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shewhohashope - Cultural Appropriation and Sci-Fi/Fantasy: A note for all those people "too scared" to write about characters like Teyla and Ronon and Teal'c.kynn - On Defensive White Authors: If you've ever felt that I've been too confrontational about the race-and-fandom situation, or felt defensive of your own actions in writing (or not writing) COCs, then this might help you to understand both me and your reactions.vito_excalibur - When talking about race = racism: or how well-meaning, decent white people self-justify.shewhohashope - Being colourblind...and erasing other people's history: a personal take of a history forgotten, ignored, erased, and eventually put aside in an attempt to 'fit in'.An open letter to white people in SFF fandom: both a condensed version of a letter by
coffeeandink, and her own letter.The full set of links are over at
rydra_wong's LJ - and I mean a FULL SET. If you're coming to this after Jan 2009, I recommend checking her calendar for that month and February.some things about you, me, our friendship, and where race comes into it
I don't believe that anyone that I interact with on this blog is a racist. (If you are and just haven't shown your colours yet, the unfriending button is there, please use it.) I think you are wonderful, lovely people with whom I have shared some of the best times of the last eight years.
That does not preclude you saying stupid things, perpetuating racist behaviours and perceptions, or hiding behind your privilege.
As
zvi_likes_tv says here "Somebody calling you on your racist behavior has already assumed you didn't mean it like that. If they thought you consciously subscribed to a philosophy of white supremacy, they wouldn't be talking to you."So I'm working through the questions of race, my own privilege, and where I belong in a culture that barely recognises People Like Me in mainstream media. I'd love it if you came along for the ride.
Some of you won't, for whatever reasons. I'm disappointed, even if I understand why you won't join me, even if I envy you for having the privilege to be able to ignore colour as I do not.
My race will be with me until the day they shovel dirt over my coffin - and, depending on how God plans to work this whole resurrection-of-the-dead business, it might even be with me in the Beyond.
I don't see myself running off to China to live among People Like Me (and after thirty-plus years of living in Australia, are they really that much Like Me in the commonplaces, even if we share a Collective Cultural History?). So I guess I'm going to have to learn how to live with myself in a world where the dominant paradigm enshrines and adores People Who Are Not Like Me, while sidelining People Like Me.
As I said, I hope you'll stay on for the journey. It may not be squeeful or comfortable, I'm going to be challenged, and I'm going to challenge you along the way, but by God, I'm going to be someone I can look in the mirror and say, "well, I didn't get it right today, but I'm working at it" and know it to be the truth.
Tags:
Skin color (in general) vs. Visual Minority (in particular)
I think is the part that confuses me about the whole discussion a lot whenever it comes up. Race vs. Minority race. If I moved to China, the people on tv would also look different from me, the commercials would advertise make up not for me, etc. I could still peruse white tv shows by downloading and ordering DVDs (just like in theory Asian and South Asians can do, not sure how well developed the techonological infrastructure is for African media).
I get the not getting a job, the not getting the appartment, that this things will never happen to me, even if I'm in a country that is majority another color than I am (at the very least because people will always have the vague suspicion that there is somebody rich or powerful behind me in some way, at the worst because even some non-white countries have some sort of lighter = prettier ingrained beauty standards). And I do get the "long history of blood and oppression" that just makes it different when I don't get special white representation in a non-white country.
But as a general rule of thumb, isn't minority representation always an issue? I do think that it sheds some ugly truths about the human psyche that as a group we seem to prefer things that look like us. So any country will try to maximize their profit by appealing to the largest group and giving them something they identify with. While minority groups, whether religious groups, gays and lesbians and minority POCs have to vye for quality representation.
For example, I have been thinking about white representation in Bollywood movies lately. They are rare. They are never the leads (and let's face it, why would they be?). They are often evil or cardboard (again, not that there is anything wrong with that, it's not like India owes me any correct represetation or I rely on them solely to provide characters I identify with). I don't think that there are ever any couples of two white people with each other (again, why would there be?) (unless maybe if they are evil), but only in the form of mixed relationships. And in the mixed relationships it's 9 times out of 10 an Indian man and a white woman, rarely ever the other way around (in fact, I can think of only a single white man Indian woman romantic pairing, the secondary pairing in Historical movie) (and no, movies like Bridge and Prejudice and Mistress of Spices don't count because they are made for a white audience).
