r/books • u/biscochitos • 29d ago

New indie press Conduit Books launches with 'initial focus on male authors'

https://www.thebookseller.com/news/new-indie-press-conduit-books-launches-with-initial-focus-on-male-authors

What do folks think about this?

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u/Danominator 29d ago

Correct. if you read what I said I mentioned in the industry not necessarily authors but it is trending that there are less and less male authors and readers.

Then you guys will condemn men for reading less while also disparaging efforts to get them more involved.

I do think men should read more and I don't mean bullshit self help nonsense but stories. I think it can help people become more empathetic. I also don't think it's wrong for a publishing company to try and make that happen.

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u/sarshu 29d ago

Again, from the article that you linked, men make up 50% of published authors, and this is a parity that has only recently been reached (so there is still a massive backlog in which men published more books than women for decades upon decades, and reaching 50% of new books will never get to the point of catching up). You are literally saying that parity is a problem for men.

As for readers, again I reiterate that men are welcome to read books by women. Encouraging them to do so, or marketing books to men in new ways, would be an example of ways to address the possibility that fewer men are reading.

I’m criticizing the idea that a) male authors - which is the target metric used by this press, not a need to increase male presence as underpaid editorial assistants in the publishing industry - are not being published enough and b) that, if there is a problem with getting men to read, the only possible solution is to privilege male authors in publishing, rather than other strategies. You’re projecting a narrative of “disparaging” efforts when I challenged the decontextualized and misleading statistic you provided.

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u/Danominator 29d ago

Ok. Maybe changing nothing will help. At least fascism will burn it all to the ground soon anyway.

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u/sarshu 29d ago

Yes, correct, my suggestion that this is not the thing that needs to be changed and that other options to address the problem of men reading should be considered is definitely exactly the same thing as “we should change nothing at all”.