This is a strange thread, to say the least. Some -- including myself -- might even call it a paranoid and racist thread.
The thread does discuss, in a pretty normal way, a lot of the sources of inspiration for my novel Miss Cult-fan America. And it discusses how I applied a lot of my own personal experiences with being biracial to the experiences one of the characters in my novel, Sasori, had of being a Hopi woman.
The thread also claims that some of the themes and narrative moments in my novel are similar to some scenes in the movie Crazy Rich Asians and Tommy Orange's novel There There.
I don't think it's crazy to make that claim. However, I then take the next step, and claim that both Tommy Orange and Kevin Kwan were inspired by my novel to write certain scenes in their stories. That claim is unfounded at the least, but probably more like cognitively dissonant, paranoid, and racist.
However, I still tend to feel like the things I say have more influence -- somehow -- than people really give me credit for. And this was what I was trying to express when I went off on what I now feel was a dissonant and racist rant -- especially toward Tommy Orange.
As you'll see, I bring up this same point when I discuss the Birds of Prey movie. There are some aspects of that movie, particularly the strange remaking of the Cassandra Cain character, that seem way too close to the elements of my story Paranoia Gotham to stop me from thinking my story didn't influence the making of that movie. And, in fact, if you watch some interviews with Margot Robbie, she'll say flat out that her team got inspiration for Birds of Prey from "fan forums," though she doesn't say more than that.
The fact is -- the professional art world lifts ideas from social media and fan forums a lot. For instance, there was a big scandal in 2020 when a woman claimed that Isaac Larian's company lifted a social media star's entire wardrobe to create a new L.O.L. doll, I believe.
It doesn't seem so awful to me personally when the professional art world lifts ideas for new stories and art from things like fan art and fanfiction based on characters that are already some company's intellectual property. After all, fan artists and fanfiction writers are lifting entire characters and universes from the companies.
However, in that case, it still would be nice if people could give a little more credit to fan artists and fanfiction writers when they get ideas from them. All some of us would really need is a shout-out. Nothing more. I'm honestly rather ambivalent about whether I'd even want a shout-out. But some little kind of wink or nod might be gratifying.
But I think there are some other kinds of shadings toward iffy-ness when professional writers and artists lift the ideas and artists of amateurs on social media without giving any credit.
For instance, I don't think it's any surprise that a lot of amateur novelists have done posts or thread on Twitter that show how their novels -- like, almost their whole novels -- have been completely rewritten, only paraphrased in some weird ways, and then re-sold -- sometimes by non-independent publishing companies.
When it gets to the point where you're making a buck off of repackaging someone else's labor, and you're not giving any credit at all to the person who are putting that labor out there to begin with, you're ripping someone off. That's not cool. At that point, I do feel that folks who feel like they are being ripped off -- like the woman who felt like her entire appearance was being used to make a doll, or for the novelists who feel like their entire novels were being repackaged and resold -- have the right to take whatever kind of recourse they feel is necessary.
I feel like people have ripped me off in this kind of way over the years, and especially on Twitter. But, again, my story isn't really unique. And it is by no means the worst kind of example of this situation.
I don't think we need to find more ways to write more copyright laws. And I don't think we need to become more punitive of people who probably are flat-out ripping people off.
But I do think we need to be more respectful of people who do the labor to put ideas out into the world. We need to be more respectful of the people. And we need to be more respectful or their ideas and their creative productions.
Nobody's going to lose their reputation by giving credit to other people who deserve credit.
But I think, even worse than this, what's happening right now is, people are taking other people's ideas -- including my ideas -- just flat-out ripping people off -- and then turning right around and abusing those people -- trying to bully and browbeat those people off of social media, trying to bully and browbeat those people out of public life, trying to bully and browbeat those people into becoming housebound, and, in many cases, even trying to bully and browbeat those people into committing suicide.
This needs to be talked about a lot more. Because it, like targeted stalking and harassment, is happening to a lot of people other than myself. People need to acknowledge that it's happening. And they need to figure out how it's happening. And we all, after that, need to figure out how we're going to redirect our actions, so that, instead of ripping people off and then turning around and bullying them out of existence, we are all giving each other the credit that's due to each other for our labor.
This is the frustration underlying the thread I wrote. And I think my frustration is valid. But I don't think I chose the right topic on which to expression my frustration. And so this thread, in some of its aspects is misguided, cognitively dissonant, paranoid, and even racist.
Thank you for reading. Please enjoy.
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