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Apr. 26th, 2008 03:58 pmI've been wanting to write this for a while. Sadly, my brain's mush at the moment due to migraine that's trying to come past the imitrex. I hope it makes some sort of sense. I thought about holding this for later review, but that would likely mean that I'd never post it at all.
Over the last few years, I've read a lot of meta discussions about writing fanfic that address the issue of responsibility. Every time it comes up, I get cranky with most of the people writing about it. (For those who don't follow such discussions, it usually consists of people arguing the supremacy of artistic vision or escapist use of various sexual kinks or necessity of keeping readers unspoiled versus social responsibility in terms of not encouraging people to think that some things are acceptable and not triggering traumatic responses in readers. The issues usually revolve around fictional rape, fictional child abuse, fictional incest, fictional violence and-- very rarely-- fictional racism, fictional homophobia and so on, how such things are written about, if they're ever appropriate topics and whether or not warnings need to be attached.)
The reason I get cranky with the discussions of responsibility is that nobody seems to bother coming up with a working definition of 'responsibility.' It's simply a stick that can be used to make demands and to imply that there's a single right answer with no options. Reality's not that easy. Reality involves considering available resources, making priorities and accepting the consequences of each priority and choice.
Responsibilities come in two overlapping categories, those one chooses to accept and carry and those one has to deal with in order to remain part of a social group, a culture and so on. The former category includes friendships, romantic relationships, having children, getting a pet, planting a garden, buying an expensive luxury on an installment plan. The latter category includes obeying the law, not violating social taboos, following the precepts of one's religion, paying one's bills on time.
Each person is different in the priority they give to their responsibilities. Does the child come before the spouse? Do treats for the pet come before a computer upgrade? Is a monetary donation to a charity more useful than an donation of time? Is patriotism more important than piety? Is saving a life more important than saving a soul? Does art come before paying the bills? Does a friend come before art?
There are people who'll answer that set of questions the way I will, but there are also a lot of people who won't. And they're not bad people because of it. (I will say here that it is possible for people to have priorities that would make me think that they are bad people or that simply make me uncomfortable, unwilling to let them babysit my daughter, unwilling to lend them money, unwilling to live next door to them, unwilling to see them walking around freely.)
Knowing a person's priorities tells me a lot about how to interact with them. It's not necessarily wrong to put, say, painting ahead of feeding the cat or paying bills. It's probably not a good thing to put painting so far ahead of both that the cat starves and you get evicted, but that's part of accepting consequences. You can do it, but people will judge you on it and will respond to you differently based on it. You're more likely to get away with it if lots of people think your painting is brilliant than if most people think it's crap.
All of this relates the fanfic responsibility discussions and my response to them in that I keep feeling that the discussions are taking place in a weird vacuum without discussing other responsibilities, other priorities. I understand why they do, but it creates a disconnect for me in thinking about the issues. I find myself hoping that those arguing don't really put either artistic responsibility or social responsibility in art first.
I suspect that this matters to me because I think of priorities and responsibility in terms of limited resources, in terms of spoons. When I have to choose where I'm going to spend my spoons, I'm probably not going to bother with either side of the responsibility debate. I'm too busy taking care of my daughter, my husband and myself.
My sympathies lie somewhere between the two poles. I'm not sure that there's any subject that shouldn't be written about in whatever way an author chooses-- As long as the author is willing to accept the consequences of her choices. Those consequences include triggering readers, squicking readers, getting flames or criticism, being mocked, having people make judgments about the writer's ethics, personal life, etc. based on the story and risking the possibility that someone will do something real based on the work that the author never dreamed of.
Readers have to accept some consequences, too. Reading any work of fiction involves some assumption of risk. For that matter, getting out of bed in the morning and eating food of any sort also involve accepting risk. Bad things happen to good people. People hurt each both intentionally and unintentionally.
Over the last few years, I've read a lot of meta discussions about writing fanfic that address the issue of responsibility. Every time it comes up, I get cranky with most of the people writing about it. (For those who don't follow such discussions, it usually consists of people arguing the supremacy of artistic vision or escapist use of various sexual kinks or necessity of keeping readers unspoiled versus social responsibility in terms of not encouraging people to think that some things are acceptable and not triggering traumatic responses in readers. The issues usually revolve around fictional rape, fictional child abuse, fictional incest, fictional violence and-- very rarely-- fictional racism, fictional homophobia and so on, how such things are written about, if they're ever appropriate topics and whether or not warnings need to be attached.)
The reason I get cranky with the discussions of responsibility is that nobody seems to bother coming up with a working definition of 'responsibility.' It's simply a stick that can be used to make demands and to imply that there's a single right answer with no options. Reality's not that easy. Reality involves considering available resources, making priorities and accepting the consequences of each priority and choice.
Responsibilities come in two overlapping categories, those one chooses to accept and carry and those one has to deal with in order to remain part of a social group, a culture and so on. The former category includes friendships, romantic relationships, having children, getting a pet, planting a garden, buying an expensive luxury on an installment plan. The latter category includes obeying the law, not violating social taboos, following the precepts of one's religion, paying one's bills on time.
Each person is different in the priority they give to their responsibilities. Does the child come before the spouse? Do treats for the pet come before a computer upgrade? Is a monetary donation to a charity more useful than an donation of time? Is patriotism more important than piety? Is saving a life more important than saving a soul? Does art come before paying the bills? Does a friend come before art?
There are people who'll answer that set of questions the way I will, but there are also a lot of people who won't. And they're not bad people because of it. (I will say here that it is possible for people to have priorities that would make me think that they are bad people or that simply make me uncomfortable, unwilling to let them babysit my daughter, unwilling to lend them money, unwilling to live next door to them, unwilling to see them walking around freely.)
Knowing a person's priorities tells me a lot about how to interact with them. It's not necessarily wrong to put, say, painting ahead of feeding the cat or paying bills. It's probably not a good thing to put painting so far ahead of both that the cat starves and you get evicted, but that's part of accepting consequences. You can do it, but people will judge you on it and will respond to you differently based on it. You're more likely to get away with it if lots of people think your painting is brilliant than if most people think it's crap.
All of this relates the fanfic responsibility discussions and my response to them in that I keep feeling that the discussions are taking place in a weird vacuum without discussing other responsibilities, other priorities. I understand why they do, but it creates a disconnect for me in thinking about the issues. I find myself hoping that those arguing don't really put either artistic responsibility or social responsibility in art first.
I suspect that this matters to me because I think of priorities and responsibility in terms of limited resources, in terms of spoons. When I have to choose where I'm going to spend my spoons, I'm probably not going to bother with either side of the responsibility debate. I'm too busy taking care of my daughter, my husband and myself.
My sympathies lie somewhere between the two poles. I'm not sure that there's any subject that shouldn't be written about in whatever way an author chooses-- As long as the author is willing to accept the consequences of her choices. Those consequences include triggering readers, squicking readers, getting flames or criticism, being mocked, having people make judgments about the writer's ethics, personal life, etc. based on the story and risking the possibility that someone will do something real based on the work that the author never dreamed of.
Readers have to accept some consequences, too. Reading any work of fiction involves some assumption of risk. For that matter, getting out of bed in the morning and eating food of any sort also involve accepting risk. Bad things happen to good people. People hurt each both intentionally and unintentionally.
