#Brown culture

[risutisumisu]

never will there ever be a moment where i refuse to consume pani puri.

[catpriciousmarjara]

Tell me: Is He Gay or In a Sherwani?

Imposition of western norms in fandom analysis of Asian characters

With the rising popularity of Indian cinema sparked by the recent success of RRR on international platforms as well as the easy availability of multiple streaming services, in addition to the appearance of South Asian characters in prominent roles in western, particularly US media, I've begun to see some concerning 'analysis' posts online. So I thought I'd address something I found common in most of these takes.

Guys, characterizing your blorbos as queer is great and all, love it, but you're making a fundamental mistake by making their clothing choices the foundation for your queer headcanons, especially when it comes to male characters. Do not apply existing western cultural ideas regarding male clothing onto South Asian characters and their dressing please.

The vast majority of the clothes being used by people in various online spaces as 'evidence' of a character being queer(gay or bi mostly) are just normal Indian clothing for men, like daily wear. A top being pink or a character's wardrobe being mostly pastel means absolutely nothing...cos Indian clothing tends to be colourful in general and the tendency to ascribe colours masculine and feminine qualities is considerably less in the subcontinent. I'm not saying it doesn't exist, but generally not a concern.

There's also this pervasive idea that colourful clothing = flamboyance = queer and that itself is something many people have already pointed as a deeply flawed way of thinking and a stereotype. Furthermore, even if you do lean into the archetype of queer men being flamboyant, subscribing to the 'stereotypes exist for a reason don't they?' school of thought perhaps, there's also the fact that ideas of what is considered flamboyant change dramatically across different cultures. What is 'flamboyant' for someone might just be normal for others. Like maybe pink or purple or yellow might be considered too much, unmanly, emasculating etc in the US or something but they're just perfectly normal colours for men to wear in many, many cultures.

It's the 'Is he Gay or European?' principle. Did you characterize this Indian character (or any South Asian character really) as queer because of their canonical behaviour and portrayal, or did you just see their clothing and decide they're queer because being well groomed and having a colourful wardrobe is a character trait you exclusively ascribe to being queer?

Like guys, I like Chaipunk like the rest of you, but if you consider Pavitr queer just because his costume is a lot fancier than the others' (An actual take I've seen multiple times) without taking into account his cultural background....¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Let me make this clear, I don't think people need a ten page analysis to imagine their fave as queer. Headcanoning a character as queer can have any reason ranging from 'I said so and so it is' to 'this is my light character analysis that makes a masters thesis look shabby' and they're all valid and an integral part of the fandom experience. What I am annoyed at are these so-called 'well-researched' theories that did not make the slightest effort to look into South Asian culture and simply transposed their western bias onto Indian media and confidently make flat out wrong judgements and mislead other people. Clothing based sexual identity determinism is the least of it. That I can at least understand through the lens of a habitual process built through years of analyzing crumbs of queer representation available only through queer coded characters and symbolism such as clothing choices being the only way to see an aspect of yourself portrayed in an aggressively heteronormative media ecosystem. I do that too, because media is tragically heteronormative everywhere. But the rest? Its just straight up misinformation and misrepresentation touted as truth.

Its the same with relationships between men. There are plenty of cultures where skinship between men is not unusual and dynamics and nuances tend to be vastly different from western representations of male friendships. In xianxia and wuxia fandoms you can see this same problem in a different font when outsiders, most often the western side of the fandom, try to apply their own standards and morals onto the original work and try to interpret it through a lens it was never supposed to be interpreted through in the first place, except maybe for comparative analysis. This practice itself isn't a major problem, its natural for people to apply what is familiar to them to try and understand something new. But when this is also accompanied by them foisting their personal interpretation and analysis as the 'correct' one and trying to impose it on the fandom as a whole, it escalates into a powder keg situation as you can imagine.

Again, not saying that western parts of fandoms are the root of all evil or anything like that, gods know how toxic netizens can be. But in this specific situation, where people try to impose western ideals on to non-western content and assumes the universalism of their own principles and value systems? Indeed an issue to be addressed.

