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rivka: "Asplode" however, was misspelled. [Wink]
Dang you rivka!!! I caught that immediately. It was originally in a Strong Bad e-mail http://www.homestarrunner.com/sbemail94.html Oh well, there goes my chance to be acknowledged by Mr. Card in the back of the book for contributing to it.
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I am rather bewildered. As I feared, too much propagandism, over-simplyfying and cheap comparisons.
An example: "Once Serbs and Croats had been the same people. But the Turks had long ruled Serbia, while Croatia was sheltered within Catholic Austria-Hungary. What did Croats know of oppression and suffering?"
Really? When? Only as other Slavs. And were there no religious issues? Austria-Hungary was a kind of haven? Why, then, was it called the Prison of Nations, fighting against the inner dissent all the time?
"The discussion moved on from there into a discussion of the Soviet Union and how eagerly the subject peoples shrugged off the Russian yoke at the first opportunity."
One of the differences: Rome has brought the progress and culture, though different. Soviets have brought unculture and backwardness.
"Can you imagine what Rome would have done if an 'ally' treated them the way France and Germany have been treating the United States?" The class laughed.
And I shiver, considering the discussions about the new US missile base on our territory. If an ally means a groveller.
The book seems to be too politic for me.
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Haven't read the whole thread yet ... just a couple of things:
1. Thanks for catching the inconsistency about what Cole is wearing. It'll be fixed in the copy edit.
2. I'm not the only person in the world who has noticed that the university establishment is leftist. It's hardly a sign that the character will faithfully represent my point of view throughout. Or am I obligated somehow to make sure all my characters see everything differently from me? What you're REALLY seeing is that this is the first novel I've written that is (a) contemporary and (b) centered around political and military issues. My beliefs are going to come up along with everybody else's. When you're dealing with military culture, you're more likely to find people who are politically aware and discuss political things.
But it's unusual for contemporary fiction these days to include sympathetic characters who have anything other than perfectly p.c. attitudes. In novel after novel, only vile and stupid characters believe in the war on terror, for instance, while all right-thinking characters call Bush a liar routinely. It's quite annoying. In this case, however, it would be absurd for me to populate the U.S. military with people who have contempt for national defense. <grin>
I'll be back to read the rest of the thread soon ...
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For everyone complaining that Mr. Card's viewpoint of most universities being leftist is wrong, I want to share an experience I had.
Before I transferred to the Colorado School of Mines, I had to take an environmental ethics class at the community college I was going to. The professor actually put in his syllabus that he was very liberal and would approach the subject from that perspective and that we disagreed to please speak up as he could learn something too. I happen to be extremly conservative and very outspoken, so quite often the class turned into a discussion between us with a few others occasionally contributing.
Towards the end of the semester, I was talking to my professor about taking a semester or two off from studying engineering to study philosophy. He told me that if I did that, I should go to a conservative college like BYU. I asked him why and he replied that while everything I said was well thought out and didn't contain any logical flaws, I would have a hard time at a liberal college because of my point of view. He even warned me that I might even get lower grades than I deserved because I disagreed with the teacher's viewpoint. He found the entire situation sad and felt it did a disservice to everyone involved as prevented both the students and professors from learning and growing from hearing differing perspectives.
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And in particular, as a Princeton B.S.E., I'll vouch for his description. There were rare Torrent-like exceptions, but most precepts/seminars in humanities classes were just as described in chapter 2.
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quote:Originally posted by Orson Scott Card: Haven't read the whole thread yet ... just a couple of things:
1. Thanks for catching the inconsistency about what Cole is wearing. It'll be fixed in the copy edit.
2. I'm not the only person in the world who has noticed that the university establishment is leftist. It's hardly a sign that the character will faithfully represent my point of view throughout. Or am I obligated somehow to make sure all my characters see everything differently from me? What you're REALLY seeing is that this is the first novel I've written that is (a) contemporary and (b) centered around political and military issues. My beliefs are going to come up along with everybody else's. When you're dealing with military culture, you're more likely to find people who are politically aware and discuss political things.
But it's unusual for contemporary fiction these days to include sympathetic characters who have anything other than perfectly p.c. attitudes. In novel after novel, only vile and stupid characters believe in the war on terror, for instance, while all right-thinking characters call Bush a liar routinely. It's quite annoying. In this case, however, it would be absurd for me to populate the U.S. military with people who have contempt for national defense. <grin>
I'll be back to read the rest of the thread soon ...
I just want to say that the incredibly self-conceited tone which you attributed to Reuben Malek as he went on to explain his disgust towards the liberal left in the beginning of the second chapter was really close to killing my interest in the series. I was very close to closing my browser and ceasing to read at that point. One of the few things that helped me brush that assault towards my beliefs was my respect for Donald Mustard as well as towards you, although it seems we have strong differences on political and religious views.
But I think you're going to alienate a lot of people with the strong assault on liberal views so early on in the book. And since most of those bashes were done as a narrative and I know your beliefs on the subject, I couldn't help but be distanced from the character. I couldn't just dislike Reuben Malek as a character in a fictional novel and brush off his attacks because it felt like they were coming from you. It felt like they were a personal attack; not a feeling I would like to get from a book I'm reading for enjoyment.
Anyway, after getting past that part of the second chapter, I got a better feel for that Malek and could attribute all that liberal hatred to him and just dislike him or at least understand him, but I'm not sure how many people with liberal leaning would want to get past that part.
And I wanted to add that controvercy is good, entertaining, and obviously profitable in today's market. But the beginning of chapter 2 isn't controversial, it's just simple, over the top, and conceited liberal bashing.
Posts: 38 | Registered: Jun 2005
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I just reread the part and I have to say again that that's some of the most offensive language I've ever read. I would expect something like that in an Ann Coulter book, but not from OSC...
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I wonder what some of you think people think and talk about after a crisis when the adrenalin rush is over. People who have just exerted themselves physically and emotionally don't talk about how horrible it was or how emotional it was; most of them, especially trained soldiers, don't cry or gasp or any of those things. That comes later, in the nightmares. Often they turn their minds away to controllable subjects. OFten they turn ahead to analyze what is really going on, and what the next danger is going to be. Or they try to figure out and understand what the actions they just went through meant and will mean.
In short, I'm wondering what you think people who have been through life-threatening crises, in which they failed to prevent something awful from happening, think about and talk about with each other? Especially when they are combat-experienced soldiers who think of themselves as still being in peril and needing to know where the next danger is coming from?
There are typos and errors and inconsistencies in the ms. But the emotional states of my characters are never accidentally chosen and are NEVER driven by ideology. They think and do what I think these characters, in these circumstances, would think and do, regardless of what I think now or think I would think in their circumstance. If that makes sense. You may disbelieve, of course; but it's never my ideology taking over, though of course I knew people would assume it was. But then, people ALWAYS assume that the author believes every single thing his characters believe, no matter how inconsistent those beliefs are. But part of the honesty of good writing is that you give eloquent lines to characters you disagree with or who have an incomplete understanding of things <grin>.
