Active and Passive Aspects

arrghus:

So now that the whole notional and material idea has been established, that leaves the question, is there another axis to the whole thing? In other words, what separates, say, Mind from Light, or Void from Heart?

I pondered this question for quite a while before coming up with an answer I found satisfactory, and I’m still far from sure I’ve got it right. But I believe the answer might lie in a slightly different perspective on the dichotomy of Active and Passive.

Keep reading

I think I’m starting to find this pretty damn compelling, at least with Time and Space in particular. It makes my head hurt to think about, though. Classpects are so…so….so complicated if this is true. God.

The Influence of the True Signs or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Trollcall

ancient-trolls:

Okay! This musing is my first writings on one of these more critical Homestuck theories I’ve written that doesn’t have to do with professional wrestling or OCs. Let’s make it a good one.

If you’re even a casual Homestuck fan, you’ve likely heard about the Trollcall. It is part of arguably the most significant paradigm shift in Homestuck’s history, the Extended Zodiac, and by extension Hiveswap as a whole. For the first time in AGES since the small crumbs given to us by Hussie or concept art of the game; we’re finally getting a look at the world of Alternia beyond the 12 central trolls. Fantroll fuel is in effect; theories have been jossed, created, enforced, everything we knew about the aspects shifted and we’re still accommodating these changes.

Naturally, this has brought about some resistance. As is the case whenever there’s a significant change to a field, there are those hesitant, if not outright hostile, to the ideas presented. An example of this can be the people who still don’t think that Karkat’s connection to the Limeblood caste is in some way not explicit. Like, god damn people, get your head out of the dirt. It’s right there with the other Lime signs.

I went off-topic there previously, but my general point here is that there are aspects to this paradigm shift that people have taken issues with. A particular area is the Trollcall; this being WhatPumpkin’s way to tide over the wait for Act 2 by drip-feeding us more and more nuggets of lore for Alternia in the fashion of introducing the background caste of the game. The issues people have taken with it is that most of the trolls are just facets of the 12 Beta trolls just exaggerated. The Tealbloods are a common caste to point fingers at where most if not all seem to have some connection to law and (in)justice in some way. Or we could look at the Goldbloods who seem to be bee-focused psionic machines with weird eyes and duality throughout them. This apparent lasseiz-faire attitude towards the castes goes on and on: feral/rural olives, artistic and verbose Indigos, yes, INDIGOS you plebs, fashionable Jadebloods, etc.

You hear it, “This troll is just X but Y!”, “This [motif] was meant to be for [beta troll], it doesn’t make SENSE that it’s applied to them all!”. Continually hearing this over and over and over, it’s maddening. Is WhatPumpkin lazy? Is this bad design? Were things better before Hussie ‘gave up’ and hired all these god damn SJWs? (This is me being facetious, naturally).

My goal with this likely-to-be large mass of writing is to dissuade, or at least explain why I don’t hold these views that the TrollCall trolls are a terrible thing or lazy design. Man, it’s easy to say these things when I’m in control of writing the complaints. Minus one point to this essay I guess. The way I’ll hopefully present my view on this ‘issue’ is by talking about an unexpected development of the Extended Zodiac, the ‘True Signs’, and how they can be used to explain away the issues that some may take with the apparent path WhatPumpkin is steering Alternian society and trolls as we know them down.

Taz has written about the influence of the True Signs before. They write mainly in the context of how the True Signs explain what some may see as inconsistencies with Xefros having so many elements of a Time player despite actually being a Rage player. The general ethos is the same, the True Signs are subconscious ‘ideals’ for each caste, and each caste is under enough pressure to act to these ideals despite it not being their natural calling.

When people like Taz, Wak, or other theory blogs, prominent (them) or obscure (me), talk about the influence of the True Signs, they mainly approach it from a classpect perspective. That doesn’t quite help me in explaining the aesthetic similarities of the Troll calls to the beta trolls. What I’m going to focus on are the genetic and social ramifications of the True Sign’s influences. My main, and likely only point as my mind buzzes writing this, is that the True Signs play a far more considerable impact on their respective castes than we think.

