The following commentary turned up on the blog of Amanda Palmer or, as many fans know her, Neil Gaiman’s fiancee:
neil also called me up slightly out of sorts, because some of HIS fans were upset about the blog. (T)his ties in with a slight problem i’ve been having lately, which is a whole new wave of neil’s fans coming over the fence to see what i’m about. (A)nd when they see conjoined twins, black humor, and half-naked red carpet photos, they run screaming (and run screaming in neil’s ear. and the screams aren’t pretty to listen to.) The entire blog can be read here:
Despite being a veteran of assorted fan temper tantrums, excoriations and blacklistings, I still found that just a bit hard to believe. But I did some checking around and, sure enough: Although there are fans reacting in a reasonable manner, there is also knee-jerk cursing out of Neil, badmouthing, and general nastiness. Even Neil’s measured suggestion that people actually wait until the hotly debated Evelyn/Evelyn project comes out so they can judge the finished project prompted curse-outs, profanities, and the default word that fans toss around whenever they want to express their ire in an inflammatory manner: Fail!
Castigating Neil because they don’t like a project being developed by his fiancee? “Why is Neil marrying this woman?” bleated one poster, prompting much head bobbing from fellow bobble-heads.
What the hëll, people? Seriously. What the hëll?
You want to talk about “fail?” How about “Fanfail”. Fans failing to act in a manner that is considerate or civilized or intelligent. Fans making untoward, unkind and unjust comments about the personal lives and romantic choices of professionals when it’s none of their dámņëd business. Instead of attacking Neil because he’s engaged to marry someone who’s working on a musical project that they don’t like (not that they’ve actually heard it or have any intention of doing so), how about they turn that laser-sharp personality deconstruction on themselves and realize just how unfair and how small-minded they are. If nothing else, they can ask themselves how they would feel about being attacked and held responsible for the actions of their significant others.
PAD
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You have got to be kidding. I haven’t looked in on Neil’s blog for a while, but this is really low. There are times like this where I actually feel bad about being a part of fandom.
There is nothing about this at Neil’s blog.
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Yeah, I found out after posting here that it’s pretty much just on her blog (with refs to what his fans are saying to him.)
I’m not surprised. But it’s on hers, and a hot topic in various other spots.
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PAD
Sad to day, but its not surprising; the relative anonymity of the internet just brings out the A-hole in a lot of people.
If they had to say the same thing where their actual voice could be heard, much less if their face could be seen, many fans wouldn’t be so petty, in my opinion.
I think that you’re right, but it’s also true that the anonymity of the internet doesn’t bring about the a-hole in everyone. I can’t help but wonder what the difference might be. Personally, I tend to think that I’m not entitled to have a say in the life of the author of comic books that I might enjoy, so I keep my opinions to myself. Perhaps some fans were simply not socialized properly.
MarvelFan, I’m a big believer in the John Gabriel Greater Internet Dickwad Theory (courtesy of the guys at Penny Arcade).
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Although, as I’ve said here recently, I think you can pretty much take the ‘anonymity’ out of that equation: People just like being dickwads, regardless. I look at some of the stuff that people post openly on Facebook and such, where their real name and pictures are attached to the comments, and I think more and more often people feel that they’re just plain immune on the internet. That their comments won’t have consequences.
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Yeah, but that’s still a level of anonymity, Graig. You don’t really know me from Adam even if you and I became Facebook friends and you saw my real name and picture with all of my comments. Well, actually you get that now, but…
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We still don’t know each other and may never meet face to face. That being the case I could say anything in any way to you and know that there’s never going to be a true reprisal since you really don’t know who I am despite the information I’ve given you. Really makes some people talk to everyone like angry drunks a lot.
Well, the reprisal may not come from me (although if it makes you feel better I can go postal on you for spelling my name wrong), but I don’t think most people realize that employers are checking such sites looking for what they do and say, searching Google, etc.
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But then, maybe most of the people who act like this were destined to make a career out of working at the drive through window anyways.
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Sorry. I know it’s a “C” and not a “G” in the spelling. I think my brain switched a gear and started spelling “Greg” instead.
And… the lessons of Harlan Ellison’s ‘Xenogenesis’ comes barfing back up once more.
God dámņ it, people, don’t make me regret my involvement in fandom.
Where can I find a copy of ‘Xenogenesis’?
I can’t find it anywhere. Is it online?
While some fans can be great, some are seriously off their nut and this is just another example of the ones off their nut. Other examples are the ones who threatened Mercedes Lackey & the ones who’ve been tearing into the fiancee of one of the guys from Supernatural (Jared’s fiancee I think) about how she’s “not worthy to be with him”.
Doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me, but maybe that’s just me.
Actually, this type of thinking by female fans of a male star is not unheard of, as the story goes girls would go up to then-girlfriend (later first wife) of George Harrison, Patti Boyd and tell her to stay away from “their” George.
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Ever read about what happened with Jackie Chan and a fan when she found out he was getting (or already was) married? Sheesh…
First off, if they don’t like Amanda Palmer or her work in The Dresden Dolls, as far as I’m concerned it’s their loss. Seriously, Coin Operated Boy, both song and video, works of genius. Well, there’s no accounting for taste.
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Attacking her for being more important to Neil Gaiman then they are is something far worse. It’s painfully indecent and like Jerry says, it makes you a little embarrassed to have something in common with them, even if that something is completely separate from their general lack of grace and civility.
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It’s kind of ironic; Neil Gaiman’s work is something I would introduce to non-comics fans as an example of the best the field can produce but it appears that some of his biggest fans are among the last people I’d want them to see, if my goal were to make them see comics as something more than a hobby for social malcontents.
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If Ms Palmer ever reads this–we’re sorry about the idiots. They embarrass us. We didn’t invite them, they just showed up. Take solace in the fact that you are probably everything they want to be and never will be.
“Painfully indecent.” Excellent term. That really sums it up.
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PAD
I hate this reaction from people. The first time I heard they were dating, I told one of my friends who is a big Neil fangirl, and she was nothing but negative about it. I am just horrified when people whine about how it’s changing him or they don’t like her or anything at all, as if they begrudge happiness to people they claim to be fans of. And then I hear people who are fans of her music complaining about him? What the hëll, people. It is so mean-spirited, so ridiculous.
I wish them all the happiness in the world!
Would it be crass of me to suggest that some of these people might not be mad that Neil is marrying Ms. Palmer, but instead mad that he’s marrying anyone but themselves?
As for whatever it is they’re pìššëd about, I can honestly say I don’t particularly care; Palmer’s milieu seems to be off my radar, and I’m perfectly fine with that. Lord knows that if the only art produced was stuff I like, millions of people with much better taste than mine would be left out in the cold.
I would be happier if she used capitalization, though.
Postscript: I’m somewhat baffled at the notion of Neil Gaiman fans being turned off by creepy, weird, borderline offensive stuff in his fiancee’s work, or her wearing a see-through dress to some awards show. Were they napping during his entire career up to now, or something?
Crass? Only if by crass you mean “nailing it on the head.”
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This happens all the time but it never ceases to piss me off. My all time favorite band is The Pixies. I also enjoy any and all of the side projects and solo albums of the band members–you could do far far worse than spend time grabbing everything by Frank Black and the Catholics, The Amps, The Breeders, etc. Frank Black recently has been making music with his wife, Violet Clark, under the band name Grand Duchy. I loved their album Petit Fours but some reviewers attacked it with a weird kind of vehemence, especially toward Ms Clark. It was as though they held her personally responsible for there not being an actual new Pixies album (though I’m not sure that Kim Deal is all that eager to do one anyway). At any rate, while it’s perfectly justifiable to like or dislike music for one’s own reasons, it seems like some people are just bringing their own baggage to the table regardless of the actual qualities of the art.
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(An aside–good God, I just tried wading through some of the brouhaha over Ms. Palmer’s project and it is astonishingly as stupid as some of the comments PAD has had to endure at the hands of the Politically Correct Militia. You know, one nice thing about being conservative is that A-you are not expected to take these people with even an iota of seriousness and B- they will probably leave you alone anyway since, by virtue of your political persuasion, you are a lost cause and probably a Nazi to boot.)
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Lord save us from such insufferable twits.
One thing I think is driving a lot of this–apparently some people believed that the fictional characters created by Ms. Palmer and Jason Webley were real…and now they are pìššëd that they were “fooled”….
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I have not the heart to tell them that Gorillaz and Josie & the Pussycats are also not exactly as portrayed…
I’m writing to Neil and Amanda a letter to offset the nastiness. Two great people have found each other in a world that is filled with uncertainty and sorrow. The world is a little bit brighter.
Seriously, why must people be so cruel in such happy moments?
I can’t help but think of the “Untouchable Trio” in the comic book THE KNIGHTS OF THE DINNER TABLE. These are the players Bob, Dave, and Brian (Sarah became the “Plus One” to the group) who will basically do absolutely anything to get ahead — steal candlesticks while a king is addressing them in their throne room, kill someone for looking at them funny, betray each other — and remain absolutely convinced that they are the heroes and are always surprised and perplexed when anyone suggests that their actions might have negative repurcussions or that they are evil.
Some fans are like this. The worst of us have an incredible sense of entitlement, the idea that because we read a comic book (in this case; applies just as well to just about any medium), the comic book professionals are somehow indebted to us and need to swallow and accept every negative or obnoxious comment we send their way. The Internet seems to magnify this, but I’m sure PAD has plenty of pre-Internet horror stories about fans.
What makes them think they have any say into Neil or Amanda’s personal life? Why does the quality (or lack thereof) of Amanda’s music have anything to do with her relationship with Neil? (And, on a personal side, what the hëll is wrong with half-naked red carpet photos, except that the person is still half-clothed?)
I just hope this doesn’t give Neil or Amanda a horrible overview of their fandom. Most of us are people who aren’t judgmental morons.
Rule #1 – People are stupid.
Rule #2 – See Rule #1.
I really do sympathize with Neil and Amanda because I know how it feels to be attacked by trolls and all other demons on the Net. While the Internet is a venue for free speech, that’s no excuse to act like áššhølëš and shoot off whatever crap comes out of their heads. Sometimes, I wish the Net would have a “Day of Silence”, where no one could post anything at all. It would be a relief from the nastiness.
Wow.
Sadly, this does not surprise me. There really has been a coarsening of our culture. And like many, I feel many of these people wouldn’t have the guts to say this to either Neil or Amanda’s face. However, the sad part is I feel there are enough people who are so “passionate” they would think nothing of going up to them at a con and saying the same things.
It’s a sign of the increasingly lack of civility and basic manners that I have seen for some time now.
It really is below the belt. I know if someone was that rude to my fiancee…well, words wouldn’t be able to describe my feelings.
That said, let me say this is also indicative of the “victim” mentality in our culture. before this, I had never even heard of the term “ableist”. It’s like people keep on looking for new ways to be offended and get angry. Around here, there has been some controversy about giving babies cochlear implants so they can, you know, hear. Some of the same people who argue for “choice” feel the parents of these children have no right to give them something that will let them hear- they feel it is a “tool in the effort to eliminate deaf culture”.
Parents who want their kids to be able to hear. Boy, aren’t they a bunch of bìŧçhëš and bášŧárdš?!
