melannen | I heard a lot of stories and I reckon they are true

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I heard a lot of stories and I reckon they are true

The latest redaction of the fic-for-sale kerfuffle has turned into a discussion on Making Light about fanfic, mostly from a pro-writing point of view, and because it's TNH, and TNH knows where it's *at*, it's also mostly pro-fanfic (in the other sense of pro, that is.)

Read her comments - it says stuff about fanfic which I've wanted to say for a long time, and is much better written than I could manage it, too.

And then

docbrite left a dissenting opinion in a comment.

(And no, I will *never* get used to the way that really amazing people can just pop up out of nowhere on the internet and jump into a conversation. It's almost as bad as suddenly finding out that the professor whose class I'm slacking off in is the same guy who came up with one of my favorite theories. And at least as cool.)

Poppy Z. Brite's opinions on fic really aren't that difficult, as anti-fan authors go. All she really seems to be saying (in this and other comments by her that I've fallen across) is that she's tried but she doesn't like writing or reading it and so she doesn't see why anyone else should either. That's a fallacy that most *fans* get beaten out of them pretty early on these days, so at least that's one thing we've got going for us. But that sort of calm but patronizing comment from somebody I respect is at least as disturbing as the most vitriolic idiocy, because it'll twig my 'I want to be liked!' reflex and then I feel bad. Plus, it almost sounds reasonable on first reading.

In the comment I saw today,

docbrite compares fanfic written about her work to somebody sneaking up and goosing her husband. "Sure, it means they care, but ick."

Ms. Brite, you've got the wrong metaphor. We're not molesting your husband. We're dating your daughters.

(This isn't really aimed at

docbrite, by the way, but at the attitudes of anti-fanfic writers in general, especially those who are far less reasonable about it than she is -- her metaphor today just gave me a jumping-off point, because I love doing indecent things to other people's metaphors.)

And yes, the first impulse might very well be to go for the shotgun, and I can't really fault anyone for thinking that - it's a natural reaction - as long as they don't follow through. Especially if you think we're only here for the sex (and fanfic writers being at least as id-driven and gleefully immature as teenage boys, many of us are) and especially if you think we're doing a bad job of it.

But look. It might be someone you'd never in a thousand years have chosen - it may be obvious they've never had an original thought in their life, barely know how to read and write, have no grasp of culture or even basic politeness, and have clearly spent their whole life in their mother's basement, watching anime and masturbating. But as long as they truly love what you've made, then just by honestly sharing that love, they make it more than it is. That's the whole *point* of love.

Yeah, you've nurtured your stories, shaped them, put hard work and the best years of your life into them, and to think of somebody else, somebody you don't know and don't trust, taking your story for a spin around the town and a make-out session in the back seat - yeah, it's scary. Maybe offensive and icky to think about. There's anger there somewhere. Your protective side comes out, and your possessive one. Probably more jealousy than you'd like to admit, too. (And, since our laws treat stories as property, always the chance that somebody might try to kidnap your work in truth - a very, very slight danger, but just real enough to make all your feelings seem justified.)

But - listen. You're the one who chose to let a story out into the wide world, who didn't want to keep that potential locked up inside you forever. And stories are like love: the more you share them, the more and better they grow. And there will always be risks. But you didn't send it to a nunnery, and you didn't (I hope) take it to a purity ball. And it's inevitable, once a story's grown up and out there on its own, that other people will fall in love with it just as you did. And some of them will want to marry it and have lots of fluffy fpreg babies. And some of them will just want to sex it up (But, really, you're not some kind of prude. I mean, as long as nobody's getting hurt, it's okay. Somehow it seems different when it's not your little girl...) And some of them may try to use it for their own benefit: but some of them just love your story, purely and surely and with no hope of gain at all.

