Fandom. you’ve got a huge race problem — An Introduction Post

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poc in fandom image

Sam Wilson. Abigail Mills. James “Rhodey” Rhodes. Eve Moneypenny . Joan Watson.

What do these characters all have in common?

Well, they’re all characters of color in popular films or television shows.

They’re all shippable with fandom’s white dude darlings (Steve Rogers, James Bond, and Sherlock Holmes for example).

And oh yeah –

Fandom constantly desexualizes them and removes them as valid canon or fanon love interests for said white dude darlings so that a white character can swoop in and fandom can have fantastic ships.

Let’s face it: fandom has a major racism problem.

The clearest sign of this is how characters of color and the fans that defend them are treated.

Fandom, we need to do better. We need to talk about the fact that there’s no balance. We need to talk about how either fandom is hypersexualizing characters of color or desexualizing them.

We also need to talk about how fans and characters of color do not get treated well in fandom and yet it keeps getting glossed over as if it’s not a sign of serious racism in fandom. Reduced to drama or ship wars, discussions about the methods that fandom undertakes to deliberately distance characters of color from white characters (either with regard to friendships or romantic relationships) are frequently pushed to the side.

Whenever someone makes a post or writes an article about the way that fandom pushes these fans and characters to the sidelines, it rarely goes well.

I know this for a fact. I’ve written my fair share of those posts and the negative responses have been both intense and immediate.

Even on my previous posts about fandom’s racism problems, I’ve gotten dismissed by people who otherwise seem like they’re great. I’ve had nasty messages sent to my inbox. Fandom friendships have suffered. After a while, you get labeled as a trouble maker because fandom is supposed to be this carefree place where oppression is ignored unless it’s that of actually diverse fictional characters and the fans wanting representation to carry over to the fandom.

Despite that, I’m not going to keep quiet about it.

I’m here to talk about this racism problem in detail by using different fandoms and ships as examples along with my personal experiences and those of fellow fans.

For the next five months, we’ll be looking at how fandom mistreats and misuses characters of color and how fandom spaces tend not to be so safe for fans of color who are vocally uncomfortable with this treatment.
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[Book Review] Ghosts and Girls of Fiction House

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ghosts and girls of fiction houseTitle: Ghosts and Girls of Fiction House
Author: Various authors, collected & edited by Michael Price
Rating: Highly Recommended
Genre/Category: Comic books, Horror, History
Release Date: November 10, 2015

Publisher: IDW Publishing

Pre-Order Here: AMAZON | IDW PUBLISHING | BARNES AND NOBLE

Blurb: The publisher Fiction House was infamous for what anti-comics crusader Dr. Fredric Wertham called “headlight comics,” i.e. comics featuring the ample female bosom. The Pre-Code publisher used their buxom heroines to star in jungle comics, science fiction tales, and scary GHOST STORIES! The Chilling Archives of Horror Comics series curates the sexiest and scariest of these poltergeist-infused Good Girl Art comics in a pulse-pounding tome, Ghosts and Girls! Your hair will stand on end and at the same time your toes will curl! Featuring faithfully reprinted original art from these 1940s and 1950s by brilliant masters Matt Baker, Maurice Whitman, and more, don’t miss this must-have, large format collection edited by comics historian and filmmaker Michael Price, with its lovingly restored comics.

** This early and honest review was made possible by Diamond Book Distributors, IDW Publishing, and NetGalley. The (somewhat lengthy) opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own. **

I’m a sucker for a good ghost story and Ghosts and Girls of Fiction House provides more than enough to satisfy me.

Collected by Michael Price, the Golden-Age tales of horror and humanity in Ghosts and Girls of Fiction House are right up my alley. The stories in this book all come from publisher Fiction House, a publisher known for their images of beautiful women in peril and blood-curdling horror.  With about two-hundred pages of comic book history (including anecdotes about horror comics’ hall of famer EC Gaines), covers for comics like Ghost and Jumbo Comics, and full-color reprints of true Golden Age greats, this book is a must have for fans of horror who are fascinated by comic book culture and history.Read More »

Snippet – Saw Palmetto Sacrifice Chapter 1

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With all the Urban Fantasy/Paranormal Romance I read, I think it makes sense for me to tackle the genre and try to put my own spin on it. Saw Palmetto Sacrifice is what happens when I look at what I don’t like about the two genres (ceaseless heteronormativity, skimpy representation of characters of color, and cultural appropriation as the main offenders) and try to subvert the genres’ most frustrating tropes and themes.

It’s kind of on a break for now as the Gothic Romance project and my freelance writing take the front seat, but I’m so very fond of it. So this snippet comes from the first chapter and gets us into Alex’s head.

