insulting tone and bigoted attitude, there is nonetheless a valid question buried in your comment.

Does anyone know whether -- and when -- MZB identified herself as an Episcopalian? Nothing in the article indicates that she did, but she is listed as an "American Episcopalian" in the categories at the bottom of the page.

I just added a subsection on her religous beliefs, and based on what it says, it seems at the very least misleading to call her an Episcopalian in the 1980s. However, she also refers to an evolution of her beliefs, so I can easily imagine she had been an Episcopalian once. I don't know what the criteria are for Wikipedia categories, so I don't know if this tag should be removed. — Lawrence King ^(talk) 10:34, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

In theory--though often not in practice--religious categories should be used only on articles where the religion is a significant part of the person's biography. In a case like this, where we are uncertain of the religion, it shouldn't go on the article.--Prosfilaes (talk) 11:58, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Society for Creative Anachronism

"...name "Society for Creative Anachronism" was coined by science fiction author Marion Zimmer Bradley, an early participant, when the nascent group needed an official name in order to reserve a park for a tournament. In 1968 Marion Zimmer Bradley moved to Staten Island New York State and founded the Kingdom of the East, holding a tournament that summer to determine the first Eastern King of the SCA...". Perhaps a minor thing compared to her writing, but I was surprised to see to mention of it, the --Snori 02:08, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

added mention of that.Mzmadmike 14:48, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

litigation/settlement

I enjoy her works as well, but feel that her complicity on the ongoing molestation of at least several underaged boys needs to be acknowledged. She admitted her actions in sworn depositions that are available online. She went so far as to knowingly assist her husband Walter Breen procure victims (they applied for a foster care license and took in wayward boys for him to victimize). She thought her husband was impotent and did not consider him orally copulating a minor to be abuse, so long as the victim had the opportunity to refuse (these were 13 year old boys). It gets far worse. I suggest you read the depositions. The refusal of some of her fan accept this fact is disturbing. I refuse to ignore this behavior simply because I enjoy her work.Chief1 08:17, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Sadly, this is true. My mother, Marion Zimmer Bradley, was aware of my father's proclivities, and went so far as to edit his vile book "Greek Love." He went to prison and was convicted of 13 counts of PC 288 A, B, C, and D. (added by User:Moiragreyland 6 May 2014, restored by User:Argyriou with formatting)

User:Chief1 has been adding information about the Walter Breen issue. I've had to revert a couple of times because it is unsourced. Beyond that, most serious, concern, there is a secondary concern, which is undue weight.

On the first point: Any controversial information needs to be sourced, which means it needs to have a reference. (WP:V) However, not all references are equally useful. Legal documents -- all legal documents -- require significant interpretation and contextualization to understand them and describe them accurately. Depositions, for instance, are prepared in an adversarial context, which is not aimed at producing truthful, verifiable facts. I haven't seen any depositions cited as references on wikipedia; they certainly shouldn't be used as general sources for statements. Reading and understanding them requires such a high level of skill and understanding that it is, for all intents and purposes, a type of original research -- which is not acceptable for publishing in wikipedia. (WP:NOR)

Please note, I'm not stating anything about the truth of the allegations you're making. Just about whether they can be documented in a way that is appropriate for an encyclopedia.

Second, on the issue of undue weight. Undue weight is a part of the "neutral point of view" policy. (See WP:NPOV.) Her biography currently has four paragraphs, one of which is devoted to this issue. Most of the biography is basic biographical facts -- other family connections, degrees, birth, and death. Of the not-quite-utterly-basic biographical information, there is one sentence on Daughters of Bilitis, and a paragraph of three sentences on the Walter Breen issue. That's about 25% of the total biography. Doing more than that strikes me as disproportionate and therefore undue weight. And especially if we were to properly contextualize the statements that you keep putting in, with whatever the MZB people would want to say -- it would really start to take over the biography section, if not the entire article.

In short, this article must have a neutral point of view. It may not be written in order to get her fans to accept anything; this article is not written by, or for, MZB's fans. Rather, this is an encyclopedia article, about Marion Zimmer Bradley, to be read by fans, critics, people who have never heard of her, and so on. Trying to beef up a section in order to make a point to her fans of the seriousness of the issue is not the purpose of a biographical article.

