I feel like the fandom idea that you can't like a character who's genuinely just a shitty guy is so horrible for everything. I feel like this leads to the downplaying of Barkovitch's racism towards all the others. People think that it means they're racist if they even ACKNOWLEDGE the microaggressions that Barkovitch partakes in while liking his character. It pisses me off.
I think Barkovitch is a fun character but I very much think you have to acknowledge his character's actions if you like him because with him being a white guy who's kind of :3 in the fandom it's so easy for people to blorbo him and act like his actions are not his own because of his clear mental illness. even though everyone else in the movie is also mentally ill and they don't acknowledge it as much.
No exactly exactly exactly, like I think there's this like... attachment of moral value (? could be wording this better I'm sure) sometimes to what characters you may like & or find relatable that I think is often a really unfortunate aspect of fandom culture.
And don't get me wrong there is nuance here for sure- like for example if you find yourself only ever rly getting attached to/relating to white or male characters in the media you enjoy that ofc is something worth analyzing, nothing exists in a bubble, your biases will affect these things, etc, etc- but also obviously enjoying what a character brings to a story & relating to them on some level isn't you saying you like sign off on & agree with everything they've ever done, and I feel like this conflation some people have with enjoying a character being indicative of their own morality leads a lot of people to get like....Very defensive & willfully ignorant, since as you said they feel like if they acknowledge the flaws & bigotry the character has they're saying that they themselves must have those traits & hold those beliefs too.
A lot of people both like Barko as a character and find his struggles with feelings of ostracization/isolation, his mental health, his rejection sensitivity, etc, to be very relatable- I relate to those aspects of Barko myself- and they kinda link their own morality to him in the way they project onto the character, so like you said they feel like admitting that he's also like...a bigot & a bully, would also mean that they themselves are a bigot & a bully.
But obv it doesn't mean that at all, it just means you have a fuller understanding of a fascinating character.
Though don't get me wrong there are def ppl who uh...Do find Barko's racism & how it manifests relatable actually, because those are behaviors they themselves engage in but never considered racist since they have a limited view of what racism is, & that's why they're so insistent that he isn't racist & he doesn't engage in any microaggressions at all ever, because if they acknowledge that he is, & he very much does, then they'd have to unpack their own racist behavior.
And they Don't Wanna Do That.
Lots of ppl default to denial & being defensive when things like microaggressions get pointed out because they think of racists as like...An exaggerated cartoon bigot shouting slurs and A Bad Thing To Be, & sometimes racism does manifest in that way, & obv being a racist like is a bad thing duh, but the thing is when ppl view/understand racism in such a limited way they often become way more concerned with salvaging their own feelings & their own sense of being A Good Person & Not Like That than with like....The thoughts/feelings of poc & ACTUALLY being anti-racist. Like it becomes a point of centering & defending their own sense of identity first & foremost, if that makes sense, def wording this v messily my bad I Am Sick & Working.
But yeah tldr- liking Barkovitch's character & finding him relatable while acknowledging his flaws doesn't say anything about your own ideals/morality, and if you do find the way he treated the poc characters to be normal in your view & you were surprised when you saw ppl calling movie Barko racist, it's actually worth sitting with that & examining your own behaviors/thought patterns around people of color! This isn't an attack on you this is actually a great learning opportunity and a chance to rly grow as a person & be better and become actively anti-racist! Yippee growth and change we love that!!