One of the most important essays I’ve ever read is by Philip K Dick, entitled “How To Build A Universe That Doesn’t Fall Apart Two Days Later.” In it, he describes his idea that people can experience reality in such different ways that they lack a common language and therefore can’t relate to one another. He’s talking about schizophrenia, but he’s really talking (as is his way) about all people, everywhere.

The problem, then, is that if subjective worlds are experienced too differently, there occurs a breakdown of communication… and there is the real illness.

If I haven’t been seen to discuss The Matter Of Dickwolves, this is the reason why. I’m not entirely certain that a conversation is possible. This isn’t mere cynicism - this is a fully rational assessment of the situation. The perspectives in play, the lenses, are too different: one side believes that not according the issue of rape the proper respect fuels a kind of perverse, perpetual engine called rape culture. There is a vast, specific lexicon and hundreds of tacit assumptions that gird it. The other side (that’s me, but not just me) believes that when it comes to expression nothing is off the table. It is the creator’s prerogative to create something - even something grotesque - out of anything they can find.