As to adrenalin and cooky: Cooky was the original spelling. I personally detest the movement toward taking the plural form and back-forming a new singular from it. Hence I'm campaigning for cooky instead of cookie. Though I confess to inconsistency, since flunky sounds like an adjective (he had a flunky semester) and flunkie appears to be the noun. Anyway, because you saw cooky in my manuscript, you are that much more aware of it as a possible spelling. And NOW you're aware of it as the older spelling.
As to adrenaline vs. adrenaline, which do you SAY? a-DREN-a-lin or a-DREN-a-leen? I say "lin" at the end, so that's the spelling I use. When I see an "ine" ending, I expect to pronounce it EEN or INE (long I). When it's a short I at in the last syllable, no E is appropriate after the consonant. Again, must my personal rationalization of spelling. )I'm not French - I don't need the E at the end to keep myself from reading it as the French nasalized short-A sound.)
Now I'll read the SECOND page of posts ...
Posts: 2005 | Registered: Jul 1999
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Surveyor 2: The character is a Serb, from Serb culture. From a Croat-hating Serbian family. In what sense am I propagandizing when I reflect the attitude that this particular character would have?
About the comparison between Russia and Rome: Duh. That was the point.
These were history students. Anyone who knows Roman history knows that their "allies" did, in fact, have to grovel. To Romans, allies were subject peoples who did what Romans required them to do. The whole point of Torrent's statement was ironic - for them to realize that the meaning of "ally" to Americans is radically different from the meaning of "ally" to the Romans - with the implication that America's "allies" today might at least give America credit, when claiming that America is the source of all evil, for NOT treating its allies with compulsion as Rome did. It would not have been taken by those students as an implication that America should treat its allies as Rome did. And as for what TORRENT believed, that remains to be shown. However, you are falling into the simplistic error of assuming that because I have posited an intelligent character, Torrent, I must agree with everything he says. But since I spend my life listening to intelligent people say well-thought-out ideas that contradict the well-thought-out ideas of other intelligent people, mere logic and intelligence do not imply to me that an idea is complete or correct or morally compelling.
In short, you are reading this looking for reasons to make negative assumptions about my beliefs, instead of simply taking the characters' statements as being statements of those characters. Loathe Torrent all you like - but don't then conclude that the BOOK or the AUTHOR are dealing in "propagandism, over-simplyfying and cheap comparisons."
Though if you do recoil at "propagandism" I imagine you must spend most of your newspaper reading time in a state of near-revulsion, since all I see from Left and Right is propaganda - and almost NOTHING that is simply statement of what is known from the evidence. News reporting has virtually disappeared or gone into hiding, overwhelmed by propagandism.
So my guess would have to be that what you dislike is not that the book is propagandizing - it is not, a CHARACTER is - but that you happen to disagree with the point of view being expressed. I'm willing to bet that the propaganda you agree with you simply consider to be "truth."
As for how universities function today, I am not exaggerating, I am underplaying the degree of rigidity, persecution of independent thought, and absolute leftist dominance of the soft-subject departments at most American universities. Moderates keep their heads down. Conservatives who didn't already have tenure before 1980 don't do anything, because they weren't hired at those universities, in those departments.
Engineering departments, math departments, and a few others where it's all about specific skills and abilities that cannot be faked, are far less susceptible to the enforced uniformity - if you have a great mathematician, you don't care if he's a "crypto-fascist" or whatever you're calling moderates these days ... you keep him on the faculty. But in English, philosophy, psychology, sociology, and all the "studies" departments, rigor about contemporary ideas is laughably absent. I have read and personally heard too many horror stories from too many faculty members (and former faculty members) and students from too many schools to think that it's anything but a near-universal phenomenon. If you don't think it exists, it is only because you are a true believer and so you don't notice how scary the enforced uniformity of thought is - especially given the paucity of reason and evidence sustaining the officially received opinions.
But we live in a time when people define "intelligent" as "believes in the same things that my coolest professors believed in." And that's sad. The university has ceased to be a marketplace of ideas, and has become instead a theological seminary for true believers in a particular ideology. Thus even where I AGREE with the ideology, I despise and fear its puritanical insistence on absolute dominance of American culture.
I'm not the only one. I find similar attitudes among, for instance, many soldiers who have, as part of their military assignment, attended American universities in order to get advanced degrees. The sharp ones patiently endure the abuse they undergo from "open-minded" people until they finally win them over; the sharpest ones also avoid being won over themselves. But the culture clash I report in chapter 2 is not fantasy and it's not propaganda, it is a faithful record of how things work in American universities at this moment.
Posts: 2005 | Registered: Jul 1999
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Icec0o1 - I'm glad to see that unlike Reuben Malek, you are open-minded and nonjudgmental, and that you are able to accept the idea that other people might disagree with you and still be worth knowing. Oh, wait - it's Malek who gets to know people who disagree with him ...
Posts: 2005 | Registered: Jul 1999
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quote:Originally posted by Orson Scott Card: I wonder what some of you think people think and talk about after a crisis when the adrenalin rush is over. People who have just exerted themselves physically and emotionally don't talk about how horrible it was or how emotional it was; most of them, especially trained soldiers, don't cry or gasp or any of those things. That comes later, in the nightmares. Often they turn their minds away to controllable subjects. OFten they turn ahead to analyze what is really going on, and what the next danger is going to be. Or they try to figure out and understand what the actions they just went through meant and will mean.
In short, I'm wondering what you think people who have been through life-threatening crises, in which they failed to prevent something awful from happening, think about and talk about with each other? Especially when they are combat-experienced soldiers who think of themselves as still being in peril and needing to know where the next danger is coming from?
I personally wouldn't expect that soldier to act any different. From personal experience, I think most people try to act as normal as possible and push the crisis to the back of their minds, giving only very subtle hints as to their disturbed/anxious state of mind.
Say in the very first chapter, the four soldiers could not prevent the last terrorist from spraying the crowd with bullets and a lot of lives were lost. I really wouldn't expect a chapter where the American soldiers would be talking about their mistakes or an overly long explanation on their feelings. I would anticipate the story to continue with small hints of their state of mind; they're soldiers after all and although there are a lot of cases where soldiers are mentally affected by disturbing things they've experienced, this is far from the norm and is not expected by the average reader.
Posts: 38 | Registered: Jun 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Orson Scott Card: Icec0o1 - I'm glad to see that unlike Reuben Malek, you are open-minded and nonjudgmental, and that you are able to accept the idea that other people might disagree with you and still be worth knowing. Oh, wait - it's Malek who gets to know people who disagree with him ...
What? Are you serious with this reply? I'm one of the most open-minded and nonjudgmental person you could ever meet. My earlier post was for no other reason than to warn you that you'll alienate a lot of people with that second chapter.
