My stories take place in the South.
I try very hard not to be overtly political in my stories. I just had somebody take the time to post a five hundred word comment on how horrible that American South is.
I'm not taking time to respond, because it is my experience that there is no response warranted, nor would one change any minds or hearts.
Sometimes I am amazed at people who will go through the efforts to try to shit on somebody's day.
Nope. It'll eventually roll off the bottom of the list anyway.
It's just sad that there are people who seem to live to pee in communal sandbox.
Oh, that's the fun part. His rant is a comment to my story Lena.
I won't do him the favor of publishing it.
Email me at oyster1950@gmail.com and I'll past the thing in its entirety.
I try very hard not to be overtly political in my stories. I just had somebody take the time to post a five hundred word comment on how horrible that American South is.
Very often, if you simply acknowledge a problem, readers will give you more leeway.
I'd start off the story (in the first few chapters at least, where some smart aleck in a bar mouths off to the character, and show that the character isn't just a southern cracker. By recognizing that you're aware of the problem, readers will give you the time to show the character is deeper than their preconceptions. If the character simply walks away from the redneck in the bar, muttering to his friends "Those are the guys who give us such a bad name", you may circumvent many of those complaints.
However, if the characters act like rednecks, then you're only playing into the stereotypes yourself. The key is (eventually) revealing the character to be multidimentional.
