Separate the Art From the Artist

[SimonDoom]

Can people think of specific examples? An example of someone you had heard was a great author, and the subject matter of whose writings intrigued you, but you chose not to read them because you had heard they were a bad person? I can't think of any examples of having done this, myself.

I'm not talking about if the writings weren't your cup of tea. I'm talking about deciding not to read something because you didn't like the author as a person even though the work otherwise sounded appealing and worth reading to you.

 

[SimonDoom]

Me, the 134 year old German man, somehow kept alive by secret Nazi sci-fi tech, typing in the forums from my clandestine, Argentinian hideout.

"PERFECT! I HAVE ZEM ALL FOOLED! MIEN GOT! TELLING ZEM THAT I LIKED ANIME THREW ZEM OFF MY TRAIL!"

Great story idea. Modern-day Nazi scientists obtain Hitler's DNA and seek to bring him back as a smut writer.

"The Boys from Brazilian Wax."

 

[djrip]

Me, the 134 year old German man, somehow kept alive by secret Nazi sci-fi tech, typing in the forums from my clandestine, Argentinian hideout.

"PERFECT! I HAVE ZEM ALL FOOLED! MIEN GOT! TELLING ZEM THAT I LIKED ANIME THREW ZEM OFF MY TRAIL!"

Hm... Anime? From... Japan??

 

[MediocreAuthor]

Hm... Anime? From... Japan??

Scheisse!!!

 

[SeraphNocturne]

I will still read and consume controversial art and content, but I will also do my damnedest to not support it in any monetary way.

Elegantly put, I very much agree with this stance.

 

[MediocreAuthor]

I apologize for the derailment!

I will still read and consume controversial art and content, but I will also do my damnedest to not support it in any monetary way.

I agree largely with this.

There are plenty of projects that I will either borrow, pirate, or buy a used copy of, just to prevent putting money towards a loathsome creator.

And often I'll just abstain. As someone else put it, there is a lot of stuff to read from nice people.

 

[SeraphNocturne]

Can people think of specific examples? An example of someone you had heard was a great author, and the subject matter of whose writings intrigued you, but you chose not to read them because you had heard they were a bad person? I can't think of any examples of having done this, myself.

I'm not talking about if the writings weren't your cup of tea. I'm talking about deciding not to read something because you didn't like the author as a person even though the work otherwise sounded appealing and worth reading to you.

Dr. Seuss was very big on using offensive caricatures representing black and Asian people. Pretty sure the masses have moved to cancel. My kid still loves Green Eggs and Ham, though, so what’re you gonna do.

I’ve got very thick skin, not much phases me at all, and my ethnic background pulls from across the globe. Passive racism or otherwise “offensive material” isn’t going to send me on a cancel culture explosion.

 

[MediocreAuthor]

Dr. Seuss was very big on using offensive caricatures representing black and Asian people. Pretty sure the masses have moved to cancel. My kid still loves Green Eggs and Ham, though, so what’re you gonna do.

I’ve got very thick skin, not much phases me at all, and my ethnic background pulls from across the globe. Passive racism or otherwise “offensive material” isn’t going to send me on a cancel culture explosion.

Dr Seuss was also the WORST kind of adulterer, and he cheated on his wife who was dying of cancer. When she died he married his mistress.

That said, I also love Green Eggs and Ham, and I won't give it up just because he decided to be a bastard.

 

[Winter_Fare]

Can people think of specific examples? An example of someone you had heard was a great author, and the subject matter of whose writings intrigued you, but you chose not to read them because you had heard they were a bad person? I can't think of any examples of having done this, myself.

I'm not talking about if the writings weren't your cup of tea. I'm talking about deciding not to read something because you didn't like the author as a person even though the work otherwise sounded appealing and worth reading to you.

I think what happens far more often is people read the stuff, Google the author, then outrage ensues. I'm not going to Google the artist first every time I pick up a book, that takes a level of commitment to "pure thought" I've not seen outside a strictly religious household.

 

[Winter_Fare]

Schopenhauer, Beethoven, Dostoevsky, Wagner, Nietzsche, Heidegger, and many more were notably antisocial. They held chauvinistic, misogynistic, racist, reactionary, and anti-Semitic views, but their contributions to human thought are undeniable.

Some may argue that many of the regulars here share the same traits. So?

Sylvia Plath wasn't exactly nice either.

The usual suspects. Anything more alternative? Rare?

 

[PeytonMirabelle]

The usual suspects. Anything more alternative? Rare?

