#respect nonwhite characters

[dutchbabey]

people are reductive as is to Harry and James Potter! If you’re going to work with a bipoc character, make them interesting and multifaceted, like Harry and James both are in canon. Yes, Harry is good at quidditch. He’s also very smart, he loves deeply, he’s sassy, he’s loyal. James grows as a person despite having done inexcusable things and was powerful enough that Voldemort recruited him for his cause. James is also similar to regulus’s depiction: he is a spoiled pure blood kid w poise and grace. James!! is a refined creature of grace and poise from the upper wizarding class, not some bumbling idiot!!!!

Also regarding their common ships

Draco is canonically a LOSER. He’s PATHETIC. He’s not this suave ice king. He’s a coward. Harry is more than his quidditch self and more than the chosen one and Draco sees that. Draco is at best a disappointing heir to the Malfoy bloodline and is deeply uncomfortable with the violence around him and Harry sees that because he’s perceptive and has empathy. Their weird tension and chemistry is what’s alluring about the ship, not the “opposites attract” sort of thing that some of this fandom seems to think it is.

Most of the jegulus content I’ve seen does reduce James to a racist caricature of a brown person, with regulus being this poised and pretty man and James being, well, an idiot.

I’m not opposed to Harry and James being bipoc. I LOVE a good bipoc Harry moment. It’s my HC too! But please be careful when depicting them as such because they are both so much more than the reductive stereotypes some of the fandom has placed on them.

there’s something sinister about the way certain parts of the fandom choose to depict harry and james as persons of colour... and highlight their athletic musculature and physical strength while simultaneously reducing them to knobheads.

ah, yes, boorish brawny brown boys who are helpless buffoons without a pale pureblood romantic interest—a refined creature of grace, pedigree, and erudition—who deigns to be seen and interact with them, and even educate them on their manners and letters (bonus points for mocking them for their empty brains occasionally)

[quatregats]

Thinking about when Dr. Jacob goes off at dinner about triliteral root systems and then is like whoops was that too much. No one understands me like he does

[a-flickering-soul]

the thing about elpheba was that she Was that formative bitch of color for me as a young child like even when i saw her being performed by white women she was so vehemently othered in the same way i myself was as a nonwhite girl in a white school and she was always performed with the same exact kind of aloofness, distaste, defensiveness, and mistrust that i instinctively understood because it often was the only way to survive while retaining any sort of dignity and respect for yourself. her being played by a black woman who fought specifically for elpheba's character design to retain multiple links to black femininity just makes sense in my head because honestly elpheba was never white (literally and figuratively).

[leporellian]

actually i'm going to talk about the met's weird thing with the rust belt more because it was definitely one of those things where a few years ago when the new met lucia was in development i was like, oh cool i wonder what they'll do with that, but now that we're here... man does it leave a bad taste in the mouth.

here's a question for you: Why Do So Many Operas Take Place In Seville?

seville is the setting for some hundreds of operas, including many of the famous ones: the barber of seville, carmen, la forza del destino, the marriage of figaro, fidelio, don giovanni (which actually might not take place in seville but given don juan stories up to them did it sticks)... the list keeps going. and there was a legitimate reason for this- for hundreds of years, seville was seen as a seedy and sexualized location where anything could happen. that exoticism carries over into the plot of many of the Seville Operas, which often feature seductions, crimes, and passion stories that fit neatly into the tales of the seedy city.

opera is about, in a lot of ways, EXOTICIZING OTHER PLACES. the spectacle of a setting was often a major part of the excitement of seeing a new opera, especially in the 19th century. but some of these places 'work' better than others, for a variety of reasons that boil down to the politics of representation and who is being who onstage.

seville works as an Exotic Opera Location Du Jour for multiple reasons. for one thing, if you notice, a lot of the seville operas take place 60-100+ years before the composition of the opera. for example, the marriage of figaro and don giovanni were composed in 1786 and 1787 respectively, and both depict 1600s seville. if you were writing a Seville Opera right now, for comparison, it would probably take place between 1890 and 1960- there's enough of a time gap that exploring the world as a more fantastical setting is easier to swallow. for another, seville is in western europe, and many of the composers depicting it were also from western europe. there is an evened playing field. (THERE IS A NOTABLE EXCEPTION about this that I WILL GET TO SOON.) finally, now that these operas are over a century old, we're even more removed from their concept of 'seville' and the 'seville' in operas has been turned into something of a convenient fantasy location in which to put an opera. it's something out of a medieval times dinner and tournament and not necessarily meant to be Actual Real Seville at all, which works fine because Seville Operas work without needing much context about the location. don jose is a soldier, you don't need to know what seville soldiers' duties were. figaro is a barber, you don't need to know what barbers in seville were like. and so on.

but there are other opera locations that don't serve this purpose as well- often nonwhite regions appropriated by white composers. the incredibly warped conceptions of egypt that show up in aida and the magic flute, the looking-glass japan of madama butterfly, the brief moment in which la fanciulla del west wherein the opera remembers the existence of native american peoples... suddenly the make-believe of exoticism goes away and is replaced by a sour feeling because in many cases these cultures could not have a say on their own depictions in the operatic world, while the western europeans featured in the operas that exoticize locations like seville or paris could.

