Censorship Fight Back

E-mail received today from Smashwords.

THE PROBLEM:

PayPal is asking us to censor legal fiction. Regardless of how one views topics of rape, bestiality and incest, these topics are pervasive in mainstream fiction. We believe this crackdown is really targeting erotica writers. This is unfair, and it marks a slippery slope. We don't want credit card companies or financial institutions telling our authors what they can write and what readers can read.
Fiction is fantasy. It's not real. It's legal.
THE SOLUTION:
There's no easy solution. Legally, PayPal and the credit card companies probably have the right to decide how their services are used. Unfortunately, since they're the moneyrunners, they control the oxygen that feeds digital commerce. Many Smashwords authors have suggested we find a different payment processor. That's not a good long term solution, because if credit card companies are behind
this, they'll eventually force crackdowns elsewhere. PayPal works well for us. In addition to running all credit card processing at the Smashwords.com store, PayPal is how we pay all our authors outside the U.S. My conversations with PayPal are ongoing and have been productive, yet I have no illusion that the road ahead will be simple, or that the outcome will be favorable.
BUILDING A COALITION OF SUPPORT:
Independent advocacy groups are considering taking on the PayPal censorship case. I'm supporting the development of this loose-knit coalition of like-minded groups who believe that censorship of legal fiction should not be allowed. We will grow the coalition. Each group will have its own voice and tactics I'm working with them because we share a common cause to protect books from censorship. Earlier today I had conversations with the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), The American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression (ABFFE) and the National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC). I briefed them on the Smashwords/PayPal situation, explained the adverse affect this crackdown will have on some of our authors and customers, and shared my intention to continue working with PayPal in a positive manner to move the discussion forward.
The EFF blogged about the issue a few days ago: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/02/legal-censorship-paypal-makes-habit-deciding-what-users-can-read Today, ABFFE and NCAC issued a press release: http://www.scribd.com/doc/83549049/NCAC-ABFFE-Letter-To-PayPal-eBay-re-Ebook-Refusal-2012
I will not be on the streets with torch in hand calling for PayPal's head, but I will encourage interested parties to get involved and speak their piece. This is where you come in...
HOW YOU CAN HELP:
Although erotica authors are being targeted, this is an issue that should concern all indie authors. It affects indies disproportionately because indies are the ones pushing the boundaries of fiction. Indies are the ones out there publishing without the (fading) protective patina of a "traditional publisher" to lend them legitimacy. We indies only have each other.
everal Smashwords authors have contacted me to stress that this censorship affects women disproportionately. Women write a lot of the erotica, and they're also the primary consumers of erotica. They're also the primary consumers of mainstream romance, which could also come under threat if PayPal and the credit card companies were to overly enforce their too-broad and too-nebulous obsenity clauses (I think this is unlikely, but at the same time, why would dubious consent be okay in mainstream romance but not okay in erotica? If you write paranormal, can your were-creatures not get it on with one another, or is that bestiality? The insanity needs to stop here. These are not questions an author, publisher or distributor of legal fiction should have to answer.).
All writers and their readers should stand up and voice their opposition to financial services companies censoring books. Authors should have the freedom to publish legal fiction, and readers should have the freedom to read what they want. These corporations need to hear from you. Pick up the phone and call them. Email them. Start petitions. Sign petitions. Blog your opposition to censorship.
Encourage your readers to do the same. Pass the word among your social networks. Contact your favorite bloggers and encourage them to follow this story. Contact your local newspaper and offer to let them interview you so they can hear a local author's perspective on this story of international significance. If you have connections to mainstream media, encourage them to pick up on the story. Encourage them to call the credit card companies and pose this simple question, "PayPal says they're trying to enforce the policies of credit card companies. Why are you censoring legal fiction?"
Tell the credit card companies you want them to give PayPal permission to sell your ebooks without censorship or discrimination. Let them know that PayPal's policies are out of step with the major online ebook retailers who already accept your books as they are. Address your calls, emails (if you can find the email) and paper letters (yes paper!) to the executives. Post open letters to them on your blog, then tweet and Facebook hyperlinks to your letters. Force the credit card companies to join the discussion about censorship. And yes, express your feelings and opinions to PayPal as well. Don't scream at them. Ask them to work on your behalf to protect you and your readers from censorship. Tell them how their proposed censorship will harm you and your fellow writers.