I also can't remember ever seeing a white person in an Asian drama (but I'm no expert).
Again, I don't think that there is anything wrong with any of the things I cited above. To me these are just intersting statistics. And again, please believe me that I'm really not trying to argue that those things are the same :) To me it's just interesting to see what kind of behaviors we tend to default to. Though of course there is the question of how much of it is natural or how much of it is an intentional counter reaction. Like, if the awareness of former white oppression and dominance didn't exist, would the kind of movies the various countries produce still be the same? Or is there more subconcious push to create something that is truly your own and unlike what the outsiders produce.
Re: Skin color (in general) vs. Visual Minority (in particular)
I think it is because there are subtle cues inside the movie that aren't even conciously in there. And in fact, in this movie they probably didn't want to come off that way (since the movie was intentional oscar bait). But you still subtly signal which characters are important and which characters don't fit.
Normally, on tv when you have a mixture of mostly white characters and maybe one or two lonely "other" characters of color, it seems that the majority of the fandom will graviatate to the white main characters, because they are archetypes we recognize, because the show subconciously signals to us that these characters are important and they are dyanamic. In the meantime, if we watch a show with only characters of color (like an Asian drama or a Bollywood movie) we have no problem identifying with the characters because we recognize the dynamic hero, the torn villain, the funloving heroine, we recognize them as people the script says are important and are worth catching our eye.
My current pet theory is that if there is a character of color exists within in cast of mostly white people he sticks out, he is the other. And IMO having him exist in a group of white people means that there is an invisible power imbalance there that makes people uncomfortable and that is why white people might be less likely to root for that character because it would force them to think about that power imbalance and that would make them feel bad. Hence the tendency maybe to make actors of color aliens like Ronon and Teyla because that way you can reasonably argue that you don't have to think about power imbalance in the traditional sense because they are from alien cultures that don't share the same kind of ugly, bloody history, so there is no need to feel guilty in front of them (since the paradigm is that maybe racism existed once upon a time, but not anymore and so if you take aware that bloody dark history you have to be aware of then just treating them like everybody else should be alright and enough).
My other current pet theory is that often feel like I seem to feel drawn to characters of color more than (apparently) is normal. I often wonder if that is because I'm not American. So I might actually identify more with the "others" who are out of the loop with the status quo since to me the status quo is "American" rather than "White". Which really actually sucks a lot and is no help it all because it might imply that the thing that draws me to COCs might be precisely what actually makes them bad writing to actual POCs.
Err, sorry for getting so rambly again about my own issues and confusions. Again, feel free to be bored/indifferent :D
Flaws in the theory
So there must be a left-over inner distance/aversion, even to shows with an all POC cast with no white person who have to identify with, feel guilty about or embarrassed by.
Still, it does seem to me that once you find white people who are willing to sit down and read subtitles, it is not hard to make them watch a "status quo" media item from a different culture and they can still identify the characters as "this one is honorable, this one is dishonorable, this one is sexy, this one I root for to get the guy while I root for this other one to fall off cliff". Which is why I came up with the theory that it must be status quo/guilt free circumstances.
Or maybe I just know the wrong people.
no subject
This is the point so many folks miss. I think all whites who wish to be sucessful allies should repeat these words like a mantra several times a day. :)
Re: Skin color (in general) vs. Visual Minority (in particular)
I'm curious about what in the movie led you to believe that they were trying to draw parallels between Elizabeth-Bhuvan and Radha-Krishna.
Re: Skin color (in general) vs. Visual Minority (in particular)
(incidentally, apparently there is a deleted scene (http://www.bollywhat-forum.com/index.php?topic=227.0) where Gauri and Bhuvan travel together and he assures her that she is both Radha and Rukhmani to him. Seems like even they knew that Gauri was the appealing character and that it was pretty yucky that Bhuvan would imply to Elisabeth that she was the Radha/that his heart is really with her)
Exact quotes
What are you looking at, memsahib?
