NB: this post was inspired in part by the events of this past weekend and in response to jeff's most recent post about rage!
i'm not so much full of rage and i am intensly annoyed by the pseudo-academic postering that i've was forced to be made privy to over the past weekend.
a little backstory and some notes:
note: i went to university. i have a BA (hon) degree in drama.
note: i am a faaaaaaaaaaarrr left leaning socialist feminist with anarchist tendencies
note: i am staunchly pro-choice, in EVERY situation for EVERY woman!
backstory:
last monday steve pirot (the neXtfest festival director) asked me direct a reading of a new play called 'ghosts of war' by this kid from lethbridge. i agreed. afterall, all i had to do was sit 5 people down for a single one hour rehearsal, answer questions and then a few days later stick a music stand in front of them and let them go to town proving their literacy...easy as pie!
there was a catch: when i agreed to take this on i hadn't read the play. all steve had told me was that it was 'small town angsty' and in dire need of an edit. the edit then fell to me because there isn't a way in hell steve was going to do it.
so i sat down and read this play and it made me sick. the first time through it was full of homophobic slurs and misinformation about abortion and the issues surrounding it and not only that but the main idea that i took from the script was: 'if you, as a woman, have an abortion you will go crazy and die in a mental institution by 30...after wish you will burn in hell!'
now, i don't believe in god and therefore i don't i don't believe in hell but either way...FUUUUUUUUUUCK off kid!
now, i couldn't edit the play for content because a) i didn't know the playwright and b) that isn't the point...it's not my play.
anyhow, so i get this play, i cut it from 51 to 37 pages and also cut all but one of the homophobic slurs then i cast it.
nigel, jason, tara, lana and jeff (not this jeff) agree to be in the reading...now, i mention jeff last because he is the point of this post...my rage at pseudo-intellectual postering is directed squarely at him on this topic.
so, it's already been established that this play was politically offensive to me and all those things that i mentioned in the notes section above, well they also apply to jeff but somehow he feels that they apply to him a little more than they perhaps apply to others. he's just one of those academics who runs around telling everyone they're in grad school and really smart. argh!
anyhow, the point is he is goes on a tirade threatening not to show up for the reading and just going on and on and on...i get it! i found the play offensive too. i hated it! i'd never work on it in any context ever again but the point of this all, and the thing that it makes me wonder about is the following:
who the fuck are we, as leftist arty artists, to say what people can and cannot produce under the guise of art. if we're allowed to produced art that works in direct opposition to the right wing power structures than why isn't this kid allowed to write a play from an expressly right wing christian perspective. it's not violent or abusive to anyone (it wasn't), it wasn't written to degrade any one particular group of people, etc...it would NEVER be produced in any theatre in edmonton but if he wants to get this play produced by his church then go hard kid...examine your spiritual questions and work your shit out, just don't ask me to be a part of it.
now, how far does my belief in the freedom of artistic expression. do i condone white power music or nazi propaganda art? hells no! but this play doesn't qualify as that. it's religious propanganda that's been pounded into this kid's head since birth and he's just dealing with it on paper; it's not hate literature and THAT's where i draw my lines.
i just don't think that we as artists have the right to slam something and write it off completely because we disagree with it POLITICALLY.
instead, i'll slam it because in the end THE PLAY WAS FUCKING CRAP and that's the worst part of it all!
discuss.
xo michelle.
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4 comments:
You're right, as a lefty (although I don't think as far left as you, based on your description), we don't have any right to bash/slam/censor anything based solely on the reason we disagree with it from a political viewpoint.
HOWEVER.....if it's misinformation, slam away. If it's something that has been proven wrong, slam away. If it's deliberately harmful to another person (and thus infringing on his/her rights), slam away. But based on unfounded beliefs or from the political end .... we have no right to dismiss their arguments, just like they have no right to dismiss our 'leftist tree-hugging b.s.'.
it is misinformed but it's misinformed because of an illogical religious dogma that he's subscribing to, not because he's purposefully discriminatory.
he's in no way infringing on anyone's rights as a human and i got really mad at this other jeff kid because it offended him because it SHOULD...because his political and academic life dictate he should hate it...ugh,there is NOTHING more annoying than pseudo-academic posturing and i am sorry but WHAT THE FUCK does he know about the emotional connection women have to their reproductive rights?
grr...
Ya, sounds like that other Jeff kid was getting pissed because it falls within the rules of his political end of the spectrum. Kinda like when punk kids hate emo because they're supposed to, but deep down they want to cover their leather jacket in Dashboard Confessional pins.
holy crap...does this mean i'm a femi-nazi too? :P
i kid.
OF COURSE I AM A FUCKING FEMI-NAZI!
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