#they were like 'look we want to include diverse representation but...'

[cripplecharacters]

Hi! Ok so at one point I remember when answering an ask you said that when making animal based characters to just stay away from making any rat ones because of negative connotations (which I totally get)

So my question is would it be ok to have a whole humanoid race that is mildly based on mice? They look like humans but their ears vaguely look mouse-ish, they have tails, and their feet are sort of like paws. I am considering two different options with the tails in case I should stay away from the mouse thing, one looks like a mouse tail (kind of the main thing making them mice themed) and the other is a similar shape but fluffy especially at the end (A little like some versions of unicorn tails I've seen)

I would like to include disabled characters so if the mouse thing still isn't recommended I'll redesign them

Hello!

Most of the time when we advise that people avoid a certain trope/concept, it isn't a complete ban on it. It's generally more of a "be careful with how you approach this" type thing.

For example, we often advise against making a disabled character that's a villain because of their disability. If your only disabled character is a villain with chronic pain that kills people because their disability stops them from their dream job, that's not great. BUT if you have this same character and you also have a wheelchair user who runs the tech stuff for the hero side (Oracle-style, for my DC folks) and a Deafblind hero who leads the charge against the villains and an autistic sidekick and an amputee henchman for the villain and several able bodied villains and so on, then its less of a problem. It might not be gold medal representation but because you're no longer equating disability with tradegy and hatred and instead showing that villain as part of a cast with diverse stories and, more importantly, as a person with their own unique experiences, it's much better.

This is all a very long way of saying that most tropes that are generally best avoided can still be okay in some contexts.

In this case, having this whole species is completely fine and it's great that you want to include disabled characters! I see nothing wrong with this.

If you had a world where the characters were all anthropomorphic animals and the only rat character was also your own disabled character, that'd be a bit of a problem because it's singling out your disabled character -- presumably to poke at their disability.

In the concept you've presented, though, being part of this species is a trait all (Or most) of your characters share. Which is fine!

As a few final notes of caution:

If you're worried about certain unintended connotations or messaging coming across, it's generally best to spread your cast out as much as possible. By this, I mean that if you have other species in this world, don't have all your disabled characters be part of this one species. Likewise, don't have every member of this species be disabled. Instead, consider having your disabled characters be from different species. For example, have an amputee character be from this species but have a blind character be from another species.

Certain specific disabilities do have individual associations to watch out for. Be careful making associations between a character with a cleft lip and hares/rabbits (Because of the derogatory term "harelip" that has been used). Likewise but to a lesser extent, be careful with associations of blind people and moles, mice, and bats. This is because of the naked mole rat, the Three Blind Mice, and "blind as a bat" respectively. There are a few of these out there.

This is less of a warning and more just something to consider but keep in mind how their animal traits can be impacted by their disability. Would a character that's paralyzed have use of their tail? Would a blind character trip over their tail or would their same "sense of self" extend to the tail like it would an arm or leg? How would a character in a wheelchair adapt their chair to their tail? Etc.

Hopefully some of this is helpful!

Cheers,

~ Mod Icarus

[intern-gershwin-palmer]

obsessed with the realisation that definitely genderqueer gayboy Hwei is not technically canonically queer, because he would be bad representation as a toxic little twink, which is absolutely delightful because to me that just confirms that he and Jhin are both queer and toxic, which was really never in question but still, love that for them, love those messy bitches, the bad rep we deserve

[maximumqueer]

Yamato, Transness, and "Passing"

Now that we're nearly a full arc removed from Wano and Yamato's introduction, I want to talk about the reaction that a subset of the one piece fandom had to his reveal as a trans man/transmasc person, the transphobia behind that reaction, and how the concept of passing plays into that reaction. I'm not going to be arguing that Yamato is a trans man, as I think it is very obvious that he is given how he is referred to in the canon text. This is instead going to be more of a fandom dissection of why (in my personal opinion) so many people refuse to acknowledge Yamato as a man.

When we are first introduced to Yamato, he is dressed in a way that gives him the appearance of a flat chest, and is wearing a mask to hide his face. He looks like a man in a cis-heteronormative way

When Yamato was depicted like this, he was (from what I can tell) mostly referred to with he/him pronouns by the fanbase. This is based on comments underneath his chapter debut and episode debut. There are comments under his episode debut that do use she/her pronouns and refer to him as a woman, but because these episodes have been out for a while, it would make sense that these kinds of comments would be left on his debut after his second design was revealed.

Then, when he removes his mask and outer layer of his outfit, he is depicted like this

After this reveal, more people began to refer to Yamato with she/her pronouns, and refer to him as Kaido's daughter, despite him referring to himself as Kaido's son, as well as the people around him using he/him pronouns exclusively for him. What changed? Well, Yamato went from having a design that looked traditionally masculine to having a more traditionally feminine one. As such people who associate only women with having breasts and more "feminine" features began to insist that Yamato was a tomboy, or a delusional woman, anything but accept that fact that he is a man.

There is a phenomena with trans "acceptance", where a character is accepted as trans only if they look like their gender according to the cis-heteronormative ideal, and questioned and denied if they don't. Kiku, a trans woman who "passes" as a woman did not receive nearly the same level of speculation and denial of her trans identity. (This is not to say that Kiku received no hate or transphobic comments, but that because she looks like a woman to the average cis-het viewer, she was treated as a "real" trans person, whereas Yamato was not).

Yamato has been repeatedly referred to as mentally ill for being a "non-passing" trans man. He has been called bad representation (despite large numbers trans men/transmasc people, myself included, saying that his IS good representation). People have made claims with no canon backing in an attempt to hand wave away his transness because he "looks like a woman", a popular one being that Kaido some how forced Yamato into being a man, despite his backstory telling us the exact opposite.

And the reasoning for all of this speculation is that trans people are held to such high standards in terms of appearance and presentation, even in fictional media. A trans man must have a flat chest, deep voice, facial hair etc. or he isn't actually trans. A trans woman must have breasts, a high voice, a lack of facial hair, etc. or she isn't actually trans. Non-binary people are dismissed entirely. This denies the many different and diverse ways that a person can be trans. Sure, some trans people wish to medically transition, get the "surgery" and go through life as if they were cis. But not all trans people want that. Gender is messy and complicated, its not nearly as black and white a we have been taught to believe. There are many trans people (both binary and non-binary) who will never medically transition. That does not make them less trans, it does not make them delusional. Yet because we have this black and white thinking ingrained in us from childhood, any deviation from the strict boxes of "man" and "woman" are immediately questioned, and that includes gender non-conforming people - both trans and cis.

This type of transphobia is not talked about enough, as the people doing it will so often hide behind the idea that they are protecting "real" trans people, and just want to make sure that they are respected and taken seriously. But, respect for a persons gender identity CANNOT be conditional. It does not matter if they "don't pass". It doesn't matter if they are a good person, a bad person. The second you start dictating who gets to have their gender respected is the second you stop being an ally. And that includes fictional characters like Yamato.

[reel-fear]

Bendy And The Power Of Representation

So those graphic novel pages huh? Seems I posted my cover post at just the right time because literally minutes after I was informed the preview pages came out and uh. This is Buddy and Norman!

Oh dear... I'll put the full graphic novel pages down below but I have so much to say on how awful this is it'll need several posts. However, right now I want to mostly talk about representation and briefly touch on why it's so damn important + inform others about the current shit Mike and Meatly are saying about the books n such.

Now note: All the things I'm saying below are based on my personal experience, maybe some people don't care about seeing the representation of their identities in the media they consume. Maybe some will think I'm merely being dramatic and I might be but I'm not lying when I say I personally believe being represented and seen in the media you consume can be one of the most wonderful feelings in the world.

