Romance Writers Org Implodes Amid Racism Charges

The Romance Writers of America, one of the country’s largest writers associations, is in chaos. In late December, the RWA board made the perplexing and instantly controversial decision to censure, suspend, and ban author Courtney Milan from ever holding national office in the organization again—essentially, because she called a 20-year-old book a “fucking racist mess.” That move set off a chain of events that now threatens to rend the institution apart in a battle for the heart and soul of not just RWA, but the romance genre as a whole. It has been a spectacularly public fight, one that reflects a long, contested history of who gets to be visible in romance. RWA, an organization founded almost 40 years ago by a black woman, has frequently been an unfriendly place for marginalized writers, and attempts to change that have been met with pushback that now threatens to destroy the institution itself. Romance novels, at their most fundamental level, are about protagonists being seen clearly and loved—and this is a story about who gets to be seen and valued in the romance genre, and whose pain matters. Read Full Article »