Visa:
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/pr?s=V+Profile
American Express:
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/pr?s=AXP+Profile
MasterCard:
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/pr?s=MA+Profile
Discover:
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/pr?s=DFS+Profile
Ebay (owns PayPal):
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/pr?s=ebay+Profile

Repression Started

Received an e-mail from Smashwords today. Pen Pal has given them a week to delete all stories in the erotica genre that have elements of children in sexual situations, bestiality, rape and incest.
Smashwords has no choice but to comply since Pay Pal handles all their payments even processing credit cards. Smashwords alread has a prohibition on minors involved in or being present in sexual situations. I removed one of my flash stories upon publication dealing with a 16 year old boy and an older woman. Can't write The Summer of 42 anymore.
Did anyone vote for Pay Pal to be the arbiter of public morals?
I know some of you are saying what's wrong with censoring these abominable items. And they are, but what's to now stop them from censoring political comments they don't like, anti-war stories, or a children's book that puts a bad light on lumberjacks (The Lorax- now a movie).
They've qualified the ban on rape as that which is tittilating, whatever the hell that means. This is the one item that affects me.
In my novel Human Sacrifices my heroine is raped by her husband the first time she says no to sex after they're married. Her husband quotes scripture saying that the woman's body belongs to her husband and she doesn't have the right to deny him. It is essential to my story to show the fundamentalist belief in women being subject to their husbands as explicitly stated in the Southern Baptist Conventions revision of the Faith and Message Statement in 2000. I don't believe the way I wrote the scene it would be of purient interest to most readers, but I can't vouch for every reader particularly one looking to be offended.
For my snarky take on this I'll post on my Captain's Log further steam.

Goodbye Old Friend

When I was 14 a friend started to lead me astray. Mike was a year behind me, but lived down the street. We became friends because all his life he had the ability to make good friends instantly. He got me smoking cigarettes which led to jumping a wall at the school into the backyard of an empty house and smoking during lunch. We were caught and suspended for three days. My parents went ballistic, but I was struggling with smoking before this. My brother the year before set the school record in the 600 yard dash and received a trophy at the awards ceremony. I vowed I'd break his record and I knew that there was no way I could do that if I smoked. Being suspended gave me the excuse to stop smoking. Mike and I hung around for a few weeks after that, but I refused to light up with him. When basketball season started I had practice after school and that was when we stopped hanging out together. I set the school record in the 660 yard dash winning the city championship the next year.
Two years ago we started attending a home church. At her work my wife made a friend whose husband pastors the church. Steve and I became friends and when I retired he asked if I would help in his law firm. It came as a surprise when Mike and his wife showed up to church. We hadn't seen each other in forty years. He spent time in the military, found the Lord, was baptised and ordained as a minister. Everyone who knew him before and after conversion witnessed first hand the transformation in his life. The one thing he couldn't shake from his old life was smoking and it killed him. Yesterday was his memorial service. It was the first time in over 40 years I said hello to his older brother and younger sister.
I've searched my heart for the past two years knowing how his health was failing what I could have done for more of a difference when we were younger, if my stopping smoking and moving away provided influence that later led to his conversion? On only one occasion we talked about God because he knew I went to church with my family every Sunday morning and night as well as Wednesdays. I'm afraid I wasn't very articulate in answering his questions.  I do know his conversion made a huge impact to those around him and many now know Jesus as their savior because of him.

Busy Busy Busy

• Since buying back the publishing rights to Optimus I've been editing it. Easier to write than edit.
•  We've reroofed the house and put on a nice new white door with oval window and storm door. It really brightens up the house both inside and out.
• Tried to have a little getaway with the wife Friday, but got called in to work in the morning. It was still nice to spend two nights away from everything going on in the house.
• Played first golf tournament yesterday a two man scramble, didn't do too well, but it was fun. Golfing tomorrow with a golfing buddy from a couple of years ago trying to get him in the Gaggle.

What Church and Faith Should be About

I grew up in church. From my earliest memories church was always there. My parents helped start at least one if not more from our living room. My brother has a doctorate in theology and I went to a Baptist University and a year of seminary. My wife has worked at the state convention for 30 years. There's hardly a church in this city we haven't attended or been members. Faith has always been a part of our lives.
In 1978 a retired state supreme court judge from Texas and the associate pastor of the largest church in Texas mounted a political attack on the Southern Baptist Convention. It's called the "fundamentalist take over" and it disenfranchised my family spiritually to this day.
A couple of years ago we started meeting in a home church. A lady my wife works with, her husband pastors the church. I gave the pastor my book Optimus and he liked it so much he has been giving me legal assistance work supposedly to help him with his openings and closings, but so far every case where I could do that has settled before the trial.
He brought me in to work on a case after only one day of retirement from teaching. I don't technically work for him since I have my own business and bill him for my services, technically he's my client, just my only client. We have become very close working in the same office and worshiping. He's working on his doctorate of ministry and has me look over every paper before turning it in.
I keep telling him that his papers have many "whereas's", but no "therefore." He counters that in theology you don't have the right to an opinion until after you've earned your doctorate. He seems to be right as he gets nothing but praises for him papers.
Michael Manning's post today brought these thoughts up and made me realize just how much the fundamentalist take over robbed me of social contact with other of my faith. They drove a wedge of conformity on certain beliefs which had nothing to do with being Baptist, just fundamentalist.
My pastor and I disagree on a number of issues, but we recognize each other's faith and respect each other.
Last September at a conference we encountered a young couple who moved here on faith. They graduated from seminary and plan on setting up what are called cell churches. A connection of home churches. The SBC entity that is supposed to support them has lost their paper work 6 times. They didn't have jobs, but were in an apartment. She was about to deliver their first child. They were in desperate need of a support church for financial and tax reasons. Our church agreed to provide this support. Since then they had a little boy, have both found jobs and just this last week bought a house where they will begin their ministry. It has felt good to assist this young couple begin their ministry.
Michael's post about social networking to help those in need rang a bell and I pray our church can reach out and help out other couples in need as well.

