I Enjoy Art by Flawed People Because I Am a Flawed Person

Sometimes a work of art is good because its creator is problematic, not in spite of it.

Sometimes a work of art is good because its creator is problematic, not in spite of it.

Photo by Matt Artz on Unsplash

In recent months, musician and filmmaker Sia has come under fire for her offensive (and frankly dangerous) portrayal of Autistic people in her newly released film Music. As an Autistic adult, I agree with nearly every concern about the movie that disabled people have voiced. Music promotes the use of prone restraint, a technique used to control Autistic bodies that sometimes suffocates and kills us. It stars a non-disabled actor performing a garish caricature of disabled mannerisms. When developing the film, Sia consulted with Autism Speaks, an organization that routinely dehumanizes Autistic people and does not center us in their decision making.

All of this is unequivocally wrong. When Sia was confronted about these problems, she responded by making placating excuses, turning defensive, and even insulting the abilities of Autistic actors. All of that was wrong too.

I’m glad that Autistic self-advocates have spoken out about this film, and used its existence as an opportunity to educate neurotypical people. I’m heartened we’re in a cultural moment where such criticisms are taken seriously by mainstream media outlets. When I was growing up, an abled person pretending to have a disability was considered respectable Oscar bait. It’s wonderful that’s rapidly becoming passé.

What I’m less enthused about are the posts excoriating Sia as a person, and encouraging people to abandon her and her music entirely. Some advocates, motivated by outrage at injustice and a lifetime of pain, are glad that they’ve run Sia off Twitter . From their perspective, because Sia didn’t agree with us, take our critiques to heart, or apologize thoroughly enough, it’s better she not be heard from at all.

As an Autist and a flawed, forever-growing person, I just can’t bring myself to agree. Dismayed as I am by Sia’s film and rude, disparaging comments, I also have compassion for her, and it’s my hope that she can continue to learn more about disability justice. She decided to make this film for a reason. Her ignorance and condescension is palpable, but there must be some real curiosity or affection for us lurking underneath it, too.

In interviews, she has said the movie was informed by a close friendship she has with a Black Autistic person — unfortunately her attempt to honor that friendship on screen is not only ableist, but incredibly racist in its execution as well. The film’s leading actress has her skin darkened, and wears braids that evoke the fact her character was originally written to be Black. The only Black character who made it into the final movie is a Ghanaian man whose HIV-positive status is played as a big, shocking reveal.

I can believe that Sia truly was motivated to make this film because she loves a Black Autistic person and has a close relationship to him and his family. I believe also that there’s an arrogant self-importance underlying her impulse to tell a story that isn’t her own. I think her supposed love of marginalized people and her arrogance might not be easily separable. As a white person who’s neurodiverse, I can honestly say I’ve been on both sides of this equation. I’ve been the person who was infantilized and oversimplified by other people’s art, and I’ve been the egotistical wannabe-ally who thought their writing was profound and anti-racist when really, it wasn’t.

Sia’s work and decision-making deserves to be critiqued intensely; this movie is really bad, and it deserves to be panned. And I can’t blame anyone if this months-long saga has put a bad taste in their mouth when it comes to Sia as a public figure and musician. It’s reasonable for her actions to taint your opinion of her other work.

For me, I’m still holding out hope that she can learn and grow. I think it would be perilous for me, as a white writer, to see myself as qualitatively different from her, or morally superior in some way. I have always found it important to see deeply flawed and problematic people as individuals I can identity with, in order to explore and confront my own latent bigotries and defensiveness. I’m also acutely aware that Sia is a member of the neurodiverse community, with a serious neurological disability of her own. This does not excuse her bigotry or ignorance, but it does mean that I’m rooting for her to work on her baggage so that she can connect with us in a meaningful way, and recognize we have many struggles and goals in common.

I believe that accepting flawed people is an integral part of the fight for disability justice. If we are to create spaces that accommodate people with mental illnesses, intellectual disabilities, and difficulties with empathy, we must tolerate some amount of imperfection, and even fragility. Others may disagree about where to draw the line of no return, but from where I’m sitting, Sia hasn’t crossed it — not forever anyway.

We can’t dispose of every person who has screwed up and then dug their heels in before delivering a lukewarm apology. If we did that, we’d drive away almost every vulnerable member of the neurodiverse community. I understand why people have no sympathy for a wealthy and privileged celebrity whose made an ass of herself. I think their anger and irritation is absolutely fine to voice. But I don’t think the calls to never platform her or listen to her music ever again are motivated by the compassion that ought to drive our movement.

