I stop by the 4thletter! comic blog on and off (We share an interest) and most recently I found, as a case example in a post on useful arguments about race, a paragraph explaining why my recoloured Legion project was dumb.
After the obligatory moment of "no u i's awesome", I was actually pretty pleased to read it. I've gotten a lot of feedback from people who it succeeded with, but pretty much nothing from people who it didn't. (And no, "Maybe you could have made their eyes more slanty?" really really doesn't count.) I mean, I think he's wrong, and I will tell you all about why, but I can see where our expectations diverge.
I'm ambivalent to some of the points he makes in the post proper. Like, I agree that arguing for fair representation is not the same as arguing for quotas, that statistics should be a tool rather then the end goal. (Of course, statistics are an *excellent* tool that can be used to make robust arguments. For example,![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
noldo's analysis on the question of whether being a CoC or white affects your life expectancy in the Doctor Who universe. Answer: yes, it is fair to reject the null hypothesis of indifferent, random death.) But even if there's no "correct" racial distribution, looking at your story, then looking at the statistics, then looking back at your story might raise a few questions that you shouldn't shrug away.
And: Here’s the root of my problem with running with percentages: good stories are good independent of color. I think that, as children, it is important to see people who look like you doing positive and negative things. That’s one of the reasons I’m so thankful Milestone existed. But, overall? If you’re grown? If it’s good, it’s good.
It is absolutely important, as children, to see people like you doing positive and negative things. It's also important to see people who *aren't* like you doing positive and negative things, to see that people who aren't like you are still the most important people in their own stories, and that their stories matter.
If you're not white, chances are the media's got you covered, at least in one direction! If you are... Well, the recent racefails have proven that we've got a blindspot in our collective imagination when it comes to CoC having anything interesting to say. (Or even PoC, far too often.) This is probably part of the problem.
And I don't believe you ever grow out of this need for representation. You may develop tools for enjoying other people's stories, but being excluded again and again, being told you don't matter? That doesn't stop being harmful.
There should be a reason for everything. If you decide to make a white character, you should know why you made him white and how that affects his characterization. If you make a black heroine, you should know why she’s black. Arbitrary decisions, or decisions made according to numbers, serve no one. People who think about their choices and create accordingly, those are the people who make a difference. Those are the people who make stories that matter.
Which I agree with, I think, except it reads as a bit backwards to me. "If you make a black character," I would agree, "you should know how being black is a part of her, how it has defined her experiences, how she will view the world differently than someone South Asian or white." (And I wouldn't feel so secure un-whitewashing a present-day Superman comic, rooted in American society. It shouldn't be the same story.)
But the statement reads like you need a *reason* to have a black character (or, being fair, a white character, but left alone we'll answer that with "Why not?" nine-hundred and ninety-nine times in a thousand). And in the context of the post, like you need a reason unrelated to any nebulous idea of "diversity", and you need that reason in place *before* working backwards to figure out the road that lead her to your story.
(And it does look like one of the commenters read it that way, responding with I think you made a couple of sterling take aways here, 1) that good comics are good regardless of color, and 2) if you’re going to deliberately include a character of a specific race, know why you’re doing it, otherwise it’s just kind of blind tokenism. which sounds to me like "CoC have to justify their existence, white characters do not" and makes me accordingly sad.)
Looking at your story and realizing, hey, I've made all six of my professors white, just like me! What if one of them was Asian, how would that change the character, how would that affect my story? What if they all were? That's not tokenism, it's story building. Why make a black heroine? Why not.
So, onto the bit regarding me:
There was this recolored Legion of Superheroes thing that made the rounds last year. I thought it was pretty dumb, because all the choices seemed pretty arbitrary. Same thing with “Chromatic Casting.” There was no reason behind it beyond making the Legion less white. As far as reasons go… it works, up to a point. This, though, went far beyond that point into… what? Showing how things could be? That’s not how this works. What good is that? Let’s deal with the real, and if it’s artificial? Let it be.
