Best selling author Sarah Dessen sends twitter followers after a college student for not liking her books

[JonesiiiFromtheMoon]

Did a quick search and didn't see a thread about this.
YA author Sarah Dessen was upset by an innocuous comment made by a college student in 2016.
She marked out the name but her followers know how to use google so they quickly found it anyway.
One of the replies (which has since been deleted) to the tweet read "Fuck that bitch" to which Sarah replied "I Love you *kissie face*".

Spoiler: Twitter Text

Authors are real people. We put our heart and soul into the stories we write often because it is literally how we survive in this world. I'm having a really hard time right now and this is just mean and cruel. I hope it made you feel good.

What she failed to mention was the book they chose over hers was "Just Mercy", a story about racism in the criminal justice system.

A friend of the woman who was quoted posted this


White fragility at its finest. Shit like this really gets on my nerves so it's hard for me to write a well thought out response to this.
Thoughts?

Edit: apologies for adding my feeling of the situation in a way that created a racial lense to this already messed up event. I have a way of not thinking things through before i post and this is definitely one of those times. I hope we can re examine the situation and discuss it for what it is. Once again I apologize. Thanks for your replies!

 

[Ding Dong Daddy]

Having the name in the second tweet sort of defeats the purpose of censoring it in the first.

 

[Excuse me]

This was all kinds of stupid. How the fuck does adult has such fit for college kid bad mouthing her book.

I mean, sure there is problem/bias how and what universities pick for common reads, but not in this case. Also, it was sad to see other famous authors pile on the student.

 

[CrazyAndy]

That comment doesn't sound so innocuous. Though, she doesn't deserve all these responses obviously.

 

[tekomandor]

I mean, being upset about the pictured comments is understandable but this is way out of proportion.

 

[NoName999]

White women and their strategic tears.

 

[Slayven]

The privilege

 

[rsfour]

Sarah Dessen sounds like she should fuck right off.

 

[wandering]

Her books sound like they're aimed at teens, so I don't know why people would be so fussed about someone not wanting them in a college curriculum.

 

[Excuse me]

That comment doesn't sound so innocuous. Though, she doesn't deserve all these responses obviously.

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End of the day it was comment made by a college student. Criticism, maybe not constructive criticism but criticism. We also don't know if her vote was the swing vote that got the authors book barred, so maybe she wouldn't have made the cut even without the campaign of Brooke Nelson.

I get authors can make mistakes as well, this one was fairly big, considering her following. She should just apologize and be done with it.

 

[Deleted member 543]

If you're a best selling author you shouldn't give a shit what a college student says about you. The difference in position is astonomical.

It's probably for the best it wasn't picked for common read, because it would have led to a lot more kids making critical judgements on her work, and many of them wouldn't be positive.

 

[TeddyShardik]

"Oh no! i'm feeling bad, now that someone citicized my work! Must be haters, trying to get me down!"

This is inexcusable.
You don't abuse your platform like that if you're a decent human being.

 

[Doomguy Fieri]

Clap and get clapped back.

 

[Jade1962]

So many white women in that thread supporting her. And comforting her about the fact someone didn't want to read her book the horror. Pretty much why I have no hope of things ever changing dramatically.

 

[Lord Fagan]

Be careful who you kick on the way up. You might meet them again on your way down.

 

[Rosenkrantz]

Well, the student's comment did come off as an arrogant assholery, even if they had some merit about YA literature being in the college curriculum, but the response from the writer is even more assholish and way more aggressive than it should be.

 

[Vyrak]

Are we really at the point now where just responding to someone being a complete asshole makes you the "real" asshole...?

 

[Westbahnhof]

Are we really at the point now where just responding to someone being a complete asshole makes you the "real" asshole...?

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No we aren't.
You think a person with over 250.000 followers posting something like this is "just responding"? I hope you just didn't think that through, because you'd have to be a pretty terrible person to be this obtuse on purpose.

 

[Excuse me]

Are we really at the point now where just responding to someone being a complete asshole makes you the "real" asshole...?

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I think the problem here is that famous author going after studend means that all the fans are also going after the student. Death threats and the usual twitter vitriol. It might be ok to respond but gotta carry the aftermath as well.

 

[Glasgow Mega-Snake]

Weird reaction. Of course as an author you want your book to be read and I get being disappointed about the comment, the "getting involved just to stop Sarah Dessen being selected" is a bit mean.

But... she's writing YA books and I don't know how she expected the book should be on a college curriculum

The university's reaction btw:

 

[moblin]

That first tweet (the one in the OP) from the author doesn't really sound like a particularly aggressive one or make it seem like she's siccing her fans on the young woman, but if she was liking/commenting on nastier tweets that's definitely an issue. People with lots of followers on social media certainly have some unwritten responsibilities but that particular tweet expressing how hurt she is doesn't really come off as bad.

 

[Vyrak]

No we aren't.
You think a person with over 250.000 followers posting something like this is "just responding"? I hope you just didn't think that through, because you'd have to be a pretty terrible person to be this obtuse on purpose.