I completely accept the fact that I can be wrong about my liberal views and Reuben could be completely right, but the language you used to depict his side was as offensive as I've ever seen and it's completely unnecessary. He can become best friends with everyone who disagrees with him and I still think this language is inexcusable. Let me quote some if you wouldn't mind.
"But in class after class, seminar after seminar, he learned that far too many students were determined to remain ignorant of any real-world data that didn't fit their preconceived notions. And even those who tried to remain genuinely open-minded simply did not realize the magnitude of the lies they had been told about history, about values, about religion, about everything ... Am I like them, just a bigot learning only what fits my worldview? That's what he kept asking himself. But finally he reached the conclusion: No, he was not."
Yep, it's definitive now. People who don't agree with him are determined to remain ignorant and he's completely right. What an open-minded person he is.
“He faced every piece of information as it came. He questioned his own assumptions whenever the information seemed to violate it. Above all, he changed his mind -- and often.”
And the assumption is that nobody else does that right? Everyone but him has preconceived ideas that they will never give up, no matter what evidence is put forth! (Religion anyone?)
"But he was really getting a doctorate in self-doubt and skepticism, a Ph.D. in the rhetoric and beliefs of the insane Left. He would be able to sit in a room with a far-left Senator and hear it all with a straight face, without having to argue any points, and with complete comprehension of everything he was saying and everything he meant by it.
In other words, he was being embedded with the enemy"
Open-minded towards the 'insane left', yet he feels they're an 'enemy'?
I'm a liberal college student and each of those punches connected with my jaw. Especially the personal reply on this forum. And I guess I was completely wrong to believe that you’ll be open-minded towards my original critique.
Posts: 38 | Registered: Jun 2005
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I'm going to try to stay far way from this debate, but I have to admit, this made me laugh...
quote:Originally posted by Icec0o1:
quote:Originally posted by Orson Scott Card: Icec0o1 - I'm glad to see that unlike Reuben Malek, you are open-minded and nonjudgmental, and that you are able to accept the idea that other people might disagree with you and still be worth knowing. Oh, wait - it's Malek who gets to know people who disagree with him ...
What? Are you serious with this reply? I'm one of the most open-minded and nonjudgmental person you could ever meet. My earlier post was for no other reason than to warn you that you'll alienate a lot of people with that second chapter.
That little bit about you being one of the most non-judgemental and open-minded people made me think of a brilliant scene in Dharma and Greg. Dharma was trying to apologize to Greg's mother about something or other, and Greg told her that all Dharma needed to do was back off and her mother would get over it. Dharma wouldn't accept that, so as Greg said...
"Dharma, you claim you're open-minded and all, but you're really not." "Greg, I can't believe you'd tell me that, I'm the most open minded person I know." Greg stares at Dharma. "But if there were someone more open minded than me, I'd be open to that."
***
Ok, my really wild tangent aside, I figure it's only fair to give my two cents on this issue.
I'd say that OSC has been more than open-minded on this issue. He's been saying that it's a character with these views you hate so much, and that as an author he doesn't necessarily agree with all of what his characters say (was that in this thread?) the point is that to write a good character, you need to be able to write that character as who they are.
Icec0o1, I'd suggest you just kind of back away from this problem and look at what you've been saying. You're offended by someone who has a negative view of people like you. Yet you claim you're open-minded, one of the most open-minded people out there. I'd say that if you really want to show your being open-minded just say you disagree, but can accept that characters point of view, even if it's narrow minded. After all, isn't being open-minded acknowledging views different from your own?
What I'd suggest is stop judging Malek and OSC as narrow-minded pricks who are stuck to their views. A point of a novel is to allow for character development, who knows, maybe Malek will have a change of heart through the novel, we've only seen five chapters.
And now I'm going to high-tail out of this thread.
Posts: 1831 | Registered: Jan 2003
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Just wanted to post my bit and say that I really liked the first 5 chapters. I've been toying with some of the same ideas in my personal philosophy of life, the universe and everything. I want to see how OSC resolves this. And I've been waiting for something from him since Magic Street. Pretty impatient, I guess.
quote:Originally posted by Vadon: Icec0o1, I'd suggest you just kind of back away from this problem and look at what you've been saying. You're offended by someone who has a negative view of people like you. Yet you claim you're open-minded, one of the most open-minded people out there. I'd say that if you really want to show your being open-minded just say you disagree, but can accept that characters point of view, even if it's narrow minded. After all, isn't being open-minded acknowledging views different from your own?
What I'd suggest is stop judging Malek and OSC as narrow-minded pricks who are stuck to their views. A point of a novel is to allow for character development, who knows, maybe Malek will have a change of heart through the novel, we've only seen five chapters.
And now I'm going to high-tail out of this thread.
First of all, don't high-tail out of this thread. I think I have a point and would like to get it across and would appreciate more comments and criticism back towards me instead of sarcastic replies. Not backing down doesn't mean I'm not open minded.
Here's a summary of my point because I think you misunderstood me, and possibly Card did as well.
I never said anything remotely close to OSC and Malek being "narrow-minded pricks who are stuck to their views" and I don't know where you got that from. I never said OSC's work on this book sucks, has views that are wrong, is purposefully being offensive towards liberals, or anything negative at all. Please, if you see where I gave anything but respect for him, quote it so I can understand my mistake.
The only problem that I had was the way OSC used excessive and unnecessary language to depict Reuben Malek hatred of liberals, calling them crazy, willfully ignorant, bigoted, stuck to their predetermined beliefs, and his enemies. (And is arguing that his character is open minded?)
Moreover, he did it in a narrative tone ("Am I like them, just a bigot learning only what fits my worldview? ... But finally he reached the conclusion: No, he was not.") This tone made it feel more like it was the author's opinion more so than the character's. (Notice the difference between the question “Am I like them” and the answer “No, he was not.” I would think ‘No, I’m not’ would serve the same purpose and be less offensive. The former implies outside absolute approval of his beliefs.)
I did not find Reuben Malek beliefs that my liberal views will destroy the United States offensive, what I found offensive was the language OSC used to depict those beliefs.
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One last thing and I'm going to back off. I never said I was personally offended; I said that the chapter contained offensive language. My point was that the chapter caused me to temporarily lose interest in the story and my intentions were to provide a completely innocent criticism intended to help OSC if he was willing to accept it. Instead, I received a snide reply attacking my character and my good intentions. Whatever, I'm the bad guy.
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Icec0o1, can you think of at least 1 person in your school that is very leftists *and* closeminded about it? That is who Malek was comparing himself to.
I go to an engineering school and the majority of the students here are right wing. Quite a few of them are closeminded. Would I be offended if a leftist compared his/herself to the closeminded students here and found them lacking? Absolutely not! I think you should just grow a thicker skin and accept that not everyone thinks liberal/leftist ideals are the best and finds the majority of their proponents lacking.
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Just finished the first 5. What a great read! Even though it does make me worry about civil war now. Can't wait to buy the book!
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quote: But it's unusual for contemporary fiction these days to include sympathetic characters who have anything other than perfectly p.c. attitudes.
