(I also agree with Christina that torts reading stunk, but not nearly so much as property. It’s been years, though, so my memory might be flawed).

I can’t come up with anything more intelligent to add to the discussion than what you’ve already contributed, Courtney. I just wanted to say that I think you rock.

–a different Christina than the one who commented up thread

Courtney & Tessa, I admire you for sticking together on this. And I appreciate the difficulty Courtney faced when deciding how to deal with this issue. I can only hope that I’ll be as even-keeled if I ever face a similar situation.

Lucy, This is not a public forum. Every post is eligible for moderation by the owner. Period. This blog is a tool used by Courtney to communicate with her readers, not a platform for others’ opinions. That is not censorship, that is the owner deciding on the mission of the blog.

Just some words for thought…
Jami G.

Prefacing bigotry with a phrase like “in my experience…” doesn’t make it any less offensive or wrong. If anything, those instances are even more insidious, because the people making those statements are so clearly perpetuating the “experience” with their own choices. Like the math teacher in Courtney’s example, who claimed black people were less smart “in his experience”, because he’d never given one an A.

Or like this Louisiana judge, who just last month denied an interracial couple a marriage license–oh-so-politely, of course–because “in his experience”, interracial marriages don’t last and are hard on the kids.

Courtney warned Adi what kind of comments she wouldn’t tolerate, he persisted in making them, and she exercised her right of moderation as the blog owner. If you want to interact with Adi, why not link to your own blog and invite him over to chat?

Denying someone a voice isn’t actually bigotry at all, unless you do it because that person is a member of a particular group. What you really mean is that I am exerting dictatorial control. Which is true. I am. But please use words in line with their actual meaning: I’m being dictatorial, not bigoted.

And yes, Courtney wearing her dictator hat declares: This is not a public forum. This is my blog as an author, and everything that is said here reflects on me personally to some extent. I’m not doing this out of misplaced benevolence, to protect you; I’m doing it out of a heavy-handed self-interested dictatorial interest in protecting my professional identity.

I’m simply not willing to open up a forum where people can feel free to bag on women, even if they do so politely, and even if they couch it with phrases like, “in my experience.”

Period.

After everything I can’t help concluding that it was actually YOU who was being the bigot.
Denying people a voice and then misquoting them to justify that denial has to be the ultimate form of bigotry.

Anyway, I had better leave now.

First of all to Adi: In case you are still following this , don’t for one second think that my upset with Courtney’s behavior means that I agree with you.

Now to Courtney : Adi wasn’t only interacting with you. We’re all interacting with each other and by cutting him off , you denied all of us that interaction which is what I’m bothered with.
Thanks for ‘protecting’ me from sexism but I can protect myself. I’m not a feeble little girl who cries for help when someone says something upsetting.
I would have especially liked to see what Adi had to say about orchestras since I’m a professional musician and I’ve played in many orchestras in almost as many countries. I could have crushed him like a weasel but I’ll never get the chance now.
Adi’s clearly full of **** but he has shown that he could admit it when he was wrong (or when he thinks he’s wrong) and concede points. Not exactly the behavior of a bigot.

I realize my “something guys would like to read” comment sounds biased in and of itself so I would like to qualify it. I read a lot. 3 to 4 books a week. I used to read more. All my friends, acquaintances and coworkers know that I read this much so they all tend to recommend their favorite books to me. Over the last 17 years a definite pattern has emerged. With the notable exception of a few authors (and a few friends) men like books written by men and women like books written by women. Although this is not true for all books liked by a specific individual the pattern is definitely there. I am sure no one is surprised.

There are thousands of places Adi can go to write what he wants. I’m not denying him freedom of speech. He can start his own blog; he can comment on this in one of the innumerable other forums that discuss the PW list. The only thing I’m denying him is the right to interact with me, and freedom of speech has never required anyone to interact with anyone else.

In case you are wondering, this is not a public forum. I am a romance author. This is a place that is inextricably tied with my commercial identity, and so that means that the range of discussions that can be had will be limited.

I haven’t actually limited it all that much, all things considered. It’s just that there are certain viewpoints that I am simply not going to give voice to on this blog. It’s not that I don’t think you all are smart enough to make up your own minds; it’s that this is not the place to have certain sorts of discussions. There’s simply some things I won’t tolerate on this blog, because I won’t have them associated with me as an author.

Sexism, racism, and homophobia cross that line.

Yes, the answer is that the person with the most moderator privileges wins. This is the only time I’ve ever moderated comments; it’s not a power I take lightly. I gave Adi a warning when he started engaging in the classic justifications that bigots used (delegitimizing the voice). I cut Adi off after he asserted that my orchestra discussion was all wrong, because women didn’t have smaller technique; they had great technique, it was just that men were the only ones who could really inspire you.

Sorry. At some point, I have to draw the line, and I draw it at the point where I think the comments would offend my readers. Adi crossed over that line. I don’t deny that he was civil in doing so, but then, the southern gentleman who had never given a black student an A was the soul of politeness. You don’t get a pass on bigotry because you say it with a smile.