The end goal of an SBURB-created universe, that is, a universe, is to create the next group of players for the following game. The trolls of Alternia were the race fated to play SBURB. Therefore it can be said that the ultimate end goal of Alternian society was to create the beta trolls and raise them to game-playing age.

With this in mind, along with the substantial influence of Doc Scratch on Alternia, it can be said that the True Signs, aspect and moon at least, are the ultimate archetypes of each caste to slowly evolve to create a player who fulfils all the requirements to play. The way I see it work is akin to a mould, or a filter.

We’ll look at the Goldbloods for this example. Sollux was the True Sign Goldblood fated to play the game for Alternia. Therefore every single Goldblood before him can be seen as various attempts to create him, or as evolutionary steps to eventually reach him. I’m not saying that there’s an overt effort to create Sollux Captor with every Goldblood, at least on Alternia’s part. To Alternia, the Gemini sign holds no actual significance. It’s a Goldblood sign for regular ass Goldbloods. Who cares?

SBURB cares is who. It’s said in the description of every True Sign that those who are a True Sign have a more significant connection to the caste than others. With this information in mind, it can be inferred that the True Signs are SBURB’s ‘model’ for the respective players. With sweeps and sweeps, generations and generations of this cosmic pressure on the caste, it makes sense that the caste as a whole would begin to exhibit traits and qualities of the last bearer of SBURB’s burden for his kind.

We can see in this in how Zebede is an ‘aspiring beekeeper, how Kuprum has a form of vision two-fold and acts as a battery-in-training, how Folykl… Well, Sollux isn’t born blind but considering that Kuprum embodies a role that Sollux takes up later in the story, it’s possible Folykl does as well with Sollux’ eventually blindness, another quirk of the True Sign influence. To loop back to genetics, we can easily see the influence of Sollux’s duality with the presence of two sets of horns on Goldbloods. The dual horns are a basic facet of Sollux and are an easily shown effect of True Sign influence. The fact that Zebede and presumably other goldbloods out there lack vision Two-Fold suggests that it’s not quite become a caste standard that dual horns have so far. You can carry on this pattern with every member of the Trollcall. This explanation may not satisfy you; you may even say “Well it’s still bad design on WP’s part!”

To respond to that, I merely have to point out that this is Alternia for chrissakes. The place has a genetically distinct caste system, which is grounds for stating that the Alternian government plays it’s part in enforcing this Darwinist approach to the True Signs, albeit unintentionally. If you really want to get a sense of overt manipulation, look no further than Doc Scratch. The 12 beta trolls are part of the long cycle of the creation of Lord English, who Doc Scratch is also the host of. Furthermore, two of the fragments of Lord English are the Alternian trolls themselves. Well, one-and-a-half of the fragments, Equius and half of Gamzee. Any deviation from these two designs wouldn’t lead to LE’s creation, and we can’t have that now, can we?

Scratch’s influence trickling down through Alternian powers can even be seen in how the Alternian government plays a part. By valuing beneficial mutations where they’d fit such as Vriska’s MC powers, Sollux’s vision two-fold and Equius’ STRONGNESS. They are unknowingly playing a part in their eventual demise by breeding and nurturing the right conditions to form the players who will wreck everything in the process of doing so, and that’s too perfectly poetic for me to not see as grounds for this stance.

If you have any responses, additions, or other such valuable contributions, feel free to reblog or message me! I can only promise that the responses will be at least sub-par.

I hadn’t realized these design similarities had people complaining.
I guess I shouldn’t be surprised, haha. I like this post a lot! I agree pretty much completely, and it kinda makes me really happy to see other people picking up the same thread. So I’ve just got a few things to say:

1) It’s true that I’ve written about it a lot, but credit for starting the True Sign Caste-Influence theory rightfully goes to @wakraya. She’s the one who made the connections in the Extended Zodiac proper! I don’t think you implied otherwise or anything, I’ve just been meaning to say so because I’ve seen some people attribute the theory itself to me, when I just happen to think Wak nailed it.