carmen is an interesting case study in Opera Exoticism because it features a location that is fine enough to exoticize (early 1800s seville) and a titular character that is not. carmen was- and, in many productions, is still- written as romani. she embodies many negative stereotypes about the culture- she is seductive, morally ambiguous, a smuggler, a femme fatale. yet we as an audience are made to sympathize with her. she is honest about who she is, accepting of the hard truths that are given to her; she is close to her friends and her crueler moments come across as more of an ill-planned joke than a real sense of antipathy. carmen is both a product of how romani people were written by white men in her time, and progressive in that we root for her against the (white) don jose. (and it should be noted that she knows that if he kills her he will be executed for it- carmen is about a mutual kill.) a good carmen production will evaluate all of these features and include them into the work somehow; be it through metatextual commentary, or careful representation, or understanding of what the audience is seeing.

anyway, now that we've covered all that, let's go look at The Met Opera's Current Fascination With Lower Class American Communities and see what we find there.

the rust belt and the sun belt have captured the imagination of the met opera recently, as seen in their current productions of lucia di lammermoor and carmen. these settings are depicted as grimy, miserable, and joyless; women are thrown around by men, men are depicted as one-dimensional monsters that are not to be understood or seen into. the cruelty is the point- these productions do not treat lower-class americans as people to relate to or understand. the sole exceptions are lucia- who is made out to be something of an outsider, so the audience can relate to her- and carmen, who is misinterpreted into being a sad woman who just wants love (god forbid a woman have some other motivation). the racial issues that dominate the cultural conversation in america are unspoken of in these productions, even when there is an opportunity to; this becomes especially uncomfortable in carmen, where the above history of carmen as a nonwhite woman and the opera's setting on the US-Mexico border (with the soldiers cast as border agents!) goes unmentioned in the name of 'heightening the class and gender inequality'- both of which were already in the original work along with the race inequality! these productions are both directed by non-american white people. simon stone is from australia, carrie cracknell is from britain. why would they want to depict this setting? because they see it as a dark, cynical den of seediness and repressed sexuality- a world where we don't have to worry about empathy, or broader implications, because the people in these settings do not go to the met- a world where we can look on with revulsion and unease.... this crosses the line from exoticism into fetishization, in which lower class people become pawns for the met to use as set dressing.

this is especially uncomfortable because of opera's long history being seen as a 'rich people hobby'. opera is characterized as snobbish, useless, reprehensible; an art form that exists only to please the rich and the white and the male-dominated. all of which is not true! i believe to the bottom of my heart that everybody deserves a night at the opera, and that there is an opera for everyone, and everybody should feel welcome in the opera house (or other opera space du jour). and there are so many people working to change the industry from the inside, particularly the work of artists of color to broaden the opera canon and depictions of that canon as we know them. but as long as the met continues to use poor people as set dressing instead of bothering to communicate with them in a meaningful way, as long as the met sees these settings as places where brutes live instead of human beings, that stereotype of the rich man's hobby is going to continue. and the met is going to suffer for it- as i suspect that, as time goes on, the voyeuristic lens of these operas into the lives of abused lower-class women will be seen as more and more revolting.

TLDR

[joyisoverparty]

I’ve made a post like this before but I really need you guys to stop with the “feral” Damian headcanons. For one, he’s a traumatized child who responds to his trauma in unconventional ways. It’s also wildly inappropriate to define a nonwhite character in a majority white cast as the savage or uncivilized one. But beyond that, it’s a flagrant mischaracterization. This is a kid raised by Ra’s al Ghul. Ra’s is a lot of things — but in almost every depiction of him, he’s a levelheaded, mild-mannered person. He’s not a towering, rubbing his hands together and cackling type of villain. He’s very respectable towards Bruce, especially when they’re occasionally on the same side. Ra’s isn’t going to raise Damian to be an ankle-biting, snot-nosed brat.

Damian himself has almost never been characterized as feral. He’s not polite, sure, and he’s very blunt in his delivery on things, but he has never been the doesn’t even understand table manners kid. He’s always been depicted as crisp and proper. As a matter of fact, he’s often characterized as too proper. One of his major flaws has always been that he doesn’t know when to turn off the “performance mode” and just relax like a normal kid.

I know a lot of fans of the Batfam have never picked up a comic, but that doesn’t make it fine to just twist a character until they’re unrecognizable. I am so tired of the “Damian bites” type of posts.

[olderthannetfic]

I have a lot respect for you but it's frustrating to the discussion on fandom and racism boiled down to a few fic interpretation arguments and then thoroughly dismissed.

--

That's inevitable when the campaign gave off vibes that were so strongly at odds with its assertion that it wasn't about which fic is bad.

I think the other problem is that none of us have any actual answers other than better blocking features or more ways to customize search for a given user.

How do you solve racism?

