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claudeleine · 4 years ago

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Did it ever occur to anyone that Wanda’s Roma background in the comics was BUILT on racist stereotypes? Similarly to M’Baku but also several others. And maybe that’s why the show runners stepped away from that..?

okay, so i think what we have here is someone who skimmed the original post in question (paragraph 2) and likely didn’t ready any of the links attached because that first message has been addressed already... but for anyone else in the same boat:

from gavia baker-whitelaw’s article:

Wanda and Pietro's Romani heritage was canon for decades (including in their non-mutant backstory), although this depiction often had problematic undertones. Wanda is literally a mysterious foreign witch, a damaging stereotype that acquired more nuance in later comics. But instead of updating Wanda and Pietro as modern Jewish/Romani superheroes (much like how Black Panther's charismatic M'Baku started out as a villain named "Man-Ape"), Disney whitewashed them. This casting choice was divisive in 2013, when The Atlantic highlighted the negative connotations of casting a white blonde actress as Scarlet Witch. Roma people are a marginalized ethnic minority, and Disney chose to erase their presence from the MCU.

...This rewrite was rather tone-deaf, because it involved Wanda and Pietro volunteering for neo-Nazi experiments. In the comics, their original parents were Holocaust survivors. Whedon also ignored the most obvious solution to Wanda and Pietro's non-mutant backstory: Django and Marya Maximoff, their Romani parents from the comics.

white washing characters is never the best solution. it doesn’t address the issue in so much as it just sweeps it under the rug. as well as perpetuating the idea that white is some unproblematic neutral that ppl can just default to. like can you imagine if in an attempt to “fix” how m’baku is portrayed in the comics, they just...put a white guy in the role? you can’t just remove a characters racial or ethnic background. no one is saying that her comic background hasn’t been problematic, but this isn’t the way to remedy that.

@scarlet--wiccan has an amazing post about the erasure of this whole family’s ethnic identity in the fox x-men films (x).

@villyns also has a good post outlining some examples of the mcu white washing rather than actually fixing the problem (x).

and here’s a decent article on white washing in media and why it’s a problem (x), quote from this article below:

Making a movie is not an easy feat; there are many things to take into account and even more people that you have to please, but there are also standards and morals to uphold. Whitewashing, blackface, brownface or yellowface is not just about denying jobs to minority actors, appropriating the stories of these groups, perpetuating stereotypes or keeping them invisible, it is about undermining their value as human beings and turning them into stepping stones, props, for white artists.

as for the second part. i think that’s entirely possible, actually. it’s done a lot to characters, where they won’t explicitly state their ethnicity but give them attributes from one (often stereotypes) and make them a caricature without making it, like i said, explicit. take the concept of jewish-coded villains in media. no one from disney has ever said that mother gothel in tangled is jewish, but it’s been pointed out by everyone that she’s jewish coded through stereotypes, ones specifically often used for “evil” witch-type characters, which is no coincidence: large, hooked nose, curly hair, greedy, etc. edit: hollywood uses coding like this often for racial/ethnic groups and the lgbtq+ community.

the maximoffs in the mcu and xmcu have never been explicitly made romani, with disney going so far as to change their parents romani names (django and marya) to oleg and irina. the name changes were unnecessary, except to distance the maximoffs from their original romani identity. the mcu changed their origins stories and cast non-romani actors to portray the maximoffs, and considering they went as far as to remove their jewish heritage as i mentioned before, it’s not a stretch that this is all an attempt to veil their romani background too. while they often joke about stealing and fortune tellers and poverty (the wv halloween episode really put it all in one place, but they’ve been doing it forever in the xmcu and mcu), i wouldn’t say this is an attempt to make them romani as much as it is to use a romani-esque caricature, to use it as a sort of “aesthetic” for the twins without acknowledging that it’s an ethnicity. the aspects they choose to keep are often either negative or painted in a negative light. i think the fact that el*zabeth ols*en continuously uses the g-slur to talk about wanda and costume design, speaks to that.

and even if the mcu came out and said, “oh, our wanda is romani,” that wouldn’t change the fact that she’s played by a non-romani actress (who continues to use anti-romani slurs, despite knowing she shouldn’t) and that so far, they have not explicitly stated in the mcu that she is.

from gavia baker-whitelaw’s article:

Wanda and Pietro's whitewashing feels like an attempt to "neutralize" them. It frames their ethnicity as a problem to be avoided, rather than an opportunity to celebrate an under-represented group. This also meant that Marvel could cast famous white actors instead of sourcing an unknown Romani actor, during a period when the MCU was visibly uninterested in racial diversity.

But Marvel Studios wanted to have its cake and eat it, too. While Wanda is now white and Sokovian, her role isn't completely divorced from its Romani origins. It can't be, because everything in the MCU is informed by the comics. That's how we end up with El*zabeth Ols*n describing her Age of Ultron costume as "kind of this g*psy, vagabond feel"—terms that usually wouldn't come to mind for a simple black minidress and maroon jacket. Wanda's Romani heritage remains visible through veiled references and superficial costume choices, sidestepping any hint of meaningful representation.

from jessica reidy’s article:

Today, some Roma do call themselves witches, and serve as healers and spell-casters in a community, but make no mistake, being a witch is a job like any other. I was trained by my grandmother, I studied hard, I started a business, and I take bookings in my Google calendar. This is the context that most people miss when creating (or, in this case, adapting) Romani witch characters like Wanda Maximoff, and while the Scarlet Witch has plenty of magic, she does not need to fall into the stereotype, nor have her identity erased.

Representation matters. Wanda’s Romani ethnicity has been well-stated in the comic books, sometimes capturing the discrimination and violence that Roma face, and other times falling flat and stereotypical. Marvel also owes us, as Roma are often rendered as mentally unstable thieves, such as Dr. Doom, Wanda and Pietro’s community, and Wanda herself, and the entertainment giant capitalizes off of these stereotypes, reinforcing them all the while.

Every opportunity we get for accurate and positive representation is essential to us because it shapes the way people understand us.

linking the post i made again, because it has a list of articles and posts i’d recommend really taking the time to look through and engaging with them, as well as following folks like jessica reidy and @scarlet--wiccan on social media for more info from romani folks.