2) You got into this later in the post, but personally, I put the emphasis much more on Lord English/Scratch caring about/being behind this particular means of producing the players than on Sburb having any particular agency/will behind it.

It’s worth mentioning that making this batch of players is what Scratch is on Alternia to do–LE arranged for this by glitching the Alpha Troll’s session and forcing them to Scratch in the first place.

LE has always been themed as a mob boss–Put another way, a crony capitalist with no regard for others’ lives. Conscripting all of Troll-kind into what is essentially a millenia-spanning, empire-wide factory line meant to produce a specific set of Correct™ trolls sounds about right, from that perspective.

By putting each troll Caste through whatever combination of genetic alteration and/or socioeconomic pressure is necessary to eventually produce the Players, Scratch can ensure their creation while minimizing his personal labor.

If that leads most trolls in history to be unhappier and less able to understand themselves, their true natures, and that of those around them–then that’s a nice bonus to LE, who would be cruel for fun even if he didn’t particularly have it out for trolls out of spite for Calliope.

3) Speaking of which, if this is true, it might go some ways to explaining why some trolls have more psychic power than others. Impossible to say for sure at this point, obviously, but when Act 2 drops I’ll be interested in seeing how trolls with different Aspects relate to their troll powers.

The selflessness of Vriska Serket

arrghus:

When Vriska Serket was young, far younger than her still very young age when we first encounter her, she faced a choice of monumental proportions, at an age so young many would not ascribe her any agency, any responsibility for her actions. Perhaps we might even call it a Choice, for it is similar in nature to the ultimatums presented by the Denizens.

The Choice was this: A: Start killing people, innocent or not, on an enormous, serial killer kind of scale. Dye your hands in blood for all futures to come. B: Die before you’ve ever had a chance to live.

The Vriska we encounter chose A. Obviously she did. If she hadn’t, we would never have met her because she would be dead. This is the reponsibility of Vriska Serket, that to even exist in the story, she had to be a person who chose A.

And that makes her evil. I mean that in a sense that to choose and to continue to choose your own life over that of countless innocent strangers is a horrible (albeit somewhat understandable) decision, but I also mean it in the sense that Vriska herself perceives and understands herself as a bad person.

She makes excuses for herself, certainly. She justifies her actions using troll morality, tries to pretend she doesn’t care, clings to arbitrary standards of “fairness”. None of it works, of course. Aranea makes that much clear, in that key conversation of hers with Terezi. It never works.

And with her repeated failures to find absolution, with guilt gnawing at her every step of the way, here is Vriska’s grand mistake, that she desires to be Good, more than she desires to be Well.

In this world I would be surprised to hear of anyone who does not know the consequences of prioritizing accomplishment over health.

Keep reading

A take on Vriska that actually mostly aligns with my own! Pretty rare.
I can’t resist the urge to mention that I see Vriska’s self-imposed selflessness as being the major identifying trait she borrows from Mindfang.

Thieves being an Active class with innately selfish tendencies and Sylphs being a Passive class with the opposite, I think the Mindfang persona itself is the major corrupting influence on Vriska’s psyche.

I’ve talked to Arrghus about this before I think, I just wanted to mention it here because not only do I think this reading is fairly accurate, I also think it’s grounded in the very mechanics of Classpects. And honestly I just think that’s hella neat, I’m never over it.

The material and the notional

arrghus:

One idea that recurs fairly prominently in Homestuck’s Gnostic roots is the duality of the material and the notional, the World of Matter and the World of Ideas. And with the advent of the Extended Zodiac, one idea that took root in my mind was the possibility that this duality extended to the Aspects themselves.

I don’t have solid evidence for this yet, but I do have a lot of anecdotes, below the cut. Regardless of whether it’s truly canon, though, I do think it’s a potentially useful and interesting way of thinking about the Aspects and Homestuck itself.