One of my favorite parts of Amanda’s blog was the following, because it sums it all up nicely, I think.
“people love to judge.
too feminist. not feminist enough. too outspoken. not outspoken enough. too intellectual.
too dumb. too glam. too underdressed. too funny. not funny enough. too inappropriate. too safe.
wrong kind of funny. marrying my favorite author and now i fûçkìņg hate her. fat. irritating. loud.
blah blah blah blah, etc, ad infinitum.”
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“That said, let me say this is also indicative of the “victim” mentality in our culture. before this, I had never even heard of the term “ableist”. It’s like people keep on looking for new ways to be offended and get angry.”
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Amen.
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And some of the arguments for that thinking are just idiotic to the extreme. Take this guy’s masterful “” question to another poster.
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“There is no comparison between Oasis and this project. One is based off of her experience and one is based on other’s experiences (ie the disabled). That is why she was applauded. I refuse to applaud someone for co-opting other’s experiences and trying to parade them as art.
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If you can answer these questions then maybe we can continue engaging with each other. If not, then we are at a stalemate.
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1. Do you agree that Evelyn Evelyn is a project? Do you agree it is a project about Conjoined Twins? Do you agree that Amanda Palmer is not disabled?”
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As you can guess, his points have basically centered around how a big part of the insult and offense here is that Amanda, a person without disability, is doing a project from the POV of a disabled voice. What an utter load of horseshit.
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Seriously, how truly ignorant is this line of thought? So what else should we label offensive by this jáçkášš’s POV (and those of the people supporting his stance) and go into palpitations over? Should we ban the sales of the film Silver Bullet because the people behind it weren’t crippled and confined to a wheelchair? Should we pull any and all TV shows, movies, books and comics from the public view if the writers are not the same color, gender, sexual persuasion or level of “ableness” as their main protagonists? Because, god knows, we can’t risk this guy and @$$holes like him being offended for all these other people that these creators are “co-opting” the experiences of to “parade them as art.”
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I really, really hope that some of the people commenting over there never breed.
Did anybody here even notice what people were so angry about to begin with?
http://disabledfeminists.com/2010/02/09/evelyn-evelyn-ableism-ableism/
What she’s doing is not merely ‘edgy’ and ‘shocking’ it’s on a level of offensive that’s this close to performing in blackface. The fact that Neil is totes okay with this (or seems to be) is, I think, a perfectly justifiable reason to be upset and disappointed.
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Sheila, people should still wait for the copleted work to come out and hear it before attacking it. There are a lot of projects out there that sounded really bad before they came out, but once poeple saw/heard them they weren’t as bad as people made them out to be.
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We don’t know what the final project will actually be or say. Why not wait until then to judge it?
Also, using “totes” as an adjective all but guarantees that no one will take you seriously, ever.
The only problem with this is that it means giving these people my money–after which I sincerely doubt they’ll care about my opinion of what I’ve purchased.
Not that they do now, but *not* paying them is the only way I have of effectively getting across the message that I don’t approve of what they’re doing.
The only problem with this is that it means giving these people my money–after which I sincerely doubt they’ll care about my opinion of what I’ve purchased.
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You are 100% wrong. Paying customers are the people whose opinions matter the most, because if they like what they’ve bought, they’ll buy the next project.
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To say, “This project does not seem like something in which I’m interested in investing money” is a perfectly reasonable attitude to have. When I see a trailer for a slasher film, I can mentally eliminate that from consideration for my movie going dollar because the trailer has made it clear that I’m not the audience for it. But I’m not going to start denouncing the film, and I’m sure as hëll not going to denounce the director’s fiancee.
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PAD
Merricat: “The only problem with this is that it means giving these people my money–after which I sincerely doubt they’ll care about my opinion of what I’ve purchased.”
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Really? I’ve heard lots of albums before I ever bought them because I knew people who got them before I did. So, no, waiting to, you know, actually hear the thing before trashing it and the people who made it doesn’t automatically mean that you have to spend money on the thing.
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But either way, condemning someone for something that, in all honesty, you can’t really comment on because you’ve never actually heard it and don’t know what it’s actually going to be like is ignorant. How would you like it if you worked very hard on a project and a bunch of people who really knew nothing about the actual content of the thing started denouncing it and you because they decided that it must be offensive based on really nothing more than their own say so? I would tend to think that you wouldn’t think they were treating you or your work fairly.
Why is it offensive, Sheila? Are you suggesting that any portrayal of someone with a disability MUST be performed by a similarly disabled person? (Gonna be a real long time before you find a pair of conjoined twins who have the musical chops to pull this off). The effective result of this would be the virtual elimination of portrayals of the disabled. They would become all but invisible, as they once were. Quite a price to pay for the dubious pleasures of making a good and talented person feel bad about her talent.
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But it’s a hëll of a lot easier than creating some “correct” art. That’s hard and it takes talent and the universe has been manifestly unfair in how talent is doled out. We can only hope that the happy day when Kurt Vonnegut’s short story Harrison Bergeron becomes a reality we will all be there to share in the utter fairness of it all.
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Me, I’m still mad that they dared have a perfectly healthy man portray Joseph Merrick in THE ELEPHANT MAN, when I’m sure a perfectly fine actor of John Hurt’s quality who also suffered from a severe form of neurofibromatosis type 1 was just waiting for the phone call.
You know, I could fill out an entire bingo card with the responses I got here, but I’m simply going to say this–
Saying “I don’t see the problem here” does not mean there isn’t a problem, particularly with your inability to see the problem IS THE PROBLEM.
I don’t have to be a conjoined twin to be sufficiently aware that this is made of several levels of wrong. I don’t have to be disabled to be disgusted that people are still reducing disability to mere entertainment and that people are still not getting why disabled people are sick and tired of being inspirational stories, especially stories that are as badly told as this one.
I don’t have to taste the soup to know it’s bad if I can smell the stench from here.
By the way, Neil isn’t just a bystander in this mess. He’s a participant–he has some minor role on the album, so he is indeed party to this fail.
I’m done.
You know, I could fill out an entire bingo card with the responses I got here
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As could I, Sheila, at the website you pointed me to. Or we could turn it into a drinking game. If we tossed back a shot every time the word “privilege” was invoked, for instance, we’d be hammered inside of an hour. Add in “fail,” the fan default judgmental word that you yourself just used, and we wouldn’t make it fifteen minutes. And I would like to think it counts for something that on this blog, you can continue to say whatever you wish. If you’re done, it’s because you’ve made that decision; it hasn’t been made for you. What does it say about the mindset on other blogs that you are only allowed to parrot the acceptable line of thinking, and if not, you’re banned or the thread gets shut down? How can people claim that others need to listen to them when they’re not remotely interested in listening to others?
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There’s nothing wrong with desiring to be sensitive to people’s feelings. But it’s from that thinking that the concept of “political correctness” has evolved, and from there it’s become a full blown national preoccupation if not outright obsession. And as such we are becoming a monolithically humorless country. If “All in the Family” were being pitched for the first time now, it would never get on the air. Never.
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PAD
Sheila: “You know, I could fill out an entire bingo card with the responses I got here, but I’m simply going to say this–”
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Oh god… A fan of one of the most mindlessly ignorant creations of the last decade or so. the “Race Fail,” “White Fail,” or “Privilege Fail” bingo card. Why have an actual conversation when you can avoid thinking?
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By the way, where does my response, the first response you got, fit on the bingo card?
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Me: “Sheila, people should still wait for the copleted work to come out and hear it before attacking it. There are a lot of projects out there that sounded really bad before they came out, but once poeple saw/heard them they weren’t as bad as people made them out to be.
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We don’t know what the final project will actually be or say. Why not wait until then to judge it?”
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Where exactly on the card are the “Try to Actually Know What You’re Talking About” and “Actually Wait Until You See/Hear Something Before You Judge It” spots are?
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Using the “bingo card” logic you’re using here we can just as easily write off any future posts by you. Hey, we know without seeing them that future Sheila posts will be as ignorant as the “bingo card” post. We don’t need to wait for her to post them to dismiss their ignorance and “intelligence fail” nature.
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Sheila,
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I should point out, so as to not put off any responses by you, that I really, really hate those bingo cards and that my post is more sarky and flip about those things than nasty at you. I really have a dislike of those things because (from personal experience) they more often than not seem to be a tool to shut down intelligent conversations and meaningful dialogue rather than promote or facilitate it.
Sheila: Saying “I don’t see the problem here” does not mean there isn’t a problem, particularly with your inability to see the problem IS THE PROBLEM.
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But what if there is, in fact, no problem here? The mere fact that someone else has a problem with it doesn’t mean that the problem is a genuine one, any more than someone else denying the existence of a problem makes a real problem go away. Annaham’s thesis, which you seem to adopt, would essentially give in-groups the right to delineate all discussions of themselves, to circumscribe all criticism, humor, or satire. Although at least the bloggers are internally consistent– one of the comments below the original post asserts that people with disabilities are entitled to delegitimize certain lines of arguments as “derailing” just as, being a white person, she doesn’t get to comment on racial discrimination. Being internally consistent myself, I think she’s wrong on both counts.
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Just to be clear: I fully support Sheila and Annaham and anyone else’s right to be offended by the work. But I support that for the exact same reason that I insist on my own right to “derail” their criticisms, by thinking they’re overreacting, thinking they’re flat-out wrong, or just not caring. We’re each entitled to our own opinions. Those opinions are often informed by our experiences, and it is quite likely that the people who are so wound up about “privilege” have a lot more experience about daily life among a disadvantaged group than, for instance, I would. Of course I should keep that in mind in discussing the issue. But it doesn’t mean I must completely yield the floor, it doesn’t mean I should withhold critical analysis, and it certainly doesn’t mean I should ever put up with one person telling another not to speak lest someone else be offended. Technically it’s not censorship unless it’s a government-imposed restriction on speech, but technically there’s never been legal discrimination against the disabled, yet it would be foolish to think that social oppression isn’t invidious. Going after Palmer and her partner for being “offensive” is wrong, far more wrong than any offense a tasteless musical act could ever be. (Yes, the use of scare quotes was intentional, and I’m assuming for the sake of argument that the project is tasteless; not having seen or heard the act myself, I wouldn’t know, and unlike some people, I think that should prevent me from rendering judgment on its artistic merit.)
I’d be interested to see if any conjoined male/female twins are offended by it.
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PAD
That doesn’t matter; it is our job to be outraged for them!
(And yeah, I got the joke) 🙂
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I guess we’ll never again get to see Joel Hodgson’s Danny O’Danny–Siamese cousins, connected at the spine. By day, just an ordinary ventriloquist dummy…by night…AGENT J!!!
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(Oh! here it is! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7EQI9xS2ltI)
That doesn’t matter; it is our job to be outraged for them!
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It reminds me of when I introduced the character of Andy, the lesbian comedienne, in “Supergirl” and I received tons of complaints about her from outraged straights on behalf of gays and straights everywhere.
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PAD
Probably the same twits who vigorously protested on behalf of the handicapped, John Callahan’s treatment of the disabled in his dark-humoured cartoons. Those same handicapped who, by the way, have been shown to be among his biggest fans.
im disabled myself and i’m not quite offened bothered yes but ranting on their websites nah if you dont like something DONT BUY IT!
