#racism is still around

[survinging-the-next-4-years]

If a Republican ever tells you that "Racism is dead", show them this video.

Racism never died. The KKK is still around. And they're still trying to cause a race war. The last few klansmen mentioned in this video are still alive and still serving their sentences. This video was uploaded 9 months ago.

Racism is still here.

[ahaura]

im sure its been said already but as the election draws near more and more liberals will come out of the woodwork to shame people with a conscience to give away their vote to the democrats for free. i'm already seeing posts saying "why aren't people more concerned about a trump presidency?" you want to know why? it's because people already know he's bad. everyone already knows what he is and what he's done and what he'll do. there's nothing to discuss. he's a racist despotic worm of a man. there's nothing else to say.

biden is currently president. the genocide is happening under his watch. he's the one funding isra*l and arming them; he's sidestepped congress more than once to give them weapons. by oct. 27, the biden administration already knew that "Israel was regularly bombing buildings without solid intelligence that they were legitimate military targets." the state department/biden have engaged in atrocity propaganda, cast doubt on the legitimacy of the death toll recorded by the gaza health ministry, and so on. the united states is currently in the process of trying to pin the "war in gaza" on netanyahu (see sen. schumer's speech) after months of backing blatant genocide as a means to act as if they're "doing something" about the genocide (Instead of, say, threatening to cut off all aid to israel with the condition that all hostilities in gaza, the west bank, and occupied jerusalem are halted immediately and permanently, allowing palestinians freedom to travel, allowing aid into gaza, etc etc etc.)

the long and short of it is that liberals view their own lives as being worth more than palestinians'. that's it. they'll vote for another 4 years of the guy ushering in genocide and supporting apartheid + settler colonialism because he isn't outright attacking them (despite various laws and rulings happening both at the supreme court level and at the local level all over the country that will endanger people). they'll settle for the illusion of safety and security and shame anyone with a conscience and accuse them of "supporting the republicans" when in an actual democracy you would be able to use your vote as leverage to extract concessions from those who want to be elected. that's how it's supposed to fucking work.

democrats are not owed people's vote. if biden loses, it will be biden's fault; it will be his campaign's fault; it will be the democrats' fault. trump is bad; the republicans are bad. we already know this. this is not an endorsement of either. but if democrats are too cowardly and feckless and servile to the motivations of the american empire and never do anything for their constituents then why the fuck should anyone vote for them. you want to get mad at someone, why don't you do something useful and stop worrying about team-sports with a purely selfish basis and start hounding the people in power who are supposed to serve you, the voter.

[ropebunnykant]

Such a mad marriage never was before.

The Taming of The Shrew (Act III, Scene II) by William Shakespeare | The Heart Killers, Episodes 1 & 6

[antiterf]

A lot of infighting could be avoided if people weren't blatant assholes about... so much.

Like, some of you took "fuck respectability politics" to mean "I can be a dick to anyone I feel like." Yes, vent, be emotional, be tired, be angry.

But do it separate from educating and communication. If you can't do that, then set your boundaries and say that no, you're not doing that work right now. It's better for both you and the person who is asking questions or trying to talk to you.

So much of infighting is just taking out pain on each other when there could otherwise be a genuine conversation that requires delicacy. People talking deserve to be able to share sensitive parts of their lives and have those things be respected. Asking questions about it should be possible without attacking the person.

If this is about community, then act like it. Listen, be vulnerable, take breaks, set boundaries, and have a conversation you think needs to happen in a way that isn't hate.

I'm not telling you to be a doormat, if someone clearly doesn't have any interest in doing the same for you, you don't interact with them. If they start harassing you, do what you need to do to set and keep your boundaries.

But it's all so petty most of the time. There's so much pain, and for what? Feeling a high from your rage? Feeling powerful? Whatever it is, it's not protecting or building anything.

[puke-ur-gutz]

i will cashapp $10 to the first person who can name 3 real life harmful things bob bryar did without accusing him of thought crime

[dykedvonte]

I dislike takes that Danse would be just as conservative in modernized aus when it's clearly shown his staunch views of things come from his time in the Brotherhood and his deep-rooted desire to belong to something with a greater purpose.

