It’s refreshing to come across thoughtful, engaging commentary on some of the issues of our day. I have recently been reading a book that I heard about through a few reviews. It is called Monsters: A Fan’s Dilemna. The author, Claire Dederer, asks quite a few questions in the book, but the main one is how we should best navigate in the tension of appreciating exceptional artistic ability (or other extraordinary achievement) in light of terrible things done in the life of the artist.
What is refreshing, to me, about the book is that it offers a thoughtful examination of the tension in a way that looks at various perspectives. This feels like life, like positive moral struggle. Dederer does not say “This is what you should do,” instead she outlines the contours of the questions that we face. She does so in some very engaging chapters. One presents the metaphor of a stain. She uses this to ask how awareness of the monstrosity of the artist reaches through time to impact their art. There is a chapter entitled “Genius,” in which Dederer opens up the troubling, historically too real, idea that if someone is declared to be genius in art or intellect (or sports or technological understanding) then they are sometimes granted a kind of permission to be morally, socially, or spiritually juvenile or hurtful (from Pablo Picasso to Elon Musk). In a chapter called “The Anti-Semite, The Racist, and Time,” Dederer addresses questions about what she calls “the Past.” She capitalizes the word because of the meaning that she sees is often projected onto it.
One of the great problems faced by audiences is named the Past. The Past is a vast terrible place where they didn’t know better. Where monstrous behaviours were accepted. Sometimes the Past seems incredibly far away, sometimes is seems to have ended last year or even last week: more difficult to accept is the idea that we are living in it right now - if by the Past, we mean a moment in history where injustice and inhumanity reigned… Our reckoning of the Past is dependent on two central ideas:
1. That people were simply products of their time.
2. We’re better now.
Sitting in my cozy home, a house wrapped in the endless shimmering ribbon of social media, I feel I’m at the apex of history.
Dederer is not, however, willing to grant the Past a kind of moral pass. She outlines how, mostly, people did know better or they should have. We may indeed have done just as poorly as them in our moral choices had we lived when they did, but this should occasion self-critique, rather than acceptance of inhuman views, now or then.
A few days ago, I ran into an old friend who I hadn’t seen in years. He left his church after decades of regular participation because the denomination to which it belongs decided to become more open in matters of sexuality, same sex-marriage, and church leadership. We talked about how the two of us held differing opinions on such matters. He seemed willing to declare that he and those who held his view cared about the Bible and faith while, somehow, those who held the view that I happen to hold must not truly care about either. I told him that I can’t question his desire of fidelity to scripture but I presented that I thought our difference was interpretation, not faith. I assured him that I came to the view that I hold because of my faith and my regard for scripture, not in spite of it.
Dederer’s examination of monsters in the world of art and entertainment is engaging, in part, because it opens an honest consideration of the past. Was it okay to discriminate? Was it okay to be misogynist, or to see the world dominated by ideas of racial hierarchy?
I am grateful for the people who were formative and helpful in my life, in my spiritual life. Can I be grateful for them, even if they held views that today would largely be considered to be repugnant by many in in our society? A concept that guides me in thinking through such things is that I can be grateful but I do not owe it to them to stay where they were. It is a mistake to think that faithfulness means that we cannot be open to moral progress or examination of our own faith and views. I aim to be faithful in being grateful but not in being stuck. They did not believe just what the generations before them did. I do not owe it to them to maintain their views.
There are more concepts that I found insightful in Dederer’s book. She mentions that one of the matters enlivening our current moral struggle is the prevalence of biography. We did not used to know the details of the lives of celebrities and saints. It turns out that many of them were scoundrels and worse. What do we do when we find out? Here is how Dederer states it, “Biography used to be something that you sought out, yearned for, actively pursued. Now it falls on your head all day long.”
Such reflection recalls for me ideas from the Psalms, one being that we are known by God. Remember how the song “Every Breath You Take” by the Police was written as a stalker song, more about creepiness than about love? It became known as a love song. It was the audience that changed its meaning. “Every breath you take, every move you make, every smile you fake, every claim you stake, I’ll be watching you.” Is that beautiful or scary? I suppose it depends on who it is that is always there, always watching.
Psalm 139 is a prayer about the assurance that we are known, that God knows a word before it is on our tongue, that God “hems us in, behind and before.” Dederer’s reflection on biography speaks a point of faith to me that God is loving and trustworthy to fully know me, but that it would be rare or impossible for anyone else to know me (or you) with such love and without regard for self.
When I read books like Dederer’s I am reminded that all around us and between us are still the questions of meaning, love, faith, sin and goodness and redemption and justice. We can, in hopeful theology, ask such questions well and help others to do the same. Doing so requires that we are not seeking to protect our particular institutions or our precious worldviews.
We should be careful about implying that such questions don’t matter to people anymore. They matter greatly. It might just be that most people have determined that the church is not the best place to honestly seek wisdom over important questions.
Liked the questions and I liked your responses. Q and R (not Q and A).