#racist fans will do anything to avoid actually engaging with a black character

[gaylittleguys]

it’s actually so fucked up and evil that random white npcs from bg3 that show up twice got more dedicated fans than Wyll

[arceespinkgun]

Jazz is much more interesting and multifaceted than people give him credit for. And it's super disappointing to see how the fandom interacts with him, especially as a black-coded character. The sheer amount of casual racism and fetishization is distressing, especially because it's mainly dispersed by his so-called "fans"

Jazz's interpersonal relationships are very fascinating and could be an important part of his character. However people seem to be unable to properly handle or understand that aspect of him; both official creators and fans. While I don't claim I know the character better than anyone else, I also don't think it's that hard NOT to write anti-black content and fetishize the character

An opinion I have which could almost be called controversial, is that I don't think Jazz and Prowl should get along at all. I would like them to be dysfunctional, I love them as worsties. I don't want them to have a bonding moment where they suddenly understand each other and work in tandem harmonically. I want them to retain that conflict of clashing ideologies and methods. I want them to agree to disagree, rather than meet each other halfway

I really feel this—at this point, I've seen most of the media Jazz appears in, and there's so much to his character that just doesn't seem to be engaged with at all. For example, how social is Jazz really? This is the guy who just stood in a field and let snow completely cover him in one episode of the Sunbow cartoon... and he often comes across as isolated from the people around him. How much of this is because he won't open up, and how much of it is because he is just a very independent person? Could he be a secret introvert? How deep are his friendships with others when many of them seem to amount to "the person Jazz hangs out with" and there are often fewer interactions between him and his friends than you'd think? These are just a few fascinating questions about the character that people rarely ask.

The rest of my response got really long so I'm putting it under a cut:

While I'm Asian and not Black (and I don't want to speak over the voices of Black fans) the racist, anti-Black tropes found in a lot of fandom writing about Jazz truly do seem like they could be so easily avoided. Basically every single one of them involves interpreting the character in the exact opposite way that multiple different series portray him! One example is how many people write him as being lazy/trying to get out of work constantly—no version of Jazz has EVER been portrayed this way in ANY series, so wouldn't it be so easy to just not?! I'm 90% certain that this is due to a mix of people's racist biases showing through in their fanwork, and also the uncritical replication of other people's racist fanwork without actually stopping to look at who this character really is (also largely caused by racist biases).

I'm not letting racist tropes in actual TF series off the hook, but I'd really wish that as transformative media the creations of fandom would be attempting to address and improve these issues instead of making them 10,000x worse by adding racist tropes that weren't even present in canon. For example, how is the Sunbow cartoon—the show so racist it had fucking Carbomya in it—one of the best portrayals of Jazz there is? I feel sad that the continuities most often discussed are some of the ones that serve the character the worst, actually. Like basically nobody's going to talk about how Jazz bravely fought Galvatron one-on-one in the Marvel comics or anything.

When it comes to Jazz and Prowl—I have very mixed feelings. I took no issue with them being longtime friends in some earlier media like the Marvel UK comics run or the Dreamwave comics, and I felt like it made a lot of sense with how they're characterized. But it doesn't seem like people examined or explored it. Instead, what's popular is layer upon layer of racist tropes (and other gross, strangely essentialist ones—why are fanfic writers so weird about characters from Praxus?) and in later canon media (with IDW2 being the worst in its messaging), Prowl has been so linked to police brutality and more issues than I can even go into here that it feels deeply inappropriate for these characters to be friends now. Because of these issues, I even feel uncomfortable having acknowledged that they were friends in any media, and while normally I'd analyze this dynamic in more detail or show excerpts that highlight it, I don't feel like I can because I can't trust people to not be gross in response.

I also remember the whiplash between IDW's Spotlight: Jazz (very underrated story by the way) in which Prowl is maybe the kindest anybody has ever been to Jazz, versus a couple years later, Prowl thinking it's a good idea to POINT A GUN TO JAZZ'S HEAD to get his attention. It's bad enough that the character the Autobot logo is depicting is horribly stained in this way—very disturbing—but I feel even worse knowing that something that was once nice for Jazz has been so ruined in both canon and fandom. I think this situation is beyond the scope of fans to tackle and that TF just needs to get its shit together regarding social issues. That being said, I feel like this makes it even more important that fans stop replicating racist tropes in their fanwork, since that's making the situation even worse.

TL;DR Jazz is great and if I see one more fic in which Prowl stops Jazz for speeding I'm going to explode

[youngbugandtonystank]

how would you rewrite spideychelle in ffh and/or hoco?

I’ll answer this one with this ask:

I was reading your answers and... why is zendaya not mary jane w?? when you said it i never really thought about this because i was more excited about infinity war and the avengers but now... its the last spiderman movie and we know nothing about her character? i thought she was supposed to be something new and big like z said? whats going on??? 

Well, first of all, I would give Zendaya the original title of Mary-Jane Watson, I still believe it was racist not to give her this position. From what I understand, there was a rumor going around (2016) that the reason they didn’t give her the MJ title is because Stan Lee had it contracted that they couldn't race swap Mary Jane or Peter Parker, so they changed her name to Michelle Jones and made a different character while treating her as their version of what is supposed to be a homage to the comic character. The thing is, Marvel fought Sony really hard to get Peter into the MCU (in their own terms), so why not offer the lead lady the same treatment? I’m pretty sure they would do it for Gwyneth or Elizabeth Olsen. Also, the rumor doesn’t make sense because Stan Lee himself said this about the situation: ‘If she is as good an actress as I hear she is, I think it’ll be absolutely wonderful’

Gwyneth Paltrow is Pepper Potts and her character is called Pepper Potts. Scarlett Johansson is Natasha Romanoff and she’s called Natasha or Black Widow. Natalie Portman is Jane Foster and the character is called Jane Foster. Why change Zendaya’s character? 

‘She's not Mary Jane Watson. She never was Mary Jane Watson. She was always this new high school character, Michelle, who we know there's an 'M' in Michelle and an 'M' in Mary.’ - Kevin Feige.

‘She’s not Mary Jane, she’s this weird girl.’ - Tom Holland. 

In every interview, I feel second-hand embarrassment for her when the interviewers ask about character development for Michelle and she has to make mental gymnastics to answer and every time the convo comes back to romance and Peter; how Peter makes her feel, how she behaves around Peter, how Peter’s life is, how her character revolves around him. Even if Zendaya wanted to play the ‘I’m not like the other girls’ quirky loner girl, she could’ve been Mary Jane with that personality too. And what I’m going to share next is just my opinion and nothing is confirmed (just making sure because some people lack common sense lmao) I believe they fooled Zendaya and told her she created this original revolutionary character for girls, where Zendaya in almost all interviews states that ‘it’s ok to be weird, to not be like the other people and it’s fine to be’ etc, etc. But the thing is, that individualism and character traits she’s putting into the character don’t really matter because her character was treated as a love interest only. She couldn’t explore that individual part of her character because she’s written as ‘Peter’s observant’ friend and that is not a trait. Look at what they actually made her believe:

"My character is not romantic," Zendaya replied when asked if she would romance Peter on-screen. "My character is, like, very dry. Awkward. Intellectual. And because she's so smart, she just feels like she doesn't need to talk to people."

"I was lucky because they already kind of wanted to re-create the character and turn her into a new version of what I think maybe the original Mary Jane character represented, and just do it in our own way in this Marvel Cinematic Universe." - Zendaya. (Well, the MCU also has their own version of Peter Parker and they don’t call him Perkin Park; a homage to Peter Parker lmaoooo)

She went there thinking she would have a badass intellectual female character only to end up being the love interest without background, development or storyline. Let’s for a moment compare her to one of the extra characters, like Betty (no offence lmao) or some other decathlon kid; what’s the real difference between her and them? An intellectual is a person who engages in critical thinking; Betty and the other kids are like that too given the kind of school they attend. Awkward? All kids are like that. Smart? lmaooo same as before, they’re in a school full of smart people. She knew Peter was Spider-Man and that makes her special? She said she wasn’t even 100% sure about it and was surprised when Peter confirmed LMAO Betty was suspecting this in FFH, some of his classmates knew something was going on with him to the point one of them thought he was a male escort. There’s no real difference except that she’s playing Peter’s girlfriend. 

And I happen to think all of this is because fans don’t care about that development or the fact that a black character could be a lead lady with an interesting plot (just like they did with Tessa Thompson in Thor, Natalie Portman, Gwyneth Paltrow, Scarlett Johansson, Elizabeth Olsen, etc). She’s been playing this character for 4 years and Michelle has 0 character development, no storyline, no background. How is that something they could use as a way to bring depth into the character? They can’t, because they didn’t actually care about the things Zendaya mentioned, they wanted her stardom and popularity to boost the movie. The fact that people started shipping her with Tom Holland helped to that reputation and promotion.

how would you rewrite spideychelle in ffh and/or hoco?

I would do exactly this: MCU’s what if’s + Michelle Jones is Nick Fury’s niece. Now, THIS is an interesting storyline, where a teenage girl is Fury’s niece, not exactly an agent but someone with a vast knowledge of espionage. This would explain why she was stalking Peter without taking away the fact that she might have a little crush on him and this line;

MJ: I don’t really have much luck when it comes to getting close to people. Um… so I lied. I wasn’t just watching you ‘cause I thought you were Spider-Man.

would’ve been more interesting with that plot in mind. This with the fact that Fury is probably training her to be an agent or to be the next director of SHIELD in the future, not only this allows her to form a much deeper connection with Peter (who is Spider-Man and struggles with a double life and responsibilities) but it would give her character depth, and a particular insight that the other spider-man girls didn’t have (this would attribute to the ‘not like the other girls’). This could’ve been done without removing the personality traits Zendaya wanted in Michelle.

Fury was involved in the second movie and this would allow their weird contract to keep someone from the avengers or related to them in the movies without having to make Happy or any others participate in them. If they wanted an original character they would’ve given her a better position in it but they didn’t, the real reason they changed her name is because dudebros and extreme comic fans couldn’t stand the thought of having a black girl as a female lead in a Spider-Man movie. They wouldn’t dare to ruin their perfect comic book MJ image, which, btw, Zendaya could’ve pulled off as well. 

