[faux-nonfiction = fiction = truth? lies? videotape?]

[reenka]

Reading through these links about the 'real identity' of a bad-slashfic-cliche-type 'queer' writer, JT LeRoy, I ask myself questions about what's an 'authentic voice' (and how does it relate to saying 'genuine' things) and what's 'metaphorical truth' and what's a 'useful conversation about gender & identity'.
    I cannot decide on any answers; I just know what makes me uncomfortable, and I also know that people who use a 'changing identity' to run away from consistency and openness most likely have something wrong with them, something that's not working. In my experience, either people are who they are or they're fucked up, basically. Not that I don't like fucked up, because I do, but I also like to call things by name, and that's what the name is when you compulsively lie about yourself, no matter what the justification, whether or not you believe the lie or someone else does.

As a writer, I'm fully aware what I write about are metaphorical truths mixed in with lies mixed in with self-invention. When I was younger especially, what I wrote was almost entirely self-invention, stories about myself-but-not-myself. I think in many ways, though, all good fiction is 'real' even if it's not true, so it's disingenuous to talk about 'giving people a voice' through faux-nonfictional fiction. In a way, that's kind of insulting to fiction.

Bottom line, if people 'need a voice' enough, as per this interview with The Guardian, they -make- it. You don't need to give it to them, because they have it, and all they ever need to do is use it. Having a hard life or having an easy life isn't as important as the sheer innate -will- to know ourselves, to prove ourselves, that's pretty inborn. So I feel pretty annoyed whenever people try to play it like their inner voices are being stifled by -outer- voices (of like, society) to the point where they'd need help to just, uh, exist. Because like, do you really exist if you don't have an inner voice? And doesn't a strong inner voice = a strong outer voice?

Besides that, you don't need to be heard to have a voice, and especially not heard by the greatest and the biggest number of people; that's different, that's feeding your ego and creating a social bond, but it's not giving you an identity. People who are -extraverted- naturally want to 'be heard' and associate that with the nature of existence, but that's their personality biases talking. I would exist just great with no one to hear me too, because I hear myself-- I exist and don't need to prove anything to anyone. So on -those- kind of meta grounds, Laura/JT LeRoy or whoever piss me off.

There keeps being that quote from JT's book, Sarah, in these articles:
    She slowly rolled her head to me, flopped an arm over the back of my neck, and pulled me closer as if she were pulling in won poker chips. 'Everybody needs someone to know who they really are,' she laughed, and guided my head down to lie next to hers.
    I do think this relates to our need to be loved, and loved by someone who knows us truly-- but even so, I still believe that the task of knowing the entire truth of oneself can only be left to oneself alone, and if this cannot be accomplished, that's when the lies are no longer metaphorical.

And I guess it's also important for me to say that in my mind, identity is never 'irrelevant', though when we're talking about fiction, the -author's- identity isn't the point, in any case-- the character's is. Unless you like the author; in that case it's helpful to know for tracking purposes.
~~

EDIT - OMG, this is the most hilarious (and spot-on) Draco comic I've seen in ages!! HEEE! I can totally see Draco eyeing both Harry & Marcus & Krum, for sure, and Ginny singing the 'gay' song. Hell, if I were Ginny, -I'd- sing the gay song to Draco, oh yes I would ♥♥♥
    Also, holy snickers, Batman, this pic by kasche (Lady Belial at DeviantArt, the one who drew my favorite James) has got to be the hottest S/R fanart I've seen in yonks. YONKS. (And also, these bunch of Marauder 'polaroids' are way hot too.)

Comments

[scoradh.livejournal.com]

I think it a bloody impossibility, to 'know' someone in the way that quote is suggesting. I have so many shells that I put on for different parts of my interactive day that if someone said to me -- ie, this 'person who knows who I really am' -- "Be the you you are without those shells", I couldn't. I'm quite aware that I act differently around different sets of people, and I don't know which of these acts, if any, is the true one.

And then to expect someone else to know?

It's like that phrase, "I love you, you make me want to be a better person." That, for me, would mean giving up three of the things I like most -- porn, being cynical, and bitching about people. Then that person has the huge responsibility of living up to what I gave up for them.

I'm confused now, so I go watch The Wedding Crashers.