<< We also recommend this clear statement of the meaning of academic freedom from University of Austin provost Jacob Howland. “At universities, the right to free speech stops when speech impedes higher education’s essential calling: the pursuit of truth so as to preserve, transmit, and extend knowledge,” writes Jacob, making a point so many of the protesters’ supporters seem to miss.>> from The Free Press
You are free to do as you wish, but that does not alter the fact of what you are. To paraphrase Forrest Gump: "A troll is as a troll does". The topic of the FP article upon which I commented was the PEN AWARDS for Christ's sake. That makes it by definition the topic at hand. I think I appreciate genre as well as a two bit hack. My "favorites" depict their characters in a variety of ways dependent upon the thematic nature of their works, both positively and negatively. That is what I expect from talented authors, but what would you know about that? You freely admit not reading Literature will a capital "L", as if that were some badge of honor. Commenting upon things you admit to avoiding makes you just another windbag. The words I used to describe Kingsolver's protagonist said nothing about "ruining the purity of a pure white character." Her masterfully-written book is about the depredations of modern rural Appalachia. There are many American stories of the misfortunes of various subsets of our culture, all unique and all deserving of attention. However, the misfortunes described in her book are idiosyncratic of poor Appalachians, commonly disparaged as "White Trash". It is a story that is under-told and she tells it well. To make her character octaroon is not offensive because being mixed racial is offensive; it disappointing because it is a sad genuflection to the social justice literary elites who demand such contortions of authors and it is unnecessary to the story. It effectively says, your character cannot be presented as a victim and be completely white because that violates the presumptions of the white colonial oppressor mindset. So post to your heart's content. You are free to say what you like as I am free not to read any more of it. BTW, it must be really sad for an erstwhile "author" to be relegated to the comments section of TFP as an outlet for your stunning creative genius.
Your wit, your audacity, your clarity, your logic, the way you put words on the page.
And, yes, in the current climate, your bravery.
The extreme cowardice and the wishy-washy responses of politicians, actors, writers, artists, most journalists, climate-change warriors, teachers, academics is breathtaking.
I was at Sydney University today waving a flag for the Jewish students and lecturers there who are increasingly intimidated by the permanent tent city set up on what was once a hallowed space filled with shrill keffiyeh-clad children beating drums and shrieking.
According to the Vice-Chancellor the 'nice' Mr Scott 'Jewish students will just have to tough out being “uncomfortable” in the face of anti-Israel slogans'. He has explained that 'from the river to the sea' and calls for an 'intifada' are not classified as hate speech. Mr Scott is paid considerably more than our Prime Minister.
If a tent city was set up by 'white' folk or Jews even mildly calling out Muslims or Indigenous Australians the response, I'm sure, would be vastly different.
and now, apparently, they've published a 'list' of States that have jailed writers and made Israel a top 'offender'. The supposed writers that are jailed by Israel are terrorists, but PEN didn't care. It's all a smear campaign to destroy Israel through lies repeated 'often enough'.
Sorry but the NYT list is not an award. The subject in question was the PEN awards and, contrary to your assertions, all the major literary awards are heavily imbued with oppressor-colonialist wokeness. If you are blind to that it's because you inhabit the same echo chamber of epistemic closure. The titles and authors you list are not of the caliber I choose to waste time on. I've no interest in pulp fiction or "series literature". Number of sales means diddly squat to me. And my frustration with the anti-white racist attitudes of the book awards is not, as you unfairly presume, a function of my lack of appetite for non-white literature. Among my favorite authors are Jhumpa Lahiri, Khaled Housseini, Gabriel Marquez, Chang-rae Lee, Yann Martel, V.S. Naipal, and too many other non-white authors to list. You seem too thick to perceive that the issue is not that I feel threatened by non-white literature, it is that the assessment of the quality of literature has fallen into the hands of idiots obsessed with unoriginal endless reiterations of the same tired theme. Consequently, the useful purpose that book awards used to provide is gone. Your jumping so eagerly onto my comments relishing your chance to virtue signal your open-mindedness is the opposite of what you presume. You're less an "author" than a comment section troll.
Brava! Magnificent! Thank you, Lionel Shriver. (Btw, "The Post-Birthday World" is one of my favorite books of all time, but that's neither here nor there.)
Yes, we need the courage to speak, but we need, as Ms. Shriver points out, the courage to Think. It's no accident that these "student" protest morons are chanting whatever words are put into their mouths. They have relinquished all critical thought in order to join the Mob.
