A brief reflection on the ugly

Regular visitors here know that I've wailed and gnashed my teeth at the ugly in aspects of the Narnia fandom for awhile.  I've been fortunate to find lovely people who have far, far outweighed the nasty that I have received.  Still, it is and has been discouraging to see longtime readers disappear when I failed to condemn same sex relationships when I finally did address them and to know that I am boycotted in some circles as immoral and un-Christian (which my offspring find hilarious).  More disturbing to me is to see how, since my entry into the fandom in 2009, aspects of the Narnia fandom have been trending further and further in the direction of bigotry, misogyny, and homophobia and that those voices are loud and popular.

Thanks to reader Heliopause (who is writing a story I'm enjoying very much), she directed me to the recently updated profile of one very popular author on fanfiction.net who hasn't written for about a year.  This author, Capegio, updated her profile on July 22, 2012 and stated that she is gay, that she was gay when she wrote her Narnia stories, that she still loves the Chronicles, but will no longer stay passively polite to those in the fandom who sweetly condemn homosexuality.  I won't link to her profile directly here though you can find Capegio's moving and beautiful statement easily be looking at the authors who are on my favorites list. 

Really, in this day and age, I keep thinking this sort of thing shouldn't even be necessary.  Yet it is and Capegio's statement makes me sad and angry and deeply moves me. 

Edit-

I’m going to close down commenting at this point.  We’re all adults here from different backgrounds who all feel enormous empathy with those, most especially young people, who courageously struggle to find themselves as we have and continue to do.  On this we may agree.  In my deeply imperfect way, I wanted to draw attention to something that upset me and from here, well, that’s up to you. 

One final thought as I’ve reflected on this is the number exchanges I’ve had with Narnia writers who express real discomfort when they and their work are touted and extolled as “moral” and not “like that other bad stuff.” We’ve lost creative voices who could not withstand that internal tension between who they know themselves to be, and who their readers assume them to be.