BlogHer - Orson Scott Card's Writings About Homosexuality and Gay Marriage Anger Many Fans - Comments

Reminds Me of Auden and Poetry

Gena Haskett — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 16:45:32 -0500

I was in my first college literature class and we read a poem written by Auden. The professor asked us what it was about. I said it was war and the anguish the writer feels about being in that place.

He said I was wrong. It was about the poet's conflict about being a homosexual and the pain of love.

I barely knew who Auden was and certainly didn't know about his sexual preferences. I came to the work on the page. I asked "I'm now responsible for knowing everything about an author before I can read his work? That's not fair."

He said "no, but now that I know the work takes on deeper meaning." I was 19 and not all that clear on what being gay meant anyway. I read it again, it was a war poem to me and I kept my mouth shut.

Years later I read Ender's Game and Speaker of the Dead. Particularly Speaker of the Dead has had a long term effect on my life - inspiring me to find out the whole story of a situation or person. What is the truth of a life?

For fiction writers sometimes other voices and "spirits" get to whispering in an author's ear and take them places in their conscious life couldn't imagine seeing. Ender wouldn't say the things that OSC has said. There would have been no judgment, just the telling of the tale.

People can create beautiful works of literature and not be nice people. Humans are flawed, biased, and some have such levels of fear of the other that fuels all kinds of responses.

I can't stop liking and appreciating Speaker of the Dead. But I can't support an author who has stated his beliefs that I disagree with. Classical and Opera lovers go through this with Wagner.

Do we come to the work or do we hold the work against the author? For the time being I can leave OSC alone.

Gena - Out On The Stoop

OSC Reader

mashadutoit — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 15:57:54 -0500

Ive read lots of Orson Scott Card - some I have found excellent, some not so great, some I've looked at the cover and shuddered.

There is a great cartoon by Jules Feiffer. It depicts a young man, sort of hippyish. In each frame he gives a new statement:

"Politics is a lie - So I dropped out of politics - Politics uses history - so I quit studying history - history is printed in books - so I quit reading books - books are made up of words - so I quit knowing words"

In the last frame he appears with his mouth taped, wearing dark glasses and a sign that says "Give to the Pure"

Or I think of people who will refuse to see certain movies, or read certain books (and try to prevent others from doing so) because it goes against some part of their faith. Do they really doubt the strenght of their own belief to that extent?

OK - I know its not really that simple. But one of the things I really like about Orson Scott Card is that his characters face up to their doubts, they struggle, they challenge their gods.

Many aspects of his books make me very uncomfortable. But I sense a questioning intelligence at work that I find very intriuging. Its like having a good friend that I dont agree with, but still have long conversations with. It makes me uncomfortable to be with him, and you know what? Its good to be uncomfortable about things like these. As soon as you think you know what the truth is, something is probably wrong.

I suspect that Vered has hit the nail on the head - as far as I know, Mormonism particularly values marriage as the sanctified space in which reproduction occurs, and reproduction is especially valued. I suppose a Mormon would be quite capable of holding views which seem contradictory to me - that while a gay person is just as capable of love and a loving relationship as anyone else, "marriage" is not possible. And I suppose its quite logical that if you believe that the prime purpose and duty of a person is to reproduce, and the purpose of marriage is to frame this reproduction - that gay marriage would threaten that.

I dont mean to justify his views at all - and I do not agree with him.

But I think its very dangerous to cut yourself off from the writings or art of anyone, because their beliefs in some way differs from your own. Rather have faith in yourself, and your children's capacity to judge for themselves.

Being a former SMOF . . .

MLOKnitting — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 01:03:13 -0500

This is not news.

I remember when this information about OSC was coming to light to those of us running Science Fiction Conventions. (His repeated refusals to attend as a GoH after suddenly re-embracing his faith was a big clue.) I was more surprised that anyone was surprised by his attitude when he was a professed Mormon and his Church teaches thusly. There are other authors who were very widely known to avoid conventions due to their religious beliefs, at least among SMOFs. Did this invalidate their talent? No.

There are a lot of things that are known about various authors that does not prevent people from reading their books. (No, I don't read Harlan Ellison's books because he is a pompous ass, I don't read them because I don't like his stye of writing.) Did you realize that Isaac Asimov was a total lech at times? Or, that many of the greats were quite sexist? They are all human with all the foibles and nonsense that accompanies that.

Some of the stranger things authors ask for would be at home on The Smoking Gun website.

If you realize that the question (6x8) is just as important as the answer (42) you understand what Douglas Adams was really trying to convey.

Pax.

MLO / Melissa

Known his views ..

debra roby — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 22:21:07 -0500

As an avid sci-fi reader, I have to admit I came late to OSC, only devouring his work in the past 5-6 years or so. Which means I could google him and learn his views on life from the very beginning.