As Kevin said;

‘And then I think it leaked that she would be playing MJ and then it became a whole headache for Zendaya to have to navigate. It was never a big, 'Oh my God, it's a big reveal!' There are big reveals in the movie. That's not one of them’ - Kevin.

Why should it be a headache for her? Why didn’t they fight for her character instead of avoiding the real problem? lmaoo this is clearly Marvel having fear of a big backlash that shouldn’t exist in the first place. Her skin color shouldn't be a big thing that she has to deal with or navigate through.

This could even allow her character to have a disney+ series to explore more about her and Fury’s family. I hope that No Way Home gives her character more screen time in terms of her independent development but as I’ve said before, I highly doubt this is possible if NWH is the last standalone spiderman movie in the MCU. 

You have Zendaya wishing to see a black Mary Jane; 

Zendaya would love to see a black Mary Jane, even if she doesn't play her. "People are going to react over anything, but of course there's going to be outrage over that because for some reason some people just aren't ready." 

You see this, along with Laura Harrier thinking that she was afraid Disney wouldn’t allow her to be in the same movie as Zendaya because she believed Disney would never handle two black girls in the same movie and still think there’s nothing wrong with the way they handled things? Only because of the typical opinion: ‘these are high school sweethearts, she’s only there to be a cute character and they already have too much diversity in the cast, it’s not that deep’ lmao 

Btw, read this, it’s worth reading: Michelle Jones: A Disrespect to Zendaya And The Mary Jane Character?

[backupblogforjg]

The racism, sexism, homophobia, ableism and cruel tropes in Voltron

So, it’s the anniversary of the ending of Voltron. And I’m getting really, really tired of people saying that only shippers hated the ending. There were many issues with Voltron, and they were neither limited to shipping nor to S8.

So, I’ve decided to compile a list.

It gets LONG. Turns out there was a hell of a lot of racist, sexist, ableist and cruel tropes in VLD.

In fact, I had originally planned on writing a list of both the terrible tropes and the plot holes. But there just wasn’t enough room for both. The post is huge as it is, and with the plot holes, it would have been twice as long, so I had to focus on only one thing.

Salt, obviously. So, so, so much salt. I could turn a lake into a sea here. You’ve been warned.

RACISM:

1) The Alteans are genocide survivors. Out of all the Alteans, only the black Altean was used for a Reverse Racism story where she resents a teammate for belonging to the race that exterminated hers. The white Alteans are totally cool with him, and with his race in general, and only hate the bad people. But the black one had to be taught that hating people because of their race is wrong.

2) VLD Allura is also the only version of Allura who is black. In every other Voltron media (several different cartoons and comics), Allura is blond with blue eyes. All the white versions of the character get a happy ending, while only the black version ends up dying to save the world.

While "hero sacrifices their life to save the world" is not a bad trope in and of itself, it becomes bad when it kills off one of the extremely few black female characters in leading roles. You kill off a white male hero, there are 463278462387 more. You kill off the black female hero, you are kinda screwed. Making it worse, Allura had been portrayed as suffering from depression throughout the latest seasons, so that her death comes across less as heroic sacrifice and more as suicide.

3) The brown Cuban kid who dreamed of being a pilot, and never once in 78 episodes ever expressed anything but sheer love for an exciting life, in the final two minutes of the final episode ends up realizing that the place for him is a farm.

4) As told in interviews, Lotor was meant to be a bad example of mixed-race person, to contrast him with Keith as good example of mixed race person. Do I even have to point out how messed up this is?

5) Even before they became Space Nazis, back when they were still on the side of the angels, the Galra invaded and conquered planets. This is portrayed as totally cool when they happily name the prince after a "hero" who invaded and conquered a lot of worlds, and the peaceful Alteans think the guy is just as heroic as one of their greatest scientists. Apparently there is such a thing as ethically killing people to steal their land.

6) They whitewashed Keith, a character who is poc in every other iteration of Voltron.

I’m sure a lot of people are going to get angry here, claiming that I hate Keith. Let me assure you, I don’t. I love Keith, and I hate what was done to him. I hate that they took a traditionally poc character and went to frankly ridiculous lengths to erase that part of his character. Keith should be Asian, and it would be incredibly easy to make him so in VLD (seriously, all they’d have to do is update the freaking bios, an intern could do it right now in 5 minutes). But they refuse to do it.

A lot of people don’t realise that the surname “Kogane” in VLD is fanon.

I’m serious. Check his official bios page. Keith is not actually called Keith Kogane in VLD. Fans started calling him that in fanfiction, and it stuck, but it’s not canon.

In every other Voltron media, Keith is an Asian guy. But in VLD, they:

- went out of their way to always avoid giving him an Asian surname

- gave him a Texan father

- refused to confirm his race, even when every other character had a specific race. Again, check his official bios. All the other characters got a race, Keith gets “human.” It got so ridiculous it would be funny if it weren’t sad. It pretty much went like this:

Fans: Keith is half alien, but about his human half, what is his ethnicity? EPs: oh, we couldn't possibly say, because the story takes place in the future, and in the future, everybody is mixed up! So, Keith is HUMAN, we can't give him a specific race because there are no specific races in the future! Fans: ok. And what are the races of the other characters? EPs: Pidge is Italian, Lance is Cuban, Hunk is half-black half- Samoan, Shiro is Japanese. Fans: but Keith...? EPs: HUMAN! There is no such thing as race in the future!

Some people at least hoped that Keith's Texan father had Asian ancestry because he kinda looked like Shiro, who is Japanese. But the EPs confirmed that the resemblance was just a coincidence, they never meant for the dad to look Japanese.

At this point pretty much the only evidence that Keith is Asian is that he is voiced by an Asian person. But then, Josh Keaton is not Japanese, is he?

7) After whitewashing Keith, they claimed he is the best leader of Voltron, better than his poc predecessor, because he has Galra blood.

So, instead of bringing up any sort of legit reason to justify why Keith should be in charge (like his empathy or pilot skills), they go with "the half-white guy is also half space-nazi and that's why he should give the orders instead of the poc guy."

If you think I’m bashing Keith here, please ask yourself why you are getting angry at the person pointing out the whitewashing instead of getting angry at the whitewashing. Especially when, again, making VLD Keith canonically poc could be done anytime with zero cost and zero effort, and DW just doesn’t want to.

- Hunk, the half-black half-Samoan guy, was going to be killed and replaced as Paladin by a blue alien. The EPs were pissed when DW forbade them to, and complained in the interview about it.

SEXISM:

Every single woman who is ever put in charge ends up going insane, making terrible decisions that endanger her planet, or losing all of her authority.

Allura starts out as co-leader of Voltron and leader of the Coalition. Ends up as a foot soldier who takes orders from the new leader and his right-hand man, and is treated as a cadet by the Earth military.

HOMOPHOBIA:

1) Dreamworks, Netflix and the EPs very, very, very heavily promoted S7 as GLBT-friendly. The EPs gave whole interviews about the past relationship between Shiro and new character Adam, retweeted a ton of posts celebrating Shiro’s homosexuality, and enthusiastically sent tweets like "you are going to see more of Adam in S7! :D" from their personal accounts after they showed the episode that introduced him.

In S7:

- Shiro's homosexuality is so ambiguous that even the Brazilian voice actor didn't realize that he was supposed to be gay. Just by watching the show, without knowing the World Of God, you can’t tell he and the other guy were engaged.

- Adam gets about 30 seconds of screentime after that one episode they had already shown. Then he dies screaming in pain and terror in a fire.

A lot of people claimed that it was okay to kill Adam because Shiro was supposed to be our rep, not Adam, who was a brand new character we knew little about. And, out of context, that would be true. Adam was pretty much a NPC, why would his death matter?

But the problem here is the context:

- Shiro is closeted in S7, you need to read interviews to know he is gay. So, if only Shiro is meant to be the rep, they couldn’t even do that right.

- They very heavily marketed both Shiro and Adam as gay rep, and specifically talked at length about Adam in several interviews.

In THAT context, REGARDLESS of what you ship, killing off Adam revealed a complete willingness to manipulate the audience to the point of outright lying. Even if you hated Adam, even if Adashi is your NOTP, the clear evidence that the creators had absolutely no problem making empty promises was NOT a good sign.

2) The moment Shiro is revealed to be gay in interviews, he is practically quarantined from the Team.

3) Shiro is also given a Totally Not AIDS deadly disease.

Making it even worse, Shiro never actually gets cured in canon. We are told he is cured in interviews, but the show itself drops the topic entirely. Depending on where you lean in the Word Of God VS Death Of The Author debate, Shiro may be doomed to die.

4) A female villain is revealed to be a lesbian. 30 seconds later she gleefully tortures a little girl. Then she, too, dies in a fire.

(Fan outrage about pulling two Bury Your Gays in the Season that had been very heavily promoted as GLBT-friendly caused DW to retcon her death and bring her back in S8, but she was originally meant to die in the explosion)

5) Shiro ends up marrying a random character who doesn’t even get a name in the show.

ABLEISM:

1) Shiro's PTSD magically disappears offscreen. In interviews, the EPs claimed that he "got over it" between S6 and S7 because "he is a professional." Wow! Who knew being a professional magically cures mental illnesses!

2) Shiro is an amputee. The EPs admitted that they never put any thought into his status as disabled rep, they just wanted a character with a cool-looking arm. It literally didn't occur to them that making him lose his arm (TWICE! First up to the biceps, then up to the shoulder) meant anything. Also worth noting that Shiro’s new arm makes him look like the guy who tormented him.

3) Shiro is systematically robbed of his agency.

- He is the only Paladin who never gets to use his bayard.

- He loses his bond with Black for no given canon reason (and the reason they give in interviews makes no sense, they basically say that transferring his soul out of the Black Lion makes her stop loving him. But she still lets Zarkon fly her!).

I know that Keith is traditionally Black’s pilot in Voltron media (although that shouldn’t matter, because VLD made a lot of huge changes to the traditional status quo). But if they wanted Black Paladin Keith that badly, they could have given some non-insulting reason for it. For example, say “because Shiro has spent so much time within Black, their bond is now so strong that he will get absorbed again if he flies her again.” Or co-pilots in Black (if Pidge can co-pilot with Matt, why can’t Shiro co-pilot with Keith?).