#anon #b.inbox #hope this clears some things up for u #anti wandavision

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permian-tropos · 4 years ago

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daniilcourse keeps veering off into the worst directions... like I want to make arguments about whether its okay to enjoy problematic characters but I’m having to do cleanup duty on people’s actual misconceptions about the character where they think he killed everyone (no ffs lol the survivors of the plague shelter in the polyhedron in utopian ending) and like some new awful argument that the fact he uses the g-slur means he’s racist against Roma people in P2 when he’s literally saying how fucking disgusted he is at the town for having these predictable “medieval” prejudices

I guess folks who might be swayed by it maybe are too young or under-informed to actually know what is being discussed here, when he’s talking about marginalized people being accused of deliberately poisoning water, but all the jewish and part-jewish fans projecting jewishness onto daniil because of that line know what the hell I mean lol... it literally IS a medieval trope and it was often levied against jews in particular but it has persisted in so many forms to this day and p2 daniil dankovsky in 1915 apparently knows that better than the woke ppl in 2020 who are calling him out for slur usage instead of reading the meaning of his words

the way he talks about marginalized people might not use sensitive language because he’s a snobby white guy from 1915 -- and I don’t know if in 1915 Russia the politically correct language necessarily was “g*psy is a slur if you say it you’re cancelled” cause back then it was just Correct to be racist, and remember how as recently as Disney’s Hunchback it was common to use the word even in stories about prejudice against Romani people and IPL has a history of being bad about anti-Romani racism in P1 so this is a believably clumsy course correction from that -- but that line isn’t proof he’s racist.... deeply it is the opposite........

and the fact that someone’s gotta go and misrepresent one of the most correct and insightful things the man says, means now I’m ranting about how he’s actually anti-racist when obviously he’s still prejudiced in many ways and I still would argue it’s fine to enjoy his character.

but I have to address the actual wrong things said about him. clearing his name now, so the bitchelor by his logic owes me

edit: the dialogue in question bc this post is just a messy rant

#untitled plague game #discourse cw #daniil dankovsky #tagging for the haters to block this so they don't learn anything and continue being uninformed

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sweetkale · 4 years ago

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all evidence that points towards Magneto being Jewish before it was first explicitly established in 1991

!!None of this is my writing!! It’s a useful but outdated source that I merely revised to replace the G slur. It was written by Rivka Jacobs and the original can be found at http://www.alara.net/opeople/xbooks/magjew.html

The Magneto Is Jewish FAQ (revised 11/9/98)

Rivka Jacobs

(1) In Uncanny #113 (Classic X-Men #19), the added material has Magneto on Asteroid M, talking about the deaths of Magda, Anya, and he mentions Auschwitz for the first time. "I endured one death camp ... in Auschwitz ... I will not see another people fear what they do not understand and destroy what they fear." Uncanny #113 is from 1978. The additional scenes were included in 1988's Classic X-Men #19. So, we know Magnus was at Auschwitz, a death camp, not just a concentration camp. (Many fans [and writers] seem to get the two types of camps confused). There could have been a number of reasons he was at Auschwitz: he was a Polish political prisoner, a Russian prisoner of war, a member of the French underground, a homosexual from Germany, Roma, or, with a high probability, a Jew. (Out of 1.5 million victims of Auschwitz, between 1.1 and 1.2 million were Jews).

(2) In Uncanny #150 (one of my favorites) Magneto mentions, in a fight with Cyclops, "I know something of grief. Search throughout my homeland, you will find NONE who bear my name. Mine was a large family, and it was slaughtered ... without mercy, without remorse." So that eliminates German homosexual and French partisan, because the entire familes of such prisoners were not slaughtered throughout an entire "homeland." After Magneto thinks he has killed Kitty, he says: "I remember my own childhood ... the gas chambers at Auschwitz, the guards joking as they herded my family to their death. As our lives were nothing to them, so human lives became nothing to me." Storm is about to blast him for "killing" Kitty, and she says, "If you have a diety, butcher, pray to it!" Magneto answers, "As a boy, I believed. As a boy, I turned my back on god forever." So now we know that Magnus is not a political prisoner (German political prisoners were sent to camps on German soil, like Dachau, or Bergen-Belsen), he is not Polish, since whole Polish families were not herded to the gas chambers. The Poles were not the target of pre-meditated Nazi genocide. While the Russian people were the target of genocide, only Russian POWs were in Auschwitz, not whole families. So, we are now left with only two groups of people that Magnus could be from, the Roma and the Jews. Uncanny #150 is from Oct. 1981; already Magnus says something very interesting here. He says he "remembers" the gas chambers of Auschwitz, "remembers" his family being herded, he "remembers" the guards joking. Fact: no one remembers the gas chambers of Auschwitz except in two ways (or three if you believe the dead can speak to the living), either you were a Nazi SS guard or doctor or official, or you were a member of the Sonderkommando. The Sonderkommando, Jewish prisoners who were forced by the Nazis -- in all the death camps -- to do the dirty work of killing. It was Nazi official policy. The Jews, the lowest of the low to the Nazis, in Auschwitz hierarchy, followed by the Russians, and then the Roma, the Jews would be the ones to lead the victims to the gas chamber, to haul the bodies from the gas chambers to the ovens, to burn and bury the dead. The Jews would pull the teeth of the corpses, cut the hair, pile the bodies three at a time on the retorts of the ovens in just the right way. The Sonderkommando had a few kapos (overseers) who were German and Polish prisoners, criminals from civil prisons in Germany and Poland. During the summer of 1944, 19 Russian POWs from Mauthausen were sent to augment the Auschwitz Sonderkommando. Totally documented, on paper and by eye witness accounts. All other members of the Auschwitz Sonderkommando were Jews.

(3) In Uncanny #161, Sept. 1982, we have the story of Xavier's trip to Israel. There he meets Magnus for the first time. However, it should be noted that the entire story is a Charlie-dream, while he is with Lilandra. In Uncanny #161 we see for the first and last time Magnus' tattoo from Auschwitz. His number is #214782. Xavier says, "That tattoo, Magnus, were you ...?" Magnus answers, "Auschwitz. I grew up there." So now we know that Magneto was first in Auschwitz as a very young person, but we can't pinpoint the age yet. Also, his number is high for someone who was there from the beginning of the camp. The first Polish prisoners, like author Wieslaw Kielar, had very low numbers, like in the 200s. Sonderkommando survivor Filip Muller's number was in the 20,000s. He arrived in early 1942. Magnus' number is a standard number, however, without the A of the 1944 arrivals, or the Z of the Roma, or the other special classification symbols. Of course the penciller didn't know these details. So a standard Auschwitz number, which is too big, but it doesn't tell us anything.

4) Vision and the Scarlet Witch, Vol. 1, #4. Magneto has just found out Wanda and Pietro are his children. (This is from Feb. 1983). He is on the moon, in the Inhuman city of Attilan, telling VIsion about his youth. "I was born into a time and place ... Android ... where both man and mutant were persecuted for being ... different." Picture of the Auschwitz camp, guards tormenting emaciated prisoners, one of whom displays a very prominent and exaggerated Star of David on his clothing. Remember Jews and Roma were kept apart in the camp. In the next panel, however, Magneto sort-of goes into a fantasy. He says, "But unlike the other victims, I possessed the power to fight back." He imagines he's hurling Nazi tanks away with magnetic energy. What's this? In 1983, the reader doesn't know what to make of this. Keep in mind, he's meeting with Wanda, Pietro, Vision, and Crystal, and has held Luna for the first time. Is he exaggerating? Showing off for them?