I love the way the man writes. I hate some of the things he believes. I don't know much about most authors I read, so I've decided hold the two separate. I probably wouldn't invite OSC to tea, but I'll read his books as long they entertain me. (the last one I read didn't).

My favorite book of his is still Enchantment...

Debra
A Stitch In Time
Weight for Deb

oops. posted that comment

kazari — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 21:21:12 -0500

oops. posted that comment twice

As a Mormon and a Sci-Fi Reader

MMarquit — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 20:57:48 -0500

I didn't really like Ender's Game that much. I actually liked Speaker for the Dead and Xenocide better. (I did read Empire last year *shrug*) I do enjoy OSC's fiction on the level that I think it's reasonably entertaining most of time, but not really that great. I think of him as the Dan Brown of Sci-fi. (If you wanna read some really gaggy stuff by OSC, read his stories about Old Testament women. A book devoted to each of the famous women of the Bible, fictionalized and what-not. Available at LDS religious bookstores. But I digress.)

I think part of the reason that it is so hard with OSC is that so many
of his books have a tolerant message. The Earthborn series features a gay character prominently. OSC's older fiction presents messages of acceptance, so it is hard to see that his personal views and opinions aren't always in line with that. I can understand the feelings of betrayal.

Anyway, I disagree with almost all of OSC's personal views. We share a religion, and that's about it. As far as I'm concerned, marriage (anyone's) should be a religious issue, and the State should just concern itself with consenting adults who want to establish legal status. Civil unions for everyone -- no matter sexual orientation.

I agree with the The Caffeinated Librarian on this one. I'm not going to stop reading OSC because I disagree with him. There are plenty of other books that I read by people I don't necessarily agree with. I'm very religious, but I enjoyed His Dark Materials immensely, although I'm not an atheist. I also enjoyed Carl Sagan's Cosmos, despite his very obvious anti-deism.

I read for the reading. And I'd really rather not know a whole lot about the authors' personal lives.

YieldingWealth.com

I didn't read Orson Scott

Caffeinated Librarian — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 20:26:09 -0500

I didn't read Orson Scott Card growing up although I heard about Ender's Game from every Sci-Fi loving friend I've ever had. After hearing for the umpteenth time what a classic it was, I finally bought a copy and tried to read it but I couldn't make it through the first chapter because it just bothered me. I couldn't stand the thing.

Then one day I was flipping through XM Radio channels to find something I could listen to while dealing with a tedious project and I came across this audiobook. I enjoyed the reading even though I had no clue what it was until the end of the episode when they announced that it was a Orson Scott Card book. Well, you can read the whole story here if you're interested, but the short version is that I loved the audiobook so much that I picked up Ender's Game again and devoured it in 3 days. Like no_I_am_zoe, I am also a painfully slow reader so the short time frame should tell you how much I enjoyed the book.

And it is a good book, a true classic. That doesn't mean that everyone ought to like it, people have a right to make that choice for themselves. And it doesn't change Orson Scott Card's opinions (and some of them are pretty odious) on anything else that he has an opinion on.

But it just pains me that people deny themselves the experience of certain books based not on the content of the books but on the lives of the book's authors. To me it would be like blaming a child for who their parent is. And besides if that's the criteria, Hell's Bells you're going to have to eliminate a lot of books to find a handful of authors who lead blameless lives and have only ever held upright opinions.

The Caffeinated Librarian [Blogger]

wow

kazari — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 17:45:57 -0500

I didn't know this about OSC. How shocking that he could write such contradictory articles!

But then, that makes me think how ignorant I am of many of the writers I read. I would be appalled to think I was reading books by people who could write such fear-filled hateful stuff. But unless I check out the moral/religious credentials of every author, how would I know?

Then the thought of only reading authors whose views align with my own... well, that makes me slightly queasy.

But Vered, you honestly haven't read Hitchhikers? You've missed out!

I think I have a recipe for that...

Torn

Pixiedyke — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 17:27:23 -0500

I too loved Ender's Game when I was a lonely weirdo teen. I found out OSC was a Mormon in college, and then assumed that he was probably a fruitcake, perhaps not my finest hour, but I did turn out to be right. His short story Unaccompanied Sonata is one of my all time favorites. I continued to read him every once in awhile, but since I didn't like Xenocide or Children of the Mind, I wrote him off as having veered away from my taste.

The last year I read "Empire," which was absolutely horrible. It read like a guy who hadn't sent his work past an editor. It read like a podcast novel. It actually read significantly worse than the Seventh Son podcast series. Empire's politics are alot like the confusion between what OSC says about marriage and what he says about Teh Gays. His "love the sinner, hate the sin" approach completely precludes him from actually getting the opinion of a real live gay person, much like the creators of Colini Firth's character.

