The Orion Team. discussion

Recently, in another genre, there was an instance of shocking self censorship. Basically a YA fiction writer got put through the electronic equivalent of a Maoist Struggle Session on the eve of her publishing her first book, and after being made to make a self criticism of the kind common in Maoist China (bitterly Ironic as she's a Chinese American who actually immigrated from the Mainland), she had her dreams crushed and decided not to publish her book.

Explanation on what happened....

https://www.theamericanconservative.c...


And a splendid denunciation by thriller fiction novelist Larry Coreia.

http://monsterhunternation.com/2019/0...

May the guy upstairs preserve spy/geopolitical/conspiracy/general action thriller fiction from such cancer as this false, so - called 'book community' which is nothing of the sort but an ideological cancer that would lay waste to any spark of creativity and fun.

Another reason for me to loathe and hate the PC crowd for its intolerance and stupidity. One of the reasons I went the self-published route.

Thanks for sharing being just a reader not an author I can only imagine what she went through and above all I cannot do with people trying to tell me or anyone what to do

Michel wrote: "Another reason for me to loathe and hate the PC crowd for its intolerance and stupidity. One of the reasons I went the self-published route."

cultural marxists will be the death of the west. Since they don't have state power to crush their enemies, they try to spread their tyranny through violent, psychotic temper tantrums, lies, slander and malicious guilt tripping....give them an inch, they won't take a mile, they'll take a whole damn country.

First they come for the YA adult fiction....then they'll come for us. https://steempeak.com/writing/@cheah/...

I’ve been fortunate enough to move from full freedom as an indie to a great deal of freedom with my current publisher. After all, the stories are what happens in the worlds from which they derive. We are simply taking notes while along for the ride.

J.T. wrote: "I’ve been fortunate enough to move from full freedom as an indie to a great deal of freedom with my current publisher. After all, the stories are what happens in the worlds from which they derive. ..."

The genre this group focuses on, does seem to be inoculated from the plague covered in the articles I linked....helps when one features a wood chipper ;)

Michel wrote: "Another reason for me to loathe and hate the PC crowd for its intolerance and stupidity. One of the reasons I went the self-published route."

Revolutions eat their own and Karma comes to those who deserve it. Author in that young adult fiction genre who was complicit in the recent bout of self censorship is himself driven to self censor by violent psychotic backlash from the very mob he was part of ......the irony is rich.

https://reason.com/archives/2019/02/2...

Samuel wrote: "Michel wrote: "Another reason for me to loathe and hate the PC crowd for its intolerance and stupidity. One of the reasons I went the self-published route."

Revolutions eat their own and Karma com..."

Zooming out, these episodes will inevitably affect YA publishing, and perhaps other areas of publishing if the fever spreads. Jackson's publisher, Sourcebooks Fire, is now in a difficult position: It's extremely rare to make changes to a book this late in the game—doing so would likely be quite expensive and disruptive given that we are less than a month from "pub day"—but how the publisher not make changes given that Jackson has already apologized and admitted wrongdoing?

This is now a pattern. It feels increasingly possible that at least some publishers, rather than adopt common-sense, liberal-minded approaches to the worthy goals of increasing diversity and representation in YA fiction, will instead adopt norms in line with Jackson's tweet about gay stories: Only Xs can write about X, and only Ys can write about Y. All because of an extremely small but incredibly loud group of Twitter users insatiable in their outrage. Imagine what a pointless, depressing loss that would be for the readers of the future.

https://reason.com/archives/2019/02/2...

This is just part of being an artist made worse by the Internet. I have been criticized for being a liberal nutcase. For being a conservative nutcase. For the way I look. For attacking the Trump administration in a book I wrote during the Obama administration. I was once physically cornered in a dark parking lot by a guy who was PISSED that I use the word cement when I mean concrete. My latest book has been completely bombed by negative reviews on Amazon so that they're pretty much all that show up on the first page. This isn't a liberal/conservative thing--look at what happened to the remake of Ghostbusters or Captain Marvel. It's just a handful of trolls sitting in their parents' basements trying to inflict damage. Hopefully, this is just a brilliant publicity stunt on her part. If not, she's right to get out of the writing biz. She's not going to like it.

Kyle wrote: "This is just part of being an artist made worse by the Internet. I have been criticized for being a liberal nutcase. For being a conservative nutcase. For the way I look. For attacking the Trump ad..."

Quite, quite. The outrage mob is broad in its attempt to find fault. They have a common cause, that transcends their divisions, namely to find something to be angry about......and yeah, I briefly thought she was tricking us all and this was to drum up sales, but now I'm not so sure....

In writing my book "Sarah The Assassin's Girlfriend" I was astonished by the attention I had to use to avoid writing something that might be too personal, too dangerous for a reader, too pornographic, or too dangerous for me (in case someone might feel I knew "too much").
The sex scenes were the most difficult to write, to my great surprise, but they were essential to the plot and were a major motivator for Harry McCabe's becoming an assassin; however, the lurid material also really annoyed my female editor. I think the bar is set very high for men who write material which involves explicit sexual activity, whereas it is very low for women who write for Cosmo. Similarly it seems that certain television series (eg Game of Thrones) get great reviews despite their nudity, barbarity and senselessness.
At my second draft I removed 60% of the sex. I also wisely decided to remove one scene which might be too dangerous if readers were to "experiment".
Another question slightly irked me: was the biblical name "Sarah" appropriate to use, since it might offend a variety of religious groups totaling four billion people? So far I have not been excommunicated. So far...
In my novel I also revisited a few of society's ethical dilemmas. For example, a prestigious Prosecutor is haunted by the fact that he argued with his pregnant girlfriend until she agreed to have an abortion. Should I have discussed the abortion in this my book? Well, a lot of the book is about the relative ethics of assassin Harry McCabe so YES!
In conclusion, while I do believe in SELF-censorship I wonder if I should have published under a "nom de plume", a pen name.

Alexander Lightstone author of "Sarah The Assassin's Girlfriend"