Keep reading

This is pretty interesting to me. I tend to consider Aspects as simultaneously notional and material, but the idea that they might have a bias one way or another has a lot of potential for fleshing out how we understand them in relation to each other, I think.

One of many ideas I’m not entirely committed to, but consider as I look through the text and consider the ways it might be evolving now.

The corruptive influence of justice

arrghus:

There are many things that cloud the minds of Homestuck’s protagonists. Many things they lean on, that they draw strength from, that they consider a positive influence in their lives, but that nevertheless serve to distract them and poison their hearts and minds. For John, it is innocence. For Karkat, it is the warrior ethos. And for Terezi, it is justice.

Justice drives many of Terezi’s actions and her understanding of the world. It’s how she justifies helping Vriska feed countless to her giant spider lusus during flarp, it’s how she justifies siccing Scratch on Vriska when flarp goes too far, it’s how she describes the nature of doomed timelines and those doomed individuals who originate in them. It’s the language she uses when psyching herself up to personally kill Vriska once and for all.

Justice, to Terezi, is about violence. Retributive violence, a punishment for evil action. It is a way to understand and interact with the world she inherited from Alternia, and it is riddled with the influence of that awful place, with its utter disregard for life, dignity, or any form of mercy. It is a means of justifying murder.

Justice, to Terezi, is a drug, and it is one she only manages to shake once she kills Vriska and finds that in the face of such enormous action its effects as a palliative are lacking. She relapses, of course, wrapping herself in the blindfolded visage of justice when seeking violent revenge on Gamzee, but this no longer brings her strength against his inexplicable juggalo pro-wrestling skills and begins a sequence shortly leading to her death in the Game Over.

Ultimately, Terezi chooses to shed justice entirely, choosing to use John to resurrect Vriska and, critically, to disrupt her initial pretend game of justice during her introduction, symbolically (and, to an extent, actually) freeing her from its curse.

The other big reference to justice that comes to mind: Aimless Renegade immediately prior to blowing some shit up and trying to kill people that end up being his friends.

I think I’m inclined to agree with seeing it as a corruptive influence. I should go through the text and see if it’s bad in every circumstance it shows up in, or if it’s toxic for Terezi in particular as linked to her Knight roleplay.

Either way, really solid point. I dig it!

A question about Pages, do they lack their aspect at the start?

hussianphilosopher:

revolutionaryduelist:

Maybe? I don’t really like jossing headcanons, but I’ve never really read a version of this idea that feels compelling to me, personally.

I think it’s more accurate to say Pages tend to either A) Attract the attention of others who mean well, but can be unpredictable in how they go about “helping” the Page, or B) Serve themselves their Aspects in very selfish ways.

I don’t think Jake in particular reads as “lacking” Hope. Understanding the impact Jake has on Dirk when they’re 13, specifically through the vector of his Hope, is instrumental to understanding both their characters, imo.

@revolutionaryduelist

Well, I think that saying that Pages “lack” their aspect is very much oversimplifying it, and it’s worth noting that we never actually hear it stated this way in the text, not even from Calliope or anyone who gets info from Calliope. It is, however, present in patterns, just as it is for Princes – “lacking” the aspect is a signifier for them, too. Let’s review:

-Tavros is the simplest and most literal application of this signifier, and is probably where the concept originated because of it. He lacks freedom, both physical (due to his confinement in a wheelchair) and social/sexual (due to his constant victimization by Vriska). And this is not a failing on his part! Tavros is aware that freedom is something he does not have, and is not happy about it! Freedom sounds pretty good to him! Eventually, he gets it. Good for him.