These statues.
Whose images are those?
This is the temple of Radha
and Krishna. These are their idols.
Today is Krishna's birthday,
so the idols are decorated.
lt's very beautiful.
Yes.
Were they husband and wife?
Oh, no, memsahib.
Krishna was married to Rukmini
and Radha to Anay.
But the deep love they had
for each other set an ideal.
lt's like...
...a dewdrop on a lotus leaf.
Neither united nor separated.
They've been worshipped together
for eons.
***
Then they lauch into a song number (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GtDsjaMkLAA) where a jealous Gauri dances and sings using elements from the myth.
***
And here the epilogue
Elizabeth returned to England
with Bhuvan in her heart.
She did not marry and remained
Bhuvan's Radha all her life.
Quotes taking from Script-O-Rama (http://www.script-o-rama.com/movie_scripts/l/lagaan-script-transcript-dialogue.html)
Re: Exact quotes
Re: Exact quotes
But to me that is the thing of the movie, that it probably tried to have it both ways. Hence, the removal of the deleted scene, so anybody who might want to ship Elisabeth could share her delusion (after all, the narrator states it like fact).
To me the main thing the movie settled was that that all English song numbers are just nothing but horrible and cringeworthy. I felt like stabbing my eyes out when Elisabeth did her stance in the later song.
Re: Exact quotes
Yeah, I agree. That's what makes it so great, I think - the filmmakers were clever with all the layers. ^^
To me the main thing the movie settled was that that all English song numbers are just nothing but horrible and cringeworthy. I felt like stabbing my eyes out when Elisabeth did her stance in the later song.
*diesss* They certainly /do not/ work in Indian movies, that's for sure. Though I do think it would've been better if they'd had a choreographer with classical ballet background, something like that.
ohgod, I completely hijacked this post. SORRY. *RETREATS*
Re: Skin color (in general) vs. Visual Minority (in particular)
To take your example of India. Sure, Bollywood movies don't feature whites; but Indian viewers also watch Hollywood movies that show white people in a positive view and take those positive views on board. And these big blockbuster Hollywood movies will show alongside the Bollywood ones.
The same thing happens the world around: media by Western cultures, heroising white people, glorifying white civilisation, and showing a variety of white people in white jobs is shown alongside the culture's own 'homegrown' media.
By contrast, in most Western countries, there is little fare from other countries available to white people unless you go looking for it. And those that are promoted are generally of a certain 'type' that reinforces the stereotype of the background culture.
As an example: Jackie Chan, Michelle Yeoh, Lucy Liu, and Jet Li are all Asian actors who have gotten into Hollywood by playing a type: the exotic oriental with kung-fu moves.
The matter is less that White People Should Be Represented In POC Media and more that white people get positive representation just about everywhere, while the same does not apply to POC in western countries.
no subject
no subject
Re: Skin color (in general) vs. Visual Minority (in particular)
Succinct! It's like a diamond. Concentrated sense. :D
Re: Skin color (in general) vs. Visual Minority (in particular)
Re: Skin color (in general) vs. Visual Minority (in particular)
Do I, sometimes. Do not, sometimes. Mostly, try I. :D
Skin color (in general) vs. Visual Minority (in particular)
I think is the part that confuses me about the whole discussion a lot whenever it comes up. Race vs. Minority race. If I moved to China, the people on tv would also look different from me, the commercials would advertise make up not for me, etc. I could still peruse white tv shows by downloading and ordering DVDs (just like in theory Asian and South Asians can do, not sure how well developed the techonological infrastructure is for African media).
I get the not getting a job, the not getting the appartment, that this things will never happen to me, even if I'm in a country that is majority another color than I am (at the very least because people will always have the vague suspicion that there is somebody rich or powerful behind me in some way, at the worst because even some non-white countries have some sort of lighter = prettier ingrained beauty standards). And I do get the "long history of blood and oppression" that just makes it different when I don't get special white representation in a non-white country.