I don't think callouts are that useful most of the time, though I will signal boost when fairly credible posts about situations like that TOG one come around. I think privately giving friends support is useful, but that's not something you do at scale or that you mandate for other people. I don't think that shadowbanning fic by removing it from basic AO3 searches is desirable. I don't think increasing one ship vs. another's content is meaningful. I do think posts about gross media tropes can be useful if they're well-researched.

I was watching a speech by Beverly Daniel Tatum the other day, and she was talking about strategies that work offline. A lot of it boiled down to raising kids in multicultural neighborhoods and sending them to diverse schools. She had some examples where it had worked, but getting people to stop being NIMBY assholes so that housing and schools can actually be fixed is extremely difficult.

I think a lot of problems in fandom are symptoms that show up far downstream of the actual causes, and it's not that easy to solve anything here. It's not that we shouldn't oppose racism, but most of the suggestions I've seen just don't address what's actually going on (like canon screwing over a character and making them less popular as a consequence). A lot of fandom activism strikes me as rats in a barrel. People cling to the illusion that they can fix things here because it's less daunting than the reality that they're going to have to fight Hollywood or that they're not going to see that much success in their lifetime even if they do their activism well.

A nonwhite friend said something to me the other day about just wanting to stop hearing about anti-racist activism in fandom, full stop. They don't come here for that, and they're tired. I think it's a common sentiment and is part of why more of the informed people don't weigh in.

I post the majority of asks I get. If people have stories about fandom racism, I'll post them. It's just that the ones I've gotten are all like "I was harassed for writing my own identity wrong" with a plea to chill the fuck out and stop assuming things.

If people have practical suggestions, I'll post those too. I just think few of us have any really useful ideas.

[neechees]

about the whole preoccupation w incest thing amongst white people on the internet i haven't really noticed it? i am white and find it intriguing (i was incestually abused as a child and so i find it interesting how it develops in families, how people respond to it, etc (it's kind of been part of my healing process)) but i don't really see anyone being obsessed w it? maybe pointing out themes of it in media but that's kinda it? some of my mutuals, idk if they're white, but they have also been abused the same way i have and find discussing it or finding media with incest in it to be a part of exposure therapy/dealing with the trauma. id love to hear your thoughts on it :)

I've talked about this a few times in the past, but I'm posting again to make my views & boundaries known that 1. Dni if you're a "pr0shipper" & enjoy shipping incest, I do not want you here, 2. Fiction does not exist in a vacuum. Im going with the assumption that anon is not a proshitter & they're asking this in good faith. Just putting a readmore because this got long and also for anyone who is triggered by this topic

The conversation I think is surrounding proshitters ("shippers"), but I think the conversation also goes deeper into things like "incest" & "step family" being popular porn site searches that very often feature white actors, as well as those things showing up in film, book, and TV, but in romantisize/sexualized/downplayed ways written by and featuring, again, white people. So I believe generally the "obsession" part means White people who are overly preoccupied with seeing incest quite often, especially and specifically in sexualized, fetishized, and/or romantisized ways. Because personally (& I believe other nonwhite people can attest to this as well, and that's what the other posts mean to say) a lot of the people who have this overkeen interest in incest are White.

Like it's not talking about people wanting to have nuanced depictions of incest, why it's bad, how that affects people & can be extremely traumatizing, and then approaching that topic respectfully (because it should be, that's a terrible thing and showing respect for victims of it & ensuring its not, accidentally or not, endorsed or shown as "okay" or normalizing it, is important. Execution as well as intent are important & should be done with tact.) The people who are mentioned as being "obsessed with incest" as these pr0shippers who find incest "sexy", want to see it, actively search it out where it is both romantisized/sexualized/fetishized, and will apply it in fanon interpretations even when it doesn't exist in canon or this interpretation wouldn't/doesn't make sense anyway, specifically because they enjoy seeing it. They find it titillating. Quite a few of the popular users on this site who have famously defended incest (and/or pedophilia) both in real life AND as proshitters have been... White. And racist.

I think there IS a correlation between White people, proshitters (who are usually people who defend romantisized depictions of things like incest), and liking incest, because I very often seen proshitters be racist (and other types of bigoted tbh), and ALSO defend things like racist depictions of nonwhite characters, things like slavery AU's featuring Black characters, or colonizer AU's, and the like. It's a common joke (not so much of a joke tho tbh) that the more White people that exist prominently in a fandom, then the less fun it is, specifically because of racism that will then exist in that fandom. So there's this huge overlap of White fans being racist but ALSO there being a lot of fans who enjoy seeing incest in their fave medias, because of the proshitters, who do both. There was also that whole thing where a bunch of popular white users on here (many of whom ALSO defended incest) defended sexual raceplay & then called any nonwhite person (ESPECIALLY BLACK USERS) "homophobic" or "transphobic" for rightfully and correctly calling this racist.

