Mary Beth Willard's book is a great discussion of our ethical obligations as audiences and consumers. Also great is Erich Hatala Matthes's "Drawing the Line." He comes to similar conclusions as Willard about the ethical questions, but includes a bit more discussion of the role artist's lives can play in our aesthetic evaluation of their work. I'm happy to have both those books out there in a time of many artists being rampant... jerks.
I assume you mean "The experience of stumbling on a pet-death scene is different [for me]". Otherwise it sounds like you're saying, and I assume you're not, that seeing a pet-death scene is aesthetically worse because at least rape scenes "can be beautifully photographed, cleverly plotted, well acted, etc". Maybe that is what you're saying.
Yep, I'm definitely reporting my own reactions in those paragraphs. For me, ghosts = meh, pet-death = dealbreaker.
It works similarly for other people with other dealbreakers, including dealbreakers for depictions of rape. I am able to aesthetically embrace "The Virgin Spring" and enjoy it in a paradox-of-painful-art way. Someone with a dealbreaker for rape scenes (including my friend from back in the day) would not be able to access the many aesthetic virtues of that film.
thanks for introducing me to "dealbreaker" … back-linked in a comment at https://whyweshould.substack.com/p/mary-beth-willards-why-its-ok-to
Thank you for the comment and the back-link!
Mary Beth Willard's book is a great discussion of our ethical obligations as audiences and consumers. Also great is Erich Hatala Matthes's "Drawing the Line." He comes to similar conclusions as Willard about the ethical questions, but includes a bit more discussion of the role artist's lives can play in our aesthetic evaluation of their work. I'm happy to have both those books out there in a time of many artists being rampant... jerks.
I assume you mean "The experience of stumbling on a pet-death scene is different [for me]". Otherwise it sounds like you're saying, and I assume you're not, that seeing a pet-death scene is aesthetically worse because at least rape scenes "can be beautifully photographed, cleverly plotted, well acted, etc". Maybe that is what you're saying.
Yep, I'm definitely reporting my own reactions in those paragraphs. For me, ghosts = meh, pet-death = dealbreaker.
It works similarly for other people with other dealbreakers, including dealbreakers for depictions of rape. I am able to aesthetically embrace "The Virgin Spring" and enjoy it in a paradox-of-painful-art way. Someone with a dealbreaker for rape scenes (including my friend from back in the day) would not be able to access the many aesthetic virtues of that film.
Thank you for the comment and clarification!