aloice:

roachpatrol:

Anonymous asked you:

So your writeups on the recent debates are really good! But, I still am wondering, why exactly is it any writers duty to focus on these issues, and if it is how are they suppose to approach it? At times I feel like everyone expects the…

I’m tired and it’s after midnight and I have gotten burned to several hours’ crying on this kind of thing before but I kind of think

While it is always good for writers to be advocates for good causes and I believe in the power of the Pen and all

We sometimes also need writers who write for the sake of telling stories and it would be a little messed up to think that to avoid becoming a morally digressive writer (is that the term? I don’t even know anymore) you absolutely have to incorporate a progressive message

I know that’s not what roach or feralphoenix is saying at all but I kind of just want to say that I guess since

When I was a child, I felt telling stories for their own sake and being told those kind of stories were really wonderful?

Stories without progressive messages probably don’t change history or keep people up at night but I think the fiction niche needs a couple of them to complete itself

Stories are sometimes a form of entertainment that you read just so that you can feel happy… /the wording is horrible I’ll just shoot myself now

For what it’s worth, I don’t think it’s a bad thing to just want to tell a story for the sake of telling a story at all!

But what Roach says about writers having louder voices than others is very true, and so at the least I think that people should make sure that the stories they want to tell aren’t actively or accidentally contributing to oppression, at least (for instance, perpetuating negative stereotypes).

There’s all kinds of messages that people want to convey with stories. Sometimes it’s a theme that they want to explore, or a message they want to pass on, or a what-if scenario they want to play with, or a joke or heartwarming anecdote they want to share. Sometimes the goal is for the audience to think deep thoughts! Sometimes the goal is even for those deep thoughts to provoke the audience into questioning if they really believe in and support stuff that they’ve been taught.

These are all valid and okay reasons to tell stories. I personally write for a lot of these different reasons combined depending on the project.

It’s just that since writers have the power to reach a larger audience than most, it’s also good to try not to inflict any hurt—or even to help, if you’ve got a story that’s relevant to a cause important to you.

so here is my two cents that nobody really even wants, yes

sorry for sticking an inarticulate cherry on top of your cake of eloquence, roach