Dead white a-holes who wrote some good stuff

[Prisoner 6655321]

While I've always been pretty socially conscientious I've also been reading a good deal longer than my socially conscientious radar was more fully developed. As I've gotten older and wiser I've become hip to things like Robert Howard, HP Lovecraft and Jack London being racists. Then there are others such as AJ Liebling who are sometimes misconstrued as raciest for often using terms that would very much today be considered so but with very little inspection one can tell that he was attacking raciest mentalities. Still, his language can often be off putting for people with more modern sensibilities and it may make you think twice before suggesting it to someone.

I'm not talking about current writers who are bigots. Obviously that's another subject altogether, as HP Lovecraft and Robert Howard won't be getting your money, but how do you view dead writers who made some pretty cool stories but held some pretty problematic beliefs (assuming you're not a flaming bigot) or, dead writers who may have not been problematic per se' but would often use language that conflicts with modern sensibilities?

Also, if you don't mind sharing what is your own ethnic / gender / socioeconomic / etc.. background, as I'm interested in how (if at all) this affects people's views on the matter.

I'll share my own stances on the subject in the near future but not at this time because I don't want to direct the conversation as much as hear other views on the subject.

[Kai "the spy"]

Well, I'm an adult, so I can read stuff without agreeing with it. I can also put them in historical context.

For instance, Ian Fleming's James Bond novels are, by today's standart, misogynistic and racist, but if you consider the time back then, as well as read it in context, he was actually as quite progressive. While he uses black characters mostly as hired help or villains, "Live And Let Die" also included a scene between M and Bond, where they discuss how black people (obviously he didn't use that term) have become great doctors, engineers, scientists, philosophers, etc., and thus are not an inferior race at all. So, again, by today's standart he was a racist, but he was well-meaning, at least.

This, of course, can't be said of Edgar Rice Burroughs. While the racism of Tarzan might have been unintentional, his John Carter did commit genocide at the end of "A Princess of Mars" without reflecting on it. I can still enjoy it, for again, I know it's really wrong and it's just fiction. Kinda like the violent cops in "Lethal Weapon". Hell, I can stomach his "The Land That Time Forgot", even though it was a big World War One-era anti-German propaganda piece.

Another example for a writer with questionable beliefs was H.G. Wells. As a socialist, he wrote some very socially conscious and critical material, which is good. Something that does not show in his work as much is that he also was an anti-democrat, believing the poor to need help, but also believing them to be incapable of the necessary intelligence to vote. He did not view this as a matter of education, but of actual intelligence.

Then there was Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, whose Sherlock Holmes stories occasionally featured some social issues. So while it wasn't the main feature in his stories, he did show some progressive thought (by Victorian standarts). But he also was unable to write women with the same depth he granted his male characters. Then there's the issue that it is very likely that he actually committed murder once.

Someone reminded me recently that good Political Correctness isn't about thought-policing or not being allowed to say certain words. It is about actually thinking about what you (and others) say, about knowing context and perspective. So, yes, I can read and enjoy a lot of fiction that is racist, sexist and chauvinistic in other ways, because I acknowledge that these parts are racist, sexist, etc..

There's this thing going on with classic cartoons, where they edit out parts and jokes that are now considered racist. I don't agree with that. I liked the approach of that Disney DVD editions (forgotten the specific edition label), where they'd show the cartoons as they were, but had a clip with Leonard Maltin pointing out racist or otherwise offensive jokes, and explaining the historical context. Retro-active editing to make a work of fiction politically correct is, in my opinion, dangerous, as it is distorting history.

So, basically, I'm for education and against censorship.

Of course, this goes for consumption as an adult. I would never give my ten year old nephew that John Carter novel with the genocide at the end.

For the record, I'm a white male German, both my parents were teachers and part of the 1968 movement, and I'm working in retail. I'm a democratic socialist, with liberal leanings.

[Filament]

I think it's important for people to realized the (pseudo) science at the time claimed proof and documented evidence of some races and ethnic types being inferior. It was taught in school to those guys. Still, like Kai, I would never supply my kid with the material now. I liked the Burrough's Pelicidar books and the paperback Frazetta covers illustrations as a kid. Looking back, I recall how the protagonists were proud of the industry they had started in the subterranean world. Freakin' smoke stacks just spewing it in an enclosed underground environment

Algis Budry's remains one of my favorite sci-fi authors, but my gosh you have to ignore the misogyny to get through it. He's about the only 50's writer that I will put up it. Even that long ago, it was unexcusable. Especially when I consider that one of my other favorites, of the same period, Clifford D. Simak, wrote his early stuff without a hint of that or racism even with aliens.

