Back when I was in middle school, I bonded with a classmate over our mutual love of anime. The classmate even owned a manga that she brought to school and let me read. That series was Rurouni Kenshin. This was the first ever manga I saw in person and this friendship was likely a major contributor to my love of anime. I don’t think I would have started collecting One Piece volumes if not for this interaction. (Also, Oda worked on Kenshin in his early days, so it’s connected there.)
Jumping ahead a couple of years and I’d decided to collect Rurouni Kenshin volumes. Viz Media even had them in these big prints where you could buy 3 volumes in one book. Unfortunately, I never finished my collection remains because the news broke that Nobuhiro Watsuki is a monster.
I won’t go into detail but just know that Watsuki shouldn’t be trusted around young girls. I don’t know how he is still able to work in the anime industry and before anyone tries to claim that “the culture is just different,” it wouldn’t have been a crime and he wouldn’t have been convicted if it were.
I had to learn the hard way to separate my love for Rurouni Kenshin from my hatred for the creator. I’m sure in recent years we’ve all had one or two( or ten) creators we had to cut off because they did something terrible. So for those who need a little help letting go, here’s a guide for separating the work you love from the artist you’ve grown to despise.
Take A Breather: These People Aren’t Your Friends
When you find yourself in a situation like this, a lot of strong emotions can fester.
Maybe you feel you can feel betrayed by a creator you used to admire. Like they doped you. Perhaps you feel responsible for their behavior. That your support empowered them to do the thing that turned you against them. Maybe you feel like you should have seen this coming. Looking back maybe there are signs of their bad behavior because hindsight is 2020.
You are allowed to take as much time as you need to feel these things, but when you are done, remember that this was not personal. The creators don’t actually know you; and more importantly, you don’t know them. They are a stranger you projected positive are You feeling Mowtraits onto and they just revealed how off-base you were.
Check You Sources
When the canceling-train comes around, there is bound to be misinformation freight hoppers on board. Sometimes they’re even the conductor.
Once you’ve had time to cool down and fact-checkers have had time to fact-check, it’s good to see if the creative you have beef actually did the thing they’re being accused of.
A couple years ago the rumor was circulating that Micheal Jordan was funding for-profit prisons. Turns out it was just another man with the same name, but that didn’t stop people from hating on him for it.
So ya know keep that in mind.
Don’t Burn Your Own Books
Throwing away your prized possessions won’t make the world suck less.
I remember it used to be a trend for people to burn merch and stuff when a creator failed them. I think Naruto and Bleach fans did it cause they were unhappy with the final pairings.
The thing is you already paid for that. If the person who you’re mad at saw that, they’d probably just laugh at all the money they made on bonfire tinder.
It’s better if, after you give yourself time to process, you just donate or resell it.
Welcome To Fandom
Fandom spaces are great ways to engage with fans of a media without having to deal with the source material. Let’s use Harry Potter as an example.
I read the Harry Potter books once as a late teen and quickly jumped headfirst into its fandom spaces. The movie had already been done for years and the books and finished even longer, but the fans were still cranking out fanfictions, music, podcasts, and musicals like the last book had just been released.
The fandom had lived beyond the series. By the time The Cursed Child and the Fantastic Beasts movies came out, a lot of fans didn’t need that canon because it conflicted with things they already came up with on their own. In fact, I was beginning to see discoures over ignoring what Rowling was saying on Pottermore and Twitter because it was contradictory to her previous words, plain boring compared to what fans had imagined, or just plain weird. Fans were already discussing separating the art from the artist after Rowling tried to canonize wizards crapping their pants before plumbing was invented. So her subsequent self-outing as transphobic just expedited that process.
Now if you have someone with narcissistic tendencies like Rowling as the creator you are trying to split from, there can be some problems enjoying fan culture. Rowling has tweeted that if you are a fan of her series that that means you agree with it, but a lot of fans actually have decided to give her the proverbial middle finger by actively criticizing her while making fan content.
At the end of the day, engaging with and buying fan content is a great way to enjoy media without supporting the problematic creator. Speaking of which…
Stop Paying for It
This one is pretty easy to do, just stop giving the creator your money.
This is why I don’t recommend getting rid of things you already paid for too soon. Because if you change your mind about getting rid of that portion of your life, you have to dump a bunch of money on rebuying it. Which may be hard but you still have other options.
Buy secondhand. The original producer doesn’t get profit from resales, so you can buy it guilt-free. If I really wanted to, I could stop by Half Price Books and pick up the remaining copies of Rurouni Kenshin to finish my collection. I just don’t want to.
Visiting the library or watching shows or movies as reruns are options. There is a small chance that some profit might trickle back to the creator but it will likely be minor compared to if you pay for it directly.
And if all else fails, piracy is always an answer!
I’m just kidding! Okay, not really.
If you pirate media, you don’t have to worry about a single cent of yours going towards someone or some company you don’t support. Piracy is also an interesting way to protest a creator. It can be a pretty direct way to say, “we want your work, but not you.”
Reexamine the Work
So now that we’ve discussed all the ways to continue to enjoy a work despite its author, we have to acknowledge the elephant in the room.
Sometimes the reason you want to drop an artist is built into their work, making it impossible to separate them and their art. A racist caricature might appear, an inappropriate relationship could be presented or unethical worldbuilding elements could be promoted as acceptable. No matter how much you want to, you can’t ignore it anymore.
If simply interacting with the media leaves a sour taste in your mouth, it might be time to move on from the work entirely. There’s no point in engaging with something that doesn’t make you happy if you don’t need to, ya know, live.
I get that if you’re reading this post, this isn’t the answer you wanted, but sometimes no matter how much it’s a part of your life, how many good memories you shared with it, no matter how much you love it, you just can’t separate the art from the artist.
I Think Thinks 