Vice Bodega Boys the War of Art Steven Pressfield Book Cover
We live and die by words. The lives of men and empires are shaped and bound by stories. There is a mysterious ability in this. Perhaps one of the greatest there is.
In the summer of 2000, I was so mad at the Army—for what information technology was, and what information technology wasn't—that I committed myself to putting my experiences on paper and to shout from the rooftops telling the world all about what the military was really similar.
Nonetheless, over the course of serving in an infantry unit, falling for a girl, going downrange, getting wounded, and coming home, that story changed. In the end, I was left with something far more meaningful than what I'd initially envisioned, and with the military every bit a staple of media ranging from movies to video games, to say zip of there being an bodily state of war on in which real people were killing and dying, I knew my audience. The hard part would but be writing the thing.
My audience.
I was wrong. In the world of books, there has been a battle for what stories are to be told. In that location is goose egg new in this. Every bit Russell Kirk said, "Culture arises from the cult," and the older I get, the more than I find that to be truthful. The question then becomes, "Who is the cult?"
The mod day publishing cult
One can chase theories all day long. However, something recently happened that allowed me a pocket-size glimpse into the world of the gatekeepers, and given the contempo dust-ups from #GamerGate to the Hugos, I idea I'd pass information technology along.
After more than a decade of shopping my book around and receiving probably most one,000 rejections along the mode, I finally received a message from a literary agent I'd approached who really liked my book, agreed with almost everything I said in it, and was interested in representing it.
However, there were some things that he idea needed to be inverse to help it get accepted by a publishing firm. Some of information technology was formatting-related, but about pertained to key parts of the plot toward the end and I told him that I couldn't modify them because that was the manner that things had happened. In light of that, I had to decline.
During our conversation, the agent went on to say something that confirmed an observation I'd fabricated early on about the concern. He said, "Sam, one thing yous'll demand to understand is that the publishing industry is virtually entirely run past women who studied things like Creative Writing in higher," and that most would detest what I've written.
He so told me about how an Afghanistan and Iraq vet had written a book, made it through the slush pile, and was in the process of review by a publishing house. Made information technology through almost all the hoops. Then, at the very cease, the senior editor was offended by something in the book and said, "Eh, fuck it, he's an asshole. Who cares?" And with her words the project died.
The men I served with did stuff like juggle grenades for fun. They have "problematic" ways of "triggering" people that SJW'south ain't ever heard of.
We continued talking about why the manufacture seems to be so focused on simply playing to the tastes of upper-middle class women in New York City, and I then told him some things that Sci-Fi author Larry Correia had said recently in a podcast concerning the Deplorable Puppies-Rabid Puppies controversy, and how it struck me that by pursuing their current strategy the publishing houses are ignoring huge markets of people willing to purchase books and are cutting their own throats.
He bankrupt in saying, "I know, I know…But look, Sam…you gotta stop thinking. But terminate thinking! Thinking about all this volition drive you crazy! Don't go to bookstores, if they fifty-fifty still have whatever where you alive. Don't expect at other books. You'll just wonder how in the world this thing fifty-fifty got published," and and then told me some more anecdotes well-nigh how the sausage is made. He then quoted Otto Priminger, proverb "Nobody knows anything."
Information technology was sad. He'south a good man, and was just as frustrated about information technology all as anybody, just he's stuck fighting a literati who only look for books that support the current narrative, and is left trying to sneak in what stories he can, yet he can.
All of this no doubtfulness confirms something you already know: few in whatever significant cultural institutions give a damn about yous. Notice the scattered inquiries into why men are "dropping out" and bolting from family formation, university study, and civic responsibilities in full general. They inquire why men aren't shouldering burdens, rather than what do men want.
Consider the attacks leveled at sites like this one. How dare men accept preferences, desires, and concerns that deviate from the Ministry of Culture! They conspicuously haven't educated themselves plenty most privilege, insecurity, outdated masculinity, and Authoritarian Personality Disorder!
There is truth to this. What's odd, though, is that my biggest sales to date came from a write-up past Ann Sterzinger and several of my best reviews have been from women. It may be that this is less an issue of the battle of the sexes, but more than of a battle of ideas, and if that'south the example, nosotros may have more allies than nosotros know.
In that location is a solution
Brand no error, the publishing industry, similar the rest of the media, is captive to the decaying zombie gestalt of modernity'due south isms. Most people will drinkable any season of Kool-Aid is poured. And this ain't gonna alter anytime soon.
Notwithstanding, at that place is reason for hope. As armed services theorist Dr. Martin van Creveld has argued, "the guerilla way is presently to overtake the conventional way." Much like the majority of 21st Century conflicts featuring non-state actors, Davids are beginning to have the fight to the Goliaths on their terms and make their enemies fight the battles they want them to fight on the ground of their choosing.
Blogs, games, podcasts, books (fifty-fifty David Mamet is self-publishing now), cartoons, movies (I swear, at that place'south even a group of veterans working to make a "tactical comedy"); frontiers are opening up. Nosotros now have more avenues to network, acquire, and create; more ways to explore opportunities and forge new loyalties, as well as the potential to rediscover a patrimony taken from usa in the name of setting us gratis. The results may non be as big (not yet, anyway) just they'll be ours.
Y'all keep your heads up.
Read More than: 9 Sometime School Ways For A Woman To Go More Attractive To Men
Source: https://www.returnofkings.com/63888/how-female-dominated-publishing-houses-are-censoring-male-authors