[angelopium]

in the deep blue

[musiquesduciel]

Patting Zoya Akhtar's back for casting a dark-skinned actress to play the rich, desirable, popular mean girl in The Archies (2023) when a light skinned Khushi Kapoor was available to play that role but instead did not.

[takemetobogman]

yes babe you're urdu poetry mummy ki silk saree silver jhumka amrita pritam faqir chand book store nukkad ki chai dilli haat jagjit singh ki ghazal pragati maidan book fair lag ja gale ghalib ki haveli baalon me gulab ka phool gf

[ihateyouvishal]

"kha jaunga tujhe" is a top tier way to call anyone cute

[samwise1548]

Biryani recipe illustrated by someone who never cooks ✌️

------

[ID: A recipe illustration that shows steps in preparing Biryani, a South Asian rice dish. Steps are divided by a swirling wisp of grey steam.

In the first step, a brown skinned person wearing an orange sweater is chopping some onions.

In the second step, various ingredients are spilling from a large steel pot. This includes vegetables, herbs, and meat, that will make up a curry.

Step three, the person from before is lifting a wooden spoon of cooked rice from a pot of rice. The flame is still lit under this pot.

In the fourth step, the pot of rice and the pot of curry are partially cropped out, making way for a third pot. In it, the rice and curry are layered on top of each other using a spoon.

The final step shows the finished Biryani, held up by the person in a red dish. The food is glowing a golden hue. \End ID]

[secretandpurplememories]

The aesthetic I would die for 🥺🤌

[theartemisagirl]

How do I explain that I absolutely love my parents and they are far from being toxic but I can't remember the last time I felt appreciated or loved by them. I love that they give me so much freedom and liberty but hate that always makes me feel like I owe them for such treatment. They buy me anything I want but makes me feel worthless if I don't get good grades. I can't sit to just talk with them without having my grades dragged into it

[chaotic-gender-fluid]

I love dark academia stuff so much but like it needs more diversity.

Like excuse me brown is objectively the most dark academia colour so why not have more characters the colour of milky coffee or melted chocolate, dark toffee or black tea.

We all know that Greece was deeply whitewashed so why not discuss that more, talk about ancient Indian and African mythologies, use ancient philosophies to argue against modern systemic issues and respond to racist people on the internet with incredibly well written and properly thought out arguments. As well as a quick reminder that there is amazing Urdu and Persian poetry that needs more love (seriously go read Rumi, Hafez, Manto and Iqbal)

There is also proof that ancient Grecian regions were probably matriarchal and we NEED more women and gender-diverse people on dark academia. We also need some more incredibly intelligent, witty, badass and mysterious women and non-binary people to fall in love with anyway.

Okay that's the end of my rant for right now but I'm just saying that if you don't think protesting/hating on the system, ranting about politics, arguing about systemic discrimination and trying to take down the racist, sexist, homophobic and tranphobic people in the world is dark academia then you're wrong. Thank you for coming to my Ted talk *bows*

[risutisumisu]

i wanna be soft spoken so bad but i’m gujarati

[browngirlmiscellaneous]

therapy isn’t enough, i need to fight my dad’s side of the family

[dal-chawal]

jab relationship mein ana hi nahi tha toh, 'me and who' mein tag hi kyon kiya bc

[musiquesduciel]

Not Imran Khan being disgusted by this plot of a rom-com in I Hate Luv Storys (2010)

When that was literally him in his debut film. Down to singing a song. Like sir, this you?

You literally had the same name, even, in both these movies.

TLDR; In I Hate Luv Storys (2010), Imran Khan plays assistant director 'Jai' who comes to hate the plot of his own love story from his debut film where he, ironically, also plays a 'Jai' and people say Imran Khan does not have range?

[badasscutie]

soo fkn jealous w the kid’s parents who understands them, do not judge them all the fkn time, don’t read their personal diary and invalidate them and be actually v v friendly w them

[ihateyouvishal]

"she's a golddigger" bhai tujhe kharid legi woh itna paisa hai uske paas