#about indigenuity

[archtroop]

Incredibly powerful.

[atopvisenyashill]

siri what is class privilege

[they-call-me-hippie]

Sometimes native North-Americans get mad at non-native Latin Americans for hating the US' imperalism and I don't understand why

[mrsjadecurtiss]

Not fond of the many theories i see about jon taking mance' cloak and becoming king beyond the wall, like that's pretty much the plot of avatar (2009)... Not the direction i want asoiaf to pivot to. One of the best things about the wildling plot in acok/asos is the very fact that it doesnt fall into the typical pitfalls of "man from the oppressor class joins indigenuous culture" type stories, like jon stays in a side role, doesn't overtake leadership, doesn't become the main special boy that everyone else bows to, learns from them but then leaves to use what he learned to influence the politics of his own people instead of staying and "doing it better than them" because of his unique oppressor class skills

[hero-israel]

It’s honestly kinda funny when leftists inadvertently hold up race science, blood quantum and imperialism when it comes to their antisemitism and antiZionism (even though they’re often the same, I’ll still separate them here).

For example, everyone (including myself) agrees that despite most Native Americans being racially mixed today due to genocide, assimilation and r-pe, that they are still Native and Indigenous and upholding blood quantum is nothing but a tool of white supremacy, cultural genocide and racism. Unless it’s used against the Jews in order to delegitimize their claim to being descendants of the Israelites who were forced into exile from their homeland.

Everyone agrees that indigenous people have a right to return to their land and take it back from the settler-imperialists no matter how long they’ve been replaced, and most even agree that doing it violently is perfectly acceptable. Unless it’s the Jews, then #LandBack is not for them and if the State of Israel ever does anything wrong (no matter how many citizens of Israel are unsupportive or against it) then it will be used to further delegitimize their claim to be indigenous. And also, they were exiled thousands of years ago and should just get over it because they have new ‘homelands’ now, despite the fact that they’ve never, ever been accepted in them or welcomed.

Everyone agrees that history, linguistics, archaeology and genetics are important tools for indigenous and colonized peoples to use to assert their indigenuity and take back their culture. Unless it’s the Jews, then any historic link they find proving to be the descendants of Israelites is just Zionist propaganda. And Arabs never imperialized the land and forcibly assimilated, converted and intermarried various ethnic groups living there into one large Arab identity, despite the historic, linguistic, archaeological and genetic evidence of modern Palestinians proving so.

These are just some examples off the top of my head. They know that, by they’re own logic, Israel is a very great example of a Land Back/Indigenous rights movement in action, but their stubbornness refuses to let themselves see it. This is why I stopped arguing with these people. Especially when most of them have no problem with defending Arab imperialism and don’t see how hypocritical that is (esp when they go on to speak out against Western imperialism). Like these are people who would defend Hitler if he was Brown and Muslim, that’s all they care about. And the fact that Jews are ‘White’ to them makes us an east target.

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[tybaltsjuliet]

Do you think there are any Disney movies that *are* meaningfully feminist?

eh. kinda? inasmuch as The Brand can do so, mulan is holding down the fort. the whole takeaway is that failing to live up to your society’s prescribed gender roles does not make you a failure of a person. mulan is not forced to contort herself to become perfectly traditionally feminine for a happy ending, but she also does not have to become perfectly traditionally masculine to save the day. she is a loving child and a skilled fighter and a smart person and all of those things co-exist with no regard for gender or sex.

it pokes fun at the restrictive, superficial nature of both performative femininity and performative masculinity, and it’s also pretty direct about the ways in which patriarchy hurts everyone, with the whole thing about mulan’s disabled veteran father being drafted AGAIN because that is considered to be a man’s duty.

also, shan yu is an ally among action movie villains for not making any weird patronizing comments on the fact that he’s about to get his shit wrecked by a woman. thanks, shan yu!

there are a few other disney movies that, at least, gesture to feminist concerns. nani’s plot in lilo & stitch has a lot to say about the struggles that single mothers/mother figures go through, and i’ve seen comments from indigenuous people appreciating that it tries to address the reality of native families so often being broken up by the system. beauty and the beast does okay, especially with regard to the framing of gaston and the ways his villainy manifests over the course of the movie.

there are a LOT of disney movies that i think COULD have actually been great, meaningfully feminist pieces of media, but if i start thinking too hard about the lost potential in brave or the princess and the frog, i will start screaming and i will not stop.

[littlespacestarbun]

Hello!! I was scrollin through a tf tag and saw ur post bout, indigenous coded aliens and how the fandom treats them.

I understand what coded means and I think I know what ur talking about? but if ur up to it could u elaborate on the “feral tfp op” bit cause I haven’t been in the fandom too long so can’t find what ur talking bout and I genuinely don’t understand but I would like to. if u don’t wanna answer this, it’s chill obviously.

:3 have a good day m8!

Hello! i do not mind elaborating at all!, as an native fan its a topic i don't get to speak on much so thank you!, (sorry in advance this is going to be a bit long),

to start with coding bipoc as aliens, robots, and other non-human creatures is a complex issue of itself, and it can harm bipoc people as well as to uplift us depending on the writers intentions, background details and of era of times of equal right movements,

the topics of coding bipoc as not human vary from person to person on our own lived experiences as bipoc, and i personally have many issues with coding bipoc as not human which are solely negative, the few positve were expections due to bipoc making them or simply them having some sort of positive effect on me instead of bad,

back onto the feral optimus issue, here's my point of view as a native fan,

optimus has personally been this one sort of "oh he's like us" coded indigenous character who's in a good light for me,

unlike every other coded indigenous alien in media i saw as a kid,

optimus prime is one of the few indigenous coded characters in tf as a whole, the others aren't very good due to many factors (thunderclash, wheelie, the combiner team victorion) or vague enough white fans ignore them even being coded at all or other things (omega, beachcomber, ironhide)