Look I'm not here to argue with people who think that Norman in particular was never meant to be a person of color, I would argue he is very coded but the points I'm making here are not about how Norman particularly had to be black. The point I want to make is the lack of diversity in our cast in general and how Norman's design has heavily dwindled it considering most people [including myself] rightfully assumed he was at least one of three black characters in our cast. Not according to this though and looking at the the rest of the pages our chances of seeing any kind of decent diverse character designs dwindle more.

So firstly... Buddy a character who has been said to experience discrimination for being Jewish, lacks any kind of ethnic features at all. That's... Cool but yeah I think this shows a rather grim future for the character designs as a whole.

Also, Norman... As I mentioned he was largely assumed to be black due to his southern dialect, his voice, and other factors. But nope, he's a generic white guy. With... Gross looking hair tbh...

Sadly this is not the first time the topic of poor representation has come up concerning Bendy either.

[note how he disregarded the other mentioned minorities and specifically cites LGBTQ+ characters]

This sucks as a response but sadly considering Mike's recent behavior it seems to fall in line with the Bendy team's general lack of care towards representing anyone who isn't straight and white.

So how did Mike respond to all of this? Well...

TDLR - "Who cares if the Graphic Novel we're selling to our fans for full price sucks, we now no longer consider the books canon."

This is horrible, I know Mike and Meatly are only really in this for the money, the fact BATIM is in the state that it is proved that, but they really couldn't have been less obvious about it?

So basically when it benefited them, AKA when it meant people would have to buy the books to understand important lore like Boris' identity... [the character you spend all of chapter 4 trying to rescue] They were considered canon... At least the author sure thought so.

Hell even in the tweet Meatly made here he doesn't say the books aren't canon, he just says they're not needed to understand Bendy's world. Now Mike is using that as a shield instead of doing the right thing and saying "You're right, the poc in our fanbase deserve better we'll have it fixed right away!" Like most reasonable people would considering how his studio has literally been accused of bigotry, poor rep, and general lack of diversity before. Why risk making more people avoid this franchise?

Also just... Imagine how insulting it would be to be an author who helps flesh out so much of this world and gives its characters depth like NONE of the games have managed to do, filling in plot holes, creating a timeline for events, etc... Then because they couldn't bother to change the graphic novel for ur story to be better they instead throw out all ur writing and declare it non-canon.

If I were her to put it bluntly I'd feel insulted and horrible. Why make her do all the work of making sure her works align with the timeline and game's canon if they're not part of it?

I can't speak for her obviously but Meatly and Mike know of her account, so speaking out against this could very much risk her being fired or at least not allowed to work on Bendy anymore... So I would take all her tweets on this situation with a grain of salt. She very much is not in a position where she could be honest if she was against this.

So with all that history now, the question I'm sure many are wondering is... Why does this even matter? Who cares how diverse the characters are when it doesn't affect the story?

Well for one thing, if you think like that consider having more empathy for your fellow human beings but also it does affect the story. One of DCTL's themes is about the bigotry of the period it is set in.

Now the Bendy team has managed to make the discussion of this book centering around their bigotry which is ironic in a way I almost find funny... Though this entire thing is just a bit too hurtful and upsetting to find any humor in, at least for me...

But another thing is representation can bring people such joy when it's done with care. It really shouldn't be understated how far it can go to make people feel more comfortable in their own sense of self to have a franchise choose to represent them and their experiences. I know this from personal experience.

Now if you've been following me for a while, you know I'm a big fan of Transformers. I no longer engage with it much due to baggage from the fandom's awful treatment of me, but before I left I remember being able to witness the release of Transformers: Earthspark first few episodes.

These introduced the Maltos the family who meets the Transformers and serve as our protagonists and guess what?

It's a family of Filipinos!

Now look I'm not Filipino, but I am half Mexican and I have a lot of love for that part of me. So seeing the representation of any Spanish culture in this franchise I loved made me so happy! I remember just watching the first episode I was happily telling my partner how fun it was to see people like me and my family in a world I love!!

But it didn't end with the Maltos in fact... There was another character who spoke to me, their name was Nightshade. Their pronouns are They/Them and they spoke about it on the show! Not just mentioning it and moving on but actually sitting down to speak about their experiences...

This clip in particular really turned them into an absolute favorite among fans and well... I'll let you see it for yourself.

This scene... Fills me with a joy I cannot describe. It is the creators of a franchise I love telling me they see people like me and find the stories of people like me important enough to include in this series. There really is nothing like being able to say there are Non-Binary characters in a franchise I have so much love for. I was far from the only one too.

This is amazing, this is wonderful, this clip and character were moving to so so many people and...

This is a joy the Bendy creators have no interest in giving their audience. They don't care how you feel as a queer and/or black person, which... Hurts...

I... Discovered I was trans while in the Bendy community... It was where I learned the word Non-Binary and started using it for myself. To me Bendy will always have that connection... But the devs themselves seem to hate the idea of being forced to actually represent that in their games... And I still haven't really gotten over that pain or betrayal if I'm being honest.

So...

With Norman now being portrayed as white here, we are down to two black characters. Thomas [who Meatly has claimed is white in the past] based on a vague conversation with Sammy in DCTL they could easily ignore... And Jacob.... A book exclusive character which according to Mike means he is non-canon.

If we don't count Thomas' vague talk with Sammy about disrespect as confirmation he's black [which the devs don't seem to think so] then we have one black character in all of Bendy... And he recently got retconned into non-existence. Great.

Look... The Bendy fanbase has always been full of wonderfully diverse designs for the staff and even more diverse people creating them. Bendy's fandom was built with the work of queer people from all kinds of places.

If the Bendy team continues to show how little they care for anyone who isn't straight or white... I wonder who they are counting on to buy this book or in general financially support their franchise?

I know right now, I am furious, I am hurt and I most certainly don't feel like buying a book that's currently just a massive fuck you to the fans and I hope I've expressed why I feel this way in an easy-to-understand way here...

Either way, I will not be forgetting this anytime soon and I hope the fanbase does the same. Maybe just maybe, if there's enough backlash to this series of horrible decisions they'll learn better.

Right now, it's kinda of our only hope for a better future, and if you know any poc who are into Bendy right now... Maybe consider making sure they're feeling okay.

I know from experience how much this sort of thing hurts, to have the creators of a world you love straight up tell you they don't intend to fix the fact no one in their stories represents your identity or life...

What I'm trying to say is...

This is a really low point for Bendy and its fans... Even more for the poc who have to witness such ignorant and careless attitudes from Mike and Meatly towards their feelings.

Please don't forget them when you discuss these tweets or this situation. That's exactly what Mike and Meatly want right now.

For them to be unrepresented and therefore... Unheard.

[vintagetvstars]

Nichelle Nichols Vs. Yvonne Craig

Propaganda

Nichelle Nichols - (Star Trek) - She speaks for herself. Legendary, iconic, at the forefront of feminism and civil rights in the 60s, she is a triple threat who did so much more. She volunteered from 1977 to promote recruitment diversity within NASA, including some of the first female and ethnic minority astronauts. Martin Luther King Jr. compared her work on Star Trek as a 'vital role model' to the civil rights marches. She refused to be dismissed, fought for visibility and shone whilst doing so. As a woman in stem, and simply a woman she means the world and stars above to me.

Yvonne Craig - (Batman, Star Trek) - 7 year old me didn't know she was a lesbian but she sure knew she liked batgirl

Master Poll List of the Hot Vintage TV Ladies Bracket

Additional propaganda below the cut

Nichelle Nichols:

She is the original badass babe. She was a black woman in a leading role on TV in the 60s, a trailblazer for black actresses for years to come. She is so beautiful and so awesome.

she's fantastic. have you seen her? paved the way for black actresses on TV even while her lines and scenes were being cut and improvised the most iconic uhura line in the series. (sulu: "I'll save you, fair maiden!" uhura, pushing him away: "sorry, neither!") she's incredibly talented and it's a crime the show didn't give her more screen time (or make her sing more often because she also has a beautiful voice!)