- He is defeated not only by Sendak, but also by a bunch of random Alteans. He basically can’t win a fight anymore unless it’s played for laughs.

- His new robot Atlas is bigger than Voltron, but also much weaker, and can only buy a few minutes for Voltron to come save the day.

- Every single enemy he ever defeated comes back to be finished off by somebody else (even the friggin' Gladiator from S1 comes back in S8). In the epilogue, he retires in his twenties.

4) Narti, the disabled General, is fridged shortly after her introduction. For a while at least it seemed like her death had affected the remaining three Generals, but then it turns out that the "For Narti" line was a trick and they never actually planned on avenging her.

CRUEL TROPES:

1) They intentionally baited the fans by pushing the plot thread that Lotor would be redeemed. They named the episode where he defects "A New Defender," they kept saying in interviews that they come from Avatar and they are very familiar with Zuko *hint hint*, they showed his family as incredibly abusive and Lotor himself as desperate, they showed that Lotor was a victim of severe racism (he is mixed race, and as stated above, the Galra are Space Nazis and are pretty obsessed with blood purity).

Then, after revealing him to be a villain, they gave an interview where they practically dislocated their shoulders by patting themselves on the back as they gleefully bragged that "we made them think we would give them a Zuko, but we gave them an Azula!"

(Nevermind the fact that Azula herself was a 14-year-old child, not a monster, and that Aaron Ehasz himself confirmed that he always wanted her to be redeemed).

When fans who are survivors of child abuse told them that the bait-and-switch was really hurtful, they laughed it off, and claimed that Lotor was just beyond redemption. Then they proceeded to redeem Lotor's abusive parents, who were objectively much worse.

2) Shiro’s clone, who sincerely believed he was Shiro and always meant well, was dehumanised, demonised and discarded like his life meant nothing. His short existence was full of pain from literally the moment he first opened his eyes, as Haggar kept torturing him with migraines to manipulate him. In the end, she brutally violates him body and mind, and brainwashes him to force him to turn on the family he was so desperate to find in The Journey. He dies in incredibly questionable circumstances, without ever getting to learn that his family survived Haggar’s plans. He is victim-blamed for the things she forced him to do against his will with mind-control, and is never mourned because the only family he ever had writes him off as a “thing” and “evil.”

In fact, the horrific treatment of Kuron foreshadowed S8. The Medium article “It never stops at one - Why Voltron: Legendary Defender's tragic ending wasn't a surprise and why more DreamWorks' series will follow suit” explains how.

The tl;dr version is that, when a story posits that the circumstances of your birth determine the value of your life, so that good intentions and hard work mean nothing, and long-established bonds can be discarded with zero thought and care, and your very humanity can be revoked over something you have absolutely no control over, and the whole sociopathic disaster is celebrated as a happy ending... it really, really can’t end well. Not just for you, but for the entire cast.

[janiedean]

Fandom and politics, that's the topic of this message and a request for your opinion on fandom and politics. In recent days in polish fantasy fandom one of the prominent figures, a writer, asked why can't we all just talk and be fandom and leave politics behind, like in "good old days". And explained how he and the wolę fandom just doesn't like ideology pushed at him in media. (1/2)

(2/2) The problem is, what he calls ideology, is often media not being as racist, sexist or homophobic as usually (i.e. the feminist head of the team of writers of The Witcher netflix show, black Heimdall in "Thor" etc.)Or women in fandom demanding to do sth with t-shirts that was sold at one convention, with a print that goes sth along the lines of "I love burning villages and raping virgins". Because those are the prominent scandals of polish fandom.

hmmm the thing is, I think that fandom shouldn’t meddle with politics when it comes to fans period and when it comes to authors, it should but to a certain point. what I mean is:

when I say fandom shouldn’t be meddling with politics when it comes to fans I mean that whole part where you’re judged as SOMETHING just out of your fandom preferences. I mean, people saying you’re homophobic because you don’t ship the slash ship, people assuming you’re racist because you ship two white guys or the likes, people thinking you’re pro-pedophilia because you ship underaged characters and so on. that imo is a thing that regardless of the media in question should die in a fire because you cannot judge people on their fictional preferences. no one should assume I’m okay with incest in general if I ship thor and loki, no one should assume I’m racist because I like stevebucky better than stevesam and no one should assume I’m homophobic if I ship a m/f ship and so on. especially when it comes to people who ship/like problematic stuff for whichever damned reason and they get told they’re monsters when they just wanna do their thing. like that imo is a thing that has to die in a fire right now especially when it becomes a fandom-wide thing and you get people basically going like ‘if you’re white you can’t engage with a fandom with black/poc characters because you’re gonna be racist anyway’ and then complain when they get zero content. or worse, the star wars lists of problematic people that you need to avoid because they ship rey/lo and are therefore *insert problematic word here* and such things. fandom should be a place where fans are free to do whatever they like and explore whatever subjects they like without being judged for it. obviously if someone fucks up MAJORLY (see: the infamous j2 haiti fic of doom) calling them out should happen, also because it means that if they’re ignorant they’ll learn, and using fandom as a platform to learn stuff about people different from your social/ethnical background is always great, but people shouldn’t be shamed for what they do in fandom as a general rule. that is my general opinion when it comes to fans. you can’t go on and judge someone on whether they like noncon in fiction or not. like. no.

what you’re talking about instead is the media itself being more progressive, and in that case I don’t agree with the *good old days* thing because more diversity is good and honestly if someone’s problem is that heimdall is black in a marvel movie that isn’t even accurate per se because in theory thor and loki aren’t even odin’s sons then like, you need to get over yourself.

and like, one thing is having reservation over a shirt such as what you said and another is telling other women they can’t like kink or m/m porn, so like that is a kind of politics that needs to be discussed and absolutely should, but that’s not what I mean when I say I’d really like politics out of fandom space. one thing is fandom space, one thing is the original content. I’m entirely down for diverse original content of whichever kind, what I don’t think should be done is fans engaging with it just looking at the politics and judging it based on the politics only and not on the plot, and mostly judging it on whether it’s progressive enough or not and judging other people for liking it if they don’t think it’s progressive enough, not fans asking for more diverse stuff in general and/or wanting to feel included in fandom spaces, and I think creators should acknowledge that.

like, the polish fantasy writer obviously doesn’t care for diversity - but no one forces him to. but saying that FANTASY IN THE GOOD OLD DAYS WAS JUST WHITE PEOPLE is also ridiculous bc diverse fantasy has been around for ages like ffs.

what I mean is that we absolutely should have politics - if by that you mean more diversity - in the original media we consume, though I don’t think authors should be forced to do that because you get better things when the author actually wants to write them, and fandom should engage with more diverse media absolutely, but fandom can’t also judge what people in it do all the time based on how *they* engage with the content in case, because everyone will like different things and you can’t force people to engage with that specific thing just because you think it’s woke. and you also can’t trash the author for things you might perceive as problematic but actually aren’t.

examples of what I mean: I, author, write a fantasy story.

not so ideal case of politics in media: I, a white cishet female author, decided to write a fantasy story. I don’t know much stuff outside standard fantasy and I don’t feel like writing people who aren’t what I am. I write your usual standard lotr-ripoff, everyone is white, cis and hetero, there’s one romance, a couple bromances, no social or political hidden commentary. it has a good story. it’s an okay book. the fandom most likely will ship the guys in the bromances. no one feels challenged. tumblr declares me problematic for not writing diverse stuff and then ignores me.

ideal case of politics in media: I, a white cishet female author, decided to write a fantasy story. I don’t want to do the same usual lotr rehash and I know that diversity is important and I want to make a good job. I make my character list. I decide who’s white and who’s not, giving a decent balance. I make some of them non-straight. I don’t see many trans characters in fantasy, so I decide one of them is. I spend months talking to anyone belonging to the aforementioned categories asking them what they think of my approach - ie I find a number of trans people to discuss what I want with the trans character, I talk to a number of black people if I want the character to be black possibly not all from the US and I pick people from all over the place. I write my book. I make sure every character has a meaningful relationship with the others so that all their interactions are interesting. I try as much as possible to not have stereotypes. I get a bunch of betas and I change anything they find improvable. my book gets published. everyone loves it.

now, ideal fallout of the above which is what I mean with healthy fandom consumption: I get a fandom made up by diverse people because I have a diverse book. people enjoy that I gave everyone some space. they might interact with me on twitter and asking me ships headcanons. I tell them that they can ship whatever they like write whatever fic off it they want. every character gets some fic or moodboard and everyone enjoys whatever they like in whichever dynamic. not-trans people who had never run into a trans character in fantasy might go like ‘wow I hadn’t realized that’s how it felt’ and might get informed. if I based it on some specific historical period people might get informed on that. people belonging to the minority categories educate the others in fandom about what they might not know, nicely. everyone writes all the porn in the world. everything is great. if someone asks me why I have black/lgbt+/etc people in my book I reply them that minorities exist so why shouldn’t they be in my book and that’s the most twitter hate I get. life is great. my publisher wants more. that book becomes a series. rinse and repeat.

not so ideal fallout, ie what I mean with fandom shouldn’t be about politics: somehow, there’s a fanon ship that gets most fans for a reason. it happens to be idk, bisexual white guy + gay white guy who are not together in the book. they get more fic than dunno, hetero black woman with hetero asian guy. people start calling the first group problematic because they don’t ship the poc couple and THEY’RE RACIST. the trans character isn’t a stereotype/isn’t *good enough* for fandom standards so they decided that idk, feminine straight guy I put in because feminine straight guys exist is actually the only trans one because HEADCANONS and suddenly all fics with a trans character for that book are about the headcanoned character that’s actually a stereotype if you go for that, not the one I actually spent six months researching, and if you don’t agree you’re suddenly a transphobe. someone sends me a twitter message asking me what I think of HEADCANONS and I answer that I’m okay with HCs but I put canon characters that aren’t white, straight and cis for a reason and suddenly I’m THE MOST PROBLEMATIC AUTHOR EVER and people decide that my efforts aren’t good enough and that as a cis woman writing gay men is problematic and everyone in fandom who writes m/m and is a woman is shit. then people decide that shipping the black cis bisexual guy with anyone white is racist and writing porn where he’s on top is racist but then another side says that if he bottoms it’s racist (guys LOOK AT SW FANDOM I DIDN’T MAKE THIS UP), so no one ends up touching the black character out of fear of being dissed. six months after the book is out, the only thing there’s a fandom following for is a problematic as hell crackship in between two cishet white guys that hate each other and barely interacted because it’s the only fandom space where people don’t get shamed for what they like.