Yeah we have known about his views for a while

Crunchy Carpets — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 12:33:17 -0500

I also tried reading Enders Game a while ago and just did NOT like it....maybe I was reading too much into it.

It is always a bit crushing when you read NON fiction stuff from your fave authors and totally disagree with them..you feel cheated.

I just never thought he was that great a writer to begin with and find it sad that he has so much opinion on things that really should NOT affect him...

Look for me at http://crunchycarpets.com or check out the ladies at www.wetcoastwomen.com

The Answer is 42

Vered — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 12:26:10 -0500

OK, I had to look that up, but now I know what you meant and I learned something new. Thank you Wikipedia.

I haven't read his books. Unlike Melissa, I don't think I could read the work of someone whose personal views, as Michelle so eloquently put it, spew hatred.

What he wrote on Mama Mia IS confusing. The only explanation I can come up with is that maybe he thinks the attraction and emotional bond between same-sex partners are valid and real, but the institution of marriage is for straight couples only. Reminds me of McCain's views.

Vered DeLeeuw

http://momgrind.com/

http://www.uptous.com/

Great Post

Melissa Ford — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 08:19:01 -0500

I haven't read Orson Scott Card, but the post reminded me on Knut Hamsen, the Nobel Prize winning author who was one of the first great modernists. As an MFA student, you had to worship his creation of the anti-hero, the unlikable protagonist. And yet, he was a supporter of the Nazi party (he gave his Nobel Prize to Goebbels) as well as Quisling. So how does a nice Jewish girl read Hamsen--especially a book as moving as Hunger--and not think about her family who died in the camps?

It's damn hard.

I do have Hamsen on my bookshelf and I've taught his books many times. But when I do, I always kick off a discussion on how difficult it is for me to love someone's art and disagree so passionately with someone's personal views at the same time. And at least my students get to think and talk about how they feel separating out art from the person.

Fantastic post.

Venting about infertility since 2006
www.stirrup-queens.blogspot.com
and we're not talkin' cowgirls...

This is old news for this old dyke

Denise — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 06:36:21 -0500

There are very few people who make me cringe, just by reading their names - OSC is one of those people.

It was a more than 10 years ago when I read OSC's propoganda and I was disappointed, to say the least. I had children who were Ender's Game age. We owned the book and I had occasionally encouraged the oldest to read it. At that time, none of them had. I took the book off of the shelf and set it on my desk for about a week so I could think about what to do or say, if anything.

I ended up putting the book back on the shelf, I don't ban books or throw them away. And when it was eventually assigned for school by my son's teacher, we discussed the problem with OSC. He read the book but he didn't like it. Michelle has always refused to read it on the grounds that OSC spews hatred.

The three younger children, the topic hasn't come up - yet. It is probably time to start thinking about how to talk to them about it.

~Denise
BlogHer Community Manager

Flamingo House Happenings

Orson Scott Card's Writings About Homosexuality and Gay Marriage Anger Many Fans

no_I_am_zoe — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 03:22:28 -0500

Over the last few weeks, the Internet has been abuzz with sci-fi fan reaction to writer Orson Scott Card's most recent posts for the Mormon Times (Science on gays falls short and State job is not to redefine marriage) about homosexuality and gay marriage. Though he has been outspoken on the issue of homosexuality as far back as 1990, it has only recently attracted great attention. Truth be told, until seeing a few posts about it last week, this Orson Scott Card fan was blissfully unaware of his views.

Growing up, I wasn't much of a reader. I was, and still am, a very slow reader, and I struggle to process what I read. With the exception of having read The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings trilogy in junior high school, which took me for-ev-er to get through, I didn't pick up a fiction book until my freshmen year of college, when a friend insisted I read Ender's Game. I loved it. Before I even finished it, I ran out and bought the next book. At the time those were the only two books in that series, so I asked my friend for another recommendation. Which lead me to Robert Heinlein. From then on I searched out books on my own.

I'm not sure what exactly it was about Ender's Game that I loved so much. Maybe I loved it because Ender was a social outcast through not fault of his own, but by virtue of being born a third child in a time where the government imposed a 2 child limit. I can certainly relate to social stigma resulting from something that is no fault of my own. I'm not sure if I would enjoy the book if I were to read it again today, but that book will always be dear to me because it sparked my desire to read for fun. Regardless of the things Orson Scott Card says about homosexuality, and how much what he says ires me, it will not take away what his books meant to me at the time I read them. Would I buy any thing else of his now? I'd say the chances of that are highly unlikely.

Some bloggers, like Attitude Problem, are thinking along my line.

