::Opening Preamble Bits::
Going to begin by apologizing if the title is a bit too "click-bait"; it's the most succinct one I could think of for the topic at hand.
My last couple of questions have been in the Wild West Forums, but it was suggested on the last one that it would have gotten more traffic/discussion if it were in a more general/public location. As such, I will continue to say that I don't care what you have to say, how you say it, as long as it contributes in some way to the topic at hand.
I don't believe anyone here knows me, as I'm not a frequent poster. I typically try to only chime in when I feel I can contribute to the conversation, rather than to perpetuate an argument (though I've occasionally posted snarky comments). I'm a would-be writer, with an interest in science fiction, mystery, and horror. My personal inspirations come from the late Victorian to late Pulp writers mostly, including Spillane, Doyle, Wells, and others.
I'm currently coming here to get a feel of how people outside of my immediate circle think. What I come here for is diversity, in the end. The only diversity that matters, in my opinion: diversity of perspective and experience.
::The Actual Point::
There's a lot of talk about representation in fiction, from comic books to movies to games. Has been for a while, really. I don't disagree with any of the points generally made, but I've seen a troubling trend for some time now, and I want to talk about how it applies in fiction, and what the mind you all are on it.
Should diverse characters be showcased, and given special notice and fanfare, or should they be treated as any other character inhabiting the world?
To explain myself further: what are "gay", "african", "white", "woman", or "pansexual" as character traits? Should they define a character, or develop them? And I'm talking in general; I know that a story can be written that the point of the story is to explore a character's sexuality or race, and therefore become defining. But in media where that's not the case, should it be?
To elucidate, I've become more obsessed with pulp era detective stories as of late, and been devouring them with what time I have available to read. As such, I have an example of what I mean. Two novels of that era I read recently I finished and began talking with my wife about how hard it would be to get someone to publish them in this day and age.
As such, I'd like to discuss some plot details from two novels: Max Allan Collins' Quarry and Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep.
In Quarry, the main (and titular) character is a hitman who ends up on a job in a small town with Boyd, his lookout and recon guy. Boyd is gay, and this is mentioned as off-handedly as possible as a book written in 1976 about a combat vet turned hitman can likely do. It's mentioned at the time to describe the character, but also used as a way to let you know how close the two have become in the years they've worked together off and on, that Boyd has shared that with him. They're as much friends as Quarry gets, and when his friend is murdered (and the money from the job stolen), he works over the town trying to find the answers.
In the Big Sleep, Philip Marlowe gets involved in no small amount of intrigue as he unravels a series of mysteries that deal with infidelity, city corruption, a pornography ring, and mental illness. One character central to the story early on is a pornographer, who invites young women to his home and gets them drugged up before posing them for a hidden camera, and its heavily implied having sex with them. While searching his home, Marlowe finds a hidden room that's obviously been lived in. This turns out to be the male lover of the pornographer, who ends up being one of the people implicated in another death in the story.
In both of these stories, the characters being gay had an impact on the story, but neither character was treated simply as a "gay" character. They also had flaws, and made missteps, much like the protagonists in both stories. They were written as characters first, and gay was simply a detail of them.
On the contrast of this, I have an anecdote that fits.
My friend is a film student, and an actor. Through his school, he's worked or auditioned for several projects, and got one that was kind of an LGBT take on the X-Files; they shot a pilot movie with an intention to get backers to turn it into a long run show. This is last year, but as of right now its only been shown in a few film festivals.
My friend got a bare bones synopsis of his character, and the script (same as anyone else). His character was in a relationship with another man, who was abducted in the opening; the main bulk of the story would take place 4 years later. In the main story, he's with a new man, as well as being part of the X-Files like organization. Both he and the actor portraying his new love interest felt their characters seemed thin, so they worked together to dot the i's and cross the t's of the backgrounds to make the characters feel more real. When they approached the director with their notes, they were told to play it as written and not meddle with it (the director was also the writer and producer).
In several scenes, my friend's only direction was "act more gay". Now, my friend is gay, so this irritated him a bit. Chiefly in the relationship scenes, the director would only call it a good shot if both actors acted as campy as possible.
This is an example of what I mean when I say "gay" as a defining character trait. The story is about aliens and a conspiracy about what's really going on, but the characters being gay (comically so, having seen the finished cut) is more important than being characters with realistic motivations.
::The TL;DR Part::
If you can't be fucked to climb the text mountain above (and honestly, I can't blame you), here's what I want to know in a nutshell:
* Is it more important that diverse characters be characters, or representative?
* Should diverse characters be treated specially, and made more important, or should they be treated like any other character?
::Extra Bit::
Mainly started thinking about this recently as I've been looking at doing a kind of pulp story myself, in a different setting. However, the themes of the novels that hook me are decadence and degeneracy among the wealthy, and corruption among the powerful. I'm going to be doing another thread looking at exploitation because of this, but mainly it got me thinking again about what kinds of characters can be good, or bad, or victims in the long run of the story.
::You're still here?::
Thanks for taking the time to read and/or respond, and for keeping any personal attacks aimed at me. I'd prefer if people kept their politics out of the discussion, by which I mean please debate the topic, and not each other.
Going to begin by apologizing if the title is a bit too "click-bait"; it's the most succinct one I could think of for the topic at hand.
My last couple of questions have been in the Wild West Forums, but it was suggested on the last one that it would have gotten more traffic/discussion if it were in a more general/public location. As such, I will continue to say that I don't care what you have to say, how you say it, as long as it contributes in some way to the topic at hand.
