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lkh_lashoutsSome short videos from the panel have been posted on FB. Mod has transcribed them for Lashouts and posterity.
VIDEO 1
[Link: HERE]
Note: Audio is mostly right speaker.
Q: What I want to know is, when you first wrote the first Anita Blake, she seemed to have a good idea of what her spiritual place was and her arc has put her through some deep, deep soul-searching of what good and evil is. And I wondered, at the beginning, did you know that that was what her arc was going to be? Did you have any plan?
LKH: Oh no. Absolutely not. And based on your question, I could just stop there. I mean, do you guys want quick answers so more people get questions or more complete answers?
Audience: More complete answers!
LKH: All right. Um, no. Uh, there are two kinds of...main schools of writers for character development. And one of them is the people who make the detailed outlines and they even do detailed outlines for the characters, so they know what's going to happen and if their character deviates, they shove them back into their plotline. Then there are people like me, that if the character surprises them and it's better, you run with the character. And that's...that's what I do. So no, in the end I started the series thinking [Anita] would be a nice little Episcopalian girl and...and she would find the love of her life. And I created Richard for her to marry. Whether they would have to kill Jean-Claude, I thought we'll just marry her off. We'll do that. And the harder I tried to push that, the worse it went. It's like trying to fix up your friends. You know, you think, "oh they'd be perfect together. Wouldn't they be perfect? They would!" And then you put them on a date, and the date even goes well! And you think, "Yes!" And then they hate each other. And then you just go, "I'm never doing this again." And you keep that promise for a while and do it again anyway. Those of us who are happily in couples, we try that more. If you're happy, you want other people to be happy, there's no people who try to hook other people up as much. So no, totally...totally a surprise.
VIDEO 2
[Link: HERE]
Note: epic sexism ahead.
Q: Have you ever decided how Anita and Edward actually met? Like how they were introduced to become Edward and Anita?
LKH: I'm sorry, how did I...?
Q: How did Edward and Anita meet? Like, originally.
LKH: Ah! Edward came in tracing something he wanted to kill. It was supernatural and Anita was involved in the police side of it, the legal side of it. And as far as he was concerned, when he first saw her, she was this young girl who didn't know what the hell she was doing. And I think...I think it was last book? Either Dead Ice or this last book, I think this book, that we actually say on stage when they first met, that he tried to seduce her. He tried to se--work with her, at least, to get what he wanted. And she was having none of it. Not only did it not work, but it backfired on him. Welcome to Jean-Claude's world! And, because [Edward]'s charming...Anita and I never see him as charming. Not that kind of charming. We've never seen that. But other women react to him, so he must be charming. But he's so much in the Best Friend Box for us now, that he'd be...it's like an incest taboo, you know?
But he initially tried to flirt Anita's way with her and that totally backfired, and that made him...that made him -- and this is going to be very sexist, but it's still true and if anybody can tell me that it's not true, have at it; but here's the sexist truth -- that men that are in certain fields, in very, very aggressive, very...very action oriented, they're very good at their jobs, they see anybody that's not got the same skill set as them as lesser. They don't mean to sometimes, but they do. And it's true! We're not going to be able to hold--stand by Edward and not get killed. Women are automatically get less credit. They just do. Because most women just do not have the training, it just...it just is the truth. Women...some women do, and there's more women in the military coming up for combat, but it's still not really something people expect of a woman. So [Edward] discounted [Anita.] He treated her like a girl in that very condescending way. And once he realized that she wouldn't behave like a girl, he respected her more. When she behaved more like one of the boys, she respect--she got more respect from him.
I've been in several martial arts and I have more friends, close friends, that are military and police than are not at this point, I think. Writers and people in the military and police, that pretty much are my two things. And I have had the compliment paid to me since college, "you'd have made a wonderful man." Uh, "you'd have been a great officer." Bad enlisted. "You'd have made a great detective" Bad uniform. Why? Because I can't take orders. But it is that whole idea that there's something about the masculine culture that women just don't get. And if you...but if you were in that arena, martial arts or whatever, you have to go in and you have to be one of the boys. What do I mean by that? Every woman who goes into a dojo and puts on a gi and acts like a girl, and doesn't act as tough as she can and do the best job she can, hurts all of the women to come after her. Every woman who has a job, every per--woman who puts on a uniform, and tries to get a girl thing going where you will not have to do as much PT or as bei--as working as hard as the men because you're gonna flirt with somebody, you hurt every woman in uniform. You hurt every woman to come after you! Cut that shit out!
