I'll add that I think the best narratives hinge upon characters making an ethical choice. Frodo chooses to not destroy the ring (for example.) But the protagonist doesn't have to make the right choice and it's often a better story when we feel the wrongness or the injustice or the complexity of the situation. Forcing the story to hit ethical beats instead of dramatic ones almost always becomes thin and didactic.

I will add that using tropes that reinforce social norms is often a sign of poor writing. Think of how racial stereotypes weaken our ability to enjoy past literature because we just wince when we encounter it*. However I don't think Gaiman was guilty of that sort of thing in Murder Mysteries. (Murder Mysteries, though is IMO one of Gaiman's weaker works, very artistically flawed. I may or may not go into that some time But (again IMO) it has nothing do with "fridging".)

• Examples: African Americans in just about any Hollywood movie pre-1962 or so. Prince what's his face the African Prince who wants to be white in Dr. Doolittle.

I guess I'd concede that it's an interesting question. But my answer to it as phrased is:

Avoid? Absolutely not.

I'm with Strega and Amy on this. Especially because I think that there's no requirement on art or storytelling to be an ethical platform. The primary purpose of storytelling is to entertain.

I admit, I am a fan of the horror genre, I've read a lot of splatterpunk, AND I think that American Psycho is (in some ways) a hysterical black comedy. So I know my tastes/opinions are not everyone's. But I think it is entirely possible to write ethically uncomfortable things and have them still be worthwhile.

Or to put it another way, I've quit reading far fewer books because of something I found troubling or upsetting than I have ones that bored me or felt like the author was Hammering Their Message Home.

Froot Loocifers:

I guess I'd concede that it's an interesting question. But

Oh, I agree that making avoidance an absolute rule is a bad idea - absolutes are a great way to screw things up, in art or life. But if you agree it's worth considering, then you may start to see where I'm coming from?

Tara's death, again, might be an example where avoidance wasn't possible. In fact, I'll go farther than that: Given our existing cultural context, it may have been impossible for Gaiman to tell the story with the impact he wanted, without causing this kind of revulsion in one group or another. That doesn't mean it shouldn't be told, but does mean that some groups('cause if I'm the only one I'll eat my copy of Heinlein in Dimension ) will find the art damaged and lessened by the choices he made.

(Is any of this making sense? I think it's past my bedtime.)

BTW, really nitpicking here, but Hec there are exceptions - writer who produced really good literature that was propaganda or didatic literature. Shaw. But I'll admit that Shaw was an exception - a didactic artist, a truly literary propagandist.

does mean that some groups('cause if I'm the only one I'll eat my copy of Heinlein in Dimension ) will find the art damaged and lessened by the choices he made.

Sure, but I think a writer shouldn't give more weight to those issues than they give to the story they want to write.

I'll eat my copy of Heinlein in Dimension

Which is where I can point at a story and say "No, not reading that ever again, thanks" with regard to Farnham's Freehold. That's my example of being repulsed by narrative choices.

BTW, really nitpicking here, but Hec there are exceptions - writer who produced really good literature that was propaganda or didatic literature. Shaw. But I'll admit that Shaw was an exception - a didactic artist, a truly literary propagandist.

When I'm watching Shaw I can't help but feel like I'm listening to the most sophisticated guy in the world and his failure of imagination to see that the most erudite nation on Earth (Germany at that time) was gathering together monumental evil. And I don't really agree with him in Major Barbara and other plays, anyway.

He has a very narrow depth to him which I think the surety of his moral stances creates.

Yeah the ideas he was propagandizing for often were proven wrong - but that did not stop his plays from being good (well many of them - given the quantity, some were awful of course - especially some of his later and mercifully forgotten works). But his best plays were both very good plays indeed and effective propaganda for the ideas he was trying to promote. Major B. is a good example - ideas I think totally proven wrong by history, but a damn good play and very effective propaganda.

I think I'm just going to mention I was definitely NOT saying art should take a specific ethical stance, just that I think it's a good idea for the artist to consider what the implications of the story he's telling are.(Like, hi Bob, what are the implications of you finishing Campbell's racist future-war story for him?)

....and call it a night. See you in the mozzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz......

just that I think it's a good idea for the artist to consider what the implications of the story he's telling are.

I think this is generally true, though it's not the first standard I apply to a work. I mean, I did like it quite a bit when Grant Morrison's Invisibles went back and told the story of a random security guy who got offed. That's not exactly stunt storytelling, but it's really picking out one thread and writing from a kind of narrative prompt (imagine the story from the POV of a minor character.)

Though as Joss notes (citing William Defoe), no character thinks they're the bad guy or a minor character. They're the lead character in their narrative.