Prejudice
Acknowledging your own prejudices is the necessary start to opposing prejudice in the world. If you believe you're somehow immune to prejudice, that you're not at all racist, have not a grain of homophobia, are tolerant of all religions, belief systems, and nationalities, are not prejudiced against people with inherited wealth or people living on welfare, people who are addicted to heroin, people who are overweight, smokers, etc. etc., you're living in cloud cuckoo land. Everyone has prejudices, and it's by looking at them honestly and examining how they are formed and how they affect our actions that we can understand the world and -- if we are so inclined -- help to change it.
Writers who preach through their fiction are using the wrong instrument. That is undoubtedly true, but it does not mean that there is no place for social criticism in fiction. On the contrary, we need more George Orwells, Nadine Gordimers, John Steinbecks, George Eliots, Joyce Carol Oates, Arthur Millers etc. When characters are pitted against each other through their actions and their ideas, the clash brings social criticism to life and can enter into the crevices of readers' minds in ways that no sermon political speech ever will.
Acknowledging your own prejudices is the necessary start to opposing prejudice in the world. If you believe you're somehow immune to prejudice, that you're not at all racist, have not a grain of homophobia, are tolerant of all religions, belief systems, and nationalities, are not prejudiced against people with inherited wealth or people living on welfare, people who are addicted to heroin, people who are overweight, smokers, etc. etc., you're living in cloud cuckoo land. Everyone has prejudices, and it's by looking at them honestly and examining how they are formed and how they affect our actions that we can understand the world and -- if we are so inclined -- help to change it.
Writers who preach through their fiction are using the wrong instrument. That is undoubtedly true, but it does not mean that there is no place for social criticism in fiction. On the contrary, we need more George Orwells, Nadine Gordimers, John Steinbecks, George Eliots, Joyce Carol Oates, Arthur Millers etc. When characters are pitted against each other through their actions and their ideas, the clash brings social criticism to life and can enter into the crevices of readers' minds in ways that no sermon political speech ever will.
