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flower-boi16 · 11 months ago

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Lily Orchard's Takes on "Racism" in The Owl House Are Garbage and Here's Why

Hello. You may know me as the guy who made two whole posts debunking Lily Orchard's takes on Hunter. Although those posts are not perfect and I do think there are some things I could add or change about them, they still hold up as I still stand by every single point I made in them.

But to say that Lily's bad Owl House takes end with Hunter would be a lie. There is this particular narrative about both TOH fandom and the show itself that she tries to paint that really pisses me off, that being the whole "Racism" narrative. I talked about it briefly in my second Hunter post but this narrative has so much objectively wrong with it that it's best to make a whole post refuting it. Here I'm going to go over Lily's takes on three characters that she primarily uses to push this whole racism narrative; Amity, Hunter, and Luz. Without further ado, let's begin...

NOTE: This post is LONG. Like, very very very very long. Its the longest post I've ever made and the longest essay I have ever posted on the internet. If you don't want to read all of that then just skip to section 7 where I have a TLDR for those who don't want to read an 8375-word long post that takes at least almost a full hour to read. So...ya, let's begin.

1. Lily Orchard's Takes on Amity are Garbage and Here's Why

I'll be covering Lily's Video "An Incoherent Discussion About Main Characters" mainly TOH segment as its the video where she talks the most about Amity. This is where the problems with Lily's narrative begin, that being; Lily saying that white characters are popular because of white favoritism rather than the fact that they are actually well written characters.

Oh, you thought Hunter was the only character Lily accused people of being racist for liking, ya, no. In the beginning of the TOH segment, Lily tries to argue that there's no reason for the fandom to love Amity so much because she (supposedly) has little depth as a character....

"At this point, Amity had no depth outside of being the bully, It's only until a month later that that would change. But the fandom latched onto Amity the moment she was introduced and hyped her up incessantly. with only a few clips where her ego is bruised and nothing else. And the thing is, Amity had nothing to her at this point. It's a common complaint from people that the fandom reduces Amity these days to just gay panic and shipping, but as of season 2, that is what she is, love interest, abusive parents, and that's it"

"Amity is a one-note character, and I don't say that as a bad thing characters fit the role that they were made for and there really isn't anything wrong with that. Amity is an obstacle for Luz to overcome and then her love interest and then occasionally gets a few moments of depth."

This is...objectively incorrect. Note I was not in the fandom at the time season 1 was airing (I only got into The Owl House when the show had already ended) however, Lily tries to act as if Amity is a character with little depth and that the fandom has no reason to like her so much. This is likely done so Lily can gaslight you into thinking she has a point so she can paint the TOH fandom as racist. Amity does go through character development throughout the show, as in season 1 she gradually becomes a better person and even makes amens with Willow after cutting her off during childhood.

She has a lot of moments of depth in episode Convention, Lost in Language, Understanding Willow, Escaping Expulsion, Eclipse Lake, and Reaching Out that develop her as a character. These aren't just "a few moments of depth". Amity is a developed character, the fandom has a reason to like her. And maybe people latched onto Amity because they liked the idea of an enemies-to-lovers romance?

Again, I wasn't in the fandom at the time, but Lily doesn't consider any of these reasons that people may like Amity so she could try and paint Amity as a 1-dimensional character when really people like Amity for being a well-developed character and Lily's arguments that she is one note are just objectively incorrect. She's a girl raised in a prestigious and high-class family who has to meet high expectations from her parents and bullies people she can't feel any weakness, and was forced to cut off her childhood best freind because she wasn't strong enough for them.

However, throughout season 1 she becomes a better person thanks to Luz, makes amens with Willow and stands up to her abusive mom in Season 2, and in Season 2 Amity still has episodes developing her with conflict with her parents, she's not just Luz's girlfriend. This is a well-developed and three-dimensional character here, and there's a reason why Amity is a fan favorite in the fandom. But Lily ignores all of that depth and character development in favor of painting Amity as one-dimensional so her racism narrative could look like it holds more water than it actually does.

And for the "abusive parents" stuff Lily says this:

"Amity's relationship to her parents and her perfectionism only ever come out in the third act of any other episode with the exception of Escaping Expulsion and Eclipse Lake. Amity's abusive home life is a plot device more than anything else, something another character pulls on to get the story going, and the solution is almost always insultingly easy, and she's only ever brought into an episode because Luz drags her into it"

Once again...this is objectively incorrect. Amity still has a lot of episodes exploring her character as I already stated so the first sentance is already false. But then Lily says that Amity's abusive home life is a...plot device? Um, no? Its not a plot device, its an aspect of Amity's character that the show is dedicating episodes to exploring. And "the solution is almost always insultingly easy"??? What do you mean by "the solution is almost always insultingly easy"?? Lily doesn't give any examples here, she just says something critical and you're supposed to just accept that.

And now...we get the moment you've all been waiting for:

"So why do people get upset at the idea that Amity is just reduced to love interest when that is literally her role in the plot? Well, (and if this gets posted on The Owl House subreddit then uhh please cover your ears you delicate little flower children) white favortism"

And now we have Lily trying to paint the TOH fandom as racist for liking Amity.

"It's been a common refrain for a while that the show has a white and the fandom makes it worse. Amity was the first instance of that"

Ok so 1. The show doesn't have a "white favoritism" problem, this is something I'll get into more later but the reason why Amity gets focus is because she objectively has more importance than to the plot thank Willow and Gusm being Luz's love interest. And I already talked about the real reasons the fandom likes Amity that don't have anything to do with racism.

"When she first appeared in I Was A Teenage Abomination, the fan base instantly started hyping her up as the greatest thing since Eda the owl lady. They immediantly projected every fucking thing on the sun onto her, and Lumity was birthed from this"

What if people just again, like the idea of an enemies-to-lovers romance between her and Luz? And I don't think I've seen ANY ONE project things onto Amity, again there are clear reasons to like these characters. Then Lily says this:

"That was all it took. It's by sheer fucking luck that Dana was going in this direction with them anyway because there was zero basis for any of this. Amity was a minor antagonist at best, and Willow was the main spotlight of I was a Teenage Abomination"

"Zero basis for any of this"? Again, Lily is acting as if there aren't any reasons to like Amity when as I already explained there clearly is. And if she means no basis for Lumity then...Lily, Lumity was clearly being set up a lot throughout the first season. Its not exactly hard to see that.

"There's no reason for people to go absolutely this crazy over her when Willow was right there. Hell throughout season 1 Willow had more grounds for a romantic relationship then Amity did. But Willow was chubby and Korean and Amity was not and not"

I don't know about you but I'm pretty sure a lot of reasons for people liking Amity more than Willow is because they find Willow and Gus to be less developed than Amity, which is a perfectly fine opinion to have. Once Again Lily ignores reasons people may prefer Amity over Willow in favor of just jumping straight to racism instead. And there also isn't as much of a hyper-fixation on Amity as Lily says there is, yes she's a fan favorite character but characters like Luz are still very popular.

The rest of the segment really is not worth talking about. Basically after this point Lily just keeps on trying to reinforce her objectively wrong narrative of "Amity is liked because of white favoritism", her saying that she thought Eda was the main character instead of Luz, and she also talks about Luz and Hunter here but that'll be covered in their respective sections.

So Lily's whole narrative about Amity being liked because of "white favoritism" is wrong, there are real reasons that people like Amity, Lily simply chooses to ignore that because that would break her narrative. Now that we have that out of the way, let's talk about the next character Lily uses to push this whole racism narrative (and the most obvious).

