/lit/ - Literature

>women and minorities need to be represented better

Go blog about it faggot

What's the point of writing fiction if I can't use my imagination?

>tfw mixed white and black african
>tfw more middle-class white than anything
>tfw if I wrote as mixed race people would be expecting the protagonist to be more 'urban'

>>4628300
They'd only expect that if you wrote specifically as mixed white/black. If it's something like white/asian people expect lots of Chinese/Japanese/korean words and cultural factoids and get disappointed when they can't distinguish your life from their own white, middle class childhood.

>>4628282
>>4628297
>>4628300
>>4628310
Not OP but all your new are showing this is a /lit/ thing, we had some good stop threads in the past.


Here is my contribution
>fantasy book must contain a dragon

>"she smiled like the world was just a big joke"

>>4628270
Why is this bad?

>>4628356
>implying men know what it's like to be a woman

>minorities shoehorned into positions of power that makes the author look more racist than anything

>rape

>>4628379
>>minorities shoehorned into positions of power

>every Hollywood film since the '90s

>>4628372
explain transsexuals

>The protagonist is a different gender or race from the author

what is Portrait of a Lady
what is Madame Bovary
what is Anna Karenina

.... oh wait, yeah, those are all really misogynist books. I guess you're right, the patriarchy needs to check its privilege and stop writing books which incisively demonstrate females to be shallow whores.

>>4628372
Is it not worse for whites/men to only write about whites/men? Wouldn't that exclude a ton of minorities/women from representation?

I know there are plenty of minority/women writers but still, why segregate storytelling?

>>4628397
they know how it feels to be transsexual

>>4628399
The Crying of Lot 49?

>character is American
>doesn't say 'USA Number #1' during the book

>>4628403
>Wouldn't that exclude a ton of minorities/women from representation?

Why should it be white men's job to represent women and non-whites? Are they too dumb to represent themselves?

>the character is relatable

>>4628396
>>4628379
>gender shoehorning

>>4628372
>>4628415


>implying you know what its like to be anything

>implying you even know what its like to be yourself

HURR HURR CANT NO NUTHIN IMAGINATION IS A CRYPTO-FASCIST LIE.

>>4628270
harry potter

>>4628270
>>4628372
Implying socially constructed genders and races exsist

>>4628415
So what the fuck are white people supposed to do then? If they don't write in minority/women characters they get shit on for being exclusionary (Lena Dunham, Girls) and if they do they're imposing on someone else's experiences?

>guy from 4chan writes

>protagonist is a teen girl with mundane qualities blown up to be important

he also watches anime

>>4628457
>implying they don't

>writing about a protagonist who has a different job from the author
>writing about a protagonist who lives in a different place than the author
>writing about a protagonist who has a different worldview than the author
>writing about experiences the author hasn't had

>The author is black
>the book is about racism

>The protagonist is a white, straight male

>>4628372
JK Rowling
Philip Pullman
C.S. Lewis
Shakespeare
EM Forster
>>4628407
This too

>>4628415
Good try, but it's not white man's job. The argument is not that white men SHOULD write about women and non-whites, it's that they CAN

Stop Threads are fine but don't start them with this bullshit

>>4628431
>implying

Why is this thread such shit?


>Character has sex and your reading it for high school
Waterland got banned from my High School because of that. After about 30 seconds in front of the schoolboard, the teachers got it brought back.

>>4628480
Cut out "guy from 4chan"
Replace with "anyone who's between the ages of 12 and 26

>writing in general

>>4628489
>imlpying rowling isnt a woman

Just because you have shit-tier perception and hardly ever interact with the opposite sex doesn't mean others are like you. Stop (and I hate saying this) projecting.

>>4628489
>implying Harry Potter is good

>>4628489
The whole gender interaction part of Harry Potter is literally the worst part of the whole series, btw

>>4628489
The whole gender interaction part of Harry Potter is literally the worst part of the whole series, btw

>>4628523
Just because you've hung out with the opposite gender and are delusional about your perception doesn't mean others are like you, either

Stop projecting.