If i had a disability/deformity, i’d be happy for you to help advocate for general awareness and willingness to help me cope with it.
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But don’t assume i’d be offended by something someone does or says and be offended on my behalf without asking me.
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In fact, i suffer from depression/bipolar disorder.
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I get just about as irritated at people who make “…poor, depressed people – they can’t help themselves, we shouldn’t make jokes about depression or bi-polar disorder or OCD because it could offend them…” as i do at people who say “Depressed? Just cheer up!”
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Both are clueless and counter-productive.
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Let people be offended for themselves, if they want to – don’t be offended for them.
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(Another analogous situation is all of the people offended on behalf of the American Indian** by “degrading” sports teams names who have never asked an Indian what he thinks.)
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**”Native American” is a misnomer and another part of the same attitude, for that part – a full-blooded Sioux or Cherokee is no more (or less) a “Native American” than i – we were both born here, and both of our ancestors came from somewhere else. The only difference is that his walked and mine arrived a few thousand years later by boat…
I had a teacher who got very angry if anyone said “Indian” as opposed to “Native American”. In my idiotic freshman belief that college was a place for respectful disagreement and such, I pointed out that one could argue that “Native” has negative connotations and “American” was a word named after one of those evil European exploiters she hated so much. So….
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Yeah, so I got a lousy grade in that class. Lesson learned, teacher.
I’ve lived my entire life in Oklahoma, so I’ve known many American Indians. Never in my entire life have I ever heard anyone call himself a ‘Native American’. They ALL say ‘Indian’, or in many cases, the name of the specific tribe. To be fair, I don’t go around asking them what they prefer to be called, so I’m only aware of which term someone uses if he brings the subject up himself. I have read before that it tends to be a regional thing– ‘Native American’ or ‘Native’ tends to be used more in the Northwest and maybe in the East, too. But supposedly, ‘Indian’ is overwhelmingly preferred in the centre of the country. I wonder if this is due to the lower population of Asian Indians here.
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Wait, I just remembered that when I was in college they had a ‘Native American Student Association’ as well as an ‘Indian Student Association’ for the Asian kind. So there is one instance where ‘Native American’ was used by the Indians here. I’m assuming that the term was only used to avoid confusion with the other group, though.
In her “Author’s Notes” in her book Godmother’s Web, Elizabeth Ann Scarborough mentions doing extensive research on and around the Hopi and Navajo Reservations, and that nobody she talked to said anything but “Indian”.
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About tribal names – i’ve read that many of the tribal names currently in use basically translate as “Those subhuman SOBs over there” in the language of their original neighbouring tribes to the east. Kind of like how “kangaroo” is supposed to mean “I don’t know either, European” or words to that effect in one of the Abo tongues.
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I’d be quite happy with the Canadian term, “First Tribes”.
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(Although there were people before the current Indians, come to think…)
Let’s assume that ms. Palmer is making a work of art that some people find in poor taste. Others maybe don’t.
So what?
You write a review saying that you didn’t like it. Some people agree with that and some don’t.
And so on.
Moreover, you take into consideration the intent. If you make a work of art that some disabled people find offensive but you don’t then it’s a matter of taste. If you make a work of art whose deliberate purpose is to promote prejudice then that’s something else.
In any case, there are ways to convey even justified criticism. And frankly in this case it seems we have a case of people who make it their business to be offended. Without any research it seems to me that that what we have here is at best a little tasteless work of art maybe (as if that’s uncommon).
That’s a magnificent website. My favorite part is the comments section, where she dismisses the most obvious criticisms of her argument as “derailing tactics,” thereby… wait for it… derailing a host of valid counterarguments. I haven’t seen anything that impressively closed-minded since college.
Like this comment from you?
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I looked over the comments too.
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I didn’t notice any point where it seemed as if she were pooh-poohing legitimate arguments.
Oopos. Sorry – i missed that youi were talking about a website complaining, rather than Amanda’s.
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I went to Amanda’s and read the comments.
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From what i’ve read about the site Sheila pointed to, i don’t need to read it – especially if comments have been shut off because that way the site owner doesn’t even have to respond dismissively to people making legitimate points she can’t or won’t respond to.
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And it sounds as if you’re right about the use of the “derailing” meme.
I remember hearing a description of “erotomania” by Dr. Elizabeth Olivet (Carolyn McCormick) on an episode of Law & Order in which Frances Fisher stars as a woman suffering from a delusion that a married colleague that she is obsessed with is really in love with her. The description I remember from that episode–the deluded person will think that the necktie worn by the person is a coded message of love to them–matches the delusions seen in real-life celebrity stalkers, like John Hinckley Jr. and that woman who stalked David Letterman.
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What I wonder about people like these fanatics (I’m not using the diminutive “fans”, because that’s not an accurate label) is whether Net anonymity has given that part of the psyche a safe venue in which to publicly manifest itself. People who are way too obsessed with their entertainment (making it personal, as opposed to simply discussing the merits of a given work) come across as low-level erotomaniacs in a way. I wonder at the type of personality disorder with which people would say the cruelest things when hiding behind anonymity that they’d never say in person.
Actually, Luigi, if I had Amanda Palmer in front of me today, I’m pretty sure I’d tell her, “Look, I like your work for the most part, but you really needed to think this project through a bit more.”
Just like I’m about ready to tell Peter David, “Hey, I’m glad you’re coming out in support of your friend, but I wish you’d take both sides into account instead of denying the experiences of one side.” Because nobody likes to be invisible, and frankly, there is ableism in the world. Mr. David appears to be lucky enough not to be disabled in any way, so how would he know, personally, how it feels?
That’s when you put aside your knee-jerk reactions and try to understand how the other side came to its conclusions.
This. Since when is thinking critically about art and trying not to hurt people a BAD thing?
I don’t think people should comment on strangers’ personal lives. Whoever did that is being unconscionably rude. However, that is not what many fans — yes, fans — are upset about. They are upset that Neil was involved in this project, and I would posit that that is the primary reason why his name keeps coming up.
I’d really like to give people the benefit of the doubt and do the “wait and see” approach, but it is usually ineffective for two reasons:
1. The finished project rarely manages to be less offensive and frequently ends up more offensive, and
2. Once I’ve given the artists my money, why should they feel inclined to listen to me?
Actually, Luigi, if I had Amanda Palmer in front of me today, I’m pretty sure I’d tell her, “Look, I like your work for the most part, but you really needed to think this project through a bit more.”
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And I wouldn’t take issue with that, because being able to voice your opinion is what makes a free society. Although I would venture to guess that the first thing she would ask you is, “Did you see it or heard the CD yet?” And if you said, “No,” then she’d tell you that you should really do so before offering critiques.
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The fact is that I’m not the one displaying the knee-jerk reaction. A knee-jerk reaction is to say, “I heard about this project, I hate it, I hate the artist, and Neil Gaiman is a jerk for being engaged to her.”
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This isn’t about me coming out in support of my friend. This is me saying that fans are displaying Fanfail in excoriating Neil because of a project that his fiancee is undertaking.
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PAD
Yep, part of it is the protection of anonymity, but the Internet also removes emotional cues. When you can SEE that a person is feeling hurt by something rude you’ve said, there is more of a tendency to wake up and stop being an a-hole.
In other words, on the Internet, everyone has Asperger’s.
Pretty much, yeah. That’s why we invented the Internet, after all – so that everyone could see what communication is like for us. (Then somebody had to be nice to the NTs and come up with the World Wide Web interface…)
(To quote EDI in Mass Effect 2, “That was a joke, Jeff.”)
It should be noted of course, that as far as people with their own delusions on ‘shots” they have with people they don’t really know, I remember when Sean Cassidy’s managers wanted him to keep any relationships private, since any appearance he was “taken” would have diminished his appeal with squealing teen girls.
when Britney had her Vegas wedding that was quickly annulled, her manager exploded, since all those guys who thought they had a shot with her would now listen to someone else.
We should note that all these idiots with their opinions that are oh-so-important are not new. The difficulty is that they now are not limited to letter columns (where they’d almost never be printed for being too out there), and they are able to connect with similar opinions. All of the things that are some of the best things about the internet (connecting people, giving the marginalized a voice) unfortunately reminds us that there are reasons some of these people were alone and marginalized.
Sorry. That was vitrolic itself. But I make the mistake of reading comments on news sites, and they make me very very upset, and afraid that some of these people are allowed to vote.
It may be related to FanDumb: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FanDumb
I just want to add:
1) I don’t see anything objectionable in her blog.
2) Even if I did, it takes a much higher level of áššhølërÿ to go complain to her fiance, whose only ‘relationship’ with me is that I’m a fan of his work.
An artist (writer) wanting to marry another artist (musician), who’d a thunk? Sarcasm IS intended.
Oaky. I went to the site Sheila directed people to, but I could not post. Want to know why? Because the person in charge of the thread is obviously not as tolerant of dissenting opinion as, well, PAD.
Take a look at her closing comment.
“Alright, folks, I think this thread is ceasing to be productive and/or make anyone think about these issues in ways other than they have already decided to think about them. It is really, intensely obvious to me that a lot of people aren’t listening and are definitely not getting the whole “letting people who actually have firsthand experience with things like ableism and disability raise these questions” thing because it is too important for them to, for example, analogize peoples’ lived experiences to hobbies, or excuse things away under the guise of “art.”
Social justice 101: When you have more privilege (look it up) than members of a marginalized group — some of whose members are talking about something problematic or offensive — you do not get to decide what is offensive or not to some members of a marginalized group when you are not a member of that group yourself (ie: non-disabled people do not get to decide what is offensive and not to people with disabilities). Asking me “what’s wrong with you” (as one unpublished comment did), telling me that I need to chill, that this is not important, that you’re able bodied and don’t find this offensive, that I am somehow disrespectful of your rights by wanting the conversation to stay on topic, that it’s just “art,” that I am ruining peoples’ fun by getting upset — all are classic derailing or silencing tactics. We PWDs can speak for ourselves now and express our own opinions, amazing as that may sound.
I and other contributors have repeatedly asked people in this thread to examine their privilege and prejudices, and to listen to what we have to say. By and large, this has not happened. I, for one, am sick of having played nice with people who are ultimately not interested in what I have to say (or in examining these issues from the perspective that disability is an actual human experience and not just something to draw upon for art’s sake), and having my willingness to explain very basic concepts spit right back into my face.
I understand. It doesn’t matter to you. I totally get it now. I’m sorry that we mean, humorless disabled folks ever invaded the internet with our feminist-y media criticism and all. Of course, now that I’ve made this decision, I’ll probably get slammed for “censorship.” I have no responsibility to let people say whatever kind of bigoted stuff they want here and get away with it. You have the entire internet for that.
I’m done. Further comments will not be published.”
This is really sad and scary and why for all it’s purported benefits, I rail against political correctness as much as I can.
I’d like to say I’m surprised, but I’m not. You’re dealing with an attitude that basically says introspection should be one way. The key phrase is this one:
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I and other contributors have repeatedly asked people in this thread to examine their privilege and prejudices, and to listen to what we have to say.