For me, Sia’s discography is not tainted retroactively by her bad actions. I enjoy her music because it reflects her full human complexity — including the personality flaws that led to the creation of this ignorant, treacly movie. I find her creative failures and successes informative, as a disabled, white creative who often screws up in my own work. And there are several other problematic artists that I relate to in this way — using their flaws as a mirror to examine my own shortcomings. I believe that sometimes, we can appreciate a work of art because its creator is imperfect, not in spite of it.

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Last week, I wrote an essay about being insecure and conflict averse. A lifetime of being harshly punished for social mistakes has made me wary of upsetting others, and made me into a desperate people-pleaser who stifles conflict . In the past I’ve also written about my deep respect for Narcissistic people who, like me, struggle to understand other peoples’ emotions and boundaries.

I have a disability that makes relating to people difficult, and I have done some manipulative, defensive shit in my day. I’ve downplayed mistakes, hidden bad behavior, and done virtuous-looking things for the sake of aggrandizing myself. I’m also capable of growth, vulnerability, and real love. When I look at Sia, I see many of the same qualities.

I’m not a die-hard Sia stan, but in the early 2010’s I enjoyed her work quite a bit. In those days, before her alcoholic-girl anthem “Chandelier” came out, Sia didn’t hide her face behind a giant wig. She wrote songs about codependency, attachment issues, and working like hell not to reproduce the family trauma that had wounded her. Her song “Oh Father” meant a lot to me, because it detailed Sia’s struggle to forgive an emotionally tormented, abusive dad who very much resembled my own. On albums like We Are Born and Some People Have Real Problems, Sia portrayed herself as a needy and wounded person who loved too much, and tried too hard to appear good.

I didn’t like Sia because she was perfect. I liked her because she was flawed, and connected with her art because it detailed those flaws bravely. I see those same flaws reflected clearly in her present actions.

Sia made a film about a misunderstood Autistic girl because she has tender feelings for the world’s misfits — and because she wanted to look like an abled savior. She turned prickly in the face of criticism because she’s insecure — and because she’s been insulated from consequences for a long time, thanks to her status and wealth. Sia chose non-Autistic Maddie Ziegler to play the movie’s titular role because the two women share a close bond— and because Sia believed Autistic people didn’t know how to act.

Sia has made some very ill-advised, damaging decisions that also make complete sense from where she is sitting as a rich, alienated person who knows very little about actual disability justice. I’ve watched Music and it’s a cringe-inducingly bad film, but its existence doesn’t undo the goodness of Sia’s early albums for me. If anything, it lends them a deeper meaning and context. If you continue on the praise-seeking path, this is what might happen. If you insist on seeing yourself forever as a good and giving person, this is how you might react to a slip-up.

I want to build public awareness of what being Autistic is like, and I want Autistic people to be able to write our own stories. I want people with even more maligned and misunderstood conditions like Borderline and Narcissistic Personality Disorder to feel welcome within our ranks. I want undiagnosed people who suspect they have a disability to join up with our cause, educate themselves, and fight for our collective liberation. In order to do that, I think we have to move past punishing individuals for making mistakes, particularly when those mistakes reflect much deeper societal issues. I want people with mental illness, trauma histories, and messy coping mechanisms to see ourselves reflected in art — including in art made by problematic people.

This is not a plea to separate the art from the artist. I’m suggesting that we look at the work of complicated people with a spirit of curiosity and grace, and learn to see a creator’s imperfections as part of what makes their creations good.

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A few years ago, I wrote an essay about being a former fan of author David Foster Wallace, in which I recounted some of his worst acts of abuse. David Foster Wallace abused and stalked women and preyed on his students. He was violent, misogynistic, destructive, and self-absorbed. He also wrote some of the most gripping and vulnerable stories about being a piece of shit man that I’ve ever read. Even though I decried Wallace in that essay, I have continued thinking back to his work, and the haunting self-awareness evidenced within it. For years I wanted to stop liking Wallace as an author. But I’ve found that I can’t.

I’m not a David-Foster Wallace-level abuser, but I’ve resented people in the ways he did. I’ve grappled with my inner prejudices without actually recovering from them in the ways he did. I think about myself a lot, write about myself a lot, fascinate myself with the machinations of my own brain. When I talk about being a bad person, and understanding bad people, I get told I’m empathic and compassionate. That is exactly what happened to Wallace. It’s confusing.