>only writing one character

>>4628486
>the author is black
>protagonist is a black male
>he seduces a white woma

>>4628372
>implying people can not understand eachother
Of course there's differences between demographics, but they're usually not so vast that you wouldn't be able to bridge them with a bit of sincere effort.

the epistemological retardation of this thread is astounding

All of you faggots are muking up the thread, you don't discuss you just post funny greentexts about obvious flaws in books.

>>4628560
There's a massive difference between being able to write a decent opposite sex character and writing a world through the eyes of the opposite sex. Which why I wrote the word PROTAGONIST and not CHARACTER.

>>4628573
Authors often write from the perspective of people who are radically different from themselves, about situations which they have never experienced. What makes you think that gender or race poses a bigger barrier than personality and circumstance?

>>4628567
Yeah fuck having discussions, just post more epic may-mays!

>le shrek face
>that feel when xD
>wow
>such laugh

>protagonist has a secret/hidden/special power

>>4628399
D.H. Lawrence is pretty legit

checketh thine priv, knave

>>4628573
>>4628485

>>4628485


>writing about anything that isint writing about writing.

>>4628587
>Authors often write from the perspective of people who are radically different from themselves

Go write about being a little girl, and tell me it's not terrible

>>4628619
>having any source of conflict other than writer's block

>>4628619
Writing is writing, is writing is writing.

>>4628621
This is cute this is fun time for food I'm so sleepy oh someone woke me up I feel bad these colors are pretty I like these ones I'm a princess

>>4628625
>having any source of conflict other than the purpose of writing
>not pondering the teleological implication therein writing
>not writing about your ponderances
>not understanding the epistemological uncertainty that you're the same person after each writing
>not writing as a means of keeping sane

>>4628560
I agree.

Mark Twain and William Faulkner

>>4628621
Actually, I plan to do just that.
>implying no author has ever written an interesting, believable child-protagonist
It's only a problem if you're a talentless hack.

>>4628626
is writing writing is is writing is writing writing is on the wall

>>4628588
>Hey that faggot is shitposting! Better shitpost in return, that'll show 'em!

>>4628640
Actually, you are and you can't recognize it.

>>4628621
>I don't know what research is
>Writers must constrain their creativity to the things they've experienced and nothing else.

Hoo boy people like you are fucking dumb.

>>4628634
>wanting to get published

>protagonist is hispanic
>speaks spanglish and uses anachronistic slang

>>4628649
>>Writers must constrain their creativity to the things they've experienced and nothing else.

>Implying anyone can write about anything they didn't experience
>implying your ability to write about any subject that isn't yourself isn't merely coming from your own understanding of those subjects
>implying you aren't the only subject you have any understanding in
>implying that writing characters that don't exist solely to tales that come from within you
>implying you're smart enough to even understand why you don't understand

"But I can write like a girl because I watched a girl flirt once so I understand everything about it. And plus I talk to girls and they tell me."

Haha.

>>4628648

Ok.

>>4628666
>Implying if a man rights a story through a woman's eyes he's told a story through a woman's eyes and not a possibly convincing lie about his understanding and imagination of what a woman's eyes are like

Do you even basic solipsism

>>4628270
you're right, flaubert never should have written madame bovary

>>4628463
Write whatever you want and disregard critics.

>implying every work of fiction isn't literally lies
>implying you can derive truth from fiction
>implying fiction isn't simply the author's restructured and reimagined view of the world which appeals to an illogical and rationalized understanding
>implying any work understands the human condition
>implying we're not all headless chickens attempting to derive meaning from a massive signal of noise
>implying any book has truly faced the absurd without itself being limited by the constraints of misunderstood language
>not having an epistemological and existential crisis every waking minute

it's like you people don't even seek

>>4628675
Now you're just being silly, anon. That's true about every fictional character.

You can't write about anyone, even yourself without relying on a constructed image of that person. Allow me to ask you again, how is a convincing lie about what you believe to be a childs perception of the world less truthful than a convincing lie about what you believe to be the life of a corrupt politician?