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If this makes me a terrible person, I'm more than happy to be terrible. I couldn't care less how many fucking followers either party has, calling out shitty people should be the standard in society.

 

[wandering]

If this makes me a terrible person, I'm more than happy to be terrible. I couldn't care less how many fucking followers either party has, calling out shitty people should be the standard in society.

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How is it shitty to stop a YA novel from being selected for college level reading curriculum?

 

[Westbahnhof]

If this makes me a terrible person, I'm more than happy to be terrible. I couldn't care less how many fucking followers either party has, calling out shitty people should be the standard in society.

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Oh, so you were being obtuse on purpose, pretending not to notice that this isn't "just responding"? Then yeah. You suck. Good thing you're in favour of calling out shitty people.
Where does this policy stop? Can everyone just call out their critics publicly, in a way that makes finding their name easy?

How is it shitty to stop a YA novel being selected for college level reading curriculum?

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You don't understand, we gotta name&shame people who don't behave correctly, maybe the harrassment will teach them a lesson /s

 

[Verelios]

Are we really at the point now where just responding to someone being a complete asshole makes you the "real" asshole...?

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How is the college student an asshole in that quote? At most it's harsh crticism. Are we really at the point where white fragility is this prevalent?

 

[Vyrak]

How is it shitty to stop a YA novel being selected for college level reading curriculum?

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Well it is shitty to be disingenuous as fuck like this.

 

[Vyrak]

Oh, so you were being obtuse on purpose, pretending not to notice that this isn't "just responding"? Then yeah. You suck. Good thing you're in favour of calling out shitty people.
Where does this policy stop? Can everyone just call out their critics publicly, in a way that makes finding their name easy?

Click to shrink...

More disingenuous silliness. This wasn't a critic giving a critique, it was someone being shitty.

 

[Westbahnhof]

Well it is shitty to be disingenuous as fuck like this.

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Show your work, what's disingenous about it?

More disingenuous silliness. This wasn't a critic giving a critique, it was someone being shitty.

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Define shitty. My god, do you really not see how subjective all this is? Naming&shaming in cases like this is just punching down.

 

[petitmelon]

YA Twitter is both fantastic and the worst thing on Earth. Last year Toni Adeyemi sent her fandom mob after Nora Roberts because of a similar title. In case the name is unfamiliar, Roberts is a highly successful and prolific romance author, basically she sent her fandom after the Stephen King of romance because the titles were similar. lolol I can't sometimes with it. I think the only thing that's worse is that it's common industry knowledge that the majority of YA readers are adult ladies which means that drama comes from people old enough to know better. I'm not surprised an author sent a mob after a critic, that is totally in line with YA Twitter drama.

 

[SolicitorPirate]

That twitter thread is like the most white woman thing I've ever seen

 

[krazen]

Weird reaction. Of course as an author you want your book to be read and I get being disappointed about the comment, the "getting involved just to stop Sarah Dessen being selected" is a bit mean.

But... she's writing YA books and I don't know how she expected the book should be on a college curriculum

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There's been a vocal corner of authors claiming that treating YA universally as pulp and genre fiction is wrong (and i agree with it, there's a similarity there with scorcese's comic movie comments, its not the mediums fault there's hacks, there's hacks in proper lit and indie movies also)...there's even some debate that it might be sexist since many of the successful authors are female and the books tend to have important female protagonists.

THAT SAID.

I agree 100% it shouldnt have made it on a college list and while it looks harsh the kid was about keeping a certain level of quality writing (which YA books also rightfully get criticized for at times) so for her to take it so personally and relish in the blowback she's getting fuck her. Imagine being an author who's successful but getting a hard on for a kids comment that wouldda sold a handful more books, what a piece of shit

 

[Excuse me]

How is it shitty to stop a YA novel from being selected for college level reading curriculum?

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I guess it was bit mean spirited to participate in the selection commitee just to bar one book, you personally didn't like. Especially when other shitty books passed (Ready player one) and other YA novels were also selected before.

But again, we have no idea if she was the swing vote that dropped her book. Nor does it even matter, if she felt so strongly about the book, she had every right to fight against it for being selected.

 

[Vyrak]

How is the college student an asshole in that quote? At most it's harsh crticism. Are we really at the point where white fragility is this prevalent?

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"So I became involved just so I could stop them from ever choosing Sarah Dessen"

Please explain to me the criticism someone is supposed to take away from this?

 

[Westbahnhof]

"So I became involved just so I could stop them from ever choosing Sarah Dessen"

Please explain to me the criticism someone is supposed to take away from this?

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That's clearly hyperbole.
It's all really clear in my opinion. Here's the criticism: "The book is not good enough to be a Common Read book".
The woman in question wanted to prevent a book she saw as "not good enough" from taking up a spot a better book could use. That's not "shitty behaviour", even though the hyperbolic quote is kinda shitty.

 

[Vyrak]

Show your work, what's disingenous about it?

