My Thoughts Thursday: Walk That Line

I really do apologize for posting three things today to catch up, dear followers, but I've been sitting on these ideas for quite some time now. Part of it is the fact that I'm very interested in politics and the human rights of people around me (hence my genres!), and another is just the infuriating fact that we as a species love to either stick our heads in the sand or sit in lawn chairs and complain about what's happening, yet never actually do anything about it.

The other part of it is that I'm on tumblr and that's a very big focus in the lit blogs I follow. There's actually a large part of tumblr, regardless of type of blog, that have noticed the serious lack of sexual, racial, religious, and gender variety. They champion the Bechdel test and note how many non-white faces they see in movies. As a generation, we notice. But here comes the problem with all of that. When you try to represent, that's great. But what happens when you go a little overboard?

You get what I like to call Textbook Syndrome. Does 'Lashawna, Mike, Qian, and Pablo all have seven watermelons' sound familiar? It makes the diversity and representation fake. As much as 'stay with your own kind' seems fake, sticking with everyone of every subset is just as bad. Not everyone needs to be a transgender pansexual half-Indian half-Chinese person. But to err on either side, to be so diverse it's obvious or so whitewashed it's appalling, is just as bad.

I see this quite often on tumblr where users tend to fly off the handle towards the underrepresented. I mean, there's even this post going around saying that in the Disney movie Frozen, which has caused both controversy over supposed 'whitewashing' and acclaim for allowing a mainstream, successful movie to not depend on the prince-saving-the-princess plot scheme, Elsa should be a lesbian, and that her lover should be an African Muslim who controls fire.

As nice as this sounds, this completely disregards the Muslim religion entirely. For the faithful, it's stated quite clearly that same-gender sexual relations are sin. This is an example of non-Muslims pushing this image just to represent a racial and sexual minority while not actually thinking of whether or not these combinations can exist. It's what I like to call pandering, trying to represent without respect.

So I guess this MTT's theme is simple: in life, you will meet people who are unlike you. Different experiences, genders, religions, sexualities, and races. But recognize in our shows, stories, and movies, that there is a difference between no representation, representation, and too much. Like many things, our living conditions, for example, there needs to be a balance.

Walking the tightrope,
Brie

Witty Wednesdays: Selfies with the Pope

Okay, so this first Wednesday post is pretty much because I have so much to talk about with this series about realism and the controversies that young adult literature seem to just want to leave alone. Race, sexuality, gender. If it isn't vaguely feminist or vaguely accepting, it's apparently not marketable. But there's a crucial part of many people's lives that seems to be seriously unrepresented: Religion.

And on one hand, I understand. In my current project, there's a rather major minor character who is a Muslim Arab. He's very religious and observes Ramadan, and struggles with maintaining his path to redemption while reacting to what actually happens around him. Most people won't even touch this, especially when it's not in the 'standard' Christian religion. Veronica Roth, in fact, barely touches this in the Divergent trilogy, where Tris is vaguely Christian but only really thinks on it when she's either facing death or contemplating suicide. Religion is difficult because it defines people in varying degrees, whether very much so or not at all.

But again, the representation of religion in YA literature is skewed: atheism or a lack of religion at all dominates, whether from tragic backstories concerning a turn away from God or just being raised that way. But truly, there are far, far many more believers than not, and Christianity isn't the only religion. Why a lot of people tend to avoid religious characters is that they don't want to offend, and it provides too many obstacles. The Muslim religion has dietary restrictions, but also many when it comes to romance. Faithful females generally wear a headscarf (the hijab), a burqa (full body covering) or other types of clothing for modesty and to completely terminate any sort of male gaze that we have problems with in Western culture, and there is no premarital sex. Heck, they can't even hang out alone until engagement. This would pose a problem for any sort of romance subplot if a character weren't allowed to even be alone with a potential love interest unless he put a ring on it.

I mean, Buddhism, Sikkism, Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Paganism, Atheism, there's interesting facets to all of these that create both a more realistic character and allows you to portray something more relatable to people. I mean, many young people struggle with how to balance their faith and their reality, or attempt to find one that works for them. Yet I see few, if any characters doing the same thing. It all goes back to representation, seeing yourself in the literature that is there and finding role models, learning through the literature how to manage your life or overcome obstacles.

This crazy life we live is hard enough, but by glossing over real topics like this readers don't get those deep, meaningful themes they're looking for and writers' works are emptier. I mean, you don't need the Pope riding a donkey backwards blindfolded to show that religion is important to many people. They show motivation and guide people on their life journeys, regardless of their degree of religion. And especially in the United States, religion affects everything. Politics (unfortunately), life choices, the economy...and to just pretend it doesn't exist just doesn't make sense.

This WW post wasn't really all that witty, but I promise next week's will be.

Namaste,
Brie

Think Tank Tuesday: Commercialism

"I lit up like a Christmas tree, Hazel Grace."

"Real or not real?"

"Always."

"May the odds be ever in your favor."

"And in that moment, I swear we are infinite."

I'm guessing you can probably tell me which book these quotes belong to, who said them, and why. And you would probably be right about all of them. They're on t shirts, fanmade goodies, and every gifset and photo collage of that book or its movie adaptation on tumblr. But what about these quotes make them special? 

The answer: Their commercial value. 

These phrases aren't just any old string of words strapped together. They are great one-liners for t-shirts, good quotes to spout as you hug that beloved book to your chest. They're enormous money makers. Publishing houses love them, movie producers want them, and authors provide them.

Or...they try to.

You can see it especially in YA writing where an author is trying - really, really trying - to make that magical phrase happen. They repeat it. They try to put some sort of infinite wisdom in there, pack it with meaning. But it just doesn't work. As much as authors will tell you they write to tell a story,  the reality is that we're also trying to make money. Sure, we clearly aren't as money-hungry as other professions (if you're in it for money, writing is not for you.), but we gotta eat. So appealing to the commercial aspect of books should play a role. But that role has started to cause a deterioration of the writing it sells. How many times have you been reading a book you love, and suddenly there's a plot twist, ooh! And it's a complete sellout, clearly meant to propel the love triangle. Or a character says something ridiculously out of character for the sake of a quotable piece on their Goodreads page. It's like someone had taken a hatchet to their manuscript and filled in the slits with little commercialized bits to catch a publisher's eye. 

Do we need to acknowledge the necessity of a commercially valid piece? Yes. But we can't let it destroy our ideas and hold them captive. A good piece of literature should stand alone, be able to be good outside the industry. You're putting your name on this, don't you want it to be good?

So for the writers: keep doing what you're doing. Write. Revise. Edit. Query. Fight for your story, and don't sacrifice it for commercial success.

For the readers: venture outside the newcomer shelves. Look on Goodreads, ask an associate of Barnes and Noble, take charge of what you read. Read something. If you love it, tell others. I've said it before and I'll say it again: you're the consumer. You hold the power. Take it.

Viva la Revolución,

Brie