but with a little sex
(contains no sex)
when I was about 23 years old, a friend of mine who was also a writer asked me, in all seriousness, how I could pursue a writing career when the world was such a mess. (for context, I turned 23 two months before september 11, 2001.) she was working for amnesty international, trying to make a difference as we careened toward another war, and couldn’t fathom that anyone who cared—which I took to mean that she understood that I did care—could take what she saw as a frivolous path.
I don't remember how I responded, exactly, but I know I tried to explain that people still need entertainment, still need joy in their lives; that joy is the thing we are fighting for when we try to make a better world. I'm sure I was less articulate at the time—I had been blindsided!—but as easy as it would be to assume I didn't understand my own beliefs then as solidly as I do now, I absolutely did.
a few years later I watched the preston sturges movie sullivan's travels for the first time. that movie, which operates from the very thesis I argued for, follows john sullivan (joel mccrae), a movie director who wants to make a serious film about how terrible the world is. for…reasons, he goes out into that world disguised as a hobo (with an adorable cross-dressing veronica lake as his unnamed sidekick), where he learns the lesson that people who are suffering need to laugh sometimes.
I write romance novels and science fiction. There is very little chance of anyone looking at that fact and seeing serious art meant to change the world, but that’s exactly what I think it is. war and hunger and plague aren’t the sum total of human suffering, nor is suffering the whole of the human experience. we need something good to fight for.
here’s an outdated example that’s still relevant: when the met gala happened in may, many of my fellow leftists railed against the display of excess overshadowing the news out of gaza. of course I care about gaza—I care so much—but if we are fighting for people, if we are fighting to make history a little bit less grim, should we not also want to preserve that history? sure, you can argue that costume history is frivolous. you’re wrong, but even if you were right, so what? it's also human history.
the costume institute derives its entire yearly budget from the gala, and it doesn’t matter if the celebrities and influencers who pay to be there care or do not care about the underlying value of that history. the funding matters regardless of the seriousness of the way it is achieved. saying the gala is bad is like (to use an even more outdated example) saying celebrities in the ‘90s didn’t really care about the rainforest—the fact is, the rainforest didn’t care where the money and awareness they raised came from.
(to be clear, I have no problem with the campaign to mass unfollow and block celebrities’ social media accounts. In fact, I am for it! we don’t owe them anything, and they should know that their audience isn’t something they are entitled to. this can be true while it is also true that this particular fundraising event is, to me, a net positive.)
in order for sullivan to learn the value of art as entertainment, he had to suffer. and I absolutely cannot agree with this as praxis. we should have empathy without personal experience. and yet, time and time again it has been shown that—as an example—homophobes only come around on the topic of gay rights when someone they are close to is gay. (of course they do not always come around. sometimes they double down. i’m not trying to downplay that.)
on the other hand, everyone who isn’t a billionaire is suffering right now. capitalism is trying to kill us, or at least crush our spirits. you know what counters that? art. entertainment. joy.
and that’s really my point: let’s treat art like it fucking matters! it really, really does. to make art is to be human. so let’s make some art!
I’m not in touch with that friend anymore, but if I was I would tell her to watch sullivan’s travels and consider that there is more than one way to make the world better.