Not to mention lines that show much more open-mindedness that get overlooked for his harsher sentiments when you first meet him. Like the oppurtunity to be a part of something is why Danse fell so far into Brotherhood dogma and it doesn't negate the offense things he does but I feel like it's just lazy to be like "hmmm he'd def be racist" just so it aligns to his BoS beliefs.

[jdorian]

i had a pretty busy day at work. coming back to tumblr to see that people are trying to talk around being racist again is something i don't have the energy for. being white passing doesn't make you white or erase your heritage and racial/ethnic background. europe and especially eastern europe has a very different experience with racism than the states.

it's okay to not be educated about something, it's not okay to stay that way and try to "correct" people who actually know what they're talking about.

[clfixationstation]

I just remembered the time I was a summer camp counselor and I tried to read the first Harry Potter book aloud to my campers, and I had to skip over so many fatphobic lines

Because why would I just expose these perfectly nice kids to a bunch of mean comments, played off as comedy, that they would use as ammunition against other kids and themselves? It's just plain cruel. Joanne was incredibly fucking weird for that

[batwynn]

Sooo I’m watching an entire facebook group full of trump and cop dick suckers lose their entire minds right now.

Everyone in my very red area just went from “blue lives matter” circle jerking to “maybe we should not have given the local police 7 billion dollars” veeeery quickly when it came out that one of them just straight up killed a guy everyone liked and almost got away with it. 🤔 Wild how fast the opinion changes when it’s them murdering a likable white guy who didn’t qualify for the “oh he’s just a druggie” apathy special. It sure feels like something.

[azol-otl]

DVD commentary about half footJason. He's such a little guy but God I love him.

Anything, brujay/royjay/jaydick, please tell me more about his relationships.

Ahhh Jaysun (half-foot Jason) my incredibly unwell little guy. For those who don't know, I have two fics about a dcu and dungeon meshi fusion (shameless self plug). There's a lot of words so...whoops lol.

So the thing about the Dungeon Meshi universe, is that when you put in dc, the subtext involving classism, racism and such that the author's don't think about/unwittingly put in becomes straight text. And in that it can lead to a lot of unfortunate implications becoming very...straight up there. And I'll openly admit that I'm pretty biased against Bruce so it won't be kind to him.

Jaysun (Jay + Sun to fit with the half-foot naming convention), was created when I started looking more into the lore of Dungeon Meshi. With half-foots known as thieves, liars, and shady overall and the general populace not even thinking twice about exploiting them or seeing them as the bottom of the hierarchy, it reads a lot like how dc makes heroes view criminals and poverty (if they aren't infantalizing the poor which is also a thing that the setting does to half-foots). And unlike "demi-humans" they're part of overall mainstream society instead of something separate (and not considered human). Which to me felt like a perfect fit for Jason both as Robin and as an adult because it's a life that Bruce wouldn't even be able to fathom. Alongside that, with a lower life expectancy, Bruce's patronizing attitude (and that of everyone else) is only aggravated and increased towards Jaysun.

Meanwhile Bruce, to me, has to be in a position of privilege and wealth for his whole thing to work. A lot of his flaws and skills comes from that disconnect. And in Dungeon Meshi, the most privileged are Elves and Dwarves. And for Bruce I chose the latter as it fits more in his image of masculinity as well as his focus on technology and combat (and Bruce with magic is just, why are you even using Bruce at that point when his whole shtick is baseline human fighting crime/things way above his weight class). Add into that half-foor culture idolizing (or at least seeing as something to strive for) dwarves and their culture, it just made for a really messy situation when Bruce adopts Jaysun.

