When you define yourself as a nail, everyone else looks like a hammer…
Posted on April 17th, 2008 in commentary |
One of the least interesting secrets in the blogosphere of late is the identity of the "unknown" author who Black Amazon was defending during her attack on Seal press. This is the dustup that resulted in the flouncing of feminist savior "Brownfemipower"*.
What then was the evil, vile racist act that brought on so much pain and warranted such a staunch defense? Did Seal Press go out clubbing young, defenseless BSOC**? Did they revive the KKK? Did they beat someone down with a patriarchy stick? No. They gave an author some honest advice when they were asked.Those bitches!
Let’s hear a first hand recounting of this hideous attack from it’s victim…
"An informal meeting with an editor from Seal Press at the WAM conference regarding the proposal for my anthology left me feeling frustrated and deflated. I was not seeking or particularly interested in having them publish the anthology, but merely hoping for advice on my book proposal. The editor, while impressed with the format of the proposal, advised me that anthologies don’t sell, and I should get someone like Gloria Steinem or Katha Pollitt to contribute, even though, as she said, I wouldn’t be able to get access to them." - Adele explains it all
There you have it. The hideous racist comment made to a young, unknown author asking for advice came down to this simple reality was that anthologies sell better when you have someone famous in them, but that famous people are often hard to get help from.
Seriously, you really have to be deeply invested in your identity as downtrodden victim to decide that that advice constitutes an attack. Then again, when you are talking about someone whose entire book project is dependant on their being downtrodden it isn’t much work to see what happened.
"I was struck by the fact that she did not suggest I contact Daisy Hernandez, bell hooks, Andrea Smith, or Alice Walker." - Adele, insulted
Maybe because most of the target market for a leftist, feminist oriented complaint anthology have heard of Steinem or Pollitt and almost none of them have heard of your personal favorites? Damn reality, always getting in the way.
I don’t think Adele was really expecting, I think, how completely the people she went to about the incident would flip out. She should have. These are people in a movement who’s entire lifeblood is manufacturing a feeling of outrage. Without constantly reminding each other how downtrodden they are, radical feminism (especially the fringe out groups of it) have nothing else to hold them together.
Well, at least we know now. It was keeping me up at night.
p.s. It looks like Black Amazon is trying to mitigate some of the damage, and that’s good to see.
* note: Given the fact that the wailing and begging is starting to fade away, expect Bfp to allow herself to be convinced to return pretty soon now… you have to strike while the iron is hot on these things and most flouncers understand this instinctually
** note: Baby Seals of Color
5 Responses
Did you read the same comment thread I did?
Because what I saw was clearly not what you saw.
Let’s take it out of the emotionally charged context of race. Let’s imagine that my friends and I were just at a “non-mainstream programming languages conference”, with my Lisp-using friends. Let’s imagine that, say, FooCorp was there and interviewing, a friend of mine goes for an interview, and the interviewer smacks him down after just reading the resume while showing some classic ignorance about Lisp. (Say, something on the order of “you need more experience with a compiled language”)
Now, I blog about the conference, and mention all the great presentations, and at the end say “Oh, and by the way? FUCK FOOCORP”. And then, in the comments, my friend says “Thanks for that; FooCorp really has nothing on Lisp Users”. (*) Because, you know, that’s what friends do for friends who’ve been dumped on - you support them.
Then faster than you can say “corporate community relations damage control” some FooCorp PR person pops up saying “we’d like to do more to support the lisp community, but we just don’t have the experience. We’re interested in a dialog with the lisp community.”
The conversation goes downhill from there, with all sorts of people saying how it’s clear that FooCorp doesn’t care at all about anything but C++ and Java, how there’s whole worlds their little minds can’t handle, etc. Classic internet flame fest made worse by the fact that I don’t really feel comfortable discussing the details of my friend’s interaction with them, or his name, because future employers can use Google, and so won’t explain the context of the original shout-out.
