< He wasn't exactly a hero, but...

~ns

It's a tough decision when you enjoy the content of someone that you so strongly disagree with. Harry Potter and Ender's Game is one of my favorite series, but I can't say I like JK Rowling, and I like Orson Scott Card even less. What can I do but separate the art from the artist?

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~pink2ds wrote:

I don't think this really is much for debate because it comes down so strongly to how people's emotions work differently.

When I hear the titles "Chinatown" or "Knife in the Water", I immediately flinch, Polanski's connection to those works hit me like a gut punch. [Cue the anti-skubs immediately overly literally interpreting that sentence.]

So if the argument is to separate the art from the artist, that'd require a big effort from me.

And it's just as true that if the argument is to hold artists responsible, that'd require a conscious effort from those who work in a different way, those who don't automatically have that emotional reaction.

As for me, there can be degrees of badness. I think Florence from Florence+The Machine has made a lot of really awful decisions such as participating in the "No Light, No Light" video but I can still stomach listening to her records (for now—I mean, those bad decisions keep piling up).

But someone who actually hurt people, actually beat people up or killed them is more difficult to listen to.

I'm not promising to be super consistent about this because, as I've argued, it's so emotion driven.

~starbreaker wrote:

Never buying new from assholes seems a good policy.