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Others should listen to them…but there is apparently no onus upon them to listen to others. Everyone who disagrees with them refuses to engage in self-reflection or hates feminists or just doesn’t get it. Even the grammatical structure of the sentence is telling: “I and other contributors,” rather than the preferred “Other contributors and I,” indicating an ego so massive that it cannot countenance challenges to it. The notions that they are, in fact, humorless or need to chill are not honestly considered but instead dismissed out of hand. And the fundamental concept that attacking Neil simply because he’s engaged to the artist is never addressed.
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This was really the perfect storm of everyone involved acting in a manner that was Standard Operating Procedure. It is SOP for performance artists to engage in outlandish demonstrations that are supposed to serve as a metaphor for the human condition. It is SOP for comics fans to decry projects without having seen them. It is SOP for certain individuals to cry foul whenever a creative individual who doesn’t share whatever their particular status in life is produces a work of fiction that speaks to some aspect of it, declaring that the artist “cannot possibly understand” and therefore has no right to address it. Put all these together and you have an explosive combination.
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It’s theater of the absurd. You’re talking about conjoined intergender twins, for God’s sake. It’s like taking offense at the Smothers Brothers because your mom really did like your sibling better and you’ve had to live with that for your entire life.
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PAD
It’s like taking offense at the Smothers Brothers because your mom really did like your sibling better and you’ve had to live with that for your entire life.
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LOL. Perfect!
I never really understood that attitude.
As a gay man, I think the worst that can happen to you is social invisibility. I’m grateful for any fiction or art that depicts gay characters*, even when they don’t get all the little details right or chose to depict them in a slightly different way than the one I would choose. It’s always a bumpy road. The more depictions we have, the greater the chance that some of those depictions will be as well-rounded characters. But we have to start somewhere. And to say only gay creators can be trusted to create gay characters is a nice way to stay in the ghetto.
* Exception made for that kind of fiction written by ultra-conservatives that depicts all gays as sick and/or pitiable monsters. THAT kind of fiction I can do without.
An unfortunate side effect of “cannot possibly understand” syndrome is how competitive it can be for personal attention. It also becomes an easy excuse to justify a lack of effective expression.
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It’s bad enough that there are already people who wouldn’t pay attention to that either. Why give them poor excuses to feel that attitude is justified?
You want to talk about “fail?” How about “Fanfail”. Fans failing to act in a manner that is considerate or civilized or intelligent. Fans making untoward, unkind and unjust comments about the personal lives and romantic choices of professionals when it’s none of their dámņëd business.
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(head-bobbling)
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I’ll never understand how someone can consider themselves a fan of superheroes and then turn around and treat people like dirt.
Probably depends on which “superheros” you claim to be a fan of – some of the “grim and gritty” and “dark” versions of “superheros” have a tendency to treat people like dirt…
@Rene
I agree totally, a gay woman I just can’t understand the people who go on and about being upset about women writing men or men writing women, especially when it comes to straight men writing gay women, or straight women writing gay men. The world would be a lot happier if people didn’t try to take ever bit of fiction as saying something at large.
It’s entertainment and authors who trying to do nothing but make a political statement with a thinly veiled and poorly written story aren’t good authors in my book. This can be done well, but I have no respect for people who just use fiction to espouse their point of view and get personally insulted when it’s criticized.
I think the whole idea that only people within a certain movement, be it based on race, sexuality, or gender is crazy. Men can’t be feminist? Whites can’t support minority issues? Way to limit your movement there.
Overall I just feel sorry for Neil and Amanda. I don’t know much of Ms Palmer’s work but anyone Neil, who by reading his blog I’m am convinced is a kind and sensible person, picks out to be his wife cannot be too bad. As for the people who don’t like the direction his work is going.
They don’t have to read it. Personally I care more that he is happy as person. Because if we truly care about the author as fans shouldn’t we want them to be happy? Idealy happy and producing lots of work, but if it were to come down it I’d rather he and Ms Palmer both be very happy for the rest of their lives together and only coming out with a few things ever now and again then miserable and with a new novel or music production every year.
Also, on another note, I can’t understand the people who are upset and disappointed about Neil being part of the project. Because you know he totally supports everything he deals with in his single and works he does with others. Like the serial killer convention in Sandman.
I was once given to understand that Baen books received a complaint from a “feminist” about “forcing” a woman to use a male pseudonym (as many women did – or else used an ambiguous name, like Lee Hoffman, or initials, like C.L.Moore – in the early days of SF, when it was pretty much an adolescent boys’ club), when it was obvious that no mere male could have so well written the protagonist of my brother David’s book, Path of the Fury.
Isn’t one of the points of the Evelyn Evelyn project is that despite what they are and what they’ve been through, they’re able to put out an album?
And they’re COMPLETELY MADE UP?!
Just sayin’…
I don’t know what any of the points of the project is, honestly, Donna, not having heard it or seen it. So I’m inclined to wait until it comes out before trying to determine that.
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PAD
To be honest, based on hearsay, it sounds like something i wouldn’t be interested in, myself, or might even find offensive.
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But, hey, if i’m offended by it, i just won’t buy/listen to it.
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So long as no conjoined twins were harmed in the making of this album, i could otherwise not care less.
Sock-puppet theater fun time!
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DERP: Oh my god, I’ve been shot!
DERPDERP: Oh I know how you feel, I just got a paper cut!
DERP: Oh lord I’m in agony…
DERPDERP: Yea, it really stinks doesn’t it? Poor me! *sniffles*
DERP: I’m f—ing bleeding to death you a–hole!
DERPDERP: Yea, I’m bleeding too, hey these band-aids will make it all better! Here, have one!
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“that is, the blog represents the feelings of some of those who are disabled in some ways
though i’m glad the internet gives them a place to share and vent, i hope they get beyond it, and have (imho) a better life
sad they haven’t realised that everyone is disabled in their own ways.
part of the human condition.
some ‘worse’ than others.” – quote by Amanda Palmer
This Sock Puppet theater fun time brought to you by the letter Q and the number 4.
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I don’t really know what’s going on in the comments on Palmer’s website or Gaiman’s website, nor do I particularly care, but the fact that some people are insisting that everyone who is complaining must just be a load of dumb mush-brained wimmins who are sad because they can’t screw Neil Gaiman (as some of the commenters on this post have done) is pathetic (and wrong – Many don’t read Gaiman’s comics and wouldn’t know him if they tripped over him, much less care who he marries). It’s also ignoring the core issue at hand. So is the original blog post here, for that matter, which just hopped, skipped and jumped right over the elephant in the room.
I don’t personally find Palmer’s project all that shocking, and really it’s just more of the same sort of cheap manufactured “outrage” and “controversy” that people have been using to sell books, records, films, etc forever, but I can understand why SOME people might find it upsetting or annoying. But I guess it’s easier to just shove off people who get upset at as “humorless” rather than try to understand another person’s life or point of view.
Here’s some light bedtime reading for certain people in these parts: http://community.livejournal.com/theyorkshergob/239911.html
And, of course that post (which i did read) is the sort of thing thinking that ultimately leads to sanitised discourse.
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All humour is in some way rooted in cruelty to someone or something, even if it’s subtle.
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If you’re offended by a joke, tell whoever told it to you exactly that (and be as strident as you wish) – but don’t complain that he/she is not allowed to tell it to audiences that won’t be offended.
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(And, yes, this means that i am standing up for the right of ne-Nazis to tell anti-semitic jokes or white supremacists to tell racist jokes or lesbians to tell misanthropic jokes.)
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But, you know, that’s not where this discussion started – PAD was complaining about the fact that Neil Gaiman is being strafed for something he didn’t do.
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Even if i were willing to concede that Amanda ought be publicly excoriated, Gaiman is a more-or-less-innocent bystander here.
Oh you read it, did you? Could have fooled me. Guess you skipped this bit?
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“Freedom of speech is a wonderful thing, and I am fully in favour of it being as extensive as possible. But if you use your freedom of speech, you have to accept that sometimes, you are going to upset people, *and that is a perfectly valid reaction for them to have.* Belittling people for being offended is missing an opportunity to learn why something is offensive. And this absolutely does not mean that you can’t say the offensive thing again; but if you say something offensive *with the knowledge that you are being offensive* then that is you being a bit of an áršëhølë. That’s cool if you are OK with being an áršëhølë, but it’s a bit rich to pretend that you’re not.”
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If you HAD read the post I linked, you might have noticed that Jeannie did in fact state that she fully believes in free speech and that people can and should be able to say whatever they care to, but don’t get your pants in a wad when someone calls you out on it. Way to completely miss the point.
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I have no opinion of Gaiman whatsoever with or without regard to this mess and my post was in response to some of the comments made here, not the original blog post. FWIW, I don’t believe it is fair to hold one person accountable for the actions of someone else, whatever the case, and I don’t recall saying any such thing.
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Uhm… Sam? The point is that Jeannie is not in this case getting upset with AP for something she has done. That’s the biggest issue with the matter at hand. What she and others are doing is getting upset at AP for what they think she has done. The album isn’t out and the completed work has been heard by none of the people complaining or claiming offense.
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Some people discussing this on various blogs have compared this to performing in blackface. Well, there are two problems, one minor and one major, with that comparison. Minor problem first. A person who is not handicapped portraying someone who is as a part of a performance does not have the same history of being an act designed to ridicule that blackface has.
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What’s the major problem with that comparison? No one has heard the entire album or seen an entire show. Why is that pertinent even here? Because it really does matter. If I said that I had an idea to poke fun at someone in a comedy and part of the gag was to have them in blackface to underscore the character’s goofiness, I think a lot of people would say that I had lost my mind. A lot of other people would question my judgment, call me a racist white guy and condemn the project before it even got off of the ground. Of course, that very same concept was done about a year ago in a film called “Tropical Thunder” and, not only did the film not create a race debate nightmare and uproar, but it was actually prescreened for the NAACP who had no problem with it because of the nature of the performance and what it was actually about.
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It was Robert Downey Jr. in blackface in a comedy… And even the NAACP didn’t see the need to get the knickers in a twist and protest it because the performance and the character was done well and done without malice. But you had to actually see the whole movie to know that. You couldn’t judge it from talk on the net or a trailer or two that you saw long before it was released. You had to see the thing to be able to judge it and once people saw it, including people who were expressing reservations at the concept before the release of the film, they walked away saying that it wasn’t at all offensive or what they thought it might have been.
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Right now Jeannie and an army of internet denizens like her are expressing outrage and offense, and some in very crass ways which is another issue with this, about something they truly know nothing about and have no truly formed opinion of. All they know is that a singer they like is dressing up as a conjoined twin to do a concept album. That’s it.
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If when the project is released it ends up being filled to the breaking point with every negative and insulting stereotype of the disabled that you can think of then by all means be offended and upset about it. But right now you can’t make an informed decision either way. Seriously. if this were a different topic and someone was telling you that they were offended by something that hasn’t actually come out yet, that they haven’t heard or seen and that they really only know a little bit about, but they think that it will be as offensive as they claim it will be so they’re being offended and hurt now…
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The only solid thing that anyone complaining can claim right now is that a nondisabled performer is portraying a disabled performer. And I’m sorry, but if you find that offensive you really need to get some thicker skin.