for me optimus was the first indigenous coded not human native person i saw painted as a hero,

he was seen as good for having his indigenous culture, beliefs and morals, it wasn't something which was used as making him evil and bad in the story, like a lot of indigenus 'rep' i had to see as a kid

that feeling is something hard to explain but i hold onto with tight hands because of how good it did me as a kid,

its why i have such deep emotional pain with how he's treated by white fans in all stories but tfp was some of the worst of it i had to see by far,

tfp optimus is full on indigenous its in your face with each moment,

to his back story, internal struggles and complex views of him from other characters (with himself and jazz being the only ones with unbias views due to being bipoc themselves),

his very writing feels like the story of a native person who made it out of force assilation and regain his cluture only to be forced into fighting for his rights again against someone who was orignally an ally, trying to assilate him into another opressive ideal,

with this in mind it makes how the jokes of tfp optimus being feral started worst,

alpha trion saying he was diffcult, he didn't fall into order right for his time not around Iacon culture, this is painted as a bad view to have by optimus,

yet the fans took this to mean because optimus lived a tribal life before that he was wild, he ran on all fours, sleep like an animal and needed to be saved from such a wild life to name some of the worst (others include nsfw and its gross),

there's a ton of aus and fanart, fics treating being indigenous to mean, he needs to be fixed, or ones painting being indigenous struggles as not real or small world issues,

these views are deeply intergrated anti-indigenous beliefs, if you look up the wild/savage native man trope and you'll see many racist movies, novels and comics painting native men as beasts who steal white women from white men, or even kill them and r-pd them because indigenous people are as savage animals,

which fall in line with how feral optimus is made with white fans, they treat his indigenous coding as fetish and use him not being human to disconnect the racism in their fanon, aus, fanart and fics,

but that disconnect only exists for them, fans of color see it clear as it is, feral optimus as a fan idea exists because of people being racist to bipoc, the concept is racist rooted in racism and race fetish spaces,

feral optimus prime stuff as fan content has been dying since we've called out on it more but its shows up from time to time and the fandom still suffers from treating bipoc coded characters badly, as a whole which i'd to touch on at some point because people don't see the issue much, and the people we kind of keep to ourselves to keep a sense mind while playing robots ha….ha,

I hope this at least gives some light onto the issue and answers your questions! not many bring it up so being able to explain it was an experience!

thank you for taking the time to ask and i hope you have a lovely day! hopefully this wasn't too wordy and made sense,

[sohannabarberaesque]

During a journey of Peter Potamus to somewhere in Polynesia Uncharted via his Magic Balloon

PETER POTAMUS, rather casually: Uh, So-So ... has it ever been mentioned to you just why it is that primitive cultures and societies are as open and direct about sex matters as they are?

SO-SO, maintaining his place at the balloon's helm: You mean to the point of fascination, Peter?

PETER POTAMUS: Obviously, So-So! And while it's understandable that sex is essential to survival of a community and its people, in many of the more indigenuous cultures and societies having yet to be trammelled underfoot by "Civilisation," and the racist ends it serves, sex is actually seen as a perfectly natural and normal experience!

SO-SO, rather excited like an overzealous schoolboy: You mean like the Trollkins down South, in a way?

PETER POTAMUS: Rather interesting analog there, So-So! And I wonder how you came up with it ... but at any rate, such primitive peoples don't really need pornography to realise their sexual interests and desires; it's basically in front of them! And besides, over in such parts of Polynesia like we're heading to, traditional folkways look upon sex as an enjoyable and magical experience!

SO-SO: Ohhhhh ... how magical can it actually get, Peter?

PETER POTAMUS: VERY magical indeed, So-So! And what better way of relaxation could such natives have than just being among themselves and letting the sheer magic of "those feelings" release itself unannoyed, undisturbed and leaving just a wonderful sensation in the end! And what could feel more relaxing in the face of such unexploited wonder, even when diving and surfing naked are other choice distractions feeling wonderful in their own way?

SO-SO: Ahhhh ... just to picture love at its purest and most naturally undisturbed ...

PETER POTAMUS: Such a sense of wondrous curiosity I happen to like in you, So-So ... which can make otherwise predictably dull journeys seem easier to handle until we splash down just outside the Three Mile Zone and I make my way with my natural hippo-type romantic charm in pure, untrammelled Polynesian nature!

[Which can only end in rather serendipitious laughter]

*************

@warnerbrosentertainment @nighttimehound @xdiver71 @thebigdingle @joey-gatorman @themineralyoucrave @archive-archives @screamingtoosoftly @princessgalaxy505 @thylordshipofbutts @theweekenddigest @restroom @jellystone-enjoyer @warnerbros-blog1

[bellwitchfaggot]

not enough materially black+chronically fatalistically bloodlet to an extent of "looking" white discourse on tumblr. Lightskin vs darkskin standard colorism rhetoric loses sooo much credibility the moment u attempt to fully divorce urself of thought nazi virtue signaling but from my perspective and experience no matter the highly recorded antiblackness genocided bloodlet Haitians and black+southeast asian+middle eastern Caucasus indigenuous ppl have been experiencing for centuries and centuries and still experience worldwide in conjunction with a eugenecistic genocidal systemic ableism rhetoric, tooooooo many white and nonblack ppl will double down in a genocidal antiblack manner on the idea that a severely chronically ill black person who "looks white" due to bloodlet hate crimes MUST not experience antiblackness to the simultaneous detriment of darker skin black folk (even when academically its known about albinism that its chronic bloodlet due to imperalistic violence rather than a congenital genetic defect and the idea that albinism is due to a congenital genetic defect is disproven disinformation) that it's a unique antiblackness vs a lesser antiblackness. + many ppl in online discourse spaces just fully fail to cognisize thought nazism in the first place

