: Saturday, January 31, 2009
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forthwritten: being other - I think part of the thing that's bothered me about the Great Cultural Appropriation Debate of 2009 is one of the assumptions that it's built on: that you should write non-white characters exactly as you should write white characters. Because yes, of course we are people first and foremost. -- coffeeandink: Some beginning reading on race and racism - it seems to me that the commenters in this round of the Great Cultural Appropriation Debate of DOOM have a lot of people who, because of race, class, or luck, haven't had to think much about race and racism before. Or maybe you know a huge amount and I just don't recognize you because I'm not the center of the world. ;) But I thought it might be helpful to point towards some beginning reading I've found useful: -
- elfwreck: How insulting can it be, if the audience doesn't understand you? - "nithing" is not a cute LOLCAT crossover of "nitwit" and "nothing." It's an old Norse/Germanic word. Our modern word "nothing" is possibly somewhat derived from it... but it doesn't mean "you don't exist to me." It's a lot closer to "you are so vile and horrific, the universe should re-arrange itself so you don't exist." -
- elspethdixon: Holy mother of God *is horrified* - Holy fuck, she calls fans of color and those who support them nithings.//In terms of offensiveness, as a former student of old English? Fuck, people, that's, well, not as horrible as the other n-word (which, please God, I hope no one's actually said), but it's pretty god-awful. Like, enough that I was reduced to staring at my computer screen in horror. -
- yeloson: The privilege of speaking openly - One of the sticks waved around recently was, "We post using our -real names- and that means we're more special than you!". Not everyone has that privilege, especially when you're speaking out against an entrenched oppression. There's always someone willing to bring consequences to you for that. -
- lyore: Thoughts on fannish characters (or: It's too damn hot to clean the house) - I'm curious if anyone else out there has such a strong correlation between main character/favourite character, or even a different one. What determines your favourite characters? -
- beccaelizabeth: Isms suck, like gravity - So, I have a theory://isms suck, like gravity//therefore orbital mechanics is a good way to conceptualise the interaction of texts and isms -
- tacky_tramp: Oh David Levine No - So yeah, [info]davidlevine, I don't like you very much, I think you're reveling in your white privilege, and it's taken a lot of effort not to be "vitriolic" in this post because I am vibrating with rage.[...]But none of that has anything to do with how you portray people of color in your short stories. It's about how you talk about racism on your blog. -
- angiepen: Racism, Cultural Appropriation, and Completely Missing the Point - Anyone who's actually studied the issue of racism knows that there are plenty of journals and web sites all over the place explaining what's what and how to deal with this stuff. Mr. Levine doesn't know that, though, and because he already believes he knows everything there is to know about racism -- what's to know, after all, besides not hating people for their skin color? [sigh] -- he's never thought to go looking. He doesn't know what he doesn't know, so he sees only the most shallow and blatant characteristics of a conversation or interaction about racism. -
- the_merope: He puts his brush to the canvas, with one quick stroke - Voltaire - I firmly believe that when a person decides to tell a fiction, a lie, a tale, a yarn, it's their business how they do it, and what subjects, themes, narrative style, genre, words, images, clichés, they use, because it is their story. It is not the story of the hundreds and hundreds of individuals and places and texts and art works that inspired it, shaped it, within the sanctity of the author's mind. -