The Four Color Media Monitor

I guess I'll add a few more newspaper op-eds about the now disgraced comics writer and novelist Neil Gaiman. For example, here's a writer at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette telling what he thinks of the news of Gaiman's sexual assault scandal:

Suggestively, few of his friends have come to his defense. He has also not threatened to sue the writer and magazine for libel, which would seem the natural response to being accused of such actions.

Granting the inevitable ambiguity of the evidence, I think Shapiro’s story substantially (and possibly completely) true.

Based on his social media behavior, which could get pretty questionable at times, it wouldn't be surprising if Gaiman had alienated more people than one might think over the years, which could explain why his buddies are deserting him.

That leads to the second question: Why do people care so much? Why are thousands of very distraught and very angry people blasting him on the web? He’s just one writer in a world filled with them.

I think his admirers feel betrayed. One common complaint is that he called himself a feminist and supported trans and LGBT people, and seemed on the side of all that is good, yet was living a secret second life where he abused women.

Unfortunately, there seem to be quite a few liberals of his type who take up specific causes and follow certain playbooks because they assume that backing said causes will literally shield them from any consequences for wrongdoing. As the past decade's made clear, it's certainly not so easy anymore. All that aside, what "good" did he actually side with or promote? Only leftist causes, and some of his writings hinted at that.

Shapiro reports that Gaiman grew up the child of parents who were at the top of the Church of Scientology. Its founder insisted that children be punished as if they were adults, and the list of offenses for which they could be punished seem to have been great.

“If a child laughed inappropriately or failed to remember a Scientology term,” she writes, “they could be sent to the ship’s hold and made to chip rust for days or confined in a chain locker for weeks at a time without blankets or a bathroom.” Someone who knew the family then said that his father put him in a cold bath and “drowned him to the point where Neil was screaming for air.”

You can see how a childhood like that could create a man who needed to feel that he was the master, the one in charge and not the one being drowned in cold water. It’s an uncomfortable fact, but there but for the grace of God (or for the accidents of the universe) go we.

You can also see how he could live his life as two different people. He could genuinely be the writer people loved and the man who abused women in private without seeing any contradiction.

That's one of the saddest parts of this whole affair. He may have been abused by the cult, but did not recognize growing up why it's also wrong to abuse the fairer sex, nor did he understand why it's the same as the abuse he experienced. As a result, how can we feel sorry for him when he failed to learn any lessons from his experience and apply them universally? There's also an article from the Irish Independent, which notes that:

...Gaiman (64) has long railed against hyper-masculine society in novels such as American Gods.

If he was equating all masculine behavior with crudeness, that's ludicrous. With the right upbringing, men can also be polite, and gentle in relations with women. Something tells me American Gods is not a novel I'd want to read, but then, I already said some time ago I'd rather not read any more of Gaiman's resume anyway. Suffice it to say his online proclamations of being a feminist have come back to haunt him.

In 2014, he began a tweet about Emma Watson speaking at the UN by addressing himself “as a feminist and human being”, before posting a photo of himself wearing the hashtag #heforshe.

Likewise, Gaiman’s public words about “believing survivors” now take on a slightly different taste.

On the one hand, there’s something very disappointing about a situation in which feminist men and allies turn out to be… not quite that.

It’s galling to hear that a man, who roundly describes himself as one of the good ones, then turns out to be not quite so good.

Many women know this exact type of man – the performative virtue-signalling feminist ally who is versed in terms like “darvo” and “gaslighting”...the man who positions himself publicly as a voice for women. This type of man prides himself on being the type of man who hears and sees women as they want to be seen.

Sometimes, and not always, these men turn out to be the worst offenders.

Yup. But then, the article resorts to blurring the differences between certain figures, for the sake of liberal talking points:

We tend to vilify, quite rightly, the men who are outspokenly and brazenly misogynist – your Andrew Tates and Donald Trumps, who make no bones about who they are.

But what about those men who claim loudly and vociferously to be feminists?

The wolves in sheep's clothing, who tell us aloud that they are one thing, while being the very opposite behind closed doors?

Are they, in fact, somehow worse?

Ahem. Tate is a bad lot, as noted before, but Trump? No solid evidence has turned up, and this is yet another blatant attempt to smear conservative figures like Trump for the sake of it. That doesn't help matters at all. At least Gaiman won't be able to do the same at this point. It'd do a lot better to just focus on the left-wing men posing as "feminists", a term which, perhaps, would be best left for women to identify as, not men.