Since I'm a fantasy reader, I can pull two more specialized examples that most people outside those circles might not know, but are pretty well known to fans of the genre:

1) Marion Zimmer Bradley wrote The Mists of Avalon (a retelling of the Arthurian myths from the POV of Morgan Le Fay) which was long considered a milestone feminist work in fantasy. Bradley also edited the anthology Sword and Sorceress, which she created to address what she saw as the lack of female protagonists in fantasy, from 1984 until her death in 1999. In 2014 (I think) Bradley's daughter accused her of child sexual abuse. Bradley's husband, Walter Breen, was convicted of several such counts and the daughter said she was also one of his victims, that Bradley knew and did nothing (on top of her own acts).

I've read a lot of fantasy. I knew of Bradley but had never read her. I don't think I ever will now.

2) David Eddings (along with oft-uncredited wife Leigh) wrote several fantasy series in the 80s and 90s, most notably The Belgariad, which is pretty widely-read, especially by teenaged readers. After the Eddings died (her in 2007, him in 09), clippings of trials emerged from the early 70s that they had both served a year in prison for child abuse.

I read some of his work when I was a teenager, enjoyed it, and had fond memories of it. I didn't find out about their crimes until many decades later. I didn't run out and throw away my books ... but I am also reluctant to recommend their books to others. In theory, they served their time and never reoffended. It's a judgment call every reader would have to make for themselves.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

Schopenhauer, Beethoven, Dostoevsky, Wagner, Nietzsche, Heidegger, and many more were notably antisocial. They held chauvinistic, misogynistic, racist, reactionary, and anti-Semitic views, but their contributions to human thought are undeniable.

Some may argue that many of the regulars here share the same traits. So?

Sylvia Plath wasn't exactly nice either.

Dostoevsky doesn't really belong in that group. Antisocial, religious, and conservative, but I don't think the rest stands.

 

[MediocreAuthor]

"It is better to remain silent at the risk of being thought a fool than to talk and remove all doubt." ---Maurice Switzer

Dostoevsky was an ardent anti-Semite and reactionary who hated Poles, Germans, Catholics, and everything Western. He hated everything and everyone, but mostly himself.

I suggest you read up on him.

Everyone has been refercing anti-Semitism, and yet no one has yet mentioned Walt Disney. He was a huge anti-Semite, correct?

 

[AwkwardlySet]

"It is better to remain silent at the risk of being thought a fool than to talk and remove all doubt." ---Maurice Switzer

Dostoevsky was an ardent anti-Semite and reactionary who hated Poles, Germans, Catholics, and everything Western. He hated everything and everyone, but mostly himself.

I suggest you read up on him.

I've actually read quite a bit about him, along with all of his work. Conservative and Slavophilic, but there was hardly any fascism in his words or deeds, especially considering the times he lived in. The man was also an outspoken pacifist. Of course, in your black and white world, only Tilan can be right.

 

[BrightShinyGirl]

Everyone has been refercing anti-Semitism, and yet no one has yet mentioned Walt Disney. He was a huge anti-Semite, correct?

Disney was a casual antisemite, much like he was a casual racist -- a typical white man of his place and time.

But he absolutely hated the Nazis, putting the entire studio on a war footing to make anti-Nazi propaganda and training cartoons for the U.S. military. His short An Education for Death is a chilling indictment of fascism. Der Fuhrer's Face won an Oscar in 1942.

 

[mirafrida]

Can people think of specific examples?

I tend to do poorly with absolutes.

In the end, my intuition is that depriving yourself of an artistic experience spites you more than the creator (which, admittedly, is a reductive and individualistic perspective on a matter that involves complex social incentives and network effects). So i lean against any principled personal boycotts in the artistic sphere.

Still, i think it can shade one's decisions. Woody Allen comes to mind as someone i used to enjoy and now mostly avoid. Granted, his creativity was declining anyway, but i probably would have kept attending his later movies if his off-camera ickyness hadn't added another point of friction. And it does make me think back on his earlier films a bit differently too.

I found the ChickFilA / O.S.Card discussion amusing. I guess i feel squicked out by both of them, and thus less likely to patronize their respective products. But to my mind, ChickFilA was the more irreplaceable of the two...

 

[Winter_Fare]

I've actually read quite a bit about him, along with all of his work. Conservative and Slavophilic, but there was hardly any fascism in his words or deeds, especially considering the times he lived in. The man was also an outspoken pacifist. Of course, in your black and white world, only Tilan can be right.