2. Lily Orchard's Takes on Hunter are Garbage and Here's Why - PART III (...kind of)

Again, I've already made two whole posts debunking Lily Orchard's critiques of Hunter so go read those if you want the full analysis on why Lily's takes on this character are completely wrong, but in the second section of Part II I talked about Lily's whole narrative about Hunter's fans that she tries to paint, that they are racist and only like Hunter for being white. She does basically the same thing she did for Amity; ignore the reasons why people may like a character in favor of painting the fandom as racist, and she also tries to act as if Hunter is only liked because people push headcanon's onto him. I'll just paste this piece of text here since I already refuted it in my second Hunter post;

"In her video talking about Hunter, Lily says that the fandom only likes Hunter in spite of how he's written, which is basically her saying "if you like this character you actually don't like him...or your just racist". Ok so, I don't want to talk about this that much here, however, it's worth noting that Lily constantly calls people who like Hunter racist purely for liking a character she doesn't that also happens to white, which is a major yikes, as there are reasons that Hunter is well-liked in the fandom beyond his race. But Lily's response to that is "If you like Hunter you only like him because you push fanon ideas onto him when he's really a shallow poorly-written character".

Let me tell you why people like Hunter; he's a boy who was indoctrinated and raised his whole life into believing he was doing the right thing and that Belos loves him, and for his whole life he was had to prove his worth to the EC or he's just worthless, and a lot of people also see Hunter's arc as him realizing he was being abused. None of this is stuff that the fandom is making up, these are literally things that are communicated in the show itself, Lily is just choosing to ignore that just so she can paint this narrative that TOH fandom is a bunch of racists because they like Hunter, completely ignoring how people can have different tastes and opinions than each other. Oh ya, and someone did point this out to Lily once in a tumblr ask...Lily responded by saying "no" and then went on another rant about how the fandom is racist for liking Hunter and sidelines Gus and Willow, and says that if Hunter was black, people would ignore him like they do with Gus and Willow...that speaks for itself. I could not find a screenshot where Lily said this, but I do know that she did say that in response to an anon poking a hole into her narrative, which just shows how she reacts to criticism."

Like with Amity, Lily constantly acts as if there aren't any reasons for people to like Hunter, and the reasons people do have are just things that people make up through headcanons, when this is objectievely false. There are clear reasons for people to like Hunter, but Lily ignores that in favor of painting this narrative that Hunter fans are racist. She even calls than misogynistic and homophobic in her video on Hunter without showing any evidence of that. And NONE of the anons she showed say anything like Lily described.

She keeps on reinforcing the narrative that Hunter fans only like him in spite of how he's written rather than the idea that he is written well, which is objectively false because again, there are reasons to like Hunter as a character, and all of Lily's takes on him are just objectively wrong. This is just Lily treating her opinions like they are facts in a very narcissistic and smug way.

But again, I've already refuted this point so let's get into the other point about Hunter that Lily tries to use to push this whole racism narrative; that being that Hunter overshadows and sidelines the non-white characters and gets too much screen time.

"Season 2 only made this worse with the introduction of Hunter, who as a character has an effect on the fanbase comparable to Audo and Ren. Overshadowing every other character and causing white girls to squee about how much of a good boy he is, even though he definitely isn't one"

I already talked about how Hunter doesn't take up as much screen time as Lily likes to think he does in my first Hunter post, but I'll just put some comments that I got from my first Hunter post as they debunk Lily's whole take her pretty well:

"Hunter having dynamics with the rest of the cast is a good thing and while him, it’s not being “stapled” into them, he’s just interacting with them in a fucking episode. He parallels all of the main four teens in some way so it makes sense. Plus, he’s only in half or less of the season 2 episodes and wasn’t in season 1, he didn’t get the luxury of low-stakes filler episodes so he kind of has to make a mark during the episodes he’s in. Which is why he’s usually the focus or at least major in them, that’s understandable and he’s compelling enough to justify it."

"I'll never understand the criticism of a character taking screentime away from others, if this character is considered by the writers to be more important than others, then they have to feel like they really do matter, that's normal."

The reason why Hunter gets a lot of focus isn't because of racism, its because he's an important character and he doesn't even appear in that many episodes so he kinda of needs to make a mark in the ones that he's in, especially in season 2B where the show got cut short so the show needed to try and dedicate as much of its time to developing the character it just introduced in the first half of the season as much as it can while still developing the other characters and progressing the plot.

Also, here's a fun fact; as two comments on my second Hunter post pointed out, Hunter is a character that can ONLY work if he's white, because he is a clone of a 1600s witch Hunter. Just a little tid-bit I thought I'd mention.

Hunter doesn't sideline characters as much as Lily likes to think he does, in Hunting Palisman, Hollow Mind and Thanks to Them he gets paired up with Luz, the main character who is also a black girl who gets an equal amount of screen time with Hunter. This is an extension of the whole "Hunter is stapled onto other characters" criticism Lily has, where she complains about...Hunter being paired up and interacting with other characters. Again, I already covered this stuff in my two Hunter posts, but Lily's whole problem here is simply that Hunter is in an episode, regardless of the reason.

And we all know that Lily is entirely biased to hate Hunter purely for being an "angsty white boy" so I think I'm done here. Again, go check out my two Hunter posts if you want to see go more in-depth on this whole "Hunter takes up too much screen time" criticism.

But in short; Hunter does not take up as much screen time as Lily says he does, and the reason the show focuses on him is that he has more importance to the plot than Willow and Gus, and because he needs to make a mark in each episode he's in, and once again there are reasons for people to like Hunter that are not related to "white favoritism". Again, go check out my posts on Lily's critiques on Hunter if you want me to go more in-depth. But now, let's get into the final character that Lily tries to use to push this whole narrative, and that is...

3. Lily Orchard's Takes on Luz's are Garbage and Here's Why (short version)

Let me just say, Lily's takes on Luz, specifically her trauma...are awful. They are almost as bad as her takes on Hunter, and I'm actually planning on making a whole post refuting Lily's critiques of Luz like I did with Hunter, but for now, let's just talk about the whole narrative she tries to paint with how Luz's trauma is received; this time I'll be covering the Luz segment of her fandom torture video.

But lets cover the Luz part of the Discussion of Main Characters video first before get into that. Don't worry, this will be quick. Here Lily constantly tries to argue that people want to ignore Luz in favor of Amity and Hunter but they can't because she is the main character

"But the thing is, while Amity and Hunter caused Willow and Gus to be completely sidlined, (and even their episodes in season 2 have generally just been them playing second fiddle to one of those two) neither of them have managed to sideline Luz. Amity's entire role in the story is to be a supporting character to Luz everything she does is to help and further Luz's goals and Hunter is an antagonistic force in Luz's story, trying to stop her efforts because they interfere with the goals of emperor Belos."

"Amity is the supporting character and love interest, and Hunter is the villain. And I imagine that is something that probably sticks in the craw of the Amity-Hunter hype train, they fact that they can't just ignore Luz like they clearly want to because the characters they like come with Luz attached as a default."

Not only does Lily not give ANY evidence to support her narrative, she's also just... objectively wrong. Luz is a beloved character in the fandom, there's tons of videos about her that get a shit ton of views, there's a lot of fan art and fan works around Luz, etc etc. People who like Amity and Hunter probably also like Luz a lot too. Just look at the Luz Noceda Tumblr tag and you'll see that it has more followers than either of any of Hunter and Amity's tags do.