Lots of White people like to do this thing where, if they are marginalized in some way, then they'll weaponize that marginalization against anyone who criticizes them for something (most often racism), even if their marginalized identity has nothing to do with the topic or was brought up. White women who happened to be gay called me "homophobic" and "misogynist" (even though I'm a bi woman but you know) because I talked about the nazi associations & racist inclinations of cottage core. I saw multiple White lotr fans call a specific artist "homophobic" because that artist asked that their art not be tagged as an incest ship, and that incest ship is very popular (and their art piece was depicting them as just family), but this incest ship isn't even canon, and the artist wasn't actually homophobic or against gay relationships in general. So they essentially just called this artist "homophobic" for no reason. Because they didn't want their art piece of two family members to be incorrectly interpreted as incestuous. Im even reluctant to draw fan art of some of my favorite characters who are family members, because I dont want people who ship incest to interact with it or tag it as that, and the fact that so many artists even have to ask people NOT to do this is insane.

Like it's one thing if someone analyzes media with it or might find comfort in certain characters in books or TV etc because they feel seen in their trauma, and yet can acknowledge that this isn't for everybody and not everyone processes their trauma this way, and that seeing it (incest in media) can make trauma WORSE for many people, AND that not all representations are made equally, and none of those are free from being available to criticism in approach of that representation anyway. But very often there's White fans (many who aren't even incest victims themselves, so they don't have the "I'm coping" excuse) that are offended that other people don't like seeing incest at ALL, that people will (understandably) not want to interact with them if they're a pr*shipper, and hate being reminded that treating incest like its a fun little interest that shouldn't be handled with care just because it's being featured in a fictional situation (or even sometimes when it's NOT) is pretty fucked up and even disrespectful & insensitive to incest survivors, and then chalk up any criticism of the amount of sexualized/romanticized incest as "censorship" even though that's not what's happening, and again, very often self victimize themselves and often are also racist.

[mmprviolet]

Why I love Earthspark

Spoilers ahead

Female characters treated like people and not weird or afterthoughts

The child characters act like children and not mini adults to please boomers

The Decepticons have more than just Card Carrying Evil

Starscream's abuse is finally taken seriously for once and without woobifying him

Megatron is Scottish

The terrans are cool

NB rep for both terran and human

The main human family are Black American and Filipino

Seriously when was the last tine we saw an interracial pair where both parties are nonwhite?

Dot is a badass, we learn about her as a person, disabled but treated with agency

Alex is also a badass and a bumblebee fanboy, yet we also learn a bit about him

Dot and Alex 🤝 Tom and Maddie = healthy relationships in classic kid properties

Elita is also a badass she's also closer to her personality than the weird trope of making her a villain or fridging her

Bumblebee is a struggling young adult and not a infantilized annoying caricature

Actually his arc seems to be one giant rebuttal against the trend of making him Kid Appeal by having him struggle with being a mentor and dealing with kids

Breakdown is Sonic the Hedgehog

The main human villain is a legitimate threat without being a villain sue or boring

The other main villain is literally named Karen (and also a legit threat)

Optimus Prime is back to being funny and not a overly serious messiah, angry old man, Nerd or cop

Soundwave's revenge bod

Skywarp and Nova Storm are girls and can put up a fight they also have more relevancy than u can say with TFA Blackarachnia

Scratch that Skywarp in animated media again and gets to use her powers

Dot and Mo have natural hair and even wear bonnets

If you look past Mo's rather uncanny design she's actually really cute and lovable

Robby is cool too

Thrash and Twitch hmmm love seeing two characters of both worlds embracing all their heritage

TWITCH'S CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT especially her dynamic with Megatron

He calls her little bird

Nigthshade. Just Nightshade. Cool altmode cool personality, doesn't sugarcoat their identity (it's not 5000% perfect but still very great to see)

Really good message about respecting history while also thinking for yourself and new generation not making those same mistakes

the old generation gets to learn and grow too, the only ones who don't refuses to

Bringing in characters like Tarantulas, Hardtop, basically characters we haven't seen much of

Love how the experiences characters go thru aren't easily wiped away a la Grimlock and Hashtag both experiencing PTSD from the harm inflicted on them and allowed to feel those emotions

Steve Blum is Starscream again but still sounds fresh and not rip Prime beat for best

The cultural details while not 5000% perfect are pretty great like league above past shows

Like you can tell more than one writer of color is in the room

More nonwhite VAs instead of the usual 3-4 max

Angered the ultra conservatives

Thrash is Hunter and Kid Andrias

Jawbreaker is funny as hell I also liked his abilities and dynamic with grimlock.

[utilitycaster]

I agree that the introduction of homophobia in Exandria in fanon is a nonsensical way to add drama. However I understand the compulsion to do it for Candela in particular since it's so close to the real world victorian era period and it does feels slightly odd to have explicitly out queer people in a world that is essentially the 19th century with monsters.

At the risk of being a bit too glib, if you can imagine a turn of the century world with monsters but have trouble imagining it having legalized gay marriage and gender transition? Skill issue.