That's life. That's *living*. That's part of being people and that's part of being *real*, just as human children grow up and grow away and become more than just their parents', so too with stories. It doesn't mean they're not yours anymore. It means that you've wrought so well that they have room in their hearts for multitudes. And letting that happen - that, well, cross-pollination is one euphemism for it - that is the *only* way new stories can ever be created.

Sure, take us out to see your gun collection. Set a curfew (but you better make sure all the windows are locked.) Chaperone on the first date. Forbid sex (with the understanding that it'll probably still happen, but at least this way you won't have to know the details.) Or just give all your fans a really stern talking-to in hopes of scaring them into behaving. But you can't keep a story tied to your apron-strings forever, and to try and stop a story from growing and changing by keeping it from *interacting* with other people will kill the most *vital* thing about it. A story is not something to be locked in a high tower or set on a pedestal - a story isn't truly alive until it's grown up and has a life of its own, beyond its parents' walls.

No, a person claiming that they own a story and nobody else should be allowed to touch it (unless they buy the rights in a contract) isn't in *quite* the same level of sheer wrong as a father asserting sole ownership over his daughter's vagina. But .. it's still fundamentally perverse, and fundamentally harmful, and hobbles and degrades us both as individual people and a society, and I constantly have doubts about a culture that teaches people that it's okay.

You say, "Calm down,

melannen, it's just a *story*."

There's no such thing as just a story.

ETA: And in the normal course of Internet serendipity, a languagelog thread about a young published author who has been accused of plagiarism on much the same basis that

cassieclaire was, back in the days when ff.net was young, and the mixing that is an inevitable part of the creative process. Cross-pollination on a much smaller scale than story, and *still* inevitable.

And while I'm at it, some enlightenment from my flist:

stellar_dust explains why writing original fic instead is not the answer;

beccaelizabeth solves the mystery of why the concept of fanfic has to exist in the first place.

webbapettigrew sells some more books! p.s.: if anybody cares more than me about buying me birthday presents, hint.

chaucerhathblog gets a c&d.

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For people popping up in strange places on the internet: I still can't get over seeing Neil Gaiman comment on Making Light. I have to fight down the urge to bust out my inner fangirl and start squealing.

Your last sentence needs to be on an icon.

And other than that, all I can say is this is awesome.

(Found this post via the comment section of Making Light.)

Neil Gaiman is definitely awesome. (Not that the ML people aren't too, it's just more unexpected...)

Thank you!

I love you.

I linked the Making Light thread in my journal, and I'm going to link you as well.

Also, I have no earthly idea how I have not run across you before (HP fen unite!), but I've added you as a friend and here is a heart: <3

Added back! And thanks! <3

....That? Is the best yet.

*memories*

Thank you! I'm glad it was liked.

You don't know me, but ... very well said. I was thinking to myself this morning (after trying to wade through the 'leventy-million comments at Making Light) that more and more, fandom is like a series of imprecise analogies. For everything. Yours works better than most; congratulations. *g*

Ah, *reality* is just a series of ever more imprecise analogies. Did I ever tell you the story about the blind men and the elephant? *G*

Woo, a very clever and entertaining analogy!

I'm not particularly anti-fanfic (I've written a couple in my life and read quite a few), but I have some problems with the analogy. Mostly because I don't own my daughter and she has free will. If she wants to date someone I don't like, there's a limit to what I can do to stop her, (in this day and age and in this culture), and I have to deal with the reality that she wants to be with this person.

My (theoretical) fictional characters do not, in any objective way "want" to be written into fanfics, they don't come to me in the night and say "I've found someone on Fanfiction.net who I want to spend the rest of my life with. Goodbye Daddy!"

Now, I don't have any meaningful control over what happens to the characters in people's minds. If I write a story starring Schmoopy the Wonder Puppy, and someone daydreams about Schmoopy, some lube, and a selection of toys from Blowfish, well, what can I do.

