And now for something totally unpolitical, fun and entertaining---I have been working on a novel making fun of Home Owner Associations and the little bully neighbors who run them and think they can push the other neighbors around. Still have to explore the self publishing world. If you have ever lived in a HOA community, you will relate to this book.
NC Maureen, I spent six LONG years of my life serving on my HOA Board, and as a result I HATE humanity! Sure enough, there are some great story arcs to be explored on this subject. I'd be interested to hear about YOUR experiences. Mine were not very positive. One thing that I learned early on was that if a male were running against a female, the male would lose every single time! Why? Because women were considered to be less confrontational...hahahahahaha!
NO ONE! But it it's the defacto opinion of people who voted but are not connected to the results. I found them to be much less "in your face", but MUCH more passive aggressive. The results were the same in the end.
If and when a pushback against Wokeness ever happens, it would be important for it to focus its retributions. This would involve understanding that the worst excesses of virtue-signalling are not evenly distributed among progressive-minded people. Some fields are absolute MAGNETS for the worst kind of narcissistic malcontents. And the legacy publishing business is right up there at the top of the phoneyness pyramid. https://grahamcunningham.substack.com/p/invasion-of-the-virtue-signallers
I’m sure there are exceptions. I don’t think confrontational is the right term, but in certain environments and as a general rule, women are the consensus makers. I hate it. But then again, that’s why I’ve always been one of those disliked women. I go against the grain too much. That’s why I’m here. Ha!
It's true! Women are less confrontational! Exhibit 1 HRC! Exhibit 2 Rasheeda Tlaib. Exhibit 3 Whatsername. Exhibit 4 Bari Wiss, or Wess, or Woiss, or something like that. ;-)
Women are less confrontational than... what? Hmm. A stampeding herd of elephants? Angry rhinoceroses? Oops! No, definitely not less than that. I'll stick with the elephants.
I am a mediator in Florida. Because pre-suit mediation is mandated in state law, I charge a reduced rate to COAs and HOAs and the owners. I have seen a lot! But it goes both ways. Some associations have that one litigious owner, sapping legal fees from the entire community, and others (many others) have overzealous boards. I try to do what I can. I remember the legislator who wrote the condo laws - for the developers.
I’m in an HOA of 120 homes. Our monthly payment is $35.00 and the neighborhood hums. Our President is a retired marine now 80 years old and this is his hobby. I thank him every time I see him. I know this is not the norm.
Same experience as you. Got tricked into doing it, and hated every minute of it. When we sold that home, one of the “musts” on our list for the realtor was “no HOA”.
Wow. These comments started off in the weeds, and went from there out to see-ya-later!
Trying for a comment on topic here. Yes, mainstream NY publishers want books that are, essentially, lies. May those corporations die and their staff become truly homeless --- so they learn what is actually going on out there. But, by writing this, I reveal that I have been connected to that "elite" who believe they rule the literary world. It reminds me of days of yore when IBM ruled computers, and force-fed customers hardware until there were other options.
I suspect that is the problem with these comments. Most people do not have experience dealing with NY publishers and their agendas. So they write about what they know. Which is HOAs! I have an HOA story too, but... No. I won't.
Of course, there are books that are just badly written too. Or boring. Yes. There are.
My BIL took over a corrupted, financially broke HOA, uncovered wrong doing and set the HOA on the right path. He was then viewed as the devil incarnate! Go figure.
By the way, in Ireland the Green Party wants to pass a bill that will make it illegal for people to own material that questions the validity of "gender identity". So, it will likely go beyond being able to publish such "controversial" (to almost no one) ideas let alone own anything that isn't all in for the cult.
Thx for that link, Lonesome. Peterson was great as usual! Nailed it.
This FP article might mention publishers like Regnery Publishing where Abigail Shrier published her groundbreaking "Irreversible Damage" book.
I'm looking for more... Gee, on Amazon I see only 2 used copies of "When Sally becomes Harry Paperback" by Ryan T. Anderson - and they are selling for $99.
Deborah Soh published "The End of Gender: Debunking the Myths about Sex and Identity in Our Society " under Threshold Editions. I don't know that one.
Dr. Miriam Grossman published "Lost in Trans Nation: A Child Psychiatrist's Guide Out of the Madness Hardcover" under Skyhorse.
And, Helen Joyce published "Trans" under Oneworld Publications
I self published 5 books on Amazon and am working on book six with modest success. Writing is fun looking for a publisher is boring. Unlike the books in the article above, my books are mind candy filled with real interesting 19th century characters like Liver Eatin' Johnson , Lotta Crabtree, Bass Reeves and others.
It would never happen today. Those shows are close to 30 years ago. Which is why they are so entertaining. Good ol' Del Boca Vista. Kramer could be my puppet dictator any day!
They are all about power. I won’t live in a HOA. Prefer the isolation of the country, a gravel drive, and no street lights. You are brilliant as always NCMaureen.
Wait, do you live in my neighborhood? We’ve been fighting those bullies since we moved into our neighborhood 4 years ago. The fun thing is we’ve been kicking their butts because they are so stupid. It does make for a fun retirement hobby.
My wife actually joined ours. She daily bangs her head against the wall. The simplest and most obvious things get so controversial amongst board members.
Been a President of a HOA and actually used common sense to make changes and reduced costs. The next year, didn't run and it went back to little Hitlers running things and hatred everywhere. Never will live in a HOA area again.
Indeed that was similar experience for us. I'm a tradesman and was able to utilize friendships within the various trades to rectify myriad problems. Largely a thankless effort and once the market took that upswing we sold. HOA? Never again.
Love your idea. My own approach to HOAs has been to become a termite officer. It turns out there are not as many busy bodies as people think. Find the majority that hates the busy bodies. Collect their proxies. Get in office. Spend the time to stay in touch with the members of that majority. Keep them happy. Stay in office. Change the term limit bylaw provisions if necessary.
A cousin in Florida has been going on about how insane the HOA is at her complex and how glad she is that she's only renting. I was a guest at another cousin's complex in Phoenix and got bullied out of the pool by a couple of elderly lesbians. Another resident had self-published a memoir about her transgender "daughter" a subject I was told to sagely avoid around her. I bought the book and...well....Anyway, I see the potential for comedy gold in this topic. Looking forward to reading...
I got kicked out a poolside chair in my MIL's condo by an HOA policeman. It was a cloudy day and there was no one else there!! Note to self: don't become one of those people
I would love to read that! We live on a cul de sac. Twice in the last year, our son was visiting us and he made the unforgivable sin of leaving his car parked in front of our house...overnight. We are the kind of people who adhere to the rules...we just forgot the second time it happened. We got letters both times. Remember, we live on a cul de sac. 🙄
It's a popular and uncovered topic.....be sure to let us know when we can give it a read.
I may be an outlier here, but I see trade-offs living in an HOA. There are some plusses.
I don't want some nutjob parking his rusted out 1968 VW tye-died minibus in front of my house. Or the slob who won't mow his lawn, paint his house, or trim the bushes.
You are correct. There are trade-offs. I lived in an HOA once and never again. Now I live in a neighborhood that is mostly nice but a has few of those "nut jobs" and I'll take them any day over the true nut jobs that often run HOAs. We all have our preferences and as I have always said: If you chose to not live in an HOA, remember, you're neighbors don't live in an HOA either. (Apologies to Alex for responding to an off-topic thread, but I excuse my breach by believing that this thread provides future authors (including Maureen) great topical material.)
LOL! My parents own a small condominium and have been unfortunately promoted to the HOA board after a series of folks resigned. The drama that goes on has made for some good laughs over the years- it would make a most excellent book!
Great piece, long overdue. One note: George Floyd was not murdered, but died of a fentanyl overdose, which the autopsy report makes clear. Since this is a piece about honesty in the face of orthodoxy, it’s an important point.
Trust me when I say that you're point is not lost on me, but I've watched the George Floyd video many times and I'm not sure I can get on board with the idea that Derek Chauvin didn't have at least a roll in his death. I also believe 2 things can be true at once (asphyxiation & fentanyl overdose)
Please read this sub post by Dr Pierre Kory concerning this thoughts on Floyds death. It's pretty insightful IMO:
As a cop, if you arrest someone, they resist, you apply submission practices as trained by your PD and they die of heart failure, sure you had a “role in their death”. It’s then revealed not only did the deceased have 2.5x the lethal dose of Fentanyl in their veins but also had a congenital heart condition and no signs of trachea damage or asphyxiation, is it tantamount to murder? That the other officers who were attempting crowd control got lengthy sentences as well should tell you the fix was in.
After watching the movie (https://www.thefallofminneapolis.com/) I felt sick for the other officers. I did not even realize they got jail sentences also. I believe it was Officer Thao who was on the SECOND call of his police career, and was sentenced to 4 years, 9 months.
I am married to a cop (now retired thank goodness) and all the left's ideas hurt the poor and minorities. The riots ruined cites and many people died. But they don't care.
Justice and a fair trial were not the priority. Avoiding the rioting that took place after Floyd’s death was. A ceasefire agreement with the terms, “Well throw the officers in jail for a long time if you agree not to riot.”
Does seem like there should be some better protocol for how to deal with a person who continues to say “I can’t breathe” even while restraining them. In addition, given how popular fentanyl is now, seems to me that there is a need for officers and emergency responders to recognize the effects of potential fentanyl overdose— I’m no expert, but it seems like it can make the person somewhat violent followed by the feeling of morning able to breath.
So while, yes Floyd died of a fentanyl overdose, I agree with Evans W that Chauvin isn’t completely innocent. He may not be guilty of murder, but I would hope that someone dying of fentanyl overdose would actually be safer in the hands of a policeman— again, if there was recognition of this and then handed over to an emergency care team to address his acute condition.
What do you think they were doing while Chauvain was kneeling on him? They were waiting for an ambulance.
I've had that hold done to me. It is painful and unpleasant, but he would have had to work a lot harder than he did to kill Floyd. The whole thing is ludicrous.
Not one person in a hundred has seen the footage of them trying to get him in the back of the patrol car, and him saying "I can't breathe" before anyone ever touched him.
The whole thing is a travesty of justice, and the irony is that prosecuting innocent white cops who were just trying to do their jobs caused cops all around the country to say "F it", stop doing their jobs, and that in turn resulted in hundreds of added homicides, mostly of black men by black men, just in 2020. All the outrage had the effect of killing young black men, and given that saving the lives of young black men was the ostentible purpose, achieving the opposite result and then lying about it approaches evil, and certainly qualifies as an unmitigated and inexcusable disaster.
Actually I have seen that footage, which is probably why the hold seemed a bit harsh to me, someone unfamiliar with police holds like that one. Just from an outsider’s perspective, if someone is saying “I can’t breathe” before you touch him, definitely seems like something is wrong. To go from that to being held on the ground- just seemed like there should have been a better way to hold him while waiting for an ambulance and/or help him before paramedics got there. Maybe there isn’t and I just don’t know. I appreciate hearing your perspective as someone who has been in a hold like that before.
But regardless of whose is at fault, I agree with you about the outcome of the whole situation. The whole narrative that ran from this one event devastated police forces and killed many more black men than it did save them. It devastated communities as well.
I’d agree if he died from asphyxia. He died from a cardiac arrest which he would’ve suffered from on his stomache or back. A muscular man over 250 lbs physically resists arrests, high on Fentanyl / meth and is now cuffed behind his back. What submission technique would you recommend as you wait for an ambulance? Chauvin had his knee on Floyd’s upper left shoulder, not neck as he was trained at MPD Academy.
