Sexism/racism etc in older fiction

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by Thasaidon

the hypersensitive politically correct thought police should go to a very warm place.

Uncalled for. If you can't argue without telling people to go to hell, then don't argue here.

[ZodWallop]

Seal's posts feel like s/he is deliberately missing the point of the other posts just to be argumentative.

Can you show who said that racism in entertainment of the past was perfectly agreeable? Nobody is saying that and arguing that anyone was saying otherwise feels like purposeful stirring of the pot.

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

They (nor I) are not suggesting that the past be erased/banned/censured because of racism, but accepting that racism used to be more "mainstream" is a far cry from giving it a free pass (sign of the times, and all). It was still wrong.

What is the point you are trying to make? Do you feel that others who said when they encounter objectionable material in older literature accept that it was a sign of the times the work was written are giving it a free pass? Do you think they think the views expressed are perfectly acceptable? What make you think that, if you do?

I admire the work of H.P. Lovecraft. Unfortunately, it can be racist. I accept that it was more acceptable to express such views back then. If i want to read these influential works I have to be mindful of the baggage they come with. I wouldn't support a modern author who is expressing these views in their work.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

What is the point you are trying to make? Do you feel that others who said when they encounter objectionable material in older literature accept that it was a sign of the times the work was written are giving it a free pass?

Yes. I think people who say "that's just how it was" and nothing else are giving it a free pass. Why shouldn't I?

I admire the work of H.P. Lovecraft. Unfortunately, it can be racist. I accept that it was more acceptable to express such views back then. If i want to read these influential works I have to be mindful of the baggage they come with. I wouldn't support a modern author who is expressing these views in their work.

You've acknowledged his racism was unfortunate. You've mentioned you need to be "mindful" when reading it. Do you see the difference between that and blowing it off as a sign of the times? I sure do.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Yes. I think people who say "that's just how it was" and nothing else are giving it a free pass. Why shouldn't I?

You've acknowledged his racism was unfortunate. You've mentioned you need to be "mindful" when reading it. Do you see the difference between that and blowing it off as a sign of the times? I sure do.

I would agree with some of what you are saying. However, in a book written well before the current era of political correctness, I will accept a good deal in the way of racism, prejudice and attitudes that are not by my standards politically correct. Are we at the point of resurrecting the spirits of Thomas and Henrietta Marie (Harriet) Bowdler to protect the public from being contaminated by the works of our uncouth forbears?

[maddz]

Originally Posted by Thasaidon

Long before the slave trade between the New World and Africa people were blacking up for all kinds of reasons. The mummers in the UK, whose traditions go back to the time of the crusades, had at least one blacked up character.

Probably a reference to the Moorish slave trade which Europe did have experience of as victims. There may also be an Italian pun as well - ‘Il Moro’ the black was also an Italian family name; which is why we now have ‘Othello, the Moor of Venice’.

I’d also like to point out that in Eastern iconography devils were traditionally depicted with white skin, red hair and blue eyes. Is that racism against white people?

You have to remember that xenophobia is part of humanity; each tribe was in competition with each other tribe so xenophobia got your tribe ahead of others. Today’s multiculturalism probably hasn’t happened since Imperial Rome.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Yes. I think people who say "that's just how it was" and nothing else are giving it a free pass. Why shouldn't I?

I'm not sure what else one can do. Authors' attitudes, like those of everybody else, are a product of the society in which they lived, and so naturally their books are going to be a mirror of those attitudes. Who was it who said "The past is a foreign country - they do things differently there" (or something similar)? I don't think it's reasonable to criticise a work for reflecting the attitudes of the author's society. As readers, who have to accept that books written a century ago aren't going to reflect the social attitudes of the 21st century.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by sealbeater

There was never a time in history that blackface wasn't insulting to Black people.

The fact that the oppressed people of the time were able to seperate the privileged man from the System doesn't make it harder to judge the System from our time.

