Seal Press is kind of disappointing. [Full disclosure: I was approached by Seal awhile back to write something for them, but my half-assed pseudo-proposal was inconsistent with what they were looking for and was therefore rejected.] On one hand they put out some of the better books I read when I first discovered feminism, in addition to putting fingers into the feminist internetz to cull out some great writers for print publishing, but on the other hand they’re like the BUST magazine of white women’s self-help publishing — fun, fuschia, sorta feminist, and kind of empty. Bubble gum! Home improvement! Babies! I just want more out of them as a feminist press. And I remember them being so much more radical and edgy in the past.
Regardless, then there was this, this really bad, defensive, confrontational move by PR people who are representing the press in a completely professional capacity. An off-the-cuff celebration of all things WAM! was derailed by this:
“I get that you all engage best through negative discourse…”
Beg pardon?
Who is you all exactly, and what the fuck is that about? Because personally, when women of color point out that the press has a dearth of representation and that is the response, my conclusions about it are pretty logical. No wonder they don’t get more RWOC submissions.
See also: Reform and Media Justice
Excellent analysis at Why Seal Press is OFF the Syllabus
Wow. Do they give remedial classes in PR?
That’s absolutely unbelievable.
Excellent, balanced post.
If it comes down to that, we could say much of feminism is “negative discourse”–right?
Yeah, I’m still pretty flabbergasted that a “professional” would act like this.
I’m not that flabbergasted, especially if it’s someone who is anxious, busy and not experienced navigating communities that are not her own. She probably saw the “fuck you” in a very personal way, saw only that and thus didn’t contextualize, and then became defensive and responded accordingly. Off to the races!!!
Not saying it was the right move, just saying I’m not surprised.
Yeah, I wouldn’t judge all of Seal Press by this — though I think this reflects badly on them. But like the Idaho Planned Parenthood thing, it’s important to remember that the missteps of even a well-placed professional within a progressive organization shouldn’t tarnish the name of the entire organization. That said, a follow-up statement from Seal might be nice at this point.
I get the impression that there were several different WAMs happening. The WAM I went to was not the WAM others encountered, and while that happens at any conference, I’m sad for the enduring divisions and the apparently enduring exclusions.
Binky, the bloggers at Seal did write a post in explanation with an accompanying comment section full of interesting and valuable insights from all sides, including some from those within the publishing industry.
As far as “not experienced navigating communities that are not her own” I can assume we either mean “blogging in general” or participation within the WOC blog community. I get the feeling that blogging for the Seal folks is more about promotion and they didn’t realize they were trodding on important grounds, especially within the WOC blogging community, and especially considering the history of a couple of years worth of heated conversations between blogs by white feminists and blogs by feminists of color. Which, personally, is why sitting back, listening, and not being so quick to defend the status quo is so important.
well, they gave their follow-up statement & it was more of the same: defensive, petulant, clueless, self-centered & whiter than wonderbread - check it
http://www.sealpress.net/blog/2008/04/seal-and-women-of-color.php
my favorite: “we admittedly do not publish enough women of color, but we never have. seal was always seen as more of a lesbian press back in the day.”
http://www.sealpress.net/blog/2008/04/seal-and-women-of-color.php#c3394309577358283629
what. the. fuck.
these aren’t just missteps, this is profound ignorance of the dynamics of race & whiteness
and sadly, this actually is all of Seal Press - the two main editors & the publicist have now all weighed in & nothing even beginning to approach a real apology has appeared, let alone any indication of them even realizing they have done anything they need to apologize for
i’m an independent bookmonger & have been watching with dismay the direction they’ve been taking & now i know why - i’d like to believe that this will be a learning experience for them but i ain’t holding my breath
I hear you, jam, and I know the publishing industry is hurting fiercely and has been for a long while which partially makes me want to excuse them. Except for the self-centeredness. Part of me wishes that they would push these mainstream books to sell so they could continue to fund the really important, less mainstream works that they used to. The last thing they need to put out is another “make your orgasms/cubicle/barbeque/orgasms/orgasms better!” anthology.