I, the author, look at all the hate messages I get on twitter and think fuck it, next time I’m just doing high fidelity 2.0 just with cishet white female protagonists so no one can tell me I did it wrong since I’m white, cishet, female and I hang out in record stores all the damned time or at least I used to when I was younger and they existed. I never write a diverse cast again. I never write a trans character again because that wasn’t what I wanted to do, I just wanted people to have fun and enjoy a more diverse cast of characters without fans murdering each other over it.

like, that’s what I mean with politics shouldn’t be in fandom that much, not that politics shouldn’t be in fandom spaces/in the media we consume period XD ;)

[inloveandwords]

I read a total of 14 books between June 14 & June 27 and there were so many great ones!

All of the books I mention in this video can be found and purchased on my storefront here.

  Quiet Girl in a noisy world by Debbie Tung

4 stars

This is a graphic novel that is basically a series of scenarios that will be very relatable to true introverts. I am much more of an extroverted introvert, so there were some things that I didn’t fully relate to, but I totally understood. The illustrations were adorable and I read this book within an hour. I think this book would make a great gift for your introvert friends who don’t get enough love in this noisy world.

Can I Come Over by Whitney G

4 Stars

I saw that a friend of mine on bookstagram was reading a couple of Whitney G novels and this was one of them. It definitely inspired me to pick it up since it was my birthday and her novels tend to be short and sweet – like a little treat on a day of relaxation.

This book had so many great romance tropes happening in it. First of all, the heroine, not unlike Whitney G, is a successful author of short, self-published, steamy romance novels. She joins this sort of pen pal ish service that is supposed to be strictly platonic and starts talking to this guy. At first he’s a douche, but then they work things out. Turns out he is her dad’s good friend. So there is a forbidden and age gap scenario.

I have to be honest, I didn’t love this at first. I really didn’t like the way the hero was talking to our heroine at all and I worried he wouldn’t redeem himself.

He did and I ended up really enjoying this. Whitney G does what few authors can when it comes to steamy novellas: she builds chemistry quickly and crafts a believable romance in otherwise outlandish settings. Her and Katee Robert are my two very favorite short, steamy, romance writers for that reason.

When a Scot Ties the Knot by Tessa Dare

5 Stars

I finally did it! I read a Tessa Dare novel and everyone was right. I freaking loved it.

This book is about a woman who is incredibly introverted and to avoid having to do the typical coming out in society thing, she makes up a pretend boyfriend. A Scottish soldier who, it turns out, actually exists.

He has been receiving her letters and learns all about her from them, so when he shows up unexpectedly at the house she inherited because of her fake engagement to him, she’s obviously surprised.

For those who don’t normally like historical romances, I think Tessa Dare is the perfect place to ease your way into the genre. Her heroines aren’t annoyingly innocent and naive. Her books feel modern even though they are not.

This had so many elements of a great romance: fake dating, a little bit of enemies-to-lovers, and an adorable meetcute.

I can’t wait to read more Tessa Dare!

The Black Flamingo by Dean Atta

5 Stars

This is a coming-of-age memoir about a mixed-race gay teen who eventually finds himself when he discovers drag, written in verse. Obviously I can’t personally speak for the rep in this novel, but I can tell you that it was beautifully written.

I’m a big fan of modern poetry and though I connected a little more with the poetry in The Poet X a little more, I still really liked this one. While I loved the audiobook, I have seen a few pages of the book and I wish I had it as I was reading as well.

I feel like this book is so important for young people to read, to help them see outside of their boxes – or to help them find themselves on page. To help them not feel so alone.

Cherry Magic

4 stars

My very first official manga was gifted to me by my sweet friend, @genkireader, for my birthday. There was definitely a learning curve when it came to reading this. I was messaging her on Instagram with questions like, “Wait, this book is backwards, where do I start? Do I read right to left or left to right?” It was surprisingly more difficult than I expected, but I REALLY enjoyed this book. So much so that I ended up buying a few more of her favorites.

This book was quirky and cute. It’s about a guy who has developed the power to read people’s mind through touch and he thinks it is because he’s a 30yo virgin. He ends up reading the mind of a charasmatic, good-looking guy in his office and discovers that he is attracted to him. So many adorable moments ensue, a ton of over-thinking and awkwardness, but also super sweet, swoony moments, too. I feel like this will speak to any of us who overthink every little thing when we are falling for someone. Especially when it is unexpected.

Thank you, De’Siree for this gift, it was like you gifted me a piece of yourself because I know how much you love these stories. Lovelovelovelovelove.

Rafe by Rebekah Weatherspoon

3 Stars

This is a cute romance between a buff, tattooed nanny who begins working for a savant young surgeon and mother of two girls.

This book was fine, though I didn’t see anything special about it. Maybe I gave in a little to the hype surrounding it and that was the issue, but mostly the romance was just ok. I felt like it was a little rushed, I wished there was more pining and more of a forbidden aspect to this, but it seemed like they both gave in pretty quickly.

Loving Mr. Daniels by Brittany C Cherry

5 stars

This was a super angsty, emotional story about a girl and a guy who are both dealing with terrible tragedy and find solace in each other. The first night they meet is filled with unbelievable chemistry, it’s almost too good to be true.

And it turns out to be. Because it turns out he is her high school teacher.

The heroine was held back in school because of a medical condition, so she is 19 years old and a senior. He is a young teacher, in his early twenties, so the age gap isn’t really a thing, but it doesn’t make it any less forbidden.

When they realize the situation, it’s heartbreaking because of how intense their first meeting was. A series of super angsty things happen and it’s all very intense, but in the best epic love kind of way.

I was rooting for this couple the entire time, but not only that, I loved the heroine’s relationship with her step siblings even with all that drama.

All American Boys by Jason Reynolds

5 Stars

This is a super relevant fictional story that is somewhat reminiscent of The Hating Game.

This is about a boy in the ROTC in high school who is falsely accused of stealing by a racist, hateful police officer who ends up beating him until he is unconscious which stirs protests in his town that is sick of this constantly happening.

Sound familiar?

What’s interesting about this story is how it follows the perspective both of the victim and a white boy that goes to his school who is linked to the police officer.

I was completely invested in this story, while also cautious. I was super curious about how this book would end. Would it be far too optimistic or would it be realistic?

When I finally came to the end, I very much appreciated it. It was hopeful without being naive. It left questions that we still need answers to, but it didn’t feel too unresolved that it leaves you unsettled. I almost took it as… let’s let current events tell us how this story is going to end.

The Prince and the Dressmaker by Jen Wang

5 Stars

I read this sweet, heartwarming graphic novel with my girls. They adored it from the very first night we read it before bed.

This story is about a prince who likes to wear dresses and hires, in secret, a dressmaker to make him custom dresses.

I didn’t tell them what it was about, I wanted them to discover it on their own and ask questions as they came up.

Books are an essential parenting tool for me.

The girls begged me every night to keep going. They loved the characters in this book and they were excited to see what was going to happen.

This entire book, but especially the ending was so adorable. I absolutely loved it and can’t wait to read more from this author. Especially if I can share the experience with my girls.

Addicted series books 1 & 1.5 by Krista and Becca Ritchie

5 stars and 4 stars

A lot of my friends have read and loved this series, between that and the premise, I’ve been super excited to read it.

This is about a woman who is a sex addict and her best friend she’s in a fake relationship with who is an alcoholic.

This is a super angsty, dark, gritty series so far with such a strong romance. These are extremely troubled characters who are using their relationship and each other to hide their addictions.

I found this book, ironically enough, addicting to read and I can’t wait to read on in the series.

The second book did seem to drag on a bit, I feel like it could’ve been half as long as it was, but I know it was necessary.

Take a Hint Dani Brown by Talia Hibbert

5 Stars

I am absolutely LOVING these Brown sisters books! Chloe’s book was fantastic, but I think this one might be my favorite so far.⁣

⁣

Dani is a smart, independent savvy woman who is not interested in a long term relationship. Zaf is basically the complete opposite.⁣

⁣

The two of them have not had much more than a nice rapport – he’s the security guard at the school she teaches at, until Dani gets trapped in an elevator and Zaf rescues her. This wouldn’t be a big deal if the entire rescue didn’t get caught on film and go viral.⁣

⁣

The “going viral” thing seems to be really popular lately and it’s not normally something I would gravitate towed. Honestly, I tend to prefer if romance novels just pretend that social media didn’t exist. I think it’s tricky including anything involving technology in contemporary romance novels only because things change so rapidly, it’s easy to become outdated.⁣

⁣

However, I didn’t care what this book was about, I knew I was going to read it and fully expected to love it … and I was right.⁣

⁣

As always, Talia’s steamy scenes are SO on point, but more than anything, she writes sweet heroes SO well. I adored Zaf with everything I am. I can’t handle how much I love his side job and that despite being a big guy, he’s a big softie. ⁣

⁣

And, of course, I adored Dani. I love how badass and confident and independent she is, even if it does complicate her relationships.⁣

Becoming by Michelle Obama

5 Stars

I borrowed this on a whim from my library. I’ve been reading a few nonfiction books lately and have enjoyed all that I’ve picked up.⁣

⁣

I have to admit, though, I loved this one the most.⁣

⁣

I didn’t realize Michelle’s father had MS. As soon as she mentioned his symptoms, my stomach dropped and I just KNEW it. It’s always hard for me to read about people who have Multiple Sclerosis, especially nonfiction because I’m always wondering if that will be me and when.⁣⁣

⁣

As a romance reader, I adored Michelle and Obama’s romance. I officially ship them SO hard. Watching their relationship unfold was so satisfying and adorable.⁣

⁣

I’m not a big crier while reading, but I got choked up so many times. When she talked about visiting the VA, when she talked about Sandy Hook… it wasn’t overly dramatic, but it was enough to have me covering my mouth with my hand trying not to cry.⁣

⁣

I’ve always admired this woman, but even more now than I did before learning more about her. ⁣

  Recent Reads: June 14-27 I read a total of 14 books between June 14 & June 27 and there were so many great ones!