(5) Now for the second most important comic proving Magneto is Jewish, Uncanny #199, Nov. 1985. Magneto with Lee Forrester and Kitty Pryde arrive at the National Holocaust Memorial in Washington, DC. (It's not really Lee, but Mystique, trying to capture Magneto). Magneto has been having an affair with Lee, he loves her. He brings her to the Holocaust Memorial? Why? Fun date, huh? Why, because he has no other family. These people are his family. Jewish survivors of the Holocaust. (The Roma have their own name for the genocide, and their own gatherings, with their own rituals and customs. Magneto has no reason to go to a Jewish gathering if he isn't Jewish). Lee/Mystique says: "Man's inhumanity to man ... how easily the race kills." Magneto answers: "Then, Lee, it was the Jews. My nightmare has ever been that tomorrow it will be Mutants." Why would he say that, why wouldn't he mention another ethnic group, if he weren't Jewish? Next, Magneto tells Kitty EXACTLY how to address the gathering in order to get information about dead or missing family members. How does Magneto know how to do this? Isn't it obvious that he's done this before? Why would he address a Jewish Holocaust gathering looking for information about his family if his family weren't Jewish? (And it is a Jewish gathering, besides the use of the word Holocaust, a speaker says in the background: "... the systematic institutionalized extermination of one people by another."). Kitty asks about her great-aunt Chava, who died at Auschwitz, and Magneto is recognized by two survivors, Ruth and David Shulman, two Jewish survivors. (Shul is another name for synagogue -- Shulman means man of the temple, or man of the synagogue). They remember Magneto as a youth in Auschwitz, and say he helped them survive. And witness him as having been there. (No implanted memories, please). They testify that he " ... Had been at that accursed place from the very start..."

Later, Mystique reveals herself, and arrests Magneto in front of all these people. Magneto says that he recognizes no authority. "My land ...all the countries of the world ... turned their back on me and mine when we were condemned to Hitler's death camps. Therefore, in return, I have sworn to deny them." So let's clear this up ... the Roma were not persecuted in Greece, the Greek Jewish community was decimated. A small number of Roma and Jews in Rumania were exiled to a new border country called "Transnistria" but the remainder of the Roma were left alone. Several hundred thousand of them. 350,000 Rumanian Jews were savagely murdered throughout the country. In Slovakia, the Roma were left alone, the Slovakian Jews were among the first sent to Auschwitz. After the Slovakian uprising was crushed in 1944, several hundred Roma who had courageously helped in the rebellion were murdered, along with the remainder of the Jews of Slovakia. Bulgaria did not persecute its Romani people. Bulgaria, although resisting deportations of its Jews, persecuted them locally. In the Netherlands, only the "wandering" Roma who were captured in camps and wagons were deported, about 500. The remaining who had bought homes or found shelter with neighbors, were left alone. The Netherlands is where Gabrielle Haller comes from -- in under two years 100,000 Dutch Jews were deported, most were killed. I could go on. There is no other people who were hunted everywhere the Nazis went or had influence but the Jews. There is no other people who had the gates of escape cut off after the war started, but the European Jews. Magneto's reasoning is based on this most extreme situation.

(6) Uncanny #211, Nov. 1986. The Mutant Massacre. Page 9 -- Betsy Braddock has just come in from discovering what happened to a wounded Morlock, who has just died. Magneto, Storm, and Wolverine are standing there in Xavier's infirmary. Betsy says, "... I saw a cadre of super-beings ... massacring every living thing in the Morlock tunnels." Magneto reacts immediately, out of pure emotion. "NO! The horrors of my childhood, born again...only this time, Mutants are the victims, instead of Jews." What else does this mean? He's talking about HIS childhood, he's making a parallel. If he weren't Jewish, he wouldn't have said Jews, he would have said Roma. The two groups of people are not interchangeable.

(7) New Mutants #49, March 1987. Magneto is dreaming. It is an entire page representation of the massacre of his family. Here we see for the first time, his family -- father, mother, sister -- as they were gunned down in front of open graves. The family members are dressed in middle class urban clothes. No peasant dress, no Roma clothing. (And it is not a cliche. Roma women always wore, at this time, their flowing skirts and distinctive scarves and clothing, similar to the Bosnian women of today). Being massacred with Magnus' family is a mixed group of people. Men in bowler hats and suits, one old woman in a long skirt. One man in a bowler hat has the side-locks of the devout Jew, but the other people could be anyone. Poles or Jews or Roma. It's Magnus and his family who are out of place. They are well-dressed, Magnus's sister in a proper school uniform with the prim collar. Every picture I've seen of the German Rom show: a people of color, having left India and Armenia five- to six-hundred years ago, the men wearing Fedoras (favorite style of hat) and normal suits and ties, and the women and girls always dressed in the long skirts and distinctive flowered scarves. The boys wear a mixture of urban short pants but scarf belts, some have socks, some don't. New Mutants #49, page 17, could show some Roma in the crowd, but Magnus' family members are definitely not Romani in this picture.

(8) X-Men Classics #12, back-up story, Aug. 1987. The actual scenes of Magneto's escape from Auschwitz. "And with World War II ending... the Third Reich defeated...it's guards wanted no witnesses left...to tell the tale of this horror..." Picture of an SS soldier about to shoot a fallen and stricken Madga. "He had been there from the start ..." Magnus has just slammed a wooden beam into the head of the SS soldier. "Grown to manhood within its electrified barbed wire fence. If he was to die, it would not be in this abattoir ... and not without a fight!" Magnus grabs a terrified Magda by the hand and drags her with him in his escape. (a) The war is almost over, it is winter, it is the winter of 1944-1945. The Roma were gone by 1945. All the Roma women were gone. Only 4 clerks, high-status friends of Nazi officials in Camp I, were left. The Romani camp was murdered in the gas chambers in August 1944. (b) This scene, by Claremont and Bolton, is completely accurate. It takes place on Jan. 20, 1945, two days after thecamp was evacuated and the Death marches began. Some 70 of the Sonderkommando were kept to help destroy the evidence of the death factory, before they were to be killed. Some 200 women from the woman's camp, Jews, were chosen to fill in the huge pits where bodies were burned. They had to haul ashes, break up human bones, all in the coldest part of winter. The SS soldiers sent back on Jan. 20th were sent to kill the women. That is exactly what you see in this comic book, because Claremont and Bolton took the time and cared enough, to do their research. Magneto was saving Magda becasue at that point, he wasn't the target, yet. If they were out by the burial pits to the northwest of the camp, that is a point close to the forest. It just makes sense.

(9) New Mutants #61, March 1988. On page 22, Magneto is alone, kneeling over the dead body of Doug Ramsey, thinking thoughts only the reader can see. This is one moment he would not misrepresent anything, to himself especially. He says, "An ill wind is coming ... they are registering mutants ... like they once registered my people in Poland ...! Who knows what horrors await us." Only the Jews were registered, and forced to wear armbands with the Star of David on them, in Poland (at the end of 1939). Efforts to murder the Polska Roma (the Polish Roma) began in 1942, but they weren't registered first. Young Magnus wouldn't have known about any of that in any case-- he was already at Auschwitz by 1942. He would only have known that "my people" the Jewish people in Poland, including the German Jews who had already been deported there in the first months of the War, were registered.