The fluid movement between leftist issues is certainly weird (BLM > Trans > Palestine), but there also seems to be another strange component, specifically about how dark someone's skin is. To many these days, dark skin automatically equates to oppressed, while light skin means oppressor. Never mind that 160K Israelis are from Ethiopia, I(insert useful idiot) know that Israelis are white oppressors.
The charge of genocide always makes me chuckle. Previously I thought, of all people, writers would know what it means. But most blindly go along with the prevailing narrative. Hamas's stated intention is to kill all Jewish people(would be genocide). Israel, on the other hand, could wipe Gaza off the map tomorrow, yet sends their citizens(who all serve in the military) into harms way specifically to minimize civilian death. Useful idiots advocate for Hamas and the Palestinians who repress women, kill or jail LGBTQ members, were video'd celebrating 9/11, are allied with Iran and other dictatorships and all wish death upon America. It's like I have a front row seat watching Rome crumble.
Such an interesting point about the activist Left - followed by legions of liberals - pivoting on a dime from slogan to slogan, victim group to victim group.
The desire to be identified with the group clearly runs so deep in us. In fact we cannot distinguish it from our “own” beliefs and desires.
“….the Anglosphere’s far left has neatly pivoted from the infantilization of black people to the Palestinian cause with the coordinated grace of a synchronized swimmer.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Global warming (which morphed into just climate change because, too cold or too hot, who could argue with that?), open borders, BLM, racism, white-privilege, LGBTQ++++++, ‘defund,’ pronouns, unisex bathrooms (and sports), the COVID shot, masks, shutdowns, Pro-Hamas and “genocide’….. I’ve lost count of the number of raised progressive flags that I’m supposed to give a crap about.
Infantilization? Huummmm…. You see, big, new words like this is why I read TFP. You’re making me think, or at least look up stuff. I LOVE IT!!
Ms. Shrivel- You reference “…the past 15 years have demonstrated with depressing clarity…”. What event coincided 15 years ago that revealed (and continues to reveal) the banality of PEN writers? Lemme see🤔. Perhaps a new American President who promised to “fundamentally change “ America? Did this viewpoint win and then decide that no other viewpoints were valid; that these other viewpoints were, in their minds, WrongThink and facist and to be cast out? Just a thought.
"[...] as of October 2023, the Anglosphere’s far left has neatly pivoted from the infantilization of black people to the Palestinian cause with the coordinated grace of a synchronized swimmer." On the nose.
"We’re cowards, conformists, and copycats. Real freedom of expression is too scary; we’d rather hide in a crowd whose keffiyeh-masked members all shout the same thing."
"We???" Speak for yourself, Lionel. I've been a published author for years, and I despise any American protester who wears a keffiyeh like a deranged Protest Barbie. I condemn Hamas without reservation, do so publicly, and believe Israel's war against Hamas is just and moral. Yes, too many noncombatants in Gaza have died. That's on Hamas for hiding in their babies' diapers instead of fighting out in the open. A hyena fights with more courage that Hamas.
PEN America (the institution) is not a coward. A large bloc of its author members are cowards for siding with Hamas and demanding PEN condemn Israel. PEN cancelled its awards program rather than give into their demands. You need to change the headline--PEN America is NOT cowardly.
I read many of your comments and am not sure where you stand on the Israel-Hamas situation, but I cannot believe someone of your intelligence can possibly side with an evil, murdering terrorist group like Hamas.
I know you can't stand Trump, but how can anyone look at the last 4 years and claim things were worse 2016-2020? Does hating Trump mean you favor 4 more years of this disaster?
234, I'm not sure where you got the notion that I support Hamas. I most emphatically don't. I want every one of those terrorists to die painfully, and would kill them myself if I had the chance. Fortunately, Israel is doing that job nicely for all of us.
The Hamas mass murder of Jewish innocents in October is part of the larger Arab insanity since WWII. Arabs brought their misery on themselves by rejecting their half of Palestine in 1948 in favor of invading the Jewish half to take both for an all-Arab state. They lost, thankfully. Not accepting the land split and rejecting all peace offers afterwards in favor of Intifada Forever is what cost them their state, and yet they persist in their belief that doing the same thing over and over will change the results.
PEN America (the organization) does not support Hamas and refuses to condemn Israel like many of its member authors insist. That's a courageous stand for PEN America to take, defying its own membership, and I applaud PEN for it. Any author who loves Hamas is no friend of mine.
I didn't say anything about Trump or Biden.
Just in case my original post was unclear about who I root for in the Israel Hamas war, I rewrote my post to make it crystal clear.