>Writing a story through the eyes of a woman writing through the eyes of a man writing through the eyes of a woman writing
>Mfw

>>4628710
Everything we write is the insane and misunderstood rantings of ourselves. There is no meaning and every book is fiction because understanding can never be achieved. Understanding is illusory and is completely mangled by our own understanding. We understand nothing. What's the purpose in writing a character if the character is one big lie? You're just writing yourself onto the page and no one will care or understand a single thing about you

>>4628714
I want to write a book about someone reading a book that's written by someone so I can explain how utterly pointless and impossible it is to transmit ideas

>>4628270
>yet another white author writing yet another white character in yet another book about white people

>>4628714
>>4628725
Except such a book couldn't be written because no one would understand it

So I'd have to lie to make people think they understand it but leave any true understanding gone and it will all be hollow.

>>4628567
>obvious flaws
>half the comments are "hur fug neggrs !!! i'm so edge xDDDDDD"

Kill yourself

>Book expects me to think critically and objectively about myself and others as participators in history and how the consequences of the past directly affects what's happening now and will be happening in the future.

>>4628717
Hey, anon, not to be rude or anything, but if you admit to that, then your whole argument falls flat.

Anyway, I disagree with
>Everything we write is the insane and misunderstood rantings of ourselves.
Just because we construct an image of the world from ideas and concepts in order to understand it does not mean we are insane, It just means that we can ever be 100% accurate.

>there is no trans* PoC strong womyn character

>>4628749
So you admit then that everything is a lie and writing is deception

>>4628756
Not even close. Do you not understand the difference between a semi-accurate representation and a lie?

>>4628747
>Expecting to actually understand what a book means

>>4628769
There is no difference. No one will ever understand you. Ever. Any attempt to understand you will only lead to falsehood.

How do you know you can't have a contradiction, anon? We don't know. There is no way to know. We base everything on this assumption and we do not know. The only proofs for the necessity of noncontradiction rely on not contradicting to be valid, because if you can have contradictions, you can have everything because it doesn't contradict.

It doesn't make sense, anon, both the rational and the empirical are assumptions, and we cannot know a goddamn thing about anything, and we float down the river of life on a sinking raft made of straw and we haven't the ability to swim, hoping that one day we will know how to make the boat not sink. We can't and will never know and writing is only the solipsistic self expression and intent of the individual.

Anon, do you know what the book To Kill a Mockingbird is about? I have no idea, if you were to force me to answer I'd tell you it's the ideas of an older woman who lied a bunch to make her idea not contradict and to paint a picture that's nothing but a goddamn lie. And misunderstanding. And I'm misunderstanding her lies and deriving ideas from that misunderstanding that are based themselves on lies.

It's all false, anon, where does the truth begin?

It's time, anonymous, to face the true absurdity, that humans are incapable of escaping their own solipsism, we will never know because the human mind cannot escape it's own process of knowledge. It's all a mere assumption. The very foundation of knowledge can never be known. The only question we are faced with in life is if it's worth it to keep going, to work on the unsolvable, or to die, and to face the darkness.

>tfw writing a story
>realize all of the characters are white
>have to consider making one character black like every other story

>>4628899
Stay strong. Don't fold, Anon.

And consider them checked.

>>4628789


it begins with disregarding your falsehood.

>>4628929
There is no falsehood.

>>4628789
I understand your desire for certainty, but I think you are exaggerating the extent of human ignorance. You believe that our inability to reach an absolute state of understanding is the same as 'floating down the river of life on a sinking raft made of straw'.

While we can never be certain of anything other than our own uncertainty, we are nevertheless capable of questioning ourselves and the world. We are imperfect, but that doesn't mean that we are blind to the truth, or without hope of recognizing it when it lay before our eyes. All it means is that we can never know for certain we were right.
Depending on how highly we value our intellect compared to that of others, and depending how well we believe to know them, we may chose to trust someone to tell us the truth, or trust ourselves to accurately judge their words. To be human is to believe. The question is simply what you can and want to believe in.

>>4628942


then you admit im right.

>>4628943
>but that doesn't mean that we are blind to the truth

Anon, we have no idea what truth even means.

>>4628954
There is no falsehood only in the sense that there is no truth, because neither make sense. Both rely on the fallability of the law of noncontradiction.