Then, from Feminism In India, they tell the following, but have something awkward to say about the Sandman series:

Gaiman’s fall from grace is disappointing but not surprising. For a long time now, self-proclaimed “feminists,” from activists and artists to authors championing progressive politics in their texts, have been found out to be serial abusers and rapists. Such well-loved figures like Tarun Tejpal, the founder of Tehelka, and actors James Franco and Justin Baldoni, to name a few, are everything that a male ally stands for in theory. They are creative, brooding, and charismatic. They say the right things and align themselves with the right politics and movements. But when the facade slips, it is made apparent that they are not the heroes we made them out to be.

In Gaiman’s famed Sandman series, fans have often aligned his persona with that of the magical Sandman, the ruler of the realm of dreams. The Sandman is always fair and righteous and does not have a blot, or as much as a smudge, in his character. He is the saviour of the marginalised and the downtrodden. For long, Gaiman was considered as larger than life as his fictional creation. Not only a magical fantasy world, Gaiman had also built an enigmatic persona for himself—one that sat right with his fans, young and old.

I think it's very disputable whether Morpheus is "fair and righteous". The way he interacted with Lyta Hall, just plain causing her husband Hector to disintegrate was insultingly unsympathetic, and as I asked earlier, does Morpheus have the right to name her infant son (Daniel)? On which note, weird Lyta wasn't written actually doing this herself the moment Daniel was born. After all, as the mom, it's her right and business to name her child. Also, there were a few times where Morpheus dealt with offenders most underwhelmingly, like in the 14th issue, letting the serial killers attending a convention just slip away without seeing any arrest by authorities. Is that "righteous"? And it goes without saying that, if Morpheus was written giving the obese rapist/murderer pleasant dreams, even going so far as to depict the child victims forgiving the monster, that was wrong, and Gaiman should be ashamed of himself for writing such a defeatist scene. The article continues:

It is now, when the truth is out in the open, that readers are faced with the murky task of reconciling with the fact that their favourite author, the one who gave them fantastical masterpieces like Coraline, American Gods, and Good Omens, is actually a predator who has systemically abused his power to exploit vulnerable women. At this time, therefore, it is once again important to re-evaluate the age-old debates around separating the art from the artist. Can we, as readers and lovers of fantasy, ever read his texts without the shadow of the fact that he is an usurper of power, looming large over the pages? Can an Ocean at the End of the Lane or a Coraline ever be read, revisited, or discussed in isolation without remembering the fact that the author who created such beloved literary magic is actually a rapist?

As lovers of all things literary, it is common knowledge to us that banning books, however murky the politics and character of the author is, is a failed project. Not only does this act promote censorship and the conservative right-wing rhetoric of silencing the literary voice, it is also an attack on free speech. Instead, free speech with consequences must be the way ahead. The reader is not a senseless child who is to be kept away from the text by force or by law. The reader is an aware individual who must go into the text with full knowledge of the author’s politics, opinions, and character history. Readers of Gaiman must be made aware of his horrific actions, and they must be encouraged to read his texts, hitherto progressive and unmarred by the author’s own life, in light of the allegations made against him. Readers must consciously and critically engage with the text, knowing full well that this author is a violator, abuser, and rapist.

I think what readers should do is take an objective view of the stories, to see if they're really the "masterpieces" the mainstream press originally made them out to be. Because when I did some research, the stories I went through were far from the "classics" his onetime apologists were making them out to be, and there were telling hints he was using the books he wrote as a platform for leftist ideologies that don't hold up. If Gaiman hadn't been found out, chances are quite a few cultists would still be defending his works as unchallengeable masterpieces, and worse, would possibly do so very cavalierly. Not everything takes a scandal to make people ostensibly come to their senses, but there's still quite a few cult-like audiences who'll only reconsider if and when a once revered author is discovered to be a wolf in sheep's clothing, and that's got to change. If it matters, of course it doesn't do any good to ban books, but nobody should be encouraged to waste money on the writings of a bad person who wasn't the talented scribe the mainstream was making him out to be.

From the business point of view, Gaiman’s literature and their screen adaptations have made him extremely famous and rich. The author has profited immensely off the sale of his books, fandom merchandise, and the deals with production houses for the cinematic adaptations of the same. Readers must henceforth be encouraged not to purchase his books firsthand from bookshops or publishers. Instead, if they wish to read them and not support the author, they should find ways to do so that do not monetarily help the author. Borrowing and retelling of texts and films, in this case, are options to look for when one wishes to boycott an author.

It is imperative to keep in mind that reading or consuming media from a creator who has been called out for their misconduct in ways that do not monetarily benefit them is not “supporting the creator.” One can consume the media and literature to critically inspect the creator’s art and how that conflates with their persona and life.