I don't believe anyone here knows me, as I'm not a frequent poster. I typically try to only chime in when I feel I can contribute to the conversation, rather than to perpetuate an argument (though I've occasionally posted snarky comments). I'm a would-be writer, with an interest in science fiction, mystery, and horror. My personal inspirations come from the late Victorian to late Pulp writers mostly, including Spillane, Doyle, Wells, and others.
I'm currently coming here to get a feel of how people outside of my immediate circle think. What I come here for is diversity, in the end. The only diversity that matters, in my opinion: diversity of perspective and experience.
::The Actual Point::
There's a lot of talk about representation in fiction, from comic books to movies to games. Has been for a while, really. I don't disagree with any of the points generally made, but I've seen a troubling trend for some time now, and I want to talk about how it applies in fiction, and what the mind you all are on it.
Should diverse characters be showcased, and given special notice and fanfare, or should they be treated as any other character inhabiting the world?
To explain myself further: what are "gay", "african", "white", "woman", or "pansexual" as character traits? Should they define a character, or develop them? And I'm talking in general; I know that a story can be written that the point of the story is to explore a character's sexuality or race, and therefore become defining. But in media where that's not the case, should it be?
To elucidate, I've become more obsessed with pulp era detective stories as of late, and been devouring them with what time I have available to read. As such, I have an example of what I mean. Two novels of that era I read recently I finished and began talking with my wife about how hard it would be to get someone to publish them in this day and age.
As such, I'd like to discuss some plot details from two novels: Max Allan Collins' Quarry and Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep.
In Quarry, the main (and titular) character is a hitman who ends up on a job in a small town with Boyd, his lookout and recon guy. Boyd is gay, and this is mentioned as off-handedly as possible as a book written in 1976 about a combat vet turned hitman can likely do. It's mentioned at the time to describe the character, but also used as a way to let you know how close the two have become in the years they've worked together off and on, that Boyd has shared that with him. They're as much friends as Quarry gets, and when his friend is murdered (and the money from the job stolen), he works over the town trying to find the answers.
The answers come in the fact that Boyd was having sex with a local man, who killed him and stole the money. Something Quarry doesn't figure out until very near the end because he (and the reader) are expecting a larger conspiracy at work, and ultimately it comes down to human fallibility and problems of the heart.
In the Big Sleep, Philip Marlowe gets involved in no small amount of intrigue as he unravels a series of mysteries that deal with infidelity, city corruption, a pornography ring, and mental illness. One character central to the story early on is a pornographer, who invites young women to his home and gets them drugged up before posing them for a hidden camera, and its heavily implied having sex with them. While searching his home, Marlowe finds a hidden room that's obviously been lived in. This turns out to be the male lover of the pornographer, who ends up being one of the people implicated in another death in the story.
Fun passage that a modern editor would cringe at:
"I still had the automatic more or less pointed at him, but he swung on me just the same. It caught me flush on the chin. I backstepped fast enough to keep from falling, but I took plenty of the punch. It was meant to be a hard one, but a pansy has no iron in his bones, whatever he looks like."
"I still had the automatic more or less pointed at him, but he swung on me just the same. It caught me flush on the chin. I backstepped fast enough to keep from falling, but I took plenty of the punch. It was meant to be a hard one, but a pansy has no iron in his bones, whatever he looks like."
In both of these stories, the characters being gay had an impact on the story, but neither character was treated simply as a "gay" character. They also had flaws, and made missteps, much like the protagonists in both stories. They were written as characters first, and gay was simply a detail of them.
On the contrast of this, I have an anecdote that fits.
My friend is a film student, and an actor. Through his school, he's worked or auditioned for several projects, and got one that was kind of an LGBT take on the X-Files; they shot a pilot movie with an intention to get backers to turn it into a long run show. This is last year, but as of right now its only been shown in a few film festivals.
My friend got a bare bones synopsis of his character, and the script (same as anyone else). His character was in a relationship with another man, who was abducted in the opening; the main bulk of the story would take place 4 years later. In the main story, he's with a new man, as well as being part of the X-Files like organization. Both he and the actor portraying his new love interest felt their characters seemed thin, so they worked together to dot the i's and cross the t's of the backgrounds to make the characters feel more real. When they approached the director with their notes, they were told to play it as written and not meddle with it (the director was also the writer and producer).
In several scenes, my friend's only direction was "act more gay". Now, my friend is gay, so this irritated him a bit. Chiefly in the relationship scenes, the director would only call it a good shot if both actors acted as campy as possible.
This is an example of what I mean when I say "gay" as a defining character trait. The story is about aliens and a conspiracy about what's really going on, but the characters being gay (comically so, having seen the finished cut) is more important than being characters with realistic motivations.
::The TL;DR Part::
If you can't be fucked to climb the text mountain above (and honestly, I can't blame you), here's what I want to know in a nutshell:
* Is it more important that diverse characters be characters, or representative?
* Should diverse characters be treated specially, and made more important, or should they be treated like any other character?
::Extra Bit::
Mainly started thinking about this recently as I've been looking at doing a kind of pulp story myself, in a different setting. However, the themes of the novels that hook me are decadence and degeneracy among the wealthy, and corruption among the powerful. I'm going to be doing another thread looking at exploitation because of this, but mainly it got me thinking again about what kinds of characters can be good, or bad, or victims in the long run of the story.
::You're still here?::
Thanks for taking the time to read and/or respond, and for keeping any personal attacks aimed at me. I'd prefer if people kept their politics out of the discussion, by which I mean please debate the topic, and not each other.