“Sorry, neither” in response to “fair maiden” was ad libbed by her. There’s a lot more I could say but what else do you need??

A sci-fi icon!

She was such a trailblazer, and Uhura was such an important character for so many people to be able to see on TV. Apparently Mae Jemison (the first African American woman to go into space) cited her as a reason she wanted to become an astronaut. She was just an absolute legend!

The story of Martin Luther King telling her not to quit Star Trek gives me chills. Representation matters. “Thank you so much, Dr. King. I’m really going to miss my co-stars.” Dr. King's smile, Nichols recalled, vanished from his face. "He said, 'What are you talking about?'" the actress explained. "I told him. He said, 'You cannot,' and so help me, this man practically repeated verbatim what Gene said. He said, 'Don’t you see what this man is doing, who has written this? This is the future. He has established us as we should be seen. 300 years from now, we are here. We are marching. And this is the first step. When we see you, we see ourselves, and we see ourselves as intelligent and beautiful and proud.' He goes on and I’m looking at him and my knees are buckling. I said, 'I…, I…' And he said, 'You turn on your television and the news comes on and you see us marching and peaceful, you see the peaceful civil disobedience, and you see the dogs and see the fire hoses, and we all know they cannot destroy us because we are there in the 23rd Century.'"

She shared the first interracial kiss on Star Trek, helped propel real life African American women into space-related careers, and looks divine in a mini skirt.

HOW DID UHURA WALK BACKWARDS SO FAR??? WOW!

[passionategamerotica]

First off I’m a white guy but I’ve seen some discussion recently around 40K’s non-white coded factions and had some thoughts about particularly some of 40K’s old world building lore tropes and how that has influenced where we are today.

Warhammer’s planet of hats trope has lead to some really interesting cultures of planets in the Imperium in the lore. Planet of hats is essentially, how you can make lots of visually distinct cultures of worlds in a lore’s canon, making one like ancient Rome (Ultramar), one like ancient Greece (Olympia), making one like space Egypt (Prospero) or making one space scandanavia (Fenris). It’s easiest to understand it primarily as a way of differentiating the biggest money making faction in the game, Space Marines and their various chapters and legions. However, I think we also need an honest conversation about how the planet of hats trope has led to some takes on race that can be reductive and generalised on particular cultures.

For instance the Salamanders, are coded and i think intentionally to be black. You often hear fans say they’re not black in our modern understanding of race, mainly cause their skin colour is meant to be a sci-fi ultra dark because of intense radiation on their homeworld. However their geneseed (things that share particular genetic traits in Space Marine creation) also gives them red eyes which are described by some in lore as demonic looking. And the Salamanders stories often focus on this disconnect from their chapter culture, humanitarianism (by 40K standards), nobility, heroism and humility and their physical appearance which some find frightening. I think this is coded discussion of how black people face discrimination because of their appearance in many places across the world, especially when we understand that colorism and dark skinned people across all cultures often face marginalisation. This is though a really heavy handed way to discuss race I personally find it a bit on the nose.

When we look at the White Scars, who are explicitly coded as east-asian particularly Mongolian but with elements of Chinese culture thrown in, we can see that planet of hats can lead to some stereotypes and generalisations about communities being ingrained. Especially when you consider most lore authors working on Warhammer are white men.

Another example I feel is the Tau, who were created at a time when Games Workshop wanted to expand into the Japanese market, using mechs very inspired by Japanese anime and sci-fi, and as such a lot of the faction is coded with Japanese cultural and racial markers. Including the voice acting in video games, which I often find is similar to the voice acting of Samurai in movies.

I think people of colour in the Warhammer 40K community have found representation and enjoyment from these examples, but that besides, I think it highlights the cause we should broader representation on the writing and modelling in the hobby, to make a richer and more interesting world. I’ve always loved the space that Warhammer gives you to create new things in their world, seeing really incredible head-canon and fanfic for more diverse and interesting representations of characters and worlds in Warhammer. But that isn’t people’s introduction to the hobby, the Warhammer official canon and lore is. Planet of hats has lead I think to less interesting factions, by not creating and exploring more nuanced world building, which I totally concede some writers do undertake but I wouldn’t say is a general trend.

I don’t know it this is really a criticism more just a sense that Warhammer is growing as hobby, it’s bigger than it has ever been in my time playing it and this is an opportunity, to bring more people into the fandom and make our hobby inclusive.

[puc-puggy]

Hello! I saw your responses on a thread about sex ed and anatomy resources and they were super helpful. I wanted to ask though, do you know of any similar resources for intersex people? Like non-sexualized images (photos/illustrations) of a variety of people/bodies with different intersex conditions? Asking as someone who is intersex and has never seen a body like mine.

sorry this took me so long!

here's a free training by Our Bodies, Ourselves that goes over intersex genital variation and includes a training on drawing diverse genitals, though i do not believe that it has any uncensored photos.

here's a selection of illustrated genitalia by Intersex Roadshow, which also does not have uncensored photos.

now for the sad bit that requires paragraphs of disclaimers. as I'm sure you know, intersex people suffer from an incredible medical stigma, and while there are available images of intersex genitalia, the vast majority of collections are using the images to explain how to assign a binary sex in spite of obvious visual mixed sex characteristics or how to surgically alter them, typically without informed consent provided to the patient. as a result, a good chunk of the imagery available exists in spaces or alongside explanations that are actively hostile to the way that intersex individuals understand and discuss themselves and state as an expectation that ambiguous genitalia must be altered and binarized.

There is nothing wrong with your body. I really prefer to send people to body positive spaces because we deserve to learn about our bodies with joy and curiosity, not to be taught to look at ourselves with shame or judgment. If while viewing these slides, you find yourself feeling negatively about your body, take a break and return to reading or spaces respectful of intersex people. i'll leave some below the cut

PROCEED WITH CAUTION

Here's links to two sets of medical school slides. Approach to DSD (Ambiguous genitalia) and Intersex Presentation. to find more images, use specific diagnoses as key terms and search for "case study," "[diagnosis] clinical approach," "[diagnosis] ambiguous genitalia" or similar language.

InterAct's Intersex FAQ

InterAct's collection of informative brochures & guides

Intersex Human Rights Australia: Celebrating Intersex Firsts on TV

JSTOR: Intersex Narratives: Shifts in the Representation of Intersex Lives in North American Literature and Popular Culture, by Viola Amato

Human Rights Campaign: Understanding the Intersex Community

GLAAD Media Reference Guide: Intersex People

[beneathashadytree]

i sorry for saying this but i have to be honest, i dont understand why the LnDs MC having a gender is a problem, i mean, i understand you making a gn OC for some kind of support or representation but not why the MC, who already have a female body (and with that i mean biologically, the old fashion way everyone would visualise in their minds at first when they hear "female body", after all even if we young ones think this patter is wrong it still a pattern old ppl and from different cultures, and almost everyone understand and learned at first at a very young age) and if im not wrong also refered as "she" im the game, cant be described with anything that isnt gender neutral, i also have no idea why someone would be offended or feel not included reading about a MC with a gender, we all are different and is impossible to include everyone, ppl can feel not included for things you cant even imagine would be a problem, and not being able to see yourself on a story once isnt a big problem, you can ignore or jump to the next one, or just see the character like a character or another person that isnt youself.

