How to suppress women’s writing in the age of social media

cassandraclare:

Inspired of course by  by Joanna Russ. And not set off by anything in particular, just an aggregate of comments and a good friend being treated terribly for posting some of her fiction for free online.

She tweets and tumblrs so she must not be working.

She never tweets and tumblrs so she must she think she is too good for her fans.

Her books don’t sell so she must be a failure.

Her books do sell so she must write for the money.

She writes too much of one series. A good writer would write books set in lots of different universes. 

She should write more of the same series because that is what I like. Hope she doesn’t think I will buy her new stuff.

She talks about and answers questions about her books, why won’t she leave her fandom alone? Why is she trying to impose her views on them?

She doesn’t answer questions from her fans or listen to what they say. She must not care about them.

She sells her work for money so she must just want money.

She posted her work for free so it doesn’t really belong to her.

I like her main female character so she must be a Mary Sue that the author based on herself.

I hate her main female character so she needs to learn how to write women.

I wrote her a nasty message and she didn’t answer so she is a coward.

I wrote her a nasty message and she did answer so she is a bully.

She contradicted me when I accused her of something so I know she did it, otherwise she wouldn’t be so defensive.

She didn’t contradict me when I accused her of something so I know she did it, otherwise she would have defended herself.

She wrote it but she tried too hard to be literary so I couldn’t get into it.

She wrote it and I really enjoyed it but because of the subject matter I know it’s trash, really.