In fact, critically engaging with Gaiman’s texts at this time, with the conscious knowledge of the violence perpetrated by him, might actually help readers process and understand how abusers often mask their violent tendencies using a veneer of progressive political consciousness. It might even help dismantle preconceived notions about the author’s greatness and expose him for he really is.

I guess this is getting somewhere. Like I said, what should be done is take an objective look at his writings to see if they actually reflect his dark side. And unfortunately, there's quite a few that do, or are just plain overrated and time-wasting. Just don't encourage actual fandom for somebody as pretentious as Gaiman turned out to be.

And then, from the New Indian Express, a columnist who'd previously spoken about the scandal last July, and takes issue with Amanda Palmer's role:

Gaiman — like actor Justin Baldoni, currently believed to be behind a targeted smear campaign against his co-star Blake Lively, whom he allegedly sexually harassed — claimed to be a feminist and queer ally. He was not, in practice. But neither was Amanda Palmer.

There’s something a little boring to me at this point about powerful, charismatic men who come unmasked. What triggers, intrigues and provokes me here is Palmer’s role. Perhaps I speak largely empirically, but the buffer zone that surrounds predatorial men almost invariably contains enabling women who defend the man in question, bring him sacrificial lambs and have their own twisted power games in motion with other women.

In this case, Palmer herself has been noted by people who encountered her in queer and artistic circles as sexually predatorial towards young women herself, as well as financially and emotionally exploitative. Gaiman may be a garden variety monster, but Palmer is certainly not an anomaly either — and women like her are monstrous too.

Sadly, there are women who've done terrible things just like men have. And they too must be held accountable for whatever role they had in these scandals. It'll remain to be seen what impact this scandal will have on Palmer's career.

Here's also another item from Splice Today, by somebody relaying a personal experience at a convention, and somebody who it appears is not fond of him, regardless of whether the writer is liberal:

I didn’t know Gaiman was chasing tail, let alone any of the specifics that have been alleged. But for the past 16 years I’ve considered him a pious bullshit artist who’s a bit too crafty about getting his way. I had a big reason for this and a minnow school of smaller reasons. The big reason was that Mr. Feminist divorced his first wife and took up with someone about 20 years younger. The smaller reasons were kicked off by a personal experience of mine. Not a big deal, a mere offhand remark he delivered to the crowd at a science fiction convention. But I was there, so it made an impression, and the impression matched various interviews he gave and pronouncements he posted. That impression didn’t forecast today’s horror show, but it goes with it well enough.

As far as I can tell, to the best of my recollection, what happened was this: he lied. I’d say he had no big reason for doing it, that all he wanted was to tickle the audience and give his reputation a minor bit of gloss. As I recall, he walked on stage and told us about the hour he’d just spent at the convention’s daycare center. There, I remember him saying, he and the kids had erected “something mysterious and teetery known as a Turkey Tower.” Bear with those quote marks. I recorded nothing and it may be that Gaiman said “wobbly and mysterious” or some other variation. The word “structure” might have been in there. But I remember him saying that he and the kids had built a Turkey Tower.

And from what's told, looks like he didn't. Either way, the scandal makes clear he doesn't belong around children any more than around women.

The UK Catholic Herald also addressed the scandal as part of topic involving Griswold vs. Connecticut:

Feminists who have expressed outrage over Gaiman’s behaviour have tended to focus only on “power imbalances” because they too are committed, for the most part, to “rights of sexual freedom”. If they are uneasy about the forms this might take in the name of “self-realisation”, they have only the fragile basis of lack of consent to aid them in their condemnation.

But what if the problem is that people can consent to acts which degrade them precisely because their bodies possess a nuptial meaning which is violated by such acts? Refusal to address the fact that our reproductive organs are, well, reproductive – they can unify us with someone of the opposite sex and speak to their paternal/maternal nature, honoured through marital commitment – means that, among other tragedies, vulnerable women will never be truly protected in the face of assertions of “sexual freedoms” by powerful men.

As always, the real defence of people’s dignity is to ask the deep question neglected by the US judges in their dangerous pursuit of new “freedoms”; namely, what is it that is good about marriage? The reason consent is so important in the sexual realm is that the “marital act” possesses a deep meaning, while acts which parody, degrade and insult marriage and marital sex are especially harmful to us. Single or married, we are “nuptial persons” whose sexuality is so precious that we cannot take a holiday from the effort to humanise our desires so they pay adequate respect to the person with whom we could engage in sexual relations. For what a person has a right to is love, and if that love takes the form of erotic love, what they deserve is marital commitment and its life-affirming, “unreserved” expression.

In the meantime our elites, be they sexual liberationist or feminist, continue to promote a view of the world destructive of marriage, that good and human – and divinely created – institution, as mass pornography goes unchallenged by lawmakers and our movie theatres celebrate BDSM as self-fulfilment in the form of the current film Babygirl starring Nicole Kidman.