Please do not keep reinserting the material until these issues have been discussed on the talk page.

--lquilter 16:37, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure I agree on the undue weight issue; that usually seems to be used as an excuse to keep the material that interesting and controversial out of the article, because it outweighs the boring material. Furthermore, the entire page is about her and certainly calling the literary career section not biography seems a little absurd. It does need to be clearly cited though, and in the same manner as the rest of the article.

However, I find the line about Moira Stern "has spent most of her adult life in and out of mental hospitals" to be completely unacceptable. It's uncited, and it's prejudicial towards a living person, and even if it's purely true I don't think it's relevant to a one sentence biography.--Prosfilaes 17:15, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

There is a reference to the Walter Breen situation on the front page that basically describes the incident. I'm happy to have discussion about the weight issue, but the material absolutely must be sourced, and depositions are not the right source for general descriptions of the issue. Anyway, if the editor can produce the actual cites, and better sources, let's work on editing. I'm happy to have more detail included of relevant scandals; I would just want to beef up the other stuff about her life too. --lquilter 01:11, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

Hello, As I noted on your page, thanks for the comments. I am better versed in the facts of this case than wiki editing protocols and will apply your critique by adding the indicated citations.

In response to your other concern- This is not a "Walter Breen issue." It is a Marion Zimmer Bradley issue. She actively participated in procuring underaged boys for her husband throughout their marriage and afterwards as well. Disclosing that is hardly giving the matter undue weight. It is an important biographical issue resulting in civil litigation that plagued her for the rest of her life. The matter is thoroughly documented (as you will see).

Regarding no citation for the daughters mental illness-The statement that she is a professional singer and harpist is not cited either. In fact, Moira Breen/Sterns professional career consists of playing the harp Friday nights at a local Starbucks in Reno Nevada. She also has a self-published DVD available on her website and was edited out of one background/extra role in a feature film. The point is taken, however, and I will not insert the info with a citation. She is a sad legacy of a talented but very disturbed author.Chief1 01:27, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

I take exception to this. I have been a professional harpist for over twenty years. I have played in literally hundreds of special events and weddings and parties, including one in Calabasas for Hillary Clinton and one in San Bernardino for Dianne Feinstein. Moreover, I have founded two opera companies and directed nine operas. I have a Master's in Music Performance. --Moira Greyland. (added by User:Moiragreyland 6 May 2014, restored by User:Argyriou with formatting)

While it would be nice to have citations for her career, it's considered very important to have cites on stuff that's negative and potentially considered libelous. Furthermore, the implication, which you just made more explicit, that mental illness is somehow the fault of the parents is one of the stigmas that people with mental illness fight and simply not true in most cases.--Prosfilaes 15:05, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

I deny mental illness. I don't know who is accusing me, but there is a difference between being mentally ill and being in the position of having to put one's own FATHER in JAIL.

Any efforts made to paint me as mentally ill are undoubtedly the result of an attempt to discredit my testimony against my parents: testimony which was sufficient to assist in his prosecution, arrest, and incarceration. --Moira Greyland (added by User:Moiragreyland 6 May 2014, restored by User:Argyriou with formatting)

Chief1, she is more than a "sad legacy." I am no fan of MZB or Walter Breen, but it chills me how the other MZB detractors here wish to depict Moira Breen as simply the human wreckage of her parents' behavior. She does not deserve to be summarized as just a psychiatric patient. Either describe her more fully here, or simply mention her by name and nothing else.

I am not "human wreckage." I am a professional musician. I currently train harpists and opera singers, and perform regularly. Even the most cursory search of my name online will demonstrate this. Feel free to contact me if you need more information. --Moira Greyland. (added by User:Moiragreyland 6 May 2014, restored by User:Argyriou with formatting)

On the other hand, I am disgusted that a previous author referred to Breen's "affair with a 14-year-old boy," which I have changed to "sexual molestation of a 14-year-old boy." Fourteen-year-olds in the U.S. cannot give consent to sex, at least not with significantly older adults. That phrase sounds straight out of NAMBLA, to be blunt. 98.217.235.131 (talk) 22:15, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

The "affair" with a 14 year old boy was undoubtedly one of the John Does 1-6 named in my father's trial. I also dispute the sense of calling molestation "affairs." --Moira Greyland (added by User:Moiragreyland 6 May 2014, restored by User:Argyriou with formatting)

Ghostwriter?