It depends on genre, Scott. In this genre, the near-future political thriller, it's unusual to include sympathetic characters who do not spend a little time criticizing the venal hypocrites who spout what are inevitably wrong-headed P.C. platitudes. Tom Clancy, despite what you may have heard, does not live in a world of warm fuzzies and shades of grey.
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quote:can you think of at least 1 person in your school that is very leftists *and* closeminded about it? That is who Malek was comparing himself to.
That's a bit of a dodge, isn't it? When someone rails against negative portrayals of religious conservatives in the media, would it be fair to reply "can't you think of one obnoxious fundamentalist? That's who we're criticizing." In both cases, a generalization is intentionally conjured up, not some hypothetical individual with personal faults and failings. (In fact, I think it's precisely the lack of established personal faults, failings, and merits in Malek's off-hand musings about his classmates and peers that makes them seem like cardboard stereotypes. It's one thing to meet Johnny Smith, liberal caricature who enjoys chess and whining and long walks on the beach with his beloved dog, and another thing to think "At least I'm not as much of a loser as all those other guys." When you're broadly sketching an entire class -- especially negatively -- for the purposes of vilification, you open yourself up to accusations of over-simplification.)
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quote:Originally posted by Icec0o1: First of all, don't high-tail out of this thread. I think I have a point and would like to get it across and would appreciate more comments and criticism back towards me instead of sarcastic replies. Not backing down doesn't mean I'm not open minded.
I didn't mean to imply that you were being narrow-minded by continuing to argue. The reason I wanted to back out is because I usually don't enjoy getting in online debates. I see them as a waste of time.
However, I do see how I misunderstood what you meant. You were pointing out how it could be offensive to some, right? Then you tried to give a friendly warning that he might be isolating his market of readers.
I can see what you were trying to say now, the problem and reason I think I misunderstood was how you pointed it out. I'll pull direct quotes to try to show my point.
quote:I couldn't help but be distanced from the character. I couldn't just dislike Reuben Malek as a character in a fictional novel and brush off his attacks because it felt like they were coming from you. It felt like they were a personal attack; not a feeling I would like to get from a book I'm reading for enjoyment.
I took this as you showing it was indeed offending you. I mean, sure, I can see how it could be offensive, how he wrote it. But how you responded to it led me to believe you were offended.
quote: I just want to say that the incredibly self-conceited tone which you attributed to Reuben Malek as he went on to explain his disgust towards the liberal left in the beginning of the second chapter was really close to killing my interest in the series. I was very close to closing my browser and ceasing to read at that point.
I think what you said here is what made me think you were being somewhat narrow-minded. What you said here made me think that you hated the message the book conveyed and you wanted to get away from it. I also thought this is where the accusition of him and Malek being 'narrow-minded pricks'.
In the end, I see you were just trying to give a warning about his alienating the possible reader-base. I just misunderstood you, while I do think you could have been slightly more... open? on your criticism, I do know that it's my own fault for not asking for an elaboration. I went off on my assumptions, and look where it got me.
Sorry about the misunderstanding, I don't think less of you, I'd just say be careful with how you give critiques to not convey other meanings that you didn't intend.
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Icecool, I can see where you're coming from. The tone of Malek's thoughts show a strong contempt for the liberal left. It definitely grated on me as I read it.
But, being open-minded, I do appreciate it. It gives me something to think about when I go back to classes at my Liberal University next week. I can examine my beliefs and decide whether I'm an insane, brainwashed, closed-minded liberal--or someone who has taken in as much information as possible and sorted it out to find something closer to the truth.
That's the liberal I am. I've asked myself if I'm just learning what fits my worldview. If I have been able to tell the lies from the truth. If I am just one of the "bigots" Malek is afraid he is like. Ironically, I've come to the same conclusion.
quote:The only question remaining was: Is Torrent a good guy? If I join whatever clandestine work he's got going, will I be on the right side?
These are good questions. I believe that the closer the book stays to them, the more interesting the story will be, especially if Malek has to reevaluate what it means to be a good guy. If I may, I'm not sure that you can say "only question," then rattle off two questions.
I know that the second question seems embedded in the first, but the two questions have different conditions of satisfaction, i.e., it's possible for one of the questions to be true and the other false, which makes me believe that they should be treated as two distinct questions. ____________
I can be considered an effete, liberal, intellectual, and I get a little queasy around guns. I'm so weak in my constitution, I get queasy around people who feel comfortable around guns, and I tend to slowly back away from people who feel that guns are ennobling.
I know I'm supposed to respect Malek. He protects us. He stands on a wall. He says, "Not on my watch." He kills people so that I can write on the internet and so that the US can be number one. (I don't mind being seven or eight.)
If this book is about a civil war between me and Malek, as far as I'm concerned, we already are a part of two different nations, two different polities with strong economic entanglements.
Religious differences are the stuff democracies should part ways on. I think that the Athenians understood this, metaphysical pluralism and democracy don't go together.
It's not like the red-staters are gassing blacks in Mississippi, if they want to become their own polity, think that first Amendment is slowing them down, put prayer in schools and abolish taxation, tell them to go ahead, and I wish them the peace of heaven.
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Thank you for that post Vadon. I guess I did let this get under my skin a little. I just didn't see Malek's character to be believable; an intelligent war hero who has such hatred towards the liberal left that he goes as far as calling them his enemies. That's why I saw OSC's personal beliefs behind the character and the strong words that he used to portray them stung a little.
I love arguing and unlike a lot of people, I disagree that it's pointless. This is part of why I believe myself to be open-minded...because I can be persuaded through a good argument. And I always like to see the other side of things as long as they are put forth in a respectful manner and not with strong, offensive, language.
Thank you for those quotes though, I do see that they were interpreted offensively by you and OSC and I appologize for them.
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Nonsense, I too like to argue. That's why I'm in a debate program. I just don't like to do it online because there is an awful stereotype that I'm thrown into far too often where I'm just a robot scouring everything people says for one little slip up as opposed to coming to a better understanding of the issue at hand. As such, I don't express my opinions very much online. I prefer seeing how other's play out.
On the topic of the book though... I'm enjoying it too much to be bothered by any stereotypes of Malek's. I mean, come on, the whole idea of a civil war between Red States V. Blue States is a Policy Debater's wildest fantasy. Posts: 1831 | Registered: Jan 2003
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Wow, Mr. Card responded to my aimless spelling ramblings! I actually was aware of "cooky" being the original spelling; I read a lot of Alcott and Montgomery. But I just can't shake that first-grade spelling drill.
