[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vP0cUBi4hwE[/youtube]
Ender's Game, a science-fiction film opening this November, has recently encountered a PR disaster. Gay-marriage advocates are calling for a boycott of the movie not because of its content, but because of its author. Ender's Game is an adaptation of the 1985 novel by Orson Scott Card, who happens to be an outspoken opponent of gay marriage.
An official petition called "Skip Ender's Game" has been started online urging everyone to "keep your money out of Orson Scott Card's pockets." It also features this rather shameful quote from the author in an article he wrote called "The Hypocrites of Homosexuality":
"Laws against homosexual behavior should remain on the books, not to be indiscriminately enforced against anyone who happens to be caught violating them, but to be used when necessary to send a clear message that those who flagrantly violate society's regulation of sexual behavior cannot be permitted to remain as acceptable, equal citizens within that society.”
While Card's views are considered archaic by most people's standards, should we really punish art because of the artist that created it? In a brilliant 2012 New York Times article titled "Good Art, Bad People", Charles McGrath points out that some of the most renowned artists in history shared reprehensible social views.
"Probably the most frequently cited example is Wagner, whose anti-Semitism was such that he once wrote the Jews were by definition incapable of art" writes McGrath. "Degas, a painter often praised for his warmth and humanity, was also an anti-Semite and a staunch defender of the French court that falsely convicted Alfred Dreyfus."
McGrath goes on to cite other famous artists and their ugly beliefs and actions, such as Ernest Hemingway, T.S Eliot, Ezra Pound, Norman Mailer, and Charles Dickens. It can be said that these men were products of the time they lived in, but the same can be said of Card. He grew up in a Mormon household and was taught Mormon values, amongst them that homosexuality was wrong.
I do not agree with Card's thoughts on gay marriage, but I will not condemn his work solely for that reason. One of the most incredible things about art is that it can be created by anyone and evoke countless reactions in a varied audience. Thanks to this always-connected world we now live in, social protests of this size are easily organized, but so are over-reactions. Should employers "keep their money out of the pockets" of their religious employees because they don't support same-sex marriage? If Ender's Game was a story that itself condemned homosexuality, then these complaints would be justified. However, Ender's Game has nothing to do with homosexuality at all, so this whole boycott is just a personal attack of Card, and it's entirely aimed at his thoughts on same-sex unions. You're basically saying that all opponents of same-sex marriage should not create art, because you won't accept it anyway. It's not about WHAT they create. It's about THEM creating. You're saying that just because they don't agree with you on this one social issue, their voice has become unworthy of being heard. That's not something I can agree with.
I support gay marriage, but I can't support the suppression of creativity from a large group of people purely because of their beliefs. This goes beyond "tolerating intolerance". This is the pot calling the kettle black.
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