I hope you dont get mad at this (and was able to understand my point, i usually have problems communicating with others and since english isnt my native language it gets worst), its that i just dont see the point in all this, i understand having a preference or incentivating one but not feeling somenthing bad and being against the other...

I understand what you’re trying to say, nonnie, but I have to point out a few things first. First off, I shouldn’t have to explain my own boundaries because at the end of the day, they are boundaries and should not be discussed. When something makes me uncomfortable, I shouldn’t be negotiating why people should respect that and stick to it without questioning my motives.

However, I understand you have no ill intentions, so I will be answering you—not because I’m obligated to, but because I want to point out where your line of thinking comes to harm marginalized communities.

The very simple answer is this: Because I’m a fanfic writer.

I’m not creating the MC in a game where she physically has a body and an appearance. Otome games were initially made as fantasies for their players to picture themselves in romantic situations. But since most Otome games have female MCs with very stereotypical appearances, most people who do NOT look like that end up having to imagine an OC/someone else in their place. It’s a shitty feeling; to feel left out because game producers can’t be assed to create more diverse options.

Second of all, the “old fashioned way” was already fucked up from the start, because even female bodied people are much less likely to look like Otome game MCs—who are almost dauntingly pretty, have virtually no physical blemishes, have straight hair, big eyes, and are incredibly thin. Now think of all the people who do NOT fit that physical description and are almost always excluded. When I visualize a female body like you say, I don’t instantly picture a perfect-looking skinny fair-skinned girl who looks not a day past 18. Because female bodies aren’t just one thing or the other. It’s a beautiful spectrum.

Third of all, leaving “old fashioned thinking” as it is is already a harmful concept. Should we ignore white people’s racism because it’s how they were brought up in the old-fashioned way? Should we allow sexism & misogyny in our communities because it’s how they were brought up back in the day? Should we encourage fatphobia by not silencing people because being thin and encouraging EDs was acceptable? Should we let homophobic hate crimes keep occurring because that’s what used to happen?

The number one goal of our new generations should be to reconstruct society and dismantle all the harmful practices that were done by our predecessors. Ending the cycle is our responsibility and no one else’s, and to do that, we have to take active measures to undo what they’ve done and erase what is “the norm.” Just thinking it’s wrong isn’t enough; we must take action to cut that shit out.

And because these were the “old-fashioned ways” it’s still the default for almost every writer to create for a female audience. Imagine a fandom has 200 writers. 190 would write for female MCs, and only 10 writers would write for more diverse MCs. Should everyone else that is not female (and, by the way, gender-queer people represent a massive percentage of fandoms online, and males do exist within our fandom spaces) just keep living their lives having to picture other people instead of themselves, because not enough people care enough to include them in their writing?

Here’s a realistic representation of what you’re saying: let’s say there are 2 million LNDS players around the world. 1 million are female. 1 million are not. The second 1 million will never get to see themselves as the MC. Now they can’t even picture themselves in fiction? Should the second 1 million be forced to feel left out in their own fandom space?

The same also happens with race representation in fandoms. Less than 50% of the world population is white. Yet we don’t see except very few people in fandoms writing for Black people, Latinos, Arabs, South-Asians, South-East Asians, Inuits, Native Americans, etc. Why is that? It’s because fandoms are catered towards white people. So should we just let the entire half of the globe never feel included in the art/writing fandom creators make? Do they not deserve representation and comfort too?

So when I write, I write for everyone. And when I say everyone, I mean EVERYONE. Because I think everyone deserves to see themselves loved and cared for by their favorite characters. Because everyone needs that sort of comfort. Because I myself have spent my entire life looking for that comfort in fandom spaces and never finding it. Even if the game doesn’t allow them to do that, I’m giving everyone a chance to enjoy the game through their own eyes, without having to be a stereotypical skinny girl with sleek straight hair and a dainty face. Because we want representation, and if the canon content can’t give us that (even though they claim it’s supposed to be “us”), then at the very least our fandom spaces should provide this. I hope you understand why my rules are there now. They’re a protection for both myself and everyone else in this fandom.

Fanfiction was created by the people, for the people—not just for a certain demographic that fits beauty standards and “old fashioned thinking”—and it should always be for ALL the people.

Being as inclusive as is humanly possible is never a bad thing. Refusing to see why consistently excluding others is wrong IS a bad thing, though.

[bohemian-nights]

love your blog <3

there's no reason for nettles to be cut. the only reason she's not in s2 is because they want to milk "daemyra" as much as possible and don't care about sacrificing the only canonically black character to make the main white couple look good.

it's bullshit. they do shit like this and then claim to be "progressive" ? including black character only to turn them into side kicks for the main white characters and mistreat them is not progressive. why are baela and rhaena sidelined for the strongs? in f&b they're more important. why is laena turned into the "unloved wife"? second to rhaenyra? why is vaemond framed as the villain for being angry that his home is being robbed by a white boy?

and now we have a shot of all of the dragonseeds - except nettles, the only important dragonseed. and when you try to complain the stans hit you with the "but there are other black characters" card. they say that "race doesn't exist in westeros" (LMAO) to excuse and justify luke being the heir and pretend like there's nothing problematic with a white person stealing a black family's home. they also use the "no race" card to justify nettles being erased or downplay her importance. the gaslighting and racist undertones are actually crazy.

thank you for calling these people out.

Thank you. I do try and try my best not to come off like a crazy person talking at a wall, but this fandom and this show are nuts and severely anti-Black.

I won’t say it’s worse than other fandoms, but admitting there is a problem is like pulling teeth.

You have people blatantly lie and pretend like their headcanons are actual canon which is extremely disturbing when it comes to the Black(ish) characters because those headcanons are made to take away their characterization.

There is only so much one can ignore without disregarding their self pride.

As far as the showrunners go I will say I don’t think they are trying to prop up that ghost ship because they wouldn’t have added choke-gate if they had any intention of turning Dumbnyra(I’m not respecting a ship populated by people who think it's fine to call Black characters the n-word) into an epic romance, but they are trying to hold off on putting Nettles on the show because she makes said self-insert look bad and they can’t have that.

Yet they know cutting her looks suspect considering their past actions.

They think diversity = having Black(ish) people there never mind lighting them on fire, sidling them, turning them into an undisputed villain, turning them into stereotypes, etc., and unfortunately they’ve emboldened an extremely racist and toxic fanbase with their (in)action(s).

Laena was deliberately made into the disposable Black girlfriend, but no one cared about that. No one cared about how that looked or how Black fans would feel with that being our representation. How it's harmful and damaging to see that play out time and time again. They cheered it on and called her slurs while doing so.

Now I’ve seen people claim to be concerned about Nettles and her being made into a mistress and yes there are problems with showing a Black woman as a mistress, but there are just as many if not more problems with showing a Black(ish) woman as someone’s second choice or showing us as undesirable. Not a peep was said about the latter.

The same people who are so concerned(I see y’all in her tag) are the same people who a couple of months ago were calling for Nettles to be cut and replaced with Baela and Rhaena or even Addam because they are all Black(ish) now. Never mind that Nettles’ story is vastly different from theirs.

That Nettles isn’t supposed to be indisputably Valyrian like the others(at least in the books her heritage is the least clear out of everyone present and in the show she still isn’t being claimed by anyone).

Never mind that she isn’t supposed to be Daemon's daughter(the dates don’t line up and I dare anyone to tell me they bathed naked with their father at 17; I dare anyone to say that someone who claimed a wild dragon with the highest body count during the sowing doesn’t know how to bathe herself).

Or that she isn’t just someone’s mistress(you don’t risk your life for a woman who is just your mistress).

That she isn’t an unloved unwanted woman despite who she is(Daemon chooses her. We can talk about how that isn’t “progressive�� enough for some people although I’d argue that it’s progressive for a character like Nettles, but that’s what’s written in black and white).