But if someone were to come up to me and tell me that, I'd probably find it a little weird and obnoxious. As weird and obnoxious as someone coming up to me and saying "You know what, schmoopy should do this and this in your next schmoopy book. And if you don't agree with me, or refuse to do that, well I'll go off and write my own Schmoopy stories, because I have as much intellectual right to control Schmoopy as you do."

I can't agree with that. I may have no legal way to stop it. And in fact, I may have no heavy practical objection to knowing it's happening, out there, somewhere on the internets *vague handwave*. But I don't want to be told that my opinion of Schmoopy's behavior or life doesn't have any status over that of anyone who happens to have read a Schmoopy story, and I don't want people feeling that position is ethically correct even if I never see what they write.

It's like music downloading. Lots of people do it. I do it. And I can give lots of good reasons why I do it. But when I'm asked directly, I still admit "Yes, I'm stealing this music." The good reasons may justify it to my satisfaction or those of my peers, but they don't make it not theft, and I won't claim they do.

If someone spreads some writing around saying "Len hates gay people.", I'm going to be hella pissed, because I don't. But if someone writes a fic where Schmoopy cleans up San Francisco and restores it to godliness... I'm still going to be hella pissed. Schmoopy would never do that. Schmoopy was concieved in my heart to stand for various ideals, and having someone take Schmoopy and have him do things I'd never have him do feels as much of a libel to me as "Len hates gay people."

Now, some writers get really really uptight about "Schmoopy has sex. Like, at all." Or "Schmoopy breaks out the whips and chains." And you know, I don't really care about stuff like that. (Sorry, I know too many of the examples here relate to sex stuff, they're just the easiest ones to draw parallels to in the fandoms I have contact with). But the principle is the same. Someone is saying something about something I created that I don't think is true.

Even if the story is a totally gen G rated "Schmoopy saves a kitten.", the underlying principle is the same, the content is irrelevant, whether I would have objected morally or ethically to the content is irrelevant. Schmoopy did not save a kitten. Maybe Schmoopy saved a puppy. Maybe Schmoopy volunteered at the homeless shelter that day instead. Maybe Schmoopy took the day off. But that's my call to make.

Now, "Schmoopy saves a kitten." is harmless. In fact "Schmoopy cleanses San Francisco" is harmless too, in that pretty much no one would really believe I wrote that, the writer probably said up front "Len owns Schmoopy, not me, not for profit, don't sue!", and if I'm asked I can say "Oh hell no, Schmoopy might cleanse San Fran with a broom and dustpan so that the next Pride parade will be more colorful, but that's about it."

I get that. I just want the fanfic writer to always reserve that one ethical/intellectual point, that their concept of the character is not primary, and that while it's unlikely I'll particularly raise objections to them specifically or to an archive, let alone hire lawyers or start tossing C&D's around, the acknowledgement of the unauthorized idea theft can't be glossed over as outmoded or wrongheaded. Because at that point I really do want to start just keeping certain ideas in my head, alone. Many people discussing authorship or fanfic dismiss that possibility, but I'm serious. If I write a story about brothers, I want them to have a sibling relationship. I don't want them to engage in incest, and if fandom is going to do that with them (and it will inevitably), then maybe I don't write a sibling story at all. And that sucks for everyone because it was a nice story.

Boy, for someone who regularly reads fanfic that came out more anti fanfic than I intended. All that passion for characters that are not only fictional, they're fictionally fictional. :)

I just very strongly believe that the creator's ownership of their creations is a big deal, and that wresting away that ownership even in part is problematic, even if it's also common/inevitable/fun.

>>Mostly because I don't own my daughter.

But see, that was the point of the analogy: stories shouldn't be chattel any more than daughters should be. You don't own the story, either.

(I didn't belabor that in the OP because I was really mostly intending to be preaching to the converted. Well, actually, I was mostly having fun with the analogy, as you could probably tell.)

I know that many people (even many fanfic writers, actually) feel very strongly that they should own their stories absolutely. (There are many people who feel they should own their daughters, too.) I just find this position *completely* indefensible from any perspective broader than "me! Me, look at me!"