And the more venues I get, the more people I talk to, unfortunately the more I'm told that my actions are unusual. And my actions are only...I'm there to work. I'm there to learn. If I didn't have this attitude, I could not have interviewed people about some of the things I've interviewed because I would have been treated like a girl. And they will not talk to a girl the same way they will talk to another person. And you can hate it, or you can like it, or you can love it, it's just the truth. You have to be a person to them first, and you can't be a person if you're still "the girl."
And the same is in reverse. Women, if we look at a guy and see him as a potential date, we do not treat him the same. He is not a person to us, he is a potential date. He's a potential boyfriend. And we treat him differently. And we act different around him. True equality only comes when you see each other as people.
Anyway, soapbox over.
VIDEO 3
[Link: HERE]
Q: Does you being polyamorous have anything to do with Anita becoming polyamorous?
LKH: Funny thing about that! I created Merry, in part, because I was tired of the sexual frustration of writing Anita. Not even sexual frustration, just she argued about everything. For the love of God and all is holy or unholy, depending on what side of the bed you were on, these are guys that...that were trying to do their best. I mean, I don't know, it was like the arguing got to me. So I created Merry, in part, so I would have someone who wouldn't argue with me. And by golly, she didn't about this. I actually had trouble writing Merry at first because she wouldn't argue with me about everything. It was weird because Anita argues about most things with me. Um, and Merry was a breath of fresh air. And, in fact, I actually have...some of the characters will turn up in my head as I'm writing other things. And I'm writing Merry, the first book, and Jean-Claude actually came into my head, clearer than he usually does, because he usually keeps himself pretty close to his chest, like cards to his chest. And he came to my head as I'm writing this, and he's like, "You had this and did not offer me any?" And I found myself apologizing to my imaginary character because I had been in the longest pursuit in literature.
Um, so, Merry...I wanted...I want--I actually wanted to base the fairy culture, the fae culture, on bonobos. How many people know the difference between chimpanzees and bonobos? Okay, bonobos used to be known as pygmy chimpanzees but they're a totally different type of great ape. And they are--chimpanzees will do war, they'll kill each other, they'll do rape, and they'll torture each other. Did you know that? Yeah. So much for we're the only ones who do this shit. But bonobos won't. Bonobos solve things on sex. So if there's a war coming, you can have one tribe of bonobos and the other tribe of bonobos, the women--well the men are beating their chests, the males are beating their chests, the wom--the females, will go and transfer and they pick males that aren't beating their chests and have sex with them while this is going on so by the time the males who want to still fight are ready to fight, there's nothing to fight for. Because their women are there, and the other women are there, and they have a choice: they can fight the few that are still left fighting, or everybody can stay together and can take turns. They take turns. And I thought, what a different way of looking at things to solve things more with sex. In the end, I couldn't do it. The last thing I want to do when I'm pissed at somebody is have sex with them. I do not--I just couldn't wrap my head around it. I'm not a good bonobo. I am a much better chimpanzee, apparently.
So that was one of the reasons that [Merry] was polyamorous and that there was no stigma attached to sex. Because I tried...I wanted a culture where there was no stigma attached to sex. I did the best I could with my own background, you know, Middle America, middle of farm country, raised by someone who told me it was all bad. Did my best. Therapy is a many splendored thing. So I thought I was going to put all the sex on stage in Merry, and then the next book after with Anita, and I'm going, "What the hell has just happened to me? How did this happen?" And suddenly, it was like once I did it on paper, once I took all the bounds off, everything was all off. And it was just, there we go. We're not going to worry about it, it's sex, it's good, natural, ok, we'll just do this.
VIDEO 4
[Link: HERE]
Q: I really love the world that you created with Anita and with the vampires and all that culture. And I was wondering if you've ever thought about making a role playing game based on the world of Anita Blake?
LKH: A role playing game's been suggested. We've thought about it. It--would somebody be interested, I'd be willing to do, I just... I don't know how to make a game. I don't understand the mechanics of it. But with the right company, the right people, we'd be willing to look at it.
Videos 5-9
VIDEO 1
[Link: HERE]
Note: Audio is mostly right speaker.
Q: What I want to know is, when you first wrote the first Anita Blake, she seemed to have a good idea of what her spiritual place was and her arc has put her through some deep, deep soul-searching of what good and evil is. And I wondered, at the beginning, did you know that that was what her arc was going to be? Did you have any plan?
LKH: Oh no. Absolutely not. And based on your question, I could just stop there. I mean, do you guys want quick answers so more people get questions or more complete answers?
Audience: More complete answers!