Like David Foster Wallace, one of my more positive and inspiring pieces of writing has come to define me as a public figure, and I feel some dissonance about that. I’m not sure I’m really the gentle, patient person who wrote Laziness Does Not Exist any more than Wallace was the reflective, warm soul who penned This Is Water. I don’t know if the real me can live up to the reputation that essay gives off. I’m more complicated than my best actions. More problematic.

On bad days, when my brain is really beating me up, I think I’m actually a lot like Sia — a well-off phony who writes kind things just to make myself look good. The only difference is I’ve been more successful in my performative goodness. Maybe it’s just a matter of time before I get found out, and stop winning all the accolades that keep my self-esteem afloat. Maybe then I’ll run away hiding, too.

When I get to feeling like this, good art by bad people brings me a hell of a lot of comfort. It reminds me of the complex darkness of the human condition, and aids me in plunging my own psychological depths. When I look at how others have rationalized or grappled with their worst actions, I have an easier time understanding my own. When I use the art of problematic people to stare my own inner demons in the face, I find it easier to lead a life that’s both authentic and good.

Good art by bad people reminds me that I don’t have to be perfect. I don’t have to define myself by my best or worst acts. I can listen to the criticism, roll with the punches. Keep moving forward. See myself and others as multifaceted, cruel, caring, and completely alive.

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When the movie Once Upon a Time in Hollywood came out, many feminists and victims’ advocates cautioned the public not to watch it, lest we line Quentin Tarantino’s pockets and lend him moral support. Not long before the film’s release, Tarantino’s former collaborator Uma Thurman had spoken out about his willful ignorance of Harvey Weinstein’s sexual assaults. She also described a harrowing incident in which Tarantino pressured her to perform her own stunts, resulting in an injury Thurman will never fully recover from.

On an ethical level, I agreed with the people who panned Tarantino’s movie. On an artistic level, not so much. You see, I couldn’t help but watch. I’m just too fascinated by Tarantino’s mind. Kill Bill remains one of the most meaningful films I’ve ever seen, though I now know Uma Thurman’s body was irrevocably brutalized while filming it. There’s a way that Tarantino depicts sharp-witted, media-obsessed, emotionally shut-down people that my cold Autistic brain can’t seem to get enough of.

So when Once Upon a Time in Hollywood came out, I found a way to watch it without paying for it. So I could try and understand it without giving it support. I enjoyed the movie and got a lot out of it. Not because it was perfect, but because it was so problematic.

Once Upon a Time in Hollywood is a witty, deftly made film with a rotten heart. The film valorizes abusers, and romanticizes an old Hollywood that was hostile to women and people of color. It implies that a leading character’s nagging spouse deserves to die, simply because she is annoying. At various points, the movie seems to look viewers in the eye, and winkingly acknowledge the accusations against Harvey Weinstein. It also implicitly mocks those who have condemned Tarantino for stuffing his films with needless violence and racial slurs.

The movie is a paean to entitled male defensiveness. It’s a tribute to those who believe anything ought to be acceptable when done in the name of a white guy’s art. And as a white, guy-ish person who makes art and feels entirely too precious about it, that was an important thing for me to see. Not because I agree with it, but because I want to make sure that I don’t.

I can’t pretend people like Tarantino don’t exist, or that they aren’t capable of crafting alluring defenses. His art is a reflection of our shared culture, our history, our values, the people we’ve listened to and the ones we’ve ignored. I am a product of that same culture, and my mind has been warped by the same problems. It helps me to see those problems so starkly rendered, reduced to absurdity and projected on screen.

Similarly, David Foster Wallace’s books are a rich illustration of how it feels to absorb the world’s most chauvinistic messaging, while simultaneously being aware of how vile it is. I’ve learned a lot about my own worst qualities by reading about the worst side of Wallace. Sia’s film Music reflects a shared cultural legacy of ableism and caretaker-as-martyr narratives, too. I might not want to support the film financially, or even be glad that it exists — but I can still learn from it.

Consuming each of these works is, for me, an exercise in self-reflection, a means of cultural criticism, and a test of human understanding. I don’t think anyone has to enjoy the work of the people they loathe. I think sometimes people who have done great and repeated harm do need to face consequences, including the loss of an artistic platform. But I also believe that that for each of us, there can be value in appreciating the flawed artists who help us contemplate our own failings. We can’t do away with all the good art of problematic people. It helps us to face the problematic nature lurking within ourselves.

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My book Laziness Does Not Exist is out now! It’s available in hardcover, ebook, and audiobook copies anywhere books are sold.

An Injustice!
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