-Jake, then, presents us with the other interpretation of this concept; that of having a bad relationship with one’s aspect, in which that part of one’s life is unhealthy. Taz can source this better than I can, but while Jake is very hopeful, he is naively so. Jake is a hopeless optimist, a person who thinks that if he just believes in something hard enough, it will eventually come true. If he believes that he’s a rugged, badass adventurer, he’ll become one! If he believes that his friends are all Good Pure People With No Issues who he can have Straightforward, Easy, Uncomplicated Relationships with, that’s what they’ll be! Everything will work out, you just gotta believe. Jake’s journey – one that as of Act 7 he has only just begun to make serious progress on – is that of understanding that hope is not enough, that in order to make the world the way you want it, you have to strive for it.

(Despite his other issues, I think we see the end of this road in Grandpa Harley – one does not become as accomplished in as many different fields as him by wishing in one hand and seeing how quickly it fills up!)

The concept holds up pretty well with the Princes, too – Eridan has hopes and dreams, but they all get smashed to pieces and his moment of greatest power and greatest impact on the story comes at his moment of utter hopelessness. Dirk certainly has a soul, he has emotions (indeed, Dirk’s biggest problem is arguably that he can’t stop feeling way too much, all the time, forever) – but, like his counterpart Rose, he’s very bad at dealing with them and processing them, and he’s constantly held back by difficulties placed in his way by his Self or versions of his Self (such as Hal) and by his own literal Self-hatred. Kurloz we don’t see too much of, but he’s a Rage player (anger, chaos, doubt, purifying truth) who is always 100% calm and collected, and dedicates himself to a god who cares nothing for him – hardly a righteous or truthful faith.

So there’s my counterpoint – I would say that yes, Pages do lack their aspect at the beginning of their journey, but that’s only one way that their difficulties can manifest, and interpreting that too literally is limiting and inaccurate. It might be better to say that early on Pages (and Princes) have a weakness corresponding to their aspect.

A solid add-on! I think I could still make an argument that Tavros’ issues stem from an unhealthy relationship with his Aspect, or a fundamental misunderstanding linked to it. But I agree on the broad points, and I think this is a pretty solid way of conceptualizing the parallels.

Classpect powers and skill

arrghus:

So I was thinking about god-tier abilities in Homestuck, and it struck me that rather a lot of the so-called “classpect powers” showcased in hs are either A: a more “supernatural” expression of something the person in question had already been doing prior, or, rarely, B: a direct response to a previously established problem. And in aggregate, these feel like they point toward a fairly particular conception of classpect abilities, that of skills that are learned (or levelups gained in a special ability, if we want to get video gamey with it).

Let’s use John as an example. As the predominant early viewpoint character, his growth is fairly well detailed. As he enters his Land and starts properly growing, he goes from using the Breeze to send objects across his Land using the Parcel Pyxis network, to subconsciously summoning the Breeze to save himself from a fire, to subconsciously having the Breeze emanate in massive quantities from his very body to put out the planet-spanning Green Tragedy, to finally as a god-tier (and with some valuable advice from Vriska) taking full control of the Breeze and using it as a tool and weapon. All of these fall into the A category, but John also has two solid B category abilities, the ability to resist detection via scent, and the ability to turn into wind to protect himself against attacks. And both those abilities are perfect for protection against Bec Noir, who tracked John down via his scent and stabbed him in the chest shortly before John god-tiered, at which point he immediately gained the first of these abilities (he showcased the second when fighting Noir in the Furthest Ring later).

Keep reading

This is pretty solid. I think with a bit of time I could prob argue Jane and the trolls also fit into this schema nicely. A bit busy right now but hopefully soon

Lord English as a Manifestation of Trauma: An Alternate Reading

betweengenesisfrogs:

[This is an excerpt from a longer post, but I think it can stand on its own. It’s based on blogger mmmmalo/Malo’s idea of Homestuck characters as Manifestations of the protagonists’ psychology and trauma. Malo argues that Lord English is a reflection of Jade’s hidden trauma; below, I present a different approach.

Content warning for discussion of neglect, abuse, CSA, suicide, assault, and general
trauma.]