[Trey Strain]

Speaking of political correctness, substitute any other ethnicity in the thread title and see how that goes over. That's why PC culture is so stupid and tiresome.

[Trey Strain]

Maybe our health-care plans can be expanded to include free counseling for people who read this literature and suffer trauma from it. The University of Florida is doing something similar.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...-costumes.html

[jeanvaljean]

Speaking of political correctness, substitute any other ethnicity in the thread title and see how that goes over. That's why PC culture is so stupid and tiresome.

I will never grow tired of treating people with respect. Everything else would be deplorable to me.

[wjowski]

If you're going to discard every author, artist, and musician that's engaged in unacceptable behavior or held to unacceptable views there's not going to be a whole lot of content out there for you. People are multifaceted, and sometimes those facets are very, very ugly.

[seismic-2]

Richard Wagner wrote some of the most admired of all operas, and he was fiercely anti-Semitic. (Well, he kind of disliked everybody, but Jews in particular.) Thomas Jefferson wrote "some good stuff", such as the Declaration of Independence, and he owned slaves. Perhaps in a hundred years readers of early 21st century literature will admire its quality while apologizing for the obvious egregious character flaws of its creators, by whatever standard may apply then (and I wouldn't even begin guess what those might be). Such is the flow of civilization...

[Trey Strain]

I will never grow tired of treating people with respect. Everything else would be deplorable to me.

But, you see, it's perfectly OK to call white people a-holes. Say that about any other group though and watch what happens to you. And the people who hear you say it will need counseling.

[aja_christopher]

But, you see, it's perfectly OK to call white people a-holes.

No it's not -- realistically speaking, most people I know judge white people on an individual basis... just as with the authors in question.

Stop trying to play the victim.

More importantly, this is an interesting topic, so let's not derail it with divisive rhetoric.

[Trey Strain]

No it's not.

Stop trying to play the victim.

So if it's not OK then why are you not having a hissy fit about the title of this thread? Of course it's OK. It's perfectly fine.

[Kai "the spy"]

But, you see, it's perfectly OK to call white people a-holes. Say that about any other group though and watch what happens to you. And the people who hear you say it will need counseling.

Oh, yes, you are so right. Reverse-racism is totally a yuge problem.

What exactly do you want? What is it that you have a problem with? Is it that the thread title? What part of it? The white or the a-holes? Because, this thread is about past writers who were racist and misogynistic, and there's just so few black writers who were those things, mostly (but not only) because there were so few published black writers at all. And what else are racists and misogynists if not a-holes?

[Trey Strain]

Oh, yes, you are so right. Reverse-racism is totally a yuge problem.

What exactly do you want? What is it that you have a problem with? Is it that the thread title? What part of it? The white or the a-holes? Because, this thread is about past writers who were racist and misogynistic, and there's just so few black writers who were those things, mostly (but not only) because there were so few published black writers at all. And what else are racists and misogynists if not a-holes?

I said it's perfectly OK call white people a-holes, and if you say that about any other group, then all hell will break loose. That's simply a fact, and I stated it.

And now you're "offended" that I stated it? Not only is it not offensive to say that, but if anyone says anything about it, then that's offensive?

You've got all the bases covered there, don't you?

But how long can you keep that up? At what point will more and more people start calling you out about it?

Then what will you do?

[bloodofthegods]

Separating the creator from the creation has never been a problem for me, not matter the skin color of the creator. I'm not sure why that seems to be an issue. If I find out that the guy that does the plumbing for my house for the last ten years is a sexist, should I stop using him? Would you?

[aja_christopher]

So if it's not OK then why are you not having a hissy fit about the title of this thread?

Because I have a life.

Feel free to fight that windmill at your leisure, though, kind sir.

Enjoy.

On topic -- the art is not the artist and sometimes art is therapy for all involved.

I'd like to think that Hitler wouldn't have become a genocidal "white a-hole" if he had been a successful artist.

And I'm pretty sure no one here is throwing away their Pantera albums just because Phil has some "questionable" views.