User:Thnidu/Dorsai Irregulars

(Potential) sources
 * Dorsai Irregulars
 * Fanlore wiki (Note: much is quoted directly from DI site.)
 * Wikifur
 * Thank You to the Dorsai (Long post on http://www.furaffinity.net about DI bad behavior at the Furfright con)
 * DI Facebook page
 * Fancyclopedia 3 (minimal)
 * DI Twitter page @Dorsai_comms (Apparently active for just two days, 25-26 Mar 2011
 * "The Dorsai Irregulars are a service fraternity that has provided convention security for over 30 years specializing in the science fiction and fannish conventio" [sic]
 * DI Twitter page @TheDorsai
 * "Joined January 2012. Only confirmed followers have access to @TheDorsai's Tweets and complete profile. Click the "Follow" button to send a follow request."
 * Filk Music and the Dorsai Irregulars by John Hall, Dorsai Irregulars

Text from Dorsai Irregulars website to use as source w/ credit

... with links & stuff added.

OVERVIEW/LEDE
The Dorsai Irregulars (also operating as the "Klingon Diplomatic Corps") is a non-profit group of science fiction fans who provide conventions with security and other support services, such as crowd control and auctioneering. Their clientele is not limited to science fiction fandom: they also contract with furry, video game, and anime conventions.

Origin and name
DI History page

In 1973, at the 31st World Science Fiction Convention (Torcon II, held in Toronto), there was friction between the fans and the hired security guards, who did not understand the fannish subculture. The theft from the Art Show of a valuable work by Kelly Freas was attributed in part to a guard's failure to recognize the artist's prominence.

Robert Asprin realized the need for a corps of experienced fans who could provide conventions with security, crowd control, guest escort and other services. Being fans themselves and familiar with the norms and customs of fandom, such a corps could, in theory, provide these services without the hostility and conflict caused by a clash of cultures between the mundane world and the fannish.

Asprin was an admirer of the work of Gordon R. Dickson, from whom he requested and received permission to use the name "Dorsai Irregulars" for the organization. In Dickson's Childe Cycle of science fiction stories, the Dorsai are the (human) inhabitants of a planet that has insufficient natural resources for trade with other worlds. Instead, they hire themselves out as mercenaries, a profession in which they have achieved extraordinary skill: an appropriate allusion for an organization providing security services to science fiction conventions.

History
The following year (1974) Asprin and six other fans, dressed in green uniforms and berets, entered the WorldCon masquerade and performed a humorous skit of close-order drill. Then Asprin announced from the stage that the Dorsai Irregulars were available for duty. Soon the new organization, led by Asprin as "Commandammit", was hired for security at a variety of SF and media cons. More members joined, bringing the roster to about 24.

After a few years Asprin stopped being active in the group, and the paramilitary look was discarded. In 1976 the DI started holding their own small, annual relaxacon, Thing, around St. Patrick's Day.

Demands of family and jobs caused a slow period as members were unable to spend as much time on group activities, but by the late 1980s the DI had recruited some younger members and again were working 6 to 12 conventions a year.

Now the DI number just over 70 active members and have settled into a pattern of continuous slow growth. Dorsai Thing has continued through the whole time. As of 2014 it has been held in 39 consecutive years in eighteen cities.

The Klingon Diplomatic Corps
DI History page

From its early days, various Irregulars liked to dress in greasepaint and glitz, put on ferocious attitudes and bullwhips, then go perform crowd control. This alter ego to the DI was called the Klingon Diplomatic Corps, or KDC. At Star Trek conventions, KDC crews got crowds to smile and obey cries of "Back, Earther scum!"

However, the whole act nearly backfired at New York Star Trek Con (NYStrek) when an unscrupulous organizer badly oversold the hotel. The heroism of the day is a story just dying to be set in print on this page. Besides, "How can you distrust a Klingon in Toe Socks?"

outside links from DI History page

 * General: [mailto:contact@di.org contact@di.org]
 * Page: [mailto:webkahuna@di.org webkahuna@di.org]
 * Follow Us On:
 * Facebook: Dorsai Irregulars
 * Twitter: @TheDorsai