As I understand it, Manifestations Theory posits:

New characters, events, and problems introduced in Homestuck come into being as symbolic echoes (manifestations) of the psychology of the original four characters. Further characters also emerge as manifestations of those new characters, and so on. This is especially true of the interaction between the kids and the trolls, but also of other figures like the Midnight Crew, the Dancestors, and Lord English.

I really dig this way of reading Homestuck! It often leads to really interesting results. I think it makes a great deal of sense in terms of how Hussie writes his characters as echoes or riffs on previous characters.

It also could be very literally true in terms of how Paradox Space works. revolutionaryduelist has written about reality as an extension of everyone’s will and agency in Homestuck, and TexTalks has pointed out that ideas like Light and Space and other Platonic Forms are literally what make up the building blocks of all things in Homestuck’s metaphysics.

I could very easily see a Paradox Space which provides its players with beings and events that echo their own psychology. In which the challenge for SBURB players, in very Gnostic fashion, is to face the reflections of their own selves in order to find their own identity within their concerns and fears. That’s awesome!

That said, my reading of the origin of Lord English as a psychological Manifestation differs significantly from Malo’s.

What I find very striking about Lord English is that he’s an amalgamation. He’s a fusion of Caliborn + Lil’ Hal (AR) + Equius + Half of Gamzee.
That’s incredibly resonant, because if there’s one thing it makes sense
for the villain to be in Homestuck, it’s a collision of overlapping
symbols, like everything else that drives its story. And a mess of
overlapping symbols is also perfect as an expression of psychological
problems.

Here’s the reading I’ve been playing around with:

Lord
English is the manifestation of the collective traumas, repressions,
and psychological issues of the initial protagonists of Homestuck.

Keep reading

Oooh my god, I love this. I never quite linked LE to trauma or any given character’s psychological issues, and I certainly never considered attempting to pair the Betas with respective components of LE.

I’m not super sure how sold I am on the link between Rose and Caliborn
(Scratch always struck me as more Hal than Caliborn myself; the twisted realization of Caliborn’s desire to be “Bros” with Dirk mingling with AR’s desire to emulate Dave by Serving others.) And I’m still mulling Jade over, too.

But that’s pretty much just me saying this take on LE is really interesting, and teases new light out of him as an antagonistic figure, so I hope we end up expanding on the concept more.

Grandpa Harley and MMMManifestations Theory Extended Discussion

betweengenesisfrogs:

[Content warning, as with my Jade post, for discussion of sexual assault, CSA, perceived suicide, and trauma, discussed slightly more explicitly than in the previous post, as well as abuse, alcoholism, and neglect in the context of other characters.]

So red-zora asked about my interpretation of Grandpa Harley from my Jade post, how my understanding of him as a character differs from mmmmalo’s interpretation according to his Manifestations Theory and how this all connects to Lord English. Very belatedly (sorry!), I’m finally posting my response!

I’ve wrestled a lot with how to approach the topic, since it concerns very intense emotional trauma that could be painful and triggering for many people, and I definitely don’t want to come off in any way hostile to mmmmalo (henceforth Malo), who by every indication is a really awesome, good dude. On the other hand, I’m sure plenty of people would be interested in my reasons for thinking the way I do, and this is a really good opportunity to clarify my thoughts. So read on if you’re interested. Let’s say I’m down to see how the conversation goes, and I’ll reserve the right to call it off if we need to.

First off, I want to make this clear: I’m not interested in excusing or ignoring any problematic actions by Grandpa Harley or any other Homestuck character. I mean, come on. This should be obvious from the fact that I spent my Jade post tearing him a new one, calling him a bad person, a bad parent, and someone who had a huge negative influence on Jade’s life. I’m more than willing to think he’s terrible.

I just disagree with some other Homestuck analysts about *why* he’s a bad parent. In figuring out Jade’s story, I’ve tried to draw on canon evidence as much as possible. I’ve tried to base my understanding of Homestuck on that evidence, and it’s that desire to be accurate to the work, rather than any desire to excuse anybody, that’s given me the interpretation I do. Hopefully that makes sense.

