However, if you must mock us, then you must be funny. My husband makes fat jokes all the time and he still lives because they are funny. I asked him how a person could lose 80 pounds and still be fat. And he said, “I don’t know, dear, but you’ve done it.”

X’s reply was very funny and made me laugh out loud. As I was having a very bad day, this was great. And really, when people say stuff that’s totally off the wall, that’s the best kind of reply.

a) that she is so careless she doesn’t read her mail properly
b) that she doesn’t really care about her readers
c) that she’s got a weird sense of humor
d) that she’s a rather arrogant person to treat me like that.

(Maybe this is due to cultural differences between the U.S. and Europe.)

In my opinion, a mail like that should not be answered but treated like anonymous letters or spam or people who spit on the street or the occasional finger flip you get when you don’t pay enough attention while driving – just ignore them, you won’t change things for the better anyway.

Are you saying Y did show interest in negotiating? I don’t think so. As much as I’d like to live in an ideal world where negotiation is always possible, I live in one where it isn’t.

Two people are required to negotiate, and Y made it clear from the first that she wasn’t interested. I doubt X could have said anything that would have changed her mind.

If Y had written X a letter that said, “I’m disappointed in your book because all the ladies in my quilting circle are God-fearing women who don’t cuss and you used the name of the Lord in vain” that would have been a valid comment. But no. Y told X not to put her name on anything with the word “quilt” again. She has no right to do that.

Then, she insulted X and the entire state of NY, while placing herself on a moral highground because of where she lives.

I was raised Catholic, BTW.

And I suppose we are going to be quilting in those labor camps ? Which are in upstate NY.

That whole Chrsitian rant ? Hogwash.

Y has issues that we know nothing about. So X ’s response is within reason and appropriate and tongue in cheek. The rest of this has been fascinating and illuminating. And deep. And over my head.

The only purpose of Y’s letter that I could see, was to insult X (as a person, not a writer), and assert Y’s own rightness. You send that to ANYONE, by email, snail mail, smoke signal, or pony express, you deserve whatever you get in response.

And, as far as anyone being a bully in this situation, let’s review, shall we?

“bul·ly
Pronunciation: ‘bu-lE
Function: noun
1. archaic a : sweetheart b : a fine chap 2. a : a blustering browbeating person; especially : one habitually cruel to others who are weaker b : pimp
3. : a hired ruffian”

Well, personally, I think Jenny is a sweetheart (as well as, yes, an ignorant slut-she’s multi-faceted), and, if she were a chap, she’d probably be fine, too. I’ll even give her blustering and browbeating, but only because she’d probably like it. And, in this case, you could actually make a case for her being X’s “hired ruffian,” even though X didn’t really hire her. But it’s that middle part that I just don’t see: “habitually cruel to others who are weaker.” Jenny? Nah.

But I’ll betcha that Y probably fits that bill. ‘Cuz there really was no purpose to Y’s letter to X other than to be cruel. And I firmly believe that one should always confront a bully. Preferably with Swinging Fists of Crazy. (Which, incidentally, may be Indian name.)

At a tangent, I saw a show based entirely on private correspondence sent to glamour models called “Dirty Fan Mail”. Very funny. I wonder what the writers would have thought if they had known they would end up being read out in funny voices on stage?
http://www.trunkrecords.com/turntable/dfm.shtml

In fact, now I’ve typed that, I’m wondering if that isn’t the key. Egroups, or shared mails, seem particularly problematic to me as what is written to one will not be read the same by all who are party to it. After seeing several fiery exchanges (and on lists which are composed of fellow professionals all from the same nation, so fewer opportunities for misunderstandings you would think) I am extremely careful what I put in emails. Some stuff I would never put in an email, as it is too easy for it to be shared, intentionally or not, with a wider audience.

In the good old days, of course, you had your servant carry the sealed message by hand, and wait for a reply. Thus one of the most famous examples of hate mail in literary history, sent by the Marquess of Queensbury to Oscar Wilde: “To Oscar Wilde, posing Somdomite,” scrawled on Queensbury’s personal card, with “Sodomite” misspelled and the handwriting so sloppy that generations of biographers had trouble deciphering exactly what he wrote.

