WHY IS THIS IN THE FILE?

Nobody took responsibility quickly enough.

The arts have developed a sophisticated alternative currency called prestige.

It is denominated in phrases such as highly selective, nationally recognized, award-winning, important, and emerging.

Prestige can be accumulated but not reliably spent.

You cannot buy groceries with a Pushcart nomination.

You cannot pay the electric bill with “widely published.”

Your dentist may be impressed that a magazine has a two-percent acceptance rate, but the office will still want a credit card.

This does not make prestige meaningless. Reputation can lead to readers, jobs, invitations, grants, contracts, and the crucial experience of having someone answer your email.

The problem begins when prestige is treated as if it were itself compensation.

An institution asks for labor. The worker asks what it pays. The institution replies by describing how difficult it is to be chosen for the labor.

This is a marvelous trick.

Imagine a restaurant telling the dishwasher that only seven percent of applicants are accepted, and therefore wages would cheapen the honor.

Writers tolerate versions of this because many of us want two things at once: to make art and to have the world confirm that making it was not ridiculous.

Prestige sells that confirmation.

Sometimes the exchange is worth it. Publish the poem for nothing because you love the magazine. Give the reading because six people will care intensely. Help the small press because it is doing something nobody else will fund.

Just keep the accounting straight.

Call love love.

Call community community.

Call prestige prestige.

And when somebody calls any of them payment, ask whether the grocery store has started accepting them.

“Normal” was considered and rejected.

KNOWN ASSOCIATES: readers, loiterers, people who should know better.

PUSH THE WEIRD BUTTON

A clerk has been notified. They are furious.