If we're to speak in assumptions, what "falsehood" is mine?

>>4628959


you have no hope of convincing me of the impossibility of transcendent, coherent communication without transcendent, coherent communication, which thoroughly amuses me.

>>4628955
>playing definition games
pls.

And yes, we do have an idea. I believe what you mean to say is that we can't be certain.

>>4628978
Well now you're understanding the absurdity. There neednt be a rational argument to prove you can have contradictions, because having contradictions contradicts the necessity for logic, and so it follows. So we have no idea what knowledge even means, because it's defined by us and we don't understand ourselves.

>>4628994
Did it ever occur to you that maybe the only thing that's contradictory here is your own worldview?

>>4628994


its easy to understand how you think intelligibility is impossible, considering your verbal diarrhea is hardly intelligible. conditional solipsists lack the capacity for anything beyond projection.

>>4628993
>And yes, we do have an idea.

No, anon, we don't. Our understanding is limited because our brains only understand by dividing into truth and nontruth. You are too simple to understand that this is an assumption and there is no knowledge that could understand whether there is validity to our knowledge.

>>4628714
Maisie Williams please take my virginity.

>>4629003
But anon, if you can have contradictions, then why should such a thing matter?

You haven't got it yet, do you, you can't think meta and think about what a contradiction is. Humans are limited by contradictions, we can't accept and understand anything that contradicts. As so, the assumption we hold is that contradictions simply cannot be.

Do you not understand that, you are no closer to understanding what ultraviolet light looks like than a blind person does?

>>4629006
Or maybe you're too simple to consider a damn thing about epistemology, because you're too caught up in your assumptions about what truth and knowledge are to take a step into the absurd.

>>4629036
>>4629008


>Our understanding is limited because our brains only understand by dividing into truth and nontruth

autists need to reduce things to simple concepts and categorical imperatives because their tiny imaginations cant handle anything more complex.

>>4629008
Anon.

A perspective that rejects the concept of truth can't function without the concept of truth.
Are you just using this doubleplusgoodthink nonsense to pull our legs?

>>4629042
Once you accept the fact that you cannot understand outside your own understanding, you'll have gained quite a bit of knowledge, fear, and maybe, if you take the time to look, you'll even catch a glimpse of the absurdity of it all.

Uncertainty is the most punishing existence for a human.

>>4629061
>claims to understand that one can not understand outside of ones own understanding
>talks about facts

>>4629061


the assertion of absurdity is a defense mechanism against the devalidation that is entailed by acknowledging lack of comprehension.

>it doesnt matter if im right or wrong since i get to make that up lol ill show those bullies who made fun of me in high school.

>>4629060
>A perspective that rejects the concept of truth can't function without the concept of truth.

Anon, this isn't so. Understanding that our concept of truth is an assumption reveals to you that we have a limit and we don't understand what not having this limit is like.

You can think about the fourth dimension all you want. You can understand it mathematically. You can understand it. But we will never truly know what the fourth dimension is, because our perception is limited to the third. And so, our actions in this world all revolve around the third, because considering the extra dimension when driving is absurd.

But it's there. And it won't leave, and you can't escape it. You're part of larger dimensions and you will never, ever, grasp what they are like. And until you can accept how limited truth is, you realize that truth simply cannot be in the objective, because it cannot be understood. We can't understand objective truth, we can only understand it subjectively, and subjective truth has no way to compare itself to the objective.

>>4629068
Anon, we simply do not know if there's facts outside of what we know. Is there, or isn't there, or does the question even apply? We do not know.

>>4629078
You are not smart enough for this discussion. You should try a literature thread focused on simple words and emotional impact.

>>4629087


im making fun of you because solipsist like you are reliant on validation to form their concepts and ideals, they reason only so far as to rationalize (par example, this whole conversation), really, im doing you a favor.

>>4629106
But, anonymous, you're simply dismissing the argument because it's hard for you and you don't like the implications. But you can't wish away the limitations of human solipsism. It's there, it's a looming limitation, and you will never be able to understand outside of it.

Does that not having any meaning to you, or do you simply reject the whole idea as a farce, simply because you're too comforable?