<< We also recommend this clear statement of the meaning of academic freedom from University of Austin provost Jacob Howland. “At universities, the right to free speech stops when speech impedes higher education’s essential calling: the pursuit of truth so as to preserve, transmit, and extend knowledge,” writes Jacob, making a point so many of the protesters’ supporters seem to miss.>> from The Free Press
You are free to do as you wish, but that does not alter the fact of what you are. To paraphrase Forrest Gump: "A troll is as a troll does". The topic of the FP article upon which I commented was the PEN AWARDS for Christ's sake. That makes it by definition the topic at hand. I think I appreciate genre as well as a two bit hack. My "favorites" depict their characters in a variety of ways dependent upon the thematic nature of their works, both positively and negatively. That is what I expect from talented authors, but what would you know about that? You freely admit not reading Literature will a capital "L", as if that were some badge of honor. Commenting upon things you admit to avoiding makes you just another windbag. The words I used to describe Kingsolver's protagonist said nothing about "ruining the purity of a pure white character." Her masterfully-written book is about the depredations of modern rural Appalachia. There are many American stories of the misfortunes of various subsets of our culture, all unique and all deserving of attention. However, the misfortunes described in her book are idiosyncratic of poor Appalachians, commonly disparaged as "White Trash". It is a story that is under-told and she tells it well. To make her character octaroon is not offensive because being mixed racial is offensive; it disappointing because it is a sad genuflection to the social justice literary elites who demand such contortions of authors and it is unnecessary to the story. It effectively says, your character cannot be presented as a victim and be completely white because that violates the presumptions of the white colonial oppressor mindset. So post to your heart's content. You are free to say what you like as I am free not to read any more of it. BTW, it must be really sad for an erstwhile "author" to be relegated to the comments section of TFP as an outlet for your stunning creative genius.
Lionel Shriver I love you.
Your wit, your audacity, your clarity, your logic, the way you put words on the page.
And, yes, in the current climate, your bravery.
The extreme cowardice and the wishy-washy responses of politicians, actors, writers, artists, most journalists, climate-change warriors, teachers, academics is breathtaking.
I was at Sydney University today waving a flag for the Jewish students and lecturers there who are increasingly intimidated by the permanent tent city set up on what was once a hallowed space filled with shrill keffiyeh-clad children beating drums and shrieking.
According to the Vice-Chancellor the 'nice' Mr Scott 'Jewish students will just have to tough out being “uncomfortable” in the face of anti-Israel slogans'. He has explained that 'from the river to the sea' and calls for an 'intifada' are not classified as hate speech. Mr Scott is paid considerably more than our Prime Minister.
If a tent city was set up by 'white' folk or Jews even mildly calling out Muslims or Indigenous Australians the response, I'm sure, would be vastly different.
and now, apparently, they've published a 'list' of States that have jailed writers and made Israel a top 'offender'. The supposed writers that are jailed by Israel are terrorists, but PEN didn't care. It's all a smear campaign to destroy Israel through lies repeated 'often enough'.
Sorry but the NYT list is not an award. The subject in question was the PEN awards and, contrary to your assertions, all the major literary awards are heavily imbued with oppressor-colonialist wokeness. If you are blind to that it's because you inhabit the same echo chamber of epistemic closure. The titles and authors you list are not of the caliber I choose to waste time on. I've no interest in pulp fiction or "series literature". Number of sales means diddly squat to me. And my frustration with the anti-white racist attitudes of the book awards is not, as you unfairly presume, a function of my lack of appetite for non-white literature. Among my favorite authors are Jhumpa Lahiri, Khaled Housseini, Gabriel Marquez, Chang-rae Lee, Yann Martel, V.S. Naipal, and too many other non-white authors to list. You seem too thick to perceive that the issue is not that I feel threatened by non-white literature, it is that the assessment of the quality of literature has fallen into the hands of idiots obsessed with unoriginal endless reiterations of the same tired theme. Consequently, the useful purpose that book awards used to provide is gone. Your jumping so eagerly onto my comments relishing your chance to virtue signal your open-mindedness is the opposite of what you presume. You're less an "author" than a comment section troll.
Brava! Magnificent! Thank you, Lionel Shriver. (Btw, "The Post-Birthday World" is one of my favorite books of all time, but that's neither here nor there.)
Yes, we need the courage to speak, but we need, as Ms. Shriver points out, the courage to Think. It's no accident that these "student" protest morons are chanting whatever words are put into their mouths. They have relinquished all critical thought in order to join the Mob.
They cannot be allowed to silence us.
Shriver kicks my ass!