I watched the documentary too; he went berserk, he was completely wild, virtually impossible for a number of strong young policemen to control. I’m not surprised that he had a cardiac arrest.
If you watch The Fall of Minneapolis, you'll learn that this was a technique all of the police were trained in and Floyd was stopped the year before and the same procedures were used......and he lived.
Who knows what the truth is? "Everything means everything so nothing means anything." Floyd was a player under the influence and Chauvin was a rookie cop. The professional poseur virtuosity of the "woke"/MSM pile on did what it is intended to do in every situation. Line the pockets of the beast and scream over the top of objective moral reason. The traumatized psyche of the general public and the survive at any cost city hall bureaucracy gladly went along for the ride. In truth nobody involved gave a flying f'k about either Floyd or Chauvin. They were just glad it isn't happening to them.
And, they should be. Because, the man behind the man whispering lovingly into the ear of moral evil and funding the social/cultural disintegration of the American Republic has the boys at the station house working overtime polishing their shiny new jackboots.
Mr. Perez's article is one more report on the fight against the mal pathology spreading from the rotten heart of criminal finance and their "break a few eggs to make an omelette" DEI comrades now butchering the American psyche. It is the mal pathology of the usurper and the jackal. It is the Biblical proverbial bind the strong man of the house in order to rob it. American freedom is literally the Grail. Truth is light. Speak it.
And, remember our friend Commander Cohen: "..ring the bell that still can ring....forget your perfect offering....there is a crack..a crack in everything ..that's how the light get in..."
The officers called for EMS 38 seconds after Mr. Floyd was on the ground. They were 8 blocks away, and went to the wrong location. It’s all documented on video and was inadmissible in the corrupt trial presided over a corrupt judge with ties to the corrupt prosecutor whose background was defending 3 of the most violent gangs in Minneapolis. The Minny Medical Examiner’s report is also very clear. There is much more. Please watch the documentary, it’s shocking.
For a crime to be considered murder it should have some premeditation or intent. Chauvin’s charges and sentencing was politically motivated to appease the marauding mob. He was never going to get a fair hearing. It’s shameful and it’s definitely not justice.
It doesn’t require premeditation for 2nd degree, just depraved indifference. Even so, Chauvin was going by the book as taught by MPD. He even obliged Floyd’s request to be taken out of the car to “breathe”. The jury were clearly intimidated by the rioters to make the “right” decision. Shame on the SCOTUS for denying review.
The degrees of murder and how they’re applied vary state to state. You’re correct in saying it doesn’t require premeditation for 2nd degree murder. What I was saying is in murder convictions it “should” be intent that is a determinant, not that it is.
Yes, absolutely it’s a miscarriage of justice that the SCOTUS wouldn’t hear the case. Cowardly I would say. Shame on them. And shame on the US prison system that its officers couldn’t even keep Chauvin from being stabbed. It’s a horrible indictment of the so called justice system that is going to rot.
I take it you didn't watch the trial, haven't read the autopsy report, and don't know that the restraint Chauvin used is sanctioned by the dept. for perps on fentanyl who are likely to experience "excited delirium" which gives them superhuman strength. His knee was not on Floyd's neck, but on his shoulder, and no airwave obstruction appears in the autopsy. Floyd had swallowed his fentanyl before and in The Fall of Minneapolis there's a close-up of a gob of it in Floyd's mouth. He died of a drug overdose AND he's the only person with COVID who didn't "die of Covid" in 2020.
Glad you pointed that out Jesper. It was the one line in this essay, that I disagreed with. After watching “The Fall of Minneapolis” , and reading the autopsy report, I believe that George Floyd’s death wasn’t legally caused by Chauvin or any of those police officers trying to do their jobs. What I do know is that the justice system in Minnesota, like the publishing companies described in this essay are perilously driven by their progressive ideology. As more people begin to realize these abuses, the publishing co’s will lose enough revenue to make them obsolete. But, the toying around with liberty by prosecutors and judges has far greater consequences.
The same is true for the television and movie industry. It’s almost impossible to find any recent production that doesn’t include at least one gay couple, a stereotypical white conservative nut job, and marginalized characters that have nothing to do to the storyline. I’ve always prided myself as a pretty tolerant viewer, but now I find myself turning off most of these limited series about three episodes in. We’re sacrificing good plot lines of human interest and struggles for fringe ideology.
In the past, if a show or commercial had a minority or gay character, I never thought much about it. Now, when I watch TV, which is not too often, I find myself looking at the race and sexual identity of the actors, and how there has to be "one of each" and not caring about the product or leftist plotline. My church is very diverse, and I never think about backround or race of the person.
One of the more interesting mysteries on either Britbox or Acorn TV is Vera. One of her latest episodes had a trans who was beaten up and wanted to go to the women's shelter (Vera kept calling her "Lass"). Same episode had a "little person," lesbian couple (checked two boxes b/c they were interracial), and more.
Even the most well written independent shows are under immense pressure to appease the box checking gatekeepers in the industry. Like it or not I can’t fault them for jumping through the required hoops to get their work to the screen. Some hills aren’t worth dying on.
I hate this too. I'm gay myself so I probably hate it even more than you do, because none of these is ever a character who is there for plot reasons who happens to be gay; they're always some screaming camp repulsive stereotype, there to be "celebrated". Well, I don't celebrate things I find repulsive. So honestly we now rarely watch a UK or US film made after 2010 (Spanish films seem mercifully free, still, from wokery.) I think the last straw for me was that film with Daniel Craig last year in which he played a French detective in a whodunnit set on an island. We said to each other within ten minutes "Of course the rich white guy is the villain; of course this will be a riff on BLM." And lo! The plotless, charmless mess dissolved into BLM screeching which came very close to glorifying mob-driven violence (the sort which has disfigured US cities since 2020). Go **** yourselves Hollywood and the Arts in general. If you want to make films/write books/produce newspapers that say nothing but "We hate you", be sure to know the feeling is mutual. The difference is that I don't need their money to exist, but they need ours. I hope that message gets through at some point but to be honest I won't hold my breath. Now I spend my money on DVDs and books produced before wokery took hold, so I can access the art which sustained me through childhood, adolescence and maturity. Before it's deleted in an act of violent wokery.
Well put my friend. We’ve been watching movies made in the 40s and 50s. Funny thing is, Im not very nostalgic, but it’s better than being a progressive:-)
I completely stopped watching TV a couple of years ago. My wife still watches "The Golden Girls" from the 80's (70's). The publishers are doing the same utterly stupid sorts of things that will put Disney up for sale in the not-too-distant future.
And who’d’ve thought the anti-gun anti-violence movie and television industry would struggle to produce anything that doesn’t include firing guns? They get a lot of stuff wrong too as has been clearly pointed out by my good friend who is an NRA trainer and former gun range owner.
Though I’ve never owned a firearm I am a staunch 2A supporter.
I was at a friend’s home recently and one of the John Wick movies was on TV about half way through. The gunfire was so voluminous and relentless I feared I was going to experience some type of seizure. For the sake of my health I was never so relieved to see a movie end.
"For years, there has been a growing politicization inside the industry, which editors describe as a slowly percolating illiberalism that makes it difficult to publish books by authors who don’t adhere to the new dogma".
Sounds all to familiar.
Universities, Big Tech, Government Agencies, Religious Organizations, Health Care, School Boards, Corporate Media, Corporate Boardrooms, Hollywood, Professional Sports.......the progressive mind virus ruins everything and eventually eats itself from within.
So happy to see new players like Substack can come in and serve as arbiters of true liberalism & free speech.
Also worth noting, Walter Kirn founded County Highway (20 page broad print newspaper) that I recently subscribed to and its great! (https://www.countyhighway.com)
One wonders if the cold smack of reality coming from less revenues will work at these places? It will be interesting to see if true believers will change or perish
Some of these institutions are looking into other markets— like China or Russia. NYT is failing here in America, but there is a reason they wouldn’t publish anything connecting the Covid virus to Wuhan— they have a CCP-approved version of the NYT that is selling in China. Before anyone even thought about the connection, NYT people were told that it was “racist” to link it to China. All the lies to Americans to save face in order to please their new non-American market.
I mean, Disney is set to lose $750M this year on their box office flops, is down 56% of their market cap, and has admitted to shareholders part of the issue is their social goals, but they only double down on it. They won't stop pushing their agendas -- they have money to burn, and making money is no longer the primary goal. Instead it's all about "forcing behavior."
The 'cold smack of reality' meaning what happens if they continue to throw 500 grand at idiots like that writer of a 'queer, feminist Western' that sells only 3500 copies? A little bit more of that reality and we may get our publishing industry back to good health - as the idealogical zealots who pose as editors are tossed onto the (cold) pavement.
Yes, the march through the institutions is complete and the woke mind virus is now driving the race to the bottom. It really is very dangerous. Kill the Great Power from within without firing a shot.
"Universities, Big Tech, Government Agencies, Religious Organizations, Health Care, School Boards, Corporate Media, Corporate Boardrooms, Hollywood, Professional Sports"
The word for this is "totalitarianism" and if we don't make a counter revolution immediately the entire purpose of this Great Experiment of the USA is over.
County Highway is an exceptional paper with a mix of modernity and a late 19th century attitude reflected in its format. The writing is second to none and highly relatable to middle Americans. It’s funny, thought provoking and covers a range of subjects. Great stories about interesting people and cultural oddities. It never insults the readers intelligence or lectures and will probably turn off those who enjoy reading that type of garbage. If you’re the type to read the evening paper with a glass of bourbon and perhaps a cigar this is for you. If you’re the type who’d rather nurse a tofu, fermented wheatgrass and cricket smoothie and listen to it on earbuds (which you can’t) and hope to find something to be offended with, it may not be your cup of organic herbal tea. But...I could be wrong. I am often.
I can’t recommend County Highway enough. Well worth the subscription price.
I'm so encouraged to read about all these options and the possible shift in the publishing world. I used to LOVE reading fiction & non-fiction but it's been years since I could find fiction books in which some full-left political talking point didn't take center stage. Can't wait to dig into the options in this article and to follow these publishers!
I agree. Many of the contemporary fiction novels I read have “narrative” sentences thrown in that do nothing for the story. It’s like it’s shoehorned into everything.
Yes! I just read the book Horse which was a fabulous novel based on the incredible race horse, Lexington. The amount of woke nonsense in that book was ridiculous and ruined the whole story for me.
I read Horse last month as well. So many of these historical fiction novels take important stories, but also have a timeline in the present that mirrors the past so closely that the reader has to conclude the safe woke perspective.
Instead of learning about the past, all you feel after reading Horse is sadness about today's world. In reality, if anyone behaved like the martyr-hero of Geraldine Brooks' novel, he would be friendless because no one could possibly live up to his standards.
Literature should lift us up, not tear us down. Today's mainstream publishers aren't interested in anything other than tearing us down. If Fahrenheit 451 were written today, and Ray Bradbury wanted to get published, it would have to be written from the perspective of the heroic (and likely checking off a few identity boxes) fireman who fights to identify and destroy the underground library.
It's so true. So many books coming out now are political. I love finding authors on Substack that are just writing according to their own unique niche. All I want at the end of the day is a good book!