I disagree with every point in that statement, obviously, or I wouldn't have altered the issue to begin with. Yes, the choices I made when redesigning the Legion's members were arbitrary. They were exceedingly arbitrary, as arbitrary as I could make them (excepting a bit of glee when making the blondest characters dark dark dark). That was actually one of the points. The Legion's made up of a couple dozen alien kids, from alien cultures with no counterpart to our own. Sure, I gave Vi dreadlocks, and Nura a wider nose, and Irma epicanthic folds, but how is that any more arbitrary than making everybody white?
Except that white is the default, of course, of course, I haven't forgotten. It's only a *change* from the default that must be justified, that can't be plot-neutral.
There was no reason behind it beyond making the Legion less white.
Which seems perfectly valid to me! But really, if you don't mind a word about my *intent*, the reason was not to make a less white Legion; it was to make a less white *future*. That the Legion became more varied was simply a by-product of a more varied universe.
There's not anything fundamentally special about the LSH, except I loved the stories as a child, reading people like me doing positive (and occasionally negative) things. I made the new version as an argument against DC's whitewashed universe, but also for myself, because I wanted a version of that future I could still look at and say "Yes".
(Full disclosure, I do think there are some potentially problematic aspects to the Legion project. F'ex, brown crayon-ified or not, DC's future is rooted in Western culture, and I don't mean to hold that up as the standard of just how it should be *except.*For the implied genocide.)
Showing how things could be? That’s not how this works. What good is that?
Showing how things *could* be is the only thing the Legion's brand of utopian sci-fi is good for! The only thing! (Even in the text, they exist to show Superman how much better his world might become.)
Let’s deal with the real, and if it’s artificial? Let it be.
But aren't they all imaginary stories? ;) There have been so many reimaginings of the LSH, I think there's enough room for mine, official or not. Besides, rejecting TPTB's reality and replacing it with my own? I'm in fandom. That's where I *live*.
(Unless he means, "Why waste time with stories when there are people being hurt in the Real World", which would be confusing from someone part of the conversation about race in comics. Didn't we all accept as a premise that stories matter?)
Regardless of how it works as an argument, as a story, I honestly believe my version is *better* than the original. Even the moral is no longer, "Sure, you all look exactly the same on the outside, but underneath you may see the world differently because of your different experiences. But underneath *that*, it turns out you really are just the same after all! Like a tuna salad sandwich on Wonderbread!
After the obligatory moment of "no u i's awesome", I was actually pretty pleased to read it. I've gotten a lot of feedback from people who it succeeded with, but pretty much nothing from people who it didn't. (And no, "Maybe you could have made their eyes more slanty?" really really doesn't count.) I mean, I think he's wrong, and I will tell you all about why, but I can see where our expectations diverge.
I'm ambivalent to some of the points he makes in the post proper. Like, I agree that arguing for fair representation is not the same as arguing for quotas, that statistics should be a tool rather then the end goal. (Of course, statistics are an *excellent* tool that can be used to make robust arguments. For example,
noldo's analysis on the question of whether being a CoC or white affects your life expectancy in the Doctor Who universe. Answer: yes, it is fair to reject the null hypothesis of indifferent, random death.) But even if there's no "correct" racial distribution, looking at your story, then looking at the statistics, then looking back at your story might raise a few questions that you shouldn't shrug away.And: Here’s the root of my problem with running with percentages: good stories are good independent of color. I think that, as children, it is important to see people who look like you doing positive and negative things. That’s one of the reasons I’m so thankful Milestone existed. But, overall? If you’re grown? If it’s good, it’s good.
It is absolutely important, as children, to see people like you doing positive and negative things. It's also important to see people who *aren't* like you doing positive and negative things, to see that people who aren't like you are still the most important people in their own stories, and that their stories matter.
If you're not white, chances are the media's got you covered, at least in one direction! If you are... Well, the recent racefails have proven that we've got a blindspot in our collective imagination when it comes to CoC having anything interesting to say. (Or even PoC, far too often.) This is probably part of the problem.
And I don't believe you ever grow out of this need for representation. You may develop tools for enjoying other people's stories, but being excluded again and again, being told you don't matter? That doesn't stop being harmful.
There should be a reason for everything. If you decide to make a white character, you should know why you made him white and how that affects his characterization. If you make a black heroine, you should know why she’s black. Arbitrary decisions, or decisions made according to numbers, serve no one. People who think about their choices and create accordingly, those are the people who make a difference. Those are the people who make stories that matter.
