End OTW Racism stuff

[soc_puppet]

For anyone who's missed it so far, end-otw-racism has put out a call to action and manifesto.

I'm planning to at least change some fic titles. I've been thinking slightly of writing and posting an actual fic entitled "End Racism in the OTW", but uh. Hmm. I'm not entirely sure how to do so without accidentally being racist myself?

Like, the general advice in writing is, when it comes to telling stories whose plot revolves around an aspect of marginalization ("issue" stories), those stories should be left to people who share that identity to tell. So, for example, anyone can write a story about a trans character, but cis people probably shouldn't be writing a story about a trans character that focuses only or primarily on the character dealing with transphobia.

I am a white person. My first thought was to write about Alya (Black character) doing what she could to set up an alternative fanfic hosting site after dealing with France's premiere fanfic host ignoring some racist bullshit, but would that count as Issue Fic? Or would it depend on how I handled it in the story itself? Would it be appropriate to instead write a story about Adrien (white character) learning about racism in fandom and trying to be an ally, or would that end up making it all about a white character instead? Could that be mitigated at all?

The safest thing to do would probably be just... not write and post a fanfic like that. Or turn it ultra meta, and have the characters break the fourth wall to talk about the campaign. Which might feel cheap, but on the other hand, much better to go cheap and not hurt people than put my whole heart into something only to end up doing the opposite of what I intended.

More thinking to be done, I suppose.

Comments

[indarkdirected]

Is this something you’d be open to input on, or more of a thinking-out-loud post? Either way, I’m glad to see that this is something people are working on/interested in.

[soc_puppet]

I would absolutely welcome input! I was honestly thinking of sending it as an ask to end-otw-racism, but I couldn't figure out a good way to phrase it. Thank you!

[soc_puppet]

The basics of the Ultra Meta fic would be script fic/chat fic/whatever it is kids call fic that's entirely dialogue with name tags.

Adrien: "Hey, guys, have you seen the title of this fic? What's up with that?"

Alya, Nino, and Marinette: *take turns explaining it to him*

Adrien: "WTF, that's bullshit (that nothing's been done yet/there's no transparency)! And those requests sound totally reasonable, too!"

Alya, Nino, and Marinette: "Right?"

Adrien: "What can I do to help?"

Alya, Nino, and Marinette: *direct Adrien (and readers!) to the manifesto/call to action*

Adrien: "Thanks, guys; I'll do my best! And please let me know if there's anything else I can do."

Alya, Nino, and Marinette: *acknowledge Adrien's efforts, make any wrap-up comments*

Nino: "Also, if you keep an extra eye out for butterflies whenever this comes up, we'd appreciate it."

Adrien: *winces* "Now that I can definitely do."

---

Or something like that.

[indarkdirected]

So, this got a bit long 😅but I appreciate you taking the time :)

I think that ultra-meta works, and I like your script! I do want to say that, regardless of your choice in this instance, I hope you won’t let the ‘general writing advice’ keep you from putting your whole heart into stories that center on people of color in the future. Even if the topic isn’t one you’re sure of!

I’ve agreed with that advice in the past, and while it’s true that I probably wouldn’t encourage you to write the next underground railroad epic, I can’t say that I think that the general advice has been particularly helpful to anyone in terms of race relations. Mostly, I think it causes people who want to do the right thing to view writing about marginalized people as a taboo, or as something to be afraid of, and to default to the (white, straight, able bodied, etc) main characters that they’re already comfortable with.

Except for very obvious (underground railroad, for example) cases, it’s hard for me to separate ‘issue fic’ from regular fic, just because there isn’t an aspect of my life that isn’t affected by my race. Every story about a poc is, in some way, a story about race and racism. Rather than reading the endless parade of stories with no racism (and therefore no poc), I, personally, would love to read a story with a poc main character that that the writer put their whole heart into. Mistakes and all. And when there are mistakes, I think that having transparent good faith dialogues about race will be a million times more helpful to ending racism than banning certain topics will be.

I hope this is helpful! And that if I was unclear (I can be wordy lol), or if you want to chat further you’ll feel free to reach out!

[soc_puppet]

This is very helpful, thank you ♥

Part of my problem is ADHD-related, where learning that I've messed up (especially with something important to me) can feel almost physically painful, but my chief way of moving on is focusing on what I've learned from screwups and how I'm going to do better in the future. The idea that I can also do this with much more public screwups, and also help other people in that way, has... potential, I think.

I think I'm going to start by putting together the script fic I've outlined above, and then spend some time getting the Alya-centric one the way I want it. And if I end up publicly learning something from writing the Alya-centric one, well, it'll probably be a lesson worth learning!