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Because this isn't all that happened and you framing it that way is being obtuse, as you would call it.

 

[Voytek]

Shrug. I get why she would be upset. But anytime you put something out there there will be always people who dislike or even hate it. Gotta accept that and just let it go. Calling people out for it almost never goes well.

 

[Vyrak]

That's clearly hyperbole.
It's all really clear in my opinion. Here's the criticism: "The book is not good enough to be a Common Read book".
The woman in question wanted to prevent a book she saw as "not good enough" from taking up a spot a better book could use. That's not "shitty behaviour", even though the hyperbolic quote is kinda shitty.

Click to shrink...

Oh, well the author is just being hyperbolic too. Let's play this stupid internet game, it is my favorite. Where the things we say mean nothing unless the person is not on "my" side.

 

[Nepenthe]

Imagine being a successful author and caring how college students curate your work.

Yes, this is white fragility at work.

 

[Jade1962]

Because this isn't all that happened and you framing it that way is being obtuse, as you would call it.

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She was fighting for a different book. There is a reason why Sarah cropped the image. One thing that lives on from Gaf here is the need to white knight for every white woman no matter what they do.

 

[Westbahnhof]

Oh, well the author is just being hyperbolic too. Let's play this stupid internet game, it is my favorite. Where the things we say mean nothing unless the person is not on "my" side.

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What's hyperbolic about making the name available for 250k followers? You're not making sense.
The student clearly had a reason: She wanted a different book. Why do you keep ignoring that?

 

[Vyrak]

She was fighting for a different book. There is a reason why Sarah cropped the image. One thing that lives on from Gaf here is the need to white knight for every white woman no matter what they do.

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Imagine thinking this is relevant. How do I stop people from ever reading anything you post again. I just prefer other posters.

Yep, the latter half is definitely what the author took issue with.

What's hyperbolic about making the name available for 250k followers? You're not making sense.
The student clearly had a reason: She wanted a different book. Why do you keep ignoring that?

Click to shrink...

Because it is completely irrelevant. If I say you are a human piece of shit and that I prefer another person. Do you really think me preferring another person is the problem?

 

[Rosenkrantz]

What's hyperbolic about making the name available for 250k followers? You're not making sense.

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To be fair, the author herself blacked out the name. Someone linked to the article in a Twitter chain.

 

[Deleted member 41638]

Social media is fantastic but at the same time shit like this makes me hate it at the same time.

I get that Dessen would be pissed someone got involved in an organization simply to stop her books from being read in it but she should know (or hopefully knows now) that the internet is very good at finding people so even trying to be coy with a name isn't going to save them from the internet mob.

I'm missing the racism angle here though. Are there white people that did the same thing to Dessen and she didn't retaliate until it was this particular college student?

 

[krazen]

Social media is fantastic but at the same time shit like this makes me hate it at the same time.

I get that Dessen would be pissed someone got involved in an organization simply to stop her books from being read in it but she should know (or hopefully knows now) that the internet is very good at finding people so even trying to be coy with a name isn't going to save them from the internet mob.

I'm missing the racism angle here though. Are there white people that did the same thing to Dessen and she didn't retaliate until it was this particular college student?

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not intentional, but apparently one of the motivating factors of the student was to make sure a minority book had a chance of getting her slot

 

[Deleted member 27246]

She shouldn't be so upset that a student was mean about her work, but your title looks like click bait. She doesn't ' send her followers' after the student and I am also not sure what race has to do with this?

 

[manchego obfuscator]

The worst of it isn't even in the OP. anyway, classic white feminism

 

[Spring-Loaded]

To be fair, the author herself blacked out the name. Someone linked to the article in a Twitter chain.

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Redacting the name is like that moment from The Simpson's where Sideshow Bob announces the people he won't kill while driving past the Simpson and Flanders households and leaves out Bart

Author is pathetic, full stop.

EDIT: Their followers are trash as well

 

[Rosenkrantz]

She shouldn't be so upset that a student was mean about her work, but your title looks like click bait. She doesn't ' send her followers' after the student and I am also not sure what race has to do with this?

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Well, the author responded to message that was among the lines of "fuck that dumb bitch" with "I love you", so, she definitely wanted some strong reaction from her fans, even if it wasn't in the tweet itself.

Overall, it looks like a competition for an honor of being a bigger twat, and Dessen have too many tools at her disposal to lose it.

 

[Aomame]

Which Sarah Dessen novel was up for common read consideration? I've only read a few, but they seem to lack... Teeth, I guess, especially compared to other authors in the YA space who are doing some really transformative work (Angie Thomas, Elizabeth Acevedo, etc.).

 

[Nepenthe]

Imagine being a successful published author and caring that one set of college students don't want to curate and read your work.

Imagine thinking that racial power dynamics are never in play when white people assert authority over non-white people in a manner whereby white people's pain to criticism from non-white people in a lower position of power becomes the central focal point of any conversation.

Imagine thinking this author's emotional fragility is worth defending.

Wait....