Thoughts on this statement?

[Stacy]

As I'm sure many of you know, I've gone on a bit of a tweet spree lately, trying to spread the message of goodness and love across the land.

And I saw this, and OMG.

@_Capitalism_

I am capitalism and successful writers are not the best writers, they are the most obedient and submissive to the whims of capital.

Retweeted it, tweeted it again, and am now opening up discussion here.

John said that you could all probably hear the gales of laughter I gave when I saw it.

It's like - it's like all my posts and thoughts and feelings ever about writing professionally, all in one tweet.

Now off to try and reply to the recent posts in my profile thread.

Dear world, I love you and want you like a flamethrower.

[thelunarfox]

Hmm. This definitely made me think. At first something seemed off to me, but I think it's because I was misunderstanding "the capitol."

There is truth to it. If by successful you mean has a lot of books sold, then yeah, best sellers are usually ones that people can read and escape in. The same authors make the best seller lists because they write what the people want and the people spend money on it.

But it isn't always that the author is delivering what the people want. Sometimes it's a fluke. People don't know what they want until it's handed to them. I think Neil Gaiman is successful, and he doesn't seem obedient or submissive to me. There are plenty of writers like him too. They write what they want, have made a niche, and when people need something specific filled, they come to him and ask him for his services.

[Velvet]

I have to agree with Lunar. That statement, while true for some (many writers in fact), it's not true for all. There are successful writers who are not catering to the masses. They're simply writing the style they like and a group of people happen to like what they write. I think the writing mill is like any other profession. You have those who work at something for the pure joy of it and those who do it for the bucks. To be a success by society's standards does not necessarily mean you're a sheep or playing to the crowd; it just means you've got something the masses may enjoy and if you can earn some bucks while doing it, I say so much the better.

A co-worker told me yesterday that she's going to finally finish up schooling for paralegal work. She plans to be an advocate. I wished her success. She replied that she'll probably never be rich but it wasn't important. I agreed; I said it's better to be poor and happy and she agreed. By that I meant, better for her to do something she feels fulfilled in doing and happy doing it than not. BUT, if she happens upon a job that pays her well, I certainly won't look down on her for taking it. LOL