Thinking about Warren Ellis
So I dunno what I'm feeling about the Warren mess. I'm not the best person to interpret other folks genuine-ness vis-a-vis the whole apology thing. I suck at interpreting other folks at the best of times. I can't tell if he's just fumbling his actual apology or if it's self-serving deflection or self-deluding confusion or what. I haven't seen anything from the folks that're directly affected by his shit, and on the whole, it's one of those things where it's not actual criminal behavior, it's just really shitty and emotionally abusive and manipulative stuff. So what do you do about that? The world's fulla assholes of one flavor or another. It's not like he's been fucking actual children, it's not like he's beating his partners, he's just fucking people in bad faith. So, how do you deal with the whole thing? How involved do we have to be with the ethics of consuming and supporting art produced by assholes? How much is that affected by the outsized influence he's had for so many folks, just because he was presenting himself as the rascal prince, as the hyperbolic charming jerk, as the wrecking ball that brings clarity, irrespective of the houses he smashes to bits?
Thing I keep thinking is, the world's also full of artists who appear to not be assholes, at least not on this level of sustained and long-term assholery. That whole "die a hero, or live to find yourself a villain" trip. Looking up to artists is probably a bad idea. Bjork was right about not letting poets lie to you. Maybe it's best to just let artists be people who make stuff, and unless they're people you actually know in meatspace, the moral and ethical quality of their lives is not your affair. But that lets the world be full of assholes who produce, and eat the less resilient folks, and feed their triumphs with the blood and sorrow of their victims. How much art doesn't get made, because Jocko Assholio the Great Artiste burned through any number of adoring fangirls to feed his muse-furnace? If we're about the art, not the artist, what responsibility do we have to make it more likely for art to emerge? To create a world that nurtures art and knowledge, that doesn't feed on young women to warm the beds and hollow stomachs of beasts and bluebeards just because they need virgin's blood to keep them plump and happy?
Shit, man, I dunno. I know I've hurt people in my past, through carelessness and self-centered appetites. I've tried to apologize to them, where possible. I've tried not to do the same things more than once, when I've realized what I've done. I try to be as supportive as I can of people in danger or who've been hurt by others. But I know that at least in part, the minimality of injury in my past is due as much to lack of opportunity as any ethical fiber on my part. I'm not better than these people because I'm a better person. I'm not as powerful as they are, and therefore I haven't had the same temptations available to me. I'd like to think that I'd be a better person even with those temptations, but I have no way of knowing. How much of me is due to diffidence and cowardace, versus any internal intrinsic value system? How can I know?
Too much time thinking about my self, I think. Does it matter? It's not my job to judge these people, is it? It's my job to not be like them, and to try and help people when and how I can.
