Quote:
Originally Posted by silasgreenback
Here's one of many statements: ... With that posted, this is as close to discussing politics as I ever plan to do here. 
...I'd rather be making friends. |
Ah, so it's not from his novels that these ideas of his beliefs and preferences are coming from. That's a bit of a relief, I thought I was missing something obvious. The following is not trying to open a political discussion, its about what comes out in the books.
It's naive to expect that an author's beliefs will not effect their writing in any way (for example it seems unlikely that Orson Scott Card is going to have gay heroes) but I do not think that that necessarily excludes them from being able to produce very good novels (sexual preference, for example, is largely irrelevant to a great many stories). To exclude an author because of something they've said
outside their novels seems a bit ... extreme. One of my favourite authors, Richard North Patterson (contemporary fiction), once said flattering things about a certain President - but that hasn't stopped me reading and enjoying his books (of course, his writing has fairly obvious political bents the other way, so I guess that helps).
There is always the argument that the assumptions in the writing may say something insidious of themselves - this is a complaint I've seen of the Twilight books, for example. I think the argument is valid, but I also think it is unavoidable unless the books is going to be completely bland. A book that contains assumptions affirmative of gay rights is making as much of a statement as a book that contains assumptions to the contrary. Note that it can also be a mistake to assume that the assumptions implicit in a story are what the writer believes, some take delight in arguing contrary to their own beliefs, and some like to include certain things for their shock-value - something to make the book stand-out.
I've never seen anything in any of Orson Scott Card's novels to complain about with regard to this topic.