nuclearmentality replied to your post “You reblogged a post that said “the only harm [non-photographic child…”

of course, it’s important to not discount the impact of propoganda-type works on the course of history

however, more often than not they are more accurately treated as symptoms than as causes

To be clear, yes, that’s definitely true. My shock wasn’t at the idea that BOTN was impactful, it factually was. But trying to pin the stubborn and long-lasting horror of white supremacy, an ideology that’s defined the world for like…centuries, on a single movie? It’s myopic to the point of being dangerously nonsensical.

That was my point here.

You reblogged a post that said “the only harm [non-photographic child porn] can do is if you read it” and I think that’s an irresponsible view for an author to hold. Fiction does affect reality, or good minority representation wouldn’t be important, Birth of a Nation wouldnt have led to a resurgence in the KKK, etc. Writers have an obligation to keep in mind what kind of impact their work will have on the people who read it, and normalizing sexual relationships with children is harmful.

annleckie:

nkjemisin:

annleckie:

Really? You think I haven’t thought about this issue? Is a story about recovery or dealing with trauma, is that “normalizing sexual relationships with children”? Should that be forbidden? Is that harmful? Should someone trying to deal with their own trauma by writing fiction that addresses it directly, should that be forbidden because it’s harmful?

Should I write only the sunniest, most proper fiction that never mentions anything disturbing or awful just in case some reader, somewhere, takes it as normalizing that awful? Is it my job to purge my work of anything that some kid, somewhere, might take in a way I didn’t intend and maybe be messed up by? Fuck no. Because let’s be 100% clear here, you actually can’t entirely predict what a reader will take away from a piece. One does one’s best. And I can’t tell another writer what to write, I can only tell them to be sure they mean to write what they write.

And the problem here is the sweeping condemnation of, what, the number of fics with particular tags? Seriously? As if it’s that simple?

Are you absolutely sure that every work tagged “pedophilia” on AO3 is wankfodder? Every one? None of them are stories where characters experience and process it, or just talk about it? None of them are stories where the authors are trying to process their own experiences? It’s never permissible to even mention pedophilia, lest someone be influenced wrongly? Should survivors never talk about or fictionalize their experiences? Really?

Do not lecture me on the responsibilities of authors–I have thought long and hard on the issue, and have come to the very considered conclusion that I have no interest in purity tests. Rape is bad, but not all stories about rape are bad. Racism is bad but not all stories about racism are bad. Pedophilia is bad but…you get the picture. Just saying “look at all these fics tagged “pedophilia” AO3 is doing a bad thing hosting them!” is so incredibly stupid I just don’t know where to begin. Are some of those fics toxic? Surely. Pretty much every other tag has toxic fics in it, too. Are all of them? I seriously have my doubts.

I am prepared to say that adults having sex with kids is bad, no nuance. I am NOT prepared to say that any fic about that topic is unambiguously bad. Because that’s not true.

I’m not in the business of telling people what to read or what to write. And you can take your list of things people somehow can’t write about because they’re bad and fuck all the way off.

What she and Foz said. And as to the anon’s point of fiction affecting reality re “Birth of a Nation” helping the KKK – let’s be super-clear, here, everyone. BoaN by itself did not resurrect the KKK. A toxic combination of economic motives, political cynicism, cowardice on the part of supposedly non-racist white people, and vicious opportunism caused that. BoaN was simply the best propaganda available for use by white supremacists who already existed, and who had long before implemented Black Codes and the Lost Cause myth and other means of retrenching America’s racist caste system. If BoaN hadn’t happened along when it did? The KKK would have found, or made, something else to use as its rallying cry.

Do I hate racist art? Yeah. But I deal with that by a) heeding warnings about it, and picking when (or if) I want to engage with it so that I minimize harm to myself, b) complaining about it when the people who publish it seem oblivious to the fact that it is racist art, and c) when I’m ready, writing anti-racist fiction that engages with it. I believe wholeheartedly in the notion that the job of the artist is to speak truth to power. But truth is many things. Truth is, sometimes, people writing out their rape fantasies so they can try to understand themselves better. Truth is people erasing the black characters from fanworks featuring their favorite media properties – and then getting called on it, and learning from the ensuing discussion. (Or not learning, and getting dismissed by a big chunk of fandom for it… and meanwhile, more quietly, truth is other fans learning from their fuckups.) Truth is critique, not blanket condemnation. (And not uncritical aggrandizement either.) This shit is too complex to handle with simplistic, black-and-white thinking. Love it or hate it, discourse ™ is the way to go.

Word.