Enjoy!

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Library Haul 10/27/2015

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Library haul 10-27.jpg

This time, my library haul is kind of focused on one thing: research!

I’m looking at Gothic Romance/Horror and trying to put my own spin on it. The story I’m working on is focused on a young biracial woman (daughter to a West Indian mother and a white American lawyer who doesn’t acknowledge her paternity) whose new husband isn’t anything like she expects.

I wanted to look at subverting genre tropes and adding some much-needed diversity to the genre and I felt like setting the story in New Orleans in that narrow period where “marriage across the color lines” was legal before 1900 would be a great idea. (I also wanted to write about vampires but I’m not sure I’m doing that in the first place because I just remembered that werewolves are my secret loves.)

But I know nothing about New Orleans so it was time for RESEARCH!Read More »

Comic Review – Clean Room #1

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Clean Room 1 - Cover by Jenny Frison
Clean Room 1 – Cover by Jenny Frison
  • Writer: Gail Simone
  • Art: Jon Davis-Hunt
  • Letters: Todd Klein
  • Publisher: Vertigo Comics
  • Release Date: October 21, 2015

Is there anything that Gail Simone touches that doesn’t turn to gold?

Simone is heading up the massively awesome Swords of Sorrow crossover event at Dynamite Entertainment, writing Secret Six again, and now, she’s at DC Comics’ Vertigo imprint with her first series for them and it is good.

Clean Room #1 is a story of psychological terror that revolves around Chloe Pierce’s attempts to find out the truth about the charismatic Astrid Mueller, the woman whose new church and self-help books are directly responsible for the death of Chloe’s lover.

This is a great book and a wonderful start to this series done by Simone and Jon Davis-Hunt. Check out my review and then check out the book (or do it the other way around if you don’t like your comics spoiled!). And above all, enjoy!

For the rest of my review, head on over to Word of the Nerd!

Comic Review – Clean Room #1

The end of BIRTHMONTH is nigh

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Birthday duck Delilah with the copy of Saladin Ahmed's "Throne of the Crescent Moon" that Vonn got ne
Birthday duck Delilah with the copy of Saladin Ahmed’s “Throne of the Crescent Moon” that Vonn got me

I’m twenty-five.

That’s amazing. Scary, but amazing.

I love birthdays but there’s something special about this one. It’s weird because essentially, I’m kind of stuck in life. I don’t have a job and I’m worried that my grad school goals are unobtainable. I’m not in the best place (or even the place that I wanted to be in) and I have every right to be upset about that.

But I woke up yesterday morning and I was happy. I’m talking ridiculously and obnoxiously happy. Even more-so than I usually am about birthdays. There’s something about turning twenty-five that makes me want to cling to hope and happiness. I’m trying to tell myself that I’m going to do my best with the next twelve months and make something of myself – or at least learn to drive because this is ridiculous.

And a part of that comes from the people around me. This birthday, I was reminded that I am loved. Not just because several of my friends bought me gifts or because my former coworkers took me out to lunch, but because so many people popped by my inbox with birthday wishes or left me comments telling me that they cared. It always sounds a bit overdramatic when I say that I don’t know where I’d be without my friends, but that doesn’t make it any less true.

So thank you friends on the internet and otherwise for making this birthday an extra special one. If you commented, messaged/tweeted me, or just looked at my screen name and went “Oh hey, I hope this nub’s having a good birthday”, thank you. You’re awesome!

Now – On to some specific thanks under the cut because some people really kind of knocked my socks off with how amazing they were and I need to share that.
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[Book Review] Envy of Angels: A Sin Du Jour Affair

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Rating: So Freaking Highly RecommendedEnvy of Angels

I am 100% writing this short non-spoilery review while tipsy.

So it’s super honest.

So very honest.

I stress-bought Matt Wallace’s Envy of Angels last night while looking at career sites. It’s like, the thing to do you know? Buy stuff as you wail about not being able to buy stuff. And in this case, it was so breaking worth it.

Matt Wallace is amazing. We became tweeps yesterday (hella!!) and I am excited to see what else he writes. Why? Because Envy of Angels hit all of my buttons. It had amazing characters (Lena is bae and Darren’s not far off), religion but not like religion, and FOOD!Read More »

Comic Review – Gotham Academy #11

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  • Gotham Academy 11 - CoverWriters: Becky Cloonan & Brenden Fletcher
  • Art: Karl Kerschl with MSASSYK and Mingjue Helen Chen
  • Colors: Serge LaPointe & MSASSYK
  • Letters: Marilyn Patrizio
  • Publisher: DC Comics
  • Release Date: October 21, 2015

Last month, Gotham Academy #10 got downright Shakespearean when the search for the mysterious Calamity saw Olive Silverlock, Maps Mizoguchi, and the rest of the Gotham Academy gang of intrepid teen detectives placed right in the middle of Macbeth and Clayface’s vendetta against the school’s drama teacher Simon Trent.

