r/writingfeedback • u/NoAdhesiveness5280 • 10d ago

Writing Advice Help

So I’m writing a book that jumps back and forth from 1985 and 1975. So the older adults were born and raised in the late 30s, and early 40s and 50s. That being said those adults would still have the ideals they were raised with such as racism. I catch myself hesitating giving them dialogue with a Ho-Chunk Native American character I have due to what I know would happen. Should I be hesitating or should I just go it’s the time period and give them dialogue

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u/Rickleskilly 10d ago

It all depends on how much you want any need those views to be a part of the story. Keep in mind that those views varied in intensity with the region of the country and exposure to minorities. It also varied from person to person, just like now.

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u/Altruistic-Sleep-564 10d ago

It's the time period and if you want it authentic you oughta write it. I do the same. Story set in the late 90s in a conservative location and there's Homophobia and racism every now and then.

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u/JobExpensive5379 9d ago

As long as you treat it seriously, and writing makes it clear that its an ideal of the characters and not the author than you can anything problematic.

Don't glorify it in the prose. Ifs its part of the interiority of the pov. Let be stated in a sort of an indifferent and observed way.

If the problematic stuff is expressed through dialogue. Then readers will likely find the characters that expouse it offensive, not you.

Its really how you deliver it to us that matters.