But the thing is, Jaysun being adopted at 12 going on 13 is different than Jason being adopted at that age because a half-foot is considered a full adult by age 14 and even then we see people under that age doing things we'd connect to "adulthood" (i.e. Chilchuck was a father of two by the time he was fourteen). It leads to a messy situation where Jaysun already feels and considers himself an adult (which Jason does in the comics as well, and is something Bruce straight up says to Gordon because of Jason's experiences despite the guy barely being a teenager). This leads to a Mia-esque situation where Jaysun falls for Bruce in a romantic and sexual sense since he is, by all accounts, soon an adult (he still dies at the same age)(Mia did have short lived crushes on Ollie and later Connor and Roy and it is something normal that happens to older foster kids. Repeat, this is normal and those feelings later morph into something different in most cases.) This is something that Bruce never even considers about because dwarves aren't adults until they're 40 (which means to Bruce even Dick who is an adult man by tall-men standards, is still a kid and this was a major wedge between them as Bruce simply didn't internalize the differences between them).

It also leads to major imposter syndrome in Jaysun as he sees himself as a replacement for Dick (which Jason also does), but in this case it's one who's even easier to control and treat like a pet. Is he right? Only sorta. Bruce probably doesn't mean to do so, but it's in the same way Senshi and Marcille still haven't understood the way they treat their friends (see: Marcille and Falin).

A load of stuff happens between Jaysun's death and him leaving Gotham for Melini (for reasons I still gotta write about 😅)

For relationships:

Jaysun -> Roy: Roy is probably the person Jaysun trusts the most. Roy, as someone from the Western Continent, has had his fair share of experiences close to Jaysun's involving the perception against him as well as experiences being dropped by loved ones even if they have, for the most part, reconciled. Roy is one of the five (him, Kori, Bizarro, Artemis, Talia) people that knows Jaysun's ability to use magic despite his race's infamous lack of skill and capability with it. He doesn't know the reason WHY, but he knows when to push and when not to. Jaysun and Roy are regulars in dungeon parties that the other leads or are a part of. Jaysun meanwhile is someone who will have to be torn apart from Roy because they both have attachment issues worse than Jaysun's self image, self harm, and fear of abandonment issues (which Roy does share). Most of these will take a lot of work to handle but considering Jaysun's stuck on light to no work for the next few months (the actual canon dungeon meshi story), I have faith in them.

Jaysun -> Dick: So so so so many Bruce issues holy shit. As much as Dick and Jaysun don't want to admit it, both have a load of similar experiences as not being seen as a person with agency caused by being raised by a long lived race when both of them are short lived ones (Dick being a tall-man). This is something that's touched upon with Kabru in Dungeon Meshi, but his foster mother was different beast from Bruce though both have absolutely caused issues in their kids. At the same time Jaysun having been taken in second, resents Dick for having a closer place to Bruce while Jaysun feels like he was more of a pet than a son (both part of the family but not equal in it). Meanwhile Dick dislikes Jaysun's overall demeanor and holds what he did in Gotham against him (which, fair) even if in the end both of them are in the same place (away from Bruce, not thought of completely as people by the man they devoted a large chunk of their lives to (most of his life in Dick's case as at 30 he's reached the halfway point for tall-men), and floundering to find footing despite their supports networks (Dick was part of a dungeoneering group called the Titans which are about as close as you can get to celebrity status for their kind of work). Also unlike Jaysun, Dick hasn't accepted his own attraction to Bruce who despite the over twenty years he's known Dick, has changed little while Dick has become a man grown. They had sex once in the dungeon that was ill-advised and hurt both of them and probably have it a few more times specifically for those reasons until they start seeing one another on more equal terms (if that ever happens). Tldr; the spectre of Bruce haunts them.

[bungerc0re]

theres some attitude that thinks because misogyny and transphobia can intersect the isolated transphobia someone experiences no longer matters at all. it's weird

[kithj]

is it just me or is the southern book club's guide to slaying vampires.... really bad?

[philsdrivinglicence]

Killing the white supremacist inside you. Easy mode. From one whitey to another.

Disclaimer: I am not an academic or an expert. Just a white person who's life was changed for the radically better during the BLM protests of 2020 who wants to share what worked for them.