That she’s saved and survives the Dance. She’s the only dragonseed that survives maybe even the last dragonrider for two hundred years. She certainly gains more than what she had(she becomes the spiritual leader of a tribe for God's sake). 

Is Nettles’ story perfect, no, but people are holding her, her arc, and her potential characterization in the show to an unhealthy standard that they would never hold a character like Rhaenyra, Daenerys, or an even Helaena to and basing whether they like her or not based on that standard.

They aren’t allowing her to be a nuanced character let alone someone with her wants and motivations who experiences love and loss alike.

Nettles' arc is as complex as every other character in this story, but people don’t want that. They don’t even want her there.

Never mind that she’s important to the narrative and there is a reason for her complexity, it’s her skin color they see. Her skin color is the only thing they see and therefore they fail to see her as someone deserving of her dynamic arc.

Instead they want the downtrodden girl. The abused girl. The poor orphan girl who is just grateful to have found a family. The girl who can easily be placed into a box and doesn’t need any analysis whatsoever.

A girl. She doesn’t need love because she’s a girl. She doesn’t need to have her own will and desires because she’s a girl. She’s a child. She’s not a nuisance. A box of gunpowder waiting to go off and change the narrative. She’s not a threat.

I’ve talked about this before(too many times), but that’s who they want.

They can’t have a Mammy that looks too obvious given the story, or Jezebel(I imagine that’s what they’ll say she is once she appears although they’ll look crazed trying to pigeon hole her into the slut category), and they know she most likely won’t be cut, so they settle for the non-threatening, sexless, naive(selectively intellectually challenged) child.

The show calls itself diverse and the fans claim themselves to be feminists, but that’s a joke and a slap in the face to Black fans who aren't self-haters (who the fandom has harassed anytime we don’t blindly agree with and call them out on their bullshit).

Black fans don’t want characters who look like us wrapped in bubble wrap with a pretty little bow on top. We want characters (in every sense of the word), but neither the showrunners nor the fans seem to get this(tale as old as time or at least it’s centuries old).

I started ranting I’m sorry anon, but Nettles tag has been a mess so I used this as an opportunity to voice my peace. It’s extremely disturbing that you have a bunch of non-Black people trying to police Black representation particularly representation for Black women, but at the end of the day what they have to say doesn’t matter.

[alpaca-clouds]

The thing that bugs me about Cazador

Allow me to ramble about a thing that really bugs me about Cazador and his character design.

Let me start out with the fact, that it is super iffy that Cazador is the one recognizable east asian character in the entire game. At least from what I came across. And, you know. It is iffy if you take a minority and make their only representation the "sadistic vampire who wants to sacrifice 7000 mostly white people to become a god". I hope I don't have to explain that.

And yes, technically speaking... yeah, Karlach is technically also East Asian. With just one problem: Her being red-skinned and having the make-up very much hides this fact. Like, I did not realize this until I saw the mod that removed the make-up from the companions.

But outside of the basic issue with the trope... Well, look. I do not think that the folks Larian were like: "Hehe, we will use this character to show how evil the Asians are!" or something like this. But the game very much shows that there was a lot of internalized biases. And be it just in the fact, that we barely come across non-white characters in the entire fucking game. All non-white characters are basically tokens.

And before someone comes in with: "Faerûn is based on medieval Europe!" First off: "Shut up." Second: Going by official DnD Lore Faerûn is a super diverse place, where you will find all sorts of Asian, Arab, and Black people. I mean, just look at the DnD movie, where they made an effort to have half of the cast be non-white. Like, the Faerûn that Larian depicts is basically the Faerûn of 3e, not 5e.

And then... Well, when it comes to Cazador, then there is the Early Access design.

Now, this is actually where WotC stepped in and was like: "Yeah, you cannot do this." Officially by explaining that elves do not have facial hair. But I do imagine that someone at WotC actually looked at this design and was like: "... Do they realize that this is Fu Manchu?"

Because yeah, this design is simply just Fu Manchu. And for those who are not aware: Fu Manchu is a character popular in pulp fiction of the early 20th century, that arose mostly from Yellow Peril stereotypes.

He was a Chinese magician, who was up to all sorts of evil schemes, which suspiciously often involved sacrificing white people (mostly white women) to evil gods or demons. He made appearances in all sorts of media back then, including movies (where he obviously was portrayed by white actors in yellowface) and some off-brand Sherlock Holmes novels that were not written by Doyle but other writers.

Fu Manchu was also what the original Mandarin in the Marvel Comics was based on.

This is one of the Renditions of Fu Manchu in one of those off-brand Sherlock Holmes stories.

And here is the earlier Mandarin design:

And, like, I am sorry. But that stuff leaves a bitter taste in my mouth.

Again, I do not really think that this stuff was done on purpose. My best guess is, that Cazador was either based on the Mandarin, or on some of the other "Chinese Magician" villains that some American Kung Fu movies put into their media in the 70s and 80s.

But I also think there was nobody at Larian who did any sort of sensitivity consulting when it came to the inclusion of non-white characters.

[ivygrowsc]

America Ferrera's breakthrough career

I just want to point out that this woman has delivered 2 cinematic, historical, browsing, impeccable speeches about the frustrations I feel about being a woman. And that actress of course is the one and only America Ferrera herself. Let's talk about her debut role in the movie — Real Women Have Curves. The 2002 independent film based on the play by Josefina Lopez is one of my all-time favourite movies I have watched in my lifetime. And if you somehow know this movie through another suspicious Greta Gerwig connection, I implore you to watch this. The movie was directed by Patricia Cardoso. At the time when it was released, America Ferrera had already filmed another movie but this movie debuted first putting her on the map. She was only 17 years old! Josefina López wrote the play when she was 18 years old. In 2019 it was the first Latina directed film to be included in the National Film Registry at the library of Congress. Taking inspiration from her real life, Josefina wrote Real Women Have Curves about Ana, mostly centered on her relationship with her mother Carmen, played by Lupe Ontiveros. This movie is touted, not only for its representation of women in their real bodies, it also delivered a warm and loving portrayal of Latina families and neighborhoods in Royal Heights and East Los Angeles. Again this isn't a time where Latinas, even today, are represented in a full and nuancent light. So to not only have this Latina family but to have them placed in East Los Angeles which has been criminally and stereotypically portrayed as "dangerous", really meant something and still means something today. And the message of that film being "there's so much more to me than my weight". I think this might serve as a comfort watch for many women around the world.

I don't understand how we were made to believe as children, that America Ferrera was the biggest woman to ever grace our tv screen. The Sisterhood Of The Traveling Pants is what I call perfection in cinema. If I ever will have a daughter in the future, she is required to watch this movie. Because every little girl needs to understand what sisterhood and what community is. I feel like girls today are not watching sisterhood displayed on television, or even in movies. It's always these toxic relationship, these toxic friendship — not to say that neither of those can't be toxic and bad, because even within this friend group they all have their own issues with each other, with their families etc. But it's not about the problems, it's how they solve them, how they come together. And I feel like this message should be displayed for the young girls today. And I just love how diverse the friend group is, because nowadays it seems like every teenager I see on tv are like the same skinny, white blondes. If you haven't seen this movie make sure to have a box of tissues nearby because it's going to make you cry.