Lily does not give any evidence to support her whole narrative and acts as if the TOH fandom really wants to ignore Luz, but as I already said Luz is still a beloved and fan-favorite character within the fandom, its not exactly hard to see that. Just because people like Amity and Hunter doesn't mean they secretly dislike Luz or something, that's just stupid.

I could go on and on about this but you get my point; Lily's entire narrative that she tries to paint that People want to ignore Luz is just straight-up false and she does not support her claim with any evidence whatsoever.

But now, let's get into the real meat of things; the narrative that Lily tries to paint in her Fandom Torture video. Again, Lily's takes on Luz's trauma are just as awful as her takes on Hunter but I'll only focus on the racism narrative she tries to paint, that being that the fandom likes watching 14-year-old black girls suffer I'm not joking. This is the narrative that Lily actually tries to paint;

"But the truth is...ya fandom does love this shit. They love watching characters' angst forever. They love their three thousand-word slow-burn hurt with no comfort fix. They love watching characters suffer especially if they're women, and especially if they're black, and Luz is both."

.......Lily, fuck you. This is a lie, a straight-up lie. Lily is trying to trick you into thinking that the TOH fandom are sadistic monsters who enjoy watching 14-year-old girls who are also black suffer, and not only is that objectively incorrect, it's also just...so unbelievably gross given the real reasons why people like Luz's depression arc.

Do you want to know why this pisses me off so much? The actual reason why people like Luz's trauma arc isn't because they enjoy watching children suffer, its because aside from it being a realistic and believable depression arc, it also resonates with a lot of people. No joke, apparently there are a lot of people who relate to Luz and see themselves through her. Dana created a depression arc for a character that ACTUAL PEOPLE WITH TRUAMA AND SELF-LOATHING ISSUES CAN RELATE TO.

NOT TO MENTION the fact that a lot of people in the fan base actually sympathize with Luz her and her self-loathing issues. Luz's trauma arc is well-received because it was able to resonate with a lot of people, and the fact that Lily chooses to ignore that in favor of painting the TOH fandom as a bunch of racists who enjoy watching black women suffer is just...disgusting. Fuck you Lily, and I mean that very sincerely.

Oh wait, cuz I'm not done with this! Hunter, a character that has gone through just as much trauma as Luz, and whose trauma is also well received by the fandom as well, Lily just ignores. So its bad when Luz gets traumatized and people like it but when the same happens to Hunter it's ok? Oh wait, I forgot, Hunter is a white boy and Luz is a black girl, that's the difference.

Lily, I'm so fucking sick of your double standards. So its bad when a fandom likes a black girl getting traumatized but when it's a white boy you don't complain and don't go and call them racist? That's stupid.

You probably already get my point by now so I'll just end this section here; Lily's whole narrative of the TOH fandom liking Luz being traumatized because they are sadistic monsters who enjoy watching black girls suffer is both flawed and disgusting, so is her narrative about the fandom wanting to ignore Luz in favor of other characters which is also objectively incorrect. But wait, there is one last video of Lily trying to push this narrative that I have not mentioned yet...

... it's the white favoritism video mentioning Hunter

4. The White Favoritism Video is Garbage and Here's Why

So for this post I decided to go ahead and watch Lily's white favoritism video, specifically the Hunter segments. I went into this video with very low expectations, expecting it to just be Lily repeating the same points she already made over and over again. And...holy shit. This video is AWFUL. Like I knew it was going to be bad, but I was not ready for the amount of bullshit Lily was going to spew. I was left completely shocked and speechless by the end of the second segment at what Lily just said in those two segments.

Time for me to tear apart both of these awful segments. Let's start with the first one, and only 16 seconds in after reinforcing her whole "Hunter is only liked because of fandom shit" narrative, Lily already starts talking bullshit:

"Even his rebelling against an abuser in the canon is undercut by the fact that it's basically a preordained destiny because every golden guard has betrayed Belos."

WHAT????! Hunter would have never betrayed Belos in the first place in if the events of Hollow Mind had never happened, hell when Luz and Hunter saw the memories of Belos doing evil things Hunter constantly tried making excuses for Belos and spent most of it being in denial. And we don't even KNOW anything about the golden guards, maybe they could've eventually realized on their own that Belos was evil, that doesn't undercut Hunter breaking from his abuser!

Then Lily says this:

"Furthermore Hunter ended up being the vector for a lot of people to start caring about Willow, Daruis and Camila, insofar so they could be used to bolster Hunter's character with romance and adoption respectively before this point these characters were ignored or in some cases vilified"

I don't really know about Willow but for Darius and Camila this is just wrong, from what I've heard Camila starting getting popular once the episode Yesterday's Lie premiered, and the reason Darius was vilified before Any Sport in a Storm is because...in he was a villain in the show until this episode showed us he may not be. This isn't racism, Darius's last appearance before this has him as an antagonist, that's why he was "vilified" before Any Sport in a Storm. The rest of this segment is not worth talking about, its just Lily reinforcing her broken narrative about Hunter only being liked because of fandom stuff when that's literally not the reason why he's well-liked as I already explained so now let's move onto the second section...

....the second section is actually worse than the first one. The amount of bullshit Lily was speaking during that three minutes gave me a stroke. So Lily actually starts off by acknowledging the accusations she has been that she only hates Hunter for being white and would've liked him if he was black (which is an undisputed fact), since she constantly complains about him being a boring white boy. How does she respond to this? Does she try to refute this in some way?

....No. Instead, what Lily says next left my jaw wide open as I tried to process wtf I just heard. This is what Lily says:

"When I started criticizing Hunter it came around the time I became a lot more vocally invested in non-white characters and some people in a prime example of desperately trying to give me what they think is a taste of my own medicine came up to me and said with whole pussy "If Hunter was black, you'd like him" with a very simple truth, "If Hunter was black, you wouldn't" "

Holy shit. When I heard this I was at a loss of words. Do I even need to explain why this is awful? Not only is Lily once again accusing Hunter fans of being racist to further her narrative, not only does Lily not even TRY to refute the idea that she dislikes Hunter for being a white boy, but she also even says that if Hunter was black, people wouldn't have liked him...even though Luz, a black girl, is a beloved character in the fandom. Lily cannot gaslight me into thinking otherwise.

Lily then continues to push this idea that if Hunter was black, people wouldn't have liked him:

"If Hunter was black the fandom would not have ignored every skleazy thing he does, like his supposedly best episode according to fangirls that established Huntlow as a ship where...he uses the power the state to kidnap several children and force them to join the magic Gestapo. They would not view this action equally if dark-skinned and stop writing that well actually comment you will not convince me that they would. "

Hmm gee Lily I love how you ignore...

The fact that Hunter meant well and didn't know what he was doing was wrong as he thought that he was doing his friends a favor by getting them into the emperor's coven because of his indoctrination so thus he doesn't exactly know any better.

(And most importantly) The fact that Hunter realizes what he did was wrong and not only takes full responsibility of his actions but also goes out of his way to fix his mistake and get his friends out a situation he put them in AND risked his position as the golden guard AND ALSO was willing to take a lethal strike from Darius just so he could fix his mistake, something that is pretty selfless if you ask me (go check out this post if you want a more in-depth rebuttal to this bullshit claim. It's not directed towards Lily but it basically addresses Lily's whole statement)

Ya Lily I love how like all Hunter critics you just completely ignore that. Now Lily is trying to push this whole "racism" narrative even further, not even trying to give a counter argument to the rebuttles Hunter fans give and just calls them racist by saying "If Hunter was black, you wouldn't be defending him". That's not a good counterargument Lily.

