When is art not art?

When it’s being argued over by people who have missed the point.

Roger Ebert recently stated that video games can never be art, a piece largely condemned by sites and other media that count themselves as “gamers.” Most of them have missed the point entirely of Ebert’s comments, and turned it into an opportunity for personal attack on the man, the most vile and loathsome of which that I’ve seen thus far coming from Penny Arcade, likening Ebert’s piece to reeking ejaculate.

Tycho’s rant has all the bumbling zeal of a six-year old who has just discovered he can use big words to offend people but, much like he accuses Ebert of doing, he also totally misses the point.

Ebert’s article, originally a response to a TED talk by Kellee Santiago, might be flawed, but he raises some valid questions and points, which have been largely ignored by commentators quick to jump to condemnation. Ebert is prepared to engage with the question of “what is art?” while many who responded to his piece do so only to defend their beloved games, little realising the larger debate in which they are partaking.

Ultimately, you can’t argue that something isn’t art without having a checklist against which to score it, condemning it to not be art when it fails to make a passing grade.

So…what is art?

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Obsoletism is a short story I wrote a few years ago, mostly as a challenge to myself to see what I could do.  It started as a diary piece, and then turned into the dialogue below (so maybe short story isn’t the best definition, but I’m going with it for now.)

As far as fiction goes, I don’t really believe in final drafts, and having a look at this, there’s still some changes I’d make if I were going back to rework it now. But I’m not going to.

This is also just the first part of it. If people enjoy it, or want to know more, I’ll post the rest later on.

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Not to get existential or that, but my name’s floating up there at the top of the page…it’s usually a good place to start.

Chances are, most of this biographical content is going to end up on the About page, but until then, you’ve got a first post to amuse you.

I’m the editor and general dogsbody over at BurnAllZombies, so you might see some stuff related to movies, video games, comics, books etc over there. This, however, is going to be a slightly more personal site. Don’t worry, the names will be changed to protect the innocent, but this site will play home to some fictional works and other entries that don’t quite come under the auspices of entertainment or reviews.

First up, I’ll be posting extracts from a short story I wrote last year, Obsoletism. I’ll put the first few hundred words up later this evening and, if people like it, I’ll put the full thing up.