PG has received a couple of private messages that are concerned that he has steered TPV into overly-political areas that have generated more heated disagreements than are usually the case at this location.
When PG reviewed the last few weeks of posts, he decided he agreed with with those who shared their concerns with him.
Henceforth, PG will endeavor to avoid posts containing politics of the elected-officials and government bureaucrats genre and stay closer to the author/book world. He does not, however, intend to bridle his scorn at idiots and predators in the publishing business, however.
I really appreciate all the work you put into finding and posting and commenting on the articles. I do wish you wouldn’t worry so much about the political bit. As Writing Observer said, everything tracks back to politics eventually. I’ll take the discussions that go on HERE over any one of a billion comment feeds in the rest of the internet.
Although if you do decide to stick with this decision, does that mean no more KKR posts? I’ll be totally happy with that. I’m about done with her.
Sunday’s Dilbert seems relevant:
https://dilbert.com/strip/2022-01-16
I don’t observe the heated disagreements. I suspect this is a case of objecting to the content of comments. We see this everywhere. Rather than engage in reasonable discussion, which may include voicing disagreement, people want the content stifled.
In years past, when TPV comments skewed much more to the left, there was indeed disagreement. Many on the left, and few on the right. Today, there is a preponderance of comments that lean right. Perhaps readers lean left and don’t like to see the current comments. That’s easy to fix. Stand up for the left as TPV comments once did. Nobody was shy about voicing their ideas, and nobody called for them to be stifled.
You’re welcome, D.
It’s unfortunate we have those keyboard warriors incapable of having a pleasant discussion or avoiding the quick turn toward ideology. Geez! We can’t have nice things?
Thank you, PG, for the hard work of aggregating this info and providing this forum for us to learn, review, and discuss these matters that sometimes involve things we won’t all agree on.
PG, I have never commented on your blog before but am moved to do so by this idiocy.
I look forward to reading your blog with my morning tea. I would hate, absolutely hate, for you to censor what you decide to share with us. Your posts and the comments of many of your followers entertain, often broaden my world view, and set my rusty cogs to turning in new directions. I am adult enough to be able to disagree with another’s opinion without getting sweated up about it. If something truly disturbs me, I don’t have to read it. Please don’t let the whining of a few turn your space into a bland, featureless landscape.
Thanks, C.
Wow. I hope you won’t allow the Ashleys of the world to censor you, PG.
“Apolitical is just another word for right-wing,” is just another way of saying, “If you so much as open your mouth I will call you a liar.”
There’s an intermediate measure that could be taken: Make the posts, but turn off comments on those posts. That way, PG’s comments on, say, freedom of speech/censorship — which really do matter to authors — can still be there to inform authors. And make authors think about them, even if they can’t engage in mudwrestling right here and now.
After all, if people are on the web, they can put up their own snide comments on their own sites and link to material here if it’s so subjectively reprehensible that it requires mudslinging. (Please note that I am not accusing any particular viewpoint of exclusively slinging the mud; sadly, it’s not the unique activity of any particular viewpoint.)
A noble goal, PG, but one that you will find quite difficult to achieve (already amply proven by the first comment on this post!) Especially when you are dependent on external sources for your content.
To paraphrase a quote (although it might also be verbatim, I cannot find it with a search): “You can certainly ignore politics, but it is certain that politics will not ignore you.”
Book banning, writer cancellation, forcing contract terms upon publishers/writers to favor libraries? Politics.
Supply chain problems in receiving books, e-readers, even paper? Politics.
Massive looting of shipping containers in Los Angeles even when the above items are shipped in, thanks to lax prosecution of “simple property crimes”? Politics.
Actually, the only recent item that you have posted, to my recollection, which does not have a direct effect (yet) on writing and/or publishing was the one on the modern iconoclasts. (I say “yet” – iconoclasm is a first cousin to book burning and press dismantling.)
TPV comments have generated heat? Relative to the rest of the world, they are ice cold and a model for any other forum.
Politics has taken aim at amplified communication in any form. Many want it shut down or tightly controlled. That includes books and comments. Serious issues with communication have become He-who-cannot-be-named.
Watch this: Voldemort.
Some ideas can’t withstand even polite questioning.
Or warnings of things to come. Yet those things will come and the closed minded will be blindsided, over and over.
Safe zones aren’t.
Still, as the Traveller said; “As you wish, so be it.”
https://www.amazon.com/Compleat-Traveller-Black-John-Brunner-ebook/dp/B00J5X5OM2/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2NPDYIAMI6MPF&keywords=traveller+in+black&qid=1642245551&sprefix=traveller+in%2Caps%2C261&sr=8-1
Ever more relevant each day.
Also, politics are in the eye of the beholder.
To those looking for political offense, they can be found even in a Disney Kids movie, like this amusing piece out of tbe UK via The Atlantic:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/how-encanto-and-moana-explain-america/ar-AASPGXq
Projection? Probably. If you’re obsessed with politics everything will be political.
Problem is: “Sometimes a cigar is a sex toy but most times it’s just a cigar.”
But even then the most harmless and sensible thing can be rendered political by those so inclined. Do a web search for “NASA leasing bill” for the latest example. What could be less contentious than a bill Authorizing NASA to lease unused facilities to save taxpayers’ money? Where therd’s will, there’s a way. There will always be a way.
Makes the problem intractable.