(10) Classic X-Men #19, March 1988, back-up story. Magneto is apparently working for the CIA hunting Nazis. He is about to be betrayed by them, and his lady love of that time, Isabelle, is about to be murdered. But as he is apprehending a Nazi war criminal he gets one of his massive headaches. "Pain," he thinks, "again indescribable." "Worse than the bite of the kapo's whip. The murder of parents and family, the death of a child ... the loss of a beloved wife!" So here we see that Magneto was the victim of kapos. He could not have been a kapo. He was too young anyway, as we've seen. He grew up in Auschwitz. Here he says the murder of parents, and family. The parents separate, gunned down. The remainder of his family, no doubt sent to the gas chambers later, while he was in the Sonderkommando. Remember what he said in UX #150, his entire family wiped out. So as a Jew in the Sonderkommando he not only watched his family die, he helped kill them. How can any other comic book character ever come close to Magneto for dramatic intensity, but only if he is a Jew.

(11) X-Factor Annual #4, 1989. Doom challenges Magneto to a duel of wills, with a helmet that pulls out unpleasant memories and torments the wearer. Who will crack first? Magneto takes his turn -- Doom describes what he sees, "...after the ignoble defeat of the Nazis in Germany, you and the woman Magda you rescued, fled the prison camp Auschwitz, in Poland."

"Auschwitz, where your family had perished --living skeletons -- and you had grown to manhood amid horrors most men could not conceive." First, Doom confirms that Magnus and Magda "fled" or escaped Auschwitz before liberation and after the Roma camp was murdered. Then he describes some of Magneto's family perishing, as living skeletons, at Auschwitz. They could either have been kept as prisoners, or brought in, starving, from ghettoes in Poland and gassed. They could have been either Roma or Jews. But then it's Doom's turn to wear the helmet. Doom's Romani heritage is discussed at great length. Doom is proud to be a Rom, he knows he is a Rom. Why would he not acknowledge that Magneto is also a Rom? Why did he say your family, implying your people, to Magneto? Not "our" people?

(12) And now the most important evidence, and just about my favorite X-Men comic, Uncanny #274, from March 1991. In the Savage Land, the entire comic is told from the point of view of Magneto. It is a first person narrative, he is talking directly to us, the readers. He is not exaggerating, he is not showing off. The writing is elegant and wonderful ... "My life's ambition has been to safeguard my fellow mutants," Magneto says. "Zaladane has no such compunction. And I hear the echo of Der Fuhrer's voice in the radio of memory, smell the awful stench of the sick and dying as the cattle cars brought the comdemned to Auschwitz. I wear red, the color of blood, in tribute to their lost lives. And the harder I try to cast it aside, to find a gentler path ... the more irresistibly I'm drawn back. I should have died myself with those I loved. Instead, I carted the bodies by the hundreds, by the thousands ... from the death house to the crematorium ... and the ashes to the burial ground. Asking now what I could not then ... why was I spared?!" So there it is. He describes his job at Auschwitz. That is it. This is no vague job description, this is what the Sonderkommando did. This is fundamental to the history of the Holocaust, to the history of Nazi Germany. Making the Jews the ones who had to do all the dirty work in the death camps.

Marvel cannot say they have their own version of Holocaust history. What kind of reasoning is that? Where do the editors and writers of Marvel get off making up their own history of the Holocaust? Where do they draw the line? Has any reader out there ever seen any major publisher or entertainment outfit, outside Neo-Nazi groups and the Militias or Far Right Splinter groups, who just took it upon themselves to change a Jew into a Romany and change Holocaust and Auschwitz history to make it fit? Magneto says it here, he was a member of the Sonderkommando. He was not a kapo. He was not a Russian POW. He was a Jew! On page 14 of UXM #274, Magneto is dreaming again. He again sees his family being gunned down. He again feels what it was like to be buried alive. Rogue wakes him up.

(13) Uncanny X-Men #275, April 1991, which concludes the Savage Land story from UXM #274, referred to above, also contains confirmation as to what happened to young Magnus. Magneto says, directly to the reader, in diary-like narration, as he uses the last strength of his emaciated body to push away his captors, "They think me beaten, finished. A mistake many have made in the past. As I found the strength, as a boy, to survive being machine-gunned and buried alive, and later the unimaginable horror of Auschwitz ... so do I find it in me, here and now, to break free."

(14) X-Men Vol. 2, No. 2, Nov. 1991. The beginning of the end for Magneto. But on page 24 he says to Moira MacTaggart, who has seemingly betrayed him, and enraged him, "Of course not. You worked for the betterment of the world and the race. I heard those same rationales as a boy, in the Auschwitz Death Camp. From Dr. Joseph Mengele himself!" Mengele's first victims were the Roma, he liked the Roma. He brought the children candy and extra food. And in August of 1944, after trying unsuccessfully to save the Romani Family Camp (also for his own experimental purposes) Mengele obeyed his orders and vigorously hunted down and helped exterminate all remaining Roma. He then dissected those of most interest to him, and sent body parts to Berlin. Then he turned his attention to the Jews of Auschwitz. Only his Jewish victims have survived. His Romani victims, those transfered out of the camp in the spring and summer of 1944, have rarely come forward. If Magneto is alive in Auschwitz after the start of 1945, and he personally heard Dr. Mengele, he is a Jew.

Magneto is a Jew especially since Mengele would have been one of his supervisors in the Sonderkommando.

(15) X-Men, Vol. 2, No. 3, Dec. 1991 -- Magneto to Xavier, "You speak to the best in humanity. I have endured the worst. You imagine the reality of the Holocaust, of the Nazi Death Camps. I grew up in one." Magneto says The Holocaust. This is the translation of SHOAH, and was first used after the war, and popularized by Eli Wiesel. It means the Jewish Holocaust. One can say the Romani genocide, and today sometimes you'll hear the Romani holocaust, or the Russian holocaust, or the holocaust perpetrated against the mentally ill and the handicapped. (Nazi pre-meditated genocide was really only carried to the fullest extreme against three groups, the first were the mentally ill and the handicapped, who were the first victims of genocide. The second and third groups were the Jews and the Roma). But the Holocaust is what Jewish people say when they refer to the calculated campaign of Nazi Germany to kill every Jew in the world. (They actually made lists of every country in the Western world, and all the Jewish populations. They made no such list for any other people). Nazi Germany succeeded in killing almost 6 million of their foremost victims, until the Third Reich was defeated.

(16) X-Factor #92, July, 1993. Havok and X-Factor are battling Cortez and the Acolytes, in this opening chapter of Fatal Attractions. Cortez is ranting about the "flatscans" and how mutants have to subjugate them. Havok says, "Out to destroy the "inferior" race ... in Magneto's name? Don't you know what an insult that is to the memory of the very man you claim to worship? Fifty years ago, Magnus barely survived a Holocaust that destroyed almost all of his people: all because some lunatic took it upon himself to decide who deserved to live ... and who didn't. Where's the sense in resurrecting that kind of evil ... in the name of one of its victims?!" Cortez answers, "You've seen this place Havok! You've seen the sentinels! You tell me ... where's the sense in letting the flatscans do to the mutants what Hitler did to the Jews? ..." Cortez has done research on Magneto, he says the Jews, as a parallel metaphor. Why say that, if Magneto isn't Jewish?