But as a general rule of thumb, isn't minority representation always an issue? I do think that it sheds some ugly truths about the human psyche that as a group we seem to prefer things that look like us. So any country will try to maximize their profit by appealing to the largest group and giving them something they identify with. While minority groups, whether religious groups, gays and lesbians and minority POCs have to vye for quality representation.
For example, I have been thinking about white representation in Bollywood movies lately. They are rare. They are never the leads (and let's face it, why would they be?). They are often evil or cardboard (again, not that there is anything wrong with that, it's not like India owes me any correct represetation or I rely on them solely to provide characters I identify with). I don't think that there are ever any couples of two white people with each other (again, why would there be?) (unless maybe if they are evil), but only in the form of mixed relationships. And in the mixed relationships it's 9 times out of 10 an Indian man and a white woman, rarely ever the other way around (in fact, I can think of only a single white man Indian woman romantic pairing, the secondary pairing in Historical movie) (and no, movies like Bridge and Prejudice and Mistress of Spices don't count because they are made for a white audience).
I also can't remember ever seeing a white person in an Asian drama (but I'm no expert).
Again, I don't think that there is anything wrong with any of the things I cited above. To me these are just intersting statistics. And again, please believe me that I'm really not trying to argue that those things are the same :) To me it's just interesting to see what kind of behaviors we tend to default to. Though of course there is the question of how much of it is natural or how much of it is an intentional counter reaction. Like, if the awareness of former white oppression and dominance didn't exist, would the kind of movies the various countries produce still be the same? Or is there more subconcious push to create something that is truly your own and unlike what the outsiders produce.
Re: Skin color (in general) vs. Visual Minority (in particular)
I think it is because there are subtle cues inside the movie that aren't even conciously in there. And in fact, in this movie they probably didn't want to come off that way (since the movie was intentional oscar bait). But you still subtly signal which characters are important and which characters don't fit.
Normally, on tv when you have a mixture of mostly white characters and maybe one or two lonely "other" characters of color, it seems that the majority of the fandom will graviatate to the white main characters, because they are archetypes we recognize, because the show subconciously signals to us that these characters are important and they are dyanamic. In the meantime, if we watch a show with only characters of color (like an Asian drama or a Bollywood movie) we have no problem identifying with the characters because we recognize the dynamic hero, the torn villain, the funloving heroine, we recognize them as people the script says are important and are worth catching our eye.
My current pet theory is that if there is a character of color exists within in cast of mostly white people he sticks out, he is the other. And IMO having him exist in a group of white people means that there is an invisible power imbalance there that makes people uncomfortable and that is why white people might be less likely to root for that character because it would force them to think about that power imbalance and that would make them feel bad. Hence the tendency maybe to make actors of color aliens like Ronon and Teyla because that way you can reasonably argue that you don't have to think about power imbalance in the traditional sense because they are from alien cultures that don't share the same kind of ugly, bloody history, so there is no need to feel guilty in front of them (since the paradigm is that maybe racism existed once upon a time, but not anymore and so if you take aware that bloody dark history you have to be aware of then just treating them like everybody else should be alright and enough).
My other current pet theory is that often feel like I seem to feel drawn to characters of color more than (apparently) is normal. I often wonder if that is because I'm not American. So I might actually identify more with the "others" who are out of the loop with the status quo since to me the status quo is "American" rather than "White". Which really actually sucks a lot and is no help it all because it might imply that the thing that draws me to COCs might be precisely what actually makes them bad writing to actual POCs.
Err, sorry for getting so rambly again about my own issues and confusions. Again, feel free to be bored/indifferent :D
Flaws in the theory
So there must be a left-over inner distance/aversion, even to shows with an all POC cast with no white person who have to identify with, feel guilty about or embarrassed by.
Still, it does seem to me that once you find white people who are willing to sit down and read subtitles, it is not hard to make them watch a "status quo" media item from a different culture and they can still identify the characters as "this one is honorable, this one is dishonorable, this one is sexy, this one I root for to get the guy while I root for this other one to fall off cliff". Which is why I came up with the theory that it must be status quo/guilt free circumstances.
