The Million Word Journey

108k Pt.1: I make the argument I'm not a bad person

 Song Selection: OK—8 Graves

This is an odd title. To anyone who's reading this, I doubt you ever cared whether I was a good person or not. And honestly, my 'goodness' isn't exactly what I'm writing about.

Recently, I came across a wasps' nest of comments about how authors who write from the first-person perspective of a bad person are "dubious" at best. Or, at worse, these authors are indulging in their own sick fantasies. Of course, I didn't pop my head in and go, 'well, actually,' because when people say that authors who write first-person antagonists are "dubious," there isn't much of an argument as one of those writers I can make without at least reassuring you that I'm not "dubious." Essentially, I have to make the argument that I'm not a bad person. 

Which, uh, I don't exactly feel like making? Not because I think I'm a terrible person, but because I think that can be distracting and fuck, everyone's idea of what a good person is or isn't tends to be different. "Authors who write from the perspectives of bad people aren't bad because I'm not bad' is a pretty weak argument, so I'm going to engage in a couple of different ways with this premise. I'm going to try to convince you that there are good reasons for authors to write from the perspectives of characters they find abhorrent: understanding these people, arguing with these people, and...

...Fuck, three is a cool and powerful number, sure, but sometimes two reasons are enough. You want all the reasons, but if two reasons are good enough to you, fuck, they're good enough; them being diminutive doesn't make them less worthy of discussion (I guess you can see why I skipped AP lang every other class; uh, perhaps you should take my writing advice with a grain of salt).

I already failed this essay. Let's get to more failure, shall we!

PART I: DEFINITIONS AND SHIT

I want to define the difference between a 'protagonist antagonist' and an 'antihero,' before I get into this. Luckily enough, I've written from the perspective of both. However, these distinctions are messy, shaded in gray, and often overlap.  An antihero can also be a protagonist antagonist. More commonly, a writer can create a character with the INTENTION of the character being perceived one way, and have the audience itself perceive it another way. They can be very similar on the surface.

The antihero: Generally, this character might be seen as an antagonist in the eyes of other characters, but what they're doing is generally seen as "good" in the eyes of the audience, even if their methods can be...questionable. From characters I've written, this would be Patrick Lee from 'No Superheroes Allowed.' To the outside world, he's seen as a villain, but hopefully, the audience doesn't see him that way; I wrote him to be a bit more of a Robin Hood figure. He's trying to do "good" things (help build community centers, help people pay rent) with "bad" means (theft)(theft from the filthy rich).

The protagonist-antagonist: This character is an antagonist, the bad guy of the story. The only difference from a normal antagonist is that we see the world from his or her perspective. From characters I've written, this would be 'Masquerade' in the sequel of Blog of a Teenage Superhero. Seventy percent of that story is written directly from his perspective, but the climax of the story surrounds his fight against the "good guys", with the audience hopefully rooting for his defeat. He is trying to do bad things (destroy all people's superpowers) with his bad means. 

Do you see the difference between the two? Good, I'll be defending the latter one, the bad guy.

PART II: WHY

A couple of years ago, I was stabbing a stale biscuit with a fork at the lunch table. Me and a mortal enemy were going at it about crime or something. I remember taking a deep breath and saying, "I don't agree with what they did, but I understand—"