#anyways. I‘m pretty sure the term ^seperating art from the artist^

[beardedhandstoadshark]

what's your stance on separation of the art from the artist / creator when it comes to the artist / creator being of a questionable person?

Ohhh dear nuanced topics. Ok. Oof. Umm.

TLDR:

on a pure technical level: always possible and SHOULD always be done actually

if the creator isn’t riding off their art/their questionable things aren’t linked to the art: maybe stop giving it money but otherwise it’s cool.

If they ARE riding off their art: stop giving it money and publicly TALKING about it. Just vibe for yourself and maybe some friends, but otherwise keeping them relevant is giving them a platform, which enables them to hurt others

Also engaging with art without knowing an asshole made it doesn’t suddenly make you evil and I am not sure why people seem to think so or if that is actually a real thing and not just some myth people think happens

Regarding just the quality of a piece of art, on a pure technical level: always separate them. A person who does nice things can bake a cake that tastes like crap, but a piece of shit can also bake the most delicious food you’ve ever eaten. (That also goes for whenever someone tries to say they’re a nice person for donating to charities. Two actions can exist separately.)

It’s kinda weird how people always go "oh their stuff wasn’t as good as we thought anyways“ like. Bro. The stuff in question literally hasn’t changed stop pretending like some supernatural force travelled back in time to alter your memories.

Then situation 1: it’s made by a pos but their shitty actions/opinions aren’t reflected in their creation. The cake is perfectly normal and even tastes good, but the hand that made it happens to belong to ass.

In that case: grab your pirate hat and library cards, we’re going sailing and taking the treasure with us. Aka: Separate the art from the artist and the artist from the money. Just buy it second-hand or pirate it. Since the opinions/actions of the person aren’t connected to the art itself, the relevancy of the art doesn’t uphold their opinions on their platform.

Like. Watching a fnaf stream doesn’t somehow help in spreading right-wing hatespeak, because there’s nothing connected to fnaf that reflects the political opinions of the dude who made it. Liking fnaf won’t lead to you reading braindead rants on Twitter.

On the other hand you’ve got minecraft (or every broken-up band ever) where the dude stopped having any connections to it like a decade ago so heck yeah let’s go enjoy it, because the art has LITERALLY been separated from the artist

Situation 2: the piece of shit is actively using the platform they gained through their art to hurt others.

Aka pulling a Kanye Rowling. As long as their platform exists in any way, they WILL continue hurting people. That is simply the truth of the matter. No buts. It sucks, but that’s how it is.

It is not separate anymore, because they have inserted themselves into the art, and using it - directly or indirectly - as a mouthpiece.

Do not give money, and do not engage online. If you engage online, you’re giving a platform. Doesn’t mean you have to burn every cd or book or whatever you own. Just vibe for yourself. Not everything needs to be a fandom ffs.

Basically:

"I like Kanye‘s music“: totally cool, if you like the sound, you like the sound. There’s nothing more to it.

"I like his music and listen to the tracks I already bought/pirated it/listened to a cover/etc“: also cool, you’re just vibin by yourself. It’s not doing anything.

"I‘m paying for new tracks/watching his videos/telling others to check him out/etc“: unfortunately you’re keeping him relevant that way, giving others a reason to bring them to his platform where he can then go spout literal Nazi propaganda, because the dude IS one. Straight up. I know US-ians like to call everyone they mildly disagree with that but in this case it’s actually true. What are people doing actively supporting the dude.

That‘s my stance anyways. Prone to change if confronted with logical arguments, as any opinion or stance should, really, but I like to believe this is a decently thought-out and realistic stance to take as it is rn lol