Every Writer's Worst YouTube Nightmare?

AnneMarble · Aug 31, 2008

I found this on a blog, and it's ridiculous and embarrassing. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2ufDRA5OU0&eurl=http://christineolinger.blogspot\
.com/

Romance author Megan Gray's son decided to make a YouTube video reading the dirty parts from some of his mother's Highland romance books. Why? I don't know. And he sneers at the whole thing chortles during some of the passages. It's weird -- he seems old enough to know better. Certainly old enough to be able to read a love scene without laughing. Too bad he also seems too old to be spanked by his mother.

I found it on this blog (warning, it has an annoying thing that plays with
your cursor):
http://christineolinger.blogspot.com/2008/08/humiliation-in-age-of-information.html
I love this quote from the blog... "Personally I would disinherit the little shit."

So what would you do if a close relative started sneeringly reading passages from your books and posting them on YouTube? Is there any way to react? If someone thinks it's OK to do that to you, how can you tell them they're being a total ass-hat without coming across as defensive? Could you ever tell them how hurtful it is and make them understand what they've done?

Ol' Fashioned Girl · Aug 31, 2008

In the mother/son instance, I'd disinherit his happy ass and let him watch all the money I'd made from those novels he's dissing go to the RWA.

Bubastes · Aug 31, 2008

AnneMarble said:
"Personally I would disinherit the little shit."

I couldn't have said it better myself.

CheshireCat · Aug 31, 2008

I don't think this is going to be a big problem for most writers.

If it were me, I'd ignore in public -- and disown the little shit in private.

Honestly, with so much porn available on the internet, the entertainment value of some immature moron reading "the dirty bits" of a book on video has to be low.

RLB · Aug 31, 2008

Wow. Did he say that she, as in his mother, had marked the sensual parts for him? I couldn't figure it out since someone had and he claimed never to have read the books.

But we can hope it will fulfill the old maxim, no publicity is bad publicity...

Marian Perera · Aug 31, 2008

So what would you do if a close relative started sneeringly reading passages from your books and posting them on YouTube?

I'd mostly be surprised that they were able to read it.

Beach Bunny · Aug 31, 2008

The kid doesn't sound like the brightest bulb on the Christmas tree. I think he could use some remedial reading classes.

If my son did this to me, the only thing that would keep me from killing him is that I don't want to go to prison. Then again, a jury of my peers (other moms who are writers) would not convict me. I'm sure they would see it as justifiable homicide.

BenPanced · Aug 31, 2008

I wonder if she can get the little putz on copyright infringement...

rugcat · Aug 31, 2008

Perhaps he has some other issues with her.

AnneMarble · Aug 31, 2008

Ol' Fashioned Girl said:
In the mother/son instance, I'd disinherit his happy ass and let him watch all the money I'd made from those novels he's dissing go to the RWA.

That would be poetic justice.

I don't know how much she made or how many books she published, but surely that money put food on his table or clothes on his back.

CheshireCat said:
I don't think this is going to be a big problem for most writers.

If it were me, I'd ignore in public -- and disown the little shit in private.

Honestly, with so much porn available on the internet, the entertainment value of some immature moron reading "the dirty bits" of a book on video has to be low.

Well there may be value in watching him make such an ass of himself.

Really, he reminds me of teen-aged boys I've seen snickering at romance novel covers in the stores. That's a pretty low level on the humor scale, somewhere between fart jokes and toilet jokes.
:e2tongue:

RLB said:
Wow. Did he say that she, as in his mother, had marked the sensual parts for him? I couldn't figure it out since someone had and he claimed never to have read the books.

But we can hope it will fulfill the old maxim, no publicity is bad publicity...

He might have flipped through looking for the love scenes just so that he could read them on his video. (Yes, this was premeditated!

) And am I the only one who was creeped out when he started reading love scenes written by his mother? Eww!

Marian Perera · Aug 31, 2008

Maybe a sequel will show the son cringing as he looks up from a sheaf of pages.

Son : Mom, do I--
Mom : Yes.
Son : But... but it's...
Mom : An M/M love scene. Problem?
Son : You're going to put this up on YouTube? My friends will watch it and think I'm gay!
Mom : They don't have to watch it. They're both here.