Here’s my thesis, then, based on a close reading of Homestuck:

Grandpa Harley’s characterization in Homestuck is based around absence and neglect, rather than sexual abuse. While it’s impossible to prove a negative, I find it very hard to make the case that he’s being depicted as a sexual predator. In viewing him as one, especially in “this is what’s happening in the story” terms, I feel like we lose track of what’s going on in his story, both in Hiveswap and in Homestuck itself.

Now, I should note that Malo’s Manifestations Theory doesn’t really deal with the literal level. As I understand it, it relies on symbolism and motif, mostly Freudian and Jungian, to draw new and interesting meanings out of Homestuck. That puts it in a different category than a literal claim about Grandpa – a reading based on symbolism is much harder to prove or disprove. At the same time, I still find symbols of ABSENCE, DEATH, and FANTASY to be much more central motifs for his character, essential if he is to be understood.

Below, I’ll talk about why, first on the literal/factual level and then on the symbolic level, and then finally get into my own feelings about Manifestation Theory and how I’d interpret Lord English under such a framework. Bear with me, this is going to be a loooong one.

Keep reading

I don’t have a ton to add here other than to say that I love this post. I myself have been struggling with wanting to address malo’s take on Grandpa-as-sexual-aggressor while also keeping perspective on my general enjoyment of malo’s work and Manifestation Theory in general.

I’m pretty much feeling like you put my jumbled, messy thoughts in order here. This is pretty much my answer to any inquiries about Grandpa-as-sexual-assailant, too.

I’m likely to have more to say about this down the line (hopefully soon I can voice my thoughts on Malo’s own response to this post, and man I am excited that we’re communicating about this stuff as a community!), but for now just…bravo. I’m so glad you took the time to write this out.

dingodad:

blood caste is NOT the alternian equivalent of race… even if we ignore that canonically alternians DO have an equivalent of race (land and sea dwellers are referred to as the “two races”), every blood caste has its own COMPLETELY UNIQUE internal traits that make them better at one thing or better at another thing, which is nothing like what ethnicity is, unless you’re literally using a definition of race from like, the 17th bloody century, mate

racism is racism. caste is caste. if the hemospectrum was a racialist institution, equius would hate gamzee just as much as he hates lowbloods. but he doesn’t, because the castes represent pseudo-xeno-feudalist classes (and are referred to as classes many times in the comic and suplementary material!). racists don’t see race as a spectrum; the closest thing would be the spanish-european caste system introduced in the americas post-colonisation, and even that brings up an important point; you can be of mixed ethnicity, but you can’t be of mixed caste. because castes aren’t malleable, arbitrary distinctions like ethnic groups are; they are strictly enforced social classes.

also: castes exist in real life. for starters, the troll “castes” are probably named after “castes” in ant colonies: physically differentiated forms of ant who all have specific roles to play in a colony, just like troll castes in the alternian empire. and ant castes aren’t anything like “the ant equivalent of ethnicities”; they’re actually more like genders. so if you wanted to directly translate the troll blood castes to a near-western near-human setting, you’d more likely be dealing with 12 genders than 12 ethnic groups.

if you really need a direct human analogue to caste, you’re in luck and still don’t need to use ethnicity because there are human societies with caste systems that don’t depend on ethnic segregation. take the caste system of the Ethiopian Amhara people, for example;

The […] caste system consisted of: (1) endogamy, (2) hierarchical status, (3) restraints on commensality, (4) pollution concepts, (5) each caste has had a traditional occupation, and (6) inherited caste membership.

so there you go. didn’t mean to turn this into a whole arse essay but reading the alternian castes as a form of alien racial segregation not only lacks a whole lot of nuance but also just has a bunch of unfortunate implications. tune in next week

Hm. The “traditional, assigned roles” thing makes me feel way more confident in all the idea of the Castes all assigning some kind of Class behavior to its members, as well as the Aspect association. Interesting stuff, thank you!