(17) Then comes the infamous Unlimited #2. This is a long and involved FAQ I've got going here, so I won't go into detail at the moment. But the bottom line is, everything that Gabrielle Haller says about Magneto's history is false. I don't want to go line by line over it now. Everything! Danzig was not annexed. It was a Free City, under League of Nations protection, that voted itself a Nazi government and welcomed the Nazi troops in like liberators. Gauleiter Forster, the extremely anti-Semitic Nazi leader of Danzig ordered all 10,000 Jews of Danzig to be kicked out of the city in 1939, not the Roma. The Jews. Auschwitz wasn't opened as a Polish political prisoner camp until the summer of 1940, not 1939. The Roma were sent to German municipal camps, in Germany and the Greater Reich, as early as 1933. But they were not sent to Auschwitz from Germany until 1943. The only people who were in a work camp in Auschwitz before it opened were 300 Jews from the town of Auschwitz who were forced to transform a collection of horse stables and army barracks into the Polish prisoner camp. "Genocide, extermination ..." of Poles? No. The Polish people suffered terribly, and were considered "sub-human" by the Nazis. Millions of Polish citizens were killed throughout the course of the war, as soldiers, as slave laborers, as underground fighters, as members of the intelligentsia. But this was Nazi suppression of a conquered country, not planned genocide. Roma, Yes. The homosexuals, no. Not genocide. Persecution and imprisonment. Treated terribly. But people weren't sent to the gas chambers just because they were homosexuals. And "intellectuals" ? (How could Nicieza have written this?) Intellectuals were targets of genocide? Well, I hardly think so, since Goebbels, and Albert Speer, and even Mengele were considered intellectuals.

No one was sent to the gas chambers, or was shot in an open grave, or was tortured and murdered JUST because they happened to be an intellectual. Thousands of Polish citizens who were members of the intelligentsia (the educated class, the vanguard or elite of the educated class), were murdered in the first months of the war. But there was no planned campaign to hunt down every intellectual in Europe and exterminate them. The mentally ill and handicapped, the Jews, and the Roma were the primary targets of Nazi genocide. The Russians came next. Everything Haller says about Magneto in Unlimited #2 contradicts most of Magneto's history as presented in 15 years worth of comics.

(18) Until recently, when, in Road to Onslaught, Marvel once again published that outrageous Gabrielle Haller speech about Magneto like they were proud of it (??) the next references in the Age of Apocalypse comics portrayed Magneto once again as Jewish. In X-Men Vol. 2, No. 40, where David Haller, Legion, pulls Magneto's memories out, you see young Magnus with the men, standing behind and below a high, barred window. This is an accurate portrayal of the quarters of the Sonderkommando at Auschwitz I. At Auschwitz I, only the Sonderkommando (other than prisoners awaiting execution) were kept in isolated basement cells, the windows of which were high, barred, and as seen from the outside, half-below ground level.

And why is Magneto in Israel anyway? How could he have come there? Well, why would a Romany go to Israel when at least 30,000 Roma lived in Germany in the late 1960s and early 1970s? And many more Rom formed a thriving community in Paris. Why not just go home to his own clan and tribe? Roma have a complex system of extended familes, clans, and tribes. Why go to Israel to "find himself" or find his "soul"? A German Jew had no place to go but somewhere else. A Polish Jew definitely had no place to go back to, since some Polish fanatics continued to murder returning Holocaust survivors well into the late 1940s. Any Jew can emigrate to Israel, under the Law of Return. All Magneto had to do was show them the tattoo on his arm. And he was home. (And in case some of you were wondering, as some of us have discussed, with the exception of the Muslim Bosnians, only the Jews of Europe practiced circumcision. It was a religious rite, not a medical procedure. Only Jewish men and boys were circumcised among the prisoners at Auschwitz. The Nazis already knew what Magneto was. He was chosen for the Sonderkommando, he was Jewish. He was not pretending to be a Jew. He wasn't misidentified as a Jew. He was a circumcised, young Jewish man). Furthermore, Magnus at this time had forged papers, that identified him as "Erik Magnus Lehnsherr." He could have immigrated to any country in the world, including the United States! If he were Roma, and didn't want to self-identify as such, why not go to America? Why go to the one country that represents enormous pain for modern Roma -- i.e., the Rom today deeply resent the focus on Israel, and the support Israel enjoys among nations of the Western world, while the Roma continue to be persecuted and ignored.

(19) In Astonishing X-Men #3, formerly Uncanny, from May 1995, we have the most clear reference to Magneto's being Jewish, written by Scott Lobdell. Magneto has just hit Bishop, and is helping him to his feet. He says, "Long before Xavier died ... before this point of divergence ... I stood by helplessly as millions of my people were led to slaughter in the name of 'genetic purity." Now the AOA is not a what-if story. It is a divergent timeline. Magneto says, before the timeline diverged. What other people were lead by the millions, led to the slaughter, in the name of genetic purity? Many people suffered and died in World War II. 250,000 to 500,000 Roma were murdered. Millions of Russians and Poles during the course of the invasions, and in political violence, and in acts of pure murder, were exterminated. But only the European Jews were "led to the slaughter" in the millions because of one man's racial beliefs. Only the Jews of Europe Persecutionand incarceration are not the same as genocide and extermination.

20) X-Men #72, cover date February 1998, published in mid-December 1997. This comic book makes a significant contribution to Magneto's history. Basically, the book reveals that the name *Erik Lehnsherr* which was revealed by Gabrielle Haller in Unlimited #2 to be Magneto's real name, is fake, and so Haller's assertion that Magneto is a *Sinte* Rom was based on false and forged identity papers.

The scenario begins with Gabrielle Haller, lying on her bed, working on a lap- top computer, writing the American Sen. Kelly, begging him to help find and secure the release of Charles Xavier. Sabra, the Israeli super-hero, a mutant and Mossad agent, suddenly appears floating in the air outside Haller's balcony doors. Haller has just pushed open the doors, saying, "You're too important to lose, Charles. I will see you ... FREE?" And Sabra says, "Sometimes, Ambassador Haller ... freedom, like the truth, is little more than an illusion. Don't you think?"

Sabra has come to Haller with information. She says to Gabrielle Haller: "I"m sure you recall shocking the world when you announced that you had UNDENIABLE proof ofMagneto's identity as Erik Lehnsherr. The undeniable has just been DENIED." Sabra then goes on to show Haller, and the readers, the file on a master forger named George Odekirk. In this file, apparently, is a computer analysis of the identity papers of Erik Lehnsherr, which shows that Odekirk forged those documents. Haller says, "He created Erik Lehnsherr? If this is true ... you must take me to him! He could be our only link to Magneto's true identity ... our last chance to stop him once and for all!"