THEN LILY SAYS THIS:

"Furthermore the main issue with Hunter is that the story spends a lot of time with him but spends no time developing him outside of making goofy faces for the internet"

hiuodshuviusdhfiudhfiudshfiuhqweqweqwe HUH?!?! The show doesn't develop Hunter as a character?!?! WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?!?! ARE WE WATCHING THE SAME SHOW!?!? Either Lily's is THAT illiterate of she's deliberately lying. The show DOES clearly spend time developing Hunter, especially in Eclipse Lake, and the very episode that Lily criticized earlier, Any Sport in a Storm where Hunter goes through development and learns to make connections with others and has real friends.

HE GOES THROUGH AN ENTIRE ARC OF BREAKING FROM HIS ABUSER!!!! And no Lily you are not going to gaslight me into thinking that was all just fanon, because its not, its literally communicated within the show, you're just fucking lying. Do I even need to refute this point anymore? Anyone who's watched the show would now this is completely false so lets just move on to the next thing Lily says:

"Making him black wouldn't fix these problems, it would exacerbate them, because now you have a black character you are doing nothing with yet proudly displaying you are doing nothing with him, and that's a problem because its now the third time you've done that"

Shows a picture of Gus and Skara

Ok, so...

The show is clearly doing things with Hunter, I already refuted this stuff in my two Hunter posts

Oh, I'm sorry Lily, didn't you say that Hunter being black would make him more interesting?

Skara is a MINOR CHARACTER that doesn't have any real importance to the plot, yet you want to show to focus on her just because she's black? What???

Also, remember the Skara thing for later btw.

"But all this distracts from the real problem, Hunter is only allowed to get away with being such a nothing burger of a character, despite taking up so much screen time because he's white and male. This is the only element of his character that people like and everything else is fanon that they made up. What little there is to his character is just ideas that were stolen from Luz and Amity and yet Hunter eclipses them both in popularity"

Do I need to explain why this point is garbage? This whole narrative that Lily tries to craft revolves around the idea that Hunter is flat and boring and has nothing to his character and nothing to him and isn't interesting and everything that people like about him is just fanon, and ANYBODY who watched the show would know that this is completely objectively wrong.

Lily, will you please stop trying to fucking gaslight people into agreeing with you? Hunter is an abused boy who was groomed and indoctrinated into believing he's doing the right thing and then breaks from his abuser and ends up finding real friends. This is not fanon, these are things being directly communicated within the show, you can not gaslight me into thinking otherwise Lily. The fact that Lily just straight up says that Hunter is only liked for being a white male reinforces the already broken narrative she has about Hunter fans. And once again Luz and Amity are still incredibly popular characters, I don't think I need to talk about this further. This point sucks, lets move onto the next thing Lily says:

"Ironically The Owl House goes to make Hunter a useless non-character because all of his acts of rebellion end up being underwritten by the fact that every golden guard has turned on Belos in the same way. So Hunter isn't even operating on his own accord its just gut instinct"

Lily, can you go five seconds in this video without saying something extremely stupid? Like I already said Hunter wouldn't have betrayed Belos if the events of Hollow Mind hadn't happened because he wouldn't have a reason to, he wasn't just going to wake up one day and say "I'm going to betray Belos for no reason at all!". Also, I'm sorry Lily, wasn't one of your complaints about Hollow Mind that Hunter was in denial for most of the episode??? HOW TF could you THEN turn around and say "Hunter's acts of rebellion were just gut instinct" like??? Hunter spent most of Hollow Mind IN DENIAL of the idea of Belos being evil, just because the other golden guards betrayed Belos doesn't mean its just "gut instinct", their genetic clones, not reincarnations.

And like I already said, we don't even KNOW anything about the golden guards, maybe they could've eventually realized on their own that Belos was evil, that doesn't undercut Hunter breaking from his abuser. Sigh let's just move on...

Now Lily's talking about Skara yaaaaaaaay

"Meanwhile if you like a character who isn't a white guy just because you vibe with them your expected to answer for it. Hunter stans can freely fawn over a character just because he's pasty and blonde as long as they invent pages upon pages of cope. But If I like a character just because their VA is cool and I vibe with their energy I'm expected to justify that like I'm in fucking court. I quite like Skara because her design is cool Kimberly Brooks is one of my favorite VA's and I like this little quasi-recovery arc she's got going on in the background. But butthurt Hunter stans angry about my criticism of the character and always throw that back in my face because those shallow surface-level traits of the character are things I call them out for focusing on"

So now Lily is addressing the whole Skara allegations except she didn't mention what people like me are accusing her of; liking Skara for being a black girl. Call it uncharitable, but Lily has constantly complained about Hunter being a "boring white guy" and explicitly stated that making him black would make him more interesting, and when asked how to fix Skara she basically said to make him a black girl, and since Skara (a black girl) is a character that Lily heavily hyper-fixates on AND straight up replaced Hunter's name with in the season 2 round up video AND since IN THIS VERY VIDEO Lily complains about Skara not getting enough focus despite the fact the show has no reason to focus on her because she's a side character with little importance to the plot, Lily has not beaten the allegations that she hates Hunter for being a white guy and likes Skara for being a black girl.

I'll admit in my second Hunter post I was a bit too uncharitable towards Lily since she has now at least given actual reasons for liking Skara, however Lily has still not beaten the accusations she's getting over liking Skara for being a black girl. There's so much evidence that points towards that and Lily hasn't refuted it at all. Also remember when Lily complained about Skara being another black character who the show did "nothing with"? Well, now she says this:

"This ignores the fact that Skara is a tertiary character and is therefore allowed to be mostly surface level. Hunter is a main character with the exact same level of depth as a background character."

So you admit that Skara is a tertiary character and thus doesn't have much importance yet earlier you complain about the show not focusing on her more??? What????

"You can argue that this is because the show was canceled but when you spend eight episodes doing nothing to progress a character the problem isn't that didn't have enough time"

I'm sorry EIGHT?! Hunter's arc throughout season 2 spans over the course of five episodes, not eight. And once again Hunter isn't doing nothing here the show is developing him as a character every time he appears, but again I already refuted this in my first Hunter post.

After this point, Lily stops talking about Hunter and goes on about how female and non-white characters are nit-picked and people act like you the weird one for not caring about their nitpicks and continues reinforcing her already broken narrative...and also makes a star wars comparison, so the rest of this segment isn't really worth talking about because it's based on points and arguments that I've already refuted. Besides this section is getting long enough already so I'll just end it here.

Good GOD that video was awful. Like, I already had low-expectations going into it expecting to just be Lily repeating the same shit over and over again...and it was, but it was also Lily making some of the WORST critiques of this show I have ever seen. Lily, how do your takes on Hunter STILL suck? The whole narrative Lily tries to build is based on points that anyone who watched the show and payed even a little bit of attention to it would know is completely objectively false.

Literally every single thing Lily says here has something wrong with it, I was NOT ready for the bullshit this video contained...

But ya, you probably get the gist now; this video is awful, and I've now gone through every single point Lily has made about racism in The Owl House and refuted each of them...