Thank you for explaining your rationalizations for choosing your spellings, though, that was very considerate of you. Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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Might it be like the use of "nigger" in Ender's Game? Even if it's the logical belief of a character, could reading such a tirade so early in the book put off readers who might mistakenly believe that the whole novel will be full of anti-liberal rants?
posted
Mr. Card, you are probably right that I am "reading this looking for reasons to make negative assumptions about your beliefs, instead of simply taking the characters' statements as being statements of those characters." But believe me, after some years of reading your political comments, it may be difficult not to make such assumptions, not to take the character's statements as statements of those characters, when the words used are so similar to the words you use, in the comments or even here in your explanations. I admit I do not know the situation in US universities. If it is even half as bad as you say, it is a reason for me to be sad - and I understand it may be a reason for you and many others to be outraged. Well, I will try to refrain from these assumptions. I will give the book a try as it is.
Posts: 35 | Registered: Sep 1999
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Tom, even when I agree, many times I don't understand the need for the full intensity of your criticisms. I think it may be a cultural thing. Most of us here, including Uncle Orson and myself, did not grow up where you did. To illustrate, I have a friend lived in Wisconsin for 2 years among young, intelligent, well-educated professionals from all over the northeast and midwest. He grew upin the rural south. He said that comments he heard that would have started fistfights in the south caused little reaction at all. People don't progress from words to fists where you live as often as elsewhere. That was his explanation for the verbal brutality that went on unchecked there. I've lived in North Carolina, Texas, and San Diego, and I've never noticed anywhere near the kind of openly cruel criticism that I have heard from you and other people our age who hail from the upper midwest and northeast.
Posts: 3354 | Registered: May 2005
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A couple of questions for OSC, if he feels like answering.
Is the cover art on the front page the actual cover art, or just a temporary mock-up? Is the tag "A disturbing look at a possible future" going on the cover?
Is this novel intended to be a "warning" of anything? If so, what?
Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002
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Here I've spent my whole career with precious few characters who in any way reflect ANY of my political views (usually because they're irrelevant to the books), and lots of characters I disagree with. No one (well, almost no one) was troubled by this.
All my characters live by some kind of moral code, or at least try to pretend to others or themselves that they do. But let me have a character who not only has a moral code that closely resembles that of the 50% of America that voted for Bush, but also has a disdainful attitude toward the in-your-face people who despise HIM for disagreeing - an attitude nowhere NEAR as hostile and patronizing as the attitudes that are regularly expressed toward me and mine on this very forum! - and suddenly I'M the one who is alienating people.
Well ... what can I say, except that I actually move back and forth between red-state and blue-state societies and know how (when I choose) to speak the language, including all the shibboleths, of both. I am at home in neither - I learn them like a foreign language, and find myself repelled by the excesses of both sides. My depiction of Reuben Malek is fair. There are plenty of people among those who lay their lives on the line to defend our country who feel themselves to be under attack by the American intellectual establishment exactly as Reuben does, and who develop the same disdain for the mindlessness of much or most of that disapproval.
What I marvel at is the inability of "open-minded" people to conceive of opposing viewpoints as having validity. I am warned that having a major character feel disdain for the intellectual establishment will "alienate" readers; but I have received identical warnings over the years because I've had sympathetically portrayed gay characters (for instance) - warnings with just the same tone of patronizing "helpfulness" offered here. Who would have trouble recognizing that warning as thinly disguised bigotry, when it comes from the Right?
It's like the poor benighted soul who posted a briefly present diatribe that claimed that Empire "proved" that I'm gay. He was incapable of recognizing that to accuse me of being gay as a way of punishing me for my politically incorrect position was, in fact, the purest bigotry. (i.e.: you can identify gay people by their writing; it's a bad thing for a writer who is "secretly gay" to create characters with politically incorrect positions, etc.) The closed-mindedness that co-exists with the insistence on the closed-minded person's open-mindedness would be funny if it weren't so sad.
There's nothing wrong with having strongly held opinions and espousing them - that's the marketplace of ideas. But to pride yourself on your open-mindedness even as you excoriate someone else for even DEPICTING a character sympathetically who disagrees with you - don't you think there would be some point where, reading their own posts, such people would say, Oh, wait a minute ... what am I doing here?
But these days the Left is as impervious to self-awareness as the Right has ever been - perhaps more so, having (as a group) control of or at least dominance in the primary institutions of culture.
It's like white people who don't actually KNOW any black people talking "knowledgeably" about what "they" want and what "they" are like; if you don't actually know any intelligent people with conservative views, then perhaps you should be cautious about your judgments of "them." Again, I assure you, conservative views have as long a history and as many brilliantly intellectual and rigorous adherents (at least) as the Left has ever had. If you don't know that, if you really think that "all intelligent people think like me," then you have, by that belief, disqualified yourself as a person educated enough to take part in the conversation. You're a cheerleader, not a player, rooting for one team but having nothing to do with what is going on out on the field.
Naturally, I mean this in the nicest possible way.
One of the surest signs of cheerleader status is the inability to conceive of people who are good players, but aren't on a "team." Likewise the inability to recognize moderate views when they are presented - if they differ AT ALL from one's own, they are anathema. Those who don't understand the rightwing extremists' views enough to recognize instantly (as those conservatives do) that I am not one of them really have no business hurling the epithet of "extremist" at people like me.
Look at how some of the people posting here are intolerant of ANY deviance from their views. What they believe is true; all other views are "extremist" - they see no gradation in degree of disagreement. This is black-and-white thinking - it is fanatical thinking - and when it also includes an unwillingness to do periodic reality checks, just to see if there ARE positions that don't agree with oneself ...
Oh, why do I bother?
The truth is, the more outraged people are, the more controversial the book will be and the better it will sell. So rail on! Attack the book! EVERY WORD YOU SAY along those lines merely demonstrates the points the book depends on: That the voices of extremism in America today are so blindly hate-filled that they cannot recognize the possibility of intelligence or virtue on the other side - particularly when they have NO experience with people who hold contrary views.
It's like the extremism of the pro- and anti-abortion "teams" in America. The pro- group cannot conceive of the idea that many or most of their opponents are not hypocrites and have no desire to oppress women - they truly believe that every fetus, ESPECIALLY those well-advanced in gestation, is a genetically independent organism and civilized people should treat it with at least as much respect as we render to, say, spotted barn owls. And on the other side, I find a complete unwillingness to recognize that many people who respect life very much believe that it's nobody's business but the mother to make the ultimate decision about which circumstances are appropriate for terminating a pregnancy.
Both sides demonize each other. Both sides seem incapable of recognizing that MOST Americans are squarely in the middle, hating how common abortion is, detesting late-term abortions, but also unwilling to criminalize abortions or ban them in the early stages. The one side looks only at the polls that show that most people oppose "banning abortions," while the other side looks only at the polls that show that most people favor "eliminating late-term abortions." Thus they can look only at the polls that give them a majority - whereas NEITHER extreme actually has majority support.
Reuben Malek is who he is. I've heard multiple soldiers express similar (or much stronger) views. Yet you want to shoot the messenger for presenting a brave, intelligent soldier as having precisely the views that many a brave intelligent soldier has in the real world.
In other words, it's OK for people like this to die in the service of their country - but it's a terrible thing to allow them to exist in our popular literature.
Isn't this very, very silly?
