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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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A truly terrifying picture of the near future is contained in Battle Lines, a long but compulsive article by Leo Benedictus in today’s Guardian Review. It describes what’s going on in the word of Young Adult fiction which is kinda reminiscent of French revolutionary politics during the Terror as everything starts to turn in on itself. It hardly needs commentary, this is just the start
| In January, a new Chinese-American author, Amélie Zhao, withdrew her forthcoming fantasy novel Blood Heir, and apologised for the way it handled slavery, which she said was based on the Asian experience, not the American one. |
| As Ellen Oh, co-founder of the campaign group We Need Diverse Books, explained in a tweet: “You are not immune to charges of racism just because you are [a person of colour]. Racism is systemic, especially anti-blackness.†|
| Another of Zhao’s critics was Kosoko Jackson, whose own debut novel A Place for Wolves, about a romance between two teenage boys during the Kosovo war, was scheduled for release in March. Jackson is black and gay, and a professional sensitivity reader, which means he reads books before publication and offers advice on how they handle matters of identity. |
| Yet on 22 February, he too was accused of insensitivity, for allegedly minimising the suffering of Albanian Muslims. “I’ve never been so disgusted in my life,†said the first review to make this point, on the reading community website Goodreads.com. On 25 February, comments below the review began to discuss sending an open letter to Jackson’s publisher. On 28 February, he posted a note apologising to “those who I hurt with my words†and withdrew the book. | |
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Boreades
In: finity and beyond
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I'm looking forward to Comic Lines, a long but compulsive article by someone I've never heard of in Guardian Review.
| Jo Brand was only talking about throwing acid at the politicians with the wrong opinions. |
| Why it was right to sack Danny Baker for an offensive royal baby tweet. |
| How many innocent dogs were radicalised by @CountDankulaTV’s “Nazi pug†video before YouTube took it down? |
| Why wealthly Oxbridge-educated comedians are the best people to lecture others about privilege and travelling first class. |
etc.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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I take your point, Borry, but I'm not posting this up because of some Leftie sounding off so we can all have a good giggle but because, as you will see, publishers and authors and critics (and therefore maybe young adults and therefore adults) have entered a sort of death spiral from which it seems none can pull out. Agreed this concerns a niche but it's tomorrow's literary ruling niche so it's worth cocking an ear. Rather than a leg.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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| In April, the British YA author Zoe Marriott was widely accused of cultural appropriation for writing a Chinese-inspired fantasy novel called The Hand, the Eye and the Heart. |
| In August 2016, the Mexican-American author EE Charlton-Trujillo’s verse novel When We Was Fierce was delayed after several bloggers criticised its attempt to capture the voice of a black teenager. It has still not been published |
| The Black Witch by Laurie Forest, attracted protests for [its] allegedly racist content. Forest published regardless, and with great success, despite a campaign of one-star reviews and emails to her publisher. Kirkus magazine, which had defended The Black Witch, downgraded and revised its review of American Heart by Laura Moriarty because it “fell short of meeting our standards for clarity and sensitivityâ€. Keira Drake, was convinced by her critics, 455 of whom signed a petition demanding that her The Continent, “a racist garbage fire†according to one fellow author, be delayed to allow “additional editorial focusâ€. A substantially revised version appeared in March 2018. |
The point about all this is that everyone concerned is impeccably right on but the rules are so tightly drawn and so subject to capricious tightening that it is impossible to write with any degree of freedom. It is not a case of pre-censorship, it is becoming pure guesswork as to what will or will not jump the hoops. One fairly common yardstick is that you are not allowed to write about characters that are not of your own race/gender/sexual orientation. The only rule when it comes to criticism, and this is what makes it Robespierrist, is that you can't be too extreme.
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Wile E. Coyote
In: Arizona
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Why is this a problem?
Superior more pious folks have always tried to censor, in the name of the greater good. Ordinary folks have always ignored them.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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I do not agree at all. Where do you think these 'ordinary folks' of yours get their values from? Do they drop from the skies? And, by the way, what are these values? Bit gor blimey, are they? Share them yourself, do you, Wiley?