...But I'm still not done. Because there is a certain trend I've been noticing throughout these three videos, especially the first and third one...

5. Gaslighting

These next few sections are probably going to be a lot shorter since this abomination of a post has gone on for long enough already, so sections 5-7 will hopefully be quicker. Anyways, a common tactic I've seen Lily use during these videos is gaslighting. This is a manipulative tactic that she uses to try and make it sound like she has a point but when you really look at it, she doesn't.

We can see this with her insisting that Hunter and Amity have no depth where she boils them down to simple character traits (or just straight-up lies) to make them sound shallow. She especially does this a lot with Hunter with the entire narrative of "Hunter is only well-liked because of fanon stuff" which anyone who watches the show would know is objectively wrong. Then there's the whole "spite-based enjoyment" she tries to paint with him, where Lily says that Hunter fans only like Hunter in spite of how he's written. And in her Hunter video she...says this:

"There are a lot of Reylos in Hunter's fan base who are obscenely racist misogynistic and homophobic. And I sure as fuck am not counting them In who I'm talking to today. Hunter is a magnet for fandom racism and misogony, but today I'm talking past those people to people with a very sincere love for the character. You don't love this character for how he's written. You love him in spite of how he's written. And you should be upset that his potential is routinely squandered in favor of just making more shots about him moping and sulking. You should expect better. Everyone would have BETTER if did not waste time on this character doing fucking NOTHING."

Typing that as I listened to Lily's video pissed me off. This narrative is entirely broken once you factor in how all of Lily's takes about Hunter are complete garbage, but even worse, Lily is trying to gaslight Hunter fans who are going to watch her video by saying "If you like this character, you actually don't like him cuz I said so"

Fuck right off Lily. There are real reasons for people to like Hunter that are not fanon things that are being made up, stop trying to gaslight Hunter fans into agreeing with ffs.

Lily also does this a lot with Amity too, insisting that she's just a one-note character with little to her and there is no reason for people to like her so much, when that is not true at all. There are actual reasons people have to like these characters that are NOT being made up unlike what Lily is trying to gaslight you into believing her. This is an incredibly manipulative and condescending way to frame your arguments, that if YOU like a character you actually don't and you should stop pretending that you do.

Fuck off Lily. The show DOES clearly use Hunter to his fullest potential, anyone who watches the show would know that, stop trying to gaslight people with your terrible arguments. Again, read my posts on Lily's takes on Hunter if you want the full context of why none of her takes on him are good, but needless to say Lily really likes to gaslight people into agreeing with her here and that is a VERY manipulative way to frame your arguments.

Oh wait, I'm still not done...because now its time to talk about...

6. "Dana has a white favoritism problem" & Lily's Hypocrisy

Yes, you read the title of this section correctly. In Lily's TOH season 2 round-up video, she says this:

"I know we're all being very charitable to Dana but I think we all need to address the elephant in the room is that The Owl House fandom has a big white favoritism problem and SO DOES DANA"

"Dana is not doing anything to help if anything she's actively making it worse and I feel somebody probably needs to probably sit her down about that and just be like "hey Dana, stop""

.......there is no other way to look at this. There is no other way to interpret this, Lily is accusing Dana of being racist. Now, complaining about a show focusing on white characters too much despite any other reasons a show may have for focusing on these characters beyond racism is one thing, but to accuse somebody of bigotry for focusing on two white characters, ignoring any reasons the show may have for focusing on them beyond racism is just...

I don't even know how to even say it, it's just gross. Once again, there are reasons why Dana chooses to focus on Amity and Hunter as I've already explained, but Lily ignores those reasons and just casually calls Dana racist. Oh, and I'm sorry Lily, but if Dana supposedly had a white favoritism problem, why tf would she make a black Latina girl the main protagonist??? And also develop st. black latina girl a lot throughout the series making her a three-dimensional and well-developed character that a lot of people love and relate to?

Lily ignores all possible reasons that Dana may have for focusing on Amity and Hunter just calls her racist. Wow, as I couldn't have hated you more Lily. Oh wait, but I'm not done with this section, no no.

Now I'm going to be discussing Lily Orchard's hilarious hypocrisy here. I find it incredibly funny how Lily constantly accuses the TOH fandom and Dana of racial bias when she literally hates a character (Hunter) for being a white male. And when she constantly fetishizes black people and explicitly stated once that Hunter would have been more interesting if he was black. I can guarantee you that if Amity and Hunter were black and Luz, Willow and Gus were all white, Lily wouldn't complain about them taking up too much screen time like she currently does, you can't convince me that she would.

Lily so desperately wants to convince us how racist the TOH fandom and Dana are yet she hates a character for his skin color and gender and constantly complains about him being a "boring white guy". This comment from my first Hunter post sums it up best:

"Lily really just desperately needs a character to channel unjustified negativity into so she can act better than the fans who like that character. She found reasons to hate Amity that way too in season 1. She gets obsessive about how the series "could be better" (i.e. the series should do the specific thing that SHE wants even if it's not the creator's vision) and when things don't turn out that way she gets... weird.

Like she shipped WilLuz and was butthurt that the fandom mainly saw Willow and Luz as just friends and recognized that Dana was emphasizing Amity crushing on Luz ... but Lily was like, "How dare they ship Lumity and not WilLuz! This is the racist fandom hating PoCs!!!" without self-awareness to see that no one was being racist but her for assuming that people only shipped a thing they liked because one character looks Caucasian.

She'd get on her high horse and accuse Dana of "white favoritism" for having Amity be important and making the fandom like her... like, the leaps and bounds Lily will go through to turn herself into "the most noble person" in a fandom is shameless. She also would rip on Amity for being derivative of Malfoy or the spoiled girl from Little Witch Academia... when that character trope is what Amity was subverting by showing that Amity had depth beyond her snobby/type-A first impression since after her first impression she almost immediately started to show layers to her character.

I feel like Lily only stopped being so negative to Amity because even she had qualms against crapping on Amity when a) she realized that complaining about Amity being a bully long after Amity had since stopped and atoned for that behavior was getting really old, and b) shitting on one half of Lumity when it was probably one of the biggest, most wholesome LGBT couples in modern animation would be a hard sell for Lily (who as an LGBT person should be less harsh on earnest representation from an LGBT creator).

Along comes Hunter and Lily can't exist without having a designated hate-sink so she projects all her dislikes into Hunter for merely existing. His design being light-skinned and handsome was enough to repel Lily. Him being a genuinely good person who had a troubled life but still perseveres to protect the relationships he's forged... he's pretty much a perfect addition to the cast that kind of adds a missing quality to the series (like how Toph in Avatar the Last Airbender was kind of the special spice that elevated the series for the better by being added to the cast). But ignore all the good his character brings because he's a caucasian-ish character who used to be tricked into being on the bad-side. I'm also sure Lily was furiously spewing venom when she saw that Willow was paired with Hunter, since Lily wanted Willow to be with Luz."

Lily, if you constantly accuse people of being racist for liking a character you don't and also accuse the creator of being racist as well, but solely hate a character for being a white male, then I'm sorry, but nobody here is being racist except for you. (I could also mention her star wars fic but this post is getting long enough so let's just end it here)

7. Conclusion

TLDR for those who don't want to read this entire post:

There are clear reasons why people may like Amity and Hunter that have nothing to do with racism at all

There are also clear reasons why the show may want to focus on these characters due to them being important to the story

Luz is a beloved fan-favorite character and Lily does not give any good evidence to suggest otherwise.

