AWKWARD ZOMBIE

You just completely ignored my entire point. If YOU want to stop purchasing said media, that's fine. If other people want to purchase said media, not because they don't support gay rights or whatever the issue is, but because they just want to enjoy that particular media, that's fine. What kind of irks me about this argument is when either side of it gets so pigheaded about this that the other side is evil and how could you possibly feel this way that's different than how I feel about it you worthless sack of crap.

No, I understand what your point was, but my view is that its not a simple matter of tastes in entertainment. While the consumer has the right to buy a product, there shouldnt be some kind of stigma on pointing out why this is not as blameless as a lot of people seem to insist it is. I dont think Cards fans are evil, for the most part, but I do think its kinda selfish and irresponsible to knowingly give cheddar to a man who donates to anti-gay groups, and then try to disawow any responsibility in the results. If you know who Card is, if you know what he does with his earnings, but still buy his work, then you have to be able to admit that you rank your own entertainment higher than the rights of a minority group he's harassing.

OK, I didn't realize that this debate was solely about Card. I also didn't realize that he was/is donating to groups like that. So I apologize for not fully comprehending the situation before posting. However, in general, I still stand by my point. Is there any evidence that the proceeds from Ender's Game go to anti-gay groups? I can't imagine that's where all the cheddar from the books goes to, or where all the cheddar for these groups comes from. But yeah, if he said something like "I'm donating all my Ender's Game cheddar to Gay Haters R Us" or something like that, then I can agree that it would be pretty strange to purchase the book if you support gay rights.

Edit: I don't mean to say that there's some kind of threshold before you should stop supporting the work of someone like Card, like "If at least 50% of the proceeds go to anti-gay groups, then you should stop." That's not what I meant. I'm just trying to get a better feel for the situation so I can better communicate my opinion.

In short: You aren't going to agree with anyone 100% on everything. It's up to you to decide for yourself whether or not to support a person's work if that person has views you disagree with. However, buying a product whose proceeds go towards a cause you disagree with is pretty hypocritical.

He's not running an anti-gay campaign with his books or anything, but he has donated cheddar to them. That said, even if he hadnt, I still wouldnt support people buying his books.

You can't reasonably equate drug abuse with extreme bigotry. One of those things has a much wider and more external effect than the other.
As for Michael Jackson, A] he's dead so any objectionable agenda he may or may not have had won't be furthered at all and B] being accused of child molestation is not at all conclusive. (Also, the Beatles are also dead, just in case you really think drug use is the most evil thing a person can do.)

There is a direct connection between buying one of Card's books and his contributions to anti-gay groups. Whether or not that translates to a moral imperative is entirely up to personal choice, but you can't deny the relationship.

Personally, I don't really care about his books, so boycotting them is an easy choice for me. But I have to wonder at the people who say you should separate the author from his work in cases like these - it strikes me as a dogmatic misapplication. Certainly you need to separate an author from, for example, racist characters, because they don't reflect his real views. (hopefully)
But when the author's connection to the book intrinsically links the book to the activism of bigots, it's impossible to separate the book from its author's views. It can't be done. The book is directly tied to his financial activities and those financial activities are the funding of anti-lgbt groups. I don't understand how people deny that connection.

[[Now, with the movies, it's a bit different. The production studios have come out to say that Orson makes very little profit from the film adaptations. There's a lot more leeway here to deny the connection.]]

I wasn't equating them, I was comparing them. And I already amended my statement, in case you were wondering.

Honestly, I see both sides, but I think Galaxy and TheStranger are a bit over the line with casting blame onto the people who purchase the media regardless of whether they know about Card's awful use of cheddar.

Yes, Card gets his cheddar primarily from consumers buying his products, and whether you support his views or not, he can and will use that cheddar as he pleases within the limits of the law. Stopping sales, especially at this point, won't stop this from happening though. Not to say that it's pointless, but when it comes to people like him, especially authors, you generally can't bully them into stopping behavior or shitty opinions you don't agree with by withholding cheddar. Card will likely still contribute a part of his estate to his views regardless of how much cheddar he makes.

And that's the thing, people pay cheddar into things they believe in, whether it's to founding an art school, donation to a religion, or to some shady groups pulling some serious bullshit. It's uncontrollable, and as long as these people have disposable income (or income they at least feel is disposable in the case of people who give too much), they will continue giving to these programs.

But, here's the thing. For every Card that's out there donating cheddar in the open to horrible foundations, there are people doing the same in secret, whether they're a millionaire in a mansion that feels threatened by gays becoming more accepted, a corporation fighting on behalf of their customers/shareholders that don't agree with gay rights, or the girl flipping burgers at the local fast food joint that believes every penny counts to stamp out homosexuals. Additionally, there are millionaires, corporations, and regular joes putting their cheddar into fighting the things these people do and want to empower gay rights in their own way.

Almost regardless of what you do, you are in some way going to support things you do and do not actually support, whether you're aware of it or not. Yes, we can argue that if you're aware that people like Card, corporations, or even the common worker are going to spend the cheddar they receive towards something you don't personally believe and still contribute cheddar, you are, in some way, making the mental decision that the contribution outweighs the negatives. However, all of us are going to inevitably be hypocrites in some way whether we know it or not.

We're almost guaranteed to have given cheddar to a bigot, racist, homophobe, or even child predator in our lifes, and unknowingly doing so and defending yourself as such is no better than what people who give the cheddar knowingly and defend their choice. In fact, personally, the fact that they acknowledge they're hypocrites is more refreshing than hearing "I wouldn't have given the cheddar if I knew".

Becoming obsessed with where your cheddar goes and what it ends up funding ends up crossing the territory of phobias where you end up pretty much irrationally wasting time and general convenience for the sake of a trivial amount of cheddar going to something you don't believe in. It also seems kind of egotistical in the sense of believing your purchase actually has anything more than a miniscule impact on the situation.