>>4629113
>my argument is beyond your understanding, and whatever you say in response to my claims is completely missing the point, and just showing of your lack of your lack of intellect

Nice argument there m8.

>>4629113


when a solipsist criticizes a hated other, they are really telling you about themselves.

ps there isint a definite divide between *you* and *everything else*.

>>4629079
>we have a limit and we don't understand what not having this limit is like.
Well, obviously that is true, but I'm still convinced that truth is a higher concept without which the laws of reality could not exist.

>>4629144
>the laws of reality

How do we know there are laws to reality?

>>4629150
Based on all we know, it's the reasonable assumption.

Of course, if, by some off-chance you are right and there are no such laws, then I have no basis for my own worldview, and that's that, but I don't think you are willing and able to actually swallow something on that scale just to validate your worldview. This is what I meant by chosing ones beliefs.

The only reason your argument holds is that you are going to absurd lengths to establish it as a system that functions independantly of the reality we can perceive, and that as such, it has no value to that reality.

>>4629183
I've just concluded that you have to be right. Problem being we cannot distinguish a world of contradiction from a word of noncontradiction. We have absolutely no way of making sense of the idea of contradiction. If we live in a contradictory world, we could also live in a noncontradictory world, because it wouldn't matter. Literally all is possible.

So all that matters is what we can understand, no matter how limited it is by solipsism. I guess there's no choice but to work on it, even though it's completely frightening to admit that none of it is real.

>>4629150
Physics.

>>4629189
Well, glad to have been of help.

Good night.

>>4629229
But anon, we're talking about a world of contradictions. There is absolutely no way to demonstrate that we cannot have a contradiction. We can't understand what the idea is like. Not being able to understand is not a substitute for knowledge. It simply means that we assume our logic, which is based on the idea of noncontradiction, has to be true because doing otherwise is an impossibility.

>>4628559
What is Devil In A Blue Dress?
>inb4 but muh one drop rule
Shut the fuck up with that shit

>being so fedora you say Frankenstein was trash because a girl wrote it

>>4629776
>being so stupid you can't comprehend a basic sentence and attack something completely unrelated to the OP

>people who refer to The Divine Comedy as just "Dante's Inferno" and don't seem to know that the other two parts exist

>>4628643

>implying that if a white male wrote a book about a black female, he would be controlling the characters traits not on the characters genetics but more on the character itself.

>implying that the mindset of applying schemas to all whites, blacks, races, men, and women isn't the thing that's perpetuating this problem in the first place.

Y'all are the type of people who assume I can't write a book about a character who happens to be black, yet that isn't a defining characteristic of that character. Character development isn't solely predicated off of the genetic makeup of the character such as gender and race.

With some of the logic I've seen in this post, one cannot properly invent a character that represents a being outside of the author's own being.

So, who gives a shit? Fiction is fiction for a reason, the character is conceived inside of the author's head, and it can represent whatever race the author so chooses, even if it fails to properly represent a being outside of the author.

It's your mindset that makes it a problem, /lit/.

>>4630420
I typed that first implying wrong, whoops. ON the characters genetics, NOT more on the character itself.

>>4628270
>yfw i'm a gay girl writing as a straight man

>prominent female character is nihilist, narcissist, and drop-dead gorgeous AND ALSO SMOKES CIGARETTES
>'my pen name is also the name of the lead character'
>random weather constantly matches the emotional tone of the story
>guys' names are all normal, girls' names are all weird as fuck
>no poetic devices ever
>misuses words regardless of connotation
>she saw her reflection and somehow this spurned a spiritual awakening even though this NEVER HAPPENS IN REAL LIFE
>she's an orphan because in this world everyone is either completely fucked up or completely innocent and realistically parenting could not take place
>wounds are either life-threatening or earned in a life-threatening battle

i fucking hate books

>>4629252
contradictions can't exist
because they are not physical objects
they are merely failures of language to be a consistent system
god fucking dammit freshmen

>>4630420
see
that's the fucking problem
race is not fucking genetics
it something you're socialized into
and being black is different from being white
and if you're writing black people like white people with black skin
that's not really what most black people are like
also, it's sorta fucked that you're tryna say a white man would, in general, write a black character more "objectively" than a back person (i assume, this assertion seemed implicit in your argument, if i'm wrong let me know)

tl;dr you're stupid, don't write any black characters, you have no clue what you're doing

but yeah, blanket prohibitions are weird, i'm sure some white people can write black characters fine

>>4628703

I think you may have been joking of course, but I take issue with the idea that there is no truth to be found in fiction - it can be found in looking at what we wish to write. You may be right in saying that fiction is the "authors restructured...understanding," but that doesn't mean there is no truth in it. The truth is IN the lie, not behind it.