Uh, Jerry? That post by Jeannie pre-dates this fiasco by quite some time. And nothing in your “rebuttal” referenced anything whatsoever in the post.
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Apparently you didn’t read it either.
And yet the major points of his post, which you fail to address, are incredibly valid.
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The “when” of the post in question is really of less importance than the concept that voicing opinions about material that you don’t have any first hand knowledge of and saying you’re doing so because of freedom of speech skips over the whole “knowing what you’re talking about” thing.
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Furthermore, the thrust of the posting is that she objects to people saying, “It was only a joke” as a way of defusing criticism. I don’t recall Palmer saying it was a joke. As a matter of fact, what she did say was this: listen: i deeply apologize if anyone has been offended by our project. there is and was absolutely no harm meant, and if harm was taken, it’s obviously worthy of discussion. That is, to all intents and purposes, exactly what the posting you’re describing SAYS that people who have offended others should say. Which leaves me wondering what the hëll you’re going on about.
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Plus the posting fails to address the simple concept of voicing an informed opinion. Which is all anyone here is advocating, but the response being given is that having the right to say whatever you want trumps the idea of knowing what the hëll you’re talking about. And I suppose that it does, but don’t be shocked when people who actually believe in informed opinions are dismissive. And it doesn’t mean they’re dismissive because they don’t share your particular status in life/skin color/gender. It means they just don’t take uninformed opinions very seriously. Right now there’s a guy doing some work on our phone lines. If I started offering opinions on how he should do it, he’d rightly dismiss my opinions out of hand. Same concept.
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PAD
“Belittling people for being offended is missing an opportunity to learn why something is offensive.”
It is more accurate to state that belittling people for being offended is missing an opportunity to learn why they were offended. It is not always because something is offensive.
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No, I read it. I just didn’t look at the date and her “it was just a joke” discussion read exactly like the criticisms of the project that some are making that AP is making fun of people with disabilities.
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If it’s just a stand alone I would just say that she needs a thicker skin. Sorry, but I’ve had lots of jokes made at my expense my entire life. The malicious áššhølëš you just ignore because they’re idiots. The others you don’t let get to you because (A) they’re not meant to hurt you and (B) good humor, even humor that pokes fun at your failings, is often rooted in an exaggerated truth.
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The idea that some people get to claim special “offended” privileges is silly. The idea that some want to claim the offense before they even see or hear what is offending them is idiotic.
A lot of white men whining about how people without their privilege are ‘going too far in their political correctness’. I hope the irony isn’t entirely lost on you.
I will buy none of whatever you are involved in any longer, and the same goes for anyone else who’s here telling those ‘cripples’ to ‘stfu’.
Point of information: No one here is telling anyone to shut the fûçk up. You’re confusing this blog with other blogs discussing this topic–blogs where I’m sure the tone is far more to your liking–where the host doesn’t like how the conversation is going and shuts down the discussion.
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So basically you would “punish” me, the one who isn’t actually shutting anyone up, by refusing to support my work, while fully agreeing with and supporting the people who DO endeavor to stifle opinions and the expression thereof.
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Congratulations. By being utterly oblivious to the irony of your position, you’ve just committed textbook Fanfail. Thank you for the illustration.
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PAD
On behalf of all sensible people who have at least the minimal competence to operate a computer, and as one who has been a part of the process that’s put computers in the hands of total nimrods, i’d like to tender an apology (sort of like BD’s apology to Melissa on behalf of the US Armed Forces) to PAD and anyone else who might need one for that poster’s complete lack of comprehension.
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Cheese. Wotta maroon.
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Wow…
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Off topic/on topic for several threads and discussions here and elsewhere on the web.
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Family Guy did a bit last week where one of the characters was written as suffering from Down syndrome. There was also a line thrown in where the character describes herself as “the daughter of the former governor of Alaska.”
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Fans of the show didn’t seem to react badly, but Palin played it up for all she was worth and played victim over it and, more important to this discussion, some self styled advocates complained about it on behalf of those who they felt should be offended.
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Now, obviously the show’s creative staff, almost all of whom have been interviewed for various things before, do not have Down syndrome. Yet they wrote a character with Down syndrome and supposedly “made fun of” a child with Down syndrome. Pretty low, huh? Certainly people with Down syndrome or people who have family with Down syndrome should be offended at these “creators” who dared to do this thing.
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Not quite. Here’s what Andrea F. Friedman had to say on the matter. Who is Andrea F. Friedman you ask? She’s just the actress who voiced the character in question.
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“My name is Andrea Fay Friedman. I was born with Down syndrome. I played the role of Ellen on the “Extra Large Medium” episode of Family Guy that was broadcast on Valentine’s day. Although they gave me red hair on the show, I am really a blonde. I also wore a red wig for my role in “Smudge” but I was a blonde in “Life Goes On”. I guess former Governor Palin does not have a sense of humor. I thought the line “I am the daughter of the former governor of Alaska” was very funny. I think the word is “sarcasm”.
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In my family we think laughing is good. My parents raised me to have a sense of humor and to live a normal life. My mother did not carry me around under her arm like a loaf of French bread the way former Governor Palin carries her son Trig around looking for sympathy and votes.”
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Here’s her IMDB profile for the skeptical.
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http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0295141/
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Oops. So an actress with Down syndrome didn’t find the part offensive even though it was written by people who do not suffer from Down syndrome and wrote the part in a comedy. My, whatever shall the Offended For Those Who Should Be Offended do now?
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Maybe they should take to heart Andrea Friedman’s comments directed at Palin.
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“It would be nice if she had a sense of humor. It’s only a joke.”
To disress a little on the FAMILY GUY episode, it reminds me a little of the W.C. Fields story where someone bet him that he couldn’t have a comedy sketch revolving around a blind man, and Fields did it — not by making fun of the man’s blindness, but by turning the blind man into an accidental force of destruction.
In the FG episode, they weren’t mocking the character’s Down Syndrome (except for one exchange: “Isn’t she special?” “Yes, that’s how the state of Rhode Island would describe her”) but turned her into a pushy, obnoxious character who bosses Chris around until he couldn’t take it anymore. They weren’t mocking her illness, or making her look stupid. Unpleasant, yes — but she would’ve come off that way were she done as a “normal” person.
Incidentally, considering FAMILY GUY has “offended” just about every group out there, shouldn’t people easily offended either skip the show entirely, or get in a very long line of people who want to complain? It’s like a person who dislikes blood and violence watching an unrated horror movie and then complaining about it!
Here’s a larf for ya – pretend for half a second that you are the mother of an infant son. Somebody makes fun of said infant son on national television. Would that not at least somewhat annoy you? And would being upset that people are turning your child into an object of fun make you “humorless”?
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I don’t care much for Sarah Palin’s politics but frankly it’s not hard to understand why she got upset. It’s not just about being “overly PC”. It was, like most of Family Guy’s crappy non-sequitor jokes, a tasteless cheap shot, and moreover at someone who can’t defend himself. If that’s your idea of a good joke, I suggest you, sir, go get a “sense of humor” that isn’t just that of a crass bully.
I don’t watch “Family Guy” in general because I think it’s incredibly hit or miss. Basically I don’t think it’s especially funny (except for the “Star Wars” parodies.)
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But I don’t condemn the many other people who genuinely enjoy it. I don’t wish for it to be canceled because I don’t like it.
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And I sure as hëll wouldn’t bad mouth Seth McFarlane’s significant other just because I’m not a huge fan of the series, which is what my original posting was all about.
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PAD
(1) Congratulations. You missed what I said was the more important point of the post to jump to position of taken offense. My primary point was directed at those who claim automatic “offensiveness” when someone who is not of a certain group writes a story about or around that group as is being done here.
(2) I could give a dámņ less about the joke really. Don’t watch Family Guy.
(3) One of the officers on my shift has a child with Down syndrome. He does watch the show and had no problem with it. He also has the same reaction to Palin most of the time that the actress with Down syndrome who voiced the part has to her.
(4) Lighten up, Pondexter.
Jerry,
I think of we get into the Palin/Family Guy thing we really will go off track.let me just say I feel the two situations are different because one is obviously taking a shot at an individual (Palin) while the other purpotedly is offending a whole group of people.
As should be obvious from the rest of my posts on this thread, I obviously feel that we have become way too “sensitive” as a society. I feel it has taken away a lot of our humor and vitality as a society.
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Fair enough. Take part about Palin out though and it’s still relevant. You had some rumblings over the episode from some quarters that paralleled the rumblings here. And the situation was somewhat the same.
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Healthy, happy, non-Down syndrome show creators do a show with a Down syndrome character and some overly PC people objected. Then it turns out that the actress who voiced the character thought it was funny and she, unlike many of the complaining idiots, actually has Down syndrome. The episode could have been offensive and probably would have looked that way if one just read a breakdown of the idea for it, but once the show air and people could actually see it it wasn’t what some may have thought it to be.
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It actually reminds me of the flap around the film The Ringer. Can’t speak for the film since I never saw it, but the flap was that it was insulting to the disabled. Turned out that a lot of the groups that work with and for the disabled thought it was a great film after they actually got a chance to see it and dismissed the early criticism of those who judged it before it was ever released.
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That’s more along the lines of what I was talking about. The Palin thing was just a bonus.
I think what it comes down to is that Palmer is doing what performance artists have always done: Create a character or characterization and drop that persona into the real world in order to provoke reactions. Back before performance art was widely understood in the United States, Andy Kaufman had created an identity as the Inter-Gender female wrestling champ. And women were openly outraged and men were either genuinely outraged or secretly amused while openly outraged on behalf of their significant others. Which is fine: He was trying to provoke outrage.
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But if the Internet had existed back then and Kaufman’s parents had Facebook pages, would it have been legit to start bìŧçhìņg at them about how they had screwed up raising their son?
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PAD
Likewise, i understand that Mexicans (and Mexican-Americans) loved Speedy Gonzalez (and his shiftless buddies) but people who were offended on their behalf got Speedy essentially banned.
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And some Mexican advocacy group decided to take pre-emptive offence at the portrayal of Pre-Columbian Mesoamericans in the film “The Road to El Dorado” … and again, apparently, the Latino audience liked it about as much as anyone else.
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And WREK, the Georgia Tech campus station, had to stop playing Jaime Brockett’s hilarious “Ballad of the USS Titanic” because Jewish groups objected to the reference to “Jewish people from Miami”…
“Actually, Luigi, if I had Amanda Palmer in front of me today, I’m pretty sure I’d tell her, “Look, I like your work for the most part, but you really needed to think this project through a bit more.”
Just like I’m about ready to tell Peter David, “Hey, I’m glad you’re coming out in support of your friend, but I wish you’d take both sides into account instead of denying the experiences of one side.” Because nobody likes to be invisible, and frankly, there is ableism in the world. Mr. David appears to be lucky enough not to be disabled in any way, so how would he know, personally, how it feels?
That’s when you put aside your knee-jerk reactions and try to understand how the other side came to its conclusions.”
My, are you close-minded and arrogant. It is not PAD or anyone else on this thread who are going on individuals’ blogs and/orFacebook pages to question their choice of mate – which is what started this thread in the first place.