But just as Sabra is flying Haller to the Transylvanian Alps, to meet with Odekirk, the scene switches to Odekirk, who is working on another forged passport, sitting in bed while his wife sleeps beside him. Suddenly, Odekirk looks up -- he has a visitor. It's Magneto, in full costume.

Magneto is floating in the air. He surrounds Odekirk's bed with his magnetic energy, and uses his power to keep Odekirk's wife unconscious. He says, "You failed me." Odekirk responds, "Please ... please, my wife ..." Magneto answers, "She will sleep the sleep of the innocent. She has done nothing ... but you ... YOU, my friend, have BETRAYED me." Odekirk protests his innocence, and then Magneto makes this remarkable speech: "Do you remember what you promised me the night I came to you, torn and filthy, nearly a quarter century ago? I was searching for my beloved MAGDA, determined not to lose her as I had lost so many others in the fire that engulfed all of Europe during my childhood. The authorities were in pursuit of me for the "crime" of avenging my daughter's murder. I was willing to deny who I was ... everything that my family died for ... so that I could find one woman ... so that I would not be caged AGAIN. The Erik Lehnsherr fabrication was a convenient means of ensuring that. You swore that the forged papers were FLAWLESS, that your skills were unsurpassed... but now, you have proven to be a liability. Your work has been called into queston by my enemies, and they will trace Erik Lehnsherr the Sinte BACK to you." Odekirk protests, "That is impossible! That forgery was impeccable! My work is ... " Magneto answers: "It was not ENOUGH! You gave birth to Erik Lehnsherr, Odekirk. And tonight, you have killed him. My secrets shall die with him. All that remains now ... is MAGNUS."

This scene says, subtly but clearly, that Magnus denied who he was, gave up everything his famly died for, to take the false identity of a Sinte Rom named Erik Lehnsherr. Since this entire FAQ has gone into great detail showing exactly how and why Magnus was born Jewish, it seems there is no doubt now, that Magneto's family and he himself, were Jews. Magnus would not say he denied *everything* his family died for, by taking a Romani identity, if his family were indeed Roma. As I pointed out above, only the Jews and Roms were targeted as entire peoples, and killed for no reason other than they were Jews and Roms. Magnus was either one, or the other. Since in XM #72, it is revealed that he is NOT a Rom, we must conclude he was born a Jew.

There are several continuity problems that arise from the revelations of XM #72. Several unanswered questions:

1) How much of Haller's speech (Unlimited #2) was based information contained in Odekirk's forgery, how much was based on what she personally knew, and how much did she "fabricate" herself? She makes a large number of mistakes, about nearly every aspect of Magneto's history and life. She also gets her Holocaust history and dates wrong. Did she perhaps add her own *facts* to what she found in those old identity papers? Was she perhaps trying to make the story coherent? As in, trying to make what she knew about Magnus and his history fit what she learned about *Erik Lehnsherr*? For example, where she says, on page 19 of Unlimited #2, "...Lehnsherr had taken to calling himself MAGNUS ... as if by choosing his MIDDLE name, he could bring some semblance of BALANCE and SIMPLICITY to his haunted life." This is Haller's supposition -- the reason he was calling himself MAGNUS in Israel. She knew him as Magnus back then, she had just found out, his full name was supposedly *Erik Lehnsherr.* Did she try to splice together the information?

2) While XM #72 makes it clear why Magnus cloaked himself in this false identity and ethnic background initially, what is not so understandable is why he continued to maintain that false identity after his search for Magda was over, and he immigrated to Israel. Did he use the forged *Erik Lehnsherr* passport to enter Israel? Why would he use a false identity and ethnic background to enter Israel, when he was a Jew?

3) Why would Magnus continue to use the Erik Lehnsherr identity during the Age of Apocalypse, especially since he publicly identified with being a Jew? (Astonishing X-Men #3, quoted above.)

4) Magnus worked for at least one intelligence agency, most likely the CIA (Classic X-Men #19). He then hunted dangerous mutants, for his own mysterious purposes, as shown in a brief cameo in Generation X #10 -- which was a memory belonging to Sean Cassidy, telepathically accessed by Emma Frost. During the time he was working for the CIA, his code-name was Magneto. In Classic X-Men #19, he is called only Magneto. In Generaton X #10, Interpol agent Sean Cassidy doesn't know who the man is who is helping him track down Arcady (the future Omega Red). Emma Frost, commenting from the present as a psionic guide to Cassidy's memories, calls the man *Erik Lehnsherr.* But the question is, after he left Israel, did Magnus use the false identity Erik Lehnsherr?

5) During the time that Magneto tried to follow Xavier's path, roughly from UXM #196 through UXM #253, and New Mutants issues #35 through #75, including UXM #188, NM #21, #23, #24, #26, #28, and #29, he referred to himself as Magnus, and others like Storm and Kitty Pryde called him Magnus. Even though he was disguised as Michael Xavier for the outside world, the X-Men and their associates all knew Magneto as Magnus. During this time, Magnus also identified strongly with his Jewish and Jewish Holocaust history. The question now is, what happened to the *Erik Lehnsherr the SInte* identity during this time?

6) Why, now, after so many years, did Magneto find it necessary to kill George Odekirk in order to protect his identity? We know why he took the false name and ethnic background to begin with. But we have no evidence that he continued to use *Erik Lehnhserr*, during each stage of his pre-Magneto career. After he became Magneto, after all the battles with the X-Men, after the events of Fatal Attractions, after the mind-wipe and the appearance of Joseph, after Onslaught, why would Magnus be so concerned with protecting his true identity? Was he trying to protect the memory of his family? Has he maintained contact with pre-Holocaust family grave sites, or places where he once lived? Is he worried that the very bones of his ancestors might be violated by those looking for his genetic material? Then there's Anya, his beloved daughter -- she was never Anya *Lehnsherr*. Her last name is now unknown -- is Magneto trying to protect something concerning her? George Odekirk wouldn't be the only witness to Magneto's true identity, either. What about those Carpathian villagers, who accepted Auschwitz escapees Magnus and Magda in 1945? Did anyone in Vinnitsa who knew Magnus' true last name survive his burst of electromagnetic radiation? What about Ruth and David Shulman, who knew him at Auschwitz, and recognized him, in UXM #199?

These, and other unanswered questions, remain.

By removing the *Erik Lehnsherr the Sinte* identity, fixing that particular retcon from Unlimited #2, and leaving the rest of Magneto's history intact, writer Joe Kelly and editor Bob Harras have not officially stated that Magneto was born Jewish, and was a Jewish survivor of Auschwitz. But, as was the case during the years Chris Claremont wrote the character, the references to Magneto's Jewish identity are there, subtle and at the same time, obvious.

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arsonsara · 4 years ago

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Acknowledging The Ostrelephant In The Room: A Breakdown of The Mag*psies, The Mistakes They Made, And How They Could Be Improved Upon.

(TW: Slurs [G*ypsie]. & Negative Representation of those in the LGBT+ Community)

[The Following Essay also contains spoilers for the game Mother 3.]