I don’t know if there is a word for “writing from beyond the grave” but I came to the wikipedia as I was curious as to how, despite her death in 1999, MZB is credited with an entire series (Clingfire) and now has an upcoming series (Children of Kings trilogy) and two forthcoming novels (The Reluctant King and Thunderlord!). Are these unpublished MZB manuscripts, MZB outlines that the co-authors are filling out, or are publishers using her name as it sells books and MZB is now a pseudonym or perhaps a house name? Marc Kupper (talk) 02:19, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Shadow's Gate vs. Witchlight series

I saw the recent edit to add Heartlight to the Shadow's Gate series and decided to look into this. The wiki page has the Colin McLaren series followed by the Shadow's Gate series. FWIW, Fantastic Fiction calls the Colin McLaren series "Claire Moffatt" and the Shadow's Gate series Witchlight [1] while Amazon uses "Light" (with the quote marks) for the latter series.

Here's a table using Amazon's Search Inside to search for various words to see if these series should be merged/renamed. The Amazon links are to the editions with the Look Inside / Search Inside in case you want to do your own searches. It's possible that things like MacLaran instead of MacLaren are OCR errors. I included the results here for completeness. Some books have more than one scanned image available and I included both links to verify the consistency of the OCR.

Title	Colin	MacLaren	MacLaran	Claire	Moffatt	Moffat	Amazon
Colin MacLaren / Claire Moffatt series
Witch Hill (1972)	18	0	5	21	1	0	0312872836
The Inheritor(1984)	52	7	0	71	5	0	0312862938
Heartlight (1998)	390	102	0	211	2	15	0312865090
Dark Satanic (1988)	Amazon Look Inside not available
Shadow's Gate / Witchlight / "Light" series
Ghostlight (1995)	6	7	0	1	0	1	0765346664
Ghostlight (1995)	6	6	0	1	0	1	0312862180
Witchlight (1996)	5	5	0	0	0	0	0765347148
Witchlight (1996)	5	5	0	0	0	0	0312858310
Gravelight (1997)	2	4	0	0	0	0	0765346672
Gravelight (1997)	2	4	0	0	0	0	0312865074

Summary - I would like to rename the Colin McLaren series to "Colin McLaren / Claire Moffat" but should it be Moffat or Moffatt? The earlier books used Moffat while Heartlight uses Moffatt more often. Marc Kupper (talk) (contribs) 22:34, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Unsourced material and external links

I removed some material and a web site. --Tom 17:40, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

And I've put them back. While the material is definitely negative towards MZB, it is well documented with long verbatim quotes from court records. Goldin's expressed opinion regarding MZB based on that material is accurately portrayed as such in the brief mention of it in the article. Just because something is unpleasant doesn't mean it should be supressed.

At the same time, it does make sense to remove material that is totally unsupported. I've taken out the "quotes" section -- of the two given, neither were sourced, and for the first it was actually admitted to be dubious.

The fact that Tom removed well-supported but highly charged material while letting stand other material that is unsupported but relatively neutral may indicate that accuracy was not really the issue here... BPK 20:51, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I am a big fan of Bradley, is that what you are getting out? The problem is with the source per wp:el so I removed it. Maybe try to find a wp:rs for this material. --Tom 12:17, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

My implication is that your admiration for her work influenced your decision to cull material unfavorable to her, material, moreover, that was almost unique in the article for being adequately sourced. I see that another restorer has already addressed the issue of unreliability; sure, the source is biased (and understandably so), but that bias does not in and of itself impugn the reliability of the evidence it presents. Since much of the evidence is in the form of court depositions from MZB and her associates themselves, it's their reliability your calling into question, unless you're contending it has been doctored to misrepresent their words. While the source draws a conclusion from the evidence, these were properly represented as opinion, not established fact. There is simply nothing to back up your contention that the source is unreliable.

There is nothing wrong with being a fan of MZB or admiring MZB's work; I am and do, as well. That admiration does not, however, give us the right to suppress unadmirable facts. I'm also a fan of the music of Richard Wagner, but that would not justify any decision on my part to go into the Wagner article and excise all the references to his antisemitism. People, even geniuses, come with warts. If we're to understand them, we need to see them warts and all.