Woke now permeates everything, regardless of how little it relates to plot or character. I find myself abandoning book after book only a few chapters in because I resent “the spoonful of bitter” being shoved down my throat. I’ve abandoned more books in the last three years then I had abandoned in the previous 30 years.
I picked up a book at the library recently about a subject very much in the news since Feb. of ‘22. I had done extensive reading and research already and hoped the book would perhaps provide new information and give an unbiased analysis laying out arguments for both sides. I kid you not I stopped reading before reaching the end of the first page. The authors bias was that obvious in the opening paragraph. I looked up the author and was reminded why I made a habit of looking up authors BEFORE deciding to read a book. Won’t make that mistake again.
Finally, the Free Press does an article on this hugely important problem which plagues publishing both in the US and in the UK.
You can read the LoobyLou substack which does try to pull back the curtain. LoobyLou still is forced to remain anonymous. https://loobylou.substack.com/
I have been warned about sticking my head above the parapet, but as a long time subscriber of the Free Press, have been trying to say many of these things for awhile. Yes, it is bad and yes there is a huge culture of fear. Yes, the Identity Synthesis did have a short march through publishing (and yes, there were problems with gatekeeping etc -- I remain uncertain if embracing the Identity Synthesis was the correct way to solve it).
One of the problems with the Identity Synthesis is that it assumes people can not write about cultures which they have no direct experience. Historical fiction which does occupy a sizable percentage of the fiction market is by definition writing about cultures and time periods which the author has no direct experience with. Are we to abandon historical -- a genre which I have written in for over 17 years? Or are we going to reembrace universalism and recognise that human emotion is a constant? Love, for example is timeless, even if the social milieus alter.
They do. But much has not been thought through. If you have a prohibition against writing out of the lived experience, how can you write something set in the past? Why would anyone want to read anything set in the past, not the eternal present if people are incapable of empathising or indeed learning from the experiences of others? How big is a market if people can only understand things if they are written by people who are in the same broad grouping as them? Or can only understand music if it is played by someone who shares the same group?
They would only want people from 'oppressed' groups to write if their experience/writing shared that prescribed narrative. If a writer decided to write about the experience of Captain John Perkins, the first black/mixed race Royal Naval officer who lived at the end of the 18th century or indeed James Skinner who founded Skinner's Horse at the start of the 19th century and was a member of the East India Company, they would most likely not be following the correct narrative. It is actually a very bigoted way of thinking to my mind but what do I know?
The driving force behind publishing (as with much else) is sales, not virtue. I live in hope that they will begin to see the trap into which they have inadvertently stumbled.
Authoritarian regimes have rarely ever been friendly to the arts. And that’s what Woke is— an authoritarian regime grasping for power. They squash freedom of expression for either your safety, or for your “virtue.” It’s a guise to control. It’s time more people started seeing through the guise.
Yes, it reminds me a bit of how the nazis closely controlled the portrayal of their “race” in the arts, and how the Soviets also had similarly strict parameters.
The inability to see that trap is what leads to Go Woke, Go Broke.
But these editors will probably never see it, even if they lose their jobs over it. In their minds, the "virtue" of their aims is paramount. Nothing else matters.
I suspect it may be more subtle than that as they never see the trap and of course are fiercely ambitious. It has been a good way to get promoted. They felt I think that they could take their core customer with them and are not discovering that it wasn't necessarily the case. Walmart of course has severely reduced its book space as the books are not selling as well as they should be which has put tremendous pressure on the mass market paperback. For many years commercial publishers did not have to look that far beyond Walmart instead of trying to be wherever their customer shopped.
Hoping that they will see the light is like hoping to win the lottery, especially if one never plays it. Far better to extract a cost for their lunacy.
The cost will be in the diminishing sales. It is very much a Go Woke, Go Broke type of situation -- look at the sales figures quoted in the article. They overpaid for certain titles.
I think the Woke would be fine to get rid of the historical fiction category altogether, because after all, they can’t have their cult members learning any real history, or learning an alternative version of history that hasn’t been polished and pre-approved to fit the Woke Narrative.
They are already using historical fiction to rewrite history. It's a useful way to instill the Narrative. Especially when readers are eager to believe that historical fiction is "the Truth."
You might take a look at Heather Mac Donald’s latest review of the film “Bologne” and how it distorts history. (IMHO, it’s always a pleasure to read Heather.)
I just read Heather's recent critique of the propaganda in Chevalier (City Journal). Watching the trailer made me groan -- oh no, not more "white people bad," "Man with dark skin long suffering saint." Well, that's what it is, all right. Heather went to town on it. A worthwhile read.
Artificial history ushered in through artificial intelligence. History collides with the armed to the teeth with state of the art weapons future. Future wins.
Some of it has to do with economies of scales and the consolidation within the industry. Most of the reading public probably does not realise how large the big five publishers are and which imprints they control. Things are altering with small independent presses such as Swift Press who took the chance on Hannah Barnes's Time to Think and had a huge pay day. Amazon controls much of the algorithms for self-pubbed etc
Often wonder how many publishers hang around conferences to pitch their very "correct" and "diverse" books to English teachers. A whole generation of future readers have been prescribed books that meet the standard of being sensitive and diverse (diverse=writers representing different races and sexual orientation not different writing styles). Books offered are "leveled" and/or have AR test points assigned to them so beginning readers are restricted to the shallow end of the literature pool by lazy reading programs and teachers.
If a nonreader is a person who has not found the right books to inspire them to become a reader, then it is grossly disappointing that schools do not offer a variety of genres, topics, and authors to their students to entice students to become readers. A local high school offers Barbara Kingsolver as a group read all four years. An introduction to Kingsolver may have merit, but why not use the next three years to offer the opportunity to read other literary works that may encourage and support a student to become a reader?
One wonders if the current system that is supported by publishers leveling books, creating AR test, and marketing a narrow selection of pc books is established to prevent students from becoming readers. The tragedy is not the downfall of the publishers but that students are given dreary reading programs that almost discourages reading.
In the UK, schools and school libraries are definitely assessed on their diversity. Also various themed days and months are tailor made for themed books.
There are problems with getting children, particularly boys to read. The books they like are not necessarily the books the Great and the Good would choose to bestow prizes on.
The challenge of a school library book collection is to have good books that reflect the readers' culture, race, etc. along with their diverse and changing reading skills and the readers' incredible variety of interests. A dynamic and well read collection of books cannot be prescribed by percentages of books representing x, y, and z.
Many boys are or could be great readers if what they read was accepted as reading. Their interests also need to be incorporated into the library in a variety of nonfiction books including instruction manuals, that scary book series, and (gasp) even war books. (These books or any other library books added to the collection need to consider and be appropriate for the emotional maturity of the readers ) The tight restrictions for what is evaluated as good and appropriate book has narrowed in many ways and then became unwholesomely broadened in other directions.
I have not murdered anyone in my lifetime...not yet anyway. Would that exclude me from writing a book about a serial killer? That’s where logic takes that silly argument.
Agreed about the logic. But have you read Brandilyn Collins -- Getting Into Character Seven Secrets a Novelist can learn from an Actor? In that, she had a great section about tapping into emotions and uses the experience of swatting flies to extrapolate how a psychopath would feel about murder. Creation of character (through method acting) is a large part of being an actor, apparently. Anyway, the book is a very interesting read and helped me when I was trying to learn -- how does one create a character who resonates with the reader.
“It’s people listening to market forces and realizing that what happens on social media isn’t necessarily real life.”
Alas, paying $250k advances for books that sell 3,000 copies (haha) is not a sustainable business model.
This is the same thing that is happening with Netflix and Disney and everyone else. In 2020 they started thinking they had to get on board with “representation” and all the rules about who can write about what and what stories they “have “ to tell. They all started pushing the same stories at us. And guess what? They lost money. Because turns out people turn to television and movies (and books) for entertainment, not for lessons in wokeness. Indeed, we turn to these things to ESCAPE all the political bullshit.
The Big Five publishing houses are, first and foremost, businesses, not social activism machines. Once they remember that, they will either produce books accordingly—the kind of books people actually want to read—or they will perish. Because guess what? While it’s fun for editors and producers to pat themselves on the back for telling formulaic woke stories and pushing their ideology on readers/viewers, it’s not fun to read preachy books (or watch preachy movies) that hit us over the head with these completely irrational, illiberal philosophies. Weirdly, people aren’t inclined to pay for that experience.
Newly returned Bob Iger has promised to respect the audience more and get back to the traditional Disney style. He is likely lying his ass off but who cares. If he does mean it good luck handing out pink slips to the fat, mustachioed gender fluid dude wearing a fairy costume greeting your confused children at the entrance of the Magic All-Inclusive Castle.
That's what is so crazy, these publishing houses aren't even making money on new books. They spend a ton of money to land a celebrity contract but then make their money on their backlist (and repeat sales of Stephen King classics). Even as a business, they don't know which books will be successful. It's more like venture capital investing. Put money into several businesses and hope one becomes the unicorn!
The stockholders of these companies probably care about profits, but I doubt the people making editing decisions do. For them, it's all about advancing The Cause, and being applauded by their comrades,
I miss the days you could get the paper, sit down and read over a cup of coffee during the week or the huge "bonus" Sunday paper. Its nice to not have a screen in your face, and it was even better to read actual, properly written text. The publishers (whether in online or paper form) have surely resorted to poor but "flashy" writers; people who look to fit some mold of a movement rather than individuals who can express thoughts in an educated and creative way. I remember reading MANY glowing reviews on Amazon over some new "poet" that all the younger kids are reading about "life, love, abuse, sexuality" - and all it was was run on sentences written in "poem" form filled with lines of complaints with the addition with a few vulgar words sprinkled in. No one can even properly craft an email anymore let alone write poetry! It's refreshing to see more and more people find the knack to using Substack to provide the world actual written art.
I remember when it was a huge deal to find a misplaced comma, typo, or grammatical error in the NYT (and rare in the WSJ). Now I feel lucky to find a coherent or non-ideological paragraph
I feel like the internet has only helped to decrease the skill of writing. Every piece of advice about writing on online spaces says to keep paragraphs short-- like really short. I get so annoyed at many poorly written blog posts out there, even articles in major websites. This new style for online writing annoys me to death. An article should not be written by starting a new paragraph every other sentence, and yet this is what the “experts” tell you to do, least anyone actually bother to take the time to read anything longer than 140 characters.
Good writers say a lot with fewer words. Run of the mill writers say very little. Word counts are meaningless if the author has no ability to make the mundane interesting. I would like to know who these “experts” are. Anyone in any form of media can call themself an expert in today’s culture of shameless self promotion . At some point experience, expertise and credentials didn’t matter anymore to anyone as long as they liked what they heard.
That’s true. But no matter the word count, good writing doesn’t need to be reduced to creating new paragraphs every other sentence. These “experts” are indeed shameless self-promoters in addition to anyone who’s “made it” in the blogger sphere.
I used to enjoy reading many editorialists with whom I may have strongly disagreed just to enjoy the delightful craftsmanship of their prose. A long-lost art! And don't get me started on the massive increase in word use errors, mispunctuation and incomprehensible grammar that seems to pass for literary genius in the press these days.
I miss print newspaper as well. Sometimes I read TFP on my laptop. When seeing the home page and links to all surrounding articles, I feel nostalgic for print and have often thought that I’d really enjoy getting TFP delivered to my mailbox...if even a newsletter sized publication.
