#metoo #ustoo Change Starts Now: Stand Against Harassment in the YA/Kidlit Community

Sara, I’m on the SCBWI board. The facts out there at present are INCOMPLETE, and the statement that SCBWI ‘didn’t act’ is completely untrue. SCBWI acted *immediately* on learning of the complaints but did not go public out of respect for the wishes of some of the *victims*. I’m hoping that a statement will be issued soon to correct and clarify.

Hi, Daniel – I’m glad you’re here and I appreciate that you’ve signed this pledge. It’s so important, for all of us. What I’m about to write is a lot less comfortable, but because this kind of pledge usually means people care if they’ve crossed lines, I feel like you’d want to know about how your behavior made me uncomfortable at a book festival several years ago.

It was the Rhode Island Children’s Book Festival – one of the first times I’d been invited to something as a featured author. I was nervous for a pile of reasons. I was a relatively new author. There weren’t many women on the lineup at all. And the other names were all big ones –people whose work I’d admired for a long time. I was also nervous because you’d recently reviewed my first picture book in the New York Times. It wasn’t a positive review – that was fine (my daughter had put it all in perspective by saying “But Mom! This means Lemony Snicket actually READ your book!) – but I was still worried that you’d make a joke about it in front of everyone at this festival.

You didn’t end up joking about that. But on the festival bus that transported the authors, you made another joke that shut me up for the rest of the morning. I was talking with another author who was sitting in the seat in front of me. He asked where I lived and said he’d thought I was from the Midwest. “It’s probably the cardigan,” I joked. “Are you a virgin, too?!” you shouted from several seats away. It was the first thing you’d spoken to me all weekend. I didn’t know how to respond, so I didn’t say anything. But I felt smaller and like maybe I shouldn’t be talking with any of these big-name authors at all.

Later that night, a large group of authors & a few spouses were waiting in the lobby to go to dinner. Many of us were just being introduced to one another when you made another joke. “These children’s book events always turn into orgies!” It probably didn’t occur to that you some of the women in that lobby were likely survivors of sexual assault. A few people laughed awkwardly. I just stood there. And hoped that I wouldn’t be seated near you at dinner.

This is, of course, minor stuff in the grand scheme of things and pales in comparison to many of the truly horrific reports we’re hearing from the children’s book world right now. We’ve heard stories of serial predators, and I have never heard anyone suggest that you are among them. But as someone who’s signed on to this pledge, you should know that this stuff matters, too. It all matters.

This festival was an amazing event, organized by fantastic people, and there were wonderful moments throughout that weekend. But when I think back to that event, what I remember most is how small I felt that day, how on-edge about what you might say next.

Later, when you made the watermelon joke at the National Book Awards, I hated myself for not having said something to you about your comments at the time. If I had, I wondered, might you have thought twice about making that joke? I realize what ridiculous thinking that is, but it bothered me for a long time. I talked with a group of women friends about it, and learned that two other ladies had similar uncomfortable memories of feeling humiliated by your “jokes” at children’s book events. We’ve had conversations about it. Is it possible that he has no idea the impact these loud uncomfortable jokes have on women? I’ve thought about writing to you since then, but worried too much about what the fallout might be.

But here you are today, signing Gwenda’s pledge. To me, this says, “I care about this. I want to be part of the solution.” So I’m taking a deep breath and taking you at your word. I’m glad you’re here. And I’m writing to request that your commitment involve not just signing this and making public statements in support of #metoo, but also rethinking some of your jokes. I understand that being edgy in this way has long been a part of your public persona. But you are talented and funny in so many other ways. You can still be big without making others feel small, and I’d love to know that your commitment includes a pledge to leave behind this sort of humor.

Best,
~Kate

Mr. Handler: at the 2011 ALA Conference in NOLA at the Printz reception I was with a group of fellow librarians who were all too intimidated to talk to you. After all, you’re Lemony Snicket. I wasn’t intimidated. When I approached you, I opened with this: “My friends were too afraid to come talk to you, but I’m not afraid.” You were surrounded by fellow publishing big names, I was a solo female librarian, a nobody and a stranger to you. You looked right at me and said, “If you’re not afraid, go knock on the door of (some random room number) and make out with whoever answers.”

I have NEVER EVER forgotten this. It was clear you thought this was quite the clever riposte – but I was a stranger to you, a woman, and someone with ostensibly much less power than you. I was, it was obvious, a fan. And, in front of a large group of ALL of our peers (they’re just as much my peers as yours) you decided to open with a sexual implication about what I should do with my body. (with a total stranger. And those are the kind of decisions I like to make on my own, thanks.) It wasn’t funny. And it didn’t intimidate or belittle or humiliate me, though it felt like that was your goal. It just made me so sad for all the time I’d spent admiring your wit and your style. And it made me angry for the other women of all ages I knew you’d reduce and try to belittle.

You can keep ignoring these comments, but they won’t go away. Think on that.

I’ve hesitated before responding to this thread about Daniel Handler because I am aware of how it might be received, but then not speaking up out of fear of retribution feels both wrong and ironic.
So here goes. I do hope a reasonable discussion can follow. Or at least a fair hearing of what I’m trying to say.
I am a lifelong feminist who has watched the recent turning of tides with pride and exhilaration, however, as many other smarter women have written, there are dangers and pitfalls to this powerful movement and I fear that what I’m seeing happen on this thread to Daniel Handler is a perfect example. To be clear: I am not discounting or undercutting anyone’s truth. I am willing to take every single story told here at face value. In other words: I believe the women who have come forward. But in all these cases, at least the stories I’ve read here, the ones made public, Handler is telling a joke that the listener did not think was funny. Or maybe thought was inappropriate. This is not sexual assault and it is not sexual harassment and to equate the stories here with assault and harassment both undercuts the seriousness of these problems and unfairly tarnishes a decent human being who happens to be a famous man. In none of these cases was Handler someone’s boss. In none of these instances did he inappropriately touch anyone. He made a joke (or in one accusation, he read aloud a scene from a Pulitzer prize winning novel) and sure, maybe you didn’t think the jokes were funny, or maybe they even offended you, but does it really seem just to excoriate him like this in a public forum and then shame him for not wading in to defend himself and/or apologize? Because it doesn’t seem right to me.

Author Alexandra Duncan and some others have been putting together just such a list, if you’d like to check it out and/or add to it: http://bit.ly/2su3VN2.