1. If you’re writing it, as opposed to typing it, that’s slower, so therefore more time to pause.

2. You write it, you look at it, you rephrase it to really get your point across.

3. You want the the handwritten/ printed sheet to look tidy so you rewrite.

4. You fold the sheet and put it in an envelope. You think again.

5. You walk to the postbox – another think.

In contrast, email – you’re in a snit, you hammer away at your keyboard and press send. The snit is on its way around the world.

Fair enough, if your fury is strong you can still hammer out a handwritten letter and sprint to the postbox. But it has to be really hot and sustained anger, and you have to think it’s really worth it.

This conversation has been more interesting than some of my senior philosophy classe’s arguments. The range of positions and arguments while some I completely agree with (X: I don’t care who you are, reader or writer, there are certain ways you are simply not justified in talking to people, and Y deserved to be taken down a notch), some I would argue against until I turn blue in the face (being upset with the filthy kids of the world that, god forbid, get to watch whatever they want on TV and expose it to other more ‘refined’ children), and some I just had to laugh at until I turned blue in the face (the christanity blog that is debating this now), they were all eye opening.

There are a lot of thoughtless things that are put out into the world and very few people that are on the receiving end of them get to have their say back. There is a certain comfort in the anonimity of sending an e-mail to public figure because you never expect to have to deal with them face to face and be held accountable for what you say, but that doesn’t give the right to be deliberatley hurtful. I think that the letter writer deserved what she got and I’m glad that all of the above people got some food for thought out of it. Way to be X, for not taking this one on the chin and turning the other cheek.

Anyways, all that I really want to say is way to go Jenny, for posting both the first letter and this new entry on the blog and for not taking life too seriously.

X and J, I’m so sorry this has happened. I wish you both lots of inner peach (peace) and that fans/not fans do not stop or hinder you from your truly amazing work.

Dr. Smith? What is your conclusion to this project? (grin)

An interesting discussion to be having at the beginning of Banned Books Week.

1. I don’t think it’s making mock of Y at all. It’s mostly a case of exploring how to handle the Ys of the world.

2. If Eleanor Roosevelt is right, then Y isn’t being hurt by any of this at all. The only power we have of hurting her, is what she allows us to have. So, she can simple turn off the “indignation” switch and feel all better.

3. I had to smile when I heard that it’s turned into a discussion of anti-Christianity according to another blog. They are riffing off a side-point, and having a great time figuring out how to deal with authors like X and J, so let them have their good time. (-: And please, please, post the particularly choice bits over here, if you feel up to the storm and thunder! (But if it’s all getting a little old, don’t bother — I don’t mind moving on, either.)

I have to agree with Bryan – Y is not going to be bothered by our discussions. The discussion has already been interpreted as being about burning churches full of Christians. Huh?

Also, Bryan, we know Y is not from NY. This algebra is really getting confusing.

I don’t know Y, of course, but I can say that Y is very famliar to me. There’s a woman I work with who was greatly offended, to the point of literally turning her back on me, because one day I altered my routine by lunching with someone else. Another person stopped speaking to me because I closed the door when I stepped into the bathroom for a moment. No, I’m not kidding, she took my closing the bathroom door as an insult.

Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple is fond of saying that people are the same wherever you go. Part of getting through life is learning from past experiences, and people are part of those. The world is full of variations on Y and once you meet her you will always recognize her again. You know how she will react to a given situation because you’ve witness that reaction before. And in case you are wondering, yes I have a point.

The Y’s of the world lash out at perceived offenses whether they are valid or not. You can’t talk them around because they aren’t interested in logic. So what can you do when they lash out? Well most often we do nothing because we’re too confused by their outbursts to make a coherent response. And sadly they often take the lack of response as validation; you aren’t arguing or defending yourself so they must be right.

Bryan said … “As to having fun with it, unless you’re one to ignore such e-mail, having fun with it is probably the healthiest response.”

Bryan is right on target here, and believe me I don’t agree with him all that often, being a Protestant of the Independent category. We can let the Y’s of the world (and possibly the why’s as well) make us crazy or we can laugh about it.