I’ve always been able to separate the artist from the work of art. I had to be able to if I was going to be a successful student. Now that I am middle aged I think my tendency is to read and watch things with complete ignorance about the creators’ biographical details. I don’t use Twitter or Mastodon. I don’t follow creators on any social media platform. I sometimes wonder what would happen if I did consume more media and payed attention to what creators say and do online. Maybe I would change my attitude. I don’t know. What I do know is that a work of art can convey a message that has absolutely nothing to do with the artist’s beliefs or political leanings. But then I remember attending a lecture that Gayatri Spivak gave at Cornell’s School of Criticism and Theory. She talked about how sometimes the politics of something, its “political value” if you will, can be much more important than what it is worth intellectually and people should go with that perception if that is what they ponder when contemplating a work of art (or literature, or any product of creativity). So, this is where subjectivity becomes important. Our subjectivity as we contemplate a work of art is important and if we feel we should disregard it because the artist is not to our liking, we might be better off rejecting it and doing something positive for the world and society. So, I guess my take is that I won’t mess with other people’s subjectivity and I hope they don’t mess with mine. On the contrary, we might be better off if we encourage each other to express our subjectivity and appreciate it for what it might mean in a social context.