Also read @nkjemisin’s books if you haven’t already.

did i really just read “a single movie revived white supremacy” as if it ever in the history of america ever, ever died? i am literally agog at this degree of delusion

krisstraub:

knitmeapony:

apaullo95:

continue-5-4-3-2-1:

thethroneofbooks:

“ In August, 1968, the country was still reeling from the assassination of Martin Luther King four months earlier, and the race riots that followed on its heels. Nightly news showed burning cities, white flight, radicals and reactionaries snarling at each other across the cultural divide.

“A brand new children’s show out of Pittsburgh, which had gone national the previous year, took a different approach. Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood introduced Officer Clemmons, a black police officer who was a kindly, responsible authority figure, kept his neighborhood safe, and was Mr. Roger’s equal, colleague and neighbor.

“Around the first anniversary of Martin Luther King’s death, Mr. Rogers invited Officer Clemmons to join him in soaking their tired feet in a plastic wading pool. And there they were, brown feet and pasty white feet, side by side in the water. Silently, contemplatively, without comment.

“25 years later, when the actor playing Officer Clemmons retired, his last scene on the show revisited that same wading pool, this time reminiscing. Officer Clemmons asked Mr. Rogers what he’d been thinking during their silent interlude a quarter century before. Fred Rogers’ answer was that he’d been thinking of the many ways people say “I love you.”

– Carl Aveni’s FB page

Mr Rogers was one of the good ones.

^^^^^

Considering the fraught and painful history of excluding black people from swimming pools in that era, there is no way this wasn’t a very pointed commentary to the people who were being exclusionary. This was a specifically chosen visual.

It’s not a fuck-you. Mr. Rogers didn’t do fuck-yous. But it was a clear, decisive, pointed statement. It was more than just showing inclusion; it was a deliberate response to what was going on in the world. This was him saying “you can do better. We can all do better. What you are doing is wrong.” This was a sweet, simple, and relatable thing to show little kids, to give them a view of a black man as kind and professional and a trusted adult – but also a lovely and strong statement to their parents and to the world.

It could have lost him his show, or at least his national distribution. It could have gotten him attacked both in the news and personally in person, but he did it anyway. I wish I knew if he ever talked about this, and how aware he and the show producers were of the statement this made.

Man, do we need more Fred Rogers in the world.

ALSO: At the end of the segment, Mr. Rogers helps dry Officer Clemmons’ feet, which is a biblical, supplicatory gesture. The scene was very, very intentionally about inclusion and caring.

“I’m honestly REALLY doubtful the Caucasian joke was meant to mock his progressive fans at all, given that there are ways Trickster Mode’s presentation lines up with Homestuck’s Gnostic and philosophical themes” are you shitting me. Hussie was/is racist as fuck and he never apologizes for any shit he does. I love HS and yes, the fact that it has gay couples is super important to me, but it’s so horrendously racist to act like LGBT characters erase Hussie’s racism and make him a “good person”.

So full disclosure: I’m expanding on this point substantially cause all this convinced me it was worth writing an essay on the subject.

Fuller disclosure: I’m latino, and I kinda bought into these criticisms for a long ass time? So it’s not exactly that I think you’re unreasonable in holding this conclusion. And yeah, there’s definitely parts of Hussie’s writing that aaaren’t the best on racial terms–can’t say I’m fond of the depiction of Damara, for example.
I can understand people taking issue with the Condesce, too, though that’s assuaged for me by the fact that Meenah is cast in a pretty dang sympathetic light.

There have also been some references to the kids as white over the course of Homestuck that undercut the claim that they’re meant to be Aracial, though I think it’s notable that the only unambiguous one–Bro being referred to as white like, one time–is also the only time I can recall that Hussie deliberately chose to retcon the story in a non-diagetic, plot-driven way. So I think it’s worth simply working around the vaguer instances, since…Word of God is pretty firmly with us there.

And no, I don’t really think that was what the Caucasian joke was ever meant to be. I think Hussie was actually always quite serious about presenting the kids as Blank White and leaving them open to interpretation, and while that’s something of a cop-out in execution just given the realities of representation, I do think he was genuine about it. I also think it was a pretty damn successful move, artistically.

The Tricksters, in contrast, employ Whiteness as a horror-movie monster aesthetic. They are also literal presentations of definite physical forms, where Homestuck ALWAYS philosophically favors symbols and possibility spaces for interpretation. Both literally and thematically, Tricksters represent things Homestuck as a story is actively repulsed by and condemns, and the denial of our ability to imagine the kids in different skin tones is part of what renders them repulsive.

Feel free to respond to my presentation for this idea once I present it in detail, or like, follow up with sources if you want to talk about it. I think it’s a conversation worth having, but like…I’m not white, and you’re not going to intimidate me out of talking about what I think by claiming I’m racist on anon and raising a lot of really dramatic intense claims with no sources or context, if that’s what you’re trying to do. That’s just not how I roll.

If you actually want to engage with stuff and have a conversation, though, I’m looking forward to hearing from you. See you around.

Keep rising, btw.