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dragonlady7Subj: it's not an apology you need, but I will explain.
Date: 6/6/2002 11:33:09 AM Eastern Daylight Time
From: Pxngxnqx
To: xxxxx@annielin.com
The more I think about it, the more I think that despite all the talking we did at the time, you still didn't understand me.
I posted that response to the flier because I thought the flier was inappropriate and insensitive. I felt that you had made a serious mistake. All that we talked about, so much of what we discussed in that conversation, was how Darius was not, in fact, an unfeeling bastard, and as such, it was unkind for you to write off his feelings and carelessly and publicly fictionalize at your will.
I was harsh in my response, because you were harsh in that flier.
You cite freedom of expression to defend you, or mentioned having done so in conversation.
I cite freedom of expression to defend ME, and in fact to tie together my entire case.
You must realize, embarking upon a study of the law as you are, that freedom of expression is a double-edged sword, and nothing i have done in objecting to what you chose to express in any way impinges on that. Just as you have a perfect right to say anything you want, so do I. Certainly you wouldn't overlook that.
And as a result, this great and wonderful freedom carries with it a great and terrible responsibility. Surely, knowing that anyone anywhere can say anything they like at any time, even if it's not what you would consider kind, must instill in you a desire to use this freedom with great care. If no-one were allowed to express dissatisfaction with another's views, how far would the Civil Rights movements of the world have come? Think of that; aren't you a bit of an activist yourself? If you weren't allowed to point out the injustices you perceive, simply because somebody might not want to hear them, then you wouldn't be doing much good for the causes you advance.
I likewise am an activist, though what I advocate is consideration, and interpersonal communication. I think that a tremendous percentage of the world's evils are caused by people focusing on their own interests to the exclusion of others, without even realizing they are doing that. Not only the initial oppressors, but those who resist them, who overthrow them, who come to supplant them. I believe that the civil rights movements of the sixties and seventies must come to be replaced by more individualistic, fragmented movements toward understanding, not revolution. The world is a flawed place, and no one organization can set it right. As the world gets more overpopulated, and we get more and more crowded, either we're going to have a nuclear war that kills both Us and Them, or we're going to have to actually llisten to each other and pay attention to what other people want, not just ourselves.
You may say to my detriment that this whole recent flurry of composition on my part has been, in fact, merely a response to perfectly free criticism of my own criticism. And to that I say perhaps you have a point, but given that Brian, as his perfectly free criticism of my views, chose to use merely name-calling, vulgarities, and defensive whining, I am free to have a rather extreme response to it. He wasn't pointing out my flaws, he was throwing mud at me. Which he is, in fact, free to do, though it starts to cross a line. And here I might add that freedom of expression is, in fact, muzzled by laws against harassment and such; this is nowhere near any of those lines, but there are lines. Think about why. You're free to say anything you want about anyone... conditionally. 1) As long as it's true, 2) as long as you say it within socially acceptable bounds, and 3) as long as you don't say it unreasonably often. The point? Freedom of expression is not something to bandy about; it is a gift, which many of the world's citizens do not possess. It is something beautiful and terrible to be used very carefully.
ESPECIALLY when you are an artist. ESPECIALLY when there is fiction involved. And that was the most impassioned part of my original critique-- a plea to those who use fiction in their art, especially fictionalized real life. PLEASE, you must be SO careful when fictionalizing your life. It's not just your life to do with as you please, unless you are the mythical Nell from that movie, who was raised entirely alone-- almost every pivotal point of your life (and most of the trivial ones as well) involves other people , who will recognize themselves in your fiction, who will be interested to see themselves there, and who WILL be hurt, on some level, in some way, if you choose to portray them hostilely. It is a simple fact of life. I was on pins and needles the entire year I worked on my thesis, simply because it was nonfiction. These were men's lives I was dealing with. Some of these men are dead, some crazy, some crippled. I was transcribing sterile, scribbled reports of their maimings, into a... cute website about my dad. (It's down at the moment, but if you hadn't seen it it's about my father's Vietnam experience. Not a subject to traipse lightly through.) And in the end, I could not bring any fiction into the project. I cut two-thirds of the project because it WAS fiction, and I didn't feel I could tread into such territory without causing hurt.