The dark side of pretty privilige is, you don't get to be funny, intelligent, respected — you just get to be pretty. So I've just finished watching Ugly Betty, I fully recommend, and I realised the only female character who's actually respected within this show, is Betty. If you don't already know the concept, Betty gets hired to be the assistant to the chief. Because he sleeps with his assistants, they decide to get him an "ugly" girl so he won't sleep with her. But she's hired for Mode, which is kind of like Vogue/Cosmo type of magazine. So naturally she gets bullied. They treat her like crap because she doesn't look like the ideal Mode girl. But the crazy thing is, since none of the men want to sleep with her, they actually respect her. They start to treat her like a human being with ideas. Then she becomes one of the most liked people by anyone in their team. On top of that, all of these gorgeous women get treated like absolute crap. No one listens to them, their ideas are not heard, and they're not respected. So it leaves a very clear message: wether you are gorgeous or "ugly", misogyny will still hunt you down and it will catch you. For Betty, men don't look twice her way. They treat her bad from the moment they see her. Just because they don't want to sleep with her, they don't find her attractive. For the beautiful women in the show, like Amanda who is painted as the gorgeous blonde, men only want to sleep with her, and they don't see that she's smart. Go back to watch the show and you'll see how horribly the other women get treated compared to Betty (and they have some good cameos in this show).

As we are reaching the end, we can claim America Ferrera as "that girl". The term is, in my opinion, used for anyone who dresses like a fashionista and acts like the queen they are. But it's much more than that. I think, to achieve that title you have to be also impactful and encourage other women to be what they want to be. America really proved it by playing the Emmy Award winning role of Gloria in Barbie, directed by Greta Gerwig. I think every cis, heterosexual white male should be forced to sit down and watch this movie. The message behind the Barbie movie is about going from being a girl to being a woman. Barbieland is what our childhood felt like; we were safe, naive, independent and everything seemed perfect. The real world is what womanhood actually is. It's scary, sexist, there's pain and we're faced with so many challenges, while still being held to unrealistic expectations by society. "We mothers stand still, so our daughters can look back to see how far they've become". America Ferrera's speech about how hard it is to be a woman, really affected me and made me tear up in the theather. "It is literally impossible to be a woman. You are so beautiful, and so smart, and it kills me that you don't think you're good enough. Like, we have to always be extraordinary, but somehow we're always doing it wrong. You have to be thin, but not too thin. And you can never say you want to be thin. You have to say you want to be healthy, but also you have to be thin. You have to have money, but you can't ask for money because that's crass. You have to be a boss, but you can't be mean. You have to lead, but you can't squash other people's ideas. You're supposed to love being a mother, but don't talk about your kids all the damn time. You have to be a career woman but also always be looking out for other people. You have to answer for men's bad behavior, which is insane, but if you point that out, you're accused of complaining. You're supposed to stay pretty for men, but not so pretty that you tempt them too much or that you threaten other women because you're supposed to be a part of the sisterhood." America Ferrera the woman you are, thank you so much for helping me and other women to believe in theirselves. Happy international women's day! <3

[shiraglassman]

Hey, I know this is kind of a dumb question, but I came across a TikTok about a month ago suggesting that dragons (the western, fire breathing, princess snatching, treasure hoarding ones) were rooted in antisemitic in the same way something like goblins are. I couldn’t tell if it was a joke or not, and it kind of sent me into a tailspin, since I’ve always loved dragons (I read the WoF series ONCE and wouldn’t shut up about it for 3 years), and I was worried that I would have to drop them entirely for fear of offending someone. I can definitely see the similarities between common antisemitic tropes and dragon tropes, but I’ve always heard that the origins of the western dragon were that it was just a scalier of the devil and not meant to represent any marginalized community. However, I am not Jewish in any way, and I’m aware it’s not my place to dictate what is and isn’t harmful, so I was curious as to what you thought. (Sorry about how long this is TuT)

I held on to this ask for a few weeks to try to make sure my response made sense, so here goes. Disclaimer that I'm just one Jewish woman who loves dragons, and I claim no expertise or position of authority. I can't guarantee that someone won't look at your special interests and judge you unfairly. I also can't guarantee that you'll be hyperaware enough and careful enough to catch dogwhistles if they're subtle, compared with ordinary fictional dragons. What I can guarantee is that your average Jewish person is not going to assume you are more unsafe to be around than other unknown gentiles just because you like dragons, but fandom spaces and Tumblr spaces sometimes represent a skewed or specific cross-section of the population and may react differently. I can't make any of those calls. I don't want to tell you to start tuning out marginalized people when we speak about our issues including bad representation, but I also don't think "every Western dragon" is a problem the same way the entire perception of Halloween witches is, for example. For "some reason" (antisemitism) we've decided that big hooked noses are a thing you strap to your face to fake being a witch, or the way witches look in clip art. This is an issue because it takes a simple, neutral feature that some of us have and exaggerates it to the point of looking nonhuman. "Ha ha," says the trope. "Wouldn't it be funny if this trait that these Others have was so different and so jarring in appearance that they looked as different as they truly are, from us, the In Group?"

If the same group of folks who had anxiety about us coexisting alongside them created the witch aesthetic as created the Western dragon lore, and indeed much of old-fashioned European fantasy, it's easy to see how their feelings about us an other marginalized groups (disabled people etc.) creep into the stories. HOWEVER, it's also incredibly easy for dragons to not be us. Or have anything to do with us. If you're nervous when writing your own stories that someone is going to mistake your greedy characters for Jewish-coded, try to establish that real (human or otherwise) Jewish characters coexist with the greedy dragon or whatever to show that you're not using the dragon as a subconscious Jewish reference. But if you're talking about just "can I continue to buy dragon merch from creators who draw cute art", the only thing I can tell you is that there's an intense diversity of opinion among the Jewish people and even though I'm saying it's fine and probably most people at my temple would say it's fine, I can't account for strangers on apps I don't even have. Personally, I think you're safe as long as you avoid dragon things that evoke the trope directly. And many MANY dragons don't even evoke the trope these days, because so many millennials and younger grew up adoring dragons so we launched media where dragons are good. And don't even always hoard wealth. Much of modern dragon media seems to ignore the greedy and/or hoarding tropes entirely or have replaced greed as a motivator for the collections with "this dragon has a special interest", which is cute and doesn't evoke antisemitic tropes at all. You'll probably be able to make good judgments about what does the trope and what doesn't, but for some additional help here is a post Meir and I did on @writingwithcolor, which is where we'd prefer these questions be directed (yes, I know we're closed currently but we're reopening soon.) P.S. If this was sent to my personal specifically to avoid the WWC ask box being closed, please don't — that's an amount of volunteer work I simply can't take on. But I also know that it's possible and likely that you didn't know about WWC at all, so now you do — feel free to peruse our vast archives of past posts. @im-tired1124

[mamaangiwine]

Hey about your post on the Barbie movie. Totally open to you still disagreeing and hearing why but as someone who saw the movie I just wanted to give perspective.

Obviously the consequences in Barbieland are just cute and funny but ultimately bad but I'm having a hard time seeing how comparing smallpox blankets (a tool of imperialism used to kill people) to infecting a place with patriarchy (another system of oppression that also kills people in real life) is a harmful metaphor.

I agree in a lot of ways the movie completely fails to actually address things like race and class to solely focus on sexism and it has been heavily criticized for being libfem. However, is it not analogous to compare two systems of oppression that obviously work differently but are both very bad?

I appreciate you reading my ask and hearing me out. I look forward to understanding your perspective better.

Thank you for being respectful.

So firstly, as you said the movie has been widely criticized for not touching on racism or classism- which is honestly something I expected. It's The Barbie Movie, after all. I wasn't expecting a particularly in depth exploration of that kind of intersectional feminism. No... Barbie's "intersectionality" lies in its optics. There is a trans Barbie, disabled Barbie, and various woc Barbies. Which begs the question- in a movie that wishes to show case its inclusivity and celebrate that inclusivity via the diversity of it's Barbies...in a movie that wishes to suggest "intersectionality" through the diversity of its Barbies...who then is missing in this film?