The fluid movement between leftist issues is certainly weird (BLM > Trans > Palestine), but there also seems to be another strange component, specifically about how dark someone's skin is. To many these days, dark skin automatically equates to oppressed, while light skin means oppressor. Never mind that 160K Israelis are from Ethiopia, I(insert useful idiot) know that Israelis are white oppressors.
The charge of genocide always makes me chuckle. Previously I thought, of all people, writers would know what it means. But most blindly go along with the prevailing narrative. Hamas's stated intention is to kill all Jewish people(would be genocide). Israel, on the other hand, could wipe Gaza off the map tomorrow, yet sends their citizens(who all serve in the military) into harms way specifically to minimize civilian death. Useful idiots advocate for Hamas and the Palestinians who repress women, kill or jail LGBTQ members, were video'd celebrating 9/11, are allied with Iran and other dictatorships and all wish death upon America. It's like I have a front row seat watching Rome crumble.
Such an interesting point about the activist Left - followed by legions of liberals - pivoting on a dime from slogan to slogan, victim group to victim group.
The desire to be identified with the group clearly runs so deep in us. In fact we cannot distinguish it from our “own” beliefs and desires.
Excellent!
“….the Anglosphere’s far left has neatly pivoted from the infantilization of black people to the Palestinian cause with the coordinated grace of a synchronized swimmer.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Global warming (which morphed into just climate change because, too cold or too hot, who could argue with that?), open borders, BLM, racism, white-privilege, LGBTQ++++++, ‘defund,’ pronouns, unisex bathrooms (and sports), the COVID shot, masks, shutdowns, Pro-Hamas and “genocide’….. I’ve lost count of the number of raised progressive flags that I’m supposed to give a crap about.
Infantilization? Huummmm…. You see, big, new words like this is why I read TFP. You’re making me think, or at least look up stuff. I LOVE IT!!
Ms. Shrivel- You reference “…the past 15 years have demonstrated with depressing clarity…”. What event coincided 15 years ago that revealed (and continues to reveal) the banality of PEN writers? Lemme see🤔. Perhaps a new American President who promised to “fundamentally change “ America? Did this viewpoint win and then decide that no other viewpoints were valid; that these other viewpoints were, in their minds, WrongThink and facist and to be cast out? Just a thought.
"[...] as of October 2023, the Anglosphere’s far left has neatly pivoted from the infantilization of black people to the Palestinian cause with the coordinated grace of a synchronized swimmer." On the nose.
"We’re cowards, conformists, and copycats. Real freedom of expression is too scary; we’d rather hide in a crowd whose keffiyeh-masked members all shout the same thing."
"We???" Speak for yourself, Lionel. I've been a published author for years, and I despise any American protester who wears a keffiyeh like a deranged Protest Barbie. I condemn Hamas without reservation, do so publicly, and believe Israel's war against Hamas is just and moral. Yes, too many noncombatants in Gaza have died. That's on Hamas for hiding in their babies' diapers instead of fighting out in the open. A hyena fights with more courage that Hamas.
PEN America (the institution) is not a coward. A large bloc of its author members are cowards for siding with Hamas and demanding PEN condemn Israel. PEN cancelled its awards program rather than give into their demands. You need to change the headline--PEN America is NOT cowardly.
I read many of your comments and am not sure where you stand on the Israel-Hamas situation, but I cannot believe someone of your intelligence can possibly side with an evil, murdering terrorist group like Hamas.
I know you can't stand Trump, but how can anyone look at the last 4 years and claim things were worse 2016-2020? Does hating Trump mean you favor 4 more years of this disaster?
234, I'm not sure where you got the notion that I support Hamas. I most emphatically don't. I want every one of those terrorists to die painfully, and would kill them myself if I had the chance. Fortunately, Israel is doing that job nicely for all of us.
The Hamas mass murder of Jewish innocents in October is part of the larger Arab insanity since WWII. Arabs brought their misery on themselves by rejecting their half of Palestine in 1948 in favor of invading the Jewish half to take both for an all-Arab state. They lost, thankfully. Not accepting the land split and rejecting all peace offers afterwards in favor of Intifada Forever is what cost them their state, and yet they persist in their belief that doing the same thing over and over will change the results.
PEN America (the organization) does not support Hamas and refuses to condemn Israel like many of its member authors insist. That's a courageous stand for PEN America to take, defying its own membership, and I applaud PEN for it. Any author who loves Hamas is no friend of mine.
I didn't say anything about Trump or Biden.
Just in case my original post was unclear about who I root for in the Israel Hamas war, I rewrote my post to make it crystal clear.
Lionel Shriver is great. Sign her up as a regular.
So many writers, so little courage.