in online spaces for bloodlet black ppl it frequently looks materially like: ^ -> a white bitch I will be facetiously online -> occasionally I will post abt my experiences w material antiblackness -> no matter what I will be accused of racism due to facetiously identifying myself online some of the time as a nonblack person -> the ppl accusing me of antiblackness online will almost always turn out to be far less black than me, blackfishing, and nazis irl -> actual black ppl online will frequently believe me about my experiences still* -> nonblack ppl will NEVER realize darker skin black ppl will p much always cognisize me as experiencing a shared antiblackness over being an equivalently nb person STILL-> I am once more being raped with knives irl w relaxer being poured on my hair standardly multiple times a day and am experiencing a chronic stroke flare up due to this and in part this relates to outing multiple blackfishing ppl online as blackfishes no matter what -> in online spaces I am once more "white"

[christellekedi]

Did Ancient Africans practice physical activity?

Africans are either Sport Champions or sick bodies lacking exercice...

Did Ancient Africans practice physical activity?

Yes, they did to the point of having rare health related issues Africans do experience in 2023.

Can you name (in your African language) a physical activity from your culture?

In South Cameroon, we have "Bikutsi" (hitting your foot against the soil) which used to be a set of movements mostly performed by females when going to harvest their fields. They used to sing during the commute and hit the soil with their feet while sharing personal stories to other women. The type of stories appropriate ladies would not talk about in public.

Nowadays, Bikutsi has become a musical genre celebrated by many female Cameroonian music icons. The essence of it can still be perceived in the way they openly speak about sexuality and female behaviour however, the physical movements have evolved into a dancing practice. 

If Africa in 2023 is the subject of poor ageism and extensive health issues linked to metabolic diseases (illnesses born out of inadapted lifestyle choices); it has become a continental problem. Why are still celebrating those who keep promoting these catastrophic lifestyle options?

People who think it is better to congratulate an African rice producer instead of a fonio one tend to forget that statistics do not lie. We are meant to be eating cereals naturally grown into our lands! Similarly to wheat, rice has been culturally imported as an eating practice. Before the independences, Did Africans eat rice or wheat? No, since they were eating what they would produce themselves. Also, the majority was living in countrysides. Independences brought the urge to move into cities to "leave indigenuous habits and lives behind".

Did Africans have a high rate in diabetes and strokes? We did not. Did we have elders unable to grow older than 60? No we did not. Why? We had different lifestyles much more in tune with our environment and cultures. Having been colonised does not mean becoming a pale copy of the past oppressors. If we do then indeed we also have to cope with the misery attached to those external lifetsyle choices.

Can we afford Western hospitals to be built in Africa? No, we cannot.

The healthiest and safest alternative is to eat and live according to our original needs/ways to prevent health challenges.

To switch from the actual way of thinking Africa according to foreign views is a common effort which has to be sustained and monitored. I can help with my methods here www.femmenoiresensuelle.com

The choice is always ours!

[magg0t-king]

hii maggot i have a couples of ocs bats my eyes. they're a doom-metal band that was much more black in the beginning called gutted and i made them ages ago after being inspired by a real music project i had with some friends and metalocalypse. they're mostly russian (all russian, but two are mixed and one is romanian-russian) with the frontman (vocals, bassist) being judas who is russian + south iranian indigenuous but judas is jus her stage name (1/)

AAHHHHH THANK YOU FOR SENDING THIS IN!!! SORRY I DIDN'T ANSWER THIS SOONER :'((((!!! (p.s u don't have to apologize for sending a lot, I love when people do that :) not sarcasm btw. I just really love hearing about peoples ocs)

But I love Jude! She sounds so damn rad like- idk how to express how much I love her :)

And I love how Gutted is an underground type of band. It adds zazz and flavor to the mtlverse(anything is zazzy to the mtlverse).

Also thank you for complimenting my boy flak :D

I feel like if he met Gutted, he'd be like 'Don't worry Flak, just remember that you love your job' because while he's friendly, he definitely can't handle another metal band being around him(thus what happened to his face), but at the same time he's probably desperate for friends lol.

Thank you for sending these bad boys in!! :D

(if you have any pics of ur oc(s), I'd love to draw them <3 (+draw them palling around with flak))

[thorraborinn]

Hello, person asking about Norse indigenuity. I was asking because I was at my local pagan store & overheard these two dudes going back in forth about Norse mythology and one of the dudes was saying that “the Norse” weren’t indigenous to Scandinavia as a basis to write off Norse heathenry & mythology completely in favor of I think he said Saxon heathenry and I just found it interesting & I didn’t even know where to begin researching such a claim. In no shape or form was I trying to make some white supremacy “gotcha” argument.

Oh jeez. Thank you for the clarification and I'm sorry for the misunderstanding.

Whatever that person was saying, they have absolutely not the slightest shred of knowledge of what they're talking about. That claim sounds like a random assemblage of words like he was reading a Madlibs or something. They were clearly starting from a bad set of premises that makes it difficult to figure out what he was even trying to communicate. So I can definitely see how this would be confusing and need clarification.

Some people like to reject using Norse sources (selectively, because every single person trying to work out a "branch" of heathenry is using mostly Norse sources) because there is enough evidence to show that there were changes and developments over time. But this isn't actually a demonstration that they had veered off from a more original state, it's just a product of having any evidence at all. If there were more than a few minor shreds of evidence for "Saxon heathenry" (or whatever other tribe or ethnic group this person was identifying with) this would be true of them as well.

"Indigeneity" really doesn't come into this in any way and if my original response could be forwarded to that person, it probably should be. The only possible and extremely generous interpretation would be to suggest that they meant that Icelanders in particular brought customs about relating to the land to a place where the geography was so different that those old customs didn't apply without significant adaptation.