Incidentally, some of the bibliographic material you recently deleted as unsourced was sourced, so I've put it back in. BPK 17:03, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't know Bradley from a hole in the ground and NEVER heard of her before and do not want to know about her. The problem is with [2] which is not a reliable source. I could get a page put up there that says you are a child rapist, would you like that linked to your bio if you had one? You say that the material is sourced to court depositions? Just provide a reliable source that backs that material up and we are finished. Again, I really don't give a rat's ass about this lady, its more about verifing material and not using online communities as sources. Anyways, --Tom 18:34, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Well, you're the one who said you were a fan; apparently you were being facetious. All I can say is that you're certainly seem to have a lot invested in a subject you claim to know nothing about. And you have done nothing to support your assertion that the source is unreliable; sorry, just a bald and repeated statement to that effect doesn't wash. This whole matter has been gone over before (I need merely refer you higher in this discussion page), and was plainly resolved to the then-disputants' satisfaction with the sourcing of the controversial issue. There should have been no need to rake it up again. Having gone over the source in question, I myself find it quite credible in matters of fact, and it's obviously reliable as an expression of its author's opinion. But I'm tired of wasting everyone's time by going back and forth on this. Since you hold otherwise and plainly aren't going to change your mind, I rewrote the contested paragraph, citing a neutral source (one of Bradley's fullest obituaries, from the London Independent) for the factual material and retaining the citation to the original source as support for the subjective judgment it indisputedly reflects. Good enough for you?

I have, once again, restored the bibliographic material you wrongly claimed was unsourced and had again deleted, this time without even a comment. It was sourced, as it properly should have been, being a matter of future intention. I can only assume that the problem you have with it is that it provides information on works that have not actually been published yet, although that's not what you said. To address your stated complaint, since the information is from the co-author's own website, it's as authoritative as to her intentions as you can get. You can't get more reliable than that. BPK 06:50, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

I am not particularly comfortable with the source that cited for this statement and have removed it from the body of the article.

Breen's accusers claim Bradley had supported him in hiding his relations with several teenage boys, citing her court deposition acknowledging she had known about them. [3]

I see this as an extraordinary claim and that should have extraordinary citations to back it.

• At present, the only source cited are a set of web pages maintained by one of MZB's accusers.
• A source for the depositions themselves are not cited.
• The accusing site also has a time line but does not provide data that could help others verify the claims such as what court/judges were involved. The statements from this time-line that look like they could cite sources are:
  • "Nov. 1989 - Mary first files suit on Ken's behalf". What court and judge? What's the outcome?
  • There was a second suit and counter-suit with the statement "Aug. 1999 - Settlement reached in favor of Ken & entered in court." What court and judge were this before? What were the about and what was the outcome? "Settlement reached in favor" is vague as often both sides spin the outcome as being something in their favor.
  • The site also posts what seems like a defense of MZB though again, the source of this article is unknown. There's nothing about it on Elisabeth Waters's site nor www.mzbworks.com.

As far as I'm concerned, MZB is dead, someone close to her (Elisabeth Waters) seems to claim that MZB did not know about Breen's molestations at the time they occurred, and there seem have been three lawsuits though how these relate to the claims is not clear. Until there's direct verifiable evidence supporting the statement above I believe it should not be included in the article. Marc Kupper (talk) (contribs) 05:34, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

You see what as an extraordinary claim? That site proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that they claim that. --Prosfilaes 12:08, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Indeed. My point exactly. Breen's conviction is verifiable easily enough. What MZB knew and when she knew it, and whether she was complicit, are somewhat harder to run down elsewhere than Goldin's site. MZB's devotees and partisans can't be expected to post anything detrimental to their idol, and her stature within the science fiction/fantasy community notwithstanding, she just wasn't a big enough celebrity for the controversy to make a huge splash in the media. But whether you believe Goldin or not, his site demonstrates that the controversy exists and is felt strongly in some quarters, and what his take on it is. Granted, it's an extraordinary claim, and would indeed require extraordinary verification to be treated as fact in this article. But while I personally have no doubt about the truth of the claim, the contested statement in this article does not treat it as fact; it merely states that it is a claim made by MZB's accusers. No extraordinary proof is needed for that; you just have to follow the citation to the site. BPK 06:07, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