I don't think it's hard to judge another time at all. Only the details change, the story pretty much stays the same.

Hmmm. Are you really suggesting that Shakespeare's play "Othello", the title role of which would certainly have been played by a blacked-up actor in Elizabethan England, is demeaning to black people? I don't think many people would agree with you if that is your view. Nor do I think that the (very few) black people in England at the time would have considered themselves to be "oppressed"; it does not appear to have been a racist society, from what I've read of the period.

[Thasaidon]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Uncalled for. If you can't argue without telling people to go to hell, then don't argue here.

My apologies.

I shall be more careful in future.

[Thasaidon]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Hmmm. Are you really suggesting that Shakespeare's play "Othello", the title role of which would certainly have been played by a blacked-up actor in Elizabethan England, is demeaning to black people? I don't think many people would agree with you if that is your view. Nor do I think that the (very few) black people in England at the time would have considered themselves to be "oppressed"; it does not appear to have been a racist society, from what I've read of the period.

Thanks Harry.

That was a good example of for the point I was clumsily trying to make.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by DNSB

Are we at the point of resurrecting the spirits of Thomas and Henrietta Marie (Harriet) Bowdler to protect the public from being contaminated by the works of our uncouth forbears?

This is where the disconnect really lies. I say "it's fair to judge the past through today's lens," and you (and others) seem to think I'm saying, "erase the past! Change it! Make it so nobody else can read it! Ban it! Burn it! Bowdlerize it!"

I'm saying nothing of the sort. I'm saying acknowledge it, don't blow it off. "That's just how it was" is only useful if you're attempting to make past racism sound OK, or more acceptable/palatable. Being a racist was never OK, even if it was more common.

[Thasaidon]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I'm saying acknowledge it, don't blow it off. "That's just how it was" is only useful if you're attempting to make past racism sound OK, or more acceptable/palatable.

Could you explain more please as I do not see why saying that racisn in past was just the way it was is ONLY useful if you're attempting to make past racism sound OK.

If I say "That is the way things are", it does not follow I agree with the way things are or absolve me from trying to change the situation if I think they need changing.

In relation to how things were in the past, I have no power to change the situation then so what can be said but "that was the way things were". Unless you think saying that should automatically be followed by a condemnation of the aspect of the past time concerned.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Thasaidon

In relation to how things were in the past, I have no power to change the situation then so what can be said but "that was the way things were". Unless you think saying that should automatically be followed by a condemnation of some aspect of the past time concerned.

That's very much my view, too. It seems entirely unreasonable to me to condemn an author for holding views that were entirely representative of his or her society, regardless of how much attitudes today may be different. As I said in an earlier post, we are all products of our own society.

[DuckieTigger]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Being a racist was never OK, even if it was more common.

And even so, an authentic book that has been written in such a time should include all the horrors (by today's standards) that did go on. Otherwise you have a setting that is unrealistically biased. Point fingers at the society, not at the authors.

Society evolves. Things change. Right now the most ridiciluos thing that happens is gender identity and bathrooms. Fastforward 40 years or so, and every book written today that seperates bathrooms into male and female is going to be politically incorrect.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by Thasaidon

Could you explain more please as I do not see why saying that racisn in past was just the way it was is ONLY useful if you're attempting to make past racism sound OK.

ONLY saying "that's just the way it was" is only useful if you're attempting to make past racism sound OK.

"Lovecraft was a racist."
"So what? Lots of people were racist back then."

Do you really not see that that is an attempt to excuse Lovecraft's racist tendencies as OK?

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by DuckieTigger

And even so, an authentic book that has been written in such a time should include all the horrors (by today's standards) that did go on. Otherwise you have a setting that is unrealistically biased.

Only if the book is about those "horrors", or is a historical account of the period. Plenty of "authentic" fiction books were written during racist/sexist times without token racism. What "authentic setting" was Lovecraft creating?