Star Wars Author Chuck Wendig Makes Bizarre Claim He Doesn’t Make Products – Gets Instantly Rebuked
Chuck Wendig has been making a stir lately on Twitter. He recently went on a profanity laced rant where he doubled down his attack on his customers calling them “white supremacists.” He then threatened to sue some folks over a parody T-shirt. His most recent rant might be the most bizarre as he claims he doesn’t create products and the people who do buy his products aren’t customers.
Wendig describes the rant as his Ted Talk and tries to explain that as a writer he does not create products and he doesn’t have customers.
Writers are not your dancing monkeys. We do not create products. You are not our customers.
Welcome to my TED Talk.
— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) June 20, 2018
I say this because I am now harangued on the daily by folks who want me to conform to some preconceived notion or predetermined activity based on my role and their relationship to me in that role.
Meaning, they want me to dance, monkey, dance.
— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) June 20, 2018
No, Mr. Wendig that isn’t what people want from you. The point is you cannot blindly trash fans and customers and expect them not to push back. That’s not how a market works. Companies cannot take a swipe at their consumers and expect them to continue purchasing their products.
He continues in his tirade pointing out he wasn’t able to answer a question by a fan. Again that isn’t what people are talking about. No expects Chuck Wendig to answer every single question he’s asked about Star Wars.
This comes in a lotta forms. It comes here on Twitter — yesterday I failed to answer’s someone’s question about something and they tweeted at me again, “You didn’t answer my question,” and it’s like, no I didn’t. I can’t reply to everything. Twitter is a fast river; I miss shit.
— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) June 20, 2018
I mean, JFC, if you’re Pat Rothfuss or GRRM or anybody writing a legacy series, you can’t tweet, “Had breakfast with a friend!” without a hundred Rando Calrissians swanning up and demanding you CEASE FRIVOLITY AND WRITE THAT BOOK, TYPEWRITER CHIMP
— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) June 20, 2018
It took a few tweets, but I believe this was the original intent behind this tweet-fest by Wendig:
Then you get those Very Special Friends, the ones who don’t want you to say anything *gasp* untoward. Vulgarity with which they disagree with. Or worse, shudder, POLITICAL OPINIONS.
— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) June 20, 2018
(Spoiler: wanting authors and books to be apolitical is itself a political opinion, and actually means you want them instead to espouse political opinions that align so neatly with yours that you’re a fish who doesn’t realize he’s swimming in water or that water is even a thing.)
— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) June 20, 2018
No, what movements like #comicsgate and what now looks to be #StarWarsGate are saying is that you cannot insert your political agendas into products from a beloved IP such as Star Wars. Or go after Star Wars fans by labeling them as racists.
No one is saying you can’t express your political opinions or that they have to neatly align with anyone’s. They just don’t want those personal political opinions taking over the IP you have been entrusted with. And if you are going to express political opinions using the brand, you aren’t free from the consequences of those ideas. People can and will challenge you.
Writers and artists are not really in the customer service business. We do not cater to your needs. That cannot be how this relationship works, because we don’t make widgets and dongles. We don’t make “products.”
— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) June 20, 2018
Products are a thing you judge by how well it does the thing that thing is supposed to do. If a coffee maker sprays scalding cat urine in your face, I think you have a pretty good case to complain; it has failed in its essential task.
— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) June 20, 2018
No one is expecting Chuck Wendig or any other “artist” to be a customer service expert. This isn’t a one-way relationship where you create, and us as the customer are then expected to buy. The creator, consumer relationship is a two-way street. People do expect some civility. You don’t get to label people you do not like with wild names and nasty accusations while writing for an IP you didn’t create.
From there Chuck attempts to use a coffee maker spraying cat pee as an analogy to why you have to “judge” services by tasks and what not. It doesn’t really make sense. But this is where the story takes a very interesting turn.
And I recognize here there is a little discomfort when it comes to things, like, say, GAMES, which are both creations of art but also products that are meant to “work” — but that balance is essential, as is our view of the art as subjective.
— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) June 20, 2018
The books I write are not meant to balance your table, or swat flies, or bludgeon mooses. They are containers for stories, and stories are themselves not things you can say WORK or DON’T WORK universally; it’s not plug-and-play, not a narrative with a clear objective.
— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) June 20, 2018
Except Wendig was given a license by Disney and Lucasfilm to create a Star Wars story that would then be sold to the rabid Star Wars fanbase. The book was specifically created to be sold to customers. Wendig might not see it like that, but that’s just the cold hard facts. He’s not getting to write under the Star Wars brand without the hope for a return on investment.