You are braver than I, more effective than I, and have managed to use your life in your art, effectively. I applaud this. But I would argue that of late you have not been careful of. In my case, it wasn't even affairs of the heart; nothing like it. Those are far, far worse, because they hurt us and we want to answer in kind. But when we do, we usually (there are exceptions to every rule, don't get me wrong, but i say in caution that it's impossible to tell on your own what will be an exception) do not, if I may say so, produce the best work. How many angst-ridden poems about the guy who dumped me do you remember seeing in the pages of the school's lit magazine? Most of them aren't any good. Yet even those poets, if given subject matter they could relate to with less angst and more clarity, could produce beautiful poems. My point is, that which hurts us also can cloud our judgement, at least initially. There is a reason it takes time to write a song about a relationship, isn't there? You can't always see what the truth of the whole thing was, when the wounds are fresh. And that's what makes good art, be it fiction or nonfiction--- truth. Not beauty but truth, as has been said hundreds of times by artists of all genres far far more qualified than I.
So I wanted to write you one last time to make sure that I had done all I could to help you understand why I wrote what I wrote, and why I stick by what I wrote.
That journal entry, in response to the flier, contains an image of the flier. It is linked to from your website. If the image is no longer on your website, the journal entry is meaningless. I have no copy of this image.
Just a little food for thought, for you.
In the end, I had thought all this buried in the fog of the past. I simply resurrect it because I am getting e-mails containing these very harsh comments by someone who was deliberately attempting to mislead me as to his actual identity; my investigation established firmly that if this interloper is not, in fact, Brian W. Spencer, then he lives in his home town, and has a markedly similar writing style to his official press autobiography. And I would say that if this matter was settled two weeks ago, then why is someone so "close" to you attacking me so personally, so recently? Perhaps you'd better explain things to him as well, or acknowledge that things are not, in fact, settled to your satisfaction. Which would disappoint me; I admit that my initial entry was very harsh, but since then I have been unsparing of my time and energy to ensure that you understood what I meant, and if your friends are attacking me, then that would indicate that you did not and my efforts have been in vain.
Sincerely,
bridget
Date: 6/6/2002 11:33:09 AM Eastern Daylight Time
From: Pxngxnqx
To: xxxxx@annielin.com
The more I think about it, the more I think that despite all the talking we did at the time, you still didn't understand me.
I posted that response to the flier because I thought the flier was inappropriate and insensitive. I felt that you had made a serious mistake. All that we talked about, so much of what we discussed in that conversation, was how Darius was not, in fact, an unfeeling bastard, and as such, it was unkind for you to write off his feelings and carelessly and publicly fictionalize at your will.
I was harsh in my response, because you were harsh in that flier.
You cite freedom of expression to defend you, or mentioned having done so in conversation.
I cite freedom of expression to defend ME, and in fact to tie together my entire case.
You must realize, embarking upon a study of the law as you are, that freedom of expression is a double-edged sword, and nothing i have done in objecting to what you chose to express in any way impinges on that. Just as you have a perfect right to say anything you want, so do I. Certainly you wouldn't overlook that.
And as a result, this great and wonderful freedom carries with it a great and terrible responsibility. Surely, knowing that anyone anywhere can say anything they like at any time, even if it's not what you would consider kind, must instill in you a desire to use this freedom with great care. If no-one were allowed to express dissatisfaction with another's views, how far would the Civil Rights movements of the world have come? Think of that; aren't you a bit of an activist yourself? If you weren't allowed to point out the injustices you perceive, simply because somebody might not want to hear them, then you wouldn't be doing much good for the causes you advance.
I likewise am an activist, though what I advocate is consideration, and interpersonal communication. I think that a tremendous percentage of the world's evils are caused by people focusing on their own interests to the exclusion of others, without even realizing they are doing that. Not only the initial oppressors, but those who resist them, who overthrow them, who come to supplant them. I believe that the civil rights movements of the sixties and seventies must come to be replaced by more individualistic, fragmented movements toward understanding, not revolution. The world is a flawed place, and no one organization can set it right. As the world gets more overpopulated, and we get more and more crowded, either we're going to have a nuclear war that kills both Us and Them, or we're going to have to actually llisten to each other and pay attention to what other people want, not just ourselves.