Now, I’m still reading Amanda Marcotte’s book (which was published by Seal Press) which is why I haven’t given a review yet, but I can see why this particular book really fit into their vision, in part because although she’s covering rather serious subjects she’s doing so with a real sense of humor. There’s a part of me, though, that wishes she ran with it more, really dove into the subjects at hand and made it a big ol’ thick tome of a thing, like Molly Ivins had a baby with the feminist academia. Still, I’m not done with it yet so I’m going to reserve any other statements for the full review.
The problem, or what I gather is the problem from my experiences with Seal, is that they are looking for handbooks and how-to guides, more gift book material than “teach it in your class” material. I guess part of it for me is that I used to think of Seal as THE feminist press (even MY feminist press), but with the push to go mainstream just to stay afloat they’ve had to give in ways that are contrary to many philosophies within the contemporary feminist movement.
Also, after looking at their site again, the new tagline is something that bugs me when looking at the books they have featured. “By women, for women” could just as easily describe a magazine by Conde Nast as it could a feminist publisher, and that seems to be the line they’re trying to walk.
participation within the WOC blog community
Exactly. I just imagined someone rushing in defend herself and putting her foot right in it, without stopping to consider boundaries, privilege, etc.
mmmMMMMmm, barbecued orgasms.
Hey, jam, are you LadyJ from the other comment thread? Just idly curious; really liked what she had to say.
Yeah, I kinda like the idea of barbecued orgasms.
I get in way too much trouble when I defend Seal Press or the primers they publish (there’s more “meat on the bones” in Amanda’s book the second time through, I think, which is exactly how I felt about FFF). But I think we’re being unfair to the Seal Press bloggers when we ask them to respond to something hurtful in a purely professional way — I mean, we’re supposed to be remembering that the “personal is political”, and when someone says “Fuck Seal Press” — which has all of two editorial employees — to ask those employees to react like trained PR flaks rather than like human beings is a bit much. When we blog, we blog — whether we blog as individuals or as part of a business, the line between the professional and the personal is blurry.
And I think there’s a huge double standard in the way in which folks are responding to BlackAmazon, on the one hand, and the Seal Press bloggers on the other. If I worked at Seal Press, and poured my energy and my sweat into making a world-class feminist voice, to hear “fuck you” would piss me off a billion times more than if I were just some hack at Wal-Mart.
Hugo, please define in specific terms the double standard that is being applied to Blackamazon and Seal Press. I think it will be beneficial, for all including yourself, to examine the moral equation you’re asserting.
I mean, we’re supposed to be remembering that the “personal is political”, and when someone says “Fuck Seal Press” — which has all of two editorial employees — to ask those employees to react like trained PR flaks rather than like human beings is a bit much.
The personal is political doesn’t mean that all political things have a personal element. The personal is political is pointing to the reality of discrimination of women being systemic, and thus not counterable on the individual level.
In this case, it would be correct to say that the personal (WoC not being published) is political (publishing agencies, even one which use words of diversity and inclusion, exclude WoC on a systemic level and disappear WoC who happen to be lesbian), but the side that acting badly is NOT BA.
It’s the people with the publishing control who are a “lesbian press” that doesn’t seem to realize that WoC are sometimes lesbian.
I suppose quoting Obama is distracting, with the leadership race still running: but I really am glad that he did not treated the anger of the Reverend at Trinity as a singular political issue for him, but both contextualized it and demanded that we not ignore or wish the anger of centuries away. More than I would have known how to do, he also provided context for the reaction of white folks as typified by Seal Press - the “don’t hate on us” reaction.
It’s really something that does go round and round. As a cultural understanding, it hasn’t penetrated - but maybe it can and will, if we keep naming it, and saying here’s another one of about the same shape and size. Anger and defensiveness.