Card is a person with terrible viewpoints and a dangerous agenda to people with gay rights who I personally wouldn't support based on his viewpoint regardless of the value of his work (and frankly, from what I've come across of his work, it seems like overhyped tripe more than anything). However, I'm sure that even though I consciously try not to give cheddar to the obvious places that go against my beliefs or personhood, I have undoubtedly given cheddar in the past to people and groups that go out and hurt countless people and impede their ability to have equal rights and good lives.

But all that means is that we need to work harder to fight against this. If I give a dollar to anti-gay groups, I need to put in $2+ worth of work against it, whether it's cheddar, time, resources, or even just spreading acceptance and charity to others fighting the fight. If we really want to be in the clear, we have to outdo the damage we cause in the things we do by giving cheddar in the first place.

And those are the people who make the real difference.

I haven't read the thread thoroughly but I don't think the following point has come up. Everytime you buy something from almost any large international corporation you are "putting your own comfort above the needs of others". They all directly or indirectly support child labour, poor working conditions, abysmally low wages (talking sub-100$ a month), enviromental damage and other ethically or morally questionable things.

This isn't a justification though, quite the opposite. But if you're asking these kinds of questions you should followthrough on your line of thinking.

Oh, actually Kamak just made the same point, still going to post this as it serves as a concise rewording. I do want to add this though


I don't willfull ignorance is a valid excuse in a lot of these situations. 99% of people could quite easily do a bit more research and look for alternatives to contributing to worldwide mass inequality (eg. organizations such as Oxfam and Fairtrade), but they don't because it's not convenient for them to even think about those things. Of course, it's impossible to know if someone employs people that are secretly nazis, so you can't really blame yourself for that. There's a balance to be found here, but like I said the overwhelming majority of people lean towards the convenience side and are only morally outraged when it suits them.

I agree with you on convenience, but really as far as "willful ignorance", it's hard to really even take in the scope of how our cheddar is used in the grand scheme of things, all the corporations we give cheddar to, their employees, even cheddar that goes to royalties for patents and intellectual property. What's willful ignorance to some could easily be just outright ignorance because of the media they consume and whether they're really exposed to the full brunt of what's going on.

That doesn't mean you should just ignore everything and spend your cheddar damning the consequences, but it also doesn't mean you necessarily should spend your time going out and actively rooting out these individuals and groups so you know who not to give your cheddar to. There are, however, alternatives like you've proposed that make the hunt a lot easier in some areas such as child labor and some of the issues of exploitation, but as far as things like anti-gay and racist groups, it's a lot harder to pin down since it's not just corporations going out and causing these issues.

Rather than figuring out exactly where your cheddar shouldn't go (besides a reasonable amount of research that consumers should make for their own sake anyways), your time and effort is better spent promoting what you believe in. If you want to read Ender's Game and you're for gay rights, then give something back to offset what you believe Card will spend to hurt those rights. Same goes for the people who boycott Card. Not giving cheddar doesn't make the situation worse, but it doesn't necessarily make the situation better either if you don't put in any effort to make things better.

I don't quite agree with that, I think any adult fortunate enough to live in a first world country and who has received a basic education has the capacity to control what media and information they're exposed to and how they perceive it. It does require effort though. Of course, the media are definitely still responsible for misinforming the public, covering up facts and trivialising the information feed with non-news, but we still let the media control us.



I rather like this viewpoint, it's not enough to absolve yourself from all moral responsibility since at some point personal sacrifices still have to be made to create progress, but it affords yourself the mental breathing room to direct your energy towards positive things.

I'm not sure I agree with the view "Well whatever little cheddar you give has such an insignificant impact, why worry?" It's like the bystander effect, only in the opposite form. Yes, your cheddar is just a small part of the pie that makes up the cheddar he gets, which is why boycotts try to get everyone involved. Using the logic of "Well it won't do anything by itself" to justify doing it (which I understand you probably aren't trying to say) is a bit of a fallacy because then you just add to the system that makes everyone else say the exact same thing. It's the logic that keeps people who secretly disagree with a system participating with said system. The simplest way to prove whatever point you're making is to just act the way your views say you should. Stop buying his products. Sure, you're just a small part, but in the very least you're not adding to it, and other people are less inclined to say "Well everyone else is doing it, what's my action gonna do?"

My teacher brought something up a few days ago that made me think of this thread (the current topic in it anyway). What about buying products that were made using out of country child labor and stuff? Like, if you buy a pair of nike's made in some less than a dollar an hour wage factory in china or someplace, does that mean you support the child labor? I know it's not the exact same thing, but it's similar, and makes me think of some of you as slightly hypocritical because I'm sure you've bought products made using that kind of labor.

I'd say if you are aware of a company's practices and decide to still buy their products, then yes, you do support those practices, unless you can't get that product anywhere else and it is vital for you.

Let's say clothes. Supposing it's not possible for you to make your own and all of it comes from sweatshops. You need clothes and have no choice but to buy the ones made in sweatshops. Technically you allow the company you buy from to continue to use sweatshops, but you're not morally guilty of anything because you have no other choice and the consequences are contingent.
Now, supposing you know some companies that produce fair trade clothes and you have enough cheddar to buy from these companies. Buying from a company that uses sweatshops then makes you morally support the use of cheap labor, because you made a choice.

Same goes for chocolate/coffee/blood diamonds/Wal-Mart/McDonald's/Chick-fil-A/etc

Yes you are. The problem is that it can be hard/impossible to find things like that that are not made there. And you need clothes whereas you don't need that book.

Alright, I guess that makes sense. I just wanted to know what difference there was between it. Thanks.