How much can we tolerate people who use bullying tactics (or are bullies)? How much should we give them the space to come back and behave well, and promise ourselves that if they cross the line we’ll deal with them then? Every time we do that, we risk excluding the more fragile members of our community and our conversation. And that is expressly against the charism of this site.
These are good questions. In my opinion, second, or third chances have to do with contrition on behalf of the offender. I've been a jerk on forums. When I first joined internet bulletin boards, I didn't really get what jerk I was being. There was a vast chasm between how I was coming across and how I thought I was behaving.
It took a few embarrassing moments before I finally got it, and they were really humiliating. Basically, people called me out for being a jerk and it turned into a dog pile. But in hindsight, I saw that I really was being a jerk. Those folks were right! That only added to the humiliation.
Still, I learned over time how to be a nice guy, or at least a nicer guy, on the internet. One thing that helped was a concept I learned in life offline, and that I try to apply to the internet is the idea of making amends.
If I, or anyone else, causes harm online, that person should make amends. Ammends can be an apology, along with a promise not to do the hurtful thing again, and then following up. We all make mistakes, but righting the wrong is part of being a responsible member of a community.
As a former internet jerk, one of the most frustrating aspects of getting called on my behavior was when my valid point was being completely ignored and instead the focus was placed on my brutish behavior. That's the risk one takes when they misbehave. It changes the focus from the topic of discussion to the behavior.
But some folks use a topic of discussion as an excuse to misbehave. That's a different issue from someone who is trying to engage but is being rude and nasty about it. In either case, I do believe people can learn and change. I think making amends is an important part of that change, both for the offender and for the victim.
Wow do I like that "narrative lust" idea. That's fantastic! Your post also made me realize I didn't spend much time on the original intention of the post. Why do I read books?
A playwright told me that the audience wants to know that they are in good hands. I am like that too. I want to enter a story and be carried away.
Maybe it's because I'm an addict (in recovery), and always have been. I walk around with an ache inside.
Most things that distract me from that ache are bad for me and I don't do them. But a good book. That fits the bill. It keeps the yearning at bay, it carries me away, and it gives me a sense of intimacy and connection with the author that reminds me that despite the howling feeling of isolation, I am not alone.
A good book makes me feel close to the narrator, to the characters. Not only do I enter a world, but I feel like I belong there somehow, often more than I feel like I belong in the real world.
A good book, a good read, makes me feel like I'm not crazy, like the funny nutty bits of life really are every bit as bizarre as I think they are. A good book makes me feel a sense of wonder, joy. If it's about wonder and joy. But also, I get very upset about everything that's hard about life, and a good book makes me realize that there's plenty to get upset about too, it helps me understand, or at least it shares the experience of pain. It validates my experience of life, which is really helpful.
It's hard to understand myself let alone explain. But books for me are spiritual food. I really need them.
Vicki @356
When I made that remark about "good fiction requires work," I was trying to explain a point of view that's not mine. I might have made my own point of view unclear, I did a lot of typing back there. I was just trying to elaborate on my earlier, spicier metaphor.
Also, for anyone who felt uncomfortable in this discussion due to any language or zeal of mine, please know that the last thing I want to do is alienate people. If you tell me to knock it off, I promise I will.
Nick,
I almost went into internet warrior mode, scouring google books for citations, searching for quotes...heart pounding, fingers tapping...and I realized, I was going what I call internet crazy.
That's what I like about Making Light. I don't come to this blog to do battle. When you said you'd seen this claim that some people like difficult writing all over the internet, and in every place nobody can provide a source, I realized...you came to this discussion loaded for bear.
That's fine. I understand your situation. People are making claims, and you want us to prove those claims. The thing is, I didn't realize I'd waded into a cybewar.
I was baffled at first by the "maybe I went to the wrong schools, got the wrong MFA, etc." remark, but now I get it. You have a horse in this race. This matters to you. I respect your passion over this issue. I do suggest that you try to be nice to us here, we are not your opponents in an internet war. I will engage with you, but if you're nicer about your approach it will make an open discussion easier. I was put off by your attitude and it didn't make me want to discuss this idea.