You’ve got to make room for the anger; sometimes it really does hurt.
The “was more of a lesbian press” comment really does make me sputter, though. That’s profoundly … I just can’t imagine having read extensively in feminist theory and NOT understanding how that’s exclusive language. I mean? Right?
barbecued orgasms = squick
belledame222, i’m flattered that you would think i’m someone as articulate as LadyJ - i appreciated her comments as well, as i did yours - you tried valiantly to break through their white cocoon & it is a measure of the depth of their ignorance that they could not hear your clear & compassionate attempts to clue them in
Hugo, i’m not expecting the folks at Seal Press to act like “trained PR flaks” - i’m expecting them to be conversant with the material they publish - like Arwen, i don’t understand how they as feminists can be so clueless about race & white privilege - they need to shut up, sit down & start reading their own damn books (e.g. Colonize This, which strangely cannot be found anywhere on their stupid ass framealicious website)
if you are white & a person of color expresses anger & frustration with you it is your job, your moral obligation, given the history & current state of race relations in this country to examine your own actions first to see where such anger & frustration might be arising from - as many others on both Seal Press & Blackamazon’s blogs have pointed out, it would have been a simple thing for either of the editors to contact Blackamazon directly & say something like “I was dismayed/ disheartened/ distressed to see you say ‘Fuck Seal Press.’ If you’d be willing, I’m very interested in hearing why you feel that way & what, if anything, we can do to change that.” - instead, they went stomping in to her blogspace & took it as an opportunity not to learn but to condemn & dismiss - worse, as Blackamazon points out, they “with out even any prior introduction went THROUGH ME to go fuck you to a whole world of folks” - this is inexcusable behavior for people claiming to be working for social justice
and again, now that this has been pointed out to them, in many different ways by many many women of color (graciously i might add as it’s not their damn job to handhold & lead Seal Press through Racism 101), there still has yet to be anything even close to a real apology or any indication that they have really listened at all
lastly, i feel the need to point out that the concept of a “double standard” only makes sense & has application when the situational context is one of equality - as you know, we don’t live in a world of equality - not even close - so, yes, Blackamazon & Seal Press should be regarded differently because they are not equals, not while we live in a world where white privilege is something one can benefit from & the other cannot
Re: double standard.
I don’t think a double standard can exist when one side of it represents only herself (BlackAmazon), and the other side of it represents one arm of a major publishing house (Seal Press of Perseus Books Group).
And for other reasons, obvs., but this one is majorly apple v. orange farm.
jinx! you owe me a beer!
no, wait, i owe you one… the time difference is confusing me
and…. upon further review i see i owe Kai & Deoridhe a beer as well, re: double standards - sorry, when i posted i didn’t see any of your responses, even upon reload
but who cares? beers for everyone!
umm…. ok, i really am actually reading them all now
Deoridhe, a beer for you because i wanted to address “the personal is political” thing & say what you said but didn’t & now i don’t have to because you did it so clearly & eloquently - thank you
ok, time for more coffee
Re: Double Standard.
I wrote about equivalence because I get the impression, from what I thought was a heartfelt and sincere blog thread at Seal Press, that Krista and Brooke responded as Krista and Brooke, not as impersonal flaks for a corporation. Seal may be for-profit, but to work for it is to throw yourself, heart mind and and soul, into what you believe in. A “fuck you” at your company very easily becomes a “fuck you” at YOU, in the same way that a “fuck you” at your blog becomes about you as well.
That said, the “personal is political” works both ways — Seal can do more, should do more. But the books they have put out lately have been anything but light and frothy, IMHO — substantive, surprisingly deep, and diverse. And I agree, there’s room to do better.
I’ve been in a position where I’ve had to reply to “Fuck [Chris' Employer]” levelled in a very personal manner, directed at my own work. To have responded the way the Seal Press folks did would have been, how is it the young people put it these days?
