>I am still a little baffled why any judgment on an author's appearance is necessary. It's being used as a proxy for zealous ideologues. A certain group of ide

>I am still a little baffled why any judgment on an author's appearance is necessary. It's being used as a proxy for zealous ideologues. A certain group of ideologues from a certain city all seem to have very similar style. Some people do not enjoy wasting their time reading the work of ideologues. To illustrate, I'll throw myself under the bus. If I can read a summary of a book and accurately guess "This came from an author based in San Francisco", I will disregard it entirely. I cannot speak for others, but I know I'm not the only one. There are a few other cities that come to mind, but SF is easily the worst offender. The most extreme and vehement bias festers in that place and it is not worth my time. The people who speak from that place are more similar to a cult-like mentality than individual or innovative thinkers. I don't bother with listening to cults and so I don't listen to people from SF. Which is unfortunate because I am sure there are a few precious gems that don't tow the party line who may be worth the time to read. The unfortunate bit is I don't have the time to read everything. Part of my decision-making process for whether or not time should be allocated to read something involves assessing the likelihood that the author is so entrenched in their own biases as to make their work a waste of my time. Looking like an ideologue, talking an ideologue's talking point, and coming from a place known for its ideologues are tell-tale signs for me that the person is very likely an ideologue. I will let others risk wasting their time reading the work. If it gets enough charitable mentions from "outsiders" (those outside of the cult) then I may give it the time of day. Until then I will dismiss it just as some people would dismiss anything from Alex Jones and his ilk. As for your last statement - there are most likely people who do. And, for what it's worth, I didn't. (Also take my throwing myself under a bus as a separate talking point than the book recommendation you made. She is not from SF, I'm just illustrating the point about dismissing ideologues based on some small amount of known criteria.)