[whovianfeminism]

Whovian Feminism Reviews “Thin Ice”

Who gets to travel in time and space?

Doctor Who would probably answer that question with an enthusiastic “Anyone!” Perhaps not everyone should travel with the Doctor. But anyone* who has an open mind, a hunger for adventure, and the will to fight the most terrible things the universe can throw at you could travel with the Doctor.

But some fans have always been aware of the asterisk that comes after anyone*. Perhaps anyone could travel with the Doctor, but not everyone would be accepted wherever the Doctor goes. And Bill Potts -- our second black companion, our first (main) queer companion, and a woman -- is especially aware of the risks of traveling to the past. And she’s still not very sure of the man who’s leading her into danger with a cheshire cat grin.

Sarah Dollard’s astounding second episode for Doctor Who tackles both the personal and the political. “Thin Ice” addresses the risks of traveling through time when you’re from a historically oppressed group, delivers a pointed critique of modern pop-culture whitewashing, and also delivers a compelling character piece between the Doctor and Bill as she discovers what kind of person you have to be to travel with the Doctor.

Doctor Who has tried to explore the discrimination and oppression the companions could face while traveling in the past, but the results have often been lackluster. “Thin Ice” makes a deliberate call back to one notable conversation from the “The Shakespeare Code,” where Martha flags the danger she might be in while walking around Elizabethan England.

“I’m not going to get carted off as a slave, am I?” she asked the Doctor.

“Why would they do that?” he replied with clear shock and distress, as if he couldn’t fathom a reason why someone would do that to his Black companion. At best, this comes off as a type of well-meaning (yet still insulting) color blindness, as if the Doctor just doesn’t recognize why Martha would be concerned for her safety because he “doesn’t see” Martha’s race. At worst, this feels like a curious and dangerous blind spot in the Doctor’s encyclopedic knowledge of human history. Rather than engaging with the subject, it feels like "The Shakespeare Code” was trying to hand-wave it away and dismiss Martha’s concerns.

When Martha points out she’s not white, the Doctor’s response is hardly reassuring. “I’m not even human,” replies the alien who happens to look shockingly like a white man. He follows up with “Just walk about like you own the place, works for me.” Of course, that absolutely wouldn’t work for anyone who didn’t look like a white guy. It’s remarkably tone-deaf and dangerous to tell marginalized people to walk around with a sense of entitlement to avoid harassment. In my experience, that approach tends to lead to worse harassment.

"Thin Ice” approaches this conversation with much more respect for Bill’s fears. The Doctor doesn’t immediately put two-and-two together and realize that Bill’s discomfort with wandering Regency England has to do with her being black. But once he understands, he doesn’t try to invalidate her feelings. He acknowledges there may be trouble and lets Bill decide what she’ll do.

In “The Shakespeare Code,” the Doctor tries to put Martha’s fears to rest by pointing out two black woman walking ahead of them and saying, “Besides, you’d be surprised. Elizabethan England, not so different from your time.” It’s a another hand-wavey moment to dismiss Martha’s fears, but it’s also the only time we see black women at all. They vanish within seconds, unnamed and without a single line. The remainder of the story is dominated by white characters. 

In “Thin Ice,” black women and people of color are a prominent, powerful presence. Kitty leads her band of street urchins and has a huge role to play in pushing the plot forward. If there was a Bechdel-style test for whether two women of color talk to each other without mentioning a white man, Bill and Kitty would pass. People of color are also prominently visible in the background of Regency London, and Dollard uses that as a way to make a critique of whitewashing in our modern pop culture. History has always been more diverse than our movies and TV shows have cared to admit. 

In the midst of all this, the Doctor and Bill are wrestling with their evolving relationship from professor and pupil to Doctor and companion. And as Bill learns more about just how alien the Doctor is, their morals and values come into conflict as well.

The Doctor seems to be finding it difficult to step back from his role as a lecturer. Throughout “Thin Ice,” he treats every conflict with Bill as another opportunity to teach her a lesson. When she’s disturbed by the death of Spider, he treats her like she’s throwing a tantrum and tells her that he’s “never had time for the luxury of outrage.” When they are about to confront Lord Sutcliffe, the Doctor orders Bill to be quiet while he interrogates Sutcliffe and lectures her about her temper, confidently saying that “Passion fights, but reason wins.” But Bill’s not here for the Doctor’s lectures or for his posturing about reason vs. passion. 

Which brings us to the truly incredible moment that the Doctor punches Lord Sutcliffe.

Narratively, this moment is absolutely earned. Viewers know that the Doctor is absolutely full of it when he says he’s never had the luxury of outrage. As Bill later says, he’s never had time for anything else! This moment puts that false choice between logic and passion in sharp relief. One is not inherently better than the other, and there are just some situations in which logic cannot win. There’s no reasoning with someone who’s that deeply, confidently racist. At a certain point, they just need to face the consequences of their actions and then be silenced.

“Thin Ice” was written and filmed long before Richard Spencer was punched at Donald Trump’s Inauguration, and yet it has managed to land squarely in the middle of the “Is It Okay To Punch Racist Assholes” conversation. The Doctor seems to fall firmly in the “YES” column. But the punch definitely seemed to touch a nerve with some. One troll on Twitter went so far as to say the episode was anti-white and that Doctor Who had been taken over by “SJWs.”


First of all, if this is the first episode in which you think that Doctor Who is advocating for social justice, I have to wonder if we’ve been watching the same show. Second, I find the assertion that the episode is “anti-white” for portraying an accurate -- even relatively muted -- racist attitude by a white person is truly ridiculous. But I did find his discomfort with showing white people’s racism to be interesting.

Science fiction fans love their allegorical or metaphorical racists. Stormtroopers and Daleks are some of our most popular and enduring pop culture characters, and both are based to some degree on Nazis. But we like our villains to be larger than life figures obscured in costumes, and our heroes facing these villains to be overwhelmingly white. The evils these villains represent can then be a few steps removed from the real world. But there’s something to be said for pulling the racist out from behind the plastic mask or metal suit. Lord Sutcliffe’s racism is very human; it’s practically banal. Our TV shows shouldn’t just address racism allegorically or metaphorically, they should show the actual perpetrators and victims in our own world.

And, for the record, I’m totally in favor of the punch. If Daleks and Cybermen and all the rest should fear the Oncoming Storm and the Destroyer of Worlds if they attempt to harm others, then racists should be afraid that an angry Scottish man with attack eyebrows will punch them in the face if they spew their venom at anyone else. 

Ultimately, this episode comes down to the value we place on human life. Lord Sutcliffe is the obvious villain because he places no value on any life besides his own. But for most of “Thin Ice,” Bill isn’t sure how much value the Doctor places on human life either.

Twice in “Thin Ice” the Doctor fails to look even remotely disturbed when people are killed right in front of him. His focus is more on retrieving his sonic screwdriver than saving their lives. And when he’s confronted by Bill he confesses that he can’t remember how many people he’s seen die -- or how many people he’s killed. Emotionally, this feels like the inverse to the moment in “Smile” where Bill realizes that the Doctor is the man who saves people. In “Thin Ice,” he’s the man who doesn’t always save everybody. Sometimes, he’s the man who kills them. He’s the man who makes the hard choices about who to save and who to sacrifice. And it’s his casual attitude towards the lives he can’t save that disturbs Bill more than anything. 

But Bill and the Doctor find their equilibrium when they come together to solve the problem. The Doctor invites Bill to participate in his deliberations rather than telling her how to think, and leaves the final decision up to her. Logic and reason are both invoked. Risks are analyzed, lives are weighed, and a judgement is made on the value Bill and the Doctor place on all the lives at stake. They both make each other stronger when they work in tandem, a pattern I hope carries through the rest of the season.

[nyxelestia]

Solution: ease up on or stop writing the problematic stuff/ You still aren't pointing out what exactly you find problematic with sterek fic. But I assume it's basically "bad friend scott" which is funny, bc if you had actually read the majority of fics tagged with that, you'd see that it actually redeems scott from his problematic behavior in canon. This, and the fact that stereks create more works for every POC than canon, the fact that you cannot read past a tag, does not make them racist.

So, what, you think it’s reasonable for me to dictate what everyone should write? // Absolutely not. But as you seem to think it's reasonable for you to dictate what people shouldn't write I do think it's reasonable to think that you could at least afford fans concrete examples of unproblematic writing.

One of the examples you've given of why fandom is racist is its tendency to downplay the role of POC characters. I don't disagree with you on that. However, how would this translate to Sterek fic? Those fics will invariably focus on Stiles and Derek, since it's...well, a Sterek fic. Scott is still the eponymous Teen Wolf of the actual show. Are you saying that Sterek fic should have as its primary focus Scott, as to avoid being racist?

The same way I can see Western culture is racist, even though not everyone in it is. Communities are the sum of their parts, and more than the sum of their parts. // no, you didn't say "not every sterek is racist but the fandom as a whole (aka the majority of the fans) is racist". you said "MOST sterek fans aka the majority of sterek fans are not racist" which means "the sterek fandom as a whole is NOT racist, but there ARE of course, some racist jerks in the batch" like in almost every group.

No one in fandom is actively sitting down and setting out to erase Scott from his narrative because of his skin color. But, they continuously hold double-standards along racial lines, they continually justify abusive or dismissive treatment of certain characters that overwhelmingly are POC // which would mean they are still racist. actively or not, consciously or not. internalized racism is still racism. your logic just doesn't add up. u gotta rethink where u coming from.

And what makes you think I’m not engaging, too?I can be engaging and be angry. I can also walk and chew gum at the same time. It’s really not that hard. // i'm looking at this blog & reading your stuff. obviously i'm not talking about what u do in rl, since i don't know u. also it's not hard to be angry/sad af & still try to keep an open mind & be ready to talk? bullshit. it is. fucking. hard. dealing with rl issues like racism in rl. ur either trying to look though or you're a clueless troll.