You may say to my detriment that this whole recent flurry of composition on my part has been, in fact, merely a response to perfectly free criticism of my own criticism. And to that I say perhaps you have a point, but given that Brian, as his perfectly free criticism of my views, chose to use merely name-calling, vulgarities, and defensive whining, I am free to have a rather extreme response to it. He wasn't pointing out my flaws, he was throwing mud at me. Which he is, in fact, free to do, though it starts to cross a line. And here I might add that freedom of expression is, in fact, muzzled by laws against harassment and such; this is nowhere near any of those lines, but there are lines. Think about why. You're free to say anything you want about anyone... conditionally. 1) As long as it's true, 2) as long as you say it within socially acceptable bounds, and 3) as long as you don't say it unreasonably often. The point? Freedom of expression is not something to bandy about; it is a gift, which many of the world's citizens do not possess. It is something beautiful and terrible to be used very carefully.
ESPECIALLY when you are an artist. ESPECIALLY when there is fiction involved. And that was the most impassioned part of my original critique-- a plea to those who use fiction in their art, especially fictionalized real life. PLEASE, you must be SO careful when fictionalizing your life. It's not just your life to do with as you please, unless you are the mythical Nell from that movie, who was raised entirely alone-- almost every pivotal point of your life (and most of the trivial ones as well) involves other people , who will recognize themselves in your fiction, who will be interested to see themselves there, and who WILL be hurt, on some level, in some way, if you choose to portray them hostilely. It is a simple fact of life. I was on pins and needles the entire year I worked on my thesis, simply because it was nonfiction. These were men's lives I was dealing with. Some of these men are dead, some crazy, some crippled. I was transcribing sterile, scribbled reports of their maimings, into a... cute website about my dad. (It's down at the moment, but if you hadn't seen it it's about my father's Vietnam experience. Not a subject to traipse lightly through.) And in the end, I could not bring any fiction into the project. I cut two-thirds of the project because it WAS fiction, and I didn't feel I could tread into such territory without causing hurt.
You are braver than I, more effective than I, and have managed to use your life in your art, effectively. I applaud this. But I would argue that of late you have not been careful of. In my case, it wasn't even affairs of the heart; nothing like it. Those are far, far worse, because they hurt us and we want to answer in kind. But when we do, we usually (there are exceptions to every rule, don't get me wrong, but i say in caution that it's impossible to tell on your own what will be an exception) do not, if I may say so, produce the best work. How many angst-ridden poems about the guy who dumped me do you remember seeing in the pages of the school's lit magazine? Most of them aren't any good. Yet even those poets, if given subject matter they could relate to with less angst and more clarity, could produce beautiful poems. My point is, that which hurts us also can cloud our judgement, at least initially. There is a reason it takes time to write a song about a relationship, isn't there? You can't always see what the truth of the whole thing was, when the wounds are fresh. And that's what makes good art, be it fiction or nonfiction--- truth. Not beauty but truth, as has been said hundreds of times by artists of all genres far far more qualified than I.
So I wanted to write you one last time to make sure that I had done all I could to help you understand why I wrote what I wrote, and why I stick by what I wrote.
That journal entry, in response to the flier, contains an image of the flier. It is linked to from your website. If the image is no longer on your website, the journal entry is meaningless. I have no copy of this image.
Just a little food for thought, for you.
In the end, I had thought all this buried in the fog of the past. I simply resurrect it because I am getting e-mails containing these very harsh comments by someone who was deliberately attempting to mislead me as to his actual identity; my investigation established firmly that if this interloper is not, in fact, Brian W. Spencer, then he lives in his home town, and has a markedly similar writing style to his official press autobiography. And I would say that if this matter was settled two weeks ago, then why is someone so "close" to you attacking me so personally, so recently? Perhaps you'd better explain things to him as well, or acknowledge that things are not, in fact, settled to your satisfaction. Which would disappoint me; I admit that my initial entry was very harsh, but since then I have been unsparing of my time and energy to ensure that you understood what I meant, and if your friends are attacking me, then that would indicate that you did not and my efforts have been in vain.
Sincerely,
bridget