I know you love your creations and you don't like the idea of anyone else messing with them. Hence the analogy up there: that protectiveness is perfectly understandable. That doesn't make it *right*.

Writing fanfic isn't like pirating music on the internet. Writing fanfic is like *humming a song on the street*. If I'm singing "Strawberry Fields Forever" in the car on the way to work, am I turning into something the Beatles never intended? Why, yes: if you'd ever heard my singing voice, you'd certainly agree.

Does that mean they have the right to tell me I'm not allowed to sing anymore?

No. And the same way, I refuse to be told that I'm not allowed to retell a story. Songs are meant to be sung. Stories are meant to be told. That is the whole point of making them! "I told this story once, and so I am the only one who is ever allowed to tell it again, ever, and everyone who wants to know about it has to come through me."

That's just ... such a bizarre way of looking at the world.

I mean, I could bring in history, anthropology, sociology, Shakespeare and Homer and Beowulf and the whole concept of an oral history hinging on people retelling other stories, changing them willy-nilly as they go, and how if we didn't have stories being told and retold and changed without permission, we wouldn't have history - we wouldn't have a *culture* - at all, without what is essentially fanfiction, by which I mean the *entirety of human knowledge*. I could talk about the history of copyright and intellectual property - about publication and distribution, and how it has become easier, and the way modern infotech completely erases the distinction between 'publishing' and 'talking with my friends' and this is surely a good thing - but you've probably heard it all before, and I have other fifteen-page academic papers than I'm supposed to be writing.

What it comes down to is that the right to tell stories - about *whatever* you want to tell stories about - is a basic, vital human right. Any infringement of what I can tell stories about destroys that whole concept, because now I need to be constantly stopping myself from saying what I want to say. Because the stories I read are just as much a part of my life experience as the people I see on the bus - why the heck can I write about one but not the other?

You do realize that if I wrote a story about how you, Len, hate gay people, and also burn churches and eat babies, I would be perfectly within my rights, and you could do nothing to me legally, as long as I made it very clear that I did not claim that my story was true or authorized by Len? It's true. There's no rule against writing fiction about real people and real places. If there was, no author would ever be able to write fiction - certainly no mainstream literary author, considering the recent vogue for thinly disguised memoir. Because nobody can own the things we see and hear and think about - that's ridiculous, that's 1984ish, nobody in their right mind would support it.

And yet, somehow, if the places and people aren't real, suddenly we have no right? I can publish a picture of a tree, but not a drawing of a tree; I can write a story about a person I saw on the bus, but not about somebody else's thoughts about that same person. Because ... why?

Because our culture has gotten stuck on this concept that thoughts can be owned. It's bizarre, it's illogical, it's harmful and unjust, and it's only been around about a hundred fifty years. Pray to god it's unsustainable in the long run...

>>I can publish a picture of a tree, but not a drawing of a tree; I can write a story about a person I saw on the bus, but not about somebody else's thoughts about that same person.

... was supposed to be "I can publish a photo of a tree, but not a photo of a drawing of a tree". Darn comment limit. (Although even the revised version's not actually true, because visual artists are much less irrational about this sort of thing than verbal artists are, and it's perfectly legal to sell a painting based on somebody else's painting, or a photograph of a photograph, or a collage, or anything like that, as long you can claim you've added artistic value to it through your changes. I just failed at coming up with another example of a fanfic-like activity that *would* be illegal, without descending even further into the depths of metaphor. Although I suppose that if your DNA contains a copywritten gene, 'having kids' might be the equivalent of writing fanfic. And then I'm back where I started.)

"But see, that was the point of the analogy: stories shouldn't be chattel any more than daughters should be. You don't own the story, either."

