I credit SFF with saving my life, too, as an abused child who desperately needed an escape valve -- and a reality check that not all families were like mine, and that I had hopes of growing up and GETTING OUT and building a life for myself away from my family of origin.
Anne McCaffrey and, later, Mercedes Lackey were really important to me -- in part because they showed abused girls/children who weren't irreparably broken by their experiences. Menolly and Talia, Kethry and Tarma and Vanyel, were all *important* to me.
They got out. And, eventually, so did I. And a lot of my attitudes on social issues were forged from my experiences with SFF -- Paganism, polyamory, queerness, non-binary people, race issues, marriage equality, social justice, reproductive rights -- so much of those attitudes, and my position of compassionate understanding toward people who were different from me... that can be laid at the feet of SFF, too, because I sure as hell didn't learn that stuff at home.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
regna
(no subject)
Date: 2014-02-26 05:50 pm (UTC)I credit SFF with saving my life, too, as an abused child who desperately needed an escape valve -- and a reality check that not all families were like mine, and that I had hopes of growing up and GETTING OUT and building a life for myself away from my family of origin.
Anne McCaffrey and, later, Mercedes Lackey were really important to me -- in part because they showed abused girls/children who weren't irreparably broken by their experiences. Menolly and Talia, Kethry and Tarma and Vanyel, were all *important* to me.
They got out. And, eventually, so did I. And a lot of my attitudes on social issues were forged from my experiences with SFF -- Paganism, polyamory, queerness, non-binary people, race issues, marriage equality, social justice, reproductive rights -- so much of those attitudes, and my position of compassionate understanding toward people who were different from me... that can be laid at the feet of SFF, too, because I sure as hell didn't learn that stuff at home.
*hugs*
-- A <3