And while he’s technically right that stories “work or don’t work universally;” they can be panned by a gigantic audience as being terrible like Star Wars: The Last Jedi.
You are not my customer.
You are, I hope, my audience.
— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) June 20, 2018
No, we’re both. I, like any potential buyer of a product, am a consumer. I consume what you create. If what you create is good, then I will recommend it others and they will also potentially consume it and then in turn while they are consuming said piece of entertainment they become an audience. These two ideas aren’t mutually exclusive.
Now, that doesn’t have to be true, and it’s okay if you’re not — it’s okay not to like things! It’s okay not to like me or my books or the things I like or the things I say. In fact, that’s expected of you to have a wild, untamed jungle of opinions.
— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) June 20, 2018
You are free to be my audience at any time, and free to get off the ride at any time.
— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) June 20, 2018
His last point is actually a very fair one.
Wendig was instantly rebuked by Aaron Sparrow, writer of Darkwing Duck and Warcraft: Family Values in his own “Ted Talk.”
Writers are not your dancing monkeys. However, we do create products that we then ask you to purchase with your hard-earned money. You are indeed our customers. Anyone who tells you different has an over-inflated sense of their own importance.
Welcome to my TED Talk.
— Aaron Sparrow (@Aaron_Sparrow) June 21, 2018
If you’re working on IP you don’t own, you have a responsibility to the IP holder to deliver, to the best of your ability, the most profitable, crowd-pleasing product (Yes. PRODUCT.) that you can. Because that IP holder didn’t hire you to lose them money.
— Aaron Sparrow (@Aaron_Sparrow) June 21, 2018
This is a very good point that Aaron has, that many “artists” fail to grasp. There is a responsibility when you take over an IP that you didn’t create. That responsibility is more important to the end product than any agenda you want to squeeze in.
Aaron makes an excellent point about demands, expectations, and just business.
Does that means that you have to pander to every voice that demands you recognize their idea of what the property or characters should be? Of course not, that’s impossible. But using someone else’s IP to tell fans why the IP they love is stupid is bad business.
— Aaron Sparrow (@Aaron_Sparrow) June 21, 2018
The fact is the vast majority of fans aren’t these demanding people. What they are, are normal people who should be respected, even if they don’t share your political opinion. Chuck doesn’t have a monopoly on who is allowed to read Star Wars books.
Now here is the reality of the world that Aaron lays down:
On top of all of that, I have a responsibility to my TEAM to deliver a solid, crowd-pleasing product. Because my team has bills to pay, and their long-term ability to do that depends entirely on you, the customer, continuing to enjoy and pay for that product.
— Aaron Sparrow (@Aaron_Sparrow) June 21, 2018
Just because you create a product doesn’t make you a “writing monkey,” but at the same time, you do owe some respect to the people you hope to buy your product. At the end of the day, if being a “Big A” artist is more important, then no one is stopping you.
If you want to be an ARTEEST, beholden to no one in some sort of post-commerce wonderland, you can certainly do that. Create your own original property and go it alone, or with people who share your philosophy.
— Aaron Sparrow (@Aaron_Sparrow) June 21, 2018
But don’t stand on the shoulders of IP you didn’t create and abdicate all responsibility to the legacy, the characters, the fan base, and the company that’s paying you because you think being a content creator puts you in some sort of rarified air.
— Aaron Sparrow (@Aaron_Sparrow) June 21, 2018
Right here, by taking on the IP you’ve also inherited the fans. Most are great human beings from all walks of life. Just because you write for the IP doesn’t take away from the responsibility you took on as the writer.
Former Vanilla World of Warcraft team leader Mark Kern also echoed Aaron’s sediments about art and the arts. As it relates to selling a product.
If you are making Art (capital A) then ignore this thread, but don’t expect to make money or have your work universally loved.
But commercial art is there to please and entertain for profit, not to make a political point for your personal morals.
Don’t blame customers. https://t.co/ePIaDQU2Av
— Mark Kern (@Grummz) June 23, 2018
Kern lays it out pretty clear, Chuck Wendig’s job as a Star Wars author is to entertain. It’s not to call fans “racists” and “white supremacists.”
Chuck Wendig pretty much got it all wrong in his epic rant and he got called out on it by his peers. If you want to be commercially viable you are then privy to the forces of the markets, thus you have customers and create products.
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