Mosaic magazine:

"We usually think of anti-Semitism as a superstition of the ignorant, to be cured by education, and that is how Bemporad presents it. But in Russia anti-Semitism has been, and remains, a preoccupation of the most highly educated people and has been favored by serious philosophical treatment. No less a figure than Dostoevsky, who once argued for Jewish rights, came to believe in the blood libel toward the end of his life. His anti-Semitism during this period, appalling even by Russian standards, has understandably perplexed and shocked readers who, like Berdyaev himself, embraced the great novelist’s ethic of empathy and compassion. Today anti-Semitism flourishes in the Eurasianist movement, pioneered by the pro-Putin political philosopher Aleksandr Dugin. As Bemporad points out, in the 1990s the organization Memory (Pamiat’) described the execution of the Romanov family, ordered by the Jewish Bolshevik leader Yakov Sverdlov, as a Jewish ritual murder. An official commission formed in 2018 is looking into the matter."

 

[AwkwardlySet]

Find his essay “The Jewish Question,” published in 1877. I’m not in the mood to educate the illiterate today.

Ah, you are referring to the "Diary of a Writer" articles. Once again, you are taking a definitive stance toward something that has been widely debated. Leonid Grossman, a prominent Russian Jew and writer argues that the portrayal of a Jewish character in "The House of the Dead" is one of sympathy. Even in the article you mentioned, while Dostoevsky does refer to the Jews as enemies of the Russian people, he also appeals that they should have full rights in every way. In various other occasions, he speaks of them in a positive light, "The nation that brought the idea of brotherhood to the rest of humankind". Many have argued that his, at times antagonistic, position towards Jews was only of the religious kind, never racist or anti-national.
So yeah, his position can be called controversial, but "an ardent anti-semite" he was not. If nothing else, he doesn't belong in the company of those others who were indeed ardent anti-semites. You, as always, take an extreme stance, one of black and white. It is therefore a bit ironic that you chose to put in your avatar a person who practically idolized Wagner - who was indeed an ardent anti-semite. I have no doubt you will argue that Bruckner idolized Wagner only in the musical sense, but the fact is he did idolize him, and his worship of Wagner started years after Wagner expressed his anti-semitic views, even calling Jewish music something that has no artistic value.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

Mosaic magazine:

"We usually think of anti-Semitism as a superstition of the ignorant, to be cured by education, and that is how Bemporad presents it. But in Russia anti-Semitism has been, and remains, a preoccupation of the most highly educated people and has been favored by serious philosophical treatment. No less a figure than Dostoevsky, who once argued for Jewish rights, came to believe in the blood libel toward the end of his life. His anti-Semitism during this period, appalling even by Russian standards, has understandably perplexed and shocked readers who, like Berdyaev himself, embraced the great novelist’s ethic of empathy and compassion. Today anti-Semitism flourishes in the Eurasianist movement, pioneered by the pro-Putin political philosopher Aleksandr Dugin. As Bemporad points out, in the 1990s the organization Memory (Pamiat’) described the execution of the Romanov family, ordered by the Jewish Bolshevik leader Yakov Sverdlov, as a Jewish ritual murder. An official commission formed in 2018 is looking into the matter."

You are quoting just one article. I suggest you read my reply to Tilan. There are plenty of debates and arguments in favor of one or the other. Off the top of my head, I can link three articles that argue that Dostoevsky was actually quite sympathetic towards Jews. My whole point is one shouldn't form an opinion about something based on one source or article.

 

[SimonDoom]

"It is better to remain silent at the risk of being thought a fool than to talk and remove all doubt." ---Maurice Switzer

Dostoevsky was an ardent anti-Semite and reactionary who hated Poles, Germans, Catholics, and everything Western. He hated everything and everyone, but mostly himself.

I suggest you read up on him.

I don't know anything about this, but I've read Crime and Punishment, The Brothers Karamazov, and The Idiot. The first two novels I would rank in my top 20 of all time. I don't know how reading his biography would, or should, change any of that. It might be interesting, as biography, but it wouldn't alter in the slightest bit my estimation of his works or my desire to read them.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

This of course strays into the whole question of cancel culture and statue toppling. We are looking at Yesterday’s people through the lens of Today. As nobody I am aware of (explicitly including myself ) is perfect and as society’s views on what is and isn’t proper are constantly changing, it follows that all of us have something in our character, actions and history which will offend those in the future. From that, it also follows that anything any of us do, have done or will do will inevitably be open to criticism sometime in the future, not for the work itself, but for ourselves.

Which leads me to my bottom line. Given that nobody is 100% pure, how flawed/sinful/whatever must somebody be or have been before they are ‘erased’ and what degree of offensive (by today’s standards) is to be permitted?

