Originally Posted on 1/8/2021

This is super relevant to fandom, where “nice” white women & queer people latch on to acceptable Black/brown targets and will spend months or even YEARS spreading hate & harassing others in the name of “their” thing.

These spaces are surface level progressive with a deep racist rot.

Here are there I’m seeing surprise expressed at the white women players in storming the capitol.

I want to talk about that because I’m not surprised.

I’m not surprised because as a fiber artist I’ve seen these women for DECADES.

Thread.

— Abby Franquemont 🇺🇸🇵🇪 (@abbysyarns) January 8, 2021

There are people who’ve had a deep hate on for me since 2015… Just for writing about racism in fandom.

There are Nice white Women who’ve tried to/did dox WOC in fandom who confronted racism in fandom.

There are people who hide their racism behind “anti censorship” or proshipping.

Those women may not have been at those rallies or at the capitol on Wed (but we don’t… actually know that) but they have contributed to super racist fandom environments and have devoted significant amounts of time (weeks, months, YEARS) to trying to push BIPoC out of fandom.

The idea that white women and their hobbies, interests, passions, and/or pleasures should be protected at the direct expense of BIPOC is older than fandom.

But it is absolutely alive here and I can give so many examples of it in action. So many example of that excuse being used.

(Across many fandoms over decades… I can give examples of real BIPoC who were abused and harassed in the name of fandom. Anyone following me across 2020 has seen how STRANGERS will lie on me/my work. The pushback to antiracism @ AO3. It’s all to reaffirm fandom as a white space.)

“Let women like things” is a strange mantra to see coming from people who aggressively refuse to let BIPoC in fandom like things… like engaging with their peers in fandom, consuming content around BIPoC, talking about their own concerns in a supposedly safe space.