Authors are People Too – With Yaoi (NSFW)

31 January, 2014 Musing Musers, Random 20 comments

Main imageI was looking for inspiration for this post. A friend DM’d me and gave me two ideas:

“I would LOVE a post on the people who react to drama by saying that authors are people too and bloggers are mean.”

Her other suggestion was:

“OR a post on yaoi. Because reasons. Sexy reasons.”

Both of these ideas have great merit, and each one would make good post material. But here at Cuddlebuggery, we’re not only interested in good posts. Or fine posts. We want to blow your mind. So I’ve decided to take these two ideas and join them into one amazing post – adding in the Yuri for my own fun. This post is Not Safe For Work, and is all the better for being so.

So reviews get written by people on Goodreads, or bloggers on their blogs. Authors come along and read them and cat fights happen. Then other bloggers or random bystanders will be like:

“Well, authors are people too.”

That’s right. They are. And should be afforded the same rights and protections under the law in their prospective country as any other citizen. You can not, for example, keep an author as your love slave in some futuristic dystopian, like people would in Ai no Kusabi.

Ai No Kusabi

As much as you’d like to. Not naming names here…

No reviewing-type-person wants to hurt an author’s feelings, guys! When I say a book would disappoint a piss-bucket and was a miasma of broken hopes and dreams, I’m not saying that to hurt an author’s feelings. I’m saying that because I’m communicating ideas about a product to my closest friends and 5,000 followers. Rather like I’ll say that this Nokia Windows phone is less useful than a shitbrick and stinks twice as bad. That it’s a clumsy, ugly, unintuitive piece of technology that shames all including its distant ancestors, the toaster-ovens. Man, those old toaster-ovens are like, “Our generation never pulled data so badly!”

Yet you wouldn’t expect Risto Siilasma to get on twitter and cry about it or rant about me (mostly because he’s probably busy lighting cigarettes with his money – because he’s the goddamn CEO of Nokia). That would be terrible customer service and bad for product image – totally not awesome. Instead, authors are advised to do what all content/product producers do, just cuddle up to the people that get you, like this:

Yuri1

In fact, when Xbox One announced that its console would need to be connected to the internet 24/7 to operate, the internet spiralled into an outrage. Microsoft Head Dudebro Creative Director, Adam Orth, went on twitter to moan and grumble about the outcry. Not unlike a couple of authors have done. Then he got into an argument with people on twitter, not unlike a couple of authors have done. You know what happened to him? He no longer had a job. Clearly Xbox One was something intimately important to Adam Orth – a labour of love and a representative of a shitload of hard work. And the public outcry over some of Xbox’s policies obviously riled him up. Yet this reaction was still not appropriate and, if even Microsoft thinks you’ve buggered up, you’ve definitely buggered up.

See any parallels here? I know it’s uncomfortable at first – like seeing two humanoids with kitty ears making out. It just looks wrong…

Kitty Ears

But then you realise it’s two hot guys kissing and it’s TOTALLY okay!

Of course authors, as human beings, have rights. If they want to publicly address negative reviews, they can. But there will be backlash. Because people, often even just regular people (not us weirdo bloggers/Goodreads reviewers) are just having an honest, ad libbed conversation about a product. And they want to be able to have that conversation uninterrupted. Like these guys want to have a “conversation” uninterrupted.

Yuri 2

End of the world be damned. Just don’t stop!

I get it, I really do. People giving honest opinions about things, even if they’re just downright wrong, are hard to handle. It’s easier to blame the thing that has caused the hurt, rather than the person who has responded inappropriately. If you see your favourite author losing their shit, instead of picking a fight – make love, not war! DM that author and offer condolences and a shoulder to cry on, privately and out of the public eye. Hold them tenderly through the night.

Yaoi1

It’s been a nice long break from drama. It felt good, didn’t it guys? Week after week of authors and bloggers getting along, playing nicely, supporting each other where appropriate. Didn’t it feel good? Don’t we all want to feel that way again? So fulfilled. So satisfied… ON FIRE!

Yaoi 2

Like this! Every day!

I know these debatable topics get people on sides. That’s okay. Know that the side I am always on, is the side of sexiness. I’m the International Ambassador of Getting it On-ville. Let’s make love, not war. Yaoi/yuri, not twitter fights. Let’s embrace those hidden desires rearing up inside us to latch onto the nearest body and kiss it until everything is okay again.

And that, people, is why I should be your president.

Aaaannnd…

Here’s one for free:

Yaoi 3

 

20 Responses to “Authors are People Too – With Yaoi (NSFW)”

  2. Christina (A Reader of Fictions)

    YOU REALLY DID IT. I love you. I love you SO MUCH.

    http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lyg2ffhAZz1qk8hih.gif

    Love the technology comparison!

    Omg, the Yuri meme. That’s fantastic. Also, better art than usual.

    See, I said this on Twitter yesterday. In pretty much any other profession, doing that would get you fired. THIS IS YOUR JOB. You’re not supposed to bitch to customers even if they are bitchy.

    You know you’ve read a lot of yaoi when the kitty ears no longer even occur to you as a weird thing.

    This giant robot yuri looks promising.

    Oh my god. This post is perfection. I can’t even right now.

    “I’m the International Ambassador of Getting it On-ville.” <– *kowtows*

  3. Dahlia Adler

    I stopped being able to read words after, like, two gifs. But I’m sure the points here were definitely prudent and stuff.

  6. Kelly

    I was doing fine until, “Like this! Every day!” and then I broke out into a sweat and my vision kind of blurred and I lost about an hour.

    But yea, more of this. All of this. All the time.

    What’s a Yuri and how do I get one?

  7. Natalie M.

    So here I am, feeling all grumpy because it’s morning (don’t ask) and then I see this post in my email inbox. Thanks for brightening up my morning!

  8. Cassi Haggard

    Love this post! I kept seeing that “Authors are people too” floating around Tumblr & kept walking away because it annoyed me so much.

  11. Momo

    Just… this is so… so much yes. I literally laughed out loud till my sides hurt. Amazing post!

  12. Chrysoula

    Deeply interested in this topic and I got distracted after a few images too. I want a bibliography or something! Whatever you call it where you tell me what those pictures are from so I can get more.