If someone had told me that on Hatrack I'd see reactions like that, I would have laughed. No, I would have said, the people who come to Hatrack understand that fiction will show characters representing the full range of society and present them fairly, in their own terms.
But since the Left has such complete dominance of our elite culture, these poor souls really are shocked to see anything like the full range of political views sympathetically expressed.
Here's a clue: You don't know, from the first five chapters, who the bad guys are ... or how bad they are, or what makes them bad, or what views the good guys will have, or what victory for either side would mean. There is a polarity in this novel, but these comments show that you aren't even open-minded enough to wait to find out what they are!
I speak, of course, of those whose writings put them in the category I'm describing. I'm quite aware of those who are open-minded enough to take the characters for who they are and wait to see how it will go ...
Enough. Enough. I have a review column to write. I just finished yet another series of revisions in the Ender's Game screenplay. Life goes on, despite the teapots that have tempests in them.
Posts: 2005 | Registered: Jul 1999
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quote:Originally posted by Orson Scott Card: But let me have a character who not only has a moral code that closely resembles that of the 50% of America that voted for Bush, but also has a disdainful attitude toward the in-your-face people who despise HIM for disagreeing - an attitude nowhere NEAR as hostile and patronizing as the attitudes that are regularly expressed toward me and mine on this very forum! - and suddenly I'M the one who is alienating people.
Pardon me for saying so, but you seem to care a little too much about the opinions of others.
I once saw a sign in someone's office in Israel. Translated roughly, it said:
"Getting aggravated means punishing yourself for the stupidity of others. Is it worth it?"
Just keep on going and let people vent. It doesn't have to touch you at all. How many books have they written?
quote:Originally posted by Orson Scott Card: It's like the poor benighted soul who posted a briefly present diatribe that claimed that Empire "proved" that I'm gay.
<blink> What now? That's dumb.
quote:Originally posted by Orson Scott Card: Those who don't understand the rightwing extremists' views enough to recognize instantly (as those conservatives do) that I am not one of them really have no business hurling the epithet of "extremist" at people like me.
When did "extremist" become a pejorative? It's such an idiotic concept; as though extreme virtue is the equivalent of extreme vice.
quote:Originally posted by Orson Scott Card: It's like the extremism of the pro- and anti-abortion "teams" in America.
Neither one of which is willing to cop to being that. The pro-abortion side needs to label itself "pro-choice", while the anti-abortion side insists that it is "pro-life".
quote:Originally posted by Orson Scott Card: If someone had told me that on Hatrack I'd see reactions like that, I would have laughed. No, I would have said, the people who come to Hatrack understand that fiction will show characters representing the full range of society and present them fairly, in their own terms.
Heh. Rose colored glasses? I'm honestly surprised.
quote:Originally posted by Orson Scott Card: Enough. Enough. I have a review column to write. I just finished yet another series of revisions in the Ender's Game screenplay. Life goes on, despite the teapots that have tempests in them.
quote:I am warned that having a major character feel disdain for the intellectual establishment will "alienate" readers; . . .
Just to clarify my thoughts, in case this was directed at me. I don't think having a major character "feel disdain for the intellectual establishment" will alienate your readers. I have been told by people who have read the chapters--I never read previews, because I hate to then wait until the book comes out for the rest of the story. I always find that I don't remember the preview well enough to pick up where I left off anyway--that chapter two, if I am not mistaken, had this character go on at length expressing those views, and being ridiculed and scorned by the Intellectual Left. All I'm saying is that roughly fifty percent of America doesn't feel this way, and may in fact see themselves as part of the class being caricatured and despised, even if only in an act of realistic characterization of this military man, and feel that the whole purpose of this book is to ridicule and express contempt for them. And it's all well and good to point out that conservatives undergo this experience all the time--so do liberals, it all just depends on which authors you read, I expect--but I wonder whether you want half of your readers to think, in chapter two, that the purpose of this book is to demonize them.
Say you read a book in which an intelligent, otherwise likeable university professor, portrayed as a protagonist, found himself traveling through the deep south, was mocked while asking for directions by some stereotypical country boys, and spent the next few pages thinking, as he drove away, about how inbred and backward these people were. Maybe as he drove he saw an anti-abortion billboard or an anti-same-sex-marriage billboard, and his ruminations went further into how backward their religious beliefs were. All these thoughts might be realistic for such a character to have. If it were a central character, who appeared to be a protagonist, spent a chapter on it, you might conclude that this book was a thinly veiled attack on southern Christians and cease to read. You might even point at it as an example of the existence of a Culture War. You might never discover that in chapter eight, he is in a debilitating accident, and over the course of his long rehabilitation, he discovers, with the help of some endearing side characters, how wrong some of his prior views are. (Especially if you had read the author expressing vaguely similar views about southerners and Christians in the past.)
Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002
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I'm just tired of left and right, conservatives and liberals, the constant fighting and lack of middle ground. Not to mention the irratating half truths on BOTH sides (Though I admit I lean more to the left and get so irratated when because I do not believe in war and view it as an outmoded concept that we don't need, (instead we should concentrate more on pretecting and helping the people and improving society, but some view war as a means of doing that and I just do not buy this... ) then I am automatically anti-American or something else that is just ridiculous. I dislike the feel of this country that has existed since after 9-11. There is an attitude that exist that we really don't need anymore. It won't solve anything. It's the same old game all the time. Who NEEDS a culture war when both sides want what is best for this country and society. Like it or not we need both liberal and conservative attitudes to make society strong and complete. We need to listen to each other and look on both sides and get rid of stereotypes and assumptions. I assume this is your goal in a way, OSC, but it rankles me when you use phrases like intellectual elite and assume liberal types are trying to destroy society, but this is not the case... Liberal ideals are necesary. I feel that society needs solid core values to make us strong, but we also need enough room and freedom to change. And that is the main thing i believe in. Freedom and reasonable restrictions. Hopefully I do not vilify the right too much because i hated reading that book by Sean Hannity so much... He kept using the word evil and it was irratating to me.
Posts: 9942 | Registered: Mar 2003
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There is a great episode of the West Wing, I think it's in the third season, where Josh posts on an internet forum and gets red hot with frothing anger and starts spewing vitriol because a few of the posters misread or misunderstood or baited him.
It's funny because he is the Assistant Chief of Staff of the President of the United States, and he is about to have an aneurysm from reading the comments of people named after fairies and comic book heroes.
It turns out Aaron Sorkin(I assume that you know him because I assume that all of the writers I like know each other and have tea and witty conversations, discussing with keen insight, poise, and elegance, all of the problems plaguing this difficult world) visited a forum and dug himself in a hole by getting into an argument about his show with a poster named for the Keebler Elves.
The moral of the story, both Sorkin's true story and its dramatization through Josh on the West Wing, is that you are a big man. It doesn't mean that you are going to be universally popular, appreciated, or understood, but your size is undeniable. You are a big man. _______
I still think that you should change the end of chapter two from
quote:The only question remaining was: Is Torrent a good guy? If I join whatever clandestine work he's got going, will I be on the right side?