>>4630561
>abstracts don't exist

My favorite forced degeneration was in Under the Dome s01e03. A feisty black woman approaches a stereotypically racist white guy in a bar and asks if he's seen her child. The white guy remarks that the daughter is white as is the other woman in the photo, to which the bald black woman replies: "We're a same-sex couple with a child. Welcome to the 21st Century."

To clarify, they were an interracial lesbian couple. I dropped the series immediately after she delivered the line.

>The protagonist is taller than the author
You can't know what shit looks like from above your own head.
>The protagonist is older than the author at the time of writing
You don't know what it's like being that old.
>The protagonist isn't a writer or some other occupation the writer did before writing professionally
How do you know what that's like?
>The protagonist is an elf or other fantasy creature
You don't know what that's like.
>The protagonist encounters an elf or other fantasy creature
How would you know what that's like either?
>The protagonist is in any way ideologically different from the author
This is basically lying.
>Anything in the story is different from the author's real life
This is lying too.

>>4630573
I'd honestly trust more a white author writing a black character than a black author writing a black character.
When the 99% of black authors writing about MUH RACIMS knock that shit out, I'll change my view on the subject.

>>4630651
>Welcome to the 21st Century.
Fucking kill me.

>>4630661
So it's a compromise between being a liar or a boring shithead, which is still a liar?

>>4630598
exactly, you got it
good jorb
literally any abstract object is a linguistic construct

>>4630651
>>4631597
No one cares.

>>4631597
you're so stupid

maybe if black people are writing about racism
it's because that's what being black is about

black people generally know more about being black than white people

ffs i hope you get murdered
i really do

>>4630651
>>4631597
>white hetero males crying that the world isn't just a big reflection of themselves, anything that isn't "me" is "degenerate"
Lord knows yours inbred, recessive genes are the real champions of the world, anon.

>>4631597
>When the 99% of black authors writing about MUH RACIMS knock that shit out
Clearly it's a conspiracy of the blacks that racism exists and targets them. Maybe when 99% of white people (including yourself) stop ignoring reality the 99% of black authors will stop spoon-feeding ti to you like the retard you are.

Gee Wilkerson, It's a good thing we don't have any mods so /pol/ can keep infesting this board.

>>4631642
Does he have to use to get to his basement?(Its is his basement right?)

>>4631696
use a lift*

>>4631696
>>4631708
If you look in the image, there is indeed an elevator shaft. It is doubtful, however, that these losers (assuming it's more than one) ever leave the basement given how their worldview could only reasonably be formed by someone that has been shut away in a basement for years.

>>4631642
MURICA FUCK YEA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhnUgAaea4M

>>4631661
a kek-kek-kek
I'm not even white by any approximation and I'm familiar with racism.
Being black is no reason to be unable to write about anything that's not racism like asians, spics, olivemonkeys and sandniggers do.
Imma spic btw

The Goldfinch was written by a woman and has a male protagonist. Great book imo and accurately depicts the life of a boy and a man

>>4628379
>Poor ethnic minorities from foreign nations
>Act like white middle class hipsters

>>4628300
I work in a call center and I talk to poor white trash alllllll day. Being white is different from being middle class.

>>4631818
>Look at this racist shit. I'll tweet this to chief Mumbutu and upload it to instagram.
>And then I'll call Washington and Zwanande to go to Starbucks and listen to Joanna Newsom while we order environment-friendly crocs for the tribe.

>>4631834
>Being white is different from being middle class.
That's probably why he said both, then, isn't it?