So basically you are saying that if I were to create a web page that states that Steve Golin's site is entirely false that I would be allowed to link in the MZB article to if with the statement "there is a claim that the previous claim is entirely false?" I would hope not. We have one person, on one site, that has not provided verifiable citations of their claims. Something I could support for the MZB article would be to add a section called "litigation" that would outline the cases but that section would need to cite the courts and dates involved so that someone interested in the issue could get copies of transcripts, judgments, etc. This would get the MZB article based squarely on verifiable data. Marc Kupper (talk) (contribs) 07:53, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Let me expand on this a bit more - my interest is in verifiable data. I used to get pissed when the wikpedia "police" came along and started tagging things fact-checking-needed, citation-needed, etc. After a while, I started to understand there's a great deal of value in this process. It turns making the encyclopedia into a "science" where I can read an article and should be able to replicate the author's results/findings. Thus, what I'm looking for is a way for people to verify Steve Golin's claims. It seems the easiest thing would be to at least list the dates, courts, and judges involved as part of the references. Marc Kupper (talk) (contribs) 08:17, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

You may also ask me. --Moira Greyland. (added by User:Moiragreyland 6 May 2014, restored by User:Argyriou with formatting)

(unindent) BTW, I'm personally happy with the latest wording and references regarding MZB/Breen/Goldin. Thank you BPK2. Marc Kupper (talk) (contribs) 22:04, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Stephen Goldin

Does anybody have any material about Goldin's involvement with child abuse? I am still trying to find some better sources than his for Bradley's involvement with her husband's afairs. --Tom 13:21, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Was Goldin's son abused? I am trying to dig through his web site to understand this better. Does Goldin have a son named Ken?--Tom 13:41, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Ok, it looks like Goldin's stepson was Ken who was abused. Do we know when the abuse started and to what extent Goldin's involvement was? Man this thing is ugly!--Tom 13:45, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

The timeline says "Nov. 1985 - Ken travels to Berkeley ... Molested for the first time." with the source cited as "Walter's confession." Ken turned 21 in 1997 meaning he was born in 1976 and the molestation occurred between ages 9 and 10 for Ken though this page says "Ken was 8 years old when Walter began molesting him."

As for Goldin's involvement? I agree that's confusing at first and takes a little digging through Goldin's web sites. He's had a relationship with Mary (Ken's mother) since at least 1984 and has been married to her since 1986 or later meaning for all sense and purposes he is Ken's father including during the time-frame the molestation occurred.

One puzzling element is the Oct. 1985 part of the time line which says "Ken invited to visit Walter's house." Ken would have been 8 or 9 at the time. MZB and Walter Breen's children would have been much older (very late teens) and I don't know if they lived with Walter or MZB. Why did Mary and Steve Goldin let a 8 or 9 year old spend the weekend by himself at Walter Breen's house? When my child was that age I never would have said ok to something like that and suspect I'm typical, as a parent, in this respect. Marc Kupper (talk) (contribs) 04:33, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

So Goldin was around while this abuse was ongoing? Has he claimed that he knew nothing at the time? --Tom 14:50, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

I have wondered that myself. She told me on the phone after I spoke with the police that she had ASKED Marion if Walter was actually a pedophile. Anyone here want to leave their children with anyone who MIGHT be a pedophile? --Moira Greyland

If Goldin knew something then it must have been ok with him at the time. From the time line Steve Goldin, Mary Mason, and Ken Smith (these blended families sure make the story confusing) lived in Sacramento (1984) and that Walter Breen lived in Berkley (Nov. 1985). How does an 8 or 9 year old child "travel to Berkeley to spend weekend at Walter's?" (Nov. 1985). Presumably Mary, and probably Steve, drove down to Berkeley (about 90 minutes in perfect traffic) to drop him off.

I made the report to the police in 1989: July 5. How long had this been going on?? --Moira Greyland

Here's an addition to the time line where this page says

• "writer/editor for a pornographic humor paper, the San Francisco Ball"
• Mr. Goldin's current wife is fellow author Mary Mason. Their wedding took place the night before EclectiCon 1 in Sacramento, at which Mr. Goldin was the Guest of Honor.

