#but generally cultural mannerisms from east asia tend to be more subdued overall than western ones | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

bancaishi · 8 months ago

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didn't want to put this rant in the tags of that last post but honestly i feel like a lot of people hate toshiro disproportionately compared to what he actually did in-story. and if we're being real it's most likely because of racism

#xyx.txt #because so much of his misunderstanding of laios comes from a cultural angle #and because his mannerisms are strongly coded as japanese especially relative to the other characters in the story #i think a lot of people's implicit biases have them reading this as an inherent and unchangeable aspect of his being #rather than being just one aspect of him that originates from a particular context and is fully changeable #like any other trait on anyone else.#part of this is just because of the fact that the story is told from laios and his party's perspective #but i think a lot of people's perspectives on him are probably informed by racism #not all east asians are quiet and polite. i know this myself as a kind of loud and awkward and easily excited east asian person myself #but generally cultural mannerisms from east asia tend to be more subdued overall than western ones #so it's. not uncommon. for western people to read east asians as being rude or cold or aloof just for behaving like this #the 'oriental inscrutability' moment...#like he doesn't need to 'get rid of the stick up his ass'. he just needs to not put such heavy expectations on other people #but yeah i think a lot of people are way more unsympathetic to him than they would have been if he were not so distinctly asian-coded #which is ironic! a lot of people being really mad at him for ableism specifically in the social expectations he holds of others #while applying the same kind of judgment to him but through the perspective of race instead of neurodivergence. suspicious.#blah blah blah it's because he's 'neurotypical' or whatever #predicting how some of you people would behave toward neurodivergent asian people and the outlook isn't good #also if we're on the subject of microaggressions.#laios repeatedly and insistently calling him 'shuro' to the point that everyone else calls him that too #that's not 'funny autism bad with names' moment that's a racist microaggression #someone misnaming me because of my distinctly ethnic/foreign-sounding name doesn't automatically become funny and relatable #just because you're neurodivergent lol #can we maybe have more empathy toward characters and people of color in fandom #instead of always using them as punching bag side character trope #thanks.

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