[sebastianshaw]

@starbucks-redcups Here is the “Toad in Tabletop Games I Like” post you requested! Also tagging @toadlingscentral and @brotherhoodofm and @awkward-snake-girl because Toad... @acaprioglino, you still like Toad? Okay, so I said I would pick a vampire clan or a werewolf/other wereanimal breed, or a DnD race class...but for Toad I am doing ALL of them because I immediately knew which I think he’d be for each. For a vampire, he is absolutely a Nosferatu. In the “Vampire: The Masquerade” setting, each clan of vampires has a curse, a weakness. For the Brujah, they enter Frenzy (a state of uncontrollable bloodthirsty rage) twice as easily as other clans. For the Lasombra, they do not appear in mirrors or photography, a fitting punishment for their pride, and more of a problem than it used to be in this modern age of cameras everywhere. For the Toreador, their same of beauty that makes them artists can also hypnotize them, making them stand still staring enraptured at whatever has captured their aesthetic appreciation...a big problem if the sun comes up or someone is attacking them. And Nosferatu....the poor Nosferatu are all so hideously deformed that they cannot ever mingle with humans, they must remain hidden so as to preserve the Masquerade (the system that keeps humans from knowing vampires exist and walk among them)  No matter what a Nosferatu looked like before their Embrace (becoming a vampire) they become horrible in death, often unrecognizable as their former selves. Many look like Count Orlok in the movie that bears their clan name, but many others have a more “individual” appearence---all of them, however, are too hideous to ever pass as human, and even the other clans look at them with revulsion (especially the beauty-obsessed Toreador) So, like Toad, they’re outcasts for their appearance, both from humanity and often looked down on by other vampires, just like Toad is rejected both by humans and often by other mutants. Yet, just as Toad has been a valuable underling to Magneto, so too are the Nosferatu very valuable to other vampires. The fact that they have had to learn how to stay hidden has made them masters at going undetected (having the power of Obfuscate helps---it can make you invisible or ignored!) and have become spymasters and intel-gatherers without peer! When you need info, you go to the Nosferatu, and they always have it---for a price.  Toad isn’t really an information-peddler at all in canon, but he is very tech-savvy, and that’s where I think he works as a Nos. In the digital age, Nosferatu have kept up very well with using computers and the internet, and some have become truly extraordinary hackers. Toad’s more of a machinery/inventor guy, but I could see Nos!Toad taking the Internet spymaster route instead. I could also see him using his inventing talents to make modern solutions to vampire problems---helping preserve the Masquerade, dealing with hunters, etc---and earning his value to other vampires that way. Nosferatus also have the power of Animalism, letting them control critters. A lot of them seem to prefer rats, but Toad can sometimes control or communicate with amphibians in canon depending who is writing, so I imagine Nos!Toad has a bunch of little frog and toad buddies that act as his eyes, ears, and living security systems.  Finally, Nosferatu are super strong, posessing the power of Potence, and while Toad’s never been a real brawler, his kicks can definitely kill a man! Toad’s werewolf tribe would be a Bone Gnawer. Bone Gnawers are the “mutts” of werewolf society, the outcasts, the poor, the downtrodden, the ill-bred. Their human forms are often homeless bums or filthy runaways, their wolf forms look more like scrawny junkyard dogs, and other tribes look down on them, especially the aristocratic Silver Fangs. They get no respect and have to earn every scrap they get, but they’re innovative and clever since they have to rely on what little they have, and they’re tough as nails despite not being as big and strong as the other tribes. They’re tragic figures, but also smart, scrappy underdogs, just like Toad.  Toad would also be a metis. See, a peculiarity of the wereanimals in “Werewolf: The Apocalpyse” is that they can’t mate with each other, they must mate with humans or animals in order to reproduce. If two werewolves mate, their offpsring will be sterile and deformed, and this is called a metis. As a note, the term “metis” is also unfortunately the name of a real-world Indigenuous Canadian ethnic group, and while I hope there is no connection (the werewolves use a lot of their own unique language that was invented for the game---crinos, ahroun, theurge, etc.---) this game company (White Wolf) has done shitty racist things before, so like...it’s a possibility. But like, regardless of what the NAME for such a creature is, that’s what Toad would be.  Anyway, MOST werewolf tribes shun the metis, and it’s against their laws for Garou (werewolves) to mate with each other for the exact reason that it produces metis. A metis has to earn their place normally, and a lot of them spend their whole lives trying to do that. But the Bone Gnawers are different. They not only embrace their own metis, but they will adopt the metis from other tribes as their own, not blaming them for the sins of their parents or being what they are. But other tribes will still be nasty towards them. So, Toad has a place among his own people, but will still face persecution from others, which I think fits. Many metis and Bone Gnawers both often become angry and bitter because they’re fighting for the same righteous cause as other Garou (just as the Brotherhood wants to protect mutantkind, the werewolves want to protect Gaia) but get treated like dogshit, which I think also fits Toad. They keep fighting the good fight, but they’re often snarky and distrustful of others because they always expect to get kicked once they’re not useful. For a werebeast, I think he’d be a Ratkin. The Ratkin are wererats, and they’re my FAVES. Not just because I love rats, but because they’re honestly SO MUCH FUN. It’s kind of hard for me to describe if you’re not familiar with the setting, but in a world where a lot of the other creatures are all very formal and serious, the Ratkin are like...honestly, I could read their entire breedbook with Toad’s voice from the X-Men Evo cartoon and it would sound PERFECT; one of the rats in it talks about how a Stargazer tribe werewolf tried to impress him with a haiku about cherry blossosm, so the Ratkin recited half a limerick then hit the wolf on the nose with a stick and ran away. I love it, I love them.  Like the Bone Gnawers (the only werewolf tribe they get along with) they’re scrappers and survivors who live on the fringes of society, using their brains to fight for a good cause even if they’re not as big and tough as others, and even if those others don’t appreciate them.  There are different “Aspects” of Ratkin, basically different castes, and Toad would ABSOLUTELY be an engineer. Engineers use their shocking intelligence to salvage and devise ingenious devices from rubble and garbage to fight against the Wyrm and its servants (the Wyrm is like...the big bad evil spirit that all the wereanimals are fighting to save Gaia from, basically) Metis are a thing with wererats too, but the rats treat them equal, unlike werewolves. I would still have Toad be one, though, to keep his odd appearance; his rat form would probably be hairless, poor guy, and he’d probably have an unpleasant smell. As a note, Ratkin HATE humans, but the Ratkin metis will often have sympathy for humans who are downtrodden and outcast by other humans (which can make their fellow rats sneer at them)  Finally, for DnD, his class would be either a Rogue or an Artificer. A Rogue is one of the original classic DnD classes, they’re sneaky cunning thief-types who live by their wits and rely on skills and stealth and cunning and trickery instead of brute force. They pick locks and pick pockets, and I think they’d be a great fit for X-men Evolution Toad specifically. They can be very acrobatic, and are great at avoiding danger, which also fits for Toad’s leaping abilities and how he can be cowardly ( speaking of that, the Ratkin, while ultimately willing to die for Gaia if they must, would definitely always prefer to live another day if they can, rather than die a noble death if they don’t have to) So you could totally go with Toad as a Rogue, someone who has been cast out by society and thus has become a thief and a scoundrel to survive. But the Artificer, a new class, works even better when you consider Toad’s mechanical genius. Artificers, like the Ratkin Engineers, merge science with the supernatural. They’re inventors extraordinaire who unlock the magic in everyday objects, and channel arcane power with tools and tinkering! For his race, either a Grung or a Kobold. The Grung are little frog-people. They’re agile, they’re amphibious, they jump really good, and their skin secretes a substance that is harmless to them but poisonous to other creatures. By using a small amount of this poison, they can mentally enslave other creatures, and depending on the writer (Toad’s powers fluctuate around a lot due to his unstable genetic structure, as I’m sure you know)  Toad can also secrete chemicals from his tongue and fingertips that allow him to influence, manipulate, and control the minds of others to a limited extent, so there’s that similarity. Different colored grungs have different castes/roles in their society, and I think Toad would be a green or blue.  Green grungs are the tribe's warriors, hunters, and laborers, and blue grungs work as artisans and in other domestic roles. Green because, even though he’s not the bravest, he is often used as a grunt or canon fodder in fights by the Brotherhood, and blue because “artisan” could also cover being an inventor. Kobolds are little lizard-people who often serve dragons as the dragon’s minions (and Toad is usually in the minion role) and are noted for their skill at building traps and preparing ambushes, which I think Toad’s engineering skills would make him good at, plus I think he’d far prefer trapping an enemy than having to fight them. Like Toad, Kobolds are often dismissed as cowardly, foolish, and weak by others, but actually they’re clever and can be quite aggressive, as is the case with Toad too.  I hope you enjoyed this and that at least some of it was accurate/fitting!

