Art and Artists
My car is a little annoying. It doesn't automatically go to the last thing you were listening to, which for me is always Bluetooth, but just defaults to the radio. I have it set to 90.5 CFCR so I get to hear some stuff. Last night, when coming home from the dog park (pictures at the end) it came on and it was the weekly board game show. They were talking about some scandal so I listened in.
The company that makes the Codenames games, CGE, announced a Harry Potter game which was met with some backlash due to J. K. Rowlings poor behavior. All said and done, the company didn't handle it overly well and has only indicated it will donate any proceeds to pro-2LGBTQIA+ groups.
One of the comments made by a host was that this isn't a case of separating art from artist. Since J. K. Rowling gives money to Anti-2LGBTQIA+ groups, buying the art is doing harm. I get this and agree with it. Thumbs up all around on that take. Actually makes me glad I never got into Mr. Potter and the Gang of Gangs.
It all is a bit difficult though and there don't seem to be good rules of what to do in some situations. If the person is alive, it's generally follow those rules but if they are dead?
You have guys like Bill Cosby or Jimmy Saville that were icons in their countries only to fall and have NOBODY consume their media. Or you get a case like H. P. Lovecraft were he was a massive racist and just shitty person but his media and universe is still beloved. Of course, when he was alive, it was still normal. And will his racism can work it's way into his writings, if you took it out it wouldn't change the story at all.
The difference between them all is how current it happened and if it was normalized at the time. You could argue H. P. Lovecraft isn't as bad as the other two, and I'd hear you out on that. And if raised now, maybe he'd see things in a different way. It's hard to say.
I do try to differentiate actual racism from just normal talk at the time though. For example, Jules Verne had black assistants that were called with the N-word and such but were treated with respect by their boss. Is it perfect? No. Is it a step in the right direction at that time. Yes.
In the end, I'm just babbling. This is a complicated discussion that I think everyone has to come up with their own opinion and solution to.
Or we could just burn all the books and only read the TV guide from now on.
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And then there's people who do find a redemption arc. Hate to keep bringing Ozzy back up but he legit tried to kill Sharon once. Like he wasn't always great. But clearly, he worked on himself and wanted to improve.
And then you have to consider we live in an absolute glut of content. There's no reason to settle for content made by bad actors when there's a whole world of other stuff out there we could be enjoying. I think I mentioned it in a post over the last few months about how we could just stop making content today and humanity would never get the chance to consume it all. I don't need Bill Cosby because there's Josh Johnston. I don't need Jimmy Saville because - well I just don't need him.
And finally at the end of the day, we do need to consider if the money we're paying is going to end up in the pockets of people making life worse for people. I certainly have been struggling with having a Spotify account knowing that some of that money is going to make weapons while disenfranchising artists. But I have so many playlists!