Debbie Reese (me). Tribally enrolled at Nambe Pueblo (for those who don't know, that means I'm American Indian) and Assistant professor in American Indian Studies. As a Native woman, mother, and aunt who is deeply connected to my family and community at Nambe Pueblo (I was raised there, and I have a home there) and as a professor who studies the ways that American Indians are portrayed, I view the world from a place that is distinctly different from most people who rarely give much (if any) thought to American Indians. Said another way, my context, and framework, and perspective for viewing the world are distinct. Like many, I believe there is great power in words. Written, or spoken, they can empower and inspire, but they can also hurt and demean. Most words about us (American Indians) are in the latter category. There is a whole lot of good intent that goes very badly. My work is not a blame-game. It is a 'hey, let's all look at this carefully and think about it!'
Neil Gaiman. His novel, The Graveyard Book, won the prestigious Newbery Medal in 2009. He is also a very popular and prolific writer. Visit his website, Neil Gaiman. Sometime back I started following him on Twitter, reading his blog entries when he tweeted them. I have not read any of his books, but I've bought several of them as gifts for my family. Contrary to what some people seemed to think, my questions about the words he said ("a few dead Indians") had nothing to do with the book itself. I was not suggesting he should have set the book in the U.S. I was not suggesting that he should have included American Indians in the book. I was noting the words he said in the interview.
Kynn Bartlett. A self-employed writer, and, I think, a game developer.
BGF Central. I don't know who BGF Central is. From Gaiman's tweets, I gather BGF Central's name is Pam. At the top of her blog, AND WE SHALL MARCH are the words "BLACK. GEEK. AND FINE WITH THAT."
WHAT KICKED OFF THE EPISODE:
First, my post, "What Neil Gaiman said..." prompted Kynn to post it on
Second, Kynn's post, "Neil Gaiman's racist fail" prompted Neil Gaiman to tweet on his Twitter page.
What followed was called "a brouhaha" by some, or a "sh*t storm" by others. A couple of days have passed, and the post you are reading now is my attempt to do two things. First, I will lay it out chronologically. For clarity sake, I'm writing it in third person.
Part of why I am taking the time to lay it out is my second reason for this post. I think it important that we see how celebrity fandom can obscure the work that my original post (and all my work on this blog) is trying to do. That is, pushing everyone to think about HOW they think about American Indians, what they THINK they know about American Indians, and how all of that comes together in the words they write and speak aloud.
TIMELINE OF THE EPISODE
April 18, 2010
9:06 AM
Debbie Reese posted "What Neil Gaiman said..." to her blog.
11:24 AM
Kynn posted "Neil Gaiman's racist fail" to
4:56 PM
Yukari m (yucaree) tweeted to Gaiman:
@neilhimself :: I'm assuming you mean European-style graveyards but someone's not happy with you :: tinyurl.com/whatneilgaimansaid
(Note: Whenever you see the @ symbol in front of a name on twitter, it means that the person who wrote the tweet (yucaree) sent it to the person named right after the @--in this case, Gaiman).
7:13 PM
Gaiman tweeted to yucaree:
@yucaree of course they aren't. It's the Internet. I left a clarification, but it's not yet posted.
7:04 PM CST
Neil Gaiman's comment to "What Neil Gaiman said..." was approved for upload by Debbie Reese. (Gaiman submitted his comment at 6:39 PM CST. Reese moderates comments to keep spam from appearing as comments on her site.)
(No time stamp available)
Gaiman tweeted:
I'm called a racist by someone who has taken a comment about European graveyards in US out of context http://bit.ly/cx9rDUnd Sigh. #twitsAs you will see, Gaiman deleted this tweet from his page. It is archived elsewhere. If you clicked on the link he provided, you saw it was a bad link. (Note: The pound sign in front of a word is a "hashtag." It is a technique in Twitter for compiling tweets with the specific hashtag on a single page. Hence, there is a page where all tweets in which people who used "#twits" in their tweet are compiled.)
8:25 PM
Debbie tweeted to Gaiman:
@neilhimself No... I did not call you a racist. Ignorant, perhaps. In fact, you misspoke.
(No time stamp available)
Gaiman tweeted:
Linkfail on 'racism' : http://bit.ly/cx9rDU (Perhaps the person thinks that Indian Burial Grounds were European-style Graveyards.)Realizing the link was bad, he provided one that worked. It went to Kynn's LiveJournal.