"The only questions were: Is Torrent a good guy? If I join whatever clandestine work he's got going, will I be on the right side?"
quote: Look at how some of the people posting here are intolerant of ANY deviance from their views.
I took this request seriously and went back through the thread. Scott, the only person on this entire thread who has demonstrated any intolerance of this sort is you. Seriously. (And I'd go so far as to say that very little intolerance of this sort has been demonstrated at all.)
Leaving aside the obvious "oh, here's what looks like a grammar error...." observations, even those people who've been most critical of your opinions -- or the voiced opinions of your characters -- and your writing style, the ones who've said they were the most concerned or hurt by what they were reading into your text, have also been quick to couch their responses in qualifiers and freely admit the possibility that they might be wrong. Show me one critic, one person, on this thread who's said something that might be fairly characterized by this statement, which you've broadly attempted to apply to them:
"EVERY WORD YOU SAY along those lines merely demonstrates the points the book depends on: That the voices of extremism in America today are so blindly hate-filled that they cannot recognize the possibility of intelligence or virtue on the other side - particularly when they have NO experience with people who hold contrary views."
If I may, I'd like to point out that the only person exhibiting this kind of "blind" extremism, the sort of extremism that assigns people to opposing camps and denies the validity of any merit in the observations of the other "side," is you. That you don't believe your side can be easily positioned on a Democrat/Republican axis doesn't mean that you aren't rooting for a team, or demonizing the people on the opposite side; you're just defining the sides differently, while remaining as guilty of the very behavior of which you disapprove. You definitely have a side, and you definitely behave as if some people are on the other one.
I'm not saying that there aren't going to be plenty of knee-jerk, uninformed, ill-considered reactions to this book. You expect that, and you say you're banking on it. Rather, I'm saying that you aren't getting any of those reactions on this thread, and are responding as if you were. That's precisely the sort of thing, as far as I can tell, that you're writing this book to criticize.
posted
Tom, a closer reading of Ice's posts will help you understand Scott's point of view.
Also, aiming personal critiques at anyone on this site has rarely been effective for you-- why do you persist in doing it? And presenting it in a public way? Good gravy, email it, fax it, send it by carrier pigeon-- just get it off of the forum.
'Empire' isn't my cup of tea. I need aliens, or fairies, or something speculative. Too close to reality, IMO. But I wish OSC the very best with it.
Posts: 14554 | Registered: Dec 1999
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OSC's correct when pointing out that readers who disagree with the opinions themselves may or may not be offended. But I think he's wrong when asserting that everyone who is offended is offended by the fact that the opinions were expressed at all, or that the root cause is some "intolerance" of "deviance" from some sort of dogma.
There are plenty of people who do in fact fall on their knees in front of sacred cows. But I'm pretty firmly convinced that not everyone in this thread -- and I'll go out on a limb and say no one in this thread -- is of that number.
posted
Mr. Card, hate is a very strong emotion. I don’t think you can't point to any but the most radical people who could ‘despise’ people like Reuben Malek for disagreeing with the general intellectual views. Are you really arguing that the intellectual community hates Christians who don’t believe in evolution? Do they really abhor pro-life, pro-death penalty, Iraq War-supporting Americans? There is a very strong disagreement which certainly evokes emotions, but true and pure hatred is nowhere near as regular as you make it seem.
quote:What I marvel at is the inability of "open-minded" people to conceive of opposing viewpoints as having validity. I am warned that having a major character feel disdain for the intellectual establishment will "alienate" readers;
You misunderstood my posts. It’s not that I’m not giving his viewpoints any validity, it’s the way that you portrayed them in the chapter through heavily offensive language that bugged me, although it’s possible that it may not seem that strong from your point of view. Reuben could have, in this fictional story, become president, outlawed the teaching of evolution in schools, banned abortions, enforced a state religion and required bible studies, cut down half of the natural forests in the united states, allowed the drilling for oil in the Alaska natural habitats, etc.; as radical and controversial to me as that would be, I would still give it validity and possibly enjoy reading about this fictional world.
What I said would alienate a lot of people was the unnecessary offensive language, not Malek’s controversial beliefs.
quote: But to pride yourself on your open-mindedness even as you excoriate someone else for even DEPICTING a character sympathetically who disagrees with you
Again, I did not do that. It is one thing for a fictional character to disagree with my liberal views and a whole other thing for him to call me crazy, willfully ignorant, bigoted, stuck to my predetermined beliefs, and his enemy. And even that I would take in most cases except here, it was written in a way that made me feel like it was coming from the author, not the fictional character, making it that much more powerful.
quote: Oh, why do I bother?
The truth is, the more outraged people are, the more controversial the book will be and the better it will sell. So rail on! Attack the book! EVERY WORD YOU SAY along those lines merely demonstrates the points the book depends on: That the voices of extremism in America today are so blindly hate-filled that they cannot recognize the possibility of intelligence or virtue on the other side - particularly when they have NO experience with people who hold contrary views.
Why do you bother? Because I hope at least some part of you can, as you so often say, be open-minded enough to look at this argument from my side. As I said before, controversy is one thing, personal attacks are another.
The Da Vinci Code was indeed so big because it was controversial. It depicted a story which went against core Christian beliefs. It invoked Christian conspiracies, lies, murders. But the book never said anything negative about Christians. It never called them ignorant, crazy, bigoted, racists, close-minded. It just wouldn’t work; the book wouldn’t be given too many second glances if it contained personally offensive language.
Why do I bother? Because I was pissed when the Advent Rising project didn’t work out, through none of your fault. I cared for this Empire project as well and hoped the best for it.
Oh, and I have plenty of experience with intelligent people who hold contrary views. I feel absolutely no hate towards them, would never use name calling and wouldn’t expect it from them either.
But hey, Mr. Card, you absolutely took my posts too emotionally. All I wanted was for a possible change of a few sentences in the 2nd chapter so your character, Malek, wouldn’t be as insulting as you made him out to be. You could easily depict his utmost hatred towards the “loony left” without being as strongly offensive towards it.
posted
Now I know that this edition is a raw copy, the dialogue felt somewhat stilted to me, which is very strange. Mr. Card usually writes conversational dialogue that reads very naturally, but some of the conversations between Cole, Rueben, and/or Cecily seemed unrefined.
It will be interestin to read the final version.
The story is certainly intriguing, and I look forward to reading the rest!
Posts: 1099 | Registered: Apr 2005
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quote:Mr. Card, you absolutely took my posts too emotionally.
quote:... just want to say that the incredibly self-conceited tone which you attributed to Reuben Malek as he went on to explain his disgust towards the liberal left in the beginning of the second chapter was really close to killing my interest in the series. I was very close to closing my browser and ceasing to read at that point. One of the few things that helped me brush that assault towards my beliefs was my respect for Donald Mustard as well as towards you, although it seems we have strong differences on political and religious views.
quote:...since most of those bashes were done as a narrative and I know your beliefs on the subject, I couldn't help but be distanced from the character. I couldn't just dislike Reuben Malek as a character in a fictional novel and brush off his attacks because it felt like they were coming from you.
quote: just reread the part and I have to say again that that's some of the most offensive language I've ever read. I would expect something like that in an Ann Coulter book, but not from OSC...
