[Hemingway's Ghost]

People write novels everyday and don't put homosexual incestuous pediphilia in them. It takes a sick twisted freak to THINK of stuff like that, let alone put it in writing.

Choose one: Because Webb wrote this passage, he's (a) a homosexual incestuous pedophile, or (b) an artist trying to make a dramatic point.

[Captain Jack Aubrey]

"or (b) an artist trying to make a dramatic point."

Or he is trying to make a buck. It seems to me that if you are trying to profit from this kind of writing or the gratuitous use of the N-word, that makes it WORSE.

[BadAndy]

"Choose one: Because Webb wrote this passage, he's (a) a homosexual incestuous pedophile, or (b) an artist trying to make a dramatic point."

Here is one of the passages, "The man grabbed his young son in his arms, turned him upside down, and put the boy’s penis in his mouth." Please tell me what POINT the author was trying to make?
I don't know if he is a homosexual pedophile, but I doubt those kinds of thoughts occur to normal well-adjusted people.

[zook]

or (c) he's trying to make a dramatic point in a gratuitously vulger and offensive fashion. (And note the absense of the phrase "an artist.")

Webb's problem -- and I think it's a significant one -- will be that although people may accept the idea of a novelist senator, they most likely will reject one who traffics in this kind of borderline obscenity. I mean, come on--"The Tin Drum" handled this with more class!

[AmishDude]

This puts me in mind of the case of Mark Fuhrman.

[Polybius]

People write novels everyday and don't put homosexual incestuous pediphilia in them. It takes a sick twisted freak to THINK of stuff like that, let alone put it in writing.

Choose one: Because Webb wrote this passage, he's (a) a homosexual incestuous pedophile, or (b) an artist trying to make a dramatic point.

or (c) retelling an actual event he saw in Southeast Asia during his tour of duty during the Vietnam War.

– Lost Soldiers: “A shirtless man walked toward them along a mud pathway. His muscles were young and hard, but his face was devastated with wrinkles. His eyes were so red that they appeared to be burned by fire. A naked boy ran happily toward him from a little plot of dirt. The man grabbed his young son in his arms, turned him upside down, and put the boy’s penis in his mouth.” ......... Bantam Books, NY, 1st Edition, 2001, (hard cover), page 333. Quote is from para. 10,.Chap. 34.

When you are in the service, you see really strange stuff in Third World countries and even in First World countries.

When I was stationed in Naples, Italy, U.S. Navy sailors were warned about Italian transvestite prostitutes. It was a real problem since a drunken sailor would pick up a good looking prostitute, get a blow job, find out that he was living the lyrics of the song "Lola" in real life, beat the crap out of the transvestite and then end up in an Italian jail charged with assault and battery and his Chief and Divison Officer would then have to try to get him released to Navy authorities.

Now, if I were to write a novel about such a duty station and later ran for office....