LKH: All right. Um, no. Uh, there are two kinds of...main schools of writers for character development. And one of them is the people who make the detailed outlines and they even do detailed outlines for the characters, so they know what's going to happen and if their character deviates, they shove them back into their plotline. Then there are people like me, that if the character surprises them and it's better, you run with the character. And that's...that's what I do. So no, in the end I started the series thinking [Anita] would be a nice little Episcopalian girl and...and she would find the love of her life. And I created Richard for her to marry. Whether they would have to kill Jean-Claude, I thought we'll just marry her off. We'll do that. And the harder I tried to push that, the worse it went. It's like trying to fix up your friends. You know, you think, "oh they'd be perfect together. Wouldn't they be perfect? They would!" And then you put them on a date, and the date even goes well! And you think, "Yes!" And then they hate each other. And then you just go, "I'm never doing this again." And you keep that promise for a while and do it again anyway. Those of us who are happily in couples, we try that more. If you're happy, you want other people to be happy, there's no people who try to hook other people up as much. So no, totally...totally a surprise.
VIDEO 2
[Link: HERE]
Note: epic sexism ahead.
Q: Have you ever decided how Anita and Edward actually met? Like how they were introduced to become Edward and Anita?
LKH: I'm sorry, how did I...?
Q: How did Edward and Anita meet? Like, originally.
LKH: Ah! Edward came in tracing something he wanted to kill. It was supernatural and Anita was involved in the police side of it, the legal side of it. And as far as he was concerned, when he first saw her, she was this young girl who didn't know what the hell she was doing. And I think...I think it was last book? Either Dead Ice or this last book, I think this book, that we actually say on stage when they first met, that he tried to seduce her. He tried to se--work with her, at least, to get what he wanted. And she was having none of it. Not only did it not work, but it backfired on him. Welcome to Jean-Claude's world! And, because [Edward]'s charming...Anita and I never see him as charming. Not that kind of charming. We've never seen that. But other women react to him, so he must be charming. But he's so much in the Best Friend Box for us now, that he'd be...it's like an incest taboo, you know?
But he initially tried to flirt Anita's way with her and that totally backfired, and that made him...that made him -- and this is going to be very sexist, but it's still true and if anybody can tell me that it's not true, have at it; but here's the sexist truth -- that men that are in certain fields, in very, very aggressive, very...very action oriented, they're very good at their jobs, they see anybody that's not got the same skill set as them as lesser. They don't mean to sometimes, but they do. And it's true! We're not going to be able to hold--stand by Edward and not get killed. Women are automatically get less credit. They just do. Because most women just do not have the training, it just...it just is the truth. Women...some women do, and there's more women in the military coming up for combat, but it's still not really something people expect of a woman. So [Edward] discounted [Anita.] He treated her like a girl in that very condescending way. And once he realized that she wouldn't behave like a girl, he respected her more. When she behaved more like one of the boys, she respect--she got more respect from him.
I've been in several martial arts and I have more friends, close friends, that are military and police than are not at this point, I think. Writers and people in the military and police, that pretty much are my two things. And I have had the compliment paid to me since college, "you'd have made a wonderful man." Uh, "you'd have been a great officer." Bad enlisted. "You'd have made a great detective" Bad uniform. Why? Because I can't take orders. But it is that whole idea that there's something about the masculine culture that women just don't get. And if you...but if you were in that arena, martial arts or whatever, you have to go in and you have to be one of the boys. What do I mean by that? Every woman who goes into a dojo and puts on a gi and acts like a girl, and doesn't act as tough as she can and do the best job she can, hurts all of the women to come after her. Every woman who has a job, every per--woman who puts on a uniform, and tries to get a girl thing going where you will not have to do as much PT or as bei--as working as hard as the men because you're gonna flirt with somebody, you hurt every woman in uniform. You hurt every woman to come after you! Cut that shit out!
And the more venues I get, the more people I talk to, unfortunately the more I'm told that my actions are unusual. And my actions are only...I'm there to work. I'm there to learn. If I didn't have this attitude, I could not have interviewed people about some of the things I've interviewed because I would have been treated like a girl. And they will not talk to a girl the same way they will talk to another person. And you can hate it, or you can like it, or you can love it, it's just the truth. You have to be a person to them first, and you can't be a person if you're still "the girl."
And the same is in reverse. Women, if we look at a guy and see him as a potential date, we do not treat him the same. He is not a person to us, he is a potential date. He's a potential boyfriend. And we treat him differently. And we act different around him. True equality only comes when you see each other as people.
Anyway, soapbox over.
VIDEO 3
[Link: HERE]
Q: Does you being polyamorous have anything to do with Anita becoming polyamorous?
