#imagine your sole cultural trait is being dummy thick to the point of it becoming a traffic violation

[aftertheradar]

so i've been rereading Artemis Fowl (series) again and even tho it was one of my favorite kids series I'm noticing some kinda weird or icky stuff that flew over my head before. Like damn if these books ain't just cyberpunk espionage magitek copaganda. Book 2 is literally about an ethnically motivated class uprising being put down by the police(who are framed as the good guys) because said racial minority/underclass is too violent and stupid to deserve better treatment in the prison system. and also too stupid and violent to have masterminded the plan for revolution themselves and needed one of the smart races to do it for them.

and any time there's a civilian presence in the book, they are depicted as either an antagonistic obstructive bureaucrat or a whiny caricature played for laughs. not totally sure if this is because these books were written while uncritically carrying over this kind of depiction that was historically the norm in its genres (police procedural), or if this is the author's own (conscious or subconscious) idealogical biases seeping in. might be both tbh.

anyway anyway the thing i actually wanted to bring up is that a really bizarre detail that stuck out to me during my re-reads is the way the different fairy races/species are characterized. there's 7(really 8) races/species of fairies who are disntint, and they have different traits and powers. So like there are elves who are good with magic, sprites who can fly, goblins (the aforementioned race that is too stupid and violent to be capable of organized protest) who can shoot fire etc.

Butt (foreshadowing lol) the one that was so weird to me is the characterization of gnomes, the last and arguably least of the fairy races in the artemis fowl series. they seem to make up the majority of the fairy population and a significant portion of background characters. bdon't get much screen time in the books because of not having any main characters who are one. They're sole defining characteristic?

Having enormous asses.

That's it. that's their whole thing. basically every time there's a gnome character depicted, the text goes out if it's way mention how dummy thicc the gnomes are and how their dumptruck rear ends take up too much room and keep blocking things and knocking shit over when they walk.

like there's also already a whole race of fairies (the dwarfs)whose whole thing is to be a never ending font of burglary escape techniques and fart jokes whenever the plot or author demand them. you would think having enormous asses would come in that territory, but no. it goes to the last group that we the audience don't really know or care about as much.

and i just don't really know what to make of that. that in coming up with fantasy races for his books, one of the most present but least prominent in tbe books' single defining and noteworthy character trait is having such fat asses that they block public pedestrian walkways (no really). i wish i knew what exactly the thought process behind (lol) that one was.

anyway hope i explained why it's so weird to me well, goodnight