More seriously, and the post I linked in my post yesterday covers it (and was in conversation with this post which I'd reblogged at the time which also covers the same topic, and in general I would recommend trying to get a sense of that line of conversation before sending anon asks defending behavior for, to be blunt, literally no reason) the problem isn't that people assume the world is homophobic. It's that they assume it's homophobic so that Marion and Sean (in this case) are afraid to confess their love for each other, but do not consider any other ramifications thereof. The homophobia exists to serve as a barrier, but no one seems to be perpetuating it; it just is some miasma. It's like reverse sex pollen. And once it's served its use, the characters do get together and everyone is happy because the homophobia vanished now that it's not needed to explain any character behaviors.

Even more seriously, no one seems to re-insert racism into the narrative, and they rarely insert misogyny, even though Rowan Hall talking about her queer PC in another game explicitly talks about educational access on the basis of gender. No one blinks at Charlotte being a successful businesswoman with ties to a criminal underworld that is distinctly not segregated and who seems to receive no special attention from the authorities. Howard and Jean are both highly educated and well-off and entirely respected despite being visibly nonwhite; I advise you look up statistics for Native American professors or female surgeons (let alone nonwhite female surgeons) in 1907 in the real world. No one ever seems to suggest that the barrier for Sean and Marion could be interracial, despite the US in this era having quite a number of anti-miscegenation laws. And in the context of another, longstanding point regarding fandoms centering a very white queer experience, often to the point of dismissing nonwhite characters' canon experiences and rewriting them as queer rather than (or at least in addition to) racialized (of which Jester, Dorian, and Fjord are all examples within Exandria) or even class-based (explicitly a theme in Candela), that is extremely telling.

This is, at least in Candela right now, something of a moot point in that after episode 2 this line was mostly dropped, both as character relationships developed and because a married same-gender couple was shown onscreen; but it pops up in Exandria pretty regularly as new fans come in, and if chapter 3 of Candela Obscura gets new viewers and there's a popular queer ship I expect to see it again. I in fact expect to see that fan-led insertion of queerphobia and no similar fan-made insertion of (period-typical) racism or misogyny.

[hufflpuffin]

Controversial opinion I guess but im going a little insane seeing people crying about a black actress potentially getting casted as Astrid in a fictional comedic fantasy world where beer drinking long bearded vikings in silly spiky armor and horned helmets ride dragons because "its not historically accurate to vikings" when there are literally nonwhite vikings in the HTTYD franchise.

The world of HTTYD itself is based in stereotypes and satirizes vikings and viking culture, so its odd to me to be upset about historical inaccuracy in a live action adaptation, but only upset specifically about skin color. Astrid in the books is literally named 'Camicazi' and from an all female tribe of warriors led by a viking called Big Boobied Bertha. That's not historically or source accurate either, but you can probably understand why the film adaptation redesigned the character. The HTTYD world is not that serious where historical accuracy is super important, its exaggerated and played up for laughs.

The original Astrid is still there, in 3 movies and multiple tv shows. Different adaptations don't have to be completely accurate to the source material, especially when the movies themselves are not accurate to the source material of the books, and the creators can change and interpret their own characters differently across mediums.

I wanna say the real issue for me is that HTTYD needs a live action adaptation at all because I think animation should be a respected medium in itself and not just "for kids", but then again I still feel like an old woman yelling at clouds because it's maybe it's just not for me but there are other people who genuinely like live-actions and i'm frankly im happy to see fans get more out of a beloved franchise 🤷‍♀️

[your-fave-is-asian]

Pinned post

[Plain text: Pinned post /End PT]

Submissions are: OPEN

[Plain text: Open /End PT]

Hi! This is a blog intended for you to submit Asian characters (whether canon or headcanon) please read the rules before submitting!

The main characters I want submitted are characters without canonical ethnicities (non-human, object show, audio drama, etc.) and canonical Asian characters but white characters who you see as Asian or other nonwhite characters you see as their nonwhite ethnicity + Asian are okay!

Mod is @zeros-dumpsterfire, I’m Vietnamese and also a minor

DNI: Racists, queerphobes, zionists, NSFW blogs, pro-police, ableists

Anything that isn’t a submission is tagged “Not a submission”

Rules

[Plain text: Rules /End PT]

When submitting a character with no canon art/design PLEASE provide a fan art LINK

Do NOT submit a character as the ethnicity they are not (IE. Don’t submit a Filipino character as Japanese) and do NOT just submit them as just “Asian”. We are not a monolith

You MUST specify if what you are submitting is canon or not

Do NOT submit a character who is canonically not Asian and not white as just Asian (IE. If they are Black submit them as Black and say, Pakistani)

Think before you submit! Why are you headcanoning the docile character as Chinese and the manipulative character as Indian?

Please just, capitalize ‘Asian’, ethnicities and country names. It’s basic respect.

If you know a character and worry their headcanon comes from a place of bigotry please bring it up with me!

Just, don’t submit real people

Don’t bully people over their headcanons? Basic fandom niceties please.

