How about giving him a chance because he's Orson Scott Card?
Either way, he's done some of my favorite science fiction titles but I mostly have to pretend he doesn't exist in real life. His politics, with regard to social issues, are just vulgar.
Either way, he's done some of my favorite science fiction titles but I mostly have to pretend he doesn't exist in real life. His politics, with regard to social issues, are just vulgar.
If you feel bad about supporting him financially, remember that he only gets about a dollar for each book you buy. If you borrow it from the library, your contribution is even smaller.
On the subject of his political views, I looked at the referenced Wikipedia site and don't see anything "vulgar" listed there. Perhaps I use a different definition of "vulgar" than others... [http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/vulgar]
While part of me is still hoping he's talking about Snopes, I know this is a reference to the University of East Anglia emails, which were about as much a blow to climate science as the Arsenic bacteria were a boon to astrobiology. I may have to adopt your "pretend he doesn't exist in real life" approach.
I refuse to read any of his new stuff, but that's probably 50% politics and 50% taste.
I think OSC's political positions are nigh idiotic, and frankly confusing given the very reasonable positions he presents in some of his books. E.G. Homosexual characters in his books are not society destroying monsters. Yet even given that you're still overstepping sane literary analysis when you start the Hitler biography bullshit. Attack the man on his politics all you want, his positions are easy to verify and highly public, just leave the stupid smears to die.
Yes, that has always puzzled me - going from portraying gay characters as alright people suffering from straight society's marginalization to ranting about the Gay Agenda. I suspect it has something to do with a remark he made in the late 80s or early 90s about local church (CoLDS) officials encouraging him to spend more of his pro writing time on religious propaganda or other pro-church material. It was in a non-fiction piece or an afterword in a book of his, and I wish I could remember which one.
What I thought was more interesting than the Hitler comparisons were the allegations of ghostwriting. I thought THAT was the real point of the article, that it was clear he didn't even know what was in his books, and when presented with something he definitely wrote, it was incoherent and poorly written.