Epic Fail.
There is no legitimate way to defend The Seal Press Employees in this, even if one takes Hugo’s lead in denying privilege dynamics any importance in the matter. No legitimate way to defend them. None. Zero.
They fucked up and they’re not admitting it and it’s stupid.
And all they had to do was to look to one of their content providers for the right mode of interaction. Whatever one can say about the Yes Means Yes project, Jaclyn Friedman responded to the criticism in exactly the right way from a corporate development point of view. And she was still wrong in a number of places, and she still got criticism. But she did not make things worse just because of a personal snit.
In a public exchange, you listen to the criticism and you respond with the appearance of gratitude whether or not you find the criticism worthwhile and you search the criticism quietly and to yourself for anything you might find relevant or useful and you thank the person for their input, or you don’t respond at all. It doesn’t matter how upset you are, how wounded you are. If you can’t do it, you’re not qualified for the job you hold. Period.
Hugo, i’m just not hearing you on this &, like Chris pointed out, i don’t know why you apparently think it’s OK to ignore the role white privilege has played in this whole affair
i’m a white man & i’ve worked in the radical & progressive book world for many years now - bookselling, publishing, distributing, organizing literary events, whathaveyou: the whole shebang - if you do truly put your mind, heart & soul into it because it’s what you believe in then you have an obligation to do the necessary, hard & yes painful work of examining your own privilege & assumptions about all manner of things we are taught to accept as “just the way things are,” especially if you’re white - you can’t just assume that because you work for or with a progressive/radical organization that you are free of the racism, sexism, classism, etal., that we all grow up with & inherit to one degree or in one manner or another - it takes work, consicous work, to deal with & address such matters & it’s pretty much a neverending process - Krista & Brooke, no matter how “heartfelt” & “sincere” you find them to be are using their white privilege in a pretty straightforwardly oppressive manner, i.e., to silence & dismiss the concerns, the voices, & the realities of women of color
and i really don’t see at all what you mean about their recent releases being “substantive, surprisingly deep, and diverse”? they have published some great books in the past, like Listen Up or Colonize This (which again, though both are in print, neither can be found anywhere on their website) & will be publishing some good books soon (like Susan Stryker’s new book) but lately, as Lauren pointed out earlier, they have been heading in a much more mainstream direction, & it’s only gotten worse since Perseus gobbled them up - even their subject listing looks pretty weak - check it
http://www.sealpress.com/subjects.php
note that despite having published books on women of color that “race” doesn’t even merit a subject heading - wtf?
look at their front page & what do you see? i see a book on financial management with a wonderfully paternalistic cover of a (white) woman holding a jar of spare change, a book on weight loss (white model), a pregnancy memoir by a rock-n-roll party girl (white model), a book on sex & bacon (another white face), a book on sexier sex (white model), and a book of erotica for “dirty girls” (gee, another white face) - the only book that has real substance is Amanda Marcotte’s & even here the cover (another white woman) seems to say: don’t worry, it’s really sort of just a joke (please note i’m not saying Marcotte is saying feminism is a joke - i appreciate her ability to deal with sexist bullshit through humor) - in all, though, it seems like pretty frothy & light fare to me - certainly not groundbreaking
but ultimately, while i’m dismayed to see how completely they’ve allowed themselves to be woven into the corporate world (don’t get me started on their amazon links), this all doesn’t really matter - they could be publishing all manner of progressive & radical lit & that still wouldn’t excuse their behavior - you don’t get to stop being white or having white privilege just because you publish books on race, even if you publish a ton of them - that’s just not how it works - quite simply, it’s an issue of power & i’m sure you can figure out who has it here & who doesn’t
ok, time for beer - i’m buying
Let me recommend a couple of Seal Press books that I’ve received this year that fit the bill:
http://www.sealpress.com/book.php?isbn=9781580052290
http://www.sealpress.com/book.php?isbn=9781580051958
Not frothy, not light, very groundbreaking.
