On Privilege, Guilt, and Research

I'm not a fan of 'white guilt'. Or for than matter, male guilt, hertero-guilt, or any other variation of people feeling ashamed of their privilege. It's not because I'm against people acknowledging their unearned advantages in life. Rather, I dislike 'privilege guilt' because guilt is about paralysis and avoidance. This emotional response comes from a place of compassion, but ends up creating more barriers between the privileged and the Other.

In the context of writing, privilege guilt can present a barrier to research and exploration, and ultimately, a barrier to diversity in Fictionland. I've encountered people who felt bad writing about people who are disabled, or of a different sexual orientation, or another race. Or people who felt bad about researching the Other, and, ironically, ended up relying on stereotypes or 'I don't see colour' attitudes to populate their stories. Both approaches yield the same result-- a cast of characters who reflect the author. In practice, this means Fictionland has a disproportionate population of straight, able-bodied, vaguely Christian, middle-class white/Anglo-European folks, and a severe lack of everyone else.

Step one to fixing this is to get over the guilt barrier and become comfortable writing character who aren't from your immediate sphere of experience. Forget writing about the '[X demographic] experience'. That's the stuff annoying stereotypes are made of. Plus it calls forth the guilt-- what if I misrepresent all disabled people ever. Let your characters be individuals whose experiences and attitudes are shaped by aspects of their group identity, but also by their own personalities, their own particular lives.  Research is your friend. If you do your basic homework, go forth an ask smart questions. I've found that most people-- aside from the generally surly ones-- are happy to talk about themselves and their experiences if they know someone is genuinely listening.