My first issue was that in some corners, the author challenges the reader, and in others the reader is more of a primary concern. This was my top/bottom thing. I think we had fun with it, it might contain some elements of truth, who knows?
As for the other...a problem with pleasure in reading, vs. work being meritorious solely for its difficulty. Let me first say this: I'm not calling anyone a jerk, even if they like hard work only because it is hard.
Secondly, I'm not in this to win, or lose. I enjoy sharing ideas based on my experience. I can't always defend them like a thesis. If capitulation is what you're looking for, I happily produce my lack of documentation as a fatal flaw in my argument.
If you want to discuss the idea, I would be delighted to, because there's a lot to it, I think. The question, to me, is the work vs. pleasure and work as pleasure and no work as pleasure relationship.
I was once one of these people who liked difficult works only because they were difficult. I play the shakuhachi. It is an extremely difficult instrument to learn. I will never, ever be any good at it. I chose this instrument to play precisely because it is so difficult. I enjoy surrendering to the challenge, to practice something for the sole reason of the practice with no expectation of results. I like the pure, blunt, brutal difficulty of it.
For reading, not so much. But there was a time when I did like difficult books just because they were difficult. If you need evidence that this thinking exists...take me! I liked John Zorn because he was difficult. I didn' t know much, I was a poseur.
Now, my fellow travelers who liked those difficult things may very well have liked them based on other merits. I certainly hope so, and I am not criticizing them based on their tastes. But me, and some of my friends, we were faking it. We thought it was good for us because it was hard to access. There was also an "emperor has no clothes" thing going on as well. None of us wanted to stand up and admit we didn't understand what we were reading.
This happens all the time. Why do we call a chocolate brownie decadent but not carrot juice? There is something to this idea that pleasure can mean escapism and for some people, that is wrong. Something that demands constant attention, like the shakuhachi, or a difficult work of fiction, has a focusing effect on the mind. For some people, the very work is the reward. It's exercise.
When people lift weights, the very difficulty of the weight lifting is the entire point and purpose of the exercise. Why can't the same happen for some people regarding literature? Why do some people like puzzles like sudoku? I hate puzzles like sudoku, precisely because they are hard, and at the end, I just have numbers in a box. Yet I practice a bamboo flute that my teacher assures me I'll never do well, unless I practice for 25 more years, and I find it incredibly fulfilling.
Stoicism, buddist non-attachment, puritanism, the argument against pleasure in many forms exists everywhere. The problem comes when people assign a value judgement on another's experience. Or attach shame to an activity that does no harm.
@ 141 SKZB,
I understand you don't like my theory. I'm OK with that. It is flawed, not provable, and certainly not uniformly applicable. BUT, it is based on my experience with writers, in writers groups, and in the behavior I've witnessed within certain communities of readers. In other words, it might not be a bulletproof concept, but I didn't pull it out of my ass either.
In the creative writing circles, the main point was "How to I express myself," and in genre writing circles, the main point was, "how do I keep the reader's interest."
I suspect, but I may be wrong, but I reckon that when you write a story, you give a lot of thought to how the story might keep the reader's interest. For example, Jim Macdonald gives this advice about writing, "If you're bored writing it, the reader will be bored reading it."
I've never heard such advice in a litfic writing workshop. If the reader was bored, he wasn't trying hard enough. That said, I'm certainly no authority on either type of author. As I said, this is based solely on my experience, but I do think it's a viewpoint worth discussion, if only because when I made this discovery it changed my entire outlook on writing.
Bruce,
Funny story!
I learned that being a writer made me less likely to get laid, but I didn't have the good fortune of having it explained. It was a long, painful lesson.
I love the term "genrephobe" xopher. I'm gonna use it.
There's a pretty good documentary about men who are having full blown relationships with real dolls. It's kind of icky, sad, and compelling.
Guys and Dolls
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