(no subject)

[the_rck]

I have my nephew's Christmas present ready to go to the post office. I just hesitate to send it because it's so early. He's seven. I don't want to ask him to wait a month to open his presents. That just seems cruel. Then again, I will be near a post office this morning and don't expect to be again until some time in January. If I don't mail it today, Scott will have to.

I baked a cake yesterday. It was from a Kroger brand mix. The texture is a little off, and it sheds crumbs a lot when I cut it. Still, it's not terrible, and it was cheaper than Betty Crocker or Pillsbury or whatever. The frosting was also Kroger brand. It's pink and tastes of artificial strawberry. I expected it to be nastier than it is. I can actually eat it which wasn't a given.

I have several DVDs I want to watch this week, and I don't know if I'll get to all of them. First, I bought the Rurouni Kenshin live action movie. I'm about twenty minutes in, and I keep stopping because there are other things I need to do. I have a DVD of Dae Jang Guem that I've had from Netflix since some time in September. I really want to watch it, but I keep not finding time. Finally, I have the last DVD of season two of Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries from the library. That's due on Sunday. I don't know if I'll be able to renew it or not; it depends on if someone requests it between now and then. I only have a few hours for watching anything today because I've got a doctor's appointment mid-morning.

I'm debating what to do with my collection of Bill Cosby albums. I have a lot of Cosby in my iTunes, and I have more on vinyl, awaiting conversion. I just don't know. It's hard to accept that he's a terrible human being, but the evidence is compelling. I loved his comedy-- It's never mean. I'm simply not sure that I can listen to it any more; it feels too much like endorsing his actions. I definitely won't purchase any more of his albums, but what to do about what I already own?

Comments

[silverr]

I can understand your feelings about Cosby; I am also someone who finds it difficult to separate the work from the artist (e.g., I put MZB's books in the recycling when I heard about that business with her husband.) ~ It's certainly easier with books and music, as the artist isn't as "visible" ... but performers, yeah, just the sight or sound recalls the story.

I suppose one option is to ebay the albums, with the proviso that the proceeds go to a women's shelter or legal defense fund?

[hyperfocused]

I remember people doing similarly with their OSC stuff, donating to lgbtq orgs in his "honor", debating whether it was OK to see Ender's Game if one donated an equal amount.

[the_rck]

I don't plan to spend any more money on Cosby's stuff. That's definite. I don't know that I want to encourage other people to spend money on it either, so I'm not sure about selling it.

My current question, before addressing whether or not I'm going to keep any of it, is whether or not I can listen to it again without flinching. I suppose the very fact that I question if I can do it is a signal that I probably can't. It's a pity because Cosby's comedy wasn't like anybody else's that I've encountered. It was funny and kind of comforting. I suspect that the comforting part is gone forever.

I suspect, too, that the fact that I don't want my daughter listening to Cosby's routines is another sign that I should get rid of them. It just feels like a really big step and like a loss. But I think the loss may have already happened.

[silverr]

I think you're right.

[the_rck]

I still have some MZB books in the basement somewhere. I haven't felt strongly enough to dig them out. I probably would if Cordelia were prone to looking at my books, though. That one's hard too because I really loved the Sword and Sorceress series. The stories MZB liked as an editor tended to work well for me, but I don't know if I could read them now.

Because of your suggestion, I looked into eBay for the Cosby stuff. Most of his stuff is selling for a few dollars and isn't getting any bids. I'm not sure I'm willing to fuss with figuring out how to list there and how to ship LPs. Getting to the post office is a big deal for me. It requires a bus trip of twenty minutes each way.

[silverr]

Yeah, normally I try to keep the work separate from its creator (and it's easy enough to do if the author/artist is a simple garden-variety douchebag), but as a mother MZB's "As long as you leave our kids alone you can do whatever you want to someone else's kids" horrifies and enrages me so deeply that her name is irretrievably tainted for me.

My take on artists and shitty behavior

[anderyn.livejournal.com]

I've gone through this with Marion Zimmer Bradley recently (don't know if you followed the bru-ha-ha when her daughter came out and disclosed bits of her abuse, but it was nasty). I decided that no matter how much I loved some of her books, I was not going to have them in my house. I still have some that escaped notice on the first sweep, but I am NOT going to support her evil in my mental space. I was of two minds about the filk that's Darkover related, but since at least the one I adore most is an AU anyway and I'm just going to pretend it has nothing to do with her.

On the other hand, I still read Anne Perry even though she is a convicted murderer (though she served her time and was released and as far as I know has never even thought nasty stuff about another person since then) -- I think the difference for me is that Perry paid her debt to society and seems to be repentant -- while it will never bring back the person she killed -- that's important. Cosby and Bradley haven't done so, and they hurt more than one person in ways that screwed up their lives for years and years and years, and neither of them have ever admitted to wrong-doing (well, Bradley can't now, being dead, but she stonewalled in court documents that I've seen transcripts of)....