There were no Native Barbies.

Honestly, that's not unusual for me as a Native. I didn't expect to see Native Barbie. I don't expect to see Natives in much of anything that doesn't take place in "the old west" or some kind of historical drama (that is, if it isn't being written and/or made by Ndns). Up until recently, people didn't even question why we hardly got to play indigenous roles in films (Johnny Depp as Tonto comes to mind).

Which is why it's so sad that the only representation we get in a film that is trying to tout its "inclusivity" is a throw-away line that references our suffering and the genocide we endured...and are still feeling the effects of to this day.

Tragedy is not one for one. Oppression is not one for one either. I don't agree that small pox was a "tool" of imperialism. Small pox, once colonizers realized they could weaponize it, was a failed "means to an end". It was just genocide. Plain and simple. Also, "patriarchy" is a broad concept that affects multiple people differently (going back to intersectionality) whereas Native genocide only affects Natives. Including the imposition of western, white patriarchy on both Native women and men. If one is going to make comparisons, they need to be prepared to take responsibility for ALL of what that comparison implies.

Let's not forget though, this wasn't just a "comparison". This was a part of a joke. Granted the joke didn't center around smallpox, but it was still placed within an exchange of dialog in which, yes, they are discussing patriarchy, but still funny-silly-goofy things are happening. For one thing, even if you could make the argument that there is an analogy to be made, there is a time and place for things- and it certainly isn't in a comedy centering around two white actors.

There isnt an analogy to be made though. The truth is, this "joke" is apart of a long problematic history of white women (like Greta Gerwig) using the history of minorities as a means to compare their own oppression to atrocities that they were also historically complicit in. White men were not the only one who stood to gain from Native Genocide. It's also a way for white feminists to wiggle their way out of discussions of their own privelege and take accountability for a system that they benefit from.

I would like to posit a question here, if I may... Would you have felt comfortable with a reference about the Holocaust in the Barbie movie? Would you have felt comfortable with a reference about Jim Crow in the Barbie movie? Particularly refenced via a line that had no bearing to the plot or any real attatchment to a character's world view or identity? That could have gone unmissed from the final product as a whole? If the thought made you pause or cringe, that's understandable. That's how it should be.

Personally, I feel Greta Gerwig felt she could make this comparison because Natives are not always treated as a living group of people suffering under colonialism, racism, and patriarchy- it's for the same reasons we are only seen in movies set in the "old west"- we are often thought of as something from the past. As though we are already gone. This makes it so Ndns have to work especially hard for our voices to be heard sometimes, because the genocide we experienced wasn't just about exterminating us but convincing people we had already been exterminated.

For all these reasons, Native voices should be elevated, Native actors should be hired, and Native History should be respected.

[messrsrobyn]

hiiii i adore all your stuff!! (very demure 🙂 very mindful 🙂‍↕️) just wanted to ask ur opinion on something i saw on tiktok about the marauders fandom using diversity amongst characters like a checklist of things to tick off and not actually doing that representation justice as a result? like, for me, i feel like i’d rather people have a go at including diverse characters than simply having everyone be cis, thin, and white, but i do also understand that there can also be harmful portrayals of these things. i’ve written fics (mostly wolfstar) and i still include things like james being desi and dorcas being black, and try to incorporate this into their characters rather than only appearance but also, when they aren’t the pov characters of the fic it can be difficult to go in depth into their representation. obviously, i can go and write a james centric or dorcas centric fic and go more in depth, but that’s just not possible in every single fic. i don’t want my portrayals to be seen as tokenising or anything, but a lot of the fanon identities have become canon in my head. (even like welsh remus and french sirius (which people in the comments of this tt were getting mad about authors using google translate for bc it’s inaccurate and saying that we only included it bc french it “hot” even though the black family motto is literally in french??)) idk, just wondered your thoughts since you always seem to say everything so well! xxx

sorry this is so long!! i love your yaps on tiktok if this warrants a spoken reply lmao <3

HIHI

literally the least relevant part of this but remus is welsh !! she-who-must-not-be-named confirmed it !! also that's,,,, so silly. yeah the motto is french??? and yk what yes the french accent IS hot but i don't think that's why we include french sirius. more so bc,,,, he's french,,,,??

MOVINGGG on i think the most important part of this is that diversity does not necessarily mean that everything is represented to the same depth every single time. one of my friends (hi rachel) phrased it as:

"diversity is a salad not a melting pot"

i think it's incredibly unrealistic to look at every individual work and expect them to go in depth about every single part, especially with side characters.

when we talk about diversity in fandom (or diversity in media in general tbh) for me at least, it just means the diversity being there as a whole. we can find fics that center around desi james and his experiences, we can find fics that center around dorcas' race (thtf is incredible here for example), we can find fics that center around the trans experience - salad pot. everything is available, you just have to find the parts you like the same way you dig in a salad bowl and take what you want.

diversity also means normalising the fact that representations are made. to have them there without necessarily needing to expand upon it??? just normalised. (like trans reg fics obviously go in depth from his pov but BACKGROUND trans reg will just be like "two cresent scars on his chest" 🙂↕️ normalised 🙂↕️). big conversations are necessary as a Whole, but not in every individual work imo.

i don't think it's "tokenising" to not go in depth about them, i think this is,,, a hobby. LIKE MAYBE THAT'S BAD TO SAY BUT i wouldn't call it tokenising to include desi james in a fic without necessarily going into detail about it because that's a very popular hc in the fandom. i think it's worse to say that diversity needs to be perfect or it shouldn't be there at all.

if the pov isn't focused around the character in question then i think it's perfectlyyy fine to just throw in a few things. this is a fun hobby. we don't expect perfection and the fact that this fandom is drawn from the veryyyyy undiverse core material and we've got this!? incredible.

generally i just don't think many people on tiktok get how fandoms work because they've joined when it's become popularised WHICH IS OKAY!!! welcome !!! have fun !!! but fandoms have ALWAYS been about adding diversity and creating queer ships and it feels like recently there's a lot of people policing on what to do when that's just Not How It Works.

i don't think diversity is being treated as a checklist, i think the in depth works are out there, there are people who write in depth povs of experiences and there are HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of fics. we can't expect every single one to have big conversations about it, especially not with side characters. sometimes it's nice to be represented without them making it your entire personality.

i can only speak from the trans and disabled side of it but i KNOW that there's plentyyyy fics that go in depth about that, and i don't expect every fic ever to go in depth. if i want a disability focused fic? i'll find one. other than that yeah it's fine to just say that remus is using a cane rn and not go into detail about it. esp if he's a background character.

does this make sense?? i hope soooo i just woke up and this is the first thing i did xxx

[growingnerves]

Trying to find a nice way to put this… what Norman said on that podcast was not okay. Insulting fans and admitting to being responsible for writers losing their jobs with such nonchalance, is downright disrespectful- although I’m thankful the truth didn’t stay buried. It’s careless behavior and it doesn’t reflect well on AMC considering this is a repeated offense.

Not everyone involved in television has to be an excellent public speaker but there should be someone at the helm who understands how to conduct themselves in interviews. Every show needs a spokesperson to be a direct link to the audience: for promoting the show, and making the fans feel included as well as appreciated. As a fan I’ve never wanted creatives to bend to the whim of every loudmouth on social media. Shallow fan service has never benefited any show. However, fair criticism and honest feedback should be welcome. Serving the self-interest of a man with an ego the size of the Eiffel Tower won’t do the show any favors either. AMC, like any other network, presumably wants someone as the face of their series who reflects positively on their brand. I’m hoping we will see some significant changes going forward to win back the trust of the fans. And I believe Melissa McBride’s input is essential to do so.