I absolutely love to escape in a book. I read 25-35 books a year. I’m a member of Amazon Prime. The quality of books have become unreadable. It’s a shame. Go to Prime reading and see for yourself. It’s le’s “diverse” than it’s ever been!
For a good chuckle go to your nearest thrift store and look at their book selection. You’d be amazed at how many books there are written-or ghost written which is usually the case-by some of the most forgettable people that ever worked in Washington DC. Those books will never leave the store unless shipped to a recycling center.
The so-called prize list books have also become boring and silly. The expectation is not to love all the books or every writing style, but there use to be one or more great reads to discover on prize lists.
I was recently in NYC for a week and met with various folks in the book business. It was a dark experience. I've tried out various adjectives to capture the general mood. And I think I have the correct description: everybody was humiliated. They know they're not living up to their own personal and professional values and it's eating at their souls.
As Herb Stein said many years ago, what can’t go on forever won’t. The major publishing houses have given into the screams , wails, and teeth gnashing of the little junior high girls
who work in book publishing to the extent that they affect their profitability. When this happens over an extended period something has got to give. Now two things are happening: the rise of new small publishers to fill the void and the weeding out of employees who if retained will ultimately put you out of business. Congrats to publishing a great and much needed piece!
In almost every article I read, the fear of a group of self designated "activists" makes companies capitulate. Why is that? Is it an act by fellow ideological soulmates or do they think the public in general get moral suasion from these fringe characters. I think society would improve dramatically if we ignored these people.
But if it's a plan coordinated on the inside and outside to enforce progressive ideology, is that too much conspiracy to be true?
It's immature adults who are so culturally programmed to a) want to be cool and b) to associate coolness with youth and the latest thing that they have absolutely no tools or principles to fall back on when the youth go nuts and the latest thing is insane.
You see the same thing among parents. My daughters third grade class last year had an issue with kids shouting out stuff from TikTok and You Tube shorts in the middle of class. Who the F hands their 8 year old an iPad and just let's them go to town on social media?
Apparently everyone. This is at a private Catholic school with mostly upper middle class, socially and politically conservative parents. When screen use comes up in conversation people shrug and say "I don't want my kid to be left out of what the other kids are doing."
I'm sorry, but *what.*
I'm pretty sure my own parents main goal in life for 12 years was making me as left out as possible from "what the other kids are doing.". Because they were grown ups. They had a very solid idea of what the good life and adulthood entailed and did not care if it tracked with some corporately manufactured youth culture idea idea of "cool."
There are not a lot of actual grown ups left in society, either in the home or the office - just a lot of aging teens-at-heart still trying to be cool.
"It's immature adults who are so culturally programmed to a) want to be cool and b) to associate coolness with youth and the latest thing that they have absolutely no tools or principles to fall back on when the youth go nuts and the latest thing is insane."
I agree. But once you buy into hip-at-all-cost your vote pretty much goes blue. It is not cool, hip, or chic to be realistic, pragmatic, or practical. I really appreciate your comment because that has been my observation as well.
I think you are spot on. I would also add that there is a virtue-signaling component as well. In addition to being “cool” the Left has convinced people that being moral has nothing to do with how you act but with what you say you believe. And it’s enticing because it’s much easier to capitulate to the Narrative than actually try to be a morally good person. If I can be seen as virtuous and cool without even trying to change myself, why not?
I thank God every day that my mom had no money. Our house was focused on basic survival. Real life. My moms goal for us was that we didn't cause troubles for others. If a call came from the school, there was going to be heck to pay at home lol. Even though I have done fairly well for myself, those core values and experiences have stuck with me.
It’s funny you say that. I am 62, rode a school bus for 11 years and attended small rural schools. I know, with no doubt, that the last thing I wanted, or my cohorts wanted, was to have done something so egregious that the school had to call my or my cohorts parents after school. That would have been doomsday.
Read and heed! The only time I've ever set foot in Trader Joe's was after they told some Karen who took exception to the "Cultural Appropriation" of their cutesy house-brand names to go pound sand. It happens, and it can work.
Yep! When I was 22 I understood that I had to work hard and kiss ass to keep my entry level job.
It was pretty well understood 20 years ago that graduation meant the party was over and your undergraduate self got left behind when you entered the real world.
Time for adults to start reasserting that message.
They force this through the Board. They threaten exposing said company on social media as not towing the cultural Marxist line. This existential risk is viewed by the Board as too great to their brand, reputation and earnings potential. So they capitulate. This is / was repeated across corporate America over the past 10 years and now has very deep roots.
My company basically caters to these people now because there are so many that they have to hire them. Part of the DEI training, in my opinion, is to teach young people how to function in a corporation. When I took that class, I was laughing all the way through it. I am surprised fast food places can even survive with the current group of workers coming into the workplace. McDonalds must have very good training. My company spends a lot of money on training.
This is a good one. It did bring up bad memories for me, but I also feel a sense of vindication. Thank you for writing this!
In 2013 I began an MFA (Master of Fine Arts) program in creative writing. I had spent my life to that point on western fire crews, in the Army, and working in oil and gas fields. I had never heard of "woke" or identity politics even though I'm from a very liberal NPR-kind of family. I wanted to write about my experiences and adventures--just tell interesting stories about interesting times and the interesting people I'd met along the way. I didn't care at all about placing myself, or women in general, as the victim in the male-dominated worlds of firefighting, the military, and the oil and gas patch. I also didn't care about advancing the global-warming (it was global warming then, before the "climate change" rebranding) finger-wagging--you know, by saying how evil those Wyoming oil and gas operators are and how terrible the whole industry is.
The MFA program was made up of mostly middle-aged white women who were not the sole income-earners in their families.
These women tore my writing to shreds. I just wouldn't say the stuff they wanted to hear. I was supposed to be an angry victim of "The Patriarchy" who spent all my time wringing my hands over the warming planet. Instead, I was like, "let me tell you about this time in the Army when our team found a lost beagle in the woods during survival school."
In turn I found their writing boring, self-involved, and crazy. So many words saying so little, most of it on being unhappy about...well, I'm not quite sure. But we all better be *sorry,* dammit.
It was during this time I coined the phrase "God save me from middle-aged white women." Which, as a middle aged white woman myself, is not only heartfelt, but also just good fun. Did I mention the humorlessness of this crowd?
I am increasingly encouraged that the signs like those described in this and other FP essays seem to indicate that we have reached a societal tipping point. We may, as a people, have finally become disgusted with the crazies on both the left and right. All the newspeak gibberish and racial nonsense that has sought to shred the fabric of our social connectivity may have peaked in effectiveness, thanks in part to efforts by the Free Press and other in the press and publishing communities. One can only pray that the tide has turned.
And now for something totally unpolitical, fun and entertaining---I have been working on a novel making fun of Home Owner Associations and the little bully neighbors who run them and think they can push the other neighbors around. Still have to explore the self publishing world. If you have ever lived in a HOA community, you will relate to this book.
NC Maureen, I spent six LONG years of my life serving on my HOA Board, and as a result I HATE humanity! Sure enough, there are some great story arcs to be explored on this subject. I'd be interested to hear about YOUR experiences. Mine were not very positive. One thing that I learned early on was that if a male were running against a female, the male would lose every single time! Why? Because women were considered to be less confrontational...hahahahahaha!
Women are less confrontational?!? Who in the holy hell said that?
NO ONE! But it it's the defacto opinion of people who voted but are not connected to the results. I found them to be much less "in your face", but MUCH more passive aggressive. The results were the same in the end.
Here's a comment that has nothing to do with HOA.
If and when a pushback against Wokeness ever happens, it would be important for it to focus its retributions. This would involve understanding that the worst excesses of virtue-signalling are not evenly distributed among progressive-minded people. Some fields are absolute MAGNETS for the worst kind of narcissistic malcontents. And the legacy publishing business is right up there at the top of the phoneyness pyramid. https://grahamcunningham.substack.com/p/invasion-of-the-virtue-signallers
Amen 🙏
I’m sure there are exceptions. I don’t think confrontational is the right term, but in certain environments and as a general rule, women are the consensus makers. I hate it. But then again, that’s why I’ve always been one of those disliked women. I go against the grain too much. That’s why I’m here. Ha!
It's true! Women are less confrontational! Exhibit 1 HRC! Exhibit 2 Rasheeda Tlaib. Exhibit 3 Whatsername. Exhibit 4 Bari Wiss, or Wess, or Woiss, or something like that. ;-)
Women are less confrontational than... what? Hmm. A stampeding herd of elephants? Angry rhinoceroses? Oops! No, definitely not less than that. I'll stick with the elephants.
Don’t forget Nukey Haley.
You and my husband could spend hours over beer one upping each other with stories.
I am a mediator in Florida. Because pre-suit mediation is mandated in state law, I charge a reduced rate to COAs and HOAs and the owners. I have seen a lot! But it goes both ways. Some associations have that one litigious owner, sapping legal fees from the entire community, and others (many others) have overzealous boards. I try to do what I can. I remember the legislator who wrote the condo laws - for the developers.
I’m in an HOA of 120 homes. Our monthly payment is $35.00 and the neighborhood hums. Our President is a retired marine now 80 years old and this is his hobby. I thank him every time I see him. I know this is not the norm.
After we sold that condo, I swore to NEVER buy into another HOA run neighborhood.
Same experience as you. Got tricked into doing it, and hated every minute of it. When we sold that home, one of the “musts” on our list for the realtor was “no HOA”.
Off topic but funny. This rings true. Watch to the end:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFeNSB66PY0
That was hilarious!
Wow. These comments started off in the weeds, and went from there out to see-ya-later!
Trying for a comment on topic here. Yes, mainstream NY publishers want books that are, essentially, lies. May those corporations die and their staff become truly homeless --- so they learn what is actually going on out there. But, by writing this, I reveal that I have been connected to that "elite" who believe they rule the literary world. It reminds me of days of yore when IBM ruled computers, and force-fed customers hardware until there were other options.
I suspect that is the problem with these comments. Most people do not have experience dealing with NY publishers and their agendas. So they write about what they know. Which is HOAs! I have an HOA story too, but... No. I won't.
Of course, there are books that are just badly written too. Or boring. Yes. There are.
Looking for a new read?:
Here's my book (The Crew, by Michael Mohr): https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B0CTRRBM6J/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?ie=UTF8&qid=&sr=
Michael Mohr
Sincere American Writing
https://michaelmohr.substack.com/
My BIL took over a corrupted, financially broke HOA, uncovered wrong doing and set the HOA on the right path. He was then viewed as the devil incarnate! Go figure.
Unpopular Kids don't become popular if they cure cancer AND walk on water. You can take that to the bank.
In HOA's the method is the "over the fence" gossip tactic. No facts, no logic, just character assassination.
hmm. a confrontational male is a 'bully'. A confrontational female is a 'Karen'- Can't win..
I'm laughing about the "HATE humanity"...also, women are less confrontational🤣
Oh dear!!!
I know this is boring and I am the one who usually is off topic, but back on topic:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/opinion/jordan-peterson-stuns-maher-s-audience-into-silence-over-democrats/ar-AA1kyVvr?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=d8ac5e8392cd4f64b57e335619c88652&ei=19
This guy nails it.