JeanneTGC · Aug 31, 2008

I like QoS's suggestion. And name the character for your loving son, and make sure the character looks like said loving son, too, down to birthmarks. I mean, in this case, TELL. LOL

In reality, I'd get him where he lives. She's a parent. I'm SURE she's got pics of him as a baby in the bath with his tiny weiner in view somewhere. Post it on his Facebook wall and say, "Girls and boys, it's still the same size NOW!"

And, yeah, were my kid stupid enough to do something like this, she'd find some horribly embarrassing stuff posted. Because total teenaged humiliation IS the best revenge. (I'm evil that way, what can I say?

) However, I credit my daughter with more sense. She's fully aware that I can still leave all the money to my cats.

Shadow_Ferret · Aug 31, 2008

I just love disfunctional families airing their problems in public.

TrickyFiction · Sep 1, 2008

RLB said:
Wow. Did he say that she, as in his mother, had marked the sensual parts for him?

I heard that too. I got the impression she knows about this and maybe even instigated it. Maybe she's laughing at it all. He didn't seem cruel to me, just uncomfortable. But I don't know the whole story. He did kind of brag about her by saying one of the novels was the first she had ever written and finished the video saying, "That's pretty amazing." I wanna give him the benefit of the doubt.

NeuroFizz · Sep 1, 2008

I hope I never get to the point where:

1) I can't laugh at the person I see in the mirror every day
2) I take my writing (or anything else I do) too seriously
3) I can't take some good natured ribbing from my family members
4) I can't forgive my offspring if they don't appreciate my endeavors, even if they express their opinions in public

As far as I can remember, it has always been in the teenage (and beyond) way-of-the-world to dis one's parents--what they do, what they stand for, etc. This doesn't make a family dysfunctional, it frequently places them pretty close to the peak of the bell curve.

alleycat · Sep 1, 2008

She should make her own YT video . . . about her son. She could show his baby pictures ("What a sweet little butt he had, see.") and show him wearing his favorite jammies (the ones with the little ducks on them), and tell all sorts of stories about all the cute things he's done and said.

tehuti88 · Sep 1, 2008

BenPanced said:
I wonder if she can get the little putz on copyright infringement...

That's what I was wondering.

veinglory · Sep 1, 2008

I have to say I am with neuro, what does it matter, really?

newbiewriter · Sep 1, 2008

I tend to agree. Lashing out at your own child is less than classy. Ignoring it all together seems to be the best choice, especially when he's probably hoping for some sort of reaction from her.

alleycat · Sep 1, 2008

Besides . . . what better publicity?

Shamisen · Sep 1, 2008

If it were my kid - well, it's what kids do isn't it. If she hadn't been a novellst he would have found something else to mock. I'm sure he'll grow out of it and I doubt it will harm her career. But that doesn't make it any less hurtful.

If a family member openly sneered at my book and humiliated me? Well, I'd be making them into an odious character pretty damn quickly. And they shouldn't be expecting any Christmas presents any time soon. Hell, why should we rise above it. Involving ourselves in petty family feuds is so much more damaging!

TrickyFiction · Sep 1, 2008

Seriously though, the author marked the steamier passages for her son to read. And he said he was going to read those because they made him "the most uncomfortable." I really don't think this was vindictive. Doesn't anyone else think it might have been a lark on the part of the author? Maybe she thought it would be funny to watch her son squirm while reading her sex scenes aloud. Maybe she dared him to do it.

newbiewriter · Sep 1, 2008

If so, that's rather disturbing. I don't like for my children to read what I've written, because although there's not any sex or a whole lot of violence (yet), it's written for adults, not children.

Being that he's a teenager, he's probably found worse things to read on the internet, but there's a whole new level of wrongness introduced when it's something your mother has written.

Pagey's_Girl · Sep 1, 2008

That's when those nekkid-butt baby pics come in handy - revenge, anyone?

(Okay, yeah, I'm evil. And I don't have kids....)

Mr. Anonymous · Sep 1, 2008

Obviously, it's all the mothers fault. Everyone knows that everything that's wrong with the kid is a byproduct of his upbringing. Sheesh guys. Come on.

I am, btw, half serious and half joking. Honestly, there has to be something very wrong in the mother-son relationship for even a not-so-bring kid to do something like that.

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