It could get pretty lonely…

 

[djrip]

Mosaic magazine:

"We usually think of anti-Semitism as a superstition of the ignorant, to be cured by education, and that is how Bemporad presents it. But in Russia anti-Semitism has been, and remains, a preoccupation of the most highly educated people and has been favored by serious philosophical treatment. No less a figure than Dostoevsky, who once argued for Jewish rights, came to believe in the blood libel toward the end of his life. His anti-Semitism during this period, appalling even by Russian standards, has understandably perplexed and shocked readers who, like Berdyaev himself, embraced the great novelist’s ethic of empathy and compassion. Today anti-Semitism flourishes in the Eurasianist movement, pioneered by the pro-Putin political philosopher Aleksandr Dugin. As Bemporad points out, in the 1990s the organization Memory (Pamiat’) described the execution of the Romanov family, ordered by the Jewish Bolshevik leader Yakov Sverdlov, as a Jewish ritual murder. An official commission formed in 2018 is looking into the matter."

So wait, does communist Russia approve or disapprove of the Bolshevik execution of the Romanovs? Er, is it still communist Russia, or neo-Tsarist Russia now?

This of course strays into the whole question of cancel culture and statue toppling. We are looking at Yesterday’s people through the lens of Today. As nobody I am aware of (explicitly including myself ) is perfect and as society’s views on what is and isn’t proper are constantly changing, it follows that all of us have something in our character, actions and history which will offend those in the future. From that, it also follows that anything any of us do, have done or will do will inevitably be open to criticism sometime in the future, not for the work itself, but for ourselves.

Which leads me to my bottom line. Given that nobody is 100% pure, how flawed/sinful/whatever must somebody be or have been before they are ‘erased’ and what degree of offensive (by today’s standards) is to be permitted?

It could get pretty lonely…

I am not into abandoning art because of problems with the artist. So I still like Harry Potter and the Belgariad. And if someone were taking down a statue because of a problem with the sculptor I'd probably be opposed. But it's worth pointing out, taking down statues is about making a statement concerning what the society you live in chooses to glorify. As German history, and examples of the art of a certain time, Nazi monuments have a place in museums. But they don't belong in city parks and in front of government buildings, where they would rightly be perceived as state endorsement of Nazism. Similarly, in America, most statues of Confederate generals and Confederate monuments are not, in fact, pieces of antebellum history, but instead, were placed in the era of Jim Crow explicitly as statements of support for segregation by the state. Like Nazi monuments, they have a place in museums as part of history, but do not deserve placement in city squares and government buildings suggesting a society that wants to glorify what they represent. In my opinion. Or, more to the point, my view is that regardless of whether one supports or opposes removing certain statues, it's an entirely different situation and debate than whether to censor or boycott art because of a problem with the artist that has nothing to do with the content of their art.

 

[Winter_Fare]

So wait, does communist Russia approve or disapprove of the Bolshevik execution of the Romanovs? Er, is it still communist Russia, or neo-Tsarist Russia now?

Yes!

 

[Emilymcplugger]

There are plenty of “problematic” artists out there, actors, directors, producers, writers.

I wouldn’t dismiss a Miramax movie because it had Harvey Weinstein’s name on it. Likewise I won’t stop enjoying the film FREQUENCY even though Jim Cavaziel has tumbled down a conspiracy theory rabbit-hole, and I still enjoy WHO’S NEXT in spite of Pete Townsend’s questionable taste in photography.

However, Gary Glitter can fuck right off.

 

[Djmac1031]

Some might consider me hypocritical on it, and maybe I am, but I tend to take these things on a case by case basis, and I'm sure I'm more than influenced in my choices by how much I enjoy the art in question.

For instance; both Kevin Spacey and Brian Singer turned out to be absolute creeps. That said, I still think The Usual Suspects is a brilliant movie.

Joss Whedon turned out to be a real douchebag, too. But I'm not culling Firefly or The Avengers from my viewing habits, either.

I went to go see The Flash, not to support Ezra Miller, but to support everyone else who worked hard on that movie. It sucked, but quite honestly not because of him specifically.

I still honestly don't know how much was truth and how much complete fiction with all the Michael Jackson stories, but it doesn't negate his talent.

Stephen King wrote a fucking child orgy scene in his novel It. Is the scene problematic? Absolutely. Do I consider him a pedophile? Of course not.

When it comes to politics, I try not to let that influence my choices either, but again it depends.

I don't agree with Tim Allen's politics, but the guy IS Buzz Lightyear, and he should never have been excluded from the Buzz Lightyear movie. I skipped that one, looked terrible anyway.

Most of the other artists I disagree with politically I was never a big fan of anyway, so it's not like I need to go out of my way to "boycott" their material.