I really hate to keep bringing up the GoodReads controversy, but I find that in some ways, coincidences spur you on to greater things. Like, this one time when I really wanted to go to a gay bar, but also I wanted to go to a strip club, and I ended up going to a gay bar that was also a strip club. Or, when something awesome happens to prove my point about something really important.
During this whole GoodReads thing, several people pointed out (and thank you for doing so) that it seems like only female authors are expected to be nice to each other. Male authors can say whatever they want about their fellow writers, they can write satire, they can express their opinions, and it's all fine. There are some spectacularly douchey male authors out there (not the one I mention later in this post, he's totally cool and non-douchey, from what I understand), but it's okay, because they have penises, and that makes their opinions important. If a female writer passes judgement on a fellow writer, it's due to jealousy, a desire to self-promote on the back of another author's success, and shallow, catty envy.
Now, check out this link: "A satirist goes for non-too-subtle shading" It's a story from the New York Times about Andrew Shaffer, a reviewer for Romantic Times and an author in his own right, who wrote a soon-to-be-released parody of 50 Shades of Grey. Okay, I think this guy is awesome. So, when I point out a few things, it's going to seem kind of harsh, or like I'm saying I don't agree with his right to do this. That is not the case, he has just as much right to poke fun at a cultural phenomenon as anyone does. I don't begrudge him the fact that he's making money off it. After all, didn't E.L. James also make money off someone else's book? So, for the record, I am a big fan of Andrew, aka Evil Wylie, and I think this book is going to be great. Still, let's break this down: I was accused of jealously trying to hook my money-gobbling wagon to E.L. James's star, because I'm blogging here about 50 Shades of Grey. Andrew Shaffer, who I will presume identifies as a man based on name and dress, writes a book lampooning 50 Shades and is paid actual money to do so and yet I see only one instance on the book's GoodReads page where he's being accused of mean-spirited envy. Not, you know, two hundred-ish comments where he's lambasted and assigned shady motivations. And I'm pretty sure no one is down voting Peter Shaffer's plays in retaliation.
Again, I'm super psyched for Andrew Shaffer, I think it's going to be a hilarious book, and I highly encourage everyone to make fun of 50 Shades of Grey because it is re-damn-diculous. And thank you, universe. Thank you for the beautiful gift of throwing the double standards in male and female author behavior into razor sharp relief.
Brilliantly put, my love!
ReplyDeleteWell put. Having boobs doesn't make me a nice person. And you don't get to call me a dog if I'm not. Having opinions and voicing them is very ladylike, it it weren't, ladies wouldn't have opinions. :)
ReplyDeleteHonestly, feminism brought us the right to get our hands dirty doing so- called man's jobs, but still we don't have the right to state our opinions without being verbally beaten, getting acussed of envy and so on.
ReplyDeleteSaddest part about it is that not men are trying to hold us down this way. Nope, the women do.
Don't you dare making fun of their precious (sad) little fantasies. Death sin!
I thank God for women with backbone, there are too many spineless people out there.
And I thank you for the recaps, because they are a great source of fun and laughter for me^^
This is an excellent post, and one I wholeheartedly agree with. Men ripping apart another's work? HILARIOUS! A woman? YOU ARE A JEALOUS BITCH. GO SIT IN A CORNER AND THINK ABOUT WHAT YOU'VE DONE.
ReplyDeleteSeriously. I have absolutely no problem with anyone dissecting another person's work. That's kind of the risk you take when you, you know, PUBLISH THINGS.
And I don't see GoodReads community up in arms over all of the people who've torn apart Twilight or Hush, Hush or Fallen or any other books of that nature. What, are those books magically allowed to be dissected because they general public has fallen out of love with them? Did they pass some "mockery threshold" that makes it socially acceptable to lampoon them?
Whatever. Haters to the left.
Yes and yes.
ReplyDeleteI don't get the double standard. I just don't get it.
You are awesome and so is your blog. Keep on with your badass self.
Best thing to do is ignore all the critics and their horseshit. Because they are looking to rattle your nerves and get a reaction. Fuck em, I say. Keep on doin what you are doin, Jen. I love your tenacity.
ReplyDeleteAwesome post. I totally agree. It's okay for Stephen King to publicly bash Stephanie Meyer for being a untalented twat (which she is) but the moment a female writer voices an unpopular opinion for this horrible excuse for literature, it's because she's jealous and probably ugly. I love that insult. 'You don't like something we like so you must be ugly.' Like, the end all be all of insults for a woman is that she's ugly. Yeah, okay.
ReplyDeleteFantastic post and sadly oh-so-true. When a man insults someone else's work it's all slaps on the backs and laugther. If a woman does it, it's all "miaow".
ReplyDeleteJen, you're a fab writer. I read your book American Vampire last night and there is nothing shitty about your writing.
Keep on doing what you're doing!!
I love this post. I've actually read that book, and after a point you can see Andrew went 'fuck it, even I can't tolerate this anymore.'
ReplyDeleteI get what you've been saying about the 'Sunshine Sisterhood' too, I panned a book on goodreads, and got a friend request from it. The request was from another writer, who said she'd had a message from the author of the book I'd panned, congratulating the requester on the success of her book and passing the woman I'd panned. As a result, the woman making the friend request read the other book ... and felt she couldn't say anything because she was so shocked about how terrible the book was. I only got the request on goodreads because I'd been unafraid to call bullshit when I smelt bullshit. I hope that's readable by the way, I think I confused myself. The point was, she felt because the other woman had been so friendly to her, she couldn't say 'yes, but your book sucks' which is a shame, because it was horribly written and pretty freakin' racist.
I like your attitude to the whole issue anyway, because I don't believe in cutting the crap and I do want to publish the book I'm writing right now, but I don't want to feel like should I manage that, I have to stop reading and reviewing the way I do. In that sense, you're like a role model for me, so thank you. The Sunshine Sisterhood can stuff it.