The past couple of months have been full of literary debate. From the national (James Frey deceives lovable Oprah with his “memoir”) to the local (a junior writes a Wespeak about “bloodthirsty savage Muslims”), everyone has a bone to pick with non-fiction writers. For some reason, we can’t say what we want anymore. Not only must our sentence structure and grammar be scrutinized, but the “truthiness” of our pieces must come under fire. It’s time I use my power to stand up for the little guy. That’s right, I’m talking to you Evan Carp!
I know I shouldn’t get involved but I feel really bad for our local pariah. He’s gotten a bad rap and it isn’t fair. Why must our liberal Wesleyan student body jump down his poor defenseless throat for saying something he believes has validity? Aw shucks, Evan, you poor, misunderstood “post-judiced” individual. Don’t you worry! I’m going to help you out and show that it isn’t cool to mess with essayists.
Let’s start with those nasty allegations of hypocrisy. Well Evan, you’re perfectly okay with generalizing all Muslims as “bloodthirsty savages” so you shouldn’t have a problem when other people label you a “racist” just because you fit the description of one. Let’s see—bigoted statements, lightness of skin, sweeping assumptions about groups to which you are unfamiliar with. Sorry, Evan but you don’t seem any different from a racist to me. Don’t fault me if you look, sound, and act like a “particular group of people” (please read Carp’s February 24th article for the reference). I’m just going with the limited knowledge I have about racists and ascribing it to a person I don’t even know. After all, that’s what you did! Thanks Evan for teaching me (and by extension Wesleyan University) about the oodles of fun I can have with arbitrary labeling.
Speaking of generalizations, just the other week, I wrote an article about campus self-love. And it’s just the darnedest thing—can you believe random people come up to me and ask if I’m a chronic masturbator? I can’t even shake my dean’s hand anymore because he’s afraid of handling some stray love juice. It sounds silly to think that my words could be read in that way (especially since I don’t believe in using my penis for anything other than urinating) but that’s the way the cookie crumbles.
At one point in my life, I wrote a fictionalized tale about an experience I had that was loosely based on a “friend” of mine. While I thought everyone in the story was fairly represented, this person assumed I called him a homophobic Aryan thug. Point meets counterpoint. I told him that my characterization was being taken way out of context, and it was fiction, but he wasn’t buying any of it. And frankly I didn’t see how he could have seen himself in that light. I only described him as a “German with a penchant for racist and sexist jokes.” I don’t think anything negative was implied, do you? Sigh, yet another example of things being taken out of context.
Wesleyan really needs to lighten up on us writers. We only mean half of what we say. See, when Evan said, “I do not condone [U.S.] slavery, of course, but that should be examined in the context of the time period” he meant “I condone slavery in the context of the time period” (see the difference?). Also he didn’t mean to say, “[Muslims] are savage, bloodthirsty, barbaric animals.” He meant to say, “[Muslims] are animals.” I hope this helps your case!
Now Evan, pay attention to this part. Whenever you craft an essay and send it to a publication, you cast a public image of yourself. And you should take care to accurately represent yourself because that image can turn into an effigy. Whether or not you mean what you say or say what you mean, you are still held responsible for your thoughts and actions. So when you write such bold statements as “many many MANY Muslims are violent” (as an aside, repeating the word “many” and then capitalizing it is not a statistic), you sound—for lack of a better word—ignorant. By the same token, while I’m not madly in love with myself, the fact that I devoted an entire article to my “out of hand” habit makes me look like a pervert.
We just need to accept that we are who we are. I’m a hard-up combative onanist and Evan, you’re a Muslim-bashing uber-capitalist. Of course, you weren’t supposed to sound like that, but many many MANY people on campus see you in that light. Then again, I could have misinterpreted. Maybe your Wespeak was meant to get the campus talking to each other about pertinent issues. Evan Carp, I think that you are merely a fomenter of debate and not a bigot. Unfortunately, that’s not what I’m saying or implying.
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