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As for taking “both sides into account”, it would be nice if some of the people on your side of this discussion actually did so. i wanted to post on a thread that was mentioned here, and it was shut down because ..well, because the moderator really wasn’t interesting what us “able-bodied individuals” had to say on the subject apparently.
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And really, crying “ableism”? Over something you haven’t even seen or heard yet? And the clincher, where you say that PAD – not being disabled himself – has no idea how a disabled person feels and should therefore keep his, i your opinion, “knee-jerk reactions” to himself is really too much.
My fiance has anxiety issues severe enough she could get disability. She has joked that I should write a script about some of our experiences dealing with it. She knows i can empathize despite my not suffering from the same thing.
And she loves horror movies and isn’t upset people aren’t taking her anxiety into account when producing them and loves rom-coms, though the nervousness and behavior of many of the characters resembles hers in similar situations and the writers, director and actors “can’t possibly understand” how seeing such experiences onscreen may affect her.
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Do you not see to what an outrageous extent we could take things (and already have) if everyone’s main priority was to never make anyone uncomfortable and if everyone could only write about what they knew from first hand experience? could only write about 40 year-old, bald, single writers. I couldn’t write about a waitress in my story, since I’ve been a waiter, but not a waitress and “couldn’t possibly understand” what a waitress goes through. I couldn’t write about someone who’s rich, since I’m not and “couldn’t possibly understand” a rich person. I couldn’t write about someone who’s homeless since I never have been and “couldn’t possibly understand” a homeless person.
I could never write about a soldier, butcher or anyone with a profession other than mine because I “couldn’t possibly understand” people who are engaged in tose professions.
According to your theory, I couldn’t even write a romantic comedy featuring a married couple – even if it was based on my hopes and zany predicaments I could see my fiance and I in – since i am not yet married and “couldn’t possibly understand” married life – or any characterization of women for that mater. And forget about including any Black, Hispanic or Asian characters in my work, because I “couldn’t possibly understand” them.
Don’t you see how narrow and limiting your mindset sems to be?
According to your theory, I couldn’t even write a romantic comedy featuring a married couple – even if it was based on my hopes and zany predicaments I could see my fiance and I in – since i am not yet married and “couldn’t possibly understand” married life – or any characterization of women for that mater. And forget about including any Black, Hispanic or Asian characters in my work, because I “couldn’t possibly understand” them.
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I can be even more specific. Kathleen and I just saw a compelling new play last night called “Race” that’s entirely about racism and turns on several black characters putting forward their view of racism. It was written by David Mamet, a white Jew. The audience was about evenly split, black and white. Both were on their feet at the end in a standing ovation. But in the world of the Internet it would be condemned without being seen and Mamet dismissed as being too “privileged” to “own” the material and thus having committed a “fail.”
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You know, someone could really do up a “Fanfail” bingo card with all the cliches that mindset bandies about.
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PAD
Jerome: Your fiancée and I have something in common, then. It’s why I got the sack — my last employer refused accommodation, refused to provide equal work for equal pay, and so I was quietly ushered out.
Because you are so close to her, I’d say if she’s unable to write about her experiences, your portrayal would be the closest to accurate we would get.
See response to Mr. Chandler for the rest, I suppose. It’s in the thread under this one.
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Dechant: “Just like I’m about ready to tell Peter David, “Hey, I’m glad you’re coming out in support of your friend, but I wish you’d take both sides into account instead of denying the experiences of one side.” Because nobody likes to be invisible, and frankly, there is ableism in the world. Mr. David appears to be lucky enough not to be disabled in any way, so how would he know, personally, how it feels?
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That’s when you put aside your knee-jerk reactions and try to understand how the other side came to its conclusions.”
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Dechant, Your post is loaded with emotion, but there’s not really much substance there.Even your “knee jerk” comment shows that you’re not actually looking at what has been said and thinking about it.
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“Because nobody likes to be invisible, and frankly, there is ableism in the world.”
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Yeah, okay… So there’s “ableism” in the world. So what? The fact that you can claim that there’s “ableism” in the world in no way automatically makes the project in question offensive. That’s like saying that there’s sexism in the world so any project where the main character is a woman while the creator is a man is automatically sexist.
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You don’t know if the project is offense. For that matter I don’t know that it’s not. The full album has not been released and heard yet so no one here can comment to that matter one way or the other.
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What can be commented on is the actions of various fans. Frankly it’s idiotic for fans to attack or disparage Amanda Palmer because they think a project that they’ve never heard will be offensive when it finally comes out and they can actually hear it.
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It’s downright crass to go whining to Neil Gaiman about the project and/or to question how he could possibly be engaged to someone like that who would do something like this. It’s even more crass and idiotic give, again, that no one complaining about it has even heard the dámņëd thing yet.
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“Mr. David appears to be lucky enough not to be disabled in any way, so how would he know, personally, how it feels?”
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This is one of the colossal fallacies in the thought process of the incredibly PC. If you’re not “A” then you can’t possibly understand what life as “A” is like. Horse pucky.
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This line of thought presumes that you don’t have friends or family who are whatever the “A” in question is and that you’ve not spent years helping them with things, seeing how they’re treated or simply listening to them when they needed you to.
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I don’t “know, personally, how it feels” to be Middle Eastern and living in the United States since 9/11. I do have a number of friends who do though. Not only have we talked about the crap they went through in the two years that immediately followed that event, but we’ve also discussed the issues that they’ve encountered with their family back home and their POV on how my friends are living their lives here. A good artist could easily draw on that kind of thing and create a story based around those discussions and some additional research into the stories of others of Middle Eastern descent who have lived in this country in the aftermath of 9/11.
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The story could be very genuine even if the creator of the story did not live that life personally. It could also be anything but offensive. Same here. Now, do I know Amanda Palmer’s background with the disabled or if she’s ever discussed anything in detail with a disabled friend? No. But I’ll wager you haven’t a clue either.
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As to what some people here might or might not know about living with a disability… Don’t open your mouth too fast. You might end up sticking both feet in it. Deep.
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“… but I wish you’d take both sides into account…”
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“That’s when you put aside your knee-jerk reactions and try to understand how the other side came to its conclusions.”
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Yeah, but there’s really only one knee-jerk side here and that’s the side that’s attacking someone for a project that they’ve never heard and, in some cases, taking the further step to attack another person and question them on how they could ever stoop so low as to be engaged to the other person.
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As for the “other side” here… What is the other side? Our side is saying that it’s a bit crass to say the things to Amanda and Neil that have been said to them by, well, your side. Our side of the debate is the side saying that the project hasn’t been released and heard yet so any meaningful judgment one way or the other is impossible. Our side is the side saying that we don’t know if the project will be offensive until we actually hear it and if it is then we’ll say so. But we reserve that condemnation until we’ve actually heard the thing and can know what we’re talking about.
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What’s your side? You’re deciding that the thing is offensive despite you never having heard it and likely not knowing as much about what went into it and what may have informed some of the creative choices as you think you do. Your side says that it must be offensive because, well, you say so and you don’t actually have to know what you’re talking about to claim that it’s offensive.
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Now, who’s the knee-jerk side here?
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Hash: “A lot of white men whining about how people without their privilege are ‘going too far in their political correctness’. I hope the irony isn’t entirely lost on you.”
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Are you just completely defective naturally or do you work at it? Seriously, since there’s no aspect of this conversation that is any way related to race… How exactly are you not a race obsessed idiot talking out of his backside? Or are you just some loon who thinks that “disabled” is some secret code for “black” these days? Sounds to me like a pretty racist and hateful mindset that you’ve got there. I’d keep it to myself if I were you.
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“I will buy none of whatever you are involved in any longer, and the same goes for anyone else who’s here telling those ‘cripples’ to ’stfu’.”
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Really? Why is it that I have a feeling that you would have to start buying his works before you could stop buying them “any longer” as you now threaten to do?
This is one of the colossal fallacies in the thought process of the incredibly PC. If you’re not “A” then you can’t possibly understand what life as “A” is like. Horse pucky.
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You know what’s interesting? I’ve never captained a starship yet no one’s ever said I had no business writing the New Frontier novels. For that matter, I wrote three novels and five comic books about the life of a crippled son of a tavern whørë. I wonder why no one ever slapped the “Fail!” label on the Sir Apropos books?
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PAD
Okay, Peter, that’s it – you obviously aren’t a mutant with the ability to bulk up through impact, destroy things with your voice, or turn into a wolf, so no more “X-Factor” for you!
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(Looking at your list of projects, I can’t testify with any degree of certainty that you aren’t able to create duplicates of yourself…)
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As an autistic, am I supposed to be offended that Dr. Temple Grandin was portrayed in a recent HBO movie by Claire Danes, who is apparently not autistic herself? Should disabled Vietnam vets be angry because the part of Lt. Dan, in Forrest Gump, was played by an able-bodied actor who was too young to have gone there? What about the manufactured outrage over that recent Family Guy episode – should it all be retracted because the actress who provided the voice actually does have Down’s Syndrome, or extended because the writers didn’t? I’m confused…
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Forget about Peter and Amanda for a moment. Let’s talk about a cultural icon for a second.
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Who is the man? John Shaft.
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Shaft, a character created in a series of novels written by Ernest Tidyman. He also wrote the screenplays for the films since he had a background with writing for films such as the French Connection and High Plains Drifter.
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So popular was the character and so great the impact of the character that Ernest Tidyman was honored with an NAACP Image Award.
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Today he would have been attacked and slandered by the PC crowd and maybe the project would have never gotten off of the ground thanks to the protests. Today he would have his judgment questioned and be labeled a racist by many of the denizens of the internet community.
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Why? Because Ernest Tidyman was white. I’m just thankful that, as fan of the movies and as someone who enjoyed the novels, the idiot brigade didn’t have the ability to scuttle things as badly back then as they sometimes do now.
Who is the man? John Shaft.
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He’s a bad mother–
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Shut ya mout’!
But he’s talking about Shaft.
And I can dig it!
PAD’s also written the Hulk, yet he is neither green, gigantic, nor radiation-infused. (And I’ve met him at a few conventions, so I’m 100% positive on the first two!)
And, having encountered PAD a few times in person, i can attest he’s not a cute twenty-something brunette chick, either; and i’m pretty sure that he can’t transform into a statuesque blonde with super powers, for that matter.
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So DC should never have hired him to write Supergirl.
“PAD’s also written the Hulk, yet he is neither green, gigantic, nor radiation-infused.”
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Havve you met him when he’s mad?
Speaking of Tidyman and “Shaft” – how about all those books about American Indian cops written by Tony Hillerman?
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Great books, Mike. Got most of them.
(NB: two email addresses = one oft-confused Dechant, so I’m using the first one that came to mind.)
Mr. Chandler:
My post was loaded with emotion. You’re right on that count. What I was feeling when I read this slew of comments wasn’t pretty. I let that influence what needs to be a drier discourse in order to reach out and educate, and for that I apologize.
I can say that, having seen part of the project, a part that employed racism and rape as consequence of a girl being out late at night (the video for “Have You Seen My Sister Evelyn?”), I’m more than a little skeeved. That it’s then tied by the artists to a backstory which uses the exploitation of disabled children as a mere plot point leaves me wondering how thoroughly the artists in question thought their project through.