I already thought it rather laughable the film would star a woman who's well into her late 50s or so, in something that looks like another older woman/younger man affair, which is getting hopelessly silly by now. But if the film comes within even miles of making sex look horrific, that's why I'd rather not buy tickets to see it.

Even a writer at First Things, another religious affairs website, had what to say about Gaiman:

Gaiman, once a vocal supporter of the #MeToo movement, fits into that category of performative feminists whose commitment to the cause doesn’t extend beyond social media platforms. I have always found such cheap piety to be deeply implausible. Not to mention, the existence of ex-wives (two, in Gaiman’s case) is always a rather troubling sign. What do they think of their erstwhile husband’s vocal online advocacy for women, women’s rights, and “the gynocracy”? The proof of a passionate commitment to respecting women is not some cost-free recitation of feminist clichés on social media that garners congratulatory retweets or Instagram likes. It is how these men treat real women in real time. Ex-wives are likely expert commentators on such matters, something that applies to the famous, such as Gaiman, as much as to the unknown online wannabe.

But setting aside his apparent hypocrisy, the garish allegations against Gaiman are, if true, the consequences of the logic of the sexual revolution, albeit rather extreme ones. That his claim of consent sounds plausible, even if ultimately untenable, speaks to the cultural intuitions of our day, where we do not typically regard sexual acts as having intrinsic value. Further, if sex is primarily about self-directed physical or emotional satisfaction, then the others involved are necessarily turned into instruments for the achievement of such an end. They become things or objects, of use only as far as they make one feel good. It is not a logic restricted to sexual matters. Ebenezer Scrooge viewed his clients not as people but as entries in his ledger. It is the most dramatic form of the failing anthropology of the modern world, forced now to reduce philosophies of sex to debates over consent, and thus to defend the most obviously degrading behavior as the glorious culmination of our freedom.

A vital point to make is that, if Gaiman's advocacies were superficial, and didn't support Muslim women and girls whose lives were threatened by abusive husbands/families, then that too should make clear he wasn't sincere in his positions about protecting women's safety and dignity. In other words, another activist who's advocacy didn't extend beyond the superficial, and refused to take up more challenging issues within that context.

Then, if anybody's wondering what'll happen with any remaining projects based on Gaiman's writings, NME announced that Dark Horse has cancelled an adaptation of Gaiman's Anansi Boys:

Dark Horse Comics have announced they have cut ties with Neil Gaiman and cancelled all upcoming collaborations with the writer.

The influential American publisher has had a long-standing relationship with Gaiman, having overseen adaptations of several of the author’s fantasy titles, including American Gods and Norse Mythology. [...]

Now, Dark Horse has posted on social media to make clear that they no longer wish to be associated with the author. “Dark Horse takes seriously the allegations against Neil Gaiman and we are no longer publishing his works,” they wrote. “Confirming that the Anansi Boys comic series and collected volume have been cancelled.”

Also, from Gizmodo:

Marc Bernardin, who co-wrote the Anansi comic, revealed the book would be ending earlier this week. While he’s “incredibly proud” of the work he did with artist Shawn Martinbrough, colorist Chris Sotomayor and cover artist David Mack, he said it all “pales” next to Gaiman’s actions. “Dark Horse will not release a trade,” he wrote. “My heart breaks for the survivors and any pain seeing these books on the shelves might have caused.”

After the initial allegations against Neil Gaiman received further reporting, Amazon announced it would cap off his TV adaptation of Good Omens with a 90-minute special. At time of writing, the streamer hasn’t revealed what it intends to do about the Anansi Boys adaptation—not only is Gaiman an executive producer on the upcoming show, he also wrote its pilot and sixth episode. Similarly, Netflix has been quiet for how it’ll handle Sandman’s second season, as have DC Comics and Marvel with the comics he previously wrote for them.

Finally, some common sense to be found from one comics publisher as much as a movie studio. Dark Horse made a wise decision (though still rather belatedly after a few months), considering how, several years ago, one of their former editors, Scott Allie, was accused of sexual misconduct, and they were slow to fully part ways with him. But that leaves DC/Marvel's response to be heard from, and if they're not going to make clear where they stand, it doesn't avail their already dismal image. I think Netflix would do well to just shelve the 2nd Sandman season, because chances are less people will want to view it at this point, and if airing it puts money in Gaiman's pockets, that's a valid reason to just drop it from the broadcasting schedule.

Labels: dc comics, Europe and Asia, golden calf of LGBT, history, indie publishers, islam and jihad, marvel comics, misogyny and racism, moonbat writers, msm propaganda, politics, violence