It reads like a revenge plot: an old writer comes to one of the most important conventions in her field to be honored for her lifetime of work, and is publicly humiliated without the opportunity to clarify what she meant when she confuses two similar terms.

The writer is the 72–year-old Mercedes Lackey. When SFWA (the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Association) chose her to be the 38th Damon Knight Grand Master, they announced:

SFWA President Jeffe Kennedy had the following to say about the organization's newest Grand Master, "From the time I read my first Mercedes Lackey book as a young woman, her stories have illuminated my imagination and brought joy to my life. With multi-layered fantasy worlds, canny magical systems, and characters who step off the page as living, breathing people, Lackey's books have made an enormous impact on the genre. She gave me warrior women I could believe in, magic-wielding queer heroes, and characters who suffered, then overcame their physical and emotional traumas. Lackey continues to have a lasting influence on my own work and I'm beyond thrilled to see her honored as SFWA's newest Grand Master."

But while the conference was underway, SFWA issued this statement:

We learned yesterday that while participating in the "Romancing Sci-Fi & Fantasy" panel, Mercedes Lackey used a racial slur. First, we apologize to our attendees and the other panelists who were subjected to that slur. We've disabled access to the panel to avoid any additional harm being caused.

Second, we are immediately removing Mercedes Lackey from the conference and the additional panels she was scheduled for, in accordance with SFWA's Moderation Policy. The use of a racial slur violates the instruction to "Respect all cultures and communities. Do not make derogatory or offensive statements even as a joke." That applies to everyone in a SFWA space, at all levels of their career.

Third, we will be discussing with the other panelists for "Romancing Sci-Fi & Fantasy" how they would prefer we proceed when they are able and comfortable in doing so. We will be offering to edit out the offensive portion of the panel or hold the panel again at a later date, inviting back the other three panelists and moderator to again take part. We will respect their wishes on how to handle this issue while also sharing the invaluable expertise they offered during the discussion.

Thank you to our conference attendees and panelists who reported the use of the slur. We appreciate being alerted to it right away, so we could investigate and come to this decision as swiftly as possible.

Because SFWA's Board of Directors "disabled access" to the "Romancing Sci-Fi & Fantasy" panel, no one has quoted exactly what Lackey said. Her comments were summarized on Twitter by a panel member, Jen Brown: While praising Samuel R. Delany's work, Lackey referred to him as "colored", the older respectful term, instead of "a person of color", the current respectful term.

Kee Malesky notes in "The Journey From 'Colored' To 'Minorities' To 'People Of Color'":

"The use of the phrase "colored people" peaked in books published in 1970."

Lackey was twenty that year. It's perfectly understandable that she would accidentally use it, especially since "people of color" did not become more popular than "colored people" until 1987, when Lackey was 37. "Colored" was an insult in parts of the black community earlier than that—some black people who adopted "black" in the 1960s used "colored" to insult black people they thought were old-fashioned—but few if any white people have ever used it as a slur. To most white people, "colored" is just one of a long list of names—Negro, Afro-American, African-American, Black with a capital B, etc.—promoted and then discarded by people who think people of African descent in the United States will win respect when they adopt the right name.

Samuel Delany responded to the matter in a comment on a Facebook post by David Lubkin:

Lackey has issued an apology:

On a panel at the 2022 Nebulas, I had the chance to celebrate authors who wrote positive gay characters long before me.

Chip Delany is obviously a major player in that game. Because there are two Samuel Delanys–there's one from Texas–I wanted to make sure people got hold of the right one. So, in my excitement, I got caught in a mental/verbal stumble between "black" and "person of color," and as best I can remember, what came stuttering out was something like "spcolored."

I'm not an amazing speaker. I stammer, I freeze up, & I get things wrong. I am sorry that I bungled a modern term while bringing attention to an amazing black creator.

Too often, I am called a pioneer, but I'm not–I'm just who some readers heard of first. I wanted to make sure Delany got all the proper credit that he is more than due, and maybe new readers would be inspired to read his work.

But SFWA has yet to apologize to Lackey. It would have been easy to find out whether she intended to insult Delany while she was praising him. All anyone had to do was ask her. Instead, she was removed from the conference, along with her husband, whose only offense was being married to a woman who confused two terms. Now two well-meaning writers have been subjected to a public mobbing, a fate I would not wish on anyone. The consequences include psychological damage. Some mobbed people have killed themselves.

So I am left wondering: Has any writing organization ever treated a writer so badly?

PS. SFWA needs to update its moderation policy. To "Do not make derogatory or offensive statements even as a joke", they should add "or in ignorance."