Batwoman, the Hugos and a racist rancher

A gay woman blogs about the different ways she’s enjoyed DC’s Batwoman as the writers have changed. I was struck by her point that in the current writer’s tenure, Kate actually has gay friends she’s not dating and that we rarely see that in comics. There’s much discussion in the comments too, showing the complexity of writing about minorities. One commenter considers Kate looking girly and feminine is just fan service for male readers; another replies that a butch lesbian is a stereotype.
•Sunday I linked to discussions of the Hugo Awards, possible attempts to get right-wing writers on the ballots, and John Scalzi’s suggestion we read the works and judge them on their merits. Today he links to several opposing arguments.
The general argument is that Theodore Beale (to name one of the writers involved) is a racist (he commented that laws allowing shooting in self-defense are to empower white people like himself to defend themselves against “savages” like black fantasy author N.K. Jemisin). Nobody should be supporting him, and trying to read his works and be “fair” to them is positively painful for the people he hates against. Ditto the others on the ballot (I’m simplifying multiple blog posts here, sorry if I simplify too far).
No argument that if the story’s politics make it toxic to a reader, that’s a good reason to put it down or never pick it up. And certainly a valid one not to vote for it. That said, I don’t think conservative political views automatically translate into conservative writing. I know people who loathe Dave Sims’ sexist views, but say they didn’t stop him writing real, complex women into his Cerberus strip. And the two Grimnoir books I’ve read by Larry Correia (apparently another strong conservative) didn’t seem laden with any particular hate or right-wing politics. Still, if someone wants to avoid the right-wingers books completely, that’s certainly their call. It’s not like there’s a shortage of stuff to read instead.
•And now the rancher. You may have heard about Cliven Bundy, the rancher who refuses to pay grazing fees to the federal government, and thereby became a right-wing hero. Now it turns out he thinks blacks might have been better off under slavery than on welfare, and that because nobody teaches “Negros” to pick cotton any more, they just sit around on welfare, go to jail or abort their babies.
This would be funny, only it isn’t.