By the way, in Ireland the Green Party wants to pass a bill that will make it illegal for people to own material that questions the validity of "gender identity". So, it will likely go beyond being able to publish such "controversial" (to almost no one) ideas let alone own anything that isn't all in for the cult.
https://www.irishtimes.com/crime-law/2022/10/26/new-bill-to-criminalise-incitement-to-hatred-against-transgender-people-following-cabinet-agreement/
https://www.foxnews.com/world/ireland-anti-hate-law-pushed-wake-dublin-riots-could-criminalize-memes-poses-free-speech-concerns
Thx for that link, Lonesome. Peterson was great as usual! Nailed it.
This FP article might mention publishers like Regnery Publishing where Abigail Shrier published her groundbreaking "Irreversible Damage" book.
I'm looking for more... Gee, on Amazon I see only 2 used copies of "When Sally becomes Harry Paperback" by Ryan T. Anderson - and they are selling for $99.
Deborah Soh published "The End of Gender: Debunking the Myths about Sex and Identity in Our Society " under Threshold Editions. I don't know that one.
Dr. Miriam Grossman published "Lost in Trans Nation: A Child Psychiatrist's Guide Out of the Madness Hardcover" under Skyhorse.
And, Helen Joyce published "Trans" under Oneworld Publications
Oof. Thanks for the link. Beautifully summarized.
Thanks lonesome. I missed that one. JP can frame an issue like no other.
I self published 5 books on Amazon and am working on book six with modest success. Writing is fun looking for a publisher is boring. Unlike the books in the article above, my books are mind candy filled with real interesting 19th century characters like Liver Eatin' Johnson , Lotta Crabtree, Bass Reeves and others.
Writing keeps me off the streets.
Check out my Substack. You might like it!
Are they in print...or eBook format (or both)?
Both
I work for a book manufacturing company (we also provide eBook services). Let me know if you ever want a bid.
By bid, what do you mean?
For the printing and binding of your physical book.
Nice, man. Congrats. I just self-published my first book, a punk rock literary novel that many agents rejected due to my horrible whiteness
Tell them you are a black, Hispanic, American Indian. It worked for Elizabet Warren.
Didn't Seinfeld cover this in an episode about his parents in Miami. Nevertheless, a worthwhile subject for further mining. Press on and good luck.
It would never happen today. Those shows are close to 30 years ago. Which is why they are so entertaining. Good ol' Del Boca Vista. Kramer could be my puppet dictator any day!
His rant wasn't very funny. But don't take my word for it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amjUNF_R_PY
I understand that Mr Seinfeld has said more or less the same thing -- or at least that he could no longer do what he once did.
They are all about power. I won’t live in a HOA. Prefer the isolation of the country, a gravel drive, and no street lights. You are brilliant as always NCMaureen.
Wait, do you live in my neighborhood? We’ve been fighting those bullies since we moved into our neighborhood 4 years ago. The fun thing is we’ve been kicking their butts because they are so stupid. It does make for a fun retirement hobby.
Hi neighbor !
My wife actually joined ours. She daily bangs her head against the wall. The simplest and most obvious things get so controversial amongst board members.
Been a President of a HOA and actually used common sense to make changes and reduced costs. The next year, didn't run and it went back to little Hitlers running things and hatred everywhere. Never will live in a HOA area again.
Indeed that was similar experience for us. I'm a tradesman and was able to utilize friendships within the various trades to rectify myriad problems. Largely a thankless effort and once the market took that upswing we sold. HOA? Never again.
Love your idea. My own approach to HOAs has been to become a termite officer. It turns out there are not as many busy bodies as people think. Find the majority that hates the busy bodies. Collect their proxies. Get in office. Spend the time to stay in touch with the members of that majority. Keep them happy. Stay in office. Change the term limit bylaw provisions if necessary.
You’ll just have to wait for my book!
With every character named "Karen?"
I eagerly await!!
Keep us posted. If it's even half as entertaining and trenchant as your offerings here it will be a huge success.
A cousin in Florida has been going on about how insane the HOA is at her complex and how glad she is that she's only renting. I was a guest at another cousin's complex in Phoenix and got bullied out of the pool by a couple of elderly lesbians. Another resident had self-published a memoir about her transgender "daughter" a subject I was told to sagely avoid around her. I bought the book and...well....Anyway, I see the potential for comedy gold in this topic. Looking forward to reading...
Wait...I want to hear more about how the senior lesbians bullied you out of the pool.
I got kicked out a poolside chair in my MIL's condo by an HOA policeman. It was a cloudy day and there was no one else there!! Note to self: don't become one of those people
That is a rich vein of ore to be mined, for sure!
I think a novel about HOAs would count as dystopian fiction. Little private dystopias, all of them.
Stepford dystopias!
I would love to read that! We live on a cul de sac. Twice in the last year, our son was visiting us and he made the unforgivable sin of leaving his car parked in front of our house...overnight. We are the kind of people who adhere to the rules...we just forgot the second time it happened. We got letters both times. Remember, we live on a cul de sac. 🙄
Good post as always, Mo. Good luck with the book.
It's a popular and uncovered topic.....be sure to let us know when we can give it a read.
I may be an outlier here, but I see trade-offs living in an HOA. There are some plusses.
I don't want some nutjob parking his rusted out 1968 VW tye-died minibus in front of my house. Or the slob who won't mow his lawn, paint his house, or trim the bushes.
You are correct. There are trade-offs. I lived in an HOA once and never again. Now I live in a neighborhood that is mostly nice but a has few of those "nut jobs" and I'll take them any day over the true nut jobs that often run HOAs. We all have our preferences and as I have always said: If you chose to not live in an HOA, remember, you're neighbors don't live in an HOA either. (Apologies to Alex for responding to an off-topic thread, but I excuse my breach by believing that this thread provides future authors (including Maureen) great topical material.)
LOL! My parents own a small condominium and have been unfortunately promoted to the HOA board after a series of folks resigned. The drama that goes on has made for some good laughs over the years- it would make a most excellent book!
Already do. Would love to see something satirical on that subject.
Great piece, long overdue. One note: George Floyd was not murdered, but died of a fentanyl overdose, which the autopsy report makes clear. Since this is a piece about honesty in the face of orthodoxy, it’s an important point.
Trust me when I say that you're point is not lost on me, but I've watched the George Floyd video many times and I'm not sure I can get on board with the idea that Derek Chauvin didn't have at least a roll in his death. I also believe 2 things can be true at once (asphyxiation & fentanyl overdose)
Please read this sub post by Dr Pierre Kory concerning this thoughts on Floyds death. It's pretty insightful IMO:
https://pierrekorymedicalmusings.com/p/george-floyd-did-not-die-of-a-fentanyl
As a cop, if you arrest someone, they resist, you apply submission practices as trained by your PD and they die of heart failure, sure you had a “role in their death”. It’s then revealed not only did the deceased have 2.5x the lethal dose of Fentanyl in their veins but also had a congenital heart condition and no signs of trachea damage or asphyxiation, is it tantamount to murder? That the other officers who were attempting crowd control got lengthy sentences as well should tell you the fix was in.
After watching the movie (https://www.thefallofminneapolis.com/) I felt sick for the other officers. I did not even realize they got jail sentences also. I believe it was Officer Thao who was on the SECOND call of his police career, and was sentenced to 4 years, 9 months.
I am married to a cop (now retired thank goodness) and all the left's ideas hurt the poor and minorities. The riots ruined cites and many people died. But they don't care.
Yep
Justice and a fair trial were not the priority. Avoiding the rioting that took place after Floyd’s death was. A ceasefire agreement with the terms, “Well throw the officers in jail for a long time if you agree not to riot.”
*We’ll
Nope, not murder. See thefallofminneapolis.com
Was just going to say this!
Does seem like there should be some better protocol for how to deal with a person who continues to say “I can’t breathe” even while restraining them. In addition, given how popular fentanyl is now, seems to me that there is a need for officers and emergency responders to recognize the effects of potential fentanyl overdose— I’m no expert, but it seems like it can make the person somewhat violent followed by the feeling of morning able to breath.
So while, yes Floyd died of a fentanyl overdose, I agree with Evans W that Chauvin isn’t completely innocent. He may not be guilty of murder, but I would hope that someone dying of fentanyl overdose would actually be safer in the hands of a policeman— again, if there was recognition of this and then handed over to an emergency care team to address his acute condition.
What do you think they were doing while Chauvain was kneeling on him? They were waiting for an ambulance.
I've had that hold done to me. It is painful and unpleasant, but he would have had to work a lot harder than he did to kill Floyd. The whole thing is ludicrous.
Not one person in a hundred has seen the footage of them trying to get him in the back of the patrol car, and him saying "I can't breathe" before anyone ever touched him.
The whole thing is a travesty of justice, and the irony is that prosecuting innocent white cops who were just trying to do their jobs caused cops all around the country to say "F it", stop doing their jobs, and that in turn resulted in hundreds of added homicides, mostly of black men by black men, just in 2020. All the outrage had the effect of killing young black men, and given that saving the lives of young black men was the ostentible purpose, achieving the opposite result and then lying about it approaches evil, and certainly qualifies as an unmitigated and inexcusable disaster.
Actually I have seen that footage, which is probably why the hold seemed a bit harsh to me, someone unfamiliar with police holds like that one. Just from an outsider’s perspective, if someone is saying “I can’t breathe” before you touch him, definitely seems like something is wrong. To go from that to being held on the ground- just seemed like there should have been a better way to hold him while waiting for an ambulance and/or help him before paramedics got there. Maybe there isn’t and I just don’t know. I appreciate hearing your perspective as someone who has been in a hold like that before.
But regardless of whose is at fault, I agree with you about the outcome of the whole situation. The whole narrative that ran from this one event devastated police forces and killed many more black men than it did save them. It devastated communities as well.
I’d agree if he died from asphyxia. He died from a cardiac arrest which he would’ve suffered from on his stomache or back. A muscular man over 250 lbs physically resists arrests, high on Fentanyl / meth and is now cuffed behind his back. What submission technique would you recommend as you wait for an ambulance? Chauvin had his knee on Floyd’s upper left shoulder, not neck as he was trained at MPD Academy.
Simple question: what should they have done? He needed to be arrested, was seemingly having a panic attack, and was very quickly getting combative.
I watched the documentary too; he went berserk, he was completely wild, virtually impossible for a number of strong young policemen to control. I’m not surprised that he had a cardiac arrest.
If you watch The Fall of Minneapolis, you'll learn that this was a technique all of the police were trained in and Floyd was stopped the year before and the same procedures were used......and he lived.
Who knows what the truth is? "Everything means everything so nothing means anything." Floyd was a player under the influence and Chauvin was a rookie cop. The professional poseur virtuosity of the "woke"/MSM pile on did what it is intended to do in every situation. Line the pockets of the beast and scream over the top of objective moral reason. The traumatized psyche of the general public and the survive at any cost city hall bureaucracy gladly went along for the ride. In truth nobody involved gave a flying f'k about either Floyd or Chauvin. They were just glad it isn't happening to them.
And, they should be. Because, the man behind the man whispering lovingly into the ear of moral evil and funding the social/cultural disintegration of the American Republic has the boys at the station house working overtime polishing their shiny new jackboots.
Mr. Perez's article is one more report on the fight against the mal pathology spreading from the rotten heart of criminal finance and their "break a few eggs to make an omelette" DEI comrades now butchering the American psyche. It is the mal pathology of the usurper and the jackal. It is the Biblical proverbial bind the strong man of the house in order to rob it. American freedom is literally the Grail. Truth is light. Speak it.
