I have to admit that I’m finding this a little discomfitting…

[elfs]

At first, I thought a setting of military chaos and horror would be a great place for a meditation on the urge for humanness in the midst of it all.  Let’s face it: I write porn, and two people trying to make sense of it and live while so much dying is going on around them is good, powerful stuff.  But the more I read about the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, the more I keep thinking that the backdrop is too… something.  Too horrific.  Too unbelievable.  Too monstrous to be understood.

It’s funny; I mentioned self-censorship in a recent post, and I’ve been invited to participate in a panel on self-censorship at a small SF convention nearby.  I think this might be a Yowler story I let die, just because I can’t convince myself to write a story about a desperate search for an echo of happiness set sixty miles from I Wish To Inform You That In The Morning We Will Be Killed Along With Our Families.

This entry was automatically cross-posted from Elf's writing journal, Pendorwright.com. Feel free to comment on either LiveJournal or Pendorwright.

Comments

If we don't talk about do we forget, and if we do talk about it do we diminish it?

[pandakahn.livejournal.com]

I read the autobiography of the Rwanda genocide written by General Romeo Dallaire. Powerful stuff. Meaty stuff. Horrific stuff. He still has nightmares and PTSD from it. A military general.

I have taught genocide studies and can tell you that your response to the events is common, even among those who lived through it. Read "Hotel Rwanda" and think about what he left out. Think about how he mitigated and downplayed and glossed over events as he was writing. I found myself pushed to the point numbing out while reading it and have come to realize that sometimes we have no choice. The European genocide of the 1940's is far enough away that we can feel emotionally safe when we deal with it. The faces, the bodies, the actions of those who destroyed lived and those whose lives were destroyed are far enough away that we can address them one step away. A safe distance so that a part of our brain can keep us safe.

I was teaching in the 1990's and lived through the events in Rwanda while living safely in Alaska. I remember listening to the news and feeling a sense of disbelief and unreality. If it was real wouldn't our military be sent to stop it? The UN would step in if it was really a genocide, wouldn't they? We did nothing and people died. We did nothing and people murdered other people with machetes and burned them to death for perceived tribal differences. Hutu and Tutsi.

Should you self censor? Yes. You should.

Why? Because, and I am reading this from what you are writing, you do not feel right about it. You don't feel comfortable with it. Finally, this is the big one, you do not seem as if this story is one that you want to use to go to the place that it is going to take you.

You understand that stories write themselves and take you places that you sometimes you never knew existed. I would not write this. I would not want to open this up. Your a better writer than I am (seriously), and I think you might be able to pull this off and leave me crying and raging when I was done reading it. Do you really want to do this? Do you really want to go there? You have a support group ready for when you get there and have to deal with the fall out?

I copped out years ago. I don't write the stuff that makes me cry when I write it, and if I do I burn it as soon as it is done. Your a better writer than I am.

I wish you the best, what ever your choice.


MPK

[antonia-tiger.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure I would call this self-censorship.

Why?

It's a story you don't want to write. Not a story you want to write, and choose not to because of possible hassles.

[(Anonymous)]

Agreed. This is "internal censorship" rather than "external censorship", it's your internal feelings not any external pressures that might exist that is putting you off this route.

[norincraft.livejournal.com]

There different scales of military chaos you don't need to write about a worst scenario. Obviously you wouldn't want to pick one where it was just the chaos of disorganization, apathy and indecision -- unless perhaps it was for humor or counterpoint. But for the most part there is a lot of average grind with conflicts of mostly low level conflicts and the occasional inexplicable loss.

Think of it this way, you can only carry so much into a battle. Today's average soldier has a basic load of 210 rounds. even if you doubled it, included a couple of grenades, a pistol and 60 rounds for a pistol, you still wouldn't have all that much. So gunfights (long ones) tend to be a few rounds every so often with the occasional high intensity flare up. You tend to see the high intensity stuff on the news. Otherwise it isn't good TV. But if your friend gets hit by the single shot they can still end up just as dead.

Another thing to consider is wars tend to be more civilized than you would think. I know that's really counterintuitive. But organized armies fight differently than crazed mobs.

I guess I am saying you can make it work and be reasonable realistic.