Every other original post I write about Sterek fandom is about its problems - such as erasing Scott's scenes to make him look more selfish than he, or projecting his scenes and characterization onto white characters to make them look less selfish than they are. Problems like ignoring canon to build up an extremely problamtic fanon Scott to be able to write Stiles spurning him or redeeming him. Problems like ignoring Scott's character development by cutting him out of his own scenes, then claiming that he has no character development in the show and thus fandom gives him more than canon. Problems like erasing all the times white characters have hurt him while overplaying times he's hurt white characters. Problems like systemically blaming characters of color for failing to be perfect, omniscient, and omnipotent - and then praising white characters for not being completely horrible. Problems like expecting characters of color to subsume their mental health to the white characters, but not expecting white characters to do the same. Stuff like denigrating characters of color for being wary or resentful of people who hurt them, while praising white characters for attacking characters who they percieved as wronging them (whether or not they actually have).

Fans can and will create things beyond what I can imagine, and there are plenty of Sterek fics that can and do treat Scott reasonably well. If you stopped sending me a barrage of Asks and got an account to talk on posts like a reasonable person, I might even be able to get through all the Asks in my inbox to actually answer your request for examples, but instead, I'm spending time trying to head off this. And the more you send barrages of messages by ask, the less I assume your original request was in good faith and the more I assume you are attempting to set me up for failure.

I don't expect Scott to be at the center of Sterek fics. I think it says a lot about fandom in general, and Teen Wolf fandom in particular, that we so drastically pay so much more attention to white characters than characters of color, that the community who likes to play with other people's narratives would rather create a new one for white characters than engage in the one that already exists for the characters of color (like we do for white leading characters of other fandoms). But analyzing fandom as a whole is a separate issue from analying the problems of Sterek fandom in particular.

If you ask the overwhelming majority of people, they will say they are not racist and not sexist and not homophobic. Many of these same people will then turn around and victim-blame women for rapes, judge kids of color for behaving like their white peers, and ask gay couples which one is the man and which one is the woman. When I say no one is actively racist, I mean that the fans here aren't saying Scott deserves everything he gets because he's Latino or that Deaton must be evil because he is black. I think that everyone is expressing the subconscious, internalized attitudes and judgments and double standards they were raised with, and then not analyzing their own decisions and thus perpetuating that racism.

So no, actually, they are not racists, not for that. I'm not going to accuse someone of something that heinous at the individual level just because they lack the education to realize what they are doing or why it's harmful. I'll accuse the fandom, sure - because the fandom is the product of its fans. And thus, it's a product of people who do not set out to discriminate people based on skin color, but end up doing so anyway without realizing it because the racism has been internalized that deeply due to the culture they grew up in.

And I don't have to bring in my real life issues with racism for engagement and positive change. I point to my fanworks, my own meta on the show, and the fanworks I share. Funny thing is, even when I create positive content, I still get hate for it, and even have to warn other fans who worked with me to create positive content that they might get hate for it, too.

You accuse me of trolling? Which of us is constantly publishing fanworks and meta under her own name, and which of us is hiding behind anon? If you consider yourself open minded, then log in and reblog my posts directly. Otherwise, why should I assume you are anything but a troll, or take anything you are saying in good faith?

[trendingnewsb]

Jaylen Brown: ‘Sport is a mechanism of control in America’

As the Boston Celtics star prepares to play in London, he talks to Donald McRae about race, the NBA and the death of his best friend

Jaylen Brown is one the most intelligent and interesting young athletes Ive met in years and it seems fitting that, midway through our interview in Boston, he should retell a parable that brings together Martin Luther King and the great American writer David Foster Wallace.

Weve got two young fish swimming one way and an older fish swimming the other way, the 21-year-old star of the Boston Celtics says as he considers the enduring backdrop of race in the United States. They cross paths and the older fish says: Whats up guys, hows the water? The two younger fish turn around and look back at the wiser fish and ask: Whats water? Theyve never recognised that this is what they actually live in. So it takes somebody special like Martin Luther King to see past what youve been embedded in your whole life.

Three years before his death, Foster Wallace included the parable in one of his most widely-read pieces of writing. Yet it carries fresh resonance when said with quiet force by a young basketball player who stands apart from many of his contemporaries to the extent that there have been numerous articles in which an unnamed NBA executive apparently suggested that Brown might be too smart for the league or his own good.

Brown was the No3 pick in the 2016 NBA draft and now, in his second season with Boston, he is a key figure as the Celtics arrive in London this week as the leading team in the Eastern Conference. Weve already spoken about Browns desire to learn new languages and his interest in books and chess while he loves playing the piano and listening to grime artists from east London. Even more intimately he has relived the death of his closest friend Trevin Steede in November. In the two games after that devastating loss Brown produced inspirational performances, which he dedicated to Steede.

He has also looked forward to playing in London on Thursday, against the Philadelphia 76ers, and answered a question as to whether his young Celtics team may become NBA champions in the next few seasons: Why not this year? People say maybe well be good in two years but I think were good now. Right now weve got one of the best records in the league. I think we could be as good as we want to be. But the more we let people construct our mindset, and start saying two years from now, is the moment we lose.

Last week the Celtics beat LeBron James Cleveland Cavaliers 102-88. Excitement and anticipation surrounds the Celtics but race still stalks our conversation and it has echoed hauntingly through Browns life. Racism definitely still exists in the South, he says, remembering his youth in Marietta, Georgia. Ive experienced it through basketball. Ive had people call me the n-word. Ive had people come to basketball games dressed in monkey suits with a jersey on. Ive had people paint their face black at my games. Ive had people throw bananas in the stands.

Racism definitely exists across America today. Of course its changed a lot and my opportunities are far greater than they would have been 50 years ago. So some people think racism has dissipated or no longer exists. But its hidden in more strategic places. You have less people coming to your face and telling you certain things. But [Donald] Trump has made it a lot more acceptable for racists to speak their minds.

Jaylen Brown takes on LeBron James earlier this season. Photograph: CJ Gunther/EPA

Brown admits that, when he was 14, It wounds you. But when I got older and went to the University of California [Berkeley] I learnt about a more subtle racism and how it filters across our education system through tracking, hidden curriculums, social stratification and things I had no idea of before. I was really emotional because one of the most subtle but aggressive ways racism exists is through our education system.

In his year at college, before pausing his degree to play in the NBA, Brown wrote a thesis about how institutionalised sport impacts on education. I was super emotional reading about it, he says of his chosen subject. Theres this idea of America that some people have to win and some have to lose so certain things are in place to make this happen. Some people have to be the next legislators and political elites and some have to fill the prisons and work in McDonalds. Thats how America works. Its a machine which needs people up top, and people down low.

Even though Ive ended up in a great place, who is to say where I wouldve been without basketball? It makes me feel for my friends. And my little brothers or cousins have no idea how their social mobility is being shaped. I wish more and more that I can explain it to them. Just because Im the outlier in my neighbourhood who managed to avoid the barriers set up to keep the privileged in privilege, and the poor still poor, why should I forget about the people who didnt have the same chance as me?

What did he think of Colin Kaepernicks protest against police brutality and racism which the former San Francisco 49ers quarterback began even before Trumps election to the White House? It was peaceful and successful. It made people think. It made people angry. It made people want to talk. Often everybody is comfortable with their role in life and they forget about the people who are uncomfortable. So for Colin to put his career on the line, and sacrifice himself, was amazing. But Colin was fed up with the police brutality and pure racism. He speaks for many people in this country including me.

Did Brown understand from the outset that Kaepernicks career was in jeopardy? Absolutely. I wasnt shocked how it turned out. Colin was trying to get back into the NFL and find another team and hes more than capable. But I knew it was over. I knew they werent going to let him back. Nobody wanted the media attention or to take the risk. They probably just wanted to blackball him out of the league.

Thats the reality because sports is a mechanism of control. If people didnt have sports they would be a lot more disappointed with their role in society. There would be a lot more anger or stress about the injustice of poverty and hunger. Sports is a way to channel our energy into something positive. Without sports who knows what half of these kids would be doing?

Were having some of the same problems we had 50 years ago. Some things have changed a lot but other factors are deeply embedded in our society. It takes protests like Kaepernicks to make people uncomfortable and aware of these hidden injustices. People are now a lot more aware, engaged and united in our culture. It takes a special person like Kaepernick to force these changes because often reporters and fans say: If youre an athlete I dont want you to say anything. You should be happy youre making x amount of money playing sport. You should be saluting America instead of critiquing it. Thats our society.

Has his anger been amplified during Trumps presidency? Not really. I just think Trumps character and some of his values makes him unfit to lead. For someone like him to be president, and in charge of our troops? Its scary to be honest.

Trumps Twitter war in November with LaVar Ball tipped the scales, for Brown, beyond credulity. The President accused Ball of being ungrateful following the release from China of his son, LiAngelo, and two other UCLA basketball players after they were caught shoplifting. He demanded a thank you, Brown says of Trump. Its ridiculous. What happened to people doing things out of the generosity of their heart or because it was the right thing to do? There have been multiple situations where its been ridiculous but that one was like: OK Im done. Im done listening to anything you have to say. A 19-year-old kid makes a mistake overseas and [Trump] demands an apology from his dad? I think Trumps unfit to lead.

Jaylen Brown dunks during a game against the Brooklyn Nets. Photograph: Justin Lane/EPA

Browns readiness to talk about politics and culture might account for the surreal suggestion in 2016 that he was too smart for the NBA. From the outside, smart seemed a euphemism for troublesome. What did Brown think when, as a teenager, he heard words unlikely to be used in conjunction with a white athlete? It was hinting at something very problematic within society. It bothered me but I was so focused on getting to where I was going I never dissected it or pointed it out to anybody.

But I disagree that an athlete cant be intelligent. Some people think that, in basketball, we have a bunch of masculine adults who dont know how to control themselves. Theyre feeble-minded and cant engage or articulate ideas. Thats a narrative they keep trying to paint. Were trying to change it because that statement definitely has a racist undertone.

Brown chose Berkeley because he knew he would be stretched academically. Has he missed the intellectual stimulus since swapping college for professional basketball? Absolutely. Ive missed it so much. Im in a good environment here but at Cal I was learning something new every day. Im now trying to keep well-balanced instead of single-minded. I take piano lessons after I spent the last year teaching myself piano. If Im frustrated or had a bad day, but need to keep engaged, practicing the piano does that for me. Same with the YouTube [vlogs which he makes]. I use the camera so I can show something of this life to the everyday person who is interested in seeing what its like for an athlete on a day-to-day basis. Everybody puts you on a pedestal especially when youre playing well and they make it seem like youre not human. But Im just a regular guy.