Which I agree with, I think, except it reads as a bit backwards to me. "If you make a black character," I would agree, "you should know how being black is a part of her, how it has defined her experiences, how she will view the world differently than someone South Asian or white." (And I wouldn't feel so secure un-whitewashing a present-day Superman comic, rooted in American society. It shouldn't be the same story.)
But the statement reads like you need a *reason* to have a black character (or, being fair, a white character, but left alone we'll answer that with "Why not?" nine-hundred and ninety-nine times in a thousand). And in the context of the post, like you need a reason unrelated to any nebulous idea of "diversity", and you need that reason in place *before* working backwards to figure out the road that lead her to your story.
(And it does look like one of the commenters read it that way, responding with I think you made a couple of sterling take aways here, 1) that good comics are good regardless of color, and 2) if you’re going to deliberately include a character of a specific race, know why you’re doing it, otherwise it’s just kind of blind tokenism. which sounds to me like "CoC have to justify their existence, white characters do not" and makes me accordingly sad.)
Looking at your story and realizing, hey, I've made all six of my professors white, just like me! What if one of them was Asian, how would that change the character, how would that affect my story? What if they all were? That's not tokenism, it's story building. Why make a black heroine? Why not.
So, onto the bit regarding me:
There was this recolored Legion of Superheroes thing that made the rounds last year. I thought it was pretty dumb, because all the choices seemed pretty arbitrary. Same thing with “Chromatic Casting.” There was no reason behind it beyond making the Legion less white. As far as reasons go… it works, up to a point. This, though, went far beyond that point into… what? Showing how things could be? That’s not how this works. What good is that? Let’s deal with the real, and if it’s artificial? Let it be.
I disagree with every point in that statement, obviously, or I wouldn't have altered the issue to begin with. Yes, the choices I made when redesigning the Legion's members were arbitrary. They were exceedingly arbitrary, as arbitrary as I could make them (excepting a bit of glee when making the blondest characters dark dark dark). That was actually one of the points. The Legion's made up of a couple dozen alien kids, from alien cultures with no counterpart to our own. Sure, I gave Vi dreadlocks, and Nura a wider nose, and Irma epicanthic folds, but how is that any more arbitrary than making everybody white?
Except that white is the default, of course, of course, I haven't forgotten. It's only a *change* from the default that must be justified, that can't be plot-neutral.
There was no reason behind it beyond making the Legion less white.
Which seems perfectly valid to me! But really, if you don't mind a word about my *intent*, the reason was not to make a less white Legion; it was to make a less white *future*. That the Legion became more varied was simply a by-product of a more varied universe.
There's not anything fundamentally special about the LSH, except I loved the stories as a child, reading people like me doing positive (and occasionally negative) things. I made the new version as an argument against DC's whitewashed universe, but also for myself, because I wanted a version of that future I could still look at and say "Yes".
(Full disclosure, I do think there are some potentially problematic aspects to the Legion project. F'ex, brown crayon-ified or not, DC's future is rooted in Western culture, and I don't mean to hold that up as the standard of just how it should be *except.*
Showing how things could be? That’s not how this works. What good is that?
Showing how things *could* be is the only thing the Legion's brand of utopian sci-fi is good for! The only thing! (Even in the text, they exist to show Superman how much better his world might become.)
Let’s deal with the real, and if it’s artificial? Let it be.
But aren't they all imaginary stories? ;) There have been so many reimaginings of the LSH, I think there's enough room for mine, official or not. Besides, rejecting TPTB's reality and replacing it with my own? I'm in fandom. That's where I *live*.
(Unless he means, "Why waste time with stories when there are people being hurt in the Real World", which would be confusing from someone part of the conversation about race in comics. Didn't we all accept as a premise that stories matter?)
Regardless of how it works as an argument, as a story, I honestly believe my version is *better* than the original. Even the moral is no longer, "Sure, you all look exactly the same on the outside, but underneath you may see the world differently because of your different experiences. But underneath *that*, it turns out you really are just the same after all! Like a tuna salad sandwich on Wonderbread!