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Wile E. Coyote
In: Arizona
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| Mick Harper wrote: | | I do not agree at all. Where do you think these 'ordinary folks' of yours get their values from? Do they drop from the skies? And, by the way, what are these values? Bit gor blimey, are they? Share them yourself, do you, Wiley? |
Tis true...I bump into very few Social Conservatives or Social Justice Warriors. In fact none. Where are they?
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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This is at the heart of Applied Epistemology. Nobody knows where their (in this case) political values came from, they always appear to their holder to be an obvious mix of common sense and good sense. If we didn't, we'd change them. We all think ourselves sufficiently clued up and sufficiently noble-spirited that we can advise our fellow citizens as to, say, whether we should leave the EU or not, whether we should leave with a deal or not and, when our new Fat Controller has dealt with Brussels, we instinctively know what kind of relationship we should have with the EU after we have left, if we can get it.
Wiley does not say to himself, "Blimey O'Reilly, I can't possibly compute any of this, nobody can." Wiley does not say to himself, "I know what suits me so I'm going to push a particular line on the pretence it will suit everybody else." Wiley just takes a punt the same as I do. But only one of us knows that this mix of common sense and good sense is basically a bunch of temporary bollocks.
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Wile E. Coyote
In: Arizona
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This also has nothing to do with Brexit.
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Grant
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Mick is wrong here. I actually do know what should happen. And I'm always right.
Still surprised I only got three o levels
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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I am the only person on this site who is ever wrong. Gives me that little feeling of superiority that cannot be counterfeited. I'm surprised too, Grant. Got them from one of those internet 'colleges', did you?
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Wile E. Coyote
In: Arizona
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I am never wrong, but wanted to pretend I make mistakes, to show my liberal credentials.
I decided against this, on the grounds that you lot would probably figure out I am always right, after I have tutored you.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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You see what I mean about it being not counterfeitable? These are much more serious issues than you guys realise. If you undertook a two-week experiment to forswear humour (in all forms) you will find it will have a remarkable effect. But you won't be able to -- perhaps for that reason, perhaps not. But mainly because I am telling you to.
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Boreades
In: finity and beyond
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| Mick Harper wrote: | | If you undertook a two-week experiment to forswear humour (in all forms) you will find it will have a remarkable effect. |
Too late Harpo - ITV has beaten you to it - but will it only last two weeks?
Head of ITV comedy drops all-male writing teams. Head of comedy tells festival that there are a ‘significant lack’ of women and an ‘awful lot’ of all-male teams.
“Too often the writing room is not sensitively run. It can be aggressive and slightly bullying,†Schuster told Diverse Festival on Monday, according to the BBC, where she featured in a panel discussion titled “why employing more women writers in comedy mattersâ€. |
It looks like Titania McGrath has beaten you to the SJW punchline as well?
| Whenever I hear a joke, I seek reassurance that at least 50% of the writers were female before signalling my approval through laughter. |
Writing comedy is clearly no laughing matter.
It's a totally different story at Chateau Boreades - I try telling M'Lady or the Boreadettes I'm being serious and they just laugh at me. S'not funny.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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| ... that had led Rana Plaza to the lowest wage economy on earth, Ethiopia. A recent study by New York University's Stern School of Business into fast fashion production found workers' wages barely covering the cost of food and transportation Lucy Siegle, Guardian |
Did you know that Ethiopia was the lowest wage economy on earth? No, nor me. You probably thought it was Laos or Bangladesh or Vietnam or ... or ... because it was. It used to be all these countries. It was probably us once. Becoming a wage economy is the first rung on the ladder. That's when multinationals like Rana Plaza come along and start paying wages which 'barely cover the cost of food and transportation'. And everyone flocks to them because it's more than the unvarying, non-wage subsistence existence that everyone has been eking out since time began. In an amazingly short time Rana Plaza will be off to Upper Volta because Ethiopia is just too damned expensive and will be the new Laos, then the new Bangladesh ... then Vietnam ... eventually us.
And it will take an amazingly short time because it's all been done before, over and over again. A lot of it by us. Meanwhile poor old Rana Plaza get it in the neck from the Guardian. They'd much rather Rana Plaza hadn't come to Ethiopia in the first place. Should have stayed in Laos and gone bust. Rana Plaza are the baddies not the goodies apparently. I can't say for sure which it is myself because I've never heard of them. Do they make a nice shooting jacket?
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