[mrsjadecurtiss]

havent watched the sequel yet but what made the first av4tar kinda flop to me where titanic is great, is that in titanic james cameron’s self insert that starts with ja- is keeping it kinda humble, like hes rose’s manic pixie dream boy that helps her development and hes just a poor boy that got onto the ship by chance, and even his special awesome talent of being a dope artist is really sensitive and romantic and contrasts with her fiancee whos trying to be romantic but in the end defaults to violence and anger when things dont go his way... and jack’s just one of many passengers and in the end “exists now only in her memory”, he was important to her but not the superhero of the story

meanwhile jake from avtaar starts off promising as like this disabled guy whos disillusioned with the government/military, but then he immediately gets this super overpowered av4tar body and while he’s “learning the way of their people” most of it in the end just amounts to leaning cool ways to be an even better fighter and motivating the indigenuous people how to fight even gooder and being a special boy who does important things, and his love interest doesn’t really get the conflict and introspection rose does in titanic either (depsite having some promising setup)

Idk i just really liked titanic not choosing a traditional masculine hero protagonist and instead favouring jack’s gentleness and calm and selflessness and the lovers nurturing each other (“he saved me... in every way that a person can be saved”) over the contrasted violence and machismo and controllingness of the antagonistic characters; and obv av4tar presents some sort of colonialist narrative so it’s clear the indigenuous tribe has to fight back and be justified in it, but why does jake as an outsider have to be the central warrior figure of this? would have much preferred him taking up a supporting, nurturing, gentle role, sharing his insider knowledge and being helpful, supporting neyt1ri emotionally (with her having a strong inner conflict, also why does she have to be a special princess instead of just a normal woman)... and all while staying disabled cause that should not prevent him from mattering to this story. Being the coolest warrior is not the only thing that counts to save the world and you dont have to be the center of attention for you actions to have an important effect

It all goes hand in hand with the “white savior” problem, it’s not magically solved by just making everyone blue (or even white for that matter), it just always feels alien and patronizing to have an outsider enter a different culture and learning their ways in 2 weeks and suddenly being the expert who’s the solution to every problem and marries the clan princess and in the end replaces their leader, instead of just knowing his place and being helpful from the sidelines... I feel such stories often say a lot about the ego of the person who’s writing them, not satisfied with just being one of many who help but wanting to be special

[thisiswhatwereupagainst]

We come from the land of the ice and snow From the midnight sun where the hot springs flow This is Snowbird aka Narya aka Anne MacKenzie, a founding member of Marvel’s Alpha Flight and one of my faves. Here’s a post all about her!

