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The SUSPECT editorial team has heard that a reader of our journal was horrified by the depiction of child rape and marriage in the story "Beauty and the Jinn" by Rahad Abir. The reaction was not unexpected, but nevertheless we're glad to have this opportunity to explain our editorial stance and share some of our internal discussions, which are still evolving.
Rahad Abir's story "The Beauty and the Jinn" is very realistic in depicting child rape and marriage for the purpose of exposing what is prevalent in his native Bangladesh, as Rahad's audio recording at the end of the story explains. The story's realism is intended to provoke moral disgust and outrage over what is often normalized or silenced in the country, and, as one editor reminded us, elsewhere in South and Southeast Asia. Another editor added, "As it stands, the story makes clear two things—the devastating impact of abuse on the victim, and the way in which a patriarchal and religious community can sometimes work to silence those that lack agency and a voice the most." To move readers to indignation is a step towards eradicating such a social horror.
At the same time, the realism of the story is leavened by its allegorical and (twisted) fairy-tale overtones in order to persuade the reader to continue reading and not to turn their eyes away. The ironic overtones are like a very long pair of tongs necessary to pick up the radioactive material for close examination.
Rahad has also chosen to write the story from the point of view of the abuser, and so immerses the reader in that very discomfiting position. As I see it, the purpose is not to create sympathy for the abuser, but to explore the darker corners of the masculinized mind. I can't speak for Rahad, but the story makes me search hard within myself for what the story exposes.
At SUSPECT, we read submissions carefully, talk them over with at least one other team member, and engage with the author before we decide to publish. In this case Rahad is an author known to us since he has submitted other manuscripts for consideration. This particular story was selected and edited by our Fiction Editor, and she discussed it with me as the Editor-in-Chief before we published it. We hope that all our publications invite, even provoke, important conversations about society and literature.
The evolving discussion within the team concerns the use of content warnings in our publications. Rachel Kuanneng Lee's essay on her sister's suicide was published with a content warning, but Rahad's story did not have one. We are well aware that a content warning may predetermine and limit the character of a work of fiction and a reader's reaction to it. The best stories may be those that devastate us emotionally. In any case, the fiction reader always has the choice to stop reading at any point, even without a content warning. But we also recognize that content warnings give the reader that choice right from the start. By giving the reader a sense of agency, we are also extending protection and empathy to the reader who may be in need of them.
There are practical things we can do. For instance, we could change the term "content warning" to "content awareness" or "content note" and so remove the connotation of danger. We could also make the content warning itself optional, by covering it under a spoiler's tag on the website or printing it at the back of a book. The team is considering these and other practical options.
This is an evolving conversation not only within the team, but also in the wider literary and academic world. How should we balance the desire for surprise and the demand for care? Such desire and demand may exist at once in the same person, and their relative strengths may change from time to time. As always, we'd love to know what you think. If you have any thoughts or suggestions, please write to us at jkoh@singaporeunbound.org.
To return to Rahad's story, we can also imagine a Bangladeshi reader, who having endured the horror of child rape and marriage, finds herself not re-traumatized but recognized, seen, on reading the story. Beauty is me, she exclaims and, after reading the content warning, turns to us and asks, who are you protecting?
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Our warmest congratulations to Wong May on winning the Windham-Campbell Prize for Poetry! So well deserved! Wong May kindly judged the first Gaudy Boy Poetry Book Prize and selected Lawrence Lacambra Ypil and Jenifer Sang Eun Park as our inaugural winners. There is a lovely interview in The Irish Times with the reclusive poet and painter.
Jee Leong Koh
March 31, 2022
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