And, remember our friend Commander Cohen: "..ring the bell that still can ring....forget your perfect offering....there is a crack..a crack in everything ..that's how the light get in..."
That's correct.
The officers called for EMS 38 seconds after Mr. Floyd was on the ground. They were 8 blocks away, and went to the wrong location. It’s all documented on video and was inadmissible in the corrupt trial presided over a corrupt judge with ties to the corrupt prosecutor whose background was defending 3 of the most violent gangs in Minneapolis. The Minny Medical Examiner’s report is also very clear. There is much more. Please watch the documentary, it’s shocking.
For a crime to be considered murder it should have some premeditation or intent. Chauvin’s charges and sentencing was politically motivated to appease the marauding mob. He was never going to get a fair hearing. It’s shameful and it’s definitely not justice.
It doesn’t require premeditation for 2nd degree, just depraved indifference. Even so, Chauvin was going by the book as taught by MPD. He even obliged Floyd’s request to be taken out of the car to “breathe”. The jury were clearly intimidated by the rioters to make the “right” decision. Shame on the SCOTUS for denying review.
The degrees of murder and how they’re applied vary state to state. You’re correct in saying it doesn’t require premeditation for 2nd degree murder. What I was saying is in murder convictions it “should” be intent that is a determinant, not that it is.
Yes, absolutely it’s a miscarriage of justice that the SCOTUS wouldn’t hear the case. Cowardly I would say. Shame on them. And shame on the US prison system that its officers couldn’t even keep Chauvin from being stabbed. It’s a horrible indictment of the so called justice system that is going to rot.
And have the rioters show up at their homes? Not a chance in hell for review.
I take it you didn't watch the trial, haven't read the autopsy report, and don't know that the restraint Chauvin used is sanctioned by the dept. for perps on fentanyl who are likely to experience "excited delirium" which gives them superhuman strength. His knee was not on Floyd's neck, but on his shoulder, and no airwave obstruction appears in the autopsy. Floyd had swallowed his fentanyl before and in The Fall of Minneapolis there's a close-up of a gob of it in Floyd's mouth. He died of a drug overdose AND he's the only person with COVID who didn't "die of Covid" in 2020.
Thanks for posting that link. It lays to rest much of the bs about the multiple factors that contributed to his death.
Glad you pointed that out Jesper. It was the one line in this essay, that I disagreed with. After watching “The Fall of Minneapolis” , and reading the autopsy report, I believe that George Floyd’s death wasn’t legally caused by Chauvin or any of those police officers trying to do their jobs. What I do know is that the justice system in Minnesota, like the publishing companies described in this essay are perilously driven by their progressive ideology. As more people begin to realize these abuses, the publishing co’s will lose enough revenue to make them obsolete. But, the toying around with liberty by prosecutors and judges has far greater consequences.
Excellent point. It’s jarring to read he was murdered when the evidence says otherwise. Incredibly disingenuous.
The same is true for the television and movie industry. It’s almost impossible to find any recent production that doesn’t include at least one gay couple, a stereotypical white conservative nut job, and marginalized characters that have nothing to do to the storyline. I’ve always prided myself as a pretty tolerant viewer, but now I find myself turning off most of these limited series about three episodes in. We’re sacrificing good plot lines of human interest and struggles for fringe ideology.
and don't forget the white woman with the obligatory black boyfriend/husband
In the past, if a show or commercial had a minority or gay character, I never thought much about it. Now, when I watch TV, which is not too often, I find myself looking at the race and sexual identity of the actors, and how there has to be "one of each" and not caring about the product or leftist plotline. My church is very diverse, and I never think about backround or race of the person.
Same
One of the more interesting mysteries on either Britbox or Acorn TV is Vera. One of her latest episodes had a trans who was beaten up and wanted to go to the women's shelter (Vera kept calling her "Lass"). Same episode had a "little person," lesbian couple (checked two boxes b/c they were interracial), and more.
Case in point - "Rings of Power." Here's a great write-up about that. https://www.lewrockwell.com/2023/11/bretigne-shaffer/why-rings-of-power-is-so-terrible-and-why-it-doesnt-matter/
Excellent article
This has infected the TV commercial advertising space too.
Car commercials, etc….
Even the most well written independent shows are under immense pressure to appease the box checking gatekeepers in the industry. Like it or not I can’t fault them for jumping through the required hoops to get their work to the screen. Some hills aren’t worth dying on.
I hate this too. I'm gay myself so I probably hate it even more than you do, because none of these is ever a character who is there for plot reasons who happens to be gay; they're always some screaming camp repulsive stereotype, there to be "celebrated". Well, I don't celebrate things I find repulsive. So honestly we now rarely watch a UK or US film made after 2010 (Spanish films seem mercifully free, still, from wokery.) I think the last straw for me was that film with Daniel Craig last year in which he played a French detective in a whodunnit set on an island. We said to each other within ten minutes "Of course the rich white guy is the villain; of course this will be a riff on BLM." And lo! The plotless, charmless mess dissolved into BLM screeching which came very close to glorifying mob-driven violence (the sort which has disfigured US cities since 2020). Go **** yourselves Hollywood and the Arts in general. If you want to make films/write books/produce newspapers that say nothing but "We hate you", be sure to know the feeling is mutual. The difference is that I don't need their money to exist, but they need ours. I hope that message gets through at some point but to be honest I won't hold my breath. Now I spend my money on DVDs and books produced before wokery took hold, so I can access the art which sustained me through childhood, adolescence and maturity. Before it's deleted in an act of violent wokery.
Well put my friend. We’ve been watching movies made in the 40s and 50s. Funny thing is, Im not very nostalgic, but it’s better than being a progressive:-)
I completely stopped watching TV a couple of years ago. My wife still watches "The Golden Girls" from the 80's (70's). The publishers are doing the same utterly stupid sorts of things that will put Disney up for sale in the not-too-distant future.
And who’d’ve thought the anti-gun anti-violence movie and television industry would struggle to produce anything that doesn’t include firing guns? They get a lot of stuff wrong too as has been clearly pointed out by my good friend who is an NRA trainer and former gun range owner.
Though I’ve never owned a firearm I am a staunch 2A supporter.
I was at a friend’s home recently and one of the John Wick movies was on TV about half way through. The gunfire was so voluminous and relentless I feared I was going to experience some type of seizure. For the sake of my health I was never so relieved to see a movie end.
Yep. Exactly. Very sad. Luckily we live in a capitalist society; the market is speaking.
"For years, there has been a growing politicization inside the industry, which editors describe as a slowly percolating illiberalism that makes it difficult to publish books by authors who don’t adhere to the new dogma".
Sounds all to familiar.
Universities, Big Tech, Government Agencies, Religious Organizations, Health Care, School Boards, Corporate Media, Corporate Boardrooms, Hollywood, Professional Sports.......the progressive mind virus ruins everything and eventually eats itself from within.
So happy to see new players like Substack can come in and serve as arbiters of true liberalism & free speech.
Also worth noting, Walter Kirn founded County Highway (20 page broad print newspaper) that I recently subscribed to and its great! (https://www.countyhighway.com)
One wonders if the cold smack of reality coming from less revenues will work at these places? It will be interesting to see if true believers will change or perish
These captured institutions can almost never recover IMHO......they just eventually collapse in on themselves.
I agree. I kept thinking as I read this article “Aren’t they in business to make money? And if they don’t, how they pay these morons?”
It’s a wonder that the contrarian publishers aren’t making a killing.
Some of these institutions are looking into other markets— like China or Russia. NYT is failing here in America, but there is a reason they wouldn’t publish anything connecting the Covid virus to Wuhan— they have a CCP-approved version of the NYT that is selling in China. Before anyone even thought about the connection, NYT people were told that it was “racist” to link it to China. All the lies to Americans to save face in order to please their new non-American market.
Exactly
Punish them in every way possible. Winston & Strawn's punch back was a brilliant start.
I mean, Disney is set to lose $750M this year on their box office flops, is down 56% of their market cap, and has admitted to shareholders part of the issue is their social goals, but they only double down on it. They won't stop pushing their agendas -- they have money to burn, and making money is no longer the primary goal. Instead it's all about "forcing behavior."
The 'cold smack of reality' meaning what happens if they continue to throw 500 grand at idiots like that writer of a 'queer, feminist Western' that sells only 3500 copies? A little bit more of that reality and we may get our publishing industry back to good health - as the idealogical zealots who pose as editors are tossed onto the (cold) pavement.
Yes. The only book with such a title that I would consider reading would be authored by Tom Robbins.
Let's hope!!
It will or they will eventually go out of business.
I think the market will prevail
Yes, the march through the institutions is complete and the woke mind virus is now driving the race to the bottom. It really is very dangerous. Kill the Great Power from within without firing a shot.
I second your approval of County Highway - I also subscribe and find the articles very well written and highly entertaining.
I listen to Walter Kern with Matt Taibbi on their weekly release.
Very entertaining.
America This Week is pure gold.
"Universities, Big Tech, Government Agencies, Religious Organizations, Health Care, School Boards, Corporate Media, Corporate Boardrooms, Hollywood, Professional Sports"
The word for this is "totalitarianism" and if we don't make a counter revolution immediately the entire purpose of this Great Experiment of the USA is over.
Word
Love Walter Kirn.
County Highway is an exceptional paper with a mix of modernity and a late 19th century attitude reflected in its format. The writing is second to none and highly relatable to middle Americans. It’s funny, thought provoking and covers a range of subjects. Great stories about interesting people and cultural oddities. It never insults the readers intelligence or lectures and will probably turn off those who enjoy reading that type of garbage. If you’re the type to read the evening paper with a glass of bourbon and perhaps a cigar this is for you. If you’re the type who’d rather nurse a tofu, fermented wheatgrass and cricket smoothie and listen to it on earbuds (which you can’t) and hope to find something to be offended with, it may not be your cup of organic herbal tea. But...I could be wrong. I am often.
I can’t recommend County Highway enough. Well worth the subscription price.
I'm so encouraged to read about all these options and the possible shift in the publishing world. I used to LOVE reading fiction & non-fiction but it's been years since I could find fiction books in which some full-left political talking point didn't take center stage. Can't wait to dig into the options in this article and to follow these publishers!
I agree. Many of the contemporary fiction novels I read have “narrative” sentences thrown in that do nothing for the story. It’s like it’s shoehorned into everything.
Yes! I just read the book Horse which was a fabulous novel based on the incredible race horse, Lexington. The amount of woke nonsense in that book was ridiculous and ruined the whole story for me.
I read Horse last month as well. So many of these historical fiction novels take important stories, but also have a timeline in the present that mirrors the past so closely that the reader has to conclude the safe woke perspective.
Instead of learning about the past, all you feel after reading Horse is sadness about today's world. In reality, if anyone behaved like the martyr-hero of Geraldine Brooks' novel, he would be friendless because no one could possibly live up to his standards.
Literature should lift us up, not tear us down. Today's mainstream publishers aren't interested in anything other than tearing us down. If Fahrenheit 451 were written today, and Ray Bradbury wanted to get published, it would have to be written from the perspective of the heroic (and likely checking off a few identity boxes) fireman who fights to identify and destroy the underground library.