Mother 3 is my favorite game of all time. If anyone has known me long enough to talk about what games I enjoy or followed me on Social Media to see my occasional bouts of reblogging fan-made content for the series, this is an obvious talking point. I’ve been a part of the community surrounding Mother 3 ever since I was about 10-12 years old, with my old Acer Laptop playing through the Fan-Translation on a GBA Emulator. While I wouldn’t consider myself a Mother 3 Veteran, I have been around long enough for me to see how the community has changed and shifted through the years as well as how I myself changed through my perspective on the world around me and myself. 10 or so years later after having played Mother 3 for the first time I still stand by my statement that it is my favorite game of all time, without question.

However, I would be lying if I were to say that Mother 3 was not a flawed game. Arguments can be made that games inspired by the Mother Franchise have gone leaps and bounds above the original series in terms of narrative structure and gameplay. However from what I've seen from the community of Mother 3, none of that tends to bother them enough to hamper the experience of the game itself. Except for one thing. One group of characters that has the community tugging at their collars or just straight up ignoring their existence. While I can understand and even empathize with the idea of just straight up mentally retconning something, especially when said thing directly affects you emotionally due to any personal connections you might have with the connotations, there’s a certain level of unease I garner when I see people clearly side-stepping the situation. Choosing to pretend it never happened as opposed to acknowledging it for it’s flaws, properly criticizing it and even potentially putting ideas forward as to how the situation could’ve been improved. Time to stop beating around the Walking Bushie: Let’s talk about the Mag*psies.

Now let’s start off with what’s right in front of us. The first thing that hits you in the face as soon as these characters are mentioned by name, the thing that unequivocally is a black mark against Mother 3 as a game. Mag*psies. Yeah, it’s bad. Now for those unawares on what I mean let’s clarify something right off the bat: The term Gy*psy is a slur. Specifically a slur against the Romani people, a slur that originated in Europe upon the rising population of Roma migrating from their homeland to European nations. The slur came from an uneducated perspective that the Romani hailed from Egypt. With this slur comes the negative stereotypes that came from that same origin point: That Romani people were a nomadic people that consisted of criminals, ne'er do wells, and the dregs of society. Sometimes, mostly in media, they were even seen as wanderers who practice unsavory and unholy acts of magic. As well as the more uninformed, sensationalized version of “Voodoo” (which, when you put into perspective of how the Romani were mistaken for Egyptians and that Voodoo originated from Hati, really puts into perspective how xenophobia is born on blatant misinformation, scapegoat tactics and a really shitty grasp on geography.)

So with that in mind, the fact that this is the name that was chosen for this group of characters is bad. Although for most people, (I hope) this goes without saying. So why am I bringing this up? Because for a group of characters whose entire troupe are named after a slur that has real world connotations, the Mag*psie don’t outwardly express any malice or xenophobia against the Romani people. With how they’re characterized and presented, there aren’t really any clear connections to the stereotypes for those of Roma descent outside of a connection to magic, in this case PSI. And even than the Magy*psies being proficient in PSI seems more like it was intended as a genuine plot point then as a racial stereotype. So if that’s the case, why was that the name that was chosen? Simple: It was a case of misinformation.

One common misconception regarding the term G*psie is that it means being a free spirit, a wanderer, one with the world around you and mystically inclined. Of course this is all false and mostly stems from taking a negative racial connotation and turning it into a marketable buzzword for anything that seems ‘Mystical’ or ‘Free-Spirited’. In the same way that a Ouija Board is a tool for summoning and contacting spirits and demons that was manufactured by Parker Brothers for about 20$. So, it’s easy to surmise that the reason the name Mag*psie was chosen is because the developers of the game believed it to be an old-world term for someone of magical expertise or connected to the Earth spiritually. It also helps to keep in mind that Mother 3 was developed in Japan, and most people were more than likely unaware towards it’s true connotation. Hell, it wasn’t until a few years ago that people in the United States started to call people out on usage of the term and considering that Mother 3 was developed in the early 2000’s it’s easy to understand the confusion. Now, i’m not saying that this to excuse the use of G*psie in the game. Point blank, it shouldn’t have been used and is a legitimate flaw and mistake on part of the developers. But it also helps to keep in mind that the choice of word wasn’t out of malice, just ignorance. Does that make it better? No, but i’d like to imagine that if way back when, if someone on the development team found out what G*psie actually meant that it wouldn’t have gone into the game. Considering the core messages of Mother 3 and it’s tennants on the importance of companionship, family, community and love, It doesn’t make sense to have such a vile slur used within it’s context.

So what do we do with this information? Well, the Mother 3 community is oddly enough in the best state it’s ever been to fix this problem. Why do I say that? Because the game hasn’t been internationally localized yet. And let’s face it, the Mag*psies are one of the biggest reasons the game hasn’t seen an official English release. And maybe it’s just my overly-optimistic, dare I say, Pollyanna-esque point of view, but if a discussion were to start about the positive changes one could make towards the Mag*psies as characters and a narrative concept, the right people might just be listening in on the conversation and make the right changes for an international release or even a remake. Now, considering how it’s been 14 years since it’s Japanese release, and soon to be 15 years in a few months, I can understand if you just groaned or rolled your eyes reading that. But on the same merit, what’s the harm? Let’s say we do have this conversation and Nintendo just doesn’t pay attention and Mother 3’s International Localization continues to be a pipe-dream. What do we lose? That’s the fun thing about Fandom, sometimes you can just toss out the bad things about something you enjoy and make it better and overall more positive for the community. We toss out the old Mag*psies with their slur-using titles and uninformed, sloppy concepts of gender expression (trust me, we’ll get to that second point later.) and have newer, better ones that we can use for fan-content! So in the end, we either change the tide of the franchise itself and turn them around, giving us a greater chance at localization than we ever did before on top of a group of characters of positive representation! Or we just have these nicer, more appealing versions of the characters for our own uses now that the franchise is pretty much finished. It’s a win-win.

So with that, I'll start by making what’s probably the easiest change to these characters anyone could ever make.

Mag*ypsies. Mag / ypsies.

Magi.

And there we go. Good as new! Plus, it still works as a title for a group of people who specialize in mysticism and PSI as Magi is the plural for Magus! So, from this point forward, I am going to be referring to these characters as The Magi. Baddabing, Baddaboom.

Now with that out of the way, it’s time we address the second issue regarding The Magi: Their presentation of their gender identity and the problems those bring. In Mother 3, The Magi are referred to by Alec as being “neither male nor female”, and it’s heavily implied that The Magi aren’t even human. That due to them being so ancient, wise and strange they can't fit into the binary of male or female, so they have the traits of both. This results in the characters looking like they’re all men in drag, acting overly flamboyant and flirtatious. This results in The Magi being seen as a negative representation of people who identify as Genderqueer or Non-Binary. The stereotype of being loud, obnoxious, overtly sexual and all placed under a single umbrella of a flawed perspective which just results in them all being poorly written “”Drag Queens””. Now that isn’t to say a character who dresses in drag is a bad thing. If anything I encourage the idea of a Post-Modern RPG having a Drag Queen or King as a plot important ally or even a party member! The issue lies in that, because all of The Magi are presented like this it implies that those who don’t fit within the gender binary of male or female are all like this. Even if that wasn’t the intention, that is what the subtext implies.