Viewers are considering ethics when it comes to their TV watching habits now more than ever. We are becoming aware of the optics of the media we consume. We can examine what we know of the practices at individual studios and networks in an effort to support shows that most closely align with our own values. We don’t need to compromise our high standards when there are endless other options. To stay in line with the audience, TV has to evolve alongside us. If AMC can’t keep up with the demand for a diverse cast and writer’s room, I’m not subscribing and I suspect other viewers will gravitate elsewhere too, as they have been.

Women’s voices are valuable even if historically they’ve been taken for granted. Women tend to have a wider outreach in their storytelling than the repetitive POV that is often seen from male showrunners. Men have not been faced with the same obstacles. They haven’t had to contort themselves into a million different shapes to be taken seriously.

Men’s voices were the only ones heard for a long time in film and television. Male protagonists were given autonomy and multifaceted stories, while women’s representation was not prioritized. Women only existed in relation to their male counterparts- and the damsel in distress just isn’t that interesting to watch. Because of this, women have projected themselves into the considerably more compelling male characters, delving into the minutiae to find some semblance of relatability in typically masculine portrayals. This has been a challenge to other marginalized groups on an even larger scale. How long have POC been sorely underrepresented, having to find ways to see themselves in white stories? And the LGBTQ+ community has been limited to watching primarily straight cis romances. The representation we do get is often times minimized to tokenism. The absence of diversity impacts everyone who doesn’t fit the same generic prototype. There are countless experiences and lifestyles that take on a wide range of forms which have not yet been in the spotlight. We don’t need another lone ranger on a motorcycle. Another mysterious brooding male antihero, yawwwwn.

Marginalized individuals have been prompted to work a creative muscle that the everyday man has not- to both suspend our disbelief and also dig into the details to uncover the inherit humanity in stories where we don’t necessarily identify with the protagonist.

These are the voices who are going to be the best conduits for fresh stories because they’ve already had to do the work to investigate human complexity to find themselves on screen, within characters who don’t necessarily look or act like they do. Not only can they build on already existing material but they can introduce original concepts. Television has been oversaturated with the straight white man running his mouth unchecked for too long. We don’t have to settle for that anymore when we can switch over to another show, one that better represents us.

[leikeliscomet]

We Failed the First Black Doctor (Part 3/End)

Discussions about Black representation in the UK have been going on for a long time, including by Lenny Henry and his criticism of Doctor Who. He claimed the show would rather have a dog as the doctor than a Black person. Unsurprisingly, white fans were quick turn the headline into a joke or start listing Black companions since 2007 who… aren’t the doctor. Hyperbole aside, he wasn’t that far off. The show’s seen first robot companions in the TARDIS before first Black ones. Even whilst starring in Spyfall, the show’s Black representation was still in a questionable place. Ryan was underdeveloped, Grace was killed to give Graham an arc and the Fugitive's appearances were a series of cameos. Even in the episode itself Henry’s character, Barton, murders his own mother in an attempt to establish his character as the villain (even though it was fairly clear from the beginning). In a similar way to Grace, a dark skin Black woman is killed to serve a narrative purpose that goes nowhere. The characters leave the warehouse after the big showdown with no concern that her dead body was still there. Henry may have been exaggerating but at the end of the day, the show’s Black representation still has a long way to go, especially when shows and films airing after its revival are challenging it in terms of quality. Even when we look again at Henry’s roles in Doctor Who, what was he given to work with? Aside from a villain in a questionable two-parter, he has played the doctor before (hence the ‘Lenny Henry is the first Black doctor’ mantra from some fans) but he’s playing the doctor in a skit. His incarnation is a joke that we are supposed to laugh at. I want non-Black fans instead of listing all Black characters in their favourite era or in the show itself to actually consider how they were written and how they were treated instead of just saying they were there. With advances in diversity in TV/Film, just being ‘there’ isn’t enough anymore. 

Any writer or show can have a Black character, but not all can do those Black characters justice.

Even breadcrumbs are apparently too much for one stomach. Claiming the Fugitive deserved better has been met with so much dismissal. The Timeless Child was shit, so Jo Martin should be held responsible by not being invited back. She was only supposed to be a cameo, which is a great time to use the first Black doctor slot because representation doesn’t matter anymore. There was a pandemic that started after she was already in the show so she doesn’t deserve screen time, even though that didn’t stop a whole new cast of characters getting storylines in Flux. We’re getting a Big Finish that not everyone can access in a 3 year wait that likely won’t get referenced in the main show. Well, that’s alright then!

The breadcrumb gets even smaller when fans accept Martin and Gatwa as our first Black doctors of nuwho only, whilst giving the ‘first’ credit to Peter Davison. Fan's shock and pearl-clutching reactions whenever Davison’s mixed father is brought up highlight that not all ‘non-white’ Doctors are treated equally. Why are you more comfortable considering Davison as the first Black doctor over Martin and Gatwa? Why is he your idea of acceptable ‘non-white’ representation? Why does his ¼ Guyanese heritage cancel out his title of being a ‘white doctor’? When two dark-skinned Black actors achieve something why is your first instinct to start adding corrections? When asked about castings for the Doctor, some Classic actors including Colin Baker still hoped for a non-white incarnation to show up, so it's safe to say the slot of the first Black doctor was still empty after Five’s era ended. Colourism is rampant in the entertainment industry and TV and Film are no different. Colourism and racism go hand in hand. The idea of a ‘Doctor Who anti racism’ that doesn’t extend to characters darker than Bill Potts is useless. If the darkest characters are still left at the bottom of the hierarchy in terms of support then what are you supporting exactly? Ncuti Gatwa is the first Black man to play the Doctor and Jo Martin is the first Black woman. Gatwa is the first in the main lineup and Martin is the first on screen and in show. Both these actors deserve the credit of being the first Black doctors. Jo Martin deserves the credit of being first because she was and I’ll maintain that no matter how controversial it is apparently to state that. 

All these nitpicks and adlibs and ‘um actuallys’ serve to erase Black characters' contributions to the shows they’re in. As for the Fugitive, these are passive-aggressive attempts at erasing her the fandom can’t admit to. In a similar fashion to Martha Jones, certain fans will allegedly care for how Black women ‘deserved better’ but when the time arrives to have these conversations on how these characters can be done better, unpacking things like misogynoir, antiblackness and colourism, it is silent. It’s almost always silent. The same ones that said Martha deserved better in terms of her crush ‘ruining’ her character are the same ones supporting her absence in the 2023 specials. The same ones that said Fugitive deserved better than shitty Chibnall writing are the same ones supporting her not ever returning to the show. I will critique all nuwho showrunners equally but simply giving them a whack for poor representation, without supporting the groups being misrepresented is the peak of performative activism that is soaked in the fabric of the current Doctor Who fandom. Complaining about how Chibnall fumbled the Fugitive? Easy peasy! Pushing for a Fugitive return in the main show? Talking about misogynoir? Nah. What’s the point right? Not enough for a number in the lineup, not enough for a physical and autonomous appearance post her debut, not enough to be a first Black doctor and not enough to be cared about by greater fandom outside of ‘Chibnall discourse’, where either ‘side’ uses her to claim a progressive high ground before they go back to ignoring Black women in TV like they usually do.

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So that is why I’ve written that we failed. Chibnall neglected the potential of her character. The BBC ignored the importance of her representation. And the fandom gives her petals when convenient but never full flowers. With Gatwa’s era starting soon, I hope he’s treated better but I also hope people remember the Fugitive, our first Black doctor. If there’s a chance she could ever return in the main show, I know where I’ll be. 

Until then, I guess it's time to pre-order some Big Finish.

<- Part 2