LKH: Funny thing about that! I created Merry, in part, because I was tired of the sexual frustration of writing Anita. Not even sexual frustration, just she argued about everything. For the love of God and all is holy or unholy, depending on what side of the bed you were on, these are guys that...that were trying to do their best. I mean, I don't know, it was like the arguing got to me. So I created Merry, in part, so I would have someone who wouldn't argue with me. And by golly, she didn't about this. I actually had trouble writing Merry at first because she wouldn't argue with me about everything. It was weird because Anita argues about most things with me. Um, and Merry was a breath of fresh air. And, in fact, I actually have...some of the characters will turn up in my head as I'm writing other things. And I'm writing Merry, the first book, and Jean-Claude actually came into my head, clearer than he usually does, because he usually keeps himself pretty close to his chest, like cards to his chest. And he came to my head as I'm writing this, and he's like, "You had this and did not offer me any?" And I found myself apologizing to my imaginary character because I had been in the longest pursuit in literature.
Um, so, Merry...I wanted...I want--I actually wanted to base the fairy culture, the fae culture, on bonobos. How many people know the difference between chimpanzees and bonobos? Okay, bonobos used to be known as pygmy chimpanzees but they're a totally different type of great ape. And they are--chimpanzees will do war, they'll kill each other, they'll do rape, and they'll torture each other. Did you know that? Yeah. So much for we're the only ones who do this shit. But bonobos won't. Bonobos solve things on sex. So if there's a war coming, you can have one tribe of bonobos and the other tribe of bonobos, the women--well the men are beating their chests, the males are beating their chests, the wom--the females, will go and transfer and they pick males that aren't beating their chests and have sex with them while this is going on so by the time the males who want to still fight are ready to fight, there's nothing to fight for. Because their women are there, and the other women are there, and they have a choice: they can fight the few that are still left fighting, or everybody can stay together and can take turns. They take turns. And I thought, what a different way of looking at things to solve things more with sex. In the end, I couldn't do it. The last thing I want to do when I'm pissed at somebody is have sex with them. I do not--I just couldn't wrap my head around it. I'm not a good bonobo. I am a much better chimpanzee, apparently.
So that was one of the reasons that [Merry] was polyamorous and that there was no stigma attached to sex. Because I tried...I wanted a culture where there was no stigma attached to sex. I did the best I could with my own background, you know, Middle America, middle of farm country, raised by someone who told me it was all bad. Did my best. Therapy is a many splendored thing. So I thought I was going to put all the sex on stage in Merry, and then the next book after with Anita, and I'm going, "What the hell has just happened to me? How did this happen?" And suddenly, it was like once I did it on paper, once I took all the bounds off, everything was all off. And it was just, there we go. We're not going to worry about it, it's sex, it's good, natural, ok, we'll just do this.
VIDEO 4
[Link: HERE]
Q: I really love the world that you created with Anita and with the vampires and all that culture. And I was wondering if you've ever thought about making a role playing game based on the world of Anita Blake?
LKH: A role playing game's been suggested. We've thought about it. It--would somebody be interested, I'd be willing to do, I just... I don't know how to make a game. I don't understand the mechanics of it. But with the right company, the right people, we'd be willing to look at it.
Videos 5-9
Tags:
- anitaverse,
- characters: anita blake,
- facebook flog,
- groups: faeries,
- media: video,
- merryverse,
- outside links,
- wank: femininism,
- wank: i do research!,
- wank: laurell the great,
- wank: lkh knows all,
- wank: plot,
- wank: poly,
- wank: sex,
- wank: sexploitation,
- wank: the characters are real to me!,
- wank: the most special of snowflakes,
- wank: writing
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no subject
Date: 2016-09-11 12:44 am (UTC)Wow. I'm sure she'd deny it, but she basically admitted there that she doesn't see women (whom she constantly refers to as 'girls', regardless of their age) as people. Oof. The ignorance and sexism... IT HURTS MY BRAIN! D:
Thanks so much for transcribing these. They're both horrifying and hilarious.
Editing to add: It boggles my mind that she's so intensely misogynistic when she herself is female! I can't even fathom the kind of weird, twisted mix of cognitive dissonance and self-loathing that HAS to involve.
no subject
Date: 2016-09-11 05:38 am (UTC)But yeah, no denying that she's intensely misogynistic IRL and in the books. I'm just...quietly horrified that people in the room cheered at her statements.
no subject
Date: 2016-09-11 04:11 pm (UTC)That being said, it does pain me to report that at least in the military, it's always the women who try to get "girl privileges" who are remembered. While in some cases this is unfair - especially when it comes to the whole "women get pregnant to get out of deployment" stereotype - there are some deserved cases.
However, I also say this as a person who IS ACTUALLY PART OF THE MILITARY, not a "friend of" military people, and I hate to break it to her: she is the last person we need spreading this message. Also, men who want to be sexist jerks will continue to be sexist jerks, regardless of what women do.