Yep 👍
It's so true. So many books coming out now are political. I love finding authors on Substack that are just writing according to their own unique niche. All I want at the end of the day is a good book!
Yes!!!
Consider giving my debut literary punk rock novel a try: https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B0CTRRBM6J/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?ie=UTF8&qid=&sr=
Woke now permeates everything, regardless of how little it relates to plot or character. I find myself abandoning book after book only a few chapters in because I resent “the spoonful of bitter” being shoved down my throat. I’ve abandoned more books in the last three years then I had abandoned in the previous 30 years.
I picked up a book at the library recently about a subject very much in the news since Feb. of ‘22. I had done extensive reading and research already and hoped the book would perhaps provide new information and give an unbiased analysis laying out arguments for both sides. I kid you not I stopped reading before reaching the end of the first page. The authors bias was that obvious in the opening paragraph. I looked up the author and was reminded why I made a habit of looking up authors BEFORE deciding to read a book. Won’t make that mistake again.
That's why I almost exclusively read books from the 20th century
Finally, the Free Press does an article on this hugely important problem which plagues publishing both in the US and in the UK.
You can read the LoobyLou substack which does try to pull back the curtain. LoobyLou still is forced to remain anonymous. https://loobylou.substack.com/
I have been warned about sticking my head above the parapet, but as a long time subscriber of the Free Press, have been trying to say many of these things for awhile. Yes, it is bad and yes there is a huge culture of fear. Yes, the Identity Synthesis did have a short march through publishing (and yes, there were problems with gatekeeping etc -- I remain uncertain if embracing the Identity Synthesis was the correct way to solve it).
One of the problems with the Identity Synthesis is that it assumes people can not write about cultures which they have no direct experience. Historical fiction which does occupy a sizable percentage of the fiction market is by definition writing about cultures and time periods which the author has no direct experience with. Are we to abandon historical -- a genre which I have written in for over 17 years? Or are we going to reembrace universalism and recognise that human emotion is a constant? Love, for example is timeless, even if the social milieus alter.
From what I've seen, the Woke demand is that history must be rewritten in historical fiction. (Rewritten, of course, to conform with Woke ideology.)
They do. But much has not been thought through. If you have a prohibition against writing out of the lived experience, how can you write something set in the past? Why would anyone want to read anything set in the past, not the eternal present if people are incapable of empathising or indeed learning from the experiences of others? How big is a market if people can only understand things if they are written by people who are in the same broad grouping as them? Or can only understand music if it is played by someone who shares the same group?
If taken to its logical extreme, writing only from lived experience removes the possibility of writing fiction at all.
But what they REALLY mean is that they only want members of "oppressed" groups to write fiction (or, indeed, anything at all).
These people are appalled at the actual "lived experience" of women in history. So it isn't veracity they are after.
They would only want people from 'oppressed' groups to write if their experience/writing shared that prescribed narrative. If a writer decided to write about the experience of Captain John Perkins, the first black/mixed race Royal Naval officer who lived at the end of the 18th century or indeed James Skinner who founded Skinner's Horse at the start of the 19th century and was a member of the East India Company, they would most likely not be following the correct narrative. It is actually a very bigoted way of thinking to my mind but what do I know?
The driving force behind publishing (as with much else) is sales, not virtue. I live in hope that they will begin to see the trap into which they have inadvertently stumbled.
Authoritarian regimes have rarely ever been friendly to the arts. And that’s what Woke is— an authoritarian regime grasping for power. They squash freedom of expression for either your safety, or for your “virtue.” It’s a guise to control. It’s time more people started seeing through the guise.
Yes, it reminds me a bit of how the nazis closely controlled the portrayal of their “race” in the arts, and how the Soviets also had similarly strict parameters.
The inability to see that trap is what leads to Go Woke, Go Broke.
But these editors will probably never see it, even if they lose their jobs over it. In their minds, the "virtue" of their aims is paramount. Nothing else matters.
I suspect it may be more subtle than that as they never see the trap and of course are fiercely ambitious. It has been a good way to get promoted. They felt I think that they could take their core customer with them and are not discovering that it wasn't necessarily the case. Walmart of course has severely reduced its book space as the books are not selling as well as they should be which has put tremendous pressure on the mass market paperback. For many years commercial publishers did not have to look that far beyond Walmart instead of trying to be wherever their customer shopped.
Hoping that they will see the light is like hoping to win the lottery, especially if one never plays it. Far better to extract a cost for their lunacy.
The cost will be in the diminishing sales. It is very much a Go Woke, Go Broke type of situation -- look at the sales figures quoted in the article. They overpaid for certain titles.
But that same (il)logic applies to readers, no?
I'm not sure what you mean?
I've live, I've had lots of experience. So you might think my "lived experience" counts.
You would be wrong.
It's like J-J Rousseau's "General Will." It's whatever the ruling elite says it is.
I think the Woke would be fine to get rid of the historical fiction category altogether, because after all, they can’t have their cult members learning any real history, or learning an alternative version of history that hasn’t been polished and pre-approved to fit the Woke Narrative.
They are already using historical fiction to rewrite history. It's a useful way to instill the Narrative. Especially when readers are eager to believe that historical fiction is "the Truth."
You might take a look at Heather Mac Donald’s latest review of the film “Bologne” and how it distorts history. (IMHO, it’s always a pleasure to read Heather.)
https://www.city-journal.org/article/minor-in-a-major-key-joseph-bologne
I just read Heather's recent critique of the propaganda in Chevalier (City Journal). Watching the trailer made me groan -- oh no, not more "white people bad," "Man with dark skin long suffering saint." Well, that's what it is, all right. Heather went to town on it. A worthwhile read.
Ugh! At least I don't have to see the movie now.
Like the historical fiction that Charlotte of Mecklenburg was black?
True dat.
Sounds like a self limiting principal.
Which makes no sense.
Artificial history ushered in through artificial intelligence. History collides with the armed to the teeth with state of the art weapons future. Future wins.
Yes.
And right on cue LoobyLou has published an essay by Kate Clanchy, the Orwell Prize winning author who was cancelled because certain people took exception to her book without actually reading it. Philip Pullman ended up resigning from the Society of Authors because of its refusal to back free speech. https://open.substack.com/pub/loobylou/p/some-complaints-i-made-and-what-they?r=8gufl&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
The real question is why we permit a small cohort of "certain people" to control the rest of us. Time to smash that collective.
Some of it has to do with economies of scales and the consolidation within the industry. Most of the reading public probably does not realise how large the big five publishers are and which imprints they control. Things are altering with small independent presses such as Swift Press who took the chance on Hannah Barnes's Time to Think and had a huge pay day. Amazon controls much of the algorithms for self-pubbed etc
In a sane and law abiding nation, Amazon would face anti-trust scrutiny. In every aspect of their business.
Often wonder how many publishers hang around conferences to pitch their very "correct" and "diverse" books to English teachers. A whole generation of future readers have been prescribed books that meet the standard of being sensitive and diverse (diverse=writers representing different races and sexual orientation not different writing styles). Books offered are "leveled" and/or have AR test points assigned to them so beginning readers are restricted to the shallow end of the literature pool by lazy reading programs and teachers.
If a nonreader is a person who has not found the right books to inspire them to become a reader, then it is grossly disappointing that schools do not offer a variety of genres, topics, and authors to their students to entice students to become readers. A local high school offers Barbara Kingsolver as a group read all four years. An introduction to Kingsolver may have merit, but why not use the next three years to offer the opportunity to read other literary works that may encourage and support a student to become a reader?
One wonders if the current system that is supported by publishers leveling books, creating AR test, and marketing a narrow selection of pc books is established to prevent students from becoming readers. The tragedy is not the downfall of the publishers but that students are given dreary reading programs that almost discourages reading.
In the UK, schools and school libraries are definitely assessed on their diversity. Also various themed days and months are tailor made for themed books.
There are problems with getting children, particularly boys to read. The books they like are not necessarily the books the Great and the Good would choose to bestow prizes on.
The challenge of a school library book collection is to have good books that reflect the readers' culture, race, etc. along with their diverse and changing reading skills and the readers' incredible variety of interests. A dynamic and well read collection of books cannot be prescribed by percentages of books representing x, y, and z.
Many boys are or could be great readers if what they read was accepted as reading. Their interests also need to be incorporated into the library in a variety of nonfiction books including instruction manuals, that scary book series, and (gasp) even war books. (These books or any other library books added to the collection need to consider and be appropriate for the emotional maturity of the readers ) The tight restrictions for what is evaluated as good and appropriate book has narrowed in many ways and then became unwholesomely broadened in other directions.
As a young boy I gobbled up the Landmark bios on the great heroes and scientists. Do they even get read now?
It’s just another form of gatekeeping.
I have not murdered anyone in my lifetime...not yet anyway. Would that exclude me from writing a book about a serial killer? That’s where logic takes that silly argument.
Agreed about the logic. But have you read Brandilyn Collins -- Getting Into Character Seven Secrets a Novelist can learn from an Actor? In that, she had a great section about tapping into emotions and uses the experience of swatting flies to extrapolate how a psychopath would feel about murder. Creation of character (through method acting) is a large part of being an actor, apparently. Anyway, the book is a very interesting read and helped me when I was trying to learn -- how does one create a character who resonates with the reader.
“It’s people listening to market forces and realizing that what happens on social media isn’t necessarily real life.”
Alas, paying $250k advances for books that sell 3,000 copies (haha) is not a sustainable business model.
This is the same thing that is happening with Netflix and Disney and everyone else. In 2020 they started thinking they had to get on board with “representation” and all the rules about who can write about what and what stories they “have “ to tell. They all started pushing the same stories at us. And guess what? They lost money. Because turns out people turn to television and movies (and books) for entertainment, not for lessons in wokeness. Indeed, we turn to these things to ESCAPE all the political bullshit.
The Big Five publishing houses are, first and foremost, businesses, not social activism machines. Once they remember that, they will either produce books accordingly—the kind of books people actually want to read—or they will perish. Because guess what? While it’s fun for editors and producers to pat themselves on the back for telling formulaic woke stories and pushing their ideology on readers/viewers, it’s not fun to read preachy books (or watch preachy movies) that hit us over the head with these completely irrational, illiberal philosophies. Weirdly, people aren’t inclined to pay for that experience.
I just saw that Disney is continuing to suffer the financial effects of putting virtue-signaling above storytelling.
And Disney has destroyed ESPN.
Really surprised they haven’t hired a trans anchor person for Sports Center yet.
To be fair, they were in a deep decline when they were purchased. Disney just finished them off.
👍👍
Newly returned Bob Iger has promised to respect the audience more and get back to the traditional Disney style. He is likely lying his ass off but who cares. If he does mean it good luck handing out pink slips to the fat, mustachioed gender fluid dude wearing a fairy costume greeting your confused children at the entrance of the Magic All-Inclusive Castle.
That's what is so crazy, these publishing houses aren't even making money on new books. They spend a ton of money to land a celebrity contract but then make their money on their backlist (and repeat sales of Stephen King classics). Even as a business, they don't know which books will be successful. It's more like venture capital investing. Put money into several businesses and hope one becomes the unicorn!
The stockholders of these companies probably care about profits, but I doubt the people making editing decisions do. For them, it's all about advancing The Cause, and being applauded by their comrades,
Correct, we can read it for free online - if we so choose to poison ourselves.