Snowbird is the daughter of a moral man, Richard Easton, and the Inua goddess Nelvanna. The Inua are the gods of the Canadian north in Marvel canon. While their name is clearly from the term “Inuit” they are not a pantheon (originally a trinity but then expanded) from any real-world culture, but they are drawn in such a way to suggest they are meant to reflect Indigenuous Canadian peoples, and when they are expanded from a trinity to a true pantheon, real-world Inuit deities like Kadlu and Sedna are added to their number. This raises some problematic issues all around, but it is what it is, so moving on--- Nelvanna is the only female member of the original trinity as they appear, and thus was tasked with conceiving a half-human child with Richard Easton when he stumbled into their realm after finding an ancient artifact at a Canadian archeological dig near the Arctic Circle, since Richard was a man. The reason they needed a half-human child was to combat The Great Beasts, immensely powerful entities. They had been trapped thousands of years ago in a prison realm by the Inua, but in modern times the magicks holding them began to weaken. Knowing the Great Beasts would break free soon, the Inua wished to produce a champion, a demi-goddess child born of both man and god, belonging to both worlds, who could fight them on this plane. Nelvanna successfully conceived a child with Richard, but he was driven mad by the experience of consort with the divine, and he lived out the rest of his life as a hermit until he attempted a ritual to summon one of the Great Beasts. This succeeded, but his life force was consumed in the process, and his remains settled on the bottom of the salt lake where the Great Beast called Tundra once stood. Richard’s spirit would live on as an evil entity, which Snowbird eventually faced and put to peaceful rest at last. But back to Snowbird---obviously, the baby that Nelvanna conceived was Narya, who became Snowbird. As Nelvanna was about to give birth, she summoned Native Canadian shaman Dr. Michael Twoyoungmen to a place of power to assist her. The being she gave birth to was unstable, a transmorph, lacking real form, and Michael knew that he had to mystically bind it to Earth or else it would have never been able to possess a human form. He did so, and the baby at last assumed a human form, that of a little blonde girl with alien features who was already a year old. Having been bound to the land of Canada itself at her birth gave Snowbird her greatest weakness----she could not leave the boundaries of Canada without weakening and, if she did not return soon enough, death. Michael raised Narya alone in a cabin in Banff National Park, where she began to learn the customs of Earth and how to use her fantastic powers---specifically, she could shapeshift into a snow-white version of any animal native to the Canadian Arctic lands. She notably preferred to eat what she hunted in her animal form, not joining Michael or his guests, the Hudsons, at dinner. But she had stranger qualities still---at only three or four chronological years, she already looked like a young woman, albeit a strange elfen one. After Michael explained to the Hudsons that Narya was not only a metamorph but a demigoddess, James Hudson invited them both to join Alpha Flight. They agreed, and were given the codenames Shaman and Snowbird. While her primary goal was always to battle the Great Beasts as she had been born for, Snowbird also dutifully served the interests of Department H and the Canadian government, and to this end took on a human identity, that of Corporal Anne MacKenzie. She used her shapeshifting power to adopt a more fully human appearance, and worked at an RCMP post somewhere in the North West Territories of Canada. However, she had the ability to sense whenever one of her enemies, the Great Beasts, awakened, and would leave whatever she was doing immediately to do battle with these monsters. This ended up costing her her job, though she likely cared little. Snowbird had a cold, distant, aloof persona, almost alien, and at one of her teammates expressed that she gave him “the heebie jeebies” to which her foster father Michael said he was not alone in, suggesting that others were regularly unnerved by her. Indeed, Narya was very much as inhuman mentally as she was physically. Alpha Flight (1983) #3 describes her as such: "Her innermost memories dwell beyond human comprehension, and she remembers the oldest snows." She seems to innately know all her own powers, even those she never used before---such as the ability to compel others to aid her against the Great Beasts should she wish--and to know that her destiny is to fight The Great Beasts, which she will automatically do despite any fear she might have. While it is possible Michael taught her the latter, it is just as likely that she simply was born knowing it. Other powers she displayed were: - Flight - Resistance to extreme cold - She's able to sense magical energies, disturbances to the land she's tied to, and the proximity of her teammates - If her teammates invoke the Great Spirit, she senses that and will come to their aid. - Post-cognitive vision, being able to see what happened in the past in a place. For instance, she looked at a plane crash and was able to basically play it back before her eyes as she looks at the wreckage in order for her to figure out what caused it. It seems there's a limit though, as in another issue she can't do it because whatever happened was 12 hours or more ago, which she can tell by tracks, showing she has tracking skills, likely from her wildnerness upbringing by Shaman and animal-like abilities - As mentioned, she can magically/psychically compel others to help her fight the Great Beasts against their wills While Snowbird originally hoped that once she vanquished all the Great Beasts, her time on Earth would be done and she could ascend to the paradise where the other Inua dwelled, her path changed when Doug Thompson, a colleague from when she had been Anne McKenzie, professed his love for her. Though she originally denied him, she eventually revealed her real self, Snowbird, to hi. She tried to tell him that she could not return his affections, but Doug simply grabbed and kissed her – the first kiss Narya ever received. Taken by surprise and filled with human emotions she had suppressed to this point, Snowbird could no longer deny that she was attracted to Doug too, however, she wanted him to fully know what he would get involved in and showed him her so True Fires, her godly form, a strange and terrifying sight to behold. Yet Doug loved her still, and so once all the Great Beasts were slain, she returned to