I agree that fans who disparage Amanda Palmer the person (as opposed to her work) and get pissy at Neil over her actions are out of line. I am not one of them. Rather, I am one of Amanda’s fans who became upset when it appeared she was trying to silence her disabled feminist fanbase on Twitter. To me, that is a step towards making good. The project is a cat well out of its bag, and after three years of work, I would not ask her to stop its release. I would ask her to take a little time to understand, perhaps, where this particular cadre of people with disabilities is coming from — that act of silencing echoes my own experiences, for example. If she has done this, great! No problems on my end, other than my desire not to dive into the full Evelyn Evelyn experience.
What you did with regards to your post-9/11 story was exactly right. You didn’t assume you could do justice to the experience; you asked those who had lived it about their own, and took that into account. There was a controversy maybe a year ago about the Lambdas suddenly being reserved for authors on the LGBTQ spectrum, even if straight authors were getting the same message across effectively. I disagreed with the notion that straight people can’t write gays; I disagree with the notion that white people can’t write people of color; I disagree with the notion that the abled can’t write people with disabilities. **For me, it comes down to getting us right and artists not silencing us when they get something wrong.**
All sides — I’m seeing more than two, now that this controversy has unfolded further — have their knee-jerk reactions as well as their well-reasoned ones. My emotional reaction to what I saw was knee-jerk; what I am trying to convey now is, I hope, a little better.
I will not be tasting shoe leather over what other posters here may or may not know about living with a disability. If they do, in fact, have similar experiences to mine (which ain’t pleasant), I’m sorry, and I hope things get better for all of us. My experiences have made me less apt to play nice with the abled when they silence me. Others’ mileage may vary. I don’t speak for anyone but myself.
I suppose the tl;dr version is “Oh, sugar. Miscommunication + emotion = Dechant backtracking a bit to find some common ground.”
Dechant, there is a response to this post of yours by:
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Jerry Chandler says:
February 23, 2010 at 12:30 pm
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It’s near the bottom of the page.
“If you’re not ‘A’ then you can’t possibly understand what life as ‘A’ is like.”
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While that is a presumptuous fallacy, Dechant’s question wasn’t necessarily an example of it. If I’m taking driving lessons from people who’ve never driven a car, I’d want to know how they’d acquired their qualifications to teach me.
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That doesn’t rule out the possibility that they could be the best instructors available, even if many people would never give them a chance to prove it.
Jerry Chandler,
“Really? Why is it that I have a feeling that you would have to start buying his works before you could stop buying them “any longer” as you now threaten to do?”
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For the same variety of reasons I had the same feeling, Jerry. There is no way to be certain, but I have a pretty good feeling your feeling – and mine – is correct in this instance.
Well, he never said definitely he has been buying PAD’s work (though “no longer” tends to that end, but might mean that he’d “no longer” even consider it if he encountered it), but it’s been my experience that the people i’ve encountered who toss that thread around do in fact tend to be not-buyers of the creator in question’s work in the forst place.
My favorite was the one who swung by during either the Scans_Daily business or the racism business and declared that they had never read anything of mine before, but now they sure were definitely never going to start. I sure considered my self told off, lemme tell ya.
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PAD
I served as the treasurer for my school’s disabilities support group and have some disabilities myself. And you know what hurts the most? The silence. It’s the othering, the fact that I’m not part of society, that I’m fragile and need to be handled with kid gloves, that no one should talk about it or or discuss it without being labled ablist or bigoted. That doesn’t protect me, that isolates me.
I love it when a tv show has people like me there. Even if it’s a bad one, I’m equal. I have the right to be offended just like everyone else. I have the right to blog about what they got wrong and right, the right to laugh, the right to disagree. All because people like me are up there on screen. The more that they put up there, the better they’ll get it. The alternative is being ignored.
I may like Amanda Palmer’s work. I may dislike it. I will likely review it and discuss it. But either way, I’m grateful to her for talking about it. I’m not fragile, I’m not helpless.
Also, I ask people to look at context. Amanda Palmer has written shocking stuff on many sensitive topics. Rape, abortion come to mind. And she has always opened up a meaningful discussion on the topic. Let’s give her the benefit of the doubt and see what happens. If she does good, mazal tov! If she doesn’t do well, hopefully someone else will see the mistakes and do better. Either way, disabled issues come to the table. Which is a win!
Extremely well said. A cogent and intelligent analysis.
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As a consequence, I’m going to boycott all your writing from now on…
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PAD
Hehe, thank you. At least I’ll be in good company!
On a more serious note, these people are preventing writers from putting disabled people into their work because they’ll be yelled at or threatened. Seriously, there are good guys and bad guys in this world and knowing the difference is key. There are jerks who are bullies and write cruel stuff to hurt me. Then there are amazing artists who are human and don’t always get something 100% right, but work hard to do right. They are allies, friends, and good people. They want to help out. They want to tell diverse, good stories.
I’m scared that amazing artists will shy away from these issues and return me to silence, to being a doll on the shelf of life, too delicate to join playtime.
Inclusion means inclusion in the good or the bad. But exclusion means nothing.
I ask to be included.
Granted there are clearly some off kilter commenters on the AP blogs, but they are on both sides of the debate. Although I personally found AP EvelynEvelyn blog post a bit sketchy my response was generally limited to WTF? this is not for me.
However the major fail (yes I used the word) is how the projects collaborators (Amanda et al) have clearly not been able to grasp just what is upsetting to people about the project. I may not possess some of those issues (is my privilege showing?) but I get where they’re coming from. Their responses to the backlash have covered polite and reserved (Neil’s wait till everything’s finished) to It’s art and you haters don’t understand me (Amanda).
People are disappointed that AP doesn’t seem to be listening and has reverted to passive aggressive twitter posts about hanging out with people who really know her. In reality, her online presence seems designed to make all those fans think they really did know her and yes, they’ve taken some of it personally.
However the major fail (yes I used the word) is how the projects collaborators (Amanda et al) have clearly not been able to grasp just what is upsetting to people about the project.
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You don’t know that. You don’t know that at all. All you know is that she hasn’t shut down the project or changed it in order to quell protests. Yet fans are also quick to condemn artists for compromising their visions. Go figure.
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I have actually noticed a rather regular tendency that goes like this: Person A puts forward a position.
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Person B disagrees.
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Person A says, “You’re not listening.”
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Person B says, “No, I’m listening, but this is where I think you’re wrong.”
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Person A says, “No, I’m right. And if you were truly listening to me, then you would realize I am right. But you’re saying that I’m wrong; therefore you’re not listening to me. Q.E.D. And the reason you are not listening is because you are privileged (or not disabled, or not my gender, or not my race, or not my sexual orientation, etc.) And if you were not privileged (or if you were disabled/my gender/my race/my sexual orientation, etc.) you would share my views, but you’re not, and that’s your problem.”
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Person B: “Well, I may not be (whatever) but that doesn’t mean my opinions are invalid.”
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Person A: “Yes it does, and I’m done talking to you now.” Often followed by, “This thread has been derailed and is now closed.”
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And I think if you take a hard look around, you will be amazed at the number of blogs that follow this pattern.
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PAD
I take your point about the quoted section of my comment. This was merely my opinion based on the responses to the drama that I had seen. I have also seen some of the blogs to which you refer as I found the whole controversy fascinating (not being involved myself) and spent quite some time readings responses in various different places. It was a curious exercise in people watching and despite years of internet use, seeing the vehemence with which people hold hard to favourite authors/musicians/artists was compelling.
It is fascinating, I’ll give you that. On the other hand, so is a car fire. All too often, these discussions just become these huge conflagrations while rubberneckers cruise by and shake their heads in amazement or even throw a log or two on the blaze to keep it going.
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They don’t call it the Information Superhighway for nothing.
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PAD
Actually, if you want to see the Internet in a nutshell, watch pretty much any routine featuring Catherine Tate’s character, Lauren Cooper. Lauren is a motormouthed British school girl and the skits always follow the same pattern:
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Lauren puts forward opinions about something. Someone disagrees with her or says something she doesn’t like. She immediately demands to know if the person is insulting her mother or her father or her family line, and then declares she’s being disrespected. And before the person can figure out what’s going on or get any traction, Lauren declares that she’s not “bovered” (i.e., bothered) , how nothing this person says is of any importance or relevance, and she stops listening to them. The only person ever to get the upper hand on her was Prime Minister Tony Blair (played by Tony Blair) who threw her completely off her game by informing her that no matter what she said to him, he wasn’t bovered.
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You should check out the routines on Youtube. They’re great.
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PAD
Amanda Palmer is trying hard to explain and discouraged posts like yours, so you’re only heaping more #dramadrama onto her. I’m not offended by the project, but it’s not for you or me to be outraged on her behalf either. You are adding fuel to the Fail.
I don’t agree with the critics about what I’ve seen of Evelyn Evelyn, but how trying to create a dogpile out of ignorance helpful to Amanda? You’ve been offended by phrases like DIAF, so you presumably have values you don’t like to see violated, so what’s your beef with fans motivated by the same impulse? Evelyn/Evelyn skits are available on Youtube and Neil Gaiman is on the new album, so your premises that nobody has found out what its about and that Neil is unrelated to the project are wrong. Do you have any evidence that fans criticizing at blogs called disabledfeminists are not in fact disabled or that they and their friends are telling Neil to control “his woman.” I don’t agree with them, but how would misrepresenting them like an insignificant number do to Amanda be any better than them?
Well, let’s keep in mind that if someone screams, “FÙÇK YOU, PETER DAVID! FÙÇK YOU! DIAF!” and I don’t find that offensive, then there’s something kind of wrong with me.
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But there is a difference between being offended when someone is deliberately trying to insult you (not to mention wishing a painful death on you) and taking offense when none is meant and you just don’t like the material (which, again, has not been seen in its completed form.) I have no reason to assume that Palmer is endeavoring to condemn, castigate, or belittle anyone in her CD, particularly when you’re talking about a project that’s as outlandish as conjoined intergender twins. If someone in a wheel chair wants to take offense at a CD about singing conjoined twins and feel that they themselves are being held up for humiliation, well, sure, they are welcome to do so. But that’s a little different from someone hurling profanities and death wishes at them.
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And it’s easy for such individuals to then assert that if I find their moral outrage odd or misplaced or over-the-top that I just don’t get it. But the reason I find it less-than-convincing is because they haven’t convinced me. Nor have they convinced me that Neil is due any ill will simply because he has a minor singing role, or that it is remotely acceptable to attack the artist as an individual because you don’t like the art. Of course, I see it as their failure to convince me, and they see it as my failure to understand. Nor does it help when such irrelevancies as “Do you have any evidence that these fans are not disabled?” are thrown into the mix. At no point did I say I thought they weren’t disabled, nor feminists. When you ask me to defend assertions I didn’t make, you just lessen your own credibility.
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And as long as walls are thrown up and easy words of dismissal such as “Fail!” and “Privilege!” and “Derailed” are tossed around, and as long as those sites shut down conversations because they don’t want to be faced with opposing viewpoints, this vast divide is going to remain.