I've run into this before but there there do not seem to be any databases/tables of SF conventions on line. I hunted around for the date of EclectiCon 1, did not find it on line, and so I looked through the convention listings in issues of LOCUS from 1986 and found that EclectiCon 1 ran from Feb. 13 to 15, 1987. This means Stephen and Mary were married on Feb. 12 or 13 1987. I looked through LOCUS issues for 1987 but did not see a report on the convention nor wedding. While looking through the issues I ran across the following:

• LOCUS issue #317, June 1987, pg. 7, the lead item for the People & Publishing column is:

Marion Zimmer Bradley suffered a stroke on May 8th and was hospitalized at Alta Bates in Berkeley, CA. She is expected to recover completely, but her speech has been affected and she had to cancel all convention appearances and lectures for the foreseeable future. She suffered two earlier strokes, in 1980 and 1986, and recovered completely. She was proofing the copy-edited manuscript of The Firebrand, her multi-million dollar novel for Simon & Schuster, when it happened. The book will be out in November.

• LOCUS issue #319, August 1987, pg. 7, the lead item for the People & Publishing column is:
  • Marion Zimmer Bradley appears to be fully recovered from her minor stroke and is attending some conventions again. She did not need physical therapy and has noticed only slight effect on her voice and handwriting.
  • Later on the page is a blurb about Stephen Goldin signing with Bantam for the "The Parsina Saga" fantasy tetralogy. It says nothing about his recent marriage.

One of my back burner projects is indexing the contents of the LOCUS magazines [4] and so as I run across articles about MZB, lawsuits, Goldin, etc. I'll post citations here. BTW - if you have any of the issues that are missing from my table I'd love to hear from you. Marc Kupper (talk) (contribs) 23:35, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

There's still no link supporting MZB's involvement in Breen's affairs other than Goldin's self-serving and undeniably biased website. It's bad practice to use this as a credible reference for the claims that some folks seem insistent on including in this entry. A better reference needs to be used if those lines are going to be included in MZB's bio. I have no objection whatsoever to those lines, so long as the reference is trustworthy (which this one clearly isn't). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 221.145.53.186 (talk) 02:26, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

The link is credible in that it supports the statement made, and you seem to be the only person who still has trouble with it. And Goldin, at least, puts his name to his statements. I don't even see a sig for you. I see no reason to let one anonymous objection override the consensus that has been worked out over time in regard to this issue. BPK 05:57, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

As I said, the link is "self-serving and undeniably biased". That's a bad way to substantiate what's supposed to be fact and one of the primary reasons that wikipedia's detractors claim that it's untrustworthy (which, if this is the test for reference material, it most certainly is). As I said, I have no objection whatsoever to MZB's illegal activities being included in the entry if only someone can find a credible reference. I can't. Can you? And a p.s.: I'm not anonymous because you have the only information for me that's worth anything of value here - my i.p. address. That's far more trustworthy than a sig. Kinda drives my whole point home, if you ask me. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 221.145.53.186 (talk) 13:15, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

221.145.53.186 - I was unhappy with the previous wording about Breen for many of the same reasons you are bringing up. However, I really liked the way BPK2 reworded it. We now have two statements that are directly supported by references.

• "Bradley has been accused by one of Breen's victims of knowing about and facilitating Breen's criminal behavior." The reference is Goldin's web site. Yes, Goldin is very biased but the current wikipedia wording is NPOV though I could see removing "facilitating" and using something like "Bradley has been accused by one of Breen's victims of failing to protect the victim from Breen's criminal behavior."

To support this one sentence, there is another just before it

• "Breen was afterward convicted of child molestation and died in prison while serving his sentence." Again this is NPOV and supported by a reference. Probably the only thing that's irrelevant to the MZB article is "and died in prison while serving his sentence."

At some point I would like to replace this section with a section titled "Legal Issues" that would document the lawsuits towards the end of MZB's life. It order to do that though I'd want to be able to cite both suits in a form that can be verified along with their outcome, etc.