him and wed him, asking him to teach her to be human. But in doing so, she bound herself to a mortal man, and thus the Inua, whom she had longed to join, cast her out for this sin. Eventually she became pregnant, and just as she had grown up rapidly, so too did her pregnancy rapidly advance. The birth was dramatic, with Snowbird rapidly shifting out of control, displaying her True Fires in her agony. The Inua appeared and offered Snowbird one last chance to join them in Paradise; ridding herself of the stench of mortality. They warned her that after the child was born they would have nothing to do with her. Afraid and suffering unbearable pain, Narya almost agreed – except that she was afraid of losing the people she loved and who loved her back. Snowbird told her mother that she couldn’t leave what she had found on Earth and with that, the Gods left. Narya still needed to reach sacred ground before she could give birth, just as she too had been born in a sacred place. Due to her own resentment of her father, Talisman aka Elizabeth Twoyoungmen, Michael’s daughter, tricked her. Dr. Strange had brought her to a place of power, yes, but it was a place of power because there was an ancient sorcerer buried beneath the frozen wasteland. Strange did not know this, but Talisman did---and said nothing. Soon the birth was set in motion, and almost instantly, Pestilence, spirit of  the ancient sorcerer, possessed and corrupted the child. Talisman knew this would happen; her plan was to watch her father try and fail to save the day, and then step in to do so herself. Yet she found herself unable to best Pestilence either, and he beat Alpha Flight, including his own “mother”, and fled, taking his new body, that of Narya’s unnamed son, with him. As horrible as this was, Nary considered this might be a blessing in disguise. She thought that perhaps if she abandoned her child and husband, then the Inua might reconsider rejecting her, and welcome her back into their fold. Understandably, her husband was upset by this, and angrily stormed off, vowing to find their son himself. He said he now realized that not being human, he could not expect Snowbird to know what motherly love meant. And yet, it turned out, she did---though it saved neither her nor her son. While the rest of Alpha Flight were busy with another mission, Shaman and Snowbird located Pestilence in the mining town of Burial Butte. Once they got there, the pair learned that Douglas, Snowbird’s husband, had gotten there before, and had been infected with a fatal disease by Pestilence. Pestilence had realized that the baby’s pure spirit was slowly overcoming his influence. Only by it being killed could Pestilence could roam free and possess someone else again. To this end, he controlled Snowbird, and forced her to kill him, releasing his spirit, while the body of the child, her child, perished at the claws of its own mother. Snowbird died too, shot down by Heather Hudson in a too-late attempt to stop her from killing her “son” and releasing the sorcerer. Pestilence escaped, but mother, father, and child were all dead. Alpha Flight laid the family to rest in beautiful glass coffins, and, at their funeral, the Inua appeared, offering the dead Snowbird one last chance to join them in their Paradise. Snowbird’s soul, however, demanded that her husband and child must be allowed to come with her as well, or she would not come at all. Though no mortal had ever been allowed in the Inua Paradise before, her divine family made an exception for the first time, and allowed her mortal one, and all their souls went to dwell there in happiness together for eternity. As with many Marvel characters, death was not the end for Snowbird. Pestilence possessed her soulless body briefly, before being forced out by Shaman, at which point the soul of Walter Langkowski aka Sasquatch, another deceased member of Alpha Flight, took it over. No longer housing a divine spirit, Snowbird’s body became that of a human-looking woman---but still a woman, with Walter’s soul inside. So for about two years, Walter went by Wanda. Yeah, he was walking about in the dead body of his teammate, don’t think about it too hard. Perhaps also due to her divine nature now being absent from her body, “Wanda” Langowski did not get any of Snowbird’s powers with her body, but instead retained his--er, her?--own, that of shifting into a Sasquatch, albeit a white one now. Wanda became Walter again eventually, and years later, Snowbird was discovered alive in an A.I.M. laboratory. Alpha Flight and Wolverine freed her and took her along to Department H, where excessive tests revealed her to be indeed really Snowbird. What A.I. M was doing with her and how she came back to life has yet to be revealed. The canon explanation is that she has regenerative powers that went to work while she was buried, but this doesn’t track at all because, again, her body didn’t stay buried, Walter was running around in it. Apparently the writers just...forgot this, and for extra irony had WALTER of all people be the person who came up with this explanation. Seriously. I just go with the idea the Inua brought her back for God Reasons and she doesn’t know why yet and then A.I.M. got ahold of her before she could rejoin her team. She also lacks being bound to the Canadian lands anymore, and I miss that limit, I thought it was cool. I like a lot of things about Snowbird. Firstly, I think the fact she can turn into animals, that’s really cool, and the limits of them always being Canadian helps temper it, and I think them always being white is a neat touch. I like that she’s WEIRD and INHUMAN and unnerves people, I like that her design is meant to be CREEPY INSTEAD OF PRETTY and I like that she actually FALTERED in being a good mother in a really HORRIBLE way that women (at least heroic/good women) don’t usually get written as even considering without becoming villains for it, I like that when she does show humanity it’s not just compassion or maternal love, it’s also BEING A DICK LIKE HUMANS CAN BE . She’s a pretty cool character and I’d like to RP as her one day. I also have some thoughts about why I think she, as a character who is literally meant as the embodiment of Canada itself, should be rewritten/re-designed as a Native Canadian woman, but those are for another post---this is just about who she is as it is. Which is a neat character with a pretty design! Fun fact: In the Ultimates universe, it’s Danielle Moonstar who is a member of Alpha Flight bearing the codename Snowbird. Instead of the powers of 616 Dani or Snowbird, she wields the ability to create and control blizzards, which she uses to overpower that universe’s Storm.