Blacklisted fandoms: Anything related to Vivziepop, Harry Potter

[chaifootsteps]

Let me list of all known nonwhite characters in hazbin: Alastor is mixed race and he’s a cannibal killer, Velvette is black and she’s friends with a literal rapist abuser, Vaggie is salvadoran and a leak states that she’s the first to die plus she gets no respect with treated as butt monkey, Sera is coded as nonwhite and she turns out to be an evil villain because heaven is bad, Wow Viv such a great nonwhite rep! All of your nonwhite characters are either evil or mistreated! /j

For Velvette's sake, I hope she never appears in this show. For the sake of wanting to see more people to call out Viv, I hope she does.

[dicapiito]

Tbh I’m seeing a helluva a lot of fetishizing of Mizu being anyone other than a mixed Japanese woman who has to live as a man to protect herself

The show makes this very clear and yet there’s all this yt nonsense trying to make her into something that’s fits into their yt fetishizing fantasies and it’s very sad and infuriating to see.

Trying to act like there’s ‘different ways’ to ‘ define’ Mizu is actually not only racist and fetishizing but it also shows a lack of respect to Japanese women and what they went through in historical times. I can’t believe so many people think it’s cool to dismiss what Mizu is going through being mixed Japanese and being shunned and to try and tie that into some modern day white people gender bullshit is extremely racist and there’s not really any room to argue this tbh.

The show is not that complicated to make this clear about Mizu but because people love to act like Asian characters are little cutsie stuffed animals and want to act like this is a study about some yt gender identity bullshit instead of what it actually is; it’s going to be unfortunate seeing yts do this crap like they always do when they see a nonwhite character in media and headcanon some serious racist stereotypes for Asian characters.

Not sure why people think it’s okay to be dismissive of Mizu and her being a mixed Japanese woman in Japan and want to rant about some gender identity and pronoun bullshit ( and yes it’s bullshit in this particular case) and just make up yt fantasies that fetishize Japanese characters. Whining that “ omg I hope Mizu isn’t a cis woman” and complaints like that makes one a racist and a fetishizing assfuck.

And no, there’s no room for acting like there’s a ‘ pronoun discussion’ or a ‘ gender identity’ discussion because it’s pretty obvious that it’s about mixed Japanese woman who has to hide who she is so she doesn’t get killed. The plot wasn’t that hard to understand

[sophieinwonderland]

you switch between arguing that tulpamancy has nothing to do with tibetan buddhism and arguing that it's actually cultural exchange which are contradictory and also the second is just regular cultural appropriation but also, what exchange? i've repeatedly seen people in the tulpamancy community assert that southeast asian buddhists can't be accurate sources on what tibetan buddhists think(as opposed to non-buddhist northern americans, who are somehow more accurate sources) because tibet is in china. it's in southeast china which directly borders southeast asia and has centuries of cultural exchange with southeast asia because they are neighbors and at many points in history did not have borders between them..... and to that end i have to ask, what cultural exchange? if you can't be bothered to do any deeper research than the first page of the google panel and every time a buddhist tries to argue with you it's time to whitesplain wikipedia to them, forgive me for doubting that you even have surface level knowledge of tibet let alone any actual connections to any region with a prominent buddhist population and history. like the accusations of orientalism are because your engagement with the topic is fundamentally shallow and all you are doing is taking. exchange is when you EXCHANGE. if a buddhist invites you to celebrate vesak with them, that's cultural exchange because you're participating in their religion with them and sharing your time and enthusiasm. if your tibetan friend gifts you a chuba, that's cultural exchange because you're friends sharing culture with each other. that's what distinguishes exchange from appropriation, that the people whose culture you're being inspired by are relevant to you and that you have made an attempt to understand them beyond the ways their culture can be useful to you, which i have seen mountains of evidence is not the case in the tulpamancy community. and while i do think this community should consider talking to and befriending modern practicing buddhists beyond one redditor who claimed to be a tibetan buddhist once, perhaps even with the respect to consider that asians might know more about asia than you do( and not even to force them to litigate whether or not sna tshogs sprul pa can be fire emblem characters i just think yall should diversify your social circle a little), i should also say that on this topic that i actually don't care if you would rather just switch to saying that tulpamancy has nothing to do with tibetan buddhism to avoid learning about tibetans/buddhists/tibetan buddhists. firstly thats just another excuse for your shallow engagement with those cultures because that's still the origin. that's still where the name is from. and it's still cultural appropriation to ignore that- actually it's the first examples of cultural appropriation. the term was invented to describe white people taking aspects of nonwhite cultures and pretending that they invented them and doing their best to separate themselves from any responsibility to treat the people whose culture they're taking with any respect. so if you want to use the term tulpa, and especially if you want to insist that it's not cultural appropriation, your community needs to do the work to not just be shallowly appropriating. instead of only bringing up religious tulpas in the context of christianity, look into the actual nirmāṇakāya. talk to some of the buddhists you're currently focusing on epicly owning the second they don't 100% agree with you. also tenzin gyatso was a slaveowner pre-exile so you should consider not using him as an authoritative source. now, of course, this runs the risk that you might run into people who disagree with your view of tulpamancy or even outright reject it as a thing you should do(as a lot of buddhists on here have), which is again the point, to care about people beyond how they can serve to reinforce the thing you already wanted to do. if the tulpamancy community became known for their strong bond with/respect for practicing buddhists this would be a non-issue

You... don't think the Dalai Lama... should be used as an authoritative source... on Tibetan Buddhism?

