hth | oh, and also, OSC? fuck you.

oh, and also, OSC? fuck you.

I don't know if I could really respond better than this to the latest salvo of unhinged homophobic batshittery from Orson Scott Card.

I remember reading the Memory of Earth series in college, back when it was even harder than it is now to find even vague references to homosexuality in genre fiction. One of the main characters was a gay man who married a woman because it was required of him, and I remember thinking it was just a really intelligent, poignant treatment of a character who had made this terrible choice between two mutually exclusive types of happiness. It's weird to look back now and realize that whole arc was not, as I believed at the time, *descriptive* of what it's like to live under enforced heteronormativity, but *prescriptive.* Card doesn't hate gay people; he just hates gay people who selfishly destroy civilization by refusing to enter heterosexual marriages and breed.

Oh, and by the way, the reason Card doesn't consider himself a homophobe is that he subscribes to a very specific definition of the word, where homophobia means a fear of homosexuality that is so crippling as to interfere with one's life. Well, I sort of think he's crossed that bridge now, since he's so terrified of teh gay conspiracy to destroy everything good and pure in lif that he can't think of any other recourse than civil war. That sort of seems like it's getting in the way of being, you know, a normal human being who doesn't want to incite civil wars? Oh, and also, a lot of his former fans now wouldn't buy one of his books if it came with a lifetime's supply of cool shoes and lubricant, so it's not been a great boon to his career, either.

Also, fuck Orson Scott Card.

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(stopping by via friendsfriends)

I saw a discussion of this a few days ago, and somebody mentioned that he's right - he's not a homophobe. He's a bigot. His attitude toward homosexuals is studied, calcutated and thought-out. He doesn't accept it as a fact of life, he actively goes out and seeks supporting evidence and like-minded people for his point of view, and writes long, rambling screeds on Why Homosexuality Will Bring About The End Times, or whatev. I find this far more appalling than people who have knee-jerk reactions because they don't know any better or have never been taught.

Also: hi. You don't actually know me.

Oh, and also, a lot of his former fans now wouldn't buy one of his books if it came with a lifetime's supply of cool shoes and lubricant, so it's not been a great boon to his career, either.

Very true. Ages ago I had "Ender's Game" on my somewhat vague list of "classic SF that I might like to read someday" but I never got around reading anything by OSC, and he's been crossed off my list for good for a while now.

Also, I had no idea that he was *this* crazy.

Curiosity: You Mormon (or any mormon family or big exposure to the religion)? I ask because Memory of Earth a retelling of the Book of Mormon- pretty much exactly, down to the character's *names*, I shit you not- and it's pretty impossible to miss if you have any background in the religion. I'm curious if you liked it *despite* that or oblivious to that.

Enderr's Game is one of the best books of modern SF, and the sequels, while they deteriorate in quality, still say these wonderful, deeply moral things about understanding and forgiveness and peace and acceptance.

When I realized that the man who wrote them was a complete bigot- PROUD of being a bigot, not even trying to hide it in polite society- I was crushed. It seems like a betrayal, you know? Someone who wrote so beautifully shouldn't be *allowed* to be so despicable. Or someone so despicable shouldn't be *able* to write so beautifully. It's a big fat warning sign against admiring a writer as a *person* based only on their fiction. You can write moral stories and still be an immoral douche.

I could have been his biggest fan. Instead, I do everything I can to keep people from buying his work. *shrug*

OSC has clearly let his inner bigot off the leash.
OTOH, I don't entirely disagree with the position* just the increasingly irrational extremes to which it is taken.

This bit: "... we are fools if we think "gay marriage" is the first or even the worst threat to marriage.
We heterosexuals have put marriage in such a state that it's a wonder homosexuals would even aspire to call their unions by that name."

This bit I quite like.

*If one defines marriage as a personal-not-civic union for the purposes of producing and rearing children in context of reproductively favorable gender role system, then by that definition, gay marriages don't support and may undermine the purpose of marriage.

I think, though, that a) most of us do not define "marriage" that way--our definitions are a LOT more inclusive in general, sometimes conflictingly defined or undefined, so it's hard to tell what "our side" expects in practical actionables versus labels. and 2)we can't just agree to disagree about it when one or more factions fixate on owning the label, polarize their position and get all psycho HATE HATE HATE U EVOL HATERS about it.

As far as I can tell, OSC's position has not changed. It just looks more extreme now that the opposition is gaining more acceptability.

I am, in retrospect, glad that my earlier poverty and die-hard cheapness means that I don't think I've ever bought a Card book new, only used. And grateful that by the time I realized, "Oh, if I want to really support an author I like, I should buy their books new" (I was slow, what can I say), I also realized I wouldn't buy a Card book new if you paid me. So to speak.

(icon directed at Card, btw)

Wow, thanks for pointing this out. I had no clue OSC thought that way. I just knew I tried reading Ender's Game and gave up because it didn't hold my interest and put his work on the "oh well, someone else apparently likes it enough, but I'm not interested pile."

It's weird to look back now and realize that whole arc was not, as I believed at the time, *descriptive* of what it's like to live under enforced heteronormativity, but *prescriptive.*

Word. Especially in the last book, the woman in that relationship looks back on her marriage and... ugh. Just ugh.

Hi there, I was just looking for your SGA fanfic (still homeless, I gather?) and well, OSC kind of broke my heart a while back when I discovered completely by accident that he was a homophobic shit. I tortured myself pretty badly trying reading his opinions to understand how his reasoning went because the guy was a great storyteller and was all for accepting ALIENS and otherness and it made ABSOLUTELY NO SENSE. I confort myself thinking that obviously he is himself pretty gay and it's trying to somehow justify how his attraction to males doesn't make him a bad Mormon or whatever because, seriously, even when he has female characters that are remotely as interesting as his male characters is always his male characters that actually *show* any kind of real emotion for each other and his het marriages are always arranged somehow and have a business deal feeling to it (sometimes the guy gets the woman's family, sometimes he gets her ideals but he never gets *her* as his "prize", she's never the point of the affair). It's a pity there's no more OSC-book based slash that's any good because it would be so great to send him something that turned his own writing against him.

Wow, really ranted at you and I didn't even read that link because I don't want to be pointlessly mad! Anyway, shutting up now :p

I used to like him!!!

Then again, he wrote those bibical books about different bibical figures being so perfect so I guess I should've seen this coming.

But seriously, he sucks!

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