[thisdiscontentedwinter]

Thank you so much for answering! I love getting lots of information about the things I don’t know.

1. So percentage wise, Australia is more white-dominated than America, am I correct? That’s surprising :O By the way, I’m still having a hard time differentiating a British accent & an Australian accent haha! My general rule of thumb was if they use “mate” often, then they 90% must be Australian, but it turned out I was wrong because British people also use mate often.

2. Sorry! I didn’t check the Pakeha page, I mistakenly thought it was another name of an Australian Indigenous tribe. Ah so the Maori immigrated to Australian lands because their lands were hit by European diseases :/?

but the descendants of these people now make up the largest black non-indigenous population in Australia.

A question, I thought the term “black people” are for people who have African ancestries? Meanwhile, Pacific Islanders (like the Vanuatu people, New Caledonians, and the Solomon Islanders) don’t have African ancestries. Afaik aren’t they native Melanesians/Polynesians/Micronesians? (unless I’m wrong and they share the same ancestor?).

3. Is this venn diagram that I made myself correct?

(sorry for bad picture)

I have another question, and it’s not exactly about Australia(ns), but I hope you don’t mind.

I think a few weeks ago (or months ago), you have touched the topic about ethnicity and nationality (but afaik, it never went deep). Reading the Australians wiki page got me thinking.

Correct me if I’m wrong:

Ethnicity: biology, can’t be changed.

Nationality: politics, can be changed.

1. So let’s say someone is British, it can mean that he is ethnically British, or by nationality, he is British. The first one means, he can be a German citizen with British ethnicity. And the second one means, he can be a Chinese born man, but changed his nationality into British when he’s an adult, which also means he’s British. Am I correct in this?

2. But if we take a look at the wiki page of Australians, on the Census subsection, (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australians#Census), you’ll see that a whooping of 35% of people claim that they are Australians. Now I might be mistaken, but isn’t the census reporting about ethnicity, not nationality (like duh, if it’s about nationality, then 100% are Australians). Scroll a bit up, and census said that the Indigenuous population is only 2.5% percent. Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t the people who can call themselves ethnically Australians are only the Indigenuous Australians? From the explanation / disclaimer (“A census in 2011 showed 60.2% of Australia’s population declared themselves as having European ancestry. In addition, many other respondents described themselves as simply "Australian”, which does not imply Indigenous descent.“), it seems Australians are counted as Europeans.

Am I going mad, or the census was wrong, to include people with European ancestry as Australians? I looked at the Canadians wiki page, and it’s similar. 32% claimed to be Canadians and I doubt 1/3 of Canada is made up of their indigenous people (and it was not; First nations people are only 4.4% of the population).

This really confuses me. What is ethnicity and what is nationality?

And after you corrected me about Pakeha, it even confused me more. Pakeha = white New Zealander. The census was taken by Australian nationality. If the Pakeha people are Australians, aren’t they no longer white New Zealander, but now white Australians? @.@

As someone from a homogenous nation, but diverse in tribes, it really confuses me. For us, nationality is Malaysian, Indonesian, British, Russian. While ethnicity is the "small” tribes, like Semang, Melayu, Serani, etc. Indonesia has Batak, Dayak, etc. Native Americans have Apache, Navajo, etc. Chinese have Han Chinese, Zhuang Chinese, Uyghur, etc. I don’t know about other European & African countries, but I’m pretty sure they also have “sub”/“small” tribes like us. It’s weird saying that our Ethnicity is Malaysian. When we fill our census, there’s no Malaysian box, but there are many sub ethnic boxes.

I wonder why are they listed simply as “British” meanwhile I’m pretty sure the people who descended from British ancestors have their own sub ethnic group. Like it was listed as simply Chinese, ignoring that they might be Han Chinese, or etc.

I’m sorry if the post got long & confusing! I hope I’m not bothering you!

DW: Once again, my answers are super generalisations! 

1. Yes, Australia has a higher percent of white population than the US. 

2. No, most NZ people (whether Maori or white) are generally here for economic or employment reasons. At least the ones I’ve talked to! Australia and NZ have a system where we can basically emigrate to each other’s countries with very little paperwork involved. We can even keep our own citizenship, and get welfare in the other country, or at least we could still do that a few years ago. So we have a very “Door’s open, come-on in” policy with NZ. 

Many Pacific Islanders are black. The South Sea Islander population in Australia is mostly from Melanesia. The name Melanesia means “black islands”. The Pacific Islands are also quite racially diverse too though. Someone who is indigenous to Vanuatu looks very different that someone who is indigenous to Tahiti, for example. 

3. Your Venn diagram looks pretty good to me. Of course, there are many people who identify with are descended from more than one indigenous group. 

Re nationality/ethnicity: 

1. I think I get what you’re saying and yes. Someone can be ethnically Chinese while their nationality is British. 

2. It’s been while since I took the Census, but you have to remember that everything on there is self-declared. The question you’re looking at was for people describing their ancestry, and it gives “Australian” as a seperate answer to “Australian Aboriginal”. And I think the reason for this might be twofold. Firstly, white Australian culture has been established for over two centuries now, and people might identify with that part of their ancestry more than with something like English, or Welsh, or whatever. And honestly, people whose families have been here for generations just might not know. Or they might have said “Well, shit, we’ve got Croatians and Italians and Greeks on this side, and the English and the Irish and the Scots on this side. And wasn’t my grandmother’s family Swedish? I’m just going to pick Australian.” I guess it also depends on how you define “ancestry”. Is it nationality or is it ethnicity? It is racial or cultural? 

And that’s probably the same reason that white people initially from NZ might identify as Pakeha rather than Australian--because that identity is still significant to them, whatever their citizenship status now is. 

It’s also worth nothing that the census takes a snapshot of everyone in Australia at the time--not just Australian citizens. This includes tourists, and foreign students, and people from other countries. You were here that night? You’re counted! So a lot of the Pakeha on the census form are probably still NZ citizens anyway, just visiting. 

I can’t tell you why the census chooses the questions it does, but I hope that clears up some of the confusion!