Wow! That's certainly a take!

Sorry, I'm going to circle around back to this in a bit.

In any case, the arguments are not contradicting. When we discuss Western tulpas, there are two distinct types of tulpas that come up.

The first is the Alexandra David-Neel tulpa, which I'll call the ADL tulpa for short. The ADL tulpa was first brought to the West by Alexandra David-Neel, a French Buddhist and the first European woman to be given an audience with the Dalai Lama.

This version of the tulpa was recorded by Alexandra David-Neel who relied on the translation services of Lama Kazi Dawa Samdup, who himself had an interest in esotericism and may have influenced an interpretation of the tulpa that incorporated concepts from Western Theosophy.

The ADL tulpa was a creation of a cultural exchange. This was the type of tulpa that permeated Western culture for nearly a century prior to modern tulpamancy which came about in 2009.

The tulpa of tulpamancy borrows its concepts from the ADL tulpa rather than any practices the ADL tulpa was based upon.

It is so distant from the sprulpa and tulku as to be unrelated in anything but a vague etymology. Even the word "tulpa" isn't one typically used by actual Tibetan Buddhist practitioners. Basically, nothing in tulpamancy from the concept to the name is directly from Tibetan Buddhism.

With that explanation, back to the Dalai Lama.

This actually highlights one of the key reasons why I'm hesitant to just believe any story by anyone who lives in or has come from the general area.

Tibet and its history is incredibly politically charged with bias and misinformation on both sides.

It's true that the structure of Tibet resembled that of European Serfdoms, which is naturally unacceptable and indefensible. But I will point out that many scholars would draw a distinction between this system and what we think of when we discuss slavery.

But accusations of the Dalai Lama being a slave owner persist, being pushed heavily by the CCP as a justification for their invasion of Tibet and their dismantling of the Tibetan religion and culture. Conquerors always love to portray themselves as liberators, as we can see happening right now with Russia trying to justify their invasion of Ukraine by claiming to be trying to "denazify" it, and pushing a narrative that the people of Ukraine are supporting Russia's invasion.

I also have to point out that the Dalai Lama took power at 15, and China bullied Tibet into signing the country's sovereignty over to them that same year. He was a kid managing a country thrown into chaos. And he ultimately was forced to flee his home at 23.

I find it unrealistic to expect a kid with no real first-hand leadership experience while surrounded by aristocrats who don't want to lose their power to just be able to instantly change the entire governing system while dealing with an outside force trying to take its rights.

All of this is huge red herring though.

The Dalai Lama's past doesn't invalidate his authority as a source on Tibetan Buddhism, as the most prominent member of the Gelug school of Tibetan Buddhism and as one of the most respected Buddhist figures around the world.

Who else would you prefer us listen to? The puppet Panchen Lama chosen by the secular CCP invaders who have claimed exclusive right to choose the reincarnations of Lamas over the will and the traditions of Tibetans?

But who really knows? Perhaps I'm overstating the importance of the Dalai Lama in modern Tibet. I would love to see survey results from modern Tibetans. Perhaps the CCP propaganda is true and the Dalai Lama is actually hated by modern Tibetans.

But then, I honestly wouldn't trust the validity of such statistics anyway. After all, who would admit to supporting the Dalai Lama in a country where that can get you arrested or just disappeared without explanation? "Yes, I do support the Dalai Lama, now take me away for splitism."

The complete oppression of free thought and expression in Tibet and massive propaganda put out by the CCP has made it impossible to trust information coming out of the region in relation to the Dalai Lama. Especially from non-Tibetans who are going to be drawing a lot of their impressions of Tibet and its history from the CCP's state-run media.

When the propaganda campaign is that strong, proximity creates more opportunity to be informed, yes. But it also creates opportunity to be disinformed. Again, look to how many Russians legitimately believe they're fighting to denazify Ukraine at this moment. Despite being neighbors, would you consider the Russians well-informed on the opinions of Ukrainians or qualified to speak for them?

Can you understand why I'm hesitant to believe non-Tibetan Buddhists speaking for Tibetan Buddhists on this actually have the best interests of Tibet in mind?

And can you understand yet why I find the concept of "we're the same race as Tibetans and live nearby so we get to decide what's offensive to their culture" problematic? After all, silencing and speaking for Tibetans and Tibetan Buddhists is what the CCP has been doing for 70 years.

So moving back to the topic of tulpamancy: The Dalai Lama has said other religions can benefit from Tibetan Buddhist meditations and has encouraged that. If the specific practices tulpamancy was based on, and their terminology, were super closed and sacred and off-limits to outsiders, then that should be decided by other Tibetan Buddhists. (Ideally, actual spiritual leaders and teachers.) It's not up to any random people who just happen to reside in the same region to decide when Tibetan culture is being appropriated or in what ways they're allowed to share their culture.

