(no subject)

Over the last few weeks, I've found myself watching the SciFi Channel's episodes of Dr Who three or four times over the course of the week, thanks to our lovely DVR, and the fact that the last two episodes have been recorded on two different tvs, just so I can see it in whichever room I find myself in, when I have time.

So yesterday, mostly in reaction to my reaction to the Cult of Captain Jack, I read John Barrowman's bio on imdb, and realised that not only was he in De-Lovely, he sang one of the songs with Kevin Kline - Night and Day. He plays Jack (yes, again), the alto who Cole Porter wrote that song for (and occasionally snogged, if the biopic is accurate in that section).

I have the soundtrack, which I originally purchased for Robbie Williams' rendition of the title song, and ripped for Alanis and Elvis Costello, and since I ripped the whole thing Back In The Day, I also have Night and Day, which I am happy to share with you.

(no subject)

Well, that discussion is back again.

You know, the one which asks whether a fic should be rated-up if it involves discussion of a subject that is Bad or Negative or involves Evil, like Discrimination or Smoking or Nazis.

To paraphrase, a relative newbie-to-FA asked whether it would be "a bad influence on readers" and thus merit a high rating if a character stated that he believed women and gays should have less rights than others, and that he was antirace mixing (like, not mixed-marriage, but separate continents). And she wanted to know if the higher-rating presumption should be mitigated by her intent to make it clear that she didn't *agree* with said character's rantings.

Obviously, on FA, we don't require a fic be "rated-up" just because there's discrimination in it. As the American Library Association says, and FA adopted years ago,

Publishers, librarians, and booksellers do not need to endorse every idea or presentation they make available. It would conflict with the public interest for them to establish their own political, moral, or aesthetic views as a standard for determining what should be published or circulated. Publishers and librarians serve the educational process by helping to make available knowledge and ideas required for the growth of the mind and the increase of learning. They do not foster education by imposing as mentors the patterns of their own thought.

I just don't understand what makes people think that you have to agree with every idea you're writing about, and if you don't, you need to condemn it within the fic or at the very least in the disclaimer or the author's note, like you need to say. Maybe that's the question I'll submit to ask at the reading in August - what does it take to be a Bad Influence On Readers? I mean, there's a degree of imitatable instruction that perhaps shouldn't be in fics - a step-by-step on hacking into federal government computers or how to make crystal meth. But does anyone decide, "Hey! I've been completely unbiased all my life, but the idea of different continents for different races sounds *groovy*! Sign me up!" just from reading a fanfic?

And if they did, is it the writer's responsibility to write differently, or the reader's responsibility to Not Be Galactically Stupid?