There are two
topics I try to avoid writing about and/or discussing even with
family: religion and politics. I do this because there’s never a
clear winner, and it can lead to some heated debates. However, after
reading an article tonight, I’m bringing out the soap box, and
discussing a political view that irks me. It seems in today’s
technology driven, connected society everything is now deemed
“offensive”. This bothers me because as a writer, I try to avoid
most taboo subjects, but it seems no matter how hard I try, something
in my stories can be labeled objectable. As they say, it’s
impossible to please everyone, but pissing people off is a piece of
cake.
Why does this
bother me? As a writer, some of us will push sometimes the envelope,
and add our personal views about some forbidden subject into our
works. In every story written, there’s some political, religious,
society view in the pages, rather it’s the main plot point or
subconsciously weaved into the story. We can’t help it because we
are e putting our heart and souls into every letter on the page. Does
this mean we should worry about every sentence typed might upset
someone? I say no because if we did that, we would never write a
single word.
This also makes you
wonder about genres that are out there for the shear purpose to shock
and awe, such as erotica and horror. Other genres, such as sci-fi and
fantasy can contain political and religious views within their
chapters. Should all of them be banned? I say no. What might sicken
one person will be enjoyed by millions. If you don’t like the genre
and/or the subjects in a single book, don’t read it. Let’s quit
raining on everyone’s parade because you don’t agree with the
story the author has penned.
I honestly feel
like that if I wrote a best selling novel where every character was a
gray blob with names of kitchen appliances, someone on the web would
deem it repulsive because gray denotes skin tones. Yes, I feel in my
heart we’re getting to that point. A novel full of non-descriptive
locations and characters will be insulting to someone. There’s no
mention of race, religion, creed, etc, but because there’s one
mention of color, it’s protested because of the color gray. I
could even change the characters all to atoms, and protested because
it promotes science.
If this madness
doesn’t end, I envision a future all forms of communication will
die off. The human race will be afraid to say anything fearing
someone will attack them because of one single word that made them
feel insulted. We’ll would be communicating through emojis so
nothing can be taking the wrong way. Far as books, every character
would an it named The, and there’s no dialogue at all between them.
No worldly views, no taboo subjects, only pages full of Wingdings.
My final thought is
this: I do censor myself, but I refuse to censor myself to the point
of worrying about who, if any, I will offend. I will write the story
as I see fit, and it contains a subject that might shocking to many
people, I will post a warning or something. After that, it’s wide
open writing till the story is crafted the way I intended it to be.
After that, I won’t remove a single word worrying about how it
might be seen once released. That’s the beauty of writing. It’s
an art that makes one think about how a fictional world mirrors the
real world, the good and the bad. Until next time, stick to your
guns and write the story you want to tell.