Amen 🙏
I miss the days you could get the paper, sit down and read over a cup of coffee during the week or the huge "bonus" Sunday paper. Its nice to not have a screen in your face, and it was even better to read actual, properly written text. The publishers (whether in online or paper form) have surely resorted to poor but "flashy" writers; people who look to fit some mold of a movement rather than individuals who can express thoughts in an educated and creative way. I remember reading MANY glowing reviews on Amazon over some new "poet" that all the younger kids are reading about "life, love, abuse, sexuality" - and all it was was run on sentences written in "poem" form filled with lines of complaints with the addition with a few vulgar words sprinkled in. No one can even properly craft an email anymore let alone write poetry! It's refreshing to see more and more people find the knack to using Substack to provide the world actual written art.
I remember when it was a huge deal to find a misplaced comma, typo, or grammatical error in the NYT (and rare in the WSJ). Now I feel lucky to find a coherent or non-ideological paragraph
I feel like the internet has only helped to decrease the skill of writing. Every piece of advice about writing on online spaces says to keep paragraphs short-- like really short. I get so annoyed at many poorly written blog posts out there, even articles in major websites. This new style for online writing annoys me to death. An article should not be written by starting a new paragraph every other sentence, and yet this is what the “experts” tell you to do, least anyone actually bother to take the time to read anything longer than 140 characters.
It’s only going to get worse with the use of ChatGBT and the like.
True dat.
Good writers say a lot with fewer words. Run of the mill writers say very little. Word counts are meaningless if the author has no ability to make the mundane interesting. I would like to know who these “experts” are. Anyone in any form of media can call themself an expert in today’s culture of shameless self promotion . At some point experience, expertise and credentials didn’t matter anymore to anyone as long as they liked what they heard.
That’s true. But no matter the word count, good writing doesn’t need to be reduced to creating new paragraphs every other sentence. These “experts” are indeed shameless self-promoters in addition to anyone who’s “made it” in the blogger sphere.
True 👍
Hahahaha so true
I used to enjoy reading many editorialists with whom I may have strongly disagreed just to enjoy the delightful craftsmanship of their prose. A long-lost art! And don't get me started on the massive increase in word use errors, mispunctuation and incomprehensible grammar that seems to pass for literary genius in the press these days.
Agreed 👍
Literary geniuses wouldn’t waste their time writing for corporate news organizations. If it has to be filtered, forget it.
Check out Walter Kirns new print newspaper that you can subscribe to (print only) - https://www.countyhighway.com/ Well worth it!
Thank you! I had read about that and forgot to check it out! We are currently on an overseas assignment- will see if they will deliver to a DPO :)
Excellent newspaper.
I've regularly pointed to the lack of editors as a Problem. Now I find out that the existing editors ARE the problem. Yeesh.
I miss print newspaper as well. Sometimes I read TFP on my laptop. When seeing the home page and links to all surrounding articles, I feel nostalgic for print and have often thought that I’d really enjoy getting TFP delivered to my mailbox...if even a newsletter sized publication.
Amen
I absolutely love to escape in a book. I read 25-35 books a year. I’m a member of Amazon Prime. The quality of books have become unreadable. It’s a shame. Go to Prime reading and see for yourself. It’s le’s “diverse” than it’s ever been!
You really have to hunt to find a book you'll like these days.
For music, go back a hundred or so years. For literature, 50 or so might be enough.
For a good chuckle go to your nearest thrift store and look at their book selection. You’d be amazed at how many books there are written-or ghost written which is usually the case-by some of the most forgettable people that ever worked in Washington DC. Those books will never leave the store unless shipped to a recycling center.
The so-called prize list books have also become boring and silly. The expectation is not to love all the books or every writing style, but there use to be one or more great reads to discover on prize lists.
I hear ya. I’ve taken to going back to classics that I missed before, because all the new stuff is just crap.
Yea, I agree.
I can’t find any interesting books to read lately.
Thinking about rereading Game of Thrones.
I was recently in NYC for a week and met with various folks in the book business. It was a dark experience. I've tried out various adjectives to capture the general mood. And I think I have the correct description: everybody was humiliated. They know they're not living up to their own personal and professional values and it's eating at their souls.
I am genuinely glad to read that.
Good. They need to change.
As Herb Stein said many years ago, what can’t go on forever won’t. The major publishing houses have given into the screams , wails, and teeth gnashing of the little junior high girls
who work in book publishing to the extent that they affect their profitability. When this happens over an extended period something has got to give. Now two things are happening: the rise of new small publishers to fill the void and the weeding out of employees who if retained will ultimately put you out of business. Congrats to publishing a great and much needed piece!
I think and hope to Christ you're right. C'mon, Capitalism!
In almost every article I read, the fear of a group of self designated "activists" makes companies capitulate. Why is that? Is it an act by fellow ideological soulmates or do they think the public in general get moral suasion from these fringe characters. I think society would improve dramatically if we ignored these people.
But if it's a plan coordinated on the inside and outside to enforce progressive ideology, is that too much conspiracy to be true?
It's immature adults who are so culturally programmed to a) want to be cool and b) to associate coolness with youth and the latest thing that they have absolutely no tools or principles to fall back on when the youth go nuts and the latest thing is insane.
You see the same thing among parents. My daughters third grade class last year had an issue with kids shouting out stuff from TikTok and You Tube shorts in the middle of class. Who the F hands their 8 year old an iPad and just let's them go to town on social media?
Apparently everyone. This is at a private Catholic school with mostly upper middle class, socially and politically conservative parents. When screen use comes up in conversation people shrug and say "I don't want my kid to be left out of what the other kids are doing."
I'm sorry, but *what.*
I'm pretty sure my own parents main goal in life for 12 years was making me as left out as possible from "what the other kids are doing.". Because they were grown ups. They had a very solid idea of what the good life and adulthood entailed and did not care if it tracked with some corporately manufactured youth culture idea idea of "cool."
There are not a lot of actual grown ups left in society, either in the home or the office - just a lot of aging teens-at-heart still trying to be cool.
"It's immature adults who are so culturally programmed to a) want to be cool and b) to associate coolness with youth and the latest thing that they have absolutely no tools or principles to fall back on when the youth go nuts and the latest thing is insane."
You are describing Democrats.
Unfortunately it is a lot of conservatives, too.
I agree. But once you buy into hip-at-all-cost your vote pretty much goes blue. It is not cool, hip, or chic to be realistic, pragmatic, or practical. I really appreciate your comment because that has been my observation as well.
I agree - it definitely leads people to end up trending blue - or their kids trending blue.
I think you are spot on. I would also add that there is a virtue-signaling component as well. In addition to being “cool” the Left has convinced people that being moral has nothing to do with how you act but with what you say you believe. And it’s enticing because it’s much easier to capitulate to the Narrative than actually try to be a morally good person. If I can be seen as virtuous and cool without even trying to change myself, why not?
I thank God every day that my mom had no money. Our house was focused on basic survival. Real life. My moms goal for us was that we didn't cause troubles for others. If a call came from the school, there was going to be heck to pay at home lol. Even though I have done fairly well for myself, those core values and experiences have stuck with me.
It’s funny you say that. I am 62, rode a school bus for 11 years and attended small rural schools. I know, with no doubt, that the last thing I wanted, or my cohorts wanted, was to have done something so egregious that the school had to call my or my cohorts parents after school. That would have been doomsday.
Huge props and a giggle: Back When, I think that every kid was convinced that their parents' goal was to make them as left out as possible.
This all comes down to lack of leadership. When was the last time you met a true leader, someone with the courage of their convictions?
Whether it’s in the workplace or the home- everyone is taking the path of least resistance.
The result is chaos and ultimately failure. No wonder this new generation is so depressed. No one has ever set a standard for them to live up to.
Right? Just tell them to get lost. It's hard to understand how this all happened in the first place. Weak leadership is the only explanation.
Read and heed! The only time I've ever set foot in Trader Joe's was after they told some Karen who took exception to the "Cultural Appropriation" of their cutesy house-brand names to go pound sand. It happens, and it can work.
Yep! When I was 22 I understood that I had to work hard and kiss ass to keep my entry level job.
It was pretty well understood 20 years ago that graduation meant the party was over and your undergraduate self got left behind when you entered the real world.
Time for adults to start reasserting that message.
They force this through the Board. They threaten exposing said company on social media as not towing the cultural Marxist line. This existential risk is viewed by the Board as too great to their brand, reputation and earnings potential. So they capitulate. This is / was repeated across corporate America over the past 10 years and now has very deep roots.
My company basically caters to these people now because there are so many that they have to hire them. Part of the DEI training, in my opinion, is to teach young people how to function in a corporation. When I took that class, I was laughing all the way through it. I am surprised fast food places can even survive with the current group of workers coming into the workplace. McDonalds must have very good training. My company spends a lot of money on training.
'I think society would improve dramatically if we ignored these people.'
Amen 🙏
This is a good one. It did bring up bad memories for me, but I also feel a sense of vindication. Thank you for writing this!
In 2013 I began an MFA (Master of Fine Arts) program in creative writing. I had spent my life to that point on western fire crews, in the Army, and working in oil and gas fields. I had never heard of "woke" or identity politics even though I'm from a very liberal NPR-kind of family. I wanted to write about my experiences and adventures--just tell interesting stories about interesting times and the interesting people I'd met along the way. I didn't care at all about placing myself, or women in general, as the victim in the male-dominated worlds of firefighting, the military, and the oil and gas patch. I also didn't care about advancing the global-warming (it was global warming then, before the "climate change" rebranding) finger-wagging--you know, by saying how evil those Wyoming oil and gas operators are and how terrible the whole industry is.
The MFA program was made up of mostly middle-aged white women who were not the sole income-earners in their families.
These women tore my writing to shreds. I just wouldn't say the stuff they wanted to hear. I was supposed to be an angry victim of "The Patriarchy" who spent all my time wringing my hands over the warming planet. Instead, I was like, "let me tell you about this time in the Army when our team found a lost beagle in the woods during survival school."
In turn I found their writing boring, self-involved, and crazy. So many words saying so little, most of it on being unhappy about...well, I'm not quite sure. But we all better be *sorry,* dammit.
It was during this time I coined the phrase "God save me from middle-aged white women." Which, as a middle aged white woman myself, is not only heartfelt, but also just good fun. Did I mention the humorlessness of this crowd?
Any place we can read your stories? They sound like an interesting read...
That's kind of you to say.
Not at the moment-I have all these files on my computer with all my stuff, but I never went further after that MFA program. Maybe I should re-think...
Start writing on Substack!
😂😂😂😂😂👍
Publishing a chapter a month is how 19th century British writers sold their work. Back to the future!
Yes!!!!! Exactly! Alexandre Dumas was my inspiration for serializing my fiction: https://www.elysian.press/p/creator-economy-for-fiction-authors
Hundreds of writers are serializing books on Substack. You can check out their work at The Library:
https://thelinklibrary.substack.com/
🤙
I am increasingly encouraged that the signs like those described in this and other FP essays seem to indicate that we have reached a societal tipping point. We may, as a people, have finally become disgusted with the crazies on both the left and right. All the newspeak gibberish and racial nonsense that has sought to shred the fabric of our social connectivity may have peaked in effectiveness, thanks in part to efforts by the Free Press and other in the press and publishing communities. One can only pray that the tide has turned.
We don't really benefit from gatekeepers who are themselves barbarians, do we?