We're just going to have to agree to disagree on that one. I feel I own my ideas just as much as I own the chair in my backyard. I feel I have the right to ask you to not sit in my chair, even if you 1. Don't damage the chair. 2. Aren't taking the chair anywhere 3. I wasn't intending on sitting in the chair the same time you were. 4. I don't actually mind you sitting in the chair, and in fact you do so frequently. I still feel I have the right to ask you not to sit in the chair and have that be respected.

*shrug*

"I know that many people (even many fanfic writers, actually) feel very strongly that they should own their stories absolutely. (There are many people who feel they should own their daughters, too.) I just find this position *completely* indefensible from any perspective broader than "me! Me, look at me!"

Many fanfic writers write for no greater purpose than to gratify themselves, serve their own egos, attract prise, etc. Why is it a defensible motivation for them and not for me?

"Writing fanfic isn't like pirating music on the internet. Writing fanfic is like *humming a song on the street*. If I'm singing "Strawberry Fields Forever" in the car on the way to work, am I turning into something the Beatles never intended? Why, yes: if you'd ever heard my singing voice, you'd certainly agree."

Well no, that's just singing a song poorly. If you read my story and have poor reading comprehension, or a learning disability, or vision problems, or the copy you've procured is misprinted with errors, or if you're reading it to kids and you're a poor storyteller, that's unfortunate, but it's not a philosophical denial of my rights as a creator (no more than singing a Beatles song badly for the Beatles).

"No. And the same way, I refuse to be told that I'm not allowed to retell a story. Songs are meant to be sung. Stories are meant to be told. That is the whole point of making them! "I told this story once, and so I am the only one who is ever allowed to tell it again, ever, and everyone who wants to know about it has to come through me."

I think you're conflating two things together there as fact. Yes, stories are made to be told, songs are made to be sung. It doesn't inherently follow that they're made to be told by other people. Perhaps I tell you a personal story about my life. It is mine. There may be some value to you to hear it, or me to tell it to you. But there may be harm in you telling it to another. And it might be fairly monstrous for you to change it. I don't know what your values are. I could never ask a white person to become black (had I the power in the first place), just because I preferred it and it suited my emotional needs. What of a story with a white character? Does Le Guin have a right to be upset that someone retells her story and obliterates things in it she finds important? What's the point of telling a story if any element of it can be dismissed, subverted, inverted to suit someone else's whims?

"What it comes down to is that the right to tell stories - about *whatever* you want to tell stories about - is a basic, vital human right. Any infringement of what I can tell stories about destroys that whole concept, because now I need to be constantly stopping myself from saying what I want to say. Because the stories I read are just as much a part of my life experience as the people I see on the bus - why the heck can I write about one but not the other?"

I don't think you should tell stories about the people you see on the bus without their permission, no. Unless you're simply using those experiences as a template or fuel for your own original stories. The stories I've read inform the stories I write, certainly, going back to the earliest stories of humanity. But I can't ask the creator of Beowulf or Gilgamesh for their permission. But I can ask Whedon, or at least acknowledge that my Firefly fanfic is intellectually parasitic. Which is not the same thing as saying that parasites have no right to live, or that the harm they do is so great that it overrides all other concerns. Inspiration is awesome. But many fanfic writers want to have it both ways. They want to tap into a richness of authenticity and spirit of community that springs from an original work and the reaction to that work, then turn around and say that original work has no intrinsic intellectual value and is just osmotic universal mind fodder to be used in whole or in part or not. Our fannish worlds and the qualities that define them are incredibly important, the stuff huge passions and loyalties and even mighty flamewars, they have this incredible weight of reality for fans and fandoms, right up to the moment the suggestion is made that the act of creating these worlds and defining these qualities, all this reality can be assigned a source, an owner, a moral value. At that point it's just all in the athropological ether. Well, if that's true, then how about going ahead and making some "Youthful Wizards at Boarding Schools" communities and websites, and just revel, in a globally and historically inclusive way on all the salient underlying themes and archetypes. Write stories riffing on all that generally Because as everyone sensible acknowledges, none of that part of it is original and no one can own those.