I am going to actively not buy OSC from now on; I haven't read anything of his since...shit, it was fairly recent and it was urban fantasy, and I'm too lazy to look it up. I still have a certain love for Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, and Children of the Mind, and it's not exactly easy to shake off. That, and I honestly like a lot of other work by other SF authors who were and are in certain ways problematic, so to just go off on Card because he's handy and has a blog would be hypocritical of me, and it would be even more hypocritical for me to say NEVER READ HIS WORK AGAIN and then still admire what he did with portraying OCD in Xenocide.
-read the full post Like Mick Jagger, in a way

Bloggers, like Sam who wrote Orson Scott Card is a hateful homophobe on Feministe, and Angrytoyrobot who wrote Orson Scott Card Loses It, or Mormons Are Just SO Kooky! on Daily Kos, have more visceral reactions to Card's latest posts.

And then there are bloggers like Yonmei, of Feminist SF, who deconstruct Card's writing point by point and offer counter arguments. Yonmei also writes about where we go from here, and why does it matter.

If Proposition 8 fails, and same-sex marriage is legally established across the US for one-fifth of the population, then whether or not the next President of the US repeals DOMA, sooner or later some test case will reach the US Supreme Court - and there will be a repeat of the June 1967 decision that struck down the interracial marriage bans across 17 states. Card's repeated, seemingly irrational fears that gay marriage will become "required" are actually very solid political/financial fears for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It was only 11 years after the 1967 court decision striking down interracial marriage that God had to reveal to Kimball that the LDS Church ought to admit black people to full membership.[... ]What Orson Scott Card fears, only he can say: but he is certainly trying to present his religious beliefs against same-sex marriage in a secular format, in the hope that these "arguments" will prove useful to the Mormons who have volunteered to promote Proposition 8 from door to door and by phone calls.
-read full post Orson Scott Card: homophobic Humpty Dumpty

In reading through all these pages about Orson Scott Card, his posts for the Mormon Times and other articles he's written, and other people's reactions to his writings, I was feeling a little bristly. But then I stumbled upon his review of Mama Mia! on his official web site, and my mild anger turned to confusion. What I don't get is this. How can a guy who makes arguments like:

No matter how sexually attracted a man might be toward other men, or a woman toward other women, and no matter how close the bonds of affection and friendship might be within same-sex couples, there is no act of court or Congress that can make these relationships the same as the coupling between a man and a woman.

This is a permanent fact of nature
-from the State job is not to redefine marriage post

and this

So if my friends insist on calling what they do "marriage," they are not turning their relationship into what my wife and I have created, because no court has the power to change what their relationship actually is.

Instead they are attempting to strike a death blow against the well-earned protected status of our, and every other, real marriage.

They steal from me what I treasure most, and gain for themselves nothing at all. They won't be married. They'll just be playing dress-up in their parents' clothes.
-from the article Civilization Watch

and then write something like this (in reference to Mama Mia!)

I had a wonderful time watching it.

Except for the appalling moment when Colin Firth's character suddenly reveals himself to be gay. No, it's not because I'm anti-gay. It's because they trivialize and ridicule him and homosexuality. His developing relationship with a gay Greek man is never shown or hinted at -- it is revealed only as a punch line. As a joke. It's a slap in the face to all gay people.

Everybody else's yearnings, everybody else's personal agonies, everybody else's love story is worth at least a few moments of screen time. But homosexuality exists in this movie only to be laughed at. It's as if they're saying that the feelings of gay people are amusing, whereas the feelings of heterosexuals are important and deep and meaningful.
-from Uncle Orson Reviews Everything Mama Mia! and The Dark Knight

He goes on to say

Don't these writers actually know any gay people? I mean know them, as friends, as family members, as colleagues? I can't believe they do. Because if they did, they could never treat their gay characters with such contempt.

How could this possibly be written by the same person? And it is the same person who writes all of these thoughts. But I don't get it. And maybe he doesn't either. Maybe someone could explain it me, because reading it makes me a feel a little bit like Sybil.

It makes me sad to know this about him. Now I won't able let myself read another of his books. Though, after writing this, I really want to reread Ender's Game to try to recapture some of what it once held for me. The other question, which someday will hopefully apply to me, is, do I let my kids discover and love Orson Scott Card as I once did? Do I tell them about, or let them read, the things he has written about homosexuality and gay marriage?

If you're an Orson Scott Card fan, how do feel about the things he's written? Does it change your opinion of his work? Will you continue to read his work? If you're not a fan, what would you do if you found out an author you loved held views quite counter your own? Do you, or would you, feel betrayed?

One final thought. If there is one thing that I have learned from being a fan of science fiction, it's that the answer is 42.