During his first year at Berkeley, in his spare time, Brown learned Spanish from scratch and became fluent. Im not as good now, he says. I started again because therere so many conjugations that slip your mind if you dont practice. But I also just learned the Arabic alphabet. Im proud of myself because the pronunciation is hard.

Brown starts to say the Arabic alphabet out loud and, to an untutored ear, he sounds impressive. Yeah, he says with a grin, Im trying.

He describes himself as an introvert and it must be hard being quiet and reflective in a boisterous sporting environment? Absolutely. Its not just the locker room. In life if you stay quiet youll get left behind. So I had to learn to be more vocal and outgoing. I just try to be respectful of everybody. But the closer you get with guys the more you talk to them. It becomes like a family especially when youre winning. Last year I was much quieter but this year my opinion is valued more. We have a good locker room.

Jaylen Browns Celtics are set for a deep playoff run this season. Photograph: CJ Gunther/EPA

The value of that locker room was felt by Brown after the tragic suicide of his friend Trevin Steede. Brown found the will to play against the NBA champions, the Golden State Warriors, the night after Steedes death and he inspired the Celtics to a memorable victory by scoring the most points [22] while producing tenacious defence. After the game Kyrie Irving, the Celticss superstar, gave Brown the ball and said: This ones for Trevin.

Before they played again, in Atlanta, where Steedes family live, Brown visited his friends mother and other grieving relatives. He then went out and shot a career-high 27 points. Im so thankful for the people around me. They lifted me up. I dont know what my mental state would be right now without them.

I met Trevin when I moved to Wheeler which is a big basketball school in Marietta, Georgia. Trevin was a year older so he was a sophomore and I was a freshman. They brought me in and there was only one spot left on the team and it was between me and him. They gave it to me.

I didnt know anybody when I first got there so at lunch in the first week Id eat by myself acting like Im on my phone. Trevin came up to me after the third day. Id seen him in workouts but I didnt really know him. He said, Man, come sit over here with us. Ever since then, we were best friends.

How did he hear about Trevins death? His mom called me. Im thinking shes just checking on me or saying hi. But she called to tell me hes passed.

Brown looks down and his hurt is obvious. He also admits he needed the support of Steedes mother to face Golden State. I probably wouldnt have played unless she called me. Brad Stevens [the Celtics coach] asked how I was doing. I told him, I dont think Im able to come in today. He said: Thats fine. Take your time. Three seconds after I hung up, Trevins mom called. I told her I wasnt doing well and I probably wasnt going to play that night. She said: You know thats not what I want and thats not what Trevin would have wanted. So if you can find it in your heart to go out and play for him, do it.

Did he play in a daze, or was he inspired by Trevin to help Celtics win? I didnt feel anything. It was like I was out there by myself.

The chance to play in London lifts his mood. I visited London for the first time last summer. It was great. I went to see Big Ben because one of my idols is Benjamin Banneker [the African American scientist who, among other achievements, worked with striking clocks in the 18th century].

This week Brown would like to hear more grime and to see Arsenal. I like Barcelona because of the players theyve had traditionally from Ronaldinho to Messi. I really like Arsenal too. I like their tradition, and their diehard fans. I hope to see them in London. I think Thierry Henry is going to be there so Ill just hit him up and see if I can get some access to the [stadium] tour, get some shots on the field. Last summer I became really close with Thierry. I got to talk to him and we keep up with each other and he gives me advice about sports and life. Hes one of the all-time greats.

At the Celtics training facility, on the outskirts of Boston, Brown rises to his full 6ft 7in. He looks around the empty court before turning back with a smile when I say weve covered a lot of ground from the mysteries of water for two young fish and the enduring problems of race in America to the impact of learning and the pleasure of following sport around the world. Yeah, Brown says softly, stretching out his hand, thats the way I like it.

The NBA London Game 2018 sees the Philadelphia 76ers host Boston Celtics at The O2 on 11 January. The game will also be live on BT Sport and NBA League Pass.

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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2018/jan/09/jaylen-brown-boston-celtics-nba-interview

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[timeflies1007-blog]

Doctor Who Reviews from a Female Doctor, Season 3, p. 2

Note: These reviews contain spoilers for Season 3 and other seasons of Doctor Who, including occasional references to the classic series.

The Lazarus Experiment: This isn’t a brilliant story, but it’s a very pleasant episode that lets Martha shine in a way that she hasn’t since “Smith and Jones.” Her scientific knowledge comes in useful, we get to watch her interact with her family, and the Doctor is, for the most part, being nice to her. He’s totally prepared to abandon her at the beginning, and he does try to pull the “one more trip” thing again at the end, but she stands up for herself and he changes his mind. In between these scenes, he’s really very charming and they work well together.  

Although there were a couple of scenes with Martha’s family in “Smith and Jones,” this is our first extended look at them. It’s lovely to see more of them, but at the same time they do feel like a step down from the Tyler family. Jackie had a lot to say about Rose’s travels with the Doctor, but she also felt like an important character as an individual, with a life of her own and a genuine sense of loneliness that made her into a far more serious character than her earliest episodes might have suggested. I really like the actress playing Francine, but I had to go back and look up what the character’s name was when I started writing the reviews for Season Three. Throughout the season, she’s annoyed with Martha’s dad and concerned about Martha spending time with the Doctor, but there’s never much of an effort to paint outside of those lines. Her seconds-too-late voicemail at the close of the episode is a great way of incorporating information necessary for the Master plotline, but she’s so closely linked to the Harold Saxon plot, both here and later in the season, that there’s not enough attention to her as a person. Gugu Mbatha-Raw also seems underutilized in her role as Tish; it’s delightful to watch the two sisters run around London together, but she doesn’t get much to do and sort of weirdly goes from being creeped out by her elderly employer’s harassment to being somewhat attracted to him once he’s a younger-looking creep. On the whole, I like Martha’s family, but I don’t feel the kind of emotional investment in what happens to them that I did with Jackie or even Pete.

The plot itself is pretty thin, but it’s mostly engaging. Lazarus, who alternates between being Mark Gatiss and being a silly-looking monster, is an entertaining enough villain, and there’s some fun chaos as the Doctor and company try to stop him. He seems like a pretty terrible scientist, given that his machine would have just blown up entirely if the Doctor hadn’t been there and that he would have had to kill approximately half the United Kingdom in about a month at the rate he was going, but he’s a solid version of the hubristic genius figure. His conversation with the Doctor about his need to avoid death is nicely done as well, and death-by-church-organ is a great resolution. I forgot most of what had happened in this episode after the first time I watched it, but if it lacks anything memorable, it’s also really very enjoyable. B

42: This is basically what you would get if you took “The Satan Pit” and removed all of the philosophy and the joy. There are quite a few similarities, from the deep, spooky voice that infects various members of the crew to the TARDIS sealed off in an inaccessible part of the ship to the device of characters quickly running through a seemingly endless series of doors to the danger of the location itself (this time at the edge of the sun instead of the edge of a black hole.) I wouldn’t mind sitting through a retread of the black hole two-parter if we wound up with anything approaching the quality of the original—I would happily sit through an entire season of episodes with basically the same premise if they were as well-written as “The Satan Pit.” This one, though, doesn’t make rushing about in space anywhere near as fun, and it replaces the exploration of the Doctor’s beliefs with a contrived impending catastrophe. There are some strong scenes here, showing Chibnall’s potential as future showrunner, but it’s not exactly a strong debut for him.

           Knowing that Chibnall would go on to cast the first female Doctor makes me look more closely at how his episodes work with gender, and on the plus side, he’s really very good at writing Martha. Her phone call to her mother from the escape pod is particularly well done, both as a depiction of Martha’s feelings and as an introduction to the government using Martha’s mother to get to her. She and the Doctor work well together here, and she has a wider emotional range than she gets in many other episodes this season. The rest of the women are so dull that I’m not even going to bother looking up their names, so I’ll just refer to them as Killed Immediately, Killed Almost Immediately, and Plot Device. The first of them dies so quickly that you barely have time to think “Oh, it’s that actress who was on Sherlock for a while” before she’s dead. In general, the minor characters are really weak here—nobody stands out, and the group as a whole doesn’t bring out anything interesting in Martha or the Doctor.

           Much of the story unfolds either with surprising slowness for an episode that depicts a real-time fall into the sun, or with too much histrionics. The Doctor’s crazed reaction to looking into the living sun is interesting at certain moments, like when he admits that he’s scared and tries to tell Martha about regeneration, but there’s an awful lot of just writhing about or yelling awkward things like “You should have scanned!!!!” The whole notion of the sun as not just a living organism but one that is sentient enough to consciously stop pulling the ship toward itself once the fuel is returned is just such an odd notion that it comes across as an awfully silly plot contrivance; it’s not quite as overtly ridiculous as “the moon is an egg,” but it makes approximately as much sense to me. The escape pod being detached from the ship is more effectively alarming, but otherwise the situation of being minutes from destruction never actually feels dangerous.

               Like “Gridlock,” we conclude an immensely boring episode with a strong final scene. This one isn’t quite as moving, but the final minutes, in which Martha kisses one of the crew members and the Doctor gives her a key to the TARDIS, is a nice conclusion to an episode that had a sort of underlying theme of regret over having left things undone or unsaid. It’s a lovely ending, but out of about 42 minutes of story, we get maybe six or seven minutes of compelling material. C+

Human Nature: After a mediocre string of episodes, Season Three gets properly underway with what has to be one of the best concepts of the entire reboot. Having the Doctor become human in order to evade his enemies is a brilliant idea, and the setting—just prior to World War I—gives him a beautiful place in which to experience that humanity. Tennant is just marvelous, even in moments when I’m uncertain about what I think of the story. He’s close enough in personality to the Doctor that he’s still recognizable, but his mannerisms are just different enough to present a truly distinct persona. It must have been a huge challenge to work out exactly how closely to hew to the Doctor’s usual personality, and both the writing and Tennant’s performance manage this perfectly. The memories that emerge from his real life as the Doctor are also handled extremely well through the device of his journal, which contains absolutely gorgeous pictures of people and monsters he has met.