Lily's take that people like watching black women suffer and that's why Luz's truama arc is well-received is completely false as it is well-received due to being able to resonate with a lot of people.

The white favoritism video is fucking awful

A majority of Lily's arguments are just her trying to gaslight you into agreeing with her

Lily complains about the TOH fandom and Dana having racial biases when she is racially biased herself

Lily Orchard remains my most hated YouTuber. She's a shit critic and an even shittier person, and I sincerely hope that one day, Lily's entire channel gets terminated and wiped off the face of the internet, because people like her do not deserve a platform. She has not improved and I don't think she EVER will. Thanks for reading this entire post, and...bye.

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spookyc · 2 years ago

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Okay so, dead end is a great show but you know what we haven't had yet? My favorite episode trope of all time, the memory episode. And I have a really freaky idea for it. (This got super long so full thing under cut.)

So, picture season 3, Norma has been tearing through the lower level angels along with Zagan, (and likely Temeluchus and Paimon too) and they've been making good progress. I picture this as a later episode, maybe like episode 7, and Norma and Zagan finally make it to Pael. He toys with them a bit, picture Luz and Belos's first fight in toh except there's no breaking of any mask. Norma and Zagan are at their top form, but Pael is simply far more skilled than they anticipated.

After some time, he chuckles, and traps Norma in the same chair that held Pugsley, with that calm smile plastered on his face. Zagan of course bolts towards her, but is restrained by several angels who file in on command.

Norma is in shock from the sudden action, but she isn't scared, she balls her fists as she glares at Pael, a determined look on her face.

Pael eyes this with great interest, chuckling again to himself.

"My my, what an interesting little one you are, I see you have returned to me with a friend." He marvels, with that soft voice of his.

"Hope you appreciated the warm welcome, we got very acquainted with your subjects." Norma replies, a devilish smirk on her face.

Pael's smile then deepens into a frown, a rare sight for the archangel.

"Yes, those foul demons have certainly trained you well, a shame really." He expresses, grimacing at the word "demon."

"And they've trained me to bring you down." She responds, her determination never faltering.

Pael shakes his head, a look of disappointment clearly expressed in the action.

"You poor girl, to think they've corrupted you like this, it is simply unforgivable." Pael utters, pity dripping from his words.

"Corrupted?"

"Why yes, they've tainted you so much, you do not even resemble yourself anymore." Pael answers.

Norma finally began to look unsettled, her hands sweating as her eyebrows knitted together.

"What do you mean by that?" She dares to ask, cursing the slight shake of her voice when she uttered her question.

Pael's smile returned and haunting laughter followed. Norma's nails dig into her hand unconsciously at the sound, and Pael's smile widens unnaturally so, the corners of his mouth rising past his cheeks.

He waves a hand and a bright golden glyph appears before her face. It was so close she could clearly see the intricate patterns and words in a ancient language spelling out around the circle. It was almost hypnotic, as if the very sight of it made her forget the horrible situation she found herself in.

"Here, dear girl, let me jog your memory." He mutters, before the glyph begins rotating rapidly, the gold growing brighter and brighter and brighter.

Norma thinks she hears a voice calling out for her, perhaps Zagan's, before the light fills the entire room, a blinding white that reverberates in her mind.

She shuts her eyes at the sight, expecting a burning pain or something worse.

She gets neither, and when she finally decides to hesitantly open her eyes, she's back in her bedroom.

The episode would follow showing several events throughout Norma's life. Perhaps even in her younger years, we'd see her Dad too, when he was still around. The memories would then become increasingly familiar, eventually replaying old scenes from the prior seasons as Norma relives them all over again.

Except, she isn't alone, Pael is with her the whole time, and he's highlighting specific moments and narrating over them. In this way, he's also changing the narrative of her own memories with his own interpretations.

Like when we cut to her watching Pauline through the years, and Pael notes:

"You've been following the wrong people your whole life, haven't you dear? Ah, but who could blame you, the most vile creatures of the planes are always the most tempting."

Right after the shots of Pauline, we'd then get shots of the demons, of Zagan, Temeluchus, and perhaps even the party itself from season 2 episode 6.

"You place your trust in those that hurt you, those that have betrayed you; you must know it is only due time before they hurt you once again, right, little one? You are a smart girl, and you have a kind heart, but these demons, these phantoms, will only use that to their advantage."

We then flash to shots of Norma and Zagan training, and Pael shakes his head.

"Your swordsmanship is impressive, young one, that friend of yours has done a wonderful job honing her personal tool." Pael notes, the word tool spoken with particular venom.

Norma has been mostly silent throughout these interactions, perhaps because she's taking it all in, or perhaps because a part of her agrees with what Pael is saying. But after that statement she turns towards him in anger.

"I am not a tool, I chose to do this!" She fires back.

Pael's expression never changes.

"It was your choice, was it, little one? But what other choice did you have? That wonderful little dog was taken from you, and you wished to inflict that pain upon us, that is why you decided to engage in this conflict, is it not?" He left no time for Norma to answer the question, the answer already being obvious.

"I am afraid the demons do not see it in that way. They, and especially that friend of yours, could not care less about the dog's death. No, it would not have mattered what reason you gave, anything would have satisfied the bloodlust they hold for us. And what a great opportunity, to have a scapegoat primed and prepared for when they at last realize they are in over their heads with this foolish war. You are a human, dear, you are expendable, and yet, remarkably flexible. Those demons could shape you into whatever they desired, and if you perished, well, there's plenty more of your kind on the Neutral Plane to gather. Your existence is inconsequential to them, my poor girl, your life is ultimately meaningless in the grand scale of their war." Pael explained, his voice wracked with pity and sympathy.

As he goes on, Norma starts to break, she shakes her head, clutches at her sleeves, pupils dilating to half their size.

"No, no that's not true, they do care, they-" Her desperate words were hardly convincing, and she was unable to continue as she felt her breath hitch in her throat, her heart pounding in her ears. She couldn't focus, and yet, Pael continued.

"They do not, dear. Those demons do not care for anyone but themselves. They are vile and selfish creatures, and I am terribly sorry that they deceived you in such a way." Pael replies with absolute finality.

His voice, it was too loud. The memories that played before Norma were too loud. Everything was too loud and too much all at once and Norma couldn't even respond to Pael anymore, the only sound emitting from her being her gasps for breath. She fell to the ground, clasping her hands over her ears and shutting her eyes.

Make it stop. Make it stop. Make it stop!

It was then, that Norma felt a hand on her shoulder. Instinctually she flinched at the touch, but before she could bat the hand away, she felt warmth resonate from it. It was a calming warmth, the kind of warmth you felt right before you fell alseep. But instead of drifting to a slumber, she opened her eyes, and saw she was back within Pael's chamber. She gasped for air and found she could breathe again and as she took in her surroundings, Pael stood before her once more.

"These demons have hurt you, have blinded you, have shaped you into their personal weapon. They have tainted your heart with sin, and they made you forget who you are. But, be not afraid, Norma, I can heal you, I can wash away this darkness that has consumed your heart. I can show you the light. So please, dear, make the right choice." He says, before extending a hand forward...

Unbeknownst to Norma, Zagan has finally gotten the upper hand on those tricky little angels. That's fine though, she isn't called the Chieftain of Patience for nothing. She's been so focused on getting out of those slimy things' grip, that she let her focus drift away from Norma. As she breaks free from the angels' grips, and makes sure they remember to never do that again, her eyes widen in horror at the sight before her. Pael is standing before Norma, and she looks to be in some kind of trance, her gaze completely focused on him. He's extended a hand towards her, a hand that has only the faintest hint of a glyph circling around it.

