Theory, Politics, Addiction, and Loss.

[tablesaw]

In a discussion with tahnan in the comments to my post on language and cultural appropriation (in addition to some guestions about language and linguistics), I added some clarifications that I think probably deserved to be in the main entry. So I'm adding them here.

The next question may be, "And now what?"

I've written a few different things to answer this that have been lost on different computers. Had I not been falling asleep on Sunday, I would have continued the essay with a bit about politics. Because the problems that I'm focusing on and that are being focused on in the failboat debacles involve both society-wide systematic oppression and the denial of that oppression.

Recently I listened to a story on PodCastle by Peter S. Beagle called "Gordon, the Self-Made Cat." It made me feel bored and annoyed, instead of amused or interested or intrigued. I believe this is because, to build the meanings and reactions intended by the author, the reader needs to have a certainly amount of love for the cuteness of cats or the antics of cats. I really have neither of these things.

So is that a "problem"? Well, Beagle may have intended for his story to be "universal" (among English readers/listeners), and now I'm telling him that it's not. But there isn't systemic, societal, institutionalized oppression against people who don't think that cats are as cute as everyone else does. And most writers in Beagle's position would probably accept and take responsibility for the fact that the story excludes parts of its potential audience. In a sense, most genre writers do this in that their writing caters to a specific audience of readers who have already read and have read within the genre. The attitude is "You can't please everybody."

The toolmakers paradigm does require a certain amount of "you can't please everybody" thinking when it comes to published work. The communication is static and directed at a wide audience, so the writer can't clarify himself with every reader individually. So a certain amount of failure by exclusion is accepted by the writer (especially writers working within a "genre"). But if a writer doesn't accept that this is happening, their communication can suffer (as currently the case with tnh and the "this is not at all a threat" argument). And when the exclusion falls along patterns of oppression that exists across society, then the writer becomes an active part of that oppression.

Because issues like the cat-antic exclusion are not politicized, it's easy for a writer to accept these exclusions and even to, in a sense, retroactively intend to do so. This fits the interpretation back into the conduit metaphor; if a reader reports a problem that the writer did not intend but that is acceptable to the writer, the writer can admit to having put it in the text when writing (though perhaps not fully consciously). But when the issue is politicized, like racism, sexism, etc., the writer resists doing so and denies responsibility for what is made of their writing.

If all the writers involved shifted gears and said, "Well, yes, I take responsibility for excluding non-white readers, but I'm not going to change, even though I could; you can't please everybody, and I'm just never going to care about pleasing readers who aren't white," there would still (hopefully obviously) be a major problem. But it would be different from the one we are currently witnessing. Instead, writers are, on the surface, professing a commitment to anti-racism which would mandate changing their attitudes and their writing, but they avoid doing so by either arguing that they cannot/need not/should not take responsibility for the exclusion reported by nonwhite readers or arguing that it is impossible for them to make any changes to themselves or their writing that would fix it. In some cases, both.

The toolmakers paradigm demands that a writer be responsible for all failures of communication, no matter how wide the audience; and real-world politics demonstrate where those failures or systemic and problematic. The toolmakers paradigm also demonstrates that the way to effectively change the situation is to account for the culture and context across the systemic divide.

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I've also been thinking very particularly about this line:

If all the writers involved shifted gears and said, "Well, yes, I take responsibility for excluding non-white readers, but I'm not going to change, even though I could; you can't please everybody, and I'm just never going to care about pleasing readers who aren't white," there would still (hopefully obviously) be a major problem. But it would be different from the one we are currently witnessing.

I may have spoken too soon about that, because there are writers who are emerging from these discussions bearing (or perhaps merely threatening to bear) this very attitude. As an example, one SFF writer, davidlevine, has written "My only statement on the cultural appropriation imbroglio," which concludes:

I may or may not continue work on this story [that features a black character as one of its protagonists]. Haven't decided yet. Maybe I'll write something safer, something where all the characters are white, or aliens or cartoon characters or disembodied spirits, and I don't have to deal with issues of race and culture. I'll spend my writing time and energy on other issues instead.

This statement is addressed to those on the "anti-racist" side of the debate who have vehemently accused certain white writers and editors of racism or cultural insensitivity:

Is this what you wanted?

The answer is No, when readers asked writers to acknowledge the racism in their work by offering examples of how that racism has harmed them in reading, they did not want those writers to turn around and adopt a bald-faced policy of racism to guide their future work.

I do find it hard to understand how a person, confronted with a chorus of voices angry about racism, could construct the meaning that the chorus desires more racism. Perhaps a clue is in the idea that writing a story "where all the characters are white" means not having to "deal with issues of race and culture," as though white people have no race or culture, or "issues" or problems only arise when the race or culture isn't white. Perhaps Levine and others are confused because the options that they feel are available are criticized as equally racist, and because they don't comprehend the other options offered.

I start to think that a mind can become addicted to the benefits of white privilege just as it could to any chemical. And in turn, I think that the mind can build up the same protections to prevent the source of the addiction from being removed. Denial, hostility, even a sort of phantom pain, the palpable discomfort felt when the discussion turns to race—the brain throws all that and more in the path of an addict to prevent them from even thinking about their addiction. And they work so subtly, so insidiously, that time and time again, predictably across addicts from all walks of life, the addict concludes, after almost any evidence, that really, all things considered, being totally rational and objective, I truly don't have a problem, everything's fine, and nothing needs to change.

It takes something massive for that mindset to be replaced. It could be an addict realizing that they are at "rock bottom," that things have gotten so bad that there is finally no choice but to overcome the blocks and examine their problems. But the nature of racism and privilige is that, unlike addictive chemicals, privilege There will never be a day when a dour face in a white coat tells you that you're dying of cancer contracted by benefitting from oppression without attempting to end it.

It could also be an intervention, when a group of people get together and tell a person they care for how the addiction has harmed them. To confront the addict with the results of their actions that don't affect them directly. And the intent is not to effect an instantaneous, miraculous, total change, but simply to get you to admit that there is a problem. You have a problem. If you see it, we can fix it, but you have to see it.

But interventions are no guarantee. Sometimes loved ones scream and yell, and they accuse their friends and family of conspiracy, and they deny the stories of pain, and they leave alone, and they find relief, for themselves, alone.

I don't know where to go with this metaphor. My family has lost people because we couldn't find the right way to communicate and break through to loved ones with addictions. But it needs to be done, for all our sakes.