The cultural foundation argument eventually becomes pointless, it's like saying you have the fundamental right to sit in my chair because the chair came from wood, wood came from trees, trees grew from sunlight, and no one can own sunlight.

"You do realize that if I wrote a story about how you, Len, hate gay people, and also burn churches and eat babies, I would be perfectly within my rights, and you could do nothing to me legally, as long as I made it very clear that I did not claim that my story was true or authorized by Len? It's true. There's no rule against writing fiction about real people and real places. If there was, no author would ever be able to write fiction - certainly no mainstream literary author, considering the recent vogue for thinly disguised memoir. Because nobody can own the things we see and hear and think about - that's ridiculous, that's 1984ish, nobody in their right mind would support it."

Sure. I think I made it clear that my comments aren't about legality, they're about ethics, and intellectual honesty. Because I'm not arguing against fanfic per se, I'm arguing against a philosophical stance that says the creator of a work has no rights beyond some fiddly rights related mostly to the sales-for-profit side of things (and some would argue even against that). That the wishes of the creator have incredible value as the reader is consuming them for the first time (in the form of the choices the creator made), but as soon as the reader has finished consuming that first set of wishes, ideals, desires, choices, they go out the window in whatever volume or order the reader likes, yet the reader will defend to their death their right to keep other of those elements, those other choices, those other author wishes. Choose one. Embrace the wishes of the author, or reject the authors creation, or do both but admit the author owns the ideas and elements you toss as much as the ones you agree with, that the fandom itself exists becuse of those choices, and the act of (the initial creator's) choosing has value that can't be dismissed. The creator owns those choices, unless we argue that stories write themselves. It has nothing to do with legality, it just has to do with really, really acknowledging why a person is in HP fandom as opposed to Doctor Who fandom as opposed to Starsky and Hutch fandom.

"Because our culture has gotten stuck on this concept that thoughts can be owned. It's bizarre, it's illogical, it's harmful and unjust, and it's only been around about a hundred fifty years. Pray to god it's unsustainable in the long run..."

If thoughts can't be owned, then thinkers can't be honored for their thoughts except via sheer popularity, and I don't like the idea of popularity being the only way to acknowledge quality. And if thoughts can't be owned, then I can't claim any thoughts to be private, and that's a nasty world indeed.

(Sorry these are so long. I think we're going to wind up having to agree to disagree. If you want to continue it might be less cumbersome to take it to email. Which is not my way of trying to get the last word, just trying not to spam up your lj with gigantically long posts).

I don't have anything particularly intelligent to say, but I just wanted to say that I love you for writing this and providing all the links. I'm about to begin the process of convincing an author and his manager that allowing fanfic is a good thing (really I have no choice about feeling them out first before promoting fanfic, since these two watch their teeny tiny fandom under a microscope), and this should help a lot! So thank you!

I was just linked to this, and all I have to say is HELL YES. This is an argument that I've made on my own blog several times, to the consernation of some of my authors -- but most of them, like TNH, believe that fanfic is, as things go, pretty good. Authors like PZB, who are vocal about their "hatred" (or whatever) re: fanfic are actually fewer and more far between than is realized, but since PZB et al are more vocal than the others (who are authors like Kassandra Sims and Susan Sizemore), they get more attention and wank.

I love this. I know I'm jumping in on this ... almost a year later. But I just wanted to let you know, I love this.

There's no such thing as just a story.

Poppy Z. Brite used to write RPS. There was one in particular about Paul and John Lennon that I might still have.

YOU'RE PRETTY FRICKING AWESOME.

I AM MEMMING THIS, SINCE THAT WAS THE SINGLE FUNNIEST METAPHOR I'VE EVER SEEN. OHMYGOD. *dead*

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I heard a lot of stories and I reckon they are true

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