The Eiger Sanction

[chris_gerrib]

Apropos of nothing, I found myself thinking about diversity in fiction. One of the arguments against having non Straight White Males in fiction, especially historical fiction, is that the non-SWMs are "not representative" of the era.

Well, here's a fact - prior to the arrival of the Industrial Revolution in any given society, 90% of the population was engaged in subsistence agriculture. They were farmers and herdsmen, poor and living hand-to-mouth. Everybody else in the society, from kings to knights to wizards to the village blacksmith, everybody, fit in that other 10%. So, any non-farmer in fiction is inherently unrepresentative, and any other occupation would be even more unrepresentative, consisting of maybe 1% of the population. Maybe 1%.

Yet how many historical fictions have you read about farmers? Even if the main character starts as a farmer, something happens to make him leave the farm. In short, pretty much any piece of historical fiction you've ever read is "un-representative."

Here's the truth - all characters in fiction are unrepresentative. In the zombie apocalypse, 90% of humanity are dead and zombie-fied, yet the story is about the 10% who aren't. If the characters weren't exceptional when the story started, they become so over the length of the story.

In short, anybody trying to tell you that we should only have "representative" characters in fiction is offering to make change for a nine-dollar bill in threes.


(with apologies to The Eiger Sanction)

Comments

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

*bursts into laughter*

Dude, you used it first, and now you have a problem with it?

I gather you think it's obvious that people who write women and minority characters only do it to make a political point (and perhaps a false political point at that, but that is less clear.)

I think it's just as obvious that people who object grew up in a world where women and minorities weren't worth writing stories about, like it that way, and are made uncomfortable by stories that feature them.

I have some sympathy for that; society is changing and change always makes me uncomfortable to start with. But I realize that about myself and try to take it into account so I can go away and think it over before opposing necessary and just changes.

[baron-waste.livejournal.com]

Okay, I think I can work with that.  I have to start by explaining what freedom is, because that's the real point of the debate.  Freedom is where you yourself decide whom or what you wish to write about.  You may choose to write about G A Custer at the Battle of the Little Bighorn.  You may choose to write about Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, at same.  It's entirely your decision, and in the course of the work you may change your mind!  You need no one's approval to do so.

Now imagine that you may only write on Approved Topics.  Sitting Bull is approved - Custer is not.  This is to “correct historical oppression” which you did not enact, or to “redress perceived injustices” by committing new, very real ones.  For the greater cause of “Social Justice” (the most recent hate movement to cloak itself in high-sounding but empty rhetoric), you are no longer free.

Now, you may have intended to write on Sitting Bull all along.  You might even agree that the other side have been shortchanged by history and their own story ought to be included.  Perhaps. (My friend chris_gerrib, and he is a friend, is of this school of thought.)  If so, you are fortunate, for you are not trammeled by the walls now in place.  Others are not so fortunate.  Sooner or later your own luck will run out also - for those walls are placed without consulting you.

How pleasant a place the world would be
If everyone in it agreed with me…

A utopia forcibly imposed - the stagnant, fearful world of Political Correctness, where “follow the leader” goes in daisy-chain circles of safe conformity and Victim Cards™ come in silver, gold and platinum, awarded by accident of birth.

Like its progenitor and role model “socialist realism,” works produced under Political Correctness are flat, formulaic, badly written - but glorifying the “historically oppressed” and disregarding the “oppressors,” both of which are rigidly and inflexibly defined.  Like their role model, the Soviet Writers' Trade Union, those who do not conform are shunned, shut out.  Good luck self-publishing!  Maybe you can sell copies by hand…

The problem with rigidity is that it is brittle.  It doesn't give way, flex, adapt - flexibility is “Trotskyite deviationism” - thoughtcrime.  Instead it cracks.  But technology and society are flexible, dynamic, and their advances are impossible to pin down to rigidity.  So inevitably the cracks widen, as more and more people realize that a world exists beyond Political Correctness - a world of freedom, where people can write about Sitting Bull OR about George Custer, about black female lesbians OR about white Anglo-Saxon males as they alone decide.  [And no one will then “correct” their stories to conform to imposed “social justice” quotas, as I was hearing about recently…]

Enthusiasm for Political Correctness wanes swiftly when it is no longer possible to punish the unenthusiastic.  No wonder the “Correct Ethnic / Gender Studies” commissars are screeching bloody murder - like the Party they came from, they're losing their grip on the present and the future is no longer theirs.  They're about to become completely irrelevant, unimportant, disregarded - and they know it.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

Okay, so some people are choosing to write about black lesbian swordswomen. That's freedom.

Other people are going "Oh, hot dog! I always wanted to read stories with that kind of protagonist!" and buying them. That's freedom.

Other people are saying "I want more stories like that!" or "I want stories written this other way!" That's freedom.

Other people are looking up and going "you want stories with women protagonists? Or gay protagonists? Werewolf packs composed mostly of teen girls? Sure, I'll write them if you'll buy them." That's freedom.

And some people are saying "no, thanks, I'll keep writing stories about manly men who save the day and have beautiful women swoon in their arms." That's freedom.

Nobody is *able* to force a writer to write this way or that way. The most they can do is not buy the work. Or read the work and tell their friends, "gosh, that was awful" or even say "you know, that guy advocates for putting gays in jail when he's not writing books. Are you sure you want to spend your book-buying dollars on a guy like that?" That's freedom.

And their friends might say "you have a good point" or they might say "nah, I'm still buying that guy's work." That's freedom.

I don't understand why you have such a problem with this. My freedom to point out that black lesbian swordswomen are more realistic than fire breathing dragons doesn't interfere with your freedom to seek out books in which women never touch a sword except to polish it.

Nothing is being imposed, utopia or otherwise, and certainly not forcibly.

[baron-waste.livejournal.com]

your freedom to seek out books

Thank the Lord for eBay.

(http://i.imgur.com/ArK1UIm.jpg)

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

Are you having trouble finding books of that type?

I am only half-way through Ken Liu's _The Grace Of Kings_ but so far it has only one woman character, and her skill is herbalism; she hasn't laid a finger on a sword. Also she mostly stays home. You might like it.

I just finished Cixin Liu's _Three Body Problem_ and while it does have some woman Red Guards, they don't fight (one gets killed while waving a flag, as I recall). There is only one major character who is a woman and she is a scientist, but her contributions to the plot have very little to do with science. You might like that one.

Have you read Andy Weir's _The Martian_ yet? The vast bulk of it follows the efforts of one man; women scientists and astronauts exist, but take up very little of the story. You might like that one.

I'm only about half-way through Brandon Sanderson's _The Way Of Kings_ but so far women don't fight, and there are plenty of examples of men striving with each other, and with monsters, in manly combat.

I think the Temeraire books wouldn't work for you; a pity, as they are some of my favorites, and offer plenty of fighting. Likewise John Ringo and David Weber, while writing lots of books with fighting, have women involved rather a lot. (Though this is not sword-fighting, as their work is space opera--does that help? If so, allow me to recommend those authors.)

I think the current publishing scene is not as short of books-without-women-fighting-that-also-don't-have-racial-issues as you seem to think.

[baron-waste.livejournal.com]

https://archive.org/details/galaxymagazine?&sort=-downloads&page=1

As I say - I ABSOLUTELY DON'T need to concern myself with today's fads and foibles beyond a moment's casual interest.  With the mere click of a mouse I may pass utterly beyond their reach.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

Yes! You absolutely don't! There is plenty of the writing you like out there! Good on you for realizing that!

[chris-gerrib.livejournal.com]

And the publishers of this stuff are for-profit businesses. If people weren't buying it, it wouldn't get published.