This month in Gotham Academy #11, the gang heads off campus to Gotham City proper in search for the truth about Olive’s mother and the connection with the costumed villain Calamity. Oh yeah, and there’s a guest appearance by Red Robin (Tim Drake) because cameos by the Batfamily are always welcome!

For the rest of this review (and my first with Word of the Nerd!!), head on over to the site to check it out!

Comic Review – Gotham Academy #11 @ Word of the Nerd

My Ultimate Nerd Secret

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When the bestie (Bianca) and I saw Crimson Peak on Saturday night, most of the trailers were kind of well… blah. Except of course for the Star Wars: The Force Awakens trailer that was packaged with the movie. (The one embedded above!)

That wasn’t blah at all.

I teared up so hard at that trailer that Bianca totally could have used best friend privileges to mock me. It was that intense and embarrassing.
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[Movie Review] Crimson Peak

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This rambling review contains minor to major spoilers for the film as well as some mentions of incest, ableism, abusive relationships, and violent women. And of course paraphrasing. Lots of paraphrasing.

crimson peak poster Crimson Peak is a beautiful movie about extremely messed up people.

I loved the movie for the way that it definitely shone as an example of the Gothic Romance genre (while subverting several of its tropes!), for feisty heroine Edith Cushing, and the tensely spiraling relationship between her and the Sharpe siblings.

All that love aside though, it’s one of those movies where I can’t help but nitpick at it because while it was a gloriously eye-catching movie with unbelievable scenery and a messed up plot, it had issues on top of the good stuff.

The film managed to both exceed and kind of reaffirm my expectations for the film.Read More »

Library Haul 10/13/2015

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Today I went to the library to return some stuff and wound up getting some more books because I am weak. Here’s the haul (with handy Amazon links for easy reference): Pearl Pink v1 by Meca Tanaka Mars: Horse With No Name by Fuyumi Soryo Forever Evil: Blight with writing by J. M. DeMattis and […]

When the reaction to calling out racism is… More racism?

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It’s been two months and I still get the best reactions to my post “Dear Comic Fans: We Get it. You’re racist and racebending scares you.” And by best, I mean that I get some of the most condescending and willfully ignorant responses out there.

Way to prove my point, fellow comic fans. How weird is it that the majority of the people that have sent me nasty tweets or left rude comments on my blog (the majority of which have probably been eaten by my spam filter because it’s super strict) are people who have gotten so angry about racebending and my calling out racism, that they need to react angrily to them?

It’s like they read my post, didn’t register anything, and decided to behave in such a way that validated my comments on fandom’s racist reactions to people wanting or working on more diversity in comic canon or superhero media.

Wild, right?Read More »

Robins: Individual Characters, Not Bruce Clones

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robin characterization post 2We’ve all seen that one Shortpacked comic where Bruce is taking inventory of the Robins and he’s pleased with the ones that look like him and lowkey annoyed with Stephanie, the lone Robin that doesn’t. She’s the only individual among the Robins and the whole point is that Bruce prefers his tiny clones over her.

It’s hilarious, but at the same time, it’s just a joke. It’s funny because like four out of five “main” Robins have black hair and blue eyes and yeah, they kind of look like Bruce, but they’re so not like him.

The reality is that if you know anything about the Robins, you’ll know that they have very different personalities and varied characterizations. They’re written as their own people and sure, their Mission lines up with Bruce’s and they share many of his ideals, but good Robin characterization hinges on them being separate from Bruce. If you’re reading a book with more than one Robin and you can’t tell Jason from Dick in either looks or temperament, you’re not reading a very good comic.

The Robins are Batman’s partners, not clones.

Not aspects of his psyche.Read More »

[Flash Fiction] Cigarette Break

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Content warning for suicidal ideation/thoughts, depiction of depression

cigarette

For the third time in a week and a half I consider jumping.

To everyone I work with, it’s just a cigarette break.

I look busy but uninterested in my own mortality while the smoke keeps everyone that’d consider questioning me staying too far away to get involved.

I don’t even like smoking. Not really. At this point, I do it because it creates distance and that’s the one thing I need when I want to stand on the roof and stare at the city out in front of me and the ground that’s so far away.Read More »