A Comic Book Writer Talks SOPA/PIPA

Originally posted 1/18/12 on my Tumblr.

This morning, Facebook pissed me off. A bunch of my friends were equatingcaring about SOPA to not caring a real problems such as AIDS, starvation, cancer, etc. I posted some snarky statuses to get across the point that being vocal about the dangers of Internet censorship doesn’t equate to being a heartless monster, but I was silly about it. EricaCV pointed out, though, that I may be better off using my “writerly influence to spread further knowledge and understanding about the situation.” She’s right - on Facebook I went for the lulz, and that was a bit of a mistake… because I think one of the fundamental misunderstandings about SOPA/PIPA and those of us who are against it is that we are merely scared of losing the Internet as a source of mindless entertainment.

It’s a hell of a lot worse than that.

Now, here’s where I stand. Piracy isn’t a shiny beacon of awesome, and I’m not for it. Obviously. I work as a writer in the comics industry, and it’s one of the most grating things to see how often our (incredibly cheap) books get pirated. Hell, take this for example. A few weeks ago, my latest comic (Grimm Fairy Tales: Holiday Edition 2011) came out, and I searched it in Google. (Yes, I self-Googled, I’m weak.) The first result wasn’t a fan’s reaction. It wasn’t a review. It was a site that offered an illegal download of the book that had literally only been out for a few hours. Bummer, right?

But.

I started thinking. I used to run a review site. On that site, I would talk about all things Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel. I would review the comics, I would post pictures of stuff that was coming out, and I would make stupid little parody images on Paint. I used Google images to pepper the site with covers from the comics to make the site prettier. That site is how I got noticed. By making friends with some of the people who worked on the Angel comic and showing that I cared about the character and that I could write, I put my foot in the door. I later wrote a story for that comic, and have since been building a career in the comics industry. The seeds for all of my current success grew from that blog… which would have been shut the fuck down in an Internet governed by SOPA/PIPA.

So would this Tumblr. Likely, so would your Tumblr. So would countless other sites that have provided entertainment, offered education, and decreased World Suck. Yes, it’s true that the pirates would get shut down, but I say this as a man trying to make it in an incredibly rough industry… it is absolutely not worth it.

For more information (and I can surely say more articulation) you can check out what Neil Gaiman, Patrick Rothfuss, Steve Niles, and many other great writers are saying all over the Internet. Look around, and see if you agree with them. It’s your prerogative. Your freedom. My point is this: without a free Internet, I wouldn’t have published a thing. And I’d wager that I would be a hell of a lot less informed about the world as a whole than I am now.

The world is at your fingertips. Don’t let them snatch it away from you.

-Patrick Shand

Mohonk Mountain House

I'm trying to write every day. That's what good writers do, right? I have a bunch of deadlines coming up, all of which I'm sure I'll make with time to spare. Getting shit done when it needs to be done has never been an issue for me. It's the day-to-day, honing my craft stuff that I need to stay on my feet to keep up with.

Right now, I'm on vacation with a beautiful girl who I am very in love with. She just laughed at a book that she's reading. I hear the birds through the door to our room, and I almost want to take her hand and go outside again. I say almost because we climbed a mountain, walked forever, and rowed a canoe today. Well, she did the rowing while I sat in what the man on the dock referred to as "the princess seat." She's badass, what can I say? My body is tired, but my mind and heart are filled to the brim with the loveliness of this place and the company with which I'm spending my time here.

From the last time we visited Mohonk together... Nov. 2010

I have a lot going on outside of this gorgeous get-away, but I think I'm going to let that all rest tonight. I'm here with my favorite person in the world. Everything else can wait.

The Romantic Gestures of Patrick Von Suave

Erica came home from France yesterday, and I wanted to be Mr. Suave and Romantic. I set a plan into motion.

1. She's been craving sunflowers for a while. "Craving" might be the wrong word, as she doesn't want to eat them (as far as I know), but she's been in a sunflower-getting mood recently. Everywhere I've been looking, however, has been completely out of sunflowers. I had some time before going to pick her up, though, so I called a bunch of places and finally found a spot that had these giant yellow buggers. So sunflowers, check.

2. I'd get to the airport super early with said sunflowers so that the first thing she'd see in the lobby waiting for her would be me and the bouquet. Then, we'd walk over to my closely parked car and drive off into the sunset (well, it would be an hour away from setting, but "drive off into the sun" evokes an entirely different image).

Turns out, her plane landed a lot earlier than we'd anticipated. Instead of parking and being the first thing she'd see, I decided to go to the pick-up area, where I'd wait until she got out. Clearly, I'm a "picking up girlfriend from airport" virgin because that doesn't fly. As soon as I pulled over, an enraged man came up to me and screamed, "WHERE YOU GO!?" and I said "Here" and he said "YOU PICK UP!?" and I said "I pick up" and he said "WHERE?" and I said "Here" and he said "CIRCLE AROUND!" and I looked sad. So, because Erica wasn't ready and this guy had something against little ginger men causing traffic jams, I had to circle around. But the airport is less circular and more labyrinthine, so my circling around led me back to the parkway going in a different direction. Mind you, Erica had to circle around when she drove there last week, and she managed to not get lost, but hey... I have the directional senses of a hunk of sharp cheddar.

So I finally made it back to the airport, figuring that Erica must be just about through with customs. I, however, didn't want to take any chances with the angry pick up area again, so I drove to the parking section. Upon seeing a line of cars parked directly across from the pick-up area, I rejoiced. This was clearly the section where people who were ready to leave parked! It was crowded, so I was thrilled to squeeze into a spot, pulling off a particularly sexy parallel park. Mr. Suave was back in business.

I saw a few people run out of the cars to greet their returning friends and family, so I did the same, flowers in hand. I called Erica, and she found me pretty quickly. I took a few of her bags, and presented her with the flowers... about the same time that I saw that all of the other cars that I'd parked behind had driven away, and that a tow truck had begun to lift my car. Much to Erica's confusion, I ran toward the truck, flowers in hand, pants slightly falling down, and began to haggle with the trucker who revealed that I was in a no parking zone. It was printed clearly on the area that all the other cars (that had sped away upon seeing the tow truck) were covering. Yay.

Erica took this flattering picture of me, the picture of romance, as I appealed to the truck driver.

Fifty-five dollars later, I found myself driving Erica home. She had her flowers, and I might have even had a so-small-you-can-just-about-see-it slice of my dignity. As I drove, I apologized profusely, and she told me that it didn't matter. "If we were suave," she said, "we wouldn't want to date each other."

So Erica is home, she's got some pretty and giant sunflowers, my car is no longer hooked up to the back of a car, and I'm dating the coolest girl in the world. I might not be Mr. Suave, but I think I've got it pretty damn good.