The Hugo Awards celebrated sci-fi and fantasy literature that enchanted audiences through the stress of 2021. The awards show found itself under fire for one of the companies that was sponsoring it, as creators got together to bask in the accomplishments of their peers and were honored just to be nominated.
The US defense contractor is called Raytheon Technologies. They are one of the largest defense manufacturers in the world and their primary focus is weapons for the military. A lot of their revenue comes from the US government. When WorldCon, the sci-fi convention in Washington, DC where the awards take place, announced that the company was a sponsor, they made their presence known.
The backlash has been very strong among the sci-fi author community. Most of the comments in the above are pointing out the bleakness of war profiteers finding a way to profit off of a celebration of the typically forward thinking speculative science fiction genre. Some people have pointed out that it is only one arm of the company that is sponsoring, but the fact that a company that specializes in missiles and drones has a space division is troubling all on its own. It's easy to see how the comic book company planned to team up with a defense contractor to focus on engineering and technology. The comic intended to promote the partnership was in bad taste, and it was canceled soon after it was announced.
DisCon has yet to speak about the partnership with Raytheon. Fans feel bad that a night that should have been about a genre they loved had to deal with reality.
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