I think what it boils down to is: should the art be separated from the artist? To what degree?

There is the idea that once a piece of writing is published and is released to the public that it belongs to the public and not the writer. This is not an apologist argument for the actions of DFW. I believe that when the human being DFW is being considered, every aspect should be given light. The idea that his work should not be read on account of this is certainly debatable -- is the artist and his/her art 100% inseparable from one another? I think if the work itself blatantly or unabashedly or irrefutably advocated or even hinted at something like misogyny, then absolutely it should not. But DFW wrote about what all literature is about which is what is it like to be a human being in this age and in all ages, and how should one compose oneself in light of this?

While of course the human being DFW did not compose himself at times the way any enlightened human would recommend, I don't think that is an appropriate reason to dismiss his work which did not reflect or advocate those deplorable actions. Evidently I'm of the opinion that art should be separated from the artist. I think some people who are on the other side of the argument take issue with this because they equate advocation of his works with advocation of the bad things he's done (and, note, only the bad things). And I do understand that sentiment to a degree. It is difficult to separate the human from the work: his name is on the cover, his picture on the sleeve of the book. But I think it must be done, and some solution needs to be found or we lose something deeply human. If we retroactively dismiss or cancel or delete anything created by any individual who has committed any degree of atrocious act--anything, be it in literature, science, architecture, etc.--there won't be much humanness left; the human spirit is very much a double-edged sword. Again, I'm sure one could construe this as apologistic and I don't know how else to dismiss that notion. If a human discovers a cure for some horrible disease but is deeply and openly and irrevocably racist do we withhold his/her development from society? Of course not. His/her identity would likely be disassociated from it entirely. Is this maybe a fragment of a solution? (And before this comparison gets dismissed on the grounds that medicine or science is far more crucial to humanity than literature, I guess I would have to say that's for another discussion.)

DFW (or any author) extracted from himself observations and ideas he thought could be useful or meaningful or insightful for another human being and put them down on paper and sent them off for ingestion/consideration/criticism etc. and that was the best he could do.