8:30 PM
Gaiman tweeted:
I should point out that the actual site the #twit LJ linked to - http://bit.ly/c5Rzv2 - is perfectly sane. And my reply wasn't sarcastic.The link he included is my post "What Neil Gaiman said..."
8:31 PM
Gaiman tweeted to Reese:
@debreese not Deb, you didn't at all. The "racist" comment was in http://bit.ly/cx9rDU which I think misunderstood your point.Note: I do not know Gaiman personally. This episode is the first time I have ever interacted with him. His use of "Deb" should not be taken to mean that we know each other.
8:32 PM
Gaiman tweeted to Reese:
@debreese and I was happy to clarify on your site what I meant. (Sad about the comment after mine though.)
8:33 PM
BGF Central tweeted to Gaiman:
@neilhimself Shall point out that you're calling this individual person a twit to your 1.4+ million followers.Apparently (as you will see), BGF Central is someone Gaiman relies on for advice.
8:35 PM
Gaiman tweeted to KurtBusiek:
@KurtBusiek Throwing a term like racist around like that cheapens it in a way I find offensive. It's a real, bad thing & that's just cheap.
I don't know who KurtBusiek is---could be a fan or a friend (or neither).
8:36 PM
Gaiman tweeted to BGF Central:
@BGFCentral Yeah. Point taken. But people had twittered it, and it was coming on the FAQ line. And there are words you don't use lightly.8:38 PM
Gaiman tweeted to BGF Central:
@BGFCentral and Pam, twit is a much, much milder term than racist. But yes, #ishouldusethesepowersonlyforgood
8:39 PM
BGF Central tweeted to Gaiman:
@neilhimself words you don't use lightly=Truth. But power dynamics factor into #agame reality....
8:40 PM
Gaiman tweeted on his Twitter page:
The wise @BGFCentral points out that calling someone a twit in front of 1.4 million people is not using these powers for good. Sigh.8:40 and 8:42 PM
BGFCentral tweeted to Gaiman:
@neilhimself ..Twitter is not the format to respond to that. Your homeport, where there is room for Big Picture & Nuance, is. Otherwise.. it looks like you're PA unleashing a bum rush, which will blowback. No FAQ line filter on Twitter.Notes: I think "homeport" is Gaiman's blog; "PA"
8:41 PM
Gaiman tweeted on his Twitter page:
And @bgfcentral is right for she is wise, so I will delete those tweets.
8:47 PM
BGF Central tweeted to Gaiman:
@neilhimself You r sweet, DON'T DELETE THEM. Also an #agame reality re Omission v Take The Hit Move On. No room here; check email later.
8:47 PM
Yucaree tweeted to Gaiman:
@neilhimself: I'm sorry, my intention wasn't to make you sigh, but I'm glad you're aware of what's being said so you can clarify your point.
8:58 PM
Reese tweeted to Gaiman:
@neilhimself I responded to your comment. And of course, your fans are commenting. Context/perspective r crucial http://tinyurl.com/y3efkes9:13 PM
Gaiman tweeted to Kynn:
@kynn I assumed that the apostrophe on "Neil Gaiman's racist" was short for "IS".9:13 PM
BGF Central tweeted to Gaiman:
@neilhimself You're right. Calling someone a twit is *nothing* compared to calling them a racist. I believe that person is *wrong*.
9:14 PM
Gaiman tweeted to Kynn:
@kynn Happy to have a real discussion. @Bfgcentral pointed out that it was wrong of me to get offended on Twitter, so I deleted comments.9:15 PM
Kynn tweeted to Gaiman:
@neilhimself you seriously thought I wrote "neil gaiman is racist fail" and not "the racist fail belonging to neil gaiman"? reeeeeally?
9:15 PM
Gaiman tweeted to Kynn:
@kynn follow me & I'll send email.
9:17 and 9:20 and 9:23
BGF Central tweeted to Gaiman:
But because of the scale difference *you* must be clear-eyed practical in if/how/where you respond to an *individual* speaking from top-of-head impulse (benefit of doubt) in a space this person might consider a personal diary & is not prepared to deal with a flood of your readers who read your missive as a call to step up and "defend" you. You will be blamed if it goes badly.
