It Cuts Both Ways

Months ago I talked about how the press has a tendency to misrepresent statements, and provided my own examples about how easy it is to do that. I referred to that earlier this week, and I hope this is the last time I find myself thinking about this for a long time. (This does get beyond the arguments, btw.)

When I posted yesterday the only name I mentioned was Ian Rankin’s. The reason was deliberate. Sure, it was the recent uproar in the press that brought up the topic, but it ties to other things I’ve talked about – the radio debate between David Roberts and Mark Billingham, for one, the recent online attack on Ken Bruen for another. And that’s why I said And there are a lot of people out there who have nothing to do with the other side of the writing community, left feeling uncomfortable over the comments made, feeling as though there's active hostility (which may or may not be true, depending on the argument and the people) and feeling as though they don't want to be around any of those people. It wasn’t just about Rankin. Certainly not just about Rankin and Val McDermid. Val was just one of the people who spoke out months ago when a comment Rankin made in an interview resulted in wide-scale criticism on him, with some alleging he was anti-lesbian, etc.

I think the broader issue to consider is one that Olen Steinhauer raised earlier this week when he asked, Can Novelists Just Be People?

The short answer? No. Whatever you say in an interview, at a public event, on a panel, on radio… all of it can come back to haunt you later. This is hardly a news flash.

At this point in their careers, I guess I’m stunned Val or Ian would be surprised by anything they see from the press and the public when they make comments in interviews or at public events. I was pretty quick to point my fingers in a different direction last fall, at the journalist who conducted the interview, and at the number of people who just took what was reported verbatim without even questioning it.

Today, Val McDermid has been reported as being upset for the way her own comments were represented in the press this week. Speaking to McDermid yesterday though, her anger wasn't directed at Rankin - but at the way the story has been reported. "Ian and I Instant Messaged each other when this story broke and were very amicable," she tells me. "We are still friends - he danced at my wedding, for Christ's sake!"

As we chat, McDermid is scanning reports of the incident on the internet, becoming increasingly incensed. "Why was only my sexuality mentioned?" she asks. "I was on stage with Denise Mina, who supported and expanded on what I said, but because she is, inconveniently, a self-confessed heterosexual, the only remarks reported on were mine.

"I did not even mention Ian's name," she adds. "Not because I was frightened to, but because I wanted to have a wider discussion about the issues. The way it has been reported makes me sound like a mad, paranoid lesbian." It's easy to see her point. Yesterday morning the page three headline in the Times read: "Revenge of the bloodthirsty lesbians."

McDermid is appalled at being referred to as "bloodthirsty" (although she is thinking very seriously about having a T-shirt made up with that headline). "It's preposterous nonsense," she says. "It makes me sound as if I'm some kind of ghastly bloodsucking demon, who shouldn't be allowed near small children. It doesn't help when the media uses such headlines, making me appear as if I have my meat cleaver ready to chop Rankin's gonads off.

"It couldn't be further from the truth," she quips. "I take my cooking seriously."

One thing I’ve learned from this is that, no matter how many news stories you read about something, you can’t be absolutely certain about the facts. I’ll take one report that’s questionable with a grain of salt. But when I see the same thing from a number of different sources it’s always seemed fair to conclude it’s been properly sourced and that things aren’t being blown too far out of proportion (assuming these aren’t wire stories).

The truth of this whole issue has been mired in misrepresentation from day 1, and nothing’s changed.

It’s a good interview, one that demonstrates we have yet another example of how things get twisted in the press. For all the reasons I argued vehemently last fall for people to not jump to conclusions over Rankin’s reported remarks (and the widely inferred meaning attached to them by people on blogs and forums) I should not have assumed there was any intention to dredge up an old argument yesterday, and I apologize if I gave anyone that impression.

Now that I’ve had an opportunity to read Val’s comments in the interview, I think I can (perhaps) finally understand why the issue was raised again. (I still wish it hadn’t been. No matter what the intention it’s come off badly, as evidenced by the strings of biting comments on all the news articles, as well as comments on author forums.) It really is a shame that that one topic overshadowed far more critical topics, such as purchasing managers for major chains not reading books by women.

The interview is good for other reasons. It reminds me of all the reasons I have so much admiration for Val’s work.

In one of the previous books in the series, The Last Temptation (2002), Jordan was brutally raped while working undercover to expose a people trafficker. Unlike most of the characters in male crime writers' novels, however, Jordan lived on to fight another case. McDermid writes about sexual violence in a way that humanises the victim, and believes in portraying the reality of such crimes and their effects. "I wanted Carol not to be a victim," she explains, "so women who also did not want to be a victim could aspire to her."

I’ve always had an appreciation for Val’s willingness to go at tough issues in her fiction, delving into things that aren’t easy to write about. And she doesn’t sugarcoat it either, which is good, because there’s nothing more insulting to people who’ve experience violence than to have people dismiss it and the way it can impact their lives.

I also think that it may be that many women write about violence because they’re more often the victims of sexual violence. (I’d add men that can be deterred from writing about rape because people start assuming they have rape fantasies. I’ve heard male authors state on panels and in interviews that they’re reluctant to write about pedophiles and rape.)

Whether men or women write the more violent crime fiction is a question nobody is likely to ever try to tackle directly, at least, not any time soon. I certainly know a number of male authors who write violence.

Putting my own 2 cents on the subject, I think women who are lesbians experience more discrimination, despite changes in society. I think about how everything I write can be interpreted, and even as a woman I worried about one thing I wrote some time ago (not published). After being raped a woman eventually begins a relationship with another woman. I worried a lot about that, about people assuming I was inferring that the reason women are lesbians is because they’ve experienced abuse. I don’t think that for a second. I think abuse can affect a person’s decision about who they’d like to have a relationship with, but it’s certainly not the reason someone’s gay, straight or otherwise. The character was, in part, inspired by a real situation I went through, when a woman talked to me about all the abuse she’d experienced from the father of her children and how she’d finally experienced a loving, nurturing relationship. And then she broke down and cried because the relationship was with a woman.

She felt so conflicted herself, there was nothing I could really say to her. Just listen. And think about how sad it is that so many people have terrible, unhealthy relationships. It seems so simple to just want to love and be loved, but it gets twisted and complicated and then people meddle, tell you who you are and are not allowed to be involved with, tell you what is and is not acceptable.

Me, I’ve never had a problem getting along with guys. On any given day about 70% of the emails I get from friends are from guys. There’s no universal truth that abuse or the absence of abuse will influence a person’s sexuality. That’s simplistic thinking.

But I still worry that if that character ever sees the light of day I may be forced to defend her existence. (Actually, this reminds me of an email I had from Al Guthrie the other day, but I can’t talk about that, or I’d have to kill everyone who read it.)

It goes back to what started this whole thing to begin with. People make assumptions, and judge, without all the facts.

Maybe it says more about us when we do that than anyone else.

I hated to think that there may be a real conflict between Ian and Val. It certainly came off as though there was a spat this week. I’m glad to be proven wrong about that. I am also aware of one... contrived publicity stunt in which authors agreed to publicly argue, within the past year, to raise their profile. When I touched on that the other day I wasn't thinking about Val and Ian, and I want to be clear on that point. I wish people wouldn't create and exaggerate arguments in public for publicity, because it's tense for everyone. There's enough to argue about already, without trying to create false drama. Believe me, if I express anger with someone, you can bet I'm seriously annoyed, but the majority of my real conflicts have actually been kept out of the public domain.