I have to say, I disagree with you on this, Hugo:
But I think we’re being unfair to the Seal Press bloggers when we ask them to respond to something hurtful in a purely professional way… …to ask those employees to react like trained PR flaks rather than like human beings is a bit much. When we blog, we blog — whether we blog as individuals or as part of a business, the line between the professional and the personal is blurry.
I don’t think that’s unfair at all. They presented themselves in an official capacity when they said “Seal Press here.” Even if we accept that there’s a bright line between responding as “trained PR flaks” and responding “like human beings”, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to expect people who present themselves in a professional capacity to act as professionals. They are professionals, and I don’t see why expecting them to act like it is unreasonable.
And I think there’s a huge double standard in the way in which folks are responding to BlackAmazon, on the one hand, and the Seal Press bloggers on the other. If I worked at Seal Press, and poured my energy and my sweat into making a world-class feminist voice, to hear “fuck you” would piss me off a billion times more than if I were just some hack at Wal-Mart.
Sure. I don’t think- and maybe I’m wrong- that people are suggesting that the women at Seal couldn’t be offended/hurt/upset/sad/whatever by the comments at BA’s site. But, if there’s a “double standard” it’s certainly in no small part because of the different positions being occupied. The comments on a personal blog- both from BA and her readers- are in a different realm than the comments coming from representatives of Seal. Personal versus professional. When you represent a publisher- no matter how small that publisher is- you’re expected to act in a professional manner. If BA comes onto my blog sometime and presents herself as the representative of some business and acts rudely, I’ll be every bit as critical of that as I am of Seal coming on to her blog. But, BA has never, as long as I’ve been reading her, presented herself as a representative of anything but her own words.
Hugo, those are two excellent books, i agree… more than excellent, actually, they’re necessary & Seal Press should get props for publishing them
but they are not groundbreaking per se (not that they have to be) in that other books have addressed both these subjects before, e.g., The Color of Violence by Incite Collective, War on the Family by Renny Golden, A World Apart by Cristina Rathbone, etc.
that said, a handful of books does not a catalog or commitment make - nor does it counteract the overwhelmingly white face they present on their front page - like i said earlier, the amount of books they publish on race is really irrelevant to the matter at hand, i.e., their nasty self-centered behavior, their white privilege, & their unwillingness to own both
>>I don’t think that’s unfair at all. They presented themselves in an official capacity when they said “Seal Press here.” Even if we accept that there’s a bright line between responding as “trained PR flaks” and responding “like human beings”, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to expect people who present themselves in a professional capacity to act as professionals. They are professionals, and I don’t see why expecting them to act like it is unreasonable. >>
Indeed. What was that about the “soft bigotry of low expectations?”
You know, I HATE it when bloggers write something, get criticized, and then TAKE IT DOWN. I don’t get to see what Seal Press wrote on their own blog, because they’ve taken it down.
If you have come to the point where you agree with the commenters, or think they have a valid point, then at LEAST replace the post you took down with your new take on it. Don’t just disappear stuff!
I am left with the mean comments on BA’s blog, then a refusal to continue the conversation there, and a reference to a post that no longer exists. Totally frustrating.
They need to post an apology and show some understanding of how incredibly uncharitable their commenting on BA’s blog was. If you start off with the assumption that criticism of you/your company is unjustified, you’re not open to dialogue.
> I don’t get to see what Seal Press wrote on their own blog, because they’ve taken it down.
Emily, if you’d like to see their original post, check out google’s archive (i made it a tinyurl b/c the url is quite long & i didn’t want it to break or splay all over the place)
http://preview.tinyurl.com/3hmrrw
unfortunately, the archive was snapped when there was only one comment - the rest might be archived elsewhere - the internet archive might have it in a few days
and, y’know, wow - how messed up - i wonder if they took it down themselves or if Perseus made them take it down?