Episode 15: Engage Trickster Mode (with optimisticDuelist)

pgenpod:

@revolutionaryduelist & @gamblignant8 present Episode 15.

hey guys, heads up! I ended up doing another episode of the Perfectly Generic Podcast with Kate!

This time we talked about Trickster Mode. You can stay tuned after for a post-show about Vast Error (which i caught up on recently, its real good guys)

Episode 15: Engage Trickster Mode (with optimisticDuelist)

Found some “old” drama around Homestuck/Andrew Hussie recently and I respect your opinion. What do you think about the “caucasian joke” that used to be found in the Trickster arc? I don’t mind it. I also saw other stuff around Andrew’s responses to questions around disabilities, fat, stereotyping, race, and similar topics. I know this question can be controversial so any other links about your opinion would be nice if you have the time. Thanks and can’t wait to see more.

Back in the old fandom days, I was one of the many who was pretty pissed about that joke and internalized it as some sort of “take that” at Homestuck fans who had criticisms of the comic’s relationship to race.

My feelings have since shifted, and I certainly don’t think that was the narrative intent. I think the Caucasian joke is better understood in context with the rest of the comic’s gnostic themes. I’ve written an article on Trickster Mode:

https://medium.com/@RoseOfNobility/the-tricksters-are-peachy-yaldabaoth-racial-identity-and-gnostic-existential-horror-7907191c8071

Suffice it to say, I’m not an expert on race issues, and I don’t want my personal feelings to imply that all people who are critical of Homestuck along those lines are being unreasonable or anything.

But my reading of the text is such that if anything, the joke here is on Whiteness as a source of political power.

Or, even more likely, on making a tongue in cheek reference to one of AURYN’s side-effects in The Neverending Story. When Bastian (a white kid) gains the amulet (same one depicted on Jane’s Lollipop), he’s also transformed into an “oriental prince.” Racebending is sort of part of the thing’s powerset.

Not on debunking the idea that the kids could be white, or mocking fans who wanted to consider the possibility.

The portal seems to have the same effect on Joey that the lollipop juju had with Jane, any thing to say about that?

Yeah, it seems like a Neverending Story thing. AURYN–the medallion that grants any wish–has a corrosive effect on humans, even as it makes them all-mighty.

Bastian quickly becomes attached and obsessed with AURYN, compelled to hold onto it against logic and reason. 

Also, AURYN changes Bastian’s race, making him an “oriental prince” (this book is from like 1970 or something ok? its not me.) 

Which blows a huge hole in the “The trickster kids are a joke about the kids actually being white”, because the kids’ original races have absolutely nothing to do with their caucasian color pallette.
That’s all an AURYN thing. In other words, as I’ve said before, trickster mode was perfect and Homestuck is good actually. 

There’s my thoughts.