That sounds like an excellent way of doing things. My only problem with the original was that the source wasn't trustworthy and I couldn't find anything more reputable as a reference. I have no personal stake in the entry; I just don't want to see what amounts to hearsay being described as fact, with nothing other than Goldin's site to bolster the claims made. If it's labeled for what it is (i.e., hearsay), then have at it. Better yet, if someone more adept than myself can find these transcripts on a more reputable site, then the original entry could be restored with the trustworthy reference. Either of these would, I think, be better for both the entry and for wikipedia in general. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 221.145.53.186 (talk) 17:29, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Walter Breen was an important part of MZB's life and had considerable notoriety of his own. Google up the Breen Boondoggle [5] and you will see that MZB supported Breen at the time and married him in the middle of a battle going on in the SF world on what should be done about Walter Breen. Marc Kupper (talk) (contribs) 08:53, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

<outdent> After time away, I am really convienced that this material should not be included if its referenced to Goldin's site asince that is self published and is very involved with this "incident" or whatever you want to call it. Can we find other reliable, 3rd party sources and work on this? Thanks, --Tom 13:11, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Religious beliefs

I've removed this section as MZB did not as write on or about religious themes, or her personal beliefs, regularly. Her religious journey was essentially a private affair that she apparently wrote one article about. --Marc Kupper|talk 18:49, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

So, what were her religious beliefs? There are no citations to either the quote attributed or to her faith conversion. Can this please be clarified? aaatkins 12 April 2009 —Preceding undated comment added 03:34, 13 April 2009 (UTC).

Phrasing

"She had known about Breen's sexual interests and previously accepted his sexual abuse of 14 year old boy." Apart from the fact that this sentence is missing an indefinite article before '14', I checked the reference because this is essentially accusing Bradley of being an accomplice to child abuse. It says fairly clearly in the original interview that Breen and the boy in question, "NAME REDACTED" ("NAME REDACTED" as this reference has been sourced from information: OBTAINED ILLEGALLY, WHICH LEGALLY SHOULD NOT BE AVAILABLE IN THE PUBLIC DOMAIN, as the "NAME REDACTED" reference violates the presumptive right to the privacy of a minor/juvenile sex crime victim, further there is no verifiable source for this entry, ADDITIONALLY THE "REDACTED NAME" reference is DEFAMATORY and potentially LEGALLY ACTIONABLE, "DELETED", (WORD ENTRY "DELETED" as this reference has been sourced from information: OBTAINED ILLEGALLY, WHICH LEGALLY SHOULD NOT BE AVAILABLE IN THE PUBLIC DOMAIN, which violates the presumptive right to the privacy of a minor/juvenile sex crime victim; further there is no verifiable source for this entry.), affair, and that Bradley seems to have accepted that as legitimate. I'm not defending Breen (I don't think adults should have sex with people under the age of consent) and I'm not defending Bradley either, but this sentence misrepresents what Bradley thought she was doing. She was not accepting that Breen was, from her point of view, abusing a minor; it's that she didn't regard the affair as abuse, whatever the law said. I think she was wrong and he was even more wrong, but I also think it's wrong to suggest that Bradley was colluding in something that the boy had not consented to and didn't want to happen - whether or not he was legally in a position to have an opinion on the matter, which being 14, he wasn't. This is a tricky one. Thoughts? (I am not a Bradley fan and indeed have never read any of her books, btw.) Lexo (talk) 09:19, 5 November 2010 (UTC)

NOTE: Much of the information in the "PHRASING" ENTRY, has been sourced from information: OBTAINED ILLEGALLY, WHICH LEGALLY SHOULD NOT BE AVAILABLE IN THE PUBLIC DOMAIN, this reference violates the presumptive right to the privacy of a minor/juvenile sex crime victim. FURTHER THERE IS NO VERIFIABLE SOURCE FOR THIS ENTRY. Responsible future action by the WIKIPEDIA COMMUNITY: DELETE the "PHRASING" ENTRY in its entirety.

The acts undertaken by Breen were, legally, sexual abuse in the jurisdiction where they were committed. Changing it to "sexual relationship" is not accurate. Adults having sex with fourteen year olds is sexual abuse and W:NPOV, previously cited when the article was last changed, does not require editors to refer to sexual abuse as a sexual "relationship." Parcequilfaut (talk) 05:15, 27 October 2013 (UTC)