#just give him a happy life without concerns of oppression regardless not some special copout like hes different but in a cool way

[possiblydave]

Ok so I'm going to write something a little aggressive about headcanons spurred by the recent post I reblogged from notedchampagne and a couple reactions I've seen that were clearly influenced by that (and if anyone I saw reads this, it's not personal but it got me thinking):

Most of the time, I'm not really gonna judge if you have hcs for certain characters unless they go against some coding in a way they really shouldn't. I've seen (and rbed!) plenty of white hs characters here, ngl. But I'm gonna be honest: if you don't understand why reading Karkat as a white redhead is kind of a problem then we need to sit down and have a talk.

Now, I'm speaking as a white redhead in the usa, keep in mind. But Karkat is a character literally steeped in the experiences of being ostracized and oppressed and left out and at risk of violence or even being killed just for his physiologial traits. And maybe once upon a time there were some negative connotations, such as the whole 'redheads are soulless' shtick. Maybe in some countries there are connotations I'm unaware of. But if you're viewing it from the usa perspective? The only way you could be more disrespectful to Karkat's coding and parallels to such struggles irl is if you made him a blond I'm pretty sure.

White redheads are NOT stigmatized in the usa! We get scholarships, we're considered 'exotic' in an attractive way if anything, studies have shown men are 'intimidated' to ask out redhead women because said women 'too good' for them. We don't get picked on or called names for our hair color, and as we get older we DEFINITELY don't experience threats of violence from our own society! The worst stereotype we have is being 'strong willed and fiery' as women and that's rarely treated like a Bad Thing in media. (I can't speak to experiences of men I haven't heard or seen jack shit on that front)

The reason that, from a probably primarily USA-fandom based perspective, white redheaded karkat is such a bad take, is because it's like a copout. You're making him "different" from the others in an uwu how terrible he's GINGER way when there's... really..... not any struggles to be had. White redheads are probably one of the few 'minorities' to be admired in the usa. So what you're doing basically is taking Karkat's core struggle and background and shitting on it. That's all there is to it.

If you're coming from a different background where redheads ARE really shit on? Fantastic! I rescind everything in this post from having any right to be used against you, because I can't speak to that. But hopefully this explains why people were giving you shit for this when you understood things differently.

Lastly, you all may have noticed I specified 'white' redheads while writing this post. Why, you may ask? Because as it turns out, natural red hair isnt exclusive to white people! Poc can have red hair too! So if you're really attached to Karkat having red hair, maybe look into exploring redhead poc as an alternative (with research ofc) because honestly? That's something I came across once in a single tumblr post on how such people exist and to this DAY I still don't think I've seen a humanstuck headcanon portraying that (I'm also guilty of this tbh).

So tl;dr - white ginger karkat headcanons really aren't safe from scrutiny given the background of the character and of irl cultural context in the usa so unless you're coming from an entirely different cultural context, you don't get to whine about how "unfair" it is that people don't like the hc. If people are attacking you personally for it? That's entirely not cool and a different issue entirely. But if this is simply because of noted-champagne's satire piece and stuff like that then stfu. If you want to have the hc? Fine, you're not alone obviously, we can't technically stop you. But there's a reason a lot of people are bothered, put off, or dislike it, and the above is why and the least you can do is recognize that.