Part of the intention behind the creation of the Magi was to balance out the more gritty, action-oriented and “Macho” tone that Mother 3 had compared to Mother 2 and 1. The idea was that The Magi would be at the center of the conflict between Tazmilly Village, The Main Party and The Pigmask Army and to balance out the darker tones of the story they would be aloof, androgynous and accepting of the fact that they would pass as the story progressed. This way the characters would be able to balance out the darker story beats and lighten the mood. Although it’s easy to see how this viewpoint would result in a less than stellar outcome. While on paper, the idea of a group of characters hearkening back to the more light-hearted and out-there tone of the previous games to make it so the game is less bleak is a fantastic idea, the execution was botched due to how sloppily it was handled.

The Magi in Mother 3 are represented in such a dissonant way, especially at the start of the game upon their introduction. Not only are you slapped in the face with their appearance and unfortunate name choice, upon asking about the whereabouts of Claus after he went up to the mountains to fight a Drago as revenge for the death of his mother, almost all the Magi basically respond by saying “Eh, who cares, humans live such short lives anyways so what does the life of one kid mean in the grand scheme of things?” Seeing as the players are meant to see The Magi as sympathetic characters and eventually team up with them in the end game to arrive at the locations of all of the Dragon Needles, the fact that this is their introduction is not only a slap in the face to those who are being negatively affected by how their presented but is also just...crappy writing. And don’t even get me started on the scene where Ionia teaches Lucas PSI, that is just BAD. Like point blank, bold text, red color, size 46 font BAD. Like even if The Magi didn’t have their original name and weren’t sloppy representations of non-binary/genderqueer folk that scene would still be really uncomfy.

And yet with all of this going against The Magi in terms of their presentation, it’s still hard to pin them down as having any ill-intent behind them because of their importance at the end of the game and what they eventually stand for. Once the race for The Dragon Needles begin, not only do all of The Magi support you on your quest and show levels of genuine concern and compassion for the protagonists, but also end up fleshing out the world around them in a way that gives the player a sense of hope in a time of hopelessness. Whether it be Ionia and her boundless compassion for the party and Kumatora especially, acting as her surrogate parental figure and doing everything she can to support the party in a time of crisis. Or Lydia, taking care of a wounded Pigmask Soldier, someone whose job it is to rip the life from The Magi in hopes of awakening the Dragon to shape the world in their master’s image. That despite their motivations, they wouldn’t let a wounded man die in the frigid cold of the mountains. These characters are meant to be beacons of hope, characters to lighten the mood during dark times and become characters you genuinely feel for. And yet, the execution fell flat due to a shoddy introduction, sub-par writing and misinformed representation.

So, where does that leave us? This is obviously an issue that’s a lot more nuanced than just changing their name so where do we start? While I don’t claim to have the perfect solution for this, and encourage others to throw their hat in the ring and keep the discussion going, I do have a few ideas: First things first, remove the concept that The Magi aren’t human and are incomprehensible to “Mortals”. Instead, make it so The Magi are just humans from the past who were so proficient in PSI and Psychic Abilities they were able to survive the cataclysm from milenia’s past and are more akin to Buddhist Monks in how they’re perceived. That being said, I do still like the idea of their style being tightly connected to that of Magicant from Mother 1. Spiral Shell houses, pink hair, very sparkly and pretty, we can keep that aesthetic. It makes sense for them! By making this change, we humanize The Magi a lot more and make it so the players can connect with them better and empathize with them easier as opposed to them being the off-the-wall weirdos that the game tries to represent them as. Plus, if the game really wanted an off-the-wall weirdo that ties back to the previous games, just give Dr. Andonuts more screentime. Along with that change, make them more empathetic without sacrificing their all-powerful mysticism. For example, when Alec and Flint arrive at the party at Aeolia’s, instead of having them nonchalantly shrug off the potential of Claus’ death, have them actively participate in assisting them in finding their lost child. Instead of it being ��We’re all powerful so the death of one person is meaningless in comparison to how we perceive the world.” it’s more “We’re all powerful, so assisting you in your journey to save your loved one is a simple task that will require minimal effort. If such a simple request can result in a good outcome, it shall be done.” Of course that begs the question of why they don’t just take care of everything, but I think that can be circumvented with the idea that they can’t intervene with the lives of others too much. That using their immense psychic powers too often would result in them misusing their powers and that they have to practice a certain level of restraint, or even that they’re so strong an overuse of their powers would result in devastation. Sort of like how a knight in a medieval fantasy story would seek guidance from an all powerful wizard, but the wizard can’t just solve the problem for them.

Now my next suggestion is turning a negative into a positive: Instead of having The Magi all represented as men in drag, The Magi are now all represented as different type of people that could fall under the non-binary or genderqueer spectrum! Now instead of all of them falling under the same umbrella, Aeolia can be purely androgynous and agender going by they/them pronouns, Doria is now demigender, partially identifying as male but going by xey/xem pronouns, having a big old pink lumberjack beard and a heartwarming smile, Lydia looks older and more aged with their physical appearance looking like that of an older man but using she/her pronouns and identifying with female presentation whilst feeling that they don’t have to be rescritced to said female presentation, Phygria could be genderfluid and upon each appearance they have they transition between genders, and Mixolydia falling under Genderqueer, having their own personal presentation of themselves and who they are! As for Ionia, I would actually argue keeping her the same! I say this because, if all The Magi are under the same umbrella representation of a stereotyped drag-queen, it’s a problem. However, if all The Magi are comprised of different, varied representations of the non-binary/genderqueer community it would make sense to have one of them fall under the representation of someone who dresses in drag!

Of course, these are all just my ideas. Whilst I have done as much research as I could while writing this, I understand that there are certain aspects behind those of non-binary expression that I am unaware of and ways that I could improve upon this idea. Like how changing The Magi in this way would still result in them all basically being a part of a big “Bury Your Gays” Trope due to them all passing away upon pulling their respective Needles, so i’m sure that there are plenty of other ideas other people could throw in! And I encourage that, I encourage people to look at this and tell me how this concept can be improved upon to create a more inclusive and positive representation of The Magi! Because that’s what we deserve! I can look at this years in the future and admit that there may have been something I missed out on or was just blatantly unaware of! But I’m hoping at the end of the day that this discussion can not only lead to a critical analysis of the wrongs behind the original Magi in Mother 3, but how they can be improved upon and made better. If not for Mother 3, or the Mother 3 community, for those who plan on making their own stories, their own games, so that they know to not make the same mistakes the developers of Mother 3 made and make something even better.

#Mother 3 #Nintendo #The Magypsies #Earthbound #Kumatora #TW: Slur #Hey look i'm talking

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