Only one deeply aware of the angels and their magic would be able to see it. The Angel's Pact. They say to never make a deal with the devil, but really, that's mostly just angel propaganda. Demons aren't hard to figure out once you know them, and their language isn't hard to decipher once you know the terminology. And besides, any demon that doesn't uphold their end of the bargain is scum to Zagan either way.

But a deal with an angel? That's something you really gotta worry about. For starters, a pact with an angel is unbreakable, there's no going back when you've made a deal with one of them. Secondly, they never mean what they say, there's always a double-edged blade to their words and angels always see things through their own perspective, they're real convincing that way. The good image they've been able to preserve for eons certainly only aids in that too, everyone always just believes angels at face value. But deep down, they're just as ugly as the demons, they always have been.

And this Angel's Pact, that is what is being presented before Norma now. But why? What had he said to her? Surely, after everything, Norma wasn't seriously considering this, right?

"Norma! Norma snap out of it!" Zagan yells out, a desperation she would never admit hiding in those words.

Pael hears this, and with a single flap of his wings, sends Zagan rocketing into the wall behind him. The impact is enough to have her torso shoot forward, and a trickle of blood runs down her mouth as she cries out in pain.

"Even now they would ask you to fight, how bitterly cruel." Pael notes, before turning back to Norma once more.

"Come, my sweet child, let us make this right again."

To be continued...

(Thinking of making this into an actual fic, would yall be interested in that? With that I'd be going into way more detail, and of course you'd also get the conclusion so let me know if that's something yall would be interested in.)

#dead end paranormal park #dead end park #dead end #de:pp #dead end season 2 spoilers #dead end zagan #norma khan #dead end pael #season 3 discussion #writing #again let me know if yall want a fic cause i am so down for it

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bicth-and-in-that-order · 3 years ago

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Discussing white favoritism, racism and racial diversity in TOH

Gus and Willow

Now that the first half of season 2 is over, looking back, TOH really fell off with Willow and Gus. A lot of people blame white favoritism when it comes to these characters being ignored by the fandom and while yes that’s a big factor, it’s not the only factor bc I have to ask, what reason were we given exactly to care about them? Gus and Willow have very surface level characterizations that wasn’t explored to nearly the same extent as the other main cast despite being featured in all the openings. Gus had a complex abt being younger than everyone but ig it wasn’t worth exploring enough past a single episode. The most interesting aspect of Willow was literally her relationship to Amity and when that was done, they gave her nothing else outside of that. In fact she didn’t even get to have a B plot episode, the bare minimum, in the first half of season 2. And yes maybe this will change in the second half of season 2 but that doesn’t erase the fact that Amity was relevant throughout the entire series, having her own dedicated story arc, plot relevancy and character development yet the writers couldn’t be bothered to give the same relevancy for Gus and Willow.

Camila

On the other hand, Camila is definitely a fandom created problem that has no bearing on the show. TOH did a great job of illustrating that while Camila and Luz don’t see eye to eye, they both love each other and have a healthy relationship. I think the fandom’s interpretation of Camila perfectly demonstrates the ill effects of white favoritism and how racism is a major issue we need to combat in fandom spaces. I’m going to start this analysis two fold, first by talking abt Camila, then by talking about the blight parents + Belos. Alright so for starters certain subsets of TOH fandom, racist subsets, see Camila as abusive, homophobic and view the boring camp Camila wanted to send Luz for literally setting snakes and spiders in the damn school as “conversion camp”🙄

Was Camila being the perfect most angelic omniscient parent ever? No. She was trying her best to do what she thought was right for Luz and ultimately parents make mistake, that doesn’t immediately make them abusive. This is just another case of people either projecting their own insecurities onto a fictional character which someone literally admits to:

Or it’s just flat out racism. A lot of white ppl stereotype Latin ppl as being overly aggressive and homophobic and here it is manifesting. Some ppl even see Eda, the white person, as the “true mom” who was better for Luz

And keep in mind a lot of these comments I found were made after the latest episode. It’s honestly kind of mind boggling, but the most telling aspect of TOH’s racism and white favoritism is the fact that you hardly see ANY discussion abt how abusive Alador and Odalia were despite literally and explicitly being abusive to Amity💀 Some freak actually said that bc Odalia was hot that makes the abuse Amity suffered okay and I wish had the screenshot to show y’all bc wtf. Same goes for Belos, if he weren’t white and “””conventionally attractive””” then there would be a lot more people banging the Belos is abusive drum.

Anyways to wrap things up, TOH is an amazing show but its diversity falls a little short in some areas. White fans, if you’re calling Camila abusive but letting Belos and the blight parents slide, ask yourself if you’re just perpetuating racism that hurts fans of color at the end of the day.

#camila toh #toh #toh Luz #toh belos #racism #blight parents #white favoritism #toh gus #toh willow

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imagine-being-straight · 4 years ago

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A Message to the TOH Fandom

I’m tired.

I feel like everyone in the fandom can agree that the TOH fandom overall has white favoritism. If you actively deny that we have a problem with white favoritism or are offended that I said this, look at yourself and other people who have been talking about this issue. Really look at yourself and ask why you are offended by what I said. Now back to the TOH fandom’s problem with white favoritism. It’s a huge problem and I don’t think people have realized how bad it’s gotten.

Luz and Amity

Do both of them have amazing content created about them? Yes, but if you look a bit closer to the contents of their contents you’ll see a clear disparity between the two. Luz is more likely to be in Lumity art (which itself isn't a problem), but the problem lies in that she is only there for Amity. Is there still content with her alone and highlighting her character? Of course there is, but for every content that exists for Luz solely, there are at least two others for Amity. Don’t get me wrong I love Amity as much as the next person, but she still is a side character. The Owl House focuses on Eda, King, and Luz mainly. They are the main characters.

When I first joined the TOH fandom, I noticed a lot of Amity focused content. A lot more so than I expected since she is a side character. I understand that a factor in her popularity is her crush on Luz and we’re all really excited for confirmed gay characters, but it doesn’t explain how popular she is. She appears in roughly half of season one’s episodes (I know she technically appears in 11 episodes, but some of her appearances are so minor you can easily forget they happened) compared to Luz being in all 18 episodes. Yes Luz isn’t always the focus of these episodes, but she still changes and develops as a character through most of them.

The reason I’m bringing all of this up is that Amity is white and Luz is a POC. Characters of color in the past have been overlooked and underappreciated in the past, not just in this fandom, but it still happens a lot here. Whether it’s conscious or not, we all have been affected by white favoritism and it is our responsibility to recognize it and change. The Owl House brings more than just gay representation: it brings an Afro-Latina Bisexual protaganist with two major side characters, Willow and Gus, being a mixed Asian-Black character and a Black character. You still think I’m full of shit saying there’s white favoritism in the TOH fandom? Well I’m just getting started here.

Willow, Gus, and Boscha

Boscha herself is an interesting character and I think people see a lot of potential for her character, but the problem is that she overshadows a lot of other characters who are much more important and relevant. Willow is a good example of someone who has been constantly overshadowed by Boscha. Most content I see of Willow is usually Boschlow content (I’m not approving or condemning Boschlow here, this is me just stating some facts) and it’s so unfair to Willow as a character. Willow is more than just Luz’s friend or a quiet girl and more people need to realize that. If you can analyze Boscha’s character in the three episodes she is in, you can do the same thing to Willow, who has been in 14 episodes (three more than Amity). There is no excuse for the lack of Willow content and the abundance of Boscha content.