Below is a non-comprehensive list of first steps you can take to begin the hard work of unpicking the layers upon layers of white supremacist bullshit baked into you from birth by the culture we live in (even if you grew up progressive or in a big city you are not exempt from this).

I made this list because POC in the phandom have been doing a lot of heavy lifting the past few days. I figured the least I could do is share what worked for me to understand what racism is and how its more subtle forms can manifest.

I hope we can all use the below as a starting point to help make the phandom a less racist and more welcoming place.

(btw I do think we are generally more self ware than many fandoms but as we are a mostly white space we have to keep ourselves accountable as white supremacy is an insidious bastard that will catch you unawares if you let it.)

So. Without further ado.

- read this article

- Read "Why I'm No Longer Talking To White People About Race" by Reni Eddo Lodge (how you choose to source this book I will not judge but consider supporting a local book store)

- Stop being so afraid of being called racist. - Hopefully, if you are engaging in good faith then you already accept that racism is baked into our society. Racist is not a dogwhistle for "evil person". It is a descriptor of very specific behavior that we can all fall into if we don't keep ourselves sharp. So part 2 of this step is -

- Look back on your life and identify a time when you have participated in racism. My go to example is my 14 year old "never met a black person in real life" self, yelling along to N****s in Paris (uncensored, duh) at a house party with a bunch of other white 14 year olds. If you're getting really introspective you'll probably have multiple of these such moments. Sit with them, feel the cringe, think about what you might say to that version of yourself now, how you might have acted differently had you been aware the behavior was problematic. And then forgive yourself. Self flagellation does nothing good, the thing to do now is learn and progress. But you can't know what to change/avoid if you don't have examples to work off of. (This one is lowkey hard mode but worth doing early on so you can see your own progress over time. Also, if the examples you are thinking of were directly harmful you may also want to consider making amends in some way).

- Look at your playlists/album collection. If you don't see many/any POC musicians make a conscious effort to change that. Seek out interviews with your favourite artists and see which black artists have influenced them. Add them to your rotation.

- Do this with youtubers, authors, actors, screenwriters etc, etc. In all forms or art and entertainment, look at what you consume and if you find it overerall skewing white, make an effort to fill it with colour.

(Kill the voice inside you that says "I just prefer - blank-", or "the stuff they make just isn't for me, I prefer stuff I can relate to". This is the white supremacy talking, POC are not a monolith, look harder, you will find artists you connect with)

- Every time a POC points something out to you that seems off to them (I often refer to this as "this doesn't pass the sniff test") before jumping in to defend your fave/point of view/TV show etc. really sit with what they have said and try to consider why what they are pointing out, while not a big deal to you, could be a big deal to them.

Like I said up top, this is a non comprehensive list and is only intended as a starting point.

I usually wouldn't post something like this as I prefer to stay out of discourse but the conversation going on this past few days has really disappointed me. So many people are being dismissive toward POC fans and completely missing the points they are trying to make. So here's my two cents. Hope it's helpful.

[cator99]

I always get detained at da border because PROFUNC never ended but basically I'm like if a targeted individual didn't even care

[crimeronan]

Your dad would LIKE the GNC black disco video??

lol, yes! for all his many many MANY faults, conscious antiblackness isn't one of them. (subconscious/unexamined antiblackness is another thing entirely, but that's not the point here.)

my dad grew up with disco and was a club-aged teen in the 70s. disco music is nostalgic, he knows like.... all of it. he wouldn't consider any of the outfit in that vid GNC except maybe the shoes, and those he'd just find funny. if i showed him that vid he'd talk about his teenage memories. it would be nice!

like. this is a guy whose favorite films are canned action movies, many of which are 70s and 80s blaxploitation flicks. he doesn't know what the blaxploitation genre is or that it was targeted toward urban Black audiences rather than rural white men.... he genuinely does not notice when the cast of a movie is almost all Black. (or when a cast is almost all women, for that matter.)

they're action movies that are set in the city and are cool and have a lot of guns. that's all he cares about!

[mrsterlingeverything]

🙂