So, a couple of days ago I met a bully.
The afternoon started off well. A pretty girl was chatting
me up on the King streetcar. She asked about the book I was reading (Kraken, by
China Miéville.) It was a pleasant diversion, and a pick-me-up – not every day
a perfect stranger engages you in small talk. Certainly not in Toronto. I had
to transfer to a different streetcar, so I said my goodbyes and arrived at the
College streetcar platform with a spring in my step, and cracked open my book
again.
“What’re you reading there?” This, from a skinny, scruffy
blond fellow. I assume by his dress, his youth, and our location a student at
Univerisity of Toronto.
I held the book up and told him the title.
“What’s it about?”
I told him the story thus far – a giant squid disappears
from the Darwin Centre in London, which sets of an investigation into
apocalyptic squid-cults and mysterious, murderous magicians.
“Oh, so what, is it magical realism?” the stranger asked me
doubtfully.
“No,” I replied. “More like straight-up urban fantasy.”
“Ah.” Understanding lit up his features, along with the
first hint of a condescending smile. “So it’s lowbrow.”
Confusion. Hurt. Followed by defensiveness. Tamped down by
rationality. I was going to give him the benefit of the doubt. “What do you
mean by that?” I asked politely. I was unconsciously holding the book to my
chest.
“You know. Lowbrow. Nothing wrong with that. I like a little
lowbrow now and then.” Said with the same tone as someone who likes a little
dogshit in their icecream.
“Well, I don’t – why do you say it’s lowbrow?”
“Why don’t you read something better, more highbrow? Like
Gabriel Garcia Marquez?” he countered.
“Marquez isn’t really my thing.” I answered. Anger, a kettle
on the boil in my guts. “Why do you think this is lowbrow?”
“Hey,” he said by way of kind-of apology, “Lowbrow’s not a
bad thing.”
“It kind of –“
“When was it written?” he interrupted. Smug. So fucking
smug.
I had no idea what he was getting at, except that this was
another joke being had at my expense.“Mid two-thousands.”
“Ah, see that’s how I know it’s bad. Nothing good’s been
written in the magic realism genre in seventy years.”
I can’t recall exactly what I said, to be honest, only that
I know it was angry and insulting and it caught the fucker off guard. He didn’t
seem to get why I was so upset. Or at least that was how he acted. Then the
smug, self-satisfied smirk returned. He pointed to the cover of my book, which
I was now clutching protectively to my chest.
“It says international bestseller on it? That’s how you know
it’s lowbrow.” All triumph.
“So if people like something, if something’s popular, it
must not be any good?” I asked, bewilderment battling it out with the simmering
anger.
“Yeah, pretty much,” he shrugged.
This is when I snapped. “Why did you even start a
conversation with me?” I asked. “You’ve never even met me! Do you just like to
pick fights with people? Did you just want to pick a fight with me?”
“Yeah,” he shrugged. “I was bored.” I couldn’t believe it. I
was actually struck speechless. I was so angry, so hurt, so humiliated
(somehow) that I turned on my heel and walked the rest of the way home. No way
was I going to spend a whole streetcar ride with this asshole.
On the long walk home, I thought of all the cutting, clever,
savage, witty and incisive and cruel things I should have said. All the while
my fury and my shame and my hurt roiling within me. My good mood from the
pretty girl? Vanished. My whole evening ruined. And I realized on that walk,
that this is what it felt like to be bullied, when I was in middle school. To
be made fun of, to have something I liked put down, by some tool who didn’t
even know me, for no discernable reason at all.
So here’s what I wanted to say to that condescending elitist
hipster douchebag: FUCK YOU.
First up: Lowbrow and highbrow are bullshit terms that you
and elitist douchebag pricks like you use to ghettoize genre fiction, to
separate what you deem worthy from everything else so you can feel good about
being a gatekeeper of ‘worthy literature.’ You might be surprised to learn that
I have read Marquez, and simply found him not to be my cup of tea. I would be
shocked to learn that you had read anything by Gaiman, or Heinlein, or Miéville
(one of the most critically lauded authors of his generation). It would be
beneath you, right?
I’m here to tell you. There are good books, and there are
bad books, but neither is defined by a genre. They are defined by the skill and
talent and craft and creativity that went into creating them. A lot of genre
fiction is bad. And so is a lot of literary fiction. So fuck you and your
elitism right in your elitist skinny-jean-wearing cornhole.
Second: Fuck you for being a bully. Fuck you for taking
malicious pleasure in making someone else feel bad for liking something. Fuck you for thinking you’re better than me
because you don’t read the same things I’ve read. Fuck you for taking me out of
a righteous good mood and putting me in a shitty mood for much of the rest of
my day. You’re an asshole.
I was in a shitty mood, and I stayed that way for a few
hours. As luck would have it, that evening I was hanging out with some friends,
who with their good humour and kind words helped me see the funny side. Now I
can look back on this complete asshole and laugh, because he’s practically a
cartoon of himself – a smug little ponce in skinny jeans who never learned how
to shave, who gets his jollies putting down other people for liking fantasy when they should be reading magic realism. I can’t imagine a more
ridiculous caricature of someone who is both a too-cool-for-school hipster and
a complete fucking dork.
But that day reminded me that just because school is over
doesn’t mean bullying is over. There’s always going to be people who try to
make you feel bad for who you are, whether it’s for being gay, or black, or a
Conservative, or a vegan, or a dude who likes his entertainment with a side of
murder and explosions and werewolves and tits.
The thing we have to remember about those people is that
they have no power over us. They lash out because they see that what we are or
what we love makes us happy – and because they are unhappy, they try to bring
us down to their level. What we have to remember about the bully is that they
are weak, and pathetic, and as my friends helped me realize about this guy –
they end up being nothing. This guy made me feel shitty for a few hours, and
that sucked. But I’ll be laughing at his ridiculous, pompous douchebaggery for
a lot longer than that.