            As a “Tenth Doctor in Love” story, it’s definitely better than “The Girl in the Fireplace,” but I have some similar qualms about the focus on the Doctor as romantic hero rather than two characters as a romantic pairing. There’s nothing that I dislike about Joan, and she does get a couple of very good moments in the second part, but in this first part she doesn’t make much of an impression. I’ve tried for a while to come up with an adjective to describe her, and I’m still having a hard time…she’s competent, I guess? I really do think that the actress is good, and there’s more attention to her perspective here than there was with Reinette, but when I try to remember pieces of the episode, what I remember is the Doctor doing cute things (like falling down the stairs out of awkwardness!) in response to her rather than anything about Joan herself. It’s fascinating to watch the Doctor fall in love in a way that isn’t influenced by the constraints of his awareness of his species, but I never really get a sense of what attracts him to her.

            Martha has to put up with even more than usual, between watching the Doctor fall in love with another woman who isn’t her and dealing with snotty, racist students. I’m not a huge fan of the decision to spend so much time on having her stare sadly at the Doctor’s instructional video—the notion that she is in very unrequited love with the Doctor has been hammered in quite enough prior to this point. Even the genuinely very tense cliffhanger at the end of the episode is basically played as another opportunity for the Doctor to compare Martha to another woman, which is tiresome. However, she gets a huge amount to do on her own here, and she is holding things together remarkably well. The script makes clear just how frustrating it is for Martha to be a highly-educated, twenty-first century woman pretending to be a servant in 1913, but her lovely friendship with Jenny brings a sense of warmth to the character that nicely counterbalances all of the nonsense that she has to deal with. Aside from her lovelorn staring at the instruction video, watching Martha in the TARDIS by herself is fantastic, as is the idea that she is basically watching over the Doctor. It’s a terrific reversal of their usual roles, and she’s very much up to the task.

           This two-parter is the most attention that we get to Martha’s race this season, and it’s a much more serious take on the idea than what we saw in “The Shakespeare Code.” The Doctor’s lack of awareness of what’s happening essentially forces her to assimilate into a society that blatantly discriminates against her, and while this isn’t addressed directly, we do get the implication that she has to take on the identity of a servant in spite of her education and knowledge because it’s the only job that she could get as a black woman. The acknowledgment that her experience as a time traveler is strongly affected by her race is a welcome change from the comments in “The Shakespeare Code,” but I’m still a little frustrated by the fact that the most prominent attention to race here comes in the form of a moment that is very much about the Doctor. I can see the intention behind having him say something racist, as it raises interesting questions about whether this is part of the imposed persona of John Smith or whether this is in part the Doctor’s own lack of racial awareness bleeding through; if the latter, it’s an intriguing follow-up to his remarks earlier in the season. However, his dismissal of Martha’s stories about the TARDIS as stemming from “cultural differences” is notable mostly for the surprise of watching the Doctor, even in a somewhat different form, saying something this blatantly racist. (Even in the earlier episode this season, he comes across as clueless but not as overtly prejudiced.) To me, it’s probably the most memorable line about race this season, so I don’t like that it is about the shock factor of watching the Doctor say something horrible, and not about Martha’s feelings or experiences. If we were to look for the best depiction of racism this season, this two-parter pretty much wins by default, but I’m not unequivocally happy with the approach here.

           Even if I’m not thrilled about how the episode uses the 1913 setting to comment on race, it is otherwise a stunningly beautiful backdrop for the episode. The monsters who wreak havoc upon it are even better. The Family is a terrific set of villains, and the use of Jenny’s body is especially sad, but the highlight is definitely Baines. Whoever was in charge of casting did an absolutely stellar job, because he has one of the creepiest faces I’ve ever seen. He has an expression like a demonic cat standing with a raised paw over a quivering mouse, and he manages to keep that look on his face for pretty much the entire time in his role as Son of Mine. He’s so scary that I completely understand the Doctor’s determination to run away from the Family, and the addition of creepy scarecrows underscores the atmosphere of terror. I also love the way that the interactions with the Family introduce the fob watch and its capabilities in a way that doesn’t register as foreshadowing until “Utopia.” The watch looks like it’s just here to help this particular plotline unfold, so its importance to the Master later on is a nice surprise. I do think that the seasonal arc runs into some gigantic problems at the end, but the slow build toward the finale is really put together extremely well. This episode isn’t quite as emotional as the second part, but it’s a stunning introduction both to a human Doctor and to an immensely scary new set of villains. A/A-

The Family of Blood: This episode contains one of my all-time favorite Doctor Who scenes. I don’t mean the Doctor’s vision of the human life he will never have, which is poignant but would mean more to me if I liked Joan better than I do. That scene is good, but to me the highlight of the episode is the brief, terrifying attack that the Scarecrows make upon the school. The Doctor looks tragically, hopelessly out of place as he stands there with a gun, unable to shoot or even move, but the most heartrending piece of the scene is the closeups on the faces of the boys themselves. As they prepare for and take part in their first battle, the camera moves close enough to show us the tears on their faces, and watching them look so young and so scared is made even more heartbreaking by the knowledge that World War I is just around the corner. The scene is accompanied by a short verse of a children’s choir singing a hymn, and the soundtrack of pure innocence as the boys are forced to kill for the first time makes the scene even sadder. The eeriness of the Scarecrows adds a sense of horror to the tragedy, and overall it’s one of the best pieces of direction ever to appear on this show.

           While this scene is astonishingly effective, I don’t feel as much of a connection to any of the boys as individuals. Latimer is well-acted, but he comes across more as a well-acted plot device than as a real character, and a result I never really engage with his plight as a bullied student or even with the war memorial at the episode’s end. The general attention to unglorious, terrifying war works very well, though, especially in Baines’s taunting lines toward the schoolmaster. “Do you think they will thank the man who taught them it was glorious?” he asks, responding merely with “Et cetera, et cetera” to the man’s boasts of his own military past.

On the whole, I like this episode much better as a war story than as a love story, but the romantic angle definitely shows improvement from the previous episode. I continue to be mostly uninterested in Joan for much of the episode, but while she’s fairly dull as John Smith’s love interest, she starts to come alive once she learns of the Doctor’s real identity. She’s smart to ask him for details of his childhood, which he can give only as impersonal, encyclopedic facts. Once he has changed, she mourns for the man she has lost, but she’s strong enough to avoid the temptation of conflating him with the Time Lord he has once again become. Even better, she doesn’t let her feelings distract her from the responsibility that the Doctor bears for how events unfolded. “If the Doctor had never visited us, if he’d never chosen this place on a whim, would anybody here have died?” she asks, and her ability to see that he wreaked havoc on her community in order to save himself is a much stronger moment for the character than anything that happens during their short-lived romance.

           Martha gets a couple of wonderful scenes here, especially the initial moments of the episode in which she uses Mother of Mine as a shield and pulls a gun on Son of Mine in order to scare the Family away. Mother of Mine’s physical resemblance to Martha’s friend doesn’t give her a moment’s hesitation, and she stays focused and determined until the crisis is over. She gets another fabulous moment when she demonstrates her medical knowledge for a skeptical Joan, a scene made even better by the fact that Martha asserts herself but isn’t really used to redeem Joan from her racist assumptions; in general, this episode doesn’t give quite as much time to Martha’s struggles as a woman of color in 1913 as did the first part, but what we do see is much more focused on Martha herself. The climax of the episode sees Martha declaring her love for the Doctor, which might have been an interesting development if he hadn’t so easily accepted her backpedaling later on. Her words show just how hopelessly infatuated with him she is: “he doesn’t even look at me, but I don’t care, because I love him to bits.” The Doctor is far too willing to dismiss these words as a desperate invention in a moment of crisis, but even if he ignores the warning signs about the destructive emotional impact he is having on her, he does show her a rare, lovely moment of genuine appreciation at the end of the episode.

           There are some good moments for supporting characters here, but the Doctor is definitely the star, and Tennant gives his very best performance in his run on the show. The Doctor’s resistance to the idea that he isn’t human is really nicely developed throughout the episode, particularly in his shock that the Doctor didn’t even think to put falling in love on his list of possibilities to look out for before he changed. He’s so palpably scared about losing what he believes to be his identity that the idea of his return to being the Doctor seems cruel and unreasonable. Even with my lack of interest in his relationship with Joan, the montage of his life with her is hauntingly sad, especially in the moments when the camera pulls back from the vision and returns to his grief-stricken face. I didn’t realize, throughout most of these two episodes, quite how much he had adjusted his speech patterns, but when he tricks the Family at the end and goes directly from John Smith to Doctor, it makes really clear just how different his voice is as a human. He’s not a completely separate person, though, and he acknowledges to Joan that “Everything John Smith is and was, I’m capable of that too.” This isn’t of as much interest now, but it sets up some interesting ideas about the relationship between a Time Lord and the human persona created by the watch—a concept that gets even more interesting in “Utopia.”

           The ending is a very dark moment for the Doctor, who doesn’t just put a stop to the Family but essentially dooms them to eternal torment. I don’t think it’s necessarily out of character for the Doctor to do something like this, as “The Runaway Bride” has already given us an example of the Doctor’s tendencies toward violence in moments of loss. I’m not sure that I believe he would stick to this scenario, even after his initial rage had passed, but he does pay a yearly visit to Sister of Mine, and it accords with his “no second chances” line from “The Christmas Invasion.” His behavior here seems awfully disrespectful to the Family’s victims; their bodies belonged to regular people before they were taken over, and having, for instance, Jenny’s body placed into the event horizon of a collapsing galaxy seems like a cruel ending for her physical form. Still, there’s a lot of focus on the darker elements of the Doctor this season, and this is perhaps the moment in which these elements are the most impressively and fully realized.

           The Doctor’s sad realization of his own inability to have a normal human relationship is much more memorable to me than the specific relationship that he is forced to give up, and that makes the love story angle a bit less emotional for me than it has been for some other viewers of the show. Still, as the story of the Doctor’s role in the destruction wrought by terrifying monsters upon the eve of the First World War, it’s a brilliant episode, and his distance from human nature has never been sadder. A