The same thing can be applied to Gus. Sure he doesn’t get very much screen time, but it is still loads more than Boscha. I have seen barely any content about Gus and the few times I do, he is usually with a group and not alone. No one talks about him and I cannot express how underrated he truly is. If you want some funny content with him, play around with his interest in humans and how he has totally misinterpreted things we know as facts. If you want Gus angst, then write about how young he is and how he could be feeling inadequate despite being smart enough to skip two grades. Amity is seen by the fandom as a whole as being extremely smart, but the fact that Gus skipped two grades, a feat Amity has not done herself, truly showcases how smart Gus really is. It’s not that hard to make Gus content and everyone is just sleeping on him.

The fandom loves to attach itself to Boscha, who may I remind you is white. Willow and Gus, who have way more plot relevance and screen time, are constantly pushed aside for more and more Boscha content. Willow and Gus are beautifully written in the show, but most people overlook it for Boscha, who in the show has been fairly one note so far. If your only argument is that you want to show the background characters some love, then where is the Skara content? Skara has just as much screen time as Boscha, but I’ve seen very little content about her. I guarantee if Boscha was a POC she would have the same level of content as Skara, but since she is white she overshadows literally every other POC supporting character, including those who have had more screen time than her. Don’t even get me started on the Detention Track kids and Emira/Viney. This post is already long enough and I don’t need to make it any longer.

Camilia and Alador/Odelia Blight

Right here is the clearest example of the white favoritism of the TOH fandom. Alador and Odalia Blight have gotten so much content about them and we still haven’t seen their faces. You can easily find so much analysis on them and how their parenting must affect the Blight siblings. You can find so much content about them and we know literally nothing about them other than the fact that they’re abusive. I know Alador is set up to be less abusive than Odalia, but it doesn’t change the fact that he is still abusive to his kids. Whether he approved what was going on or not doesn’t matter because he was still complacent with what was happening.

Now let’s look at Camilia and all her content- oh wait there is basically none for her. All the Camilia content is basically nothing other than CamilEda content (again I’m not trying to bash or approve CamilEda, I’m just trying to state some facts). Camilia did make a mistake in setting Luz to the camp, but that does not make her a bad mother. People need to remember one bad action does not make a bad person. I think Dana herself said that Luz and Camilia do love each other, but they do have their differences, which makes things hard sometimes. Camilia truly does care about Luz and tries her best to do what‘s best for Luz and more people need to recognize it. There is so much untapped potential with Camilia’s character, like how she will react to Luz not coming home or what she will do to try to get Luz back. What if she sees all of the recordings Luz has made for her? How will she react? These are all things we can make content on, yet I see so many people sleeping on it.

Now when you compare how the fandom treats both Camilia and the Blight parents, there’s a clear bias in favor for the Blight parents. The Blight parents are given more attention and content despite having less actual screen time and being actual pieces of garbage. Camilia is shoved to the side despite there being plenty to analyze about her and her relationship with Luz. Camilia is also a good person, which is clearly different to the Blight parents. It’s never been a matter of which parent/child relationship is better because they’re both written very well, but rather the fact that Camilia gets shoved aside every time we talk about parent/child relationships. I mean when you look at it, Camilia and Luz’s relationship with each other is literally the Blight family’s dynamic, except the opposite. The only difference between the two families is that one has POCs and the other is white. And to no one’s surprise, the white family gets more attention and analysis than the POC’s family.

Statistics

If you’re still not convinced here's some cold hard evidence that white characters are more favored than POC characters. I’m going to be using AO3’s (archiveofourown) data on how many works a character is tagged in.

On AO3 at around 6:35 PM EST Oct 3, 2020, The Owl House had 1921 works. As we can see Luz is number one (as she should), Willow is number three, and Gus is number four. They’re ranked fairly high (which was a surprise to me), but when you look at how many works they’re actually in, the white favoritism becomes clear. Amity is tagged in around 1480 works and Willow and Gus each are in 730 and 610 respectively. Willow and Gus are in half the works Amity is. Somehow Willow appears in half the works Amity does even though Willow appears more than Amity in the show. Boscha also has 360 works with her in it, half of what Gus and Willow’s works despite being a very minor character who has appeared only a few times. What's worse is that Edric and Emira are literally 200 to 60 works away from Willow and Gus respectively. Edric and Emira, two white characters who have appeared in literally three episodes, but are tagged in nearly the same number of works as two main POC-supporting characters. Now maybe you’re like “Oh the Blight siblings are only so popular because of Lumity, this data is skewed” so the next picture is of all the characters with all of the romantic relationship tags excluded.

The data shows that the fandom favors the white characters so drastically that there is no excuse or other explanation for it. Lumity being popular doesn’t explain why Amity is still the third most written-about character, even with the Lumity tag being blocked. Quantity of episode appearances doesn't explain why Willow has less content about her because Willow appears in three more episodes than Amity does. The only explanation is white favoritism because the most popular characters are all white (with the exception of Luz, but that’s because she is the main character). Before you tell me “Oh it's because they’re more interesting or they have more potential” actually look and analyze the POC characters because they’re amazingly well written if you actually sit down and analyze them.

Why Calling Out White Favoritism Matters

Now you may be asking: why should I care? Well you should care because the fandom as a whole is literally favoring white characters over POC characters, which is low key racist. It makes people care less about POC characters and actual people which can lead to some internalized racism if not caught early enough. The Owl House tries very hard to highlight their POC characters and actively ignoring or dismissing them is disrespecting the show itself.

I feel like I should make it clear that I’m not shaming anyone who’s favorite character just happens to be white. What I’m doing here is being critical of whether or not a person likes a character because they are white (whether that decision is conscious or not). There is a clear difference between “Oh X is my favorite character, but I recognize the other characters are good in their own ways.” and “Oh I love X and only X. I will only use the other characters to further X’s character and completely ignore everyone else’s complexity”. Please take some time and think about why you like a character and see if you unconsciously love them because they are white. No one is immune to it and even I had to realize I was unconsciously favoring white characters while writing something The Owl House related.

The sad part about all of this is that it needs to be said that racism is bad. It needs to be said that white favoritism is extremely toxic and we should make sure we don’t actively take part or be complacent in it. I know for a fact that other POC have seen this white favoritism, but are too numb to say anything about this because they feel like their voices won’t change anything. The few people who have spoken out haven't been listened too. The fact that I had to step up and make this just to try to get people to listen and I might not even make a difference is so sad to me. The fact that I’m young makes me not numb to the white favoritism. The fact that I dealt with, for the first time, racism at the age of 14, which is extremely late for a POC. The fact that the only reason I can be mad about this is because I dealt with racism so late that I have energy to speak out against this and not be numb to this all. I hate that all of this exists and we all let this happen. We all let this problem fester and now it is now our responsibility to get our priorities straight and change. If we let this problem grow and grow, then in a few years this fandom will be a shell of what it once was.

“We can do this together.” -Luz Noceda

#the owl house #toh #lumity #luz noceda #gus porter #willow park #camilia noceda #amity blight #boscha #edric blight #emira blight #alador blight #odalia blight

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