[evalerie.livejournal.com]

Oh no.... I've really loved some of Marion Zimmer Bradley's books. I'll have to read up on this. Ouch. Bleagh.

(But I appreciate knowing. Even when news is bad, I would rather know than not know.)

[evalerie.livejournal.com]

I went and read about this. It does explain rather a lot about "The Mists of Avalon." I recently re-read that book, and decided *not* to add it to the list of books to read out loud to my kids, because there was too much incestuous sex with children.

I am saddened and nauseated.

[anderyn.livejournal.com]

Me too. Though I never liked "Mists of Avalon", personally -- it was just ... wrong ... somehow. I did enjoy a lot of her space opera books, and while I know that the book is not the person, I still feel dirtied by enjoying her prose now. Sigh.

[anderyn.livejournal.com]

There were some very informative posts by Deidre Saorse Moen that you can read on her blog -- in fact, that's where Bradley's daughter came out with her tale. http://deirdre.net/blog/ You'll have to scroll back to August or September, but the posts are there.

[ramenkuri.livejournal.com]

Maybe sit on them for a while?

I kind of feel that the work and the creator of that work are separate, and while my feelings about the creator can taint how I feel about the work, they don't have to. 2 of my favorite manga artists have plagiarized photos and ads in their work. I really wish they hadn't, but I still love their work and what it evokes for me.

But it is much harder for me to think that way for artists who are their own work - I was ambivalent about Michael Jackson for years because of the allegations and rumors. Now, I have discounted the allegations, but if someone were to prove the allegations to me, I don't know if I could enjoy his work the same way.

I also love Cosby's humor - so much humor out there is mean and unpleasant; Cosby's work was really rare.

[the_rck]

I've unchecked Cosby's stuff in iTunes but haven't deleted it. I want some time to think about it, and I don't want it coming up on shuffle in the meantime. Keeping or not keeping the routines isn't going to make a difference to Cosby-- I already paid for them. I just have to decide how I feel about it. I'm not sure I want to hear his voice. Pity I can't get his routines as covered by some other comedian.

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

Can you send the present in an outer box addressed to your sister, with an inner box addressed to your nephew? When I was growing up, most of our relatives lived nearby, but we never knew when the out-of-town ones sent presents...my parents always kept them until the appropriate day. A package my dad got from his brother 2 weeks before my birthday was boring--I didn't think of it as "waiting to open my present," because it was his package and I had no idea what was inside.

As for Bill Cosby, I agree that it's a hard question. Sometimes what you know about the artist is so overwhelming you can't think about the art separately from that. But there's nothing logical about that--I feel like some art is hopelessly entangled with my view of the artist, and other artists (who may have been much worse criminals) feel quite separate from their art. If you have "Bill Cosby is a decent man, gentle and inspiring" in a different mental compartment from "the jokes on this album are funny and don't trigger my anxiety," it can be ok to listen the the jokes. Because you're not giving him any more money, or contributing to his fame/reputation, it doesn't do any harm if it doesn't bother you.

[the_rck]

Cordelia watches incoming packages like a hawk and assumes that anything for me and Scott might actually contain something for her or at least of interest to her, especially in proximity to her birthday and Christmas. Some of that is that she knows that I do 95% of my shopping online and so am likely to have presents for her delivered. I tend to simply hope that packages will be delivered while she's at school.

That said, I have no idea how my nephew is about such things. I've wrapped the books and tagged them as for him and from us. I can easily enough change the addressing on the exterior box so that it goes to my sister or to her husband. (He's home all day and would have the opportunity to hide the gifts while my nephew wasn't at home. My sister tends only to be home when her son is.) I'll have to have Scott ask my sister what's best. (She doesn't tend to read or answer email, but she does respond to notes on Facebook. Scott's on Facebook; I'm not.)

I'm still on the fence about Cosby. I think I need to try actually listening to some of his stuff to see how I feel about it because I'm not sure right now what category his work falls into. I've kept MZB's Sword and Sorceress anthologies, after all.

[anderyn.livejournal.com]

Though the anthologies are work by diverse hands, and not just hers. She did edit them (or so it's claimed, though I do not know how involved she was in her later years as I understand she was non compos mentis after her stroke) but that's a far cry from actually writing every word herself. meh. I do still have those anthologies, too.

[the_rck]

MZB also isn't reading the anthologies aloud. The Cosby stuff is in his own voice, so I can't pretend he's not associated with it.

Some of the stories in those anthologies were important to me. I don't know that I want to lose them. I suspect that finding them elsewhere is unlikely.