Who is taking whose posts too emotionally?
How was Scott supposed to write a career soldier attending Princeton? Malek is representative of LOTS of the soldiers I work with. And more than that, OSC explains Malek's prejudices and shows us how he justifies them. Your objections reveal Scott's point-- you hate the idea that someone disagrees with your political leanings so much you can't see your way to opening your mind that they might have a reason for disagreeing.
Did people at Princeton mistreat Malek? According to the text (which is all we have to go on) yes they did. Why? Because he was a soldier, according to the text (which is all we have to go on).
quote:All I wanted was for a possible change of a few sentences in the 2nd chapter so your character, Malek, wouldn’t be as insulting as you made him out to be. You could easily depict his utmost hatred towards the “loony left” without being as strongly offensive towards it.
I think that when people read something written by someone they know they have a political disagreement with, they look for things that bolster and reinforce that division. What was Malek's main problem with Princeton? It wasn't the politics. It was the way people treated him, and other students' tendency to "remain ignorant of any real-world data that didn't fit their preconceived notions."
Nothing about politics, there. Posts: 14554 | Registered: Dec 1999
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ScottR, you don't get to paint Icec0o1 as the Villain, lest he(I'll say "he") believe that he actually did something wrong.
He spouted clear, half-formed opinions that were completely within the bounds of decency and responsibility.
Icec0o1,
My advise is that you don't respond to me. Don't respond to ScottR. You didn't do anything wrong. You don't need to explain yourself; your other posts do a fine job. You are set-up to be a scapegoat. ScottR is giving you some rope in hope that you'll hang yourself with denial, repudiation, acceptance, or a clever cocktail of all three, which will vindicate what can easily be considered an over-reaction by our esteemed host.
Have you read the Game of Thrones? (Remember, don't answer) But if you haven't, you should, it's a nice breezy read. Half-way through the first book, Ned kills an innocent wolf in order to protect the good name of his puerile nephew. Right now, you are the sacrificial wolf.
I'm asking you to dig deep and ignore the bait. And in the spirit of practicing what I preach, this will be my last post on this subject.
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quote:ScottR is giving you some rope in hope that you'll hang yourself with denial, repudiation, acceptance, or a clever cocktail of all three, which will vindicate what can easily be considered an over-reaction by our esteemed host.
Interesting interpretation but I'm really not smart enough to think this far ahead.
If I WERE smart enough, I'd form a secret cabal to manipulate the forum to my own nefarious ends.
This portion of my post:
quote:Your objections reveal Scott's point-- you hate the idea that someone disagrees with your political leanings so much you can't see your way to opening your mind that they might have a reason for disagreeing.
is out of line-- I can't prove that Ice really feels that way.
In any case, I don't see where Malek or OSC-as-Malek HAS insulted liberals. Instead, Malek (or OSC) has described a situation ('Princeton Intellectuals: Playah haterz!') in which a character feels maligned and threatened. To my worldview, with my experience, it makes sense that a soldier, or anyone who'd had Malek's experiences, would feel this way. Ice disagrees with me, and seems to feel that OSC has insulted his people with the expression of this character's feelings.
quote:To my worldview, with my experience, it makes sense that a soldier, or anyone who'd had Malek's experiences, would feel this way.
I think the issue here is not whether it's in-character for Malek to feel this way, but whether his feelings are going to be subsequently validated by events controlled by the author (as, say, Petra's opinion of psychologists proves to be). It's one thing for a fictional cab driver to think something like "all left-handed people are friggin' idiots," because we recognize him as an imperfect narrator; it's another for the author to write a book in which -- in his rigidly-controlled reality -- this is true. Malek is presented throughout as an experienced expert whose opinions we are to take seriously; we are given no reason to doubt his opinion of Princeton, or of "intellectuals" in general.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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Well, what about the running to the White House and walking back to Arlington stuff? Are we going to be given some sense of scale? Some mention that they hadn't let desk jobs keep them from being pretty fit? That's the only thing that's straining my credulity at this point. Well, except for the coincidence of the submariners being spotted exactly when they were. Reading it again, it is remarked on, but that doesn't make it not a ludicrous coincidence.
I'm also looking around because the name "Independence Avenue Bridge" didn't sound familiar, and I think whatever the bridge is you're referrring to is probably called something else.
Okay, we'll I'm all turned around. These descriptions of things are not giving me a good bearing. But that doesn't necessarily mean anything, since I tend to be uninterested by geographic and journey description in reading in a way that doesn't seem reflect at all on the quality of the writing. If you've had a normal person read it without discomfort, you're probably alright.
posted
I very much enjoyed those 5 chapters, they were fluent and a very good read. As a non-American myself and as someone who never crossed the Atlantic ocean I really don't have an opinion about the blue/red or left attitudes in the universities (I know I spelled that word wrong somehow) but as other people here I also felt a strong dislikement of the author to that institution and the people who operate in it. It was especially strong when Cole met the hero and agreed with him, what immediately made him "a smart guy". I read OSC posts here and I understand that he doesn't try to make his own opinions come through in the story but even after reading those posts I still can't release myself from that impression, I feel as if I am being lectured to, instead of just observing the hero thoughts and feelings, and that's not a very nice feeling. One thing I had a hard time understanding is the date of story, is it happening right now and the president is Bush? is it next year? ten years
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Wow...just...let me wrap my mind around the last three pages of...nonsense.
Okay.
Does everyone here understand that this is a work of fiction, containing characters that exist to move forward the story? Why are we seeking a full-on justification of a characters motivation? Also, why are we then questioning the answers we're being given? Have we become so jaded that everything has to have an ulterior motive?
Posts: 1480 | Registered: Dec 2004
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quote:Originally posted by Irami Osei-Frimpong: He spouted clear, half-formed opinions that were completely within the bounds of decency and responsibility.
So now I was spouting and my opinions are half-formed huh? <grin> (as Card does so often)
I haven’t read the Game of Thorns but if you recommend it, I can pick it up and read it on the plane since I’ll be flying in 3 days.
quote:Originally posted by Scott R: In any case, I don't see where Malek or OSC-as-Malek HAS insulted liberals.
That’s what I thought; I didn’t believe Card purposefully wanted to be that strongly offensive. I was hoping that you could look at it from my point of view and see how the words and phrases used could be very insulting to a lot of people.
Anyways, I never meant for my posts to be insulting or polarizing. I didn’t express my thoughts in the best of ways so I’ll apologize for them again. I’ll drop this now and wish you best of luck with this project Mr. Card.
Posts: 38 | Registered: Jun 2005
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