Free At Last

I now have the publishing rights to Optimus: Praetorian Guard. PA over the last 4+ years has done a roller coaster ride on pricing that it was difficult to generate sales. They got me to buy over a hundred copies, most of them given to family and friends. I sold some at book signings and a few to blogger friends who gratefully wrote reviews.
I plan a complete re-edit and e-publish at Smashwords and Amazon for a reasonable price. The sequel "Stephanus" is in the works.

Grandparents

Michael Manning has a post about Airstream travel trailers that sparked a warm memory. My maternal grandfather was sad that his only children were daughters so Mom named me after him with my middle name. My son and grandson now share the same middle name.
My maternal grandmother was diagnosed with cancer in either 1958 or 59. She was given 6 months. Grandma and Grandpa owned a building in Pueblo, CO living upstairs and the bottom floor was the Record Music Company. One of my dear friends in my Writers2Writers groups that meets once a month is from Pueblo and remembers buying records there. "The shop" as Mom always referrs to it was the first store to sell color television sets.
When Grandma was diagnosed with cancer Grandpa sold the shop to my aunt and Mom. What happened to the shop after that is another story and why we moved to Albuquerque.
Grandpa bought a brand new pink Cadallac, the only car Grandma was comfortable riding in, and a Boll's Air travel trailer. It was beige and white and square, but about the same size as the Airstream. He felt that if they only had a little time left they'd spend it traveling around the country since they'd spent most of their lives working in the shop.
Grandma received radiation treatment for her type of cancer and lived thirty more years. They got to do alot of traveling in that trailer. Grandma liked riding in the Caddy, but resented the two or three times extra cost to get work done on it.
When they'd come home from their travels they'd set up in a trailer park and we'd go over to visit. They'd set up a screen and show us the slides they took in Florida, Texas, California and other states they traveled through.
A few years later Grandpa sold the trailer and car. They settled into a house in Pueblo and bought a GMC pickup with a KamperKing. It was a beast. We'd already moved to Albuquerque. Mom and Dad were both working so they offered to take my younger sister, who was a toddler and me for the summer. When we were in Pueblo I'd work at the shop selling records and my aunt feeling some guilt for shoving us out of the business let me keep as many 45's and LP's as I wanted. After converting the LP's and looking at the huge stack of 45's now I wish she hadn't been so generous. The shop also sold band instruments so my brother got his coronet and I got my clarinette.
It was in the GMC truck and camper that we went fishing. Colorado has great fishing lakes and three times over that summer we went out. I remember stopping between Coatapaxi and Salida to spend the night. It was still a little light out so we got our fishing poles to see if we could catch something in the Arkansas river. I had the reel that has the button you take your thumb off to let the line fly. I threw the whole thing into the river on the first cast. Grandpa had to get out his waders, grab a flashlight and in the rushing water retrieve my rod and reel. We didn't catch any fish that night. Dad would have exploded, but Grandpas, and now that I am one too I understand, have more patience.
In all I spent three summers with them working in the store and going out fishing. They are great memories. The last summer when I was thirteen they were living above the shop again and my bedroom window overlooked Colorado Avenue. They turned in early and that left me with a lot of time on my hands to read. I read the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy that summer, special thanks to Mrs. Mojica who read The Hobbit in my English class that school year gettin my head full of elves and goblins and dwarves and dragons.
The last time we went fishing was at John Martin Dam outside of La Junta on the plains not far from Kansas. Up in the mountains it gets cold at night; on the plains it stays hot. There you fish with minnows. Grandpa was fishing off a pier and I found a nice spot where I could sit on the metal minnow cage where they farmed the minnows they sold to the fishermen. I caught four fish fairly good sized rather quickly then nothing for about an hour. I'd put the fish I caught on a stringer and left them in the water by the cage. When I picked them up all that was left were their heads. A turtle got a free meal.
From then on Grandma and Grandpa would come down to visit, but our summers of fishing were over. I haven't been fishing since. I don't think it would be the same.

New Year, New Start

Guess that's the nice thing about a new year is that alot of the bad stuff that happened in the old year can be put in the dust bin and you start over.
Came down with a stomach flu New Year's Eve. If I'm going to feel that bad at least it should be for drinking!
Finally feeling human. Back at the office today, getting my mini-van fixed up and later this week getting the front part of the roof on the house reshingled.