Because of a current situation with an author, the question of pen names and author responsibility has come up yet again. I don’t want to get into details about any particular author, especially with something ongoing that I’m not closely involved in. This has to do with an author whose books I’ve never read and who I’ve never followed on any social media, so I cannot and will not speak directly to that. Suffice it to say it’s a JT LeRoy situation with a good dash of Rachel Dolezal thrown in.
That is not the subject I want to discuss. There are two intertwined ideas at play: author pen names and authors’ life stories, which converge as Author Personas.
Four years ago (it’s hard to believe it’s been that long), I was still writing as a progressive Christian blogger. Before that, I’d halfheartedly kept a random, anonymous “mommy blog” with posts about some of the cute and weird things my kids did. It was a bit of a silly mix between sunny and sarcastic. The only people reading it were real-life friends.
The “mommy blog” morphed when I started questioning things at our church. I was emerging from what I call fundamentalism lite, and I was seeking the company of other like-minded people. I was still anonymous at that point. But I wanted to really put myself out there, and I’d read advice to use my real name and just enough detail to give myself credibility. So I did.
I’m not sorry I did. During that time, I met some really cool people. I traveled across the country to see them in person, and some are still friends to this day. My religious and political views shifted really far to the left, and I had a ton of support.
At the end of that time, I was dabbling in fan fiction (as an outlet for some of the deep hurts from my religious days) and also beta reading for a website. I met a colleague who became a friend, and she encouraged me to send my first manuscript to her publisher, which I did (and it was accepted).
Meanwhile, some things were blowing up in the progressive Christian world, including a well-known blogger being outed by another well-known blogger. There were as many opinions as people, but the biggest thing I learned was regarding Own Voices writing. A lot of bloggers wanted the conversation to be led by LGBTQ+ Christians. Some of the most vocal were also vicious and saying hurtful and harmful things.
Because I’m a particularly sensitive person, I internalized a lot. I ended up believing that my one book with a bisexual main character might be “offensive” if I didn’t come out myself. So…I did. Publicly. Really, really publicly.
While this was happening, several other progressive bloggers also came out. I’m not exaggerating when I say they weaponized it. People threw accusations at each other that they were posing as “fake queers” to gain credibility points, either to speak for the LGBTQ+ community or to avoid scrutiny for problematic statements. Having just come out myself in order to protect against being accused of appropriation, I no longer felt safe in a community I’d trusted. I felt like a fraud, especially given that I wasn’t out until I was approaching my forties and wasn’t doing things considered “queer enough.” I left, but not without doing my share of damage and leaving broken hearts on both sides.
Fast forward to being a published author. My blog is still public. You can read back through for all my old posts. A few have been deleted, but I’ll bet you could even locate those via Wayback. Everything I just said can probably be found and verified, though I didn’t give much information. I still use my legal name on my Facebook account, and I use my author name (which is actually my birth name) everywhere else. I wasn’t trying to give all the sordid details of my life so readers could feel like they knew me. It’s simply an outgrowth of already having had a public profile while blogging non-fiction. I chose not to cover it up.
All that said, I have no issues with how authors choose to present. Take a pen name, or not. Take a new one for each genre you write, or not. Divulge details, or not. It makes no difference to me as a reader or as a colleague.
Where I find the ethics get tricky: Creating an author persona which is entirely different from your real life.
On the surface, that probably doesn’t matter much, if no one is being hurt. However, it does present a problem when it comes to Own Voices and when there’s risk of harm to others via that persona.
Posing as a member of a marginalized community that you don’t belong to does damage. I’m not simply talking about those people who invent tragic back stories and then con followers out of money, although that’s clearly a terrible thing to do. I mean even in situations like mine.
A white person posing as someone of a marginalized race (like Rachel Dolezal) can easily be sussed. If they come back with claims they really are this other person, they’re rightfully removed from any position of authority. But it’s much more complicated with the LGBTQ+ community.
For one thing, some authors really are transgender and discover this or are able to come out through writing. And some cannot be out, so their author persona reflects their true self. They don’t typically invent tragic back stories to manipulate readers, however. For another thing, there are plenty of folks like me who present to the world as cisgender heterosexual but who actually are not. We may choose to be open about it (or not) for a variety of reasons.
But once a person has invented something for the purpose of manipulating others or for financial gain, it calls into question every single one of us who thought being honest about ourselves was the right thing to do. It means that I might be grilled on my history, since I’m a genderqueer bisexual writer who has only ever been in one long-term relationship that appears cisgender heterosexual. It means trans folk have to out themselves in order not to be accused of lying and manipulating and threatened with legal action. It means potentially losing genuine allies due to lack of mutual trust.
I’m not sure what the way forward looks like. We need to weed out individuals who manipulate, and I have no trust for people who pose as LGBTQ+ folks and really are cisgender, heterosexual, and allosexual (i.e., tick all three boxes). I don’t think they care about or have the best interests of our community in mind.
I do think we need to talk more honestly about Own Voices and why it’s important that people who are part of marginalized communities are heard. This is not to limit what people are “allowed” to write. But I suspect the pressure to be Own Voices touches each of us in different ways. I felt pressure to come out; others may feel the only way is to lie about who they are. Which speaks to the privilege of those folks, and that’s also a much-needed conversation.
I’ve long been an advocate of self-reflection, and this is no different. Rather than a blanket always/never for what authors write or how we present to the world, we should think about the motivation for both of those things. What is underlying our choices, and how can we make those decisions ethically?
If an author is contemplating taking on the persona of someone marginalized, even if it doesn’t include a tragic history or involve money-making scams, that person should ask themselves why they are compelled to do it. Faking being LGBTQ+ or any other marginalized identity doesn’t come with the burdens and joys of our real-life experiences.