Now, WTF? I mean, who is it who first jumps on the “OMG! Please don’t hate me!” wagon? Who is overreacting to a perceived slight? It isn’t the person who said “FUCK FOOCORP”.
You know, sometimes us white folk have to accept that PoCs are going to be pissed at us sometimes. Part of real respect is not freaking out at every imagined slight. I know I’m going to screw up and do or say something racist or ignorant at some point. If I get called on it, it’s my job to look at what the other person is saying and look at what they say. Specifically, it’s my job to not freak out. “OMG! SOMEONE CALLED ME A RACIST! THEY’LL TAKE AWAY MY LIBERAL BUMPER STICKER!” A single “FUCK YOU” shout-out doesn’t demand going all “let’s dialog with the community and use multisyllabic words that make us all feel nice and generically calm and like we really truly care about every human being”.
Oh, and not heard of Alice Walker? What rock have you been hiding under to imagine that the author of The Color Purple wouldn’t be a recognizable name among Seal Press’s target market?
(*) never mind that this wouldn’t happen because the lisp community is a bunch of bitter individualists - imagine for this example that they’re as friendly as Ruby users, at least to each other
Just wanted to give you a shout out and tell you I love your blog. I think you are spot on all of your observations of the feminist blogosphere. I’d rather die than be labeled a feminist after reading feminist material online and the constant bickering and sniping that I see go on among women (who are supposed to be supportive of women but you would never know it by these people). Most of them act exactly like the patriarchy that they claim to abhor, They seek to silence others, tell them what they can or cannot say, feel and act. And don’t even get me started on the WOC who have the biggest chips on their shoulders over every little thing. They support free speech and being considerate of other women’s feelings only if you agree with them and LISTEN to them. They’re big on YOU listening to them but won’t even consider listening to YOU. It is such complete bullshit and I can’t believe how everyone is supposed to tip-toe all over their feelings like they are the only people on earth with feelings. And if someone apologizes to them after they make the mistake of commenting the wrong way….HOLY SHIT…they NEVER forgive you for being human. All they do is tell you that you such for being white and privileged. It’s the same song and dance 24/7 with them.
One more thing, BlackAmazon wants us to cut her slack for being 23. She’s 23 folks. Got that? She mentions it every post as she rips into someone for pissing her off AGAIN. I really don’t know how BA can claim that she writes about WOC issues when if you took the time to go through her blog, I’d say about 95% is her bitching about some supposed “slight” that is being made against her. Everyone is after her. I love the post where she claims that when she went to the WAM conference that everyone stared at her like she was some sort of exhibit. Sounds like someone is a little insecure to me or maybe it’s narcissism to believe that everyone is staring at her because she’s black. Please. I don’t believe that for one minute. Maybe she was being loud and rude and that’s why people stared or maybe she just imagined it. Either way I find her very odd.
[...] This pose was a draft that was little more than a copy / past of this comment that I was intending to respond to. Since some trackbacks already link here I won’t delete [...]
you wrote: “* note: Given the fact that the wailing and begging is starting to fade away, expect Bfp to allow herself to be convinced to return pretty soon now.”
while i don’t think things are as simple as you’ve outlined them, i do agree with this statement. i’m pretty tired of the “i’m taking my marbles and going home” theatrics. having read woman of color blog since its inception, the woman has a short fuse and never does what she says when she throws a temper tantrum. she’s flounced off in a huff at least five times now and she always returns. typically, she flees because she’s ashamed of her temper tantrum, sometimes ashamed when she should not be, when she is right to be angry, hurt, and upset. then she sits around and waits for everyone to plead for her return. the time she doesn’t return will be when she actually starts acting in the real world in a way that means she doesn’t have time to waste her time anymore. right now, she may be acting in the real world but anyone who has time to blog as much as she does while going to school, working, and taking care of a family is probably someone who is letting something slide. blogging is wasting her talent and time. i hope she’s finally realizing she has much to contribute to the world and that the world is much more than blogging. if she doesn’t come back, i will be glad because it will mean she’s finally engaged in the struggle in a way that will matter to her and to her community.