Questions that keep me awake at night...

[catherineldf]

when not pondering global warming, the general ghastliness of it all and just how the hell I'm going to fit 500 hours work in 80 hours or so-why the hell is the following so fricking popular around here?
Went to a reading recently (names and times frames changed to protect the guilty since this is a general not specific rant) by some of the local literary type writers. In these parts, they likes their memoir, even if their lives are really pretty bloody dull. But they likes it anyway, lots and lots. Especially the following scenario: earnest white person brings lover/partner/spouse/whatever from exotic category X - African, Asian, Latino, disabled, same sex, transgender, Jewish, Wiccan, narcoleptic, actually from another planet, etc., etc. and if the audience is really lucky, a combination of all of the above! - home to meet the parents.

Dear goddess, where to begin? I have heard a few other variations but this seems the most common. If I had a dollar for every time I've sat through this 'memoir,' I might have a car payment by now. At thsi point, there are no new spins on this. Really. The object of desire is nearly always...the object of desire. They seldom get to break out of the little description box with airholes that they inhabit. You don't get to hear them complain about meeting the memoirist's boring family while their supposed beloved has attention-getting histrionics in the foreground. Even the finale is monotonous. This scenario almost always has one of the following outcomes: 1. family freaks out in ugly way or 2. family takes it all more or less in stride. And yes, it is nearly always dinner. Not lunch, not coffee. Dinner.

Okay, so the writer has gotten lots of attention, positive or negative, from their families, which appears to be the point. And what about the exotic other? Well, they're nearly a literary device anyway. Besides memoiring about the almost inevitable breakup when they get tired of being treated like a weird pet will make for a great chapter or two. Can you tell that I find this icky and annoying? Honestly, people, if this is the best you can do for the story of your life that's so terribly unique everyone should want to read it, perhaps you might want to try actually living a bit first instead of worrying about the possibility of your parents retroactively aborting you for your choice of partner. Hrumph...

Comments

[sparkymonster.livejournal.com]

I also hate the "but I can't be racist/transphobic/etc. I dated someone who was [insert exoticized category] once!" Such a false statement.

Once, my then girlfriend had me come with her to a family outing to an art museum followed by a late lunch. The special exhibit we were seeing was about Gaugin. One major theme was how Gaugin started out as a nice respectable married Danish man but then exotic brown skinned women lured him into sin, STDs, debauchery and madness.

My girlfriend's family are uptight descendants of Danes (and very proud of their Danish heritage). I was the exotic brown skinned woman preventing my girlfriend from producing grand children. As you can guess, it was an AMAZING afternoon.

[catherineldf.livejournal.com]

Ye gods and goddesses. :-((( Yes, I've heard that one too. It is such a load of crap. The amazing thing is that there are so many variations on it and it's so very hard to kill off.
I once spent an excruciating week with my boyfriend at the time's family - very high up in one of the more uptight Lutheran churches and extremely judgemental. He had neglected to tell them we were living together or anything about me - the bi thing, the Wicca thing, the politics, etc., etc. Good times all around. My favorite moment was when his dad burst into his room without knocking in hopes of catching his (mid-twenties) son in the act with 'that woman.' i was sitting (fully clothed) on the floor reading a book while the son slept on the bed. The look on dad's face was priceless. :-)

[cbpotts.livejournal.com]

The last paragraph here? This bit:

Can you tell that I find this icky and annoying? Honestly, people, if this is the best you can do for the story of your life that's so terribly unique everyone should want to read it, perhaps you might want to try actually living a bit first instead of worrying about the possibility of your parents retroactively aborting you for your choice of partner. Hrumph...


That's why I love you.

(I'm not sure which one of us is the exotic one here, but I'm guessing it's you. I hope you don't mind being objectified as such. On the other hand, my family is so remarkably self absorbed, they might not even notice if I brought someone home to meet them...)

[catherineldf.livejournal.com]

Why thank you. :-D
I'm not all that exotic unless you count wardrobe and I actually open my mouth. I've noticed the kind of folks who really get into this sort of thing seem to go more for visually exotic. Gets more attention that way. I'm sure at some point all of it started out with a degree of sincerity but the other night I actually heard someone riff on the title, content and scenarios of someone else's memoir from about 8-9 years ago. Only the lesbian partner had been 'upgraded' to trannie and the family was more mellow. It got me thinking on just how often I'd heard this schtick. Think I'll stick with real fiction, personally.

[jean-roberta.livejournal.com]

Why don't more earnest white people in search of exotic brown-skinned women (or other exotic type) as literary inspiration check out the skeletons in their own family closet?
If "white" is an exclusive category, actual ghosts seem more credible to me.
Scratch a rigidly righteous Lutheran & you're likely to find all sorts of interesting roots - non-Lutheran at least.
Someone (can't remember who) once estimated that 20% of current "white" population of the U.S. has some African blood. Given the history, I suspect the estimate is low.
What continues to stick in my craw is how often a casual expression of bigotry is made to someone who looks "white" enough to accept it. What, you've never put on a sheet & burned a cross? You don't attend the homophobic Church of the Father-led Family? Where have you been, Tahiti?

[catherineldf.livejournal.com]

Well, some of them do. Consider "Slaves in the Family" and such. Of course, that's a serious history and not an attention getting device. Ooops, I mean a memoir.
But there is a certain flavor of aspiring memoir writing here in the Cities that plays on these same scenarios over and over again. It get grants, it gets the prestigious reading spots and in short, is rewarded up the wazoo even when it's riffing on things people have done sixty times before. Stupid, questionable at best and very tiresome.

[thaedeus.livejournal.com]

I know what you mean. I feel the same way about coming of age stories
involving dragons and young boys that learn how to sword fight in 5 minutes.

In does seem to be interesting--but only to me--that I have never ever had
a protagonist's parents appear in a story. Well, once, but just the headstone. :)

To me, "dinner with the parents" deserves the same fate as "expository lump,"
regardless of skin color, sexual preference, or writer's AGENDA.

hahaha

[evilroygato.livejournal.com]

this line: "when they get tired of being treated like a weird pet will make for a great chapter or two." was really awesome. And yeah, what a dull phenomenon.

Re: hahaha

[catherineldf.livejournal.com]

I swear, the thing I sat through the other night was someone else's memoir from about 8 or 9 years ago. Only the lesbian partner had a makeover and was now trannie. Gotta love it.
How are things going?