#also me literally the moment someone asks: sldfjslkdfjsdlkfjdkdfj

[olivia-anderson-fanfic]

in reference to your "if you like tom taylor's writing you're white" post, could you possibly elaborate? i don't want this to sound rude so i'm a little nervous about sending but!! i like his writing, i am also white, and i would like to know any issues in his writing that i can look out for so i can enjoy it critically. i realize i'm not entitled to an answer, but if you feel like it then i would appreciate it greatly!

Of course darling.

Now, I was just going to talk about some dumb plotlines if this ever came up (like the telenovela shit and the fact that he uses cameos from beloved stories to make up for the fact that very little of his plotlines are original) but I didn't expect such a genuine answer and I have some free time... so I guess I'm doing doing a breakdown of all of the bullshit in his writing.

For the record: I'm not going to speak on how he handles disabled people. It's neither on topic nor my place. Several people have done this well here, here, and here if this interests you.

There are two main reasons why (tw for a bunch of stuff, don't read if you're sensitive):

How he treats race

I bring to the stand: "the romani smile incident".

Listen, I feel like this one was good-intentioned. Maybe. Probably. However, it's just so fucking weird from every angle I try and look at it from.

Telling someone they have a "(insert race here) smile" is already just... a very strange way to do representation. If you want to call back to/confirm his Romani heritage, which I would be all for, do it in a way that makes sense. Please. Literally anyone that thought about it for longer than half a second stopped and went "sorry, what the fuck".

I saw some people theorizing that he probably thought that, since there's such thing as a "white person smile", there had to be something like that for other races. And I hope that's the case.

It's funny... and also way better than the alternative.

Because there is a phrase like that for Romani people: "they had a (g-slur) smile". It generally means all of the things that are stereotyped about that culture. Mischievous, free-spirited, mysterious, etc. Changing it so the slur isn't used doesn't change the connotation and continues the perpetuation of stereotypes.

And then there's the entirety of this picture:

I don't even know where to start with this one, honestly.

Damian has been whitewashed to hell and back.

Duke isn't even there. He is considered part of the core batfam nowadays, so it's very strange that he hasn't been included. Especially since he's the only black character. Tom defended himself by saying that Duke hasn't appeared in a Nightwing comic in quite some time, but he has control over who is in the comics. He is the writer. And, since Cass is in the background of one of the pictures, the whole "there wasn't enough room!" doesn't really work.

And, speaking of that, Cass is in the background? The people of color are just not winning today. She's even in the background of Steph's picture, which makes it worse. Steph isn't even a part of the batfam, she can't be for the sake of Timsteph fans, she's just a family friend. Why did the family friend get to be in the front of the frame? Why is Cass, an Asian woman, considered a literal background character?

... anyways.

Then there's the zionism

This was 2013, so I genuinely would give the benefit of the doubt here... but Tom Taylor recently defended his past self by saying that "it's fiction, that doesn't mean I agree that he should have forced them to sign a peace treaty!", which means he still doesn't understand what is wrong with implying that the war in the middle east isn't a group of people trying to fight back against their oppressors.

2. Performative activism

The reason I have this second, despite feeling like it's the stronger argument, is because performative activism isn't strictly a White Person Thing... but, also, yes it is. So, let's get into his politics.

The treatment of homeless people: It's strange to see Dick Grayson suddenly "discover" homeless people in the most recent Nightwing comics, especially since he was homeless for a while in a previous run. I brushed past this, originally, though, because I figured he just wanted to address the recent talking point about how Bruce Wayne (and, by extension, his kids) should be using his money to help people in need rather than beat up the poor and I wanted to see what he did with it. I no longer let it go, because Tom Taylor has nothing to say. Homelessness bad. Yeah? You gonna address it at all, buddy? Some solutions? Some explanations for why homelessness exists? No? "Donate to the homeless" is all you're gonna say? Alright. Thank you for all your wisdom and new ideas, I guess.

The whole 'school gun violence' plotline with Jon was whack. It honestly deserves its own post, but I refuse to spend even more time thinking about it. Instead I'm just gonna sum up the villain's motivation and leave it there: the villain... wants school shootings to stop and therefore tries to draw attention to them... by shooting up a school.

Jon Kent... honestly, his whole thing at the moment is very white-savior-y, which is already annoying in itself, but that's not the real point here. His whole thing is saving the planet in the environmental sense, but Tom Taylor loves "good billionaires". He made Nightwing a billionaire. For some reason, I don't have much faith in his understanding of the global climate crisis.

Basically, if I see one more person call Tom Taylor a leftist I will scream. I am a leftist, he's an annoying liberal. We are not the same.

More seriously, the reason that I think performative activism is almost strictly White Person Thing, though, is because most people of color think more about what's going on and have more to say. Not because we want to know a lot about things like this, but because we have to. Systemic issues are our problems to deal with and white people's problem to sometimes talk about when they want some "good person points". And yet they never seem to do anything more than point at an issue and say it's an issue. It's a privileged position to be in.

And, we're done. If you want more information, try going through the 'anti tom taylor' tag. I'm lazy and don't have enough time to do any more before class. Byeeeee.