9:22 PM
Gaiman tweeted to BFG:
@BGFCentral good advice, much too late. I had already deleted. Now being accused of hiding the evidence.Gaiman's "hiding the evidence" is in reference to the conversation taking place on Kynn's LiveJournal.
9:26 PM
BGF Central tweeted to Gaiman:
@neilhimself Arg very sorry to hear that, but not surprised. Couldn't type warning fast enough cuz doing bunches of things at once, here.
9:25 PM
Reese tweeted to Gaiman:
@neilhimself Context in which I read interview:23 of 100 bks in SLJ Top 100 List hve American Indians (sort of)http://tinyurl.com/SLJ-Top100
9:36 PM
BGF Central tweeted to Gaiman:
@neilhimself Clarify at your homeport next week (by Monday mean-time would be best). Be honest, do not equivocate. Then weather the hit.9:37 PM
Gaiman tweeted to Kynn:
@kynn sent you an honestly apologetic email.Kynn posted Gaiman's apologetic email on Kynn's LiveJournal at 10:07. (Update, 6:58 AM, April 22: If that link does not work, try this one: http://kynn.livejournal.com/1239035.html. )
9:39 PM
Gaiman tweeted to Kynn:
@kynn Again, sorry.9:38 PM
BGF Central tweeted to Gaiman:
@neilhimself From what I know of you the Weather The Hit part might be hardest. But you can take it and will come through Wiser. #agame9:47 PM
Gaiman tweeted on his Twitter page:
Argh. Appear to have made a mess of that one in every possible way. Apologies to all, especially @debreese and @kynn.
9:50 PM
Gaiman tweeted on his page:
Too long on the road. Food, and sleep. And may the #volcanogod look kindly on my attempts to get to the UK this week.
That was his last tweet on this topic. At 9:51, I tweeted to Gaiman: "[Apology] to me? Not necessary. Interesting, though, to see people blasting me for pointing to the interview in the first place." I tweeted that to him because I don't know why he was apologizing to me. Or rather, what he was apologizing for. Maybe it was because his fans were blasting me.
MY REFLECTIONS
Gaiman has over a million followers. His tweets sent ten thousand of them to American Indians in Children's Literature over a 24 hour period. Many of them submitted comments. in 2006 when I started blogging, I did not moderate comments. But then I started getting all kinds of spam, so I set the comments option to "moderate comments." I rarely reject a comment submitted by an actual person. The ones that just curse me, I ignore those. But I approve both, negative and positive comments. When the comments started coming to "What Neil Gaiman said..." I read each one and approved all except one. Then on Monday, I posted a note saying the comments option was closed.
As of this writing, I have not gone back to study the comments. My impression is that most of the individuals submitting comments did so without reading and reflecting on what I said, and without reading and reflecting on comments submitted prior to theirs. Instead, it was mostly a dogpile.
Some people seemed to think that I was/am angry at Gaiman for NOT setting his book in a United States cemetery, and for NOT including American Indians in his book. Some people blasted me for "not reading the book." Some people said I was making a mountain out of a molehill, that Gaiman's remark did not merit being singled out. Privately, someone said that if he'd said "a few dead Jews" the response would have been very different.
My concern is not his book, so, it does not matter if I read it or not. My concern is that a very powerful figure said some things in a newspaper interview that I found troubling. I was (and am) sure that Gaiman knows more about American Indians than his words implied.
I want him to write something about this. Given his fanbase, he could push society to think about the ways we all think, write, and speak about American Indians. He said a little at my blog, clarifying what he meant, but, I want him to write about this on HIS blog. And I want him to tweet it when he does it.
As minutes passed on Sunday night, he worked pretty hard to make amends with Kynn for calling Kynn a twit, but that took him away from his "a few dead Indians" remark.
I think there is more for him to do and say, and I'd like him to do that.
(Note to Gaiman, Kynn, and BGF: I copied and pasted items from your tweets. If I've made errors, please let me know. My email address is dreese dot nambe at gmail dot com.)
Update: April 21, 1:17 PM
I tweeted this follow-up to Gaiman. He tweeted back "definitely planning to blog about it. Still several blogs behind due to volcano travel madness." When his blog post is published, I will provide a link.