Or maybe I just know the wrong people.
no subject
This is the point so many folks miss. I think all whites who wish to be sucessful allies should repeat these words like a mantra several times a day. :)
Re: Skin color (in general) vs. Visual Minority (in particular)
I'm curious about what in the movie led you to believe that they were trying to draw parallels between Elizabeth-Bhuvan and Radha-Krishna.
Re: Skin color (in general) vs. Visual Minority (in particular)
(incidentally, apparently there is a deleted scene (http://www.bollywhat-forum.com/index.php?topic=227.0) where Gauri and Bhuvan travel together and he assures her that she is both Radha and Rukhmani to him. Seems like even they knew that Gauri was the appealing character and that it was pretty yucky that Bhuvan would imply to Elisabeth that she was the Radha/that his heart is really with her)
Exact quotes
What are you looking at, memsahib?
These statues.
Whose images are those?
This is the temple of Radha
and Krishna. These are their idols.
Today is Krishna's birthday,
so the idols are decorated.
lt's very beautiful.
Yes.
Were they husband and wife?
Oh, no, memsahib.
Krishna was married to Rukmini
and Radha to Anay.
But the deep love they had
for each other set an ideal.
lt's like...
...a dewdrop on a lotus leaf.
Neither united nor separated.
They've been worshipped together
for eons.
***
Then they lauch into a song number (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GtDsjaMkLAA) where a jealous Gauri dances and sings using elements from the myth.
***
And here the epilogue
Elizabeth returned to England
with Bhuvan in her heart.
She did not marry and remained
Bhuvan's Radha all her life.
Quotes taking from Script-O-Rama (http://www.script-o-rama.com/movie_scripts/l/lagaan-script-transcript-dialogue.html)
Re: Exact quotes
Re: Exact quotes
But to me that is the thing of the movie, that it probably tried to have it both ways. Hence, the removal of the deleted scene, so anybody who might want to ship Elisabeth could share her delusion (after all, the narrator states it like fact).
To me the main thing the movie settled was that that all English song numbers are just nothing but horrible and cringeworthy. I felt like stabbing my eyes out when Elisabeth did her stance in the later song.
Re: Exact quotes
Yeah, I agree. That's what makes it so great, I think - the filmmakers were clever with all the layers. ^^
To me the main thing the movie settled was that that all English song numbers are just nothing but horrible and cringeworthy. I felt like stabbing my eyes out when Elisabeth did her stance in the later song.
*diesss* They certainly /do not/ work in Indian movies, that's for sure. Though I do think it would've been better if they'd had a choreographer with classical ballet background, something like that.
ohgod, I completely hijacked this post. SORRY. *RETREATS*
Re: Skin color (in general) vs. Visual Minority (in particular)
To take your example of India. Sure, Bollywood movies don't feature whites; but Indian viewers also watch Hollywood movies that show white people in a positive view and take those positive views on board. And these big blockbuster Hollywood movies will show alongside the Bollywood ones.
The same thing happens the world around: media by Western cultures, heroising white people, glorifying white civilisation, and showing a variety of white people in white jobs is shown alongside the culture's own 'homegrown' media.
By contrast, in most Western countries, there is little fare from other countries available to white people unless you go looking for it. And those that are promoted are generally of a certain 'type' that reinforces the stereotype of the background culture.
As an example: Jackie Chan, Michelle Yeoh, Lucy Liu, and Jet Li are all Asian actors who have gotten into Hollywood by playing a type: the exotic oriental with kung-fu moves.
The matter is less that White People Should Be Represented In POC Media and more that white people get positive representation just about everywhere, while the same does not apply to POC in western countries.
no subject
no subject
Re: Skin color (in general) vs. Visual Minority (in particular)
Succinct! It's like a diamond. Concentrated sense. :D
Re: Skin color (in general) vs. Visual Minority (in particular)
Re: Skin color (in general) vs. Visual Minority (in particular)
Do I, sometimes. Do not, sometimes. Mostly, try I. :D