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But there will continue to be sites such as this where people of both sides can continue to discuss the matter, if that’s of any use. Actually, I find it a tad ironic that disabled feminists would disable comments, whereas someone who is abled keeps the comments enabled.
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PAD
@Alison,
I totally agree.
Almost all homosexuals want their families and straight friends to understand them. I know I do. It makes no sense then to turn around and claim that straights can’t create gay characters, because you have to be gay to understand what it is like.
Unfortunately that’s exactly what writers have to deal with. The very same groups who will complain about under-representation will also be the first to condemn any such representation as being tone-deaf or invalid and the creator having committed a “fail” and thus ripe for condemnation. And sure, I totally understand that such groups do not speak with one voice, but it sure as hëll provides a disincentive to portray them in works of fiction.
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PAD
WHich reminds me – what sorts of reactions (if any) did you see to the various stories involving Andy (Jones, was it?) in “Supergirl” – particularly the ones involving her parents?
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I would suspect you probably got some negative reactions; were there any really positive ones?
WHich reminds me – what sorts of reactions (if any) did you see to the various stories involving Andy (Jones, was it?) in “Supergirl” – particularly the ones involving her parents?
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Actually–and tragically–you have no idea how many gay readers told me that they faced some variation of exactly that reaction from their folks. I based it partly on the actual experiences of the woman upon whom Andy was based, but made it more extreme for dramatic purposes and hoped that I wasn’t going too far. As it turns out, some people told me that their parents’ reactions were even MORE extreme.
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Outraged straight readers, of course, protesting on behalf of gays everywhere, told me I didn’t know what I was doing and that it was insulting and demeaning.
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PAD
Wow, go away for a few days…
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There are people in the fanfail circle who I just genuinely disagree with and, while they are far too complacent in the harm they may do, are fundamentally decent people and genuinely think they are endeavoring to a greater good. They think they’re right, I think they’re not, we may end up coming to an understanding.
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Some are malicious no-talents who see this kind of thing as a way to control creativity and thus become, in a truly twisted way, part of that greater creative community. Which, sadly, is something they probably won’t get to be a part of in any other way. They may think they are critics but they are not. Critics, good ones anyway, can actually contribute to art, make us see aspects we might have missed, enrich our enjoyment. These are the people who liked to kick down sandcastles.
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The last group seem to actually believe that people cannot possibly understand and/or write about anything that is not directly and explicitly applicable to their own life. I think they are serious. What they themselves do not understand is that this may well be true of them but is NOT in any way true of all. I give them credit for self awareness but it’s when they try to pass their own inadequacies off as just part of the human condition that they lose me.What I’d be interested in figuring out is whether they are genuinely correct that their ability to understand (and create based on that understanding) is so limited or whether they are just taking the easy way out so as to avoid having to see beyond their own worldview.
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I’ve gotten angry over this and will no doubt do so again but really–unless these folks are motivated by envy and mendacity, which I think is true for only a few, it would probably be a better and more productive thing to view them sympathetically and try to help them see this from (in my opinion) a more realistic angle.
Dan Shive covers these people – and criticis and criticism in general – in recent installment of his webcomic, El Goonish Shive … and says it better than i ever have.
Thanks for bringing that to my attention. It did cover it rather well. Although I also liked his follow-up cartoon about the Gods of Curling. Kath delights in bringing to my attention when curling is on because I think she likes the way I roll my eyes.
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PAD
Along with Misfile and Girl Genius, EGS is one of the webcomics i try not to miss.
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(Oh, and xkcd…)
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Dan has a wonderfully twisted worldview.
Speaking of curling: http://www.gocomics.com/thenewadventuresofqueenvictoria/2010/02/23/
I find your cavalier labeling of people who like kick down sandcastles offensive. I remember one time I kicked down a sandcastle in front of this dork and I walked off with this hot chick and laughed and laughed. I heard the dork got angry and kicked over a table with a lamp on it and read an ad about body-building in a comic book which apparently involved lifting one of those big dumbell’s over your head. Yeah, he swore revenge, but what is he going to do? Get really ripped and knock me over?
…I’m not sure where I was going with that. It’s almost 5 AM, cut me a break, yo. Does anyone know where that classic ad is? My google-fu is weak.
I’d look it up for you but today is The Day That Bill Told Off His Boss.
Well, if you’re serious, here it is
Yeah, that ad rocks. I forgot the jacked-up nerd in the last panel just walks up to the guy and punches him in the face. It looks like he dislocates his jaw. That’s hella-violent. Funny, though.
It’s probably been, like, at least 7 years since the sand kicking incident, but mac just goes up and pops him in the snout while mouthing the witty rejoinder he’s been practicing in his mind over and over and over again. (I’m pretty sure in one version he says “Why don’t YOU go dry up and blow away!” which is just classic; the way he puts the emphasis on the “you” just turns the bully’s words right around at him, ha ha!)
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But the bully must have no freaking idea why the hëll this guy just hit him. It would be like me hunting down Vic Mannino and, just as he is reaching into his medicine cabinet to retrieve his lumbago pills I smite him across the back of the head with a metal washer bin. “Who’s Mr Poopy pants NOW?” I cry out as he hits the floor like a bag of rocks, my victory only mildly tainted by the fact that he probably forgot that incident in kindergarten only about 3 days after it happened, while I, conversely, have replayed it in the bijou of my mind at least twice a day for the last 40 years. Yeah, well, payback’s a bìŧçh, baby, it’s a gøddámņ bìŧçh.
Hey, like the old Klingon proveb goes, best served cold, yo.
I have trouble picturing Klingons saying “yo” but I get the idea…
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PAD
What I really do not understand is how can he marry a woman called Amanda. Call it beibg irresponsible…
If certain conjoined twins are offended by Ms. Palmer’s work, I would say that considering that:
A) The work in question did not come out yet.
B) The does not seem to be any malicious intent to the work.
C) The artist in question is known to be provocative.
I sympathize even if I do not agree with the feeling of being offended, but it is up to each person, conjoined twin or not, to decide on their own, and voice their disapproval in the appropriate ways.
If somebody who is disabled said they were offended my reply would be the same. I would say that if he or she is feeling offended, I can respect that, but he or she is not in a position to speak for others disabled or not.
If the person offended is not disabled in any way, I’d give the same answer. I’d think that either this person is a sensitive empathetic person, which is OK, or that they are looking for causes to be offended about because of self righteousness.
If the offended person starts using words like white privilege, I start worrying that the offense has more to do with politics and power over others than feelings.
Re your last paragraph – sounds like the kind of person who wouldn’t disagree with “Wenn ich Kultur höre … entsichere ich meinen Browning!”
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“If I culture hear… release I to mean Browning!”
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????????
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Man does Babble Fish ever suck at the job it’s supposed to be able to do.
I don’t know what this means.
Browning is a make of gun. I think he’s saying, “When I hear culture, I unholster my Browning” (or maybe slip the safety.) Or to go more vernacular, “When I hear culture, I wanna shoot something.”
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PAD
“My hovercraft is full of Brownings?”
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Theno
Thanks for the translation, and the answer is no, the statement has nothing to do with what I said.
I get nervous when people use talking point and/or ideological jargon. I get the feeling that they are going to force whatever is discussed into a very rigid abstract ideological framework while ignoring actual issues and actual people.
“Jerome: Your fiancée and I have something in common, then. It’s why I got the sack — my last employer refused accommodation, refused to provide equal work for equal pay, and so I was quietly ushered out.”
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Well, I don’t know the particulars of your situation, buy my fiancee’s dream is to get a job in nursing, which she loves.
The problem is she has a lot of enablers and people surrounding her who are used to the status quo who would be just as well pleased if she went on disability. Financially speaking, she doesn’t HAVE to work.
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But she realizes that if she really wants to do what she wants to do, she has to work at it. She has to get herself in a position and frame of mind where she reach for the high bar. She doesn’t expect anyone to lower it for her. As spoled as she can be, regarding this she doesn’t WANT to be accommodated. She wants to get to a point where she can accommodate her employer, by doing her job like everybody else.
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The rest of your post was sweet and kind. Thank you.
“My favorite was the one who swung by during either the Scans_Daily business or the racism business and declared that they had never read anything of mine before, but now they sure were definitely never going to start. I sure considered my self told off, lemme tell ya.’
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That is classic, PAD! Absolutely classic! LOL!
There are several people on my friends lists that were fans that were upset during one or the other or both of those fiascos.
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Some of them just quit reading the blog in a sort of head-in-the-sand fashion (which I probably should have continued doing myself when someone told me about this post), but still enjoy PAD’s work, others have quit buying his work altogether and basically sworn him off as just another internet-jerk. But hey, who cares, really? There’s always more where they came from, I guess.
I keep wondering if these people also swear never to watch a Matt Damon, Greg Kinnear, or Farrely Brother’s film again. Cause, ya know, having a slapstick movie about conjoined twins is almost as insulting as Ms. Palmer’s new work.
(I say that with actually never seeing the movie… so yes, I know some people liked it)
I used to know someone who burned all of her Dwight Yoakam CDs because of his portrayal of Doyle in Sling Blade.
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Her reasoning was that if he wasn’t a jerk in real life, he wouldn’t have been able to so accurately portray one in the movie. And, she wasn’t going to let her kids listen to music made by someone like that.
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Theno
I think “reasoning” is a very generous term in that circumstance.
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PAD
Sam– your reply,
“Oh you read it, did you? Could have fooled me. Guess you skipped this bit?”
This “bit” makes absolutely no sense, given that the people had no direct knowledge of what was done. They’re reacting to their idea of what was done, which has no relation to what Amanda is doing.
Or I can use my freedom of speech to say, “I’m offended at someone getting offended without actually seeing the work of art. Freedom of speech means taking responsibility for your speech with an informed perspective–you are rightly ignored as ignorant if you react merely to the idea and not to the expression of the idea.”
Take your pick.
Thanks. I didn’t really feel up to wading back through the whole thing to clarify…
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Dechant: “I can say that, having seen part of the project, a part that employed racism and rape as consequence of a girl being out late at night (the video for “Have You Seen My Sister Evelyn?”), I’m more than a little skeeved.”
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Dude, what the hëll are you talking about? To the best of my knowledge AP hasn’t even made a video for that song yet.
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Wait… I did some digging and found something that matches your description.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFhnGYmiMww
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You know when you dismissed others for not reading something above? You might want to take your own criticisms and apply them to yourself. This video, the only video that looks anything like what you described, is described pretty much everywhere I found it as an unofficial fan video using the music from the upcoming album.
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So not only are you supporting the notion of uninformed outrage being just fine so long as it’s expressed by the right people, but you’re now for condemning people for something that someone else does with their work without their input or knowledge? Lovely.
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Lawyered.
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(In joke for fans of “How I Met Your Mother.”)
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PAD
As a disabled man I’m NOT offended by this, hëll I might I check it out if I remember it.
That’s certainly your privilege…
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PAD
Apologies for the popups. But it’s a classic and deserves to be seen, and it is relevant to the discussion.
http://www.gocomics.com/feature_items/explore?page=1&tag=20973&tag_name=offensensitivity
Amanda Palmer is playing people like a violin… she’ll use Gaiman and anybody else to get attention.Because that’s how talentless fame-whørë’s roll.