Let’s get one thing straight: Shooting People is a great resource for screenwriters, actors, filmmakers. I constantly recommend it to my newbie writing clients. It’s helped me personally no end – I’ve got script reading gigs from it, got discounts on various stuff, made contacts, begun friendships and collaborations, not to mention had hours of interesting reading each morning (I always either forget to check forums, or spend every waking hour on them, so think the arrival of the list each morning is a great idea).

But as I’ve mentioned only recently and various Bloggers have discussed before around www.land and I have with various people in real life, the dialogue section of SP can turn tiresome from time to time. It seems that there are various subjects that boomerang back again, not to mention moanfests about how unfair schemes like the UKFC’s “25 Words or Less” are. Script readers seem to be frequently under attack and Adrian Mead has even been called a “spammer”. Insults and accusations are levvied at the work of directors Shooters dislike, such as the seemingly universally hated “Happy Go Lucky” that spiralled into a melee of name-calling and assertions about Mike Leigh.

I should mention at this juncture: none of this criticism is levvied at the moderator of the screenwriters’ bulletin, Andy Conway. He does a fantastic job wading through posts from weirdoes like myself. He can only work with what he has and actually, a lot of the time dialogue is good when contributors are more focused. In addition, I reckon flame wars have gone down by approximately 90% (that’s a statistical fact by the way, arf) since Andy started moderating the list two years ago and he DOES make an effort to stamp out those repetitive threads. Only this morning he posited the idea in his editorial that he should ban posts with certain key words in, lol.

So – looking at what I consider the “bad” dialogue on SP then, I wonder: is this REALLY the face we want to present as writers? Writers often complain they don’t get taken seriously by producers and the like. Is this part of the reason why?

Andy mentions in his response to my post today that “no one gets flamed”, but I don’t agree that someone calling someone else a “spammer” is “a frank exchange of views”. Shooting People is by no means unusual in this regard – The Hubster belongs to an angling forum (yes, I’m a fishing widow) and I’m always surprised by the level of vitriol they levvy at each other for not knowing what type of bait or hook to use on what type of fish (eugh).

Why is it that we say things on the internet we wouldn’t dream of in real life? Because of the anonymity I suppose – but I think this desire to say exactly what we feel actually gets in the way of intelligent debate and us growing as writers. You’d talk to your mates in the pub about how crap a film is and how you wanted to punch the lead in the face: on a forum or list like SP, why can’t we talk about what we would have PREFERRED to see in a film we didn’t like, sans accusations, swearing and general assertions about how I AM RIGHT AND YOU ARE WRONG? It can be done.

Well anyway, that’s just what I think. But I know I’m right and if you don’t agree with me you’re all doped-up halfwits : P . Arf.

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MY POST: I’m with Andy who expressed disbelief yesterday that the argument about screenwriting books has come round AGAIN. That, along with the questions, “can talent be taught?” and “what constitutes “good” grammar?”, are just three notions that come up on this list with alarming regularity. Are we really sitting at our PCs and Macs with no other thoughts than what screenwriting book to read or burn, whilst worrying if we have God-given talent as we scour BBC Skillswise and “Eats, Shoots & Leaves”? I hope not.

I love Shooting People, naturally, but I have to admit I am skimming the screenwriters’ bulletin these days. I would love to see some dialogue on here that surprises – no accusations or flame wars either, or slagging off contributors, directors, producers, or people we disagree with.

It’s easy to point the finger, harder to create. Many of my Bang2writers confess they are “scared” of posting in to SP in case people “get on their case”. I think this is a real shame. Let’s stimulate some real debate and stop repeating ourselves. It shouldn’t be difficult – we ARE writers.

Have a fab weekend, Lucy : )
www.lucyvee.blogspot.com

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ANDY’S RESPONSE

This is a little unfair, Lucy. We have lots of new members who might not be familiar with arguments that we haven’t had here for over a year (August 2007, and even then only a brief flare up quickly stamped out). And those people who tell you they’re scared of writing here just amaze me. No one ever gets flamed here. I don’t allow it. But we do have the occasional frank exchange of views. If anyone is scared of that then I give up on them as a writer that has anything to say to anyone. I’ve been editing this bulletin for over two years and one thing I know for sure by now is that the people who bitch about it from afar are the ones who never ever write in or contribute, no matter how much you try to address their gripes. As you say, it’s easy to point the finger, harder to create.
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