#and has knock-on effects you didn't entirely intend and don't‚ perhaps‚ on reflection entirely endorse.)

[aeide-thea]

like, someone posted an article recently that was like 'i didn't like these books because the main characters were women who slept with women but weren't sufficiently enlightened about it for me as a queer woman to feel Represented,' and i just felt like. i bet i wouldn't enjoy those books either, judging from the reviewer's description! but faced with a review that's like 'these characters had attitudes i found unpleasant'—iirc a tendency to ironic detachment and internalized fatphobia respectively, which, to be clear, i expect i would also find unpleasant! but those are attitudes that plenty of real young women do have; are we arguing it's only acceptable to tell stories about the sort of people we'd personally want to befriend?—'so i didn't find their stories nourishing,' it's hard for me not to think, okay, fair enough, but—should 'nourishing' really be the definitive metric for art? should 'savory'? an author's job is, after all, to make art, not food…

#like. sometimes art is a door and not a mirror or a meal or whatever. #(also sometimes it might be a mirror for someone who isn't you. or for someone you don't want to be.) #anyway. let's all go reread some cheever and then reconvene. #discussion questions: do you feel represented by neddy merrill's nonmonogamy. is it problematic to set a story in the suburbs. #does it alter your reaction to learn that cheever was queer. #bookblogging #(also like. the thing abt this discussion is like. my feelings ALSO revolt at stuff like this. frequently and vehemently‚ even! #i just think like. it's not sufficient to feel‚ & to then regurgitate that feeling & call it a take; you also have to think. #and‚ like‚ *actually* think (and *re*think if necessary)‚ not just apply a veneer of rationalization to yr original kneejerk reaction. #otherwise—how are we actually better than the conservatives we disdain. #we have to have actual thought-out principles we attempt to consult‚ not just a different set of outraged‚ reactive feelings.) #(this also gets tricky because like. we obviously get to dislike things‚ & to complain abt them! fucked up to suggest otherwise! #but at the same time—there IS a point at which censure tips over into censorship. #like. most people will not feel free to behave in ways that are decried sufficiently strongly by sufficiently many voices. #so if we value freedom—and i hope we do!—i think we have a responsibility to be thoughtful abt how we use our voice.) #(which isn't to say don't do it! sometimes it would be shameful not to! #but power dynamics are complex‚ and sometimes punching a person as hard as you'd punch a system means the blow rebounds #and has knock-on effects you didn't entirely intend and don't‚ perhaps‚ on reflection entirely endorse.)