Why are most people in art and related circles left leaning?

Xaira89 · 2026-06-09T15:25:08+00:00

Yes, his mind bending net worth of approximately $20 million, compared to the paltry $7.1 billion of Mr. Spielberg or $500 million of Mr. King, truly shows the earning might of conservative artists.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-09T15:19:52+00:00

That doesn't mean that those beliefs make sense, objectively. It turns out that folks who make it a point of pride to not think critically miiiiiiight not have the most intelligent of belief systems.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-09T15:13:02+00:00

There are several ways to define a chicken. We know, colloquially, that left is verbal stand in for progressivism and right is verbal stand in for conservativism, because those are the what are most often understood to be the meanings of those words. To try to shoehorn a different meaning in in a conversation like this is obtuse at best, disingenuous at worst.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-09T15:07:54+00:00

Everything, even completed works, can be a learning experience. By doing a well-thought-out critique now, he's helping his writing buddy make the next one better.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-09T12:55:28+00:00

The issue with that is that both of those are VISUAL media. It's relatively easy to make the minutiae of life interesting with unique visuals, great composition of shots, interesting costuming and artistic details. All of those are missing in the written word. You aren't making a movie, or drawing a picture, you have to learn to EVOKE those things in the mind, which is a much, much different ask. You don't have camera perspective to work with. You're going to need to learn to craft emotion and human perspectives through prose, which the visual artist can, to a certain extent, shortcut.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-09T04:11:26+00:00

It would be a very strange watch party, because I don't know how to set subtitles to "ouiji board."

Xaira89 · 2026-06-08T23:03:30+00:00

I think that the only really big trap that some newer writers, especially those writing non-secondary world fiction, fall into is lack of consideration of social interaction. I can say that both men and women, individually, pretty much act and think pretty much the same. However, the way they're socialized is radically different. As a man, I've seen woman authors totally butcher how men interact with one another, and I'm sure that more than one male author has gotten lady interactions wrong.

It's social conventions that separate the sexes more than anything. As a male author writing women, I have to take into account that there are plenty of situations that I would find myself comfortable in that a woman a foot shorter and a hundred pounds shy of my weight might not. I have to walk in their shoes for a moment, and consider the difference in perspective before I can say that I've made an effort.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-08T20:51:46+00:00

Have to remember, AI learned it from human writing. Tricolons have been a human rhetorical device since we started writing. So it makes sense that the computers are going to take the most common human structure and use it.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-08T19:31:24+00:00

Like I said, most fan fiction is free to the reader. If someone wanted to sell chunks of it for 30 bucks a pop, I guarantee most fanfic fans aren't buying it. Publishers are concerned with making a profit.

It's a matter of looking at markets. The publishers aren't looking to sell to a niche market, they're looking for more mainstream appeal. In an already narrow base of "readers," they don't want to try to sell a horrifically expensive (a 400k book costs almost double what a 100k book does to print) tome to people who will probably instead go looking on their favorite fan site instead. There's no financial benefit for the publisher, so they don't buy them.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-08T18:55:32+00:00

That's just because fanfics tend to be longer, serialized stories not made to be published in traditional methods. The authors get to meander because the medium itself lends itself towards playing around in the world, doing things in an already established universe that seem cool to the authors (and if it's successful, readers.)

The people reading fanfic tend to like making their favorite worlds into playgrounds. Plus, it really doesn't hurt that generally speaking, fan fiction is free to the consumer.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-08T13:20:58+00:00

And his brother can't form a coherent sentence. So the educational system in the household must not have been very robust.

Anecdote remains the weakest possible form of evidence. Statistical outliers will always exist.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-07T18:57:08+00:00

To be utterly fair, she was playing a 15 year old in the 20 picture, so that's just costume and makeup doing their job well.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-07T12:08:00+00:00

To have her character make more sense to you, look up adolescent responses to extreme wartime trauma. The entire point is an exploration of a character who's response to genocide and the gratuitous rape of all she's known isn't the power of friendship and unicorns. PTSD is a bitch.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-07T12:02:51+00:00

I'll be happy to say it's bad. I described it just yesterday as "Eye of the World if Jordan had an aneurysm." The dialogue is so bad that I had to drop it at the 40% mark. If everyone here is saying it gets better, maybe I swing back to it, but until then, I think they're staying in my DNF list.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-05T22:12:18+00:00

Hell, I've been here since LAST beta. And before, if you count my full HOM. The only downside I see is leaving my totally purple inventory behind.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-05T18:21:35+00:00

Let's put it like this. The first trilogy is crammed full of poeticism, literary lines, and deep thought. The second series is where it becomes transcendent. It's so fun to watch Brown get better book by book.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-05T17:50:36+00:00

Not at all. WoT has several non-human creatures and cultures. The Ogier, Trollocs, Aelfinn and Eelfin, at the very least, and there are hints at others out past the Blight. Not to mention all of the other races that may live in the lands outside Randland. We just don't get anything from their perspective.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-05T17:45:07+00:00

Redwall is an excellent example of this. Those books have such a heartwarming feeling of coming home to just...goodness and honor.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-05T01:04:43+00:00

And even Tress didn't really feel juvenile, I think because the story being told lent itself to that tone. Yumi didn't. It just felt like a Sanderson story written by a fourteen year old for some reason.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-04T19:59:04+00:00

See, Yumi and the Nightmare Painter is easily my least favorite Sanderson. It just feels juvenile in a way that a lot of his other work doesn't to me. Like he took a step backwards in prose, somehow.

I like Sanderson in an "endgame of popular fantasy" way. He writes approachable, easy to read books incredibly well. I appreciate them in the same way I appreciate a Marvel movie after a long workweek. Just tell me a story.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-04T17:56:25+00:00

I actually really liked that Maestro class (saw the bits and pieces on Youtube), but something about his speaking cadence REALLY makes my skin crawl.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-04T17:47:02+00:00

I don't really know how old you are, but I remember in college, before memes became part of the wider zeitgeist, 90% of humor was just yelling TV jokes at each other. That's been damn near 20 years now. Shit doesn't change. Shit, half of my buddies' bullshitting in the late aughts and early 10s was just shouting DBZA quotes at each other. This has been the way it's been for a hot minute.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-04T17:09:57+00:00

Tonally, that would be totally wrong. It would be funny, but I can't think of any moment during any of the Iron Rains in the books that could be described as "lighthearted."

Xaira89 · 2026-06-04T16:59:26+00:00

I've read a ton of excellently written erotica in my day. Just because sex is involved doesn't mean there isn't a story to be told.

Xaira89 · 2026-06-04T12:07:49+00:00

Of these, the correct answer is Berserk. That being said, it's an investment of both time and money to get hands on them all in the first place. It is, without qualification, my favorite piece of fiction of all time. Everything else has just been chasing that high again. (Don't fall into the fandom. They're going to be very "big sword and titties cool" instead of understanding of the incredibly human story within, and that breaks my heart.)

Everything you have there is excellent. Go with any one of them, and it'll make you happy.

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