Especially not ones like you who come at me parroting CCP propaganda and arguing that I should trust non-Tibetan Buddhists in the same region over the Dalai Lama on the matter of Tibetan Buddhism.

[spidermanifested]

this is not my usual type of post but ive been rotating some thoughts and i guess my blogs as good a place as any to get them organized. okay so this is basically my take on the entire discourse surrounding the "feminine (presumed cis lets be honest) women are uniquely oppressed for being feminine/making female characters quote unquote Less Feminine is antifeminist" thing. which i keep seeing come up. on this internet of ours

context being im a trans guy. grew up largely seen by others as female, probably, sort of. was about as far from a cishet womans feminine as you can imagine. not in a cool tomboy way. not in a way that society had a box for. and thats the thing, is that when you fail at gender, whether youre conscious of it or not, theres this extremely profound loneliness that comes with it. part of it was the autism but i made like 6 real-life friends total from ages 4 to 18 and there were no examples of anyone with an even remotely adjacent experience i could find in the media or irl. anytime a female character skirted a little too close to actual masculinity in a tv show or movie shed get that makeover eventually. i was bullied by both boys and girls but the girls who bullied me were uniformly very feminine.

and so i see people talking about how hard feminine women and girls have it, how the world hates them for being beautiful, and on the one hand its like okay, Misogyny Exists. thats not really refutable thats just the reality of it. society hates women. and as for eurocentric femininity specifically i understand its a hard tightrope to walk!!! you have to put on all these masks BUT make them seem natural, youre forced into these narrow boxes of acceptable behavior and appearance and desires, and if you under- or over-shoot then people get reminded the whole thing is a farce and get mad (often violently!) at YOU for it

........but then my thing is, that on one side of the tightrope, the "overperforming eurocentric femininity" side, the tradwife or girlboss or blonde bimbo side, theres an entire history of structural trope-crafting to break your fall, right. like its a shitty box but its the box society WANTS you to be in. they look at you and go "yep thats a woman. we dont like those but that sure is one". there are known social niches to carve out. theres a script.

on the unfeminine side theres just. nothing. its stone cold concrete down there. and apparently twitter would have you believe its actually that the "more masculine" somebody presumed female appears the more society respects them but that to me is the wildest and most nonsense take on the planet because if people see you as a woman or girl who has not taken the needed steps to justify your place as one of those things you might as well be an alien, or even a monster. theres no script at all. and i feel like this is one of the major experiences that trans and gnc people of every gender share-- god knows trans women get the brunt of the vitriol-- and from my knowledge a lot of nonwhite people too, and also fat and disabled people, like. there are SO many things that affect your ability to achieve even a fraction of success at this aspirational femininity.

ive had to see people for real make the argument that princess peach making an angry face is masculine. i think the most masculine woman anyone on twitter can imagine right now is like a businesswoman in a form-fitting pantsuit and light mascara. maybe the struggle of succeeding at femininity under patriarchy deserves exploration, ive seen plenty of coherent and reasonable points, its not without worth as a discussion. but i do not trust the general public with the topic without immediately sliding into bog standard gender policing and transphobia, and so in closing, when the mainstream feminist take on the whole thing seems to be "the more you perform the femininity expected of you the worse you have it", i get the sensation that nobody told me it was opposite day and im about to feel real silly

[cartridgeconverter]

Might talk more about this later, but I think something that could be explored more is the races of the different DG characters. Usually the only POC in a production is Zerlina, and while that’s fine, adding a racial element could make things interesting.

Obviously if Zerlina, Masetto, and Leporello are all nonwhite but DG, Elvira, Anna, and Ottavio are, that amplifies the class divide by adding race. This is sort of what happened with the Met 2023 production.

Speaking of that prod, a dynamic I see sometimes is Asian Zerlina and Black Masetto, which kind of plays into some unfortunate racial stereotypes, especially if Masetto is portrayed as more violent than normal. See the Peter Sellars prod.

If Anna, the Commendatore, and Ottavio are nonwhite, but DG is, that could show why Ottavio is so hesitant to accuse DG, because he may be less well respected due to his race. I think this also works if they are much younger than Giovanni. Or, if Anna and her father are nonwhite, but Ottavio is, that could show a disconnect between them that changes their dynamic with regards to marriage.

If Elvira is nonwhite, but Anna and Zerlina are, that could give her character some insecurities regarding her race and the beauty standards of the setting. It would also show how much the odds are stacked against her, with her being a single woman of color traveling alone.

Finally, if DG is nonwhite, but everyone else is, this clearly sets him apart from the rest of society. He might be seen as an exotic seducer or a violent criminal, like the Peter Sellars prod. That could easily be viewed as offensive, though, if not treated with care.

This was mainly just a musing on the potential usage of race to interpret this show. As a POC myself, it’s sad that theatre, especially opera, is a mainly white industry and I would love to see more casts with nonwhite actors or new works written focusing on nonwhite characters. Feel free to add on if you have more thoughts, I’d love to hear them :v