see, it's like this

[rm]

yuki_onna has a great post about why it's perfectly easy to boycott books of people who say appalling bigoted stuff on the Internet.

It is not, as so many people seem to think, some dogmatic decision to only engage with people who think exactly like me. Rather, life is short, books cost money, and when it comes down to deciding what I want to read -- allowing for a few cases of staggering genius that actually makes these decisions complex -- I'm not going to read stuff by people who are hateful, threatening and rude to me and mine, online or off.

Comments

[xtricks.livejournal.com]

Yeah. I find myself in a strange place ... I am really coming to like the concept of boycott as an effective way to present concequences to people who seem to need it and at the same time I'm a foaming at the mouth anti-censorship person.

Which ends up being, I'm perfectly happy to encorage people not to buy whats-his-name's books (and publicize the fact so he knows *why*), but not so comfortable with encoraging/asking publishers not to publish something based on an author's politica/other views.

I spend far, far to much time watching/listening to how a handful of fundies just like the author succesfully censor tv/books/libraries/websites etc based on creator's other work/subject matter to be easy with the idea - no matter the direction of the issue.

Which doesn't mean I expect or want anyone else to act the same BTW. It's one of those areas where I'm still not sure what I think and don't think it's an easy issue to wade through.

[rm.livejournal.com]

That's sort of where I am. I've not written to Tor, but I will totally tell people what's up and if Tor happens to drop the guy because his sales fall -- AWESOME.

[demotu.livejournal.com]

Okay, but here's the standard racism vs. homophobia comparison. If an author spewed that kind of venom against (insert minority racial group here) people would be demanding his publisher drop him. That's what really gets me these days - is that it's still politically correct to say a homophobe is "entitled to their opinions" and shouldn't have any consequences on the grander scale over them.

I totally realize I'm preaching to the choir here, obviously, but IMO we'll never get anywhere in gay rights until we stop apologizing for telling them they're wrong and full of hate. I don't think homophobia should be a political view that we accept anymore than racism, but it is and changing that would make the whole fight a lot easier. (I think, blahblah insert disclaimer here.)

[xtricks.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it's much more acceptable to do that sort of stuff for racism issues and (sometimes) for more overt forms of sexism but I wouldn't participate in a campaign to boycott the distributor/publishing co either. I'd take it directly to the author. It makes me significantly more uncomfortable to do that when it's about racism etc (because, as you mentioned, homophobia is more acceptable) but I *think* that's where my intentions lie.

The caveat being that works with book writers (more or less) but not so much with many other forms of media (where the writers are only one of a large team) and so TV shows and movies need pressure on the companies that 'own' the product. Though I still think voting with one's feet is important since networks do look at viewing numbers - part of the reason why I don't watch Supernatural.