(this ramble got the fuck away from me and turned into a hell of a tangent because I am so fucking sick of the thin skinned babies crying about how dare you make fandom toxic whenever their bigoted behavior is pointed out but fuck it I'll post this even tho there is a shit ton of other stuff I neglected to cover like the ableism or this weird need to frame Barkovitch and Harkness as non-white men, or how fat and wearing jeans literally normalized fatphobia, or the fetishization in general, or how tlwtwt with their fuckass behavior refuse to hold their friends accountable, and so much more because this fandom is that much of a mess.)
Frankly, the reason a lot of the bigotry (racism, ableism, etc) in tlw fandom is occurring is because the fandom refuses to engage with the characters as characters and shoving them into cookie cutter archetypes. “who cares, I’m just having fun and we are all just smashing dolls together” is a very common defense I see when called out on many of these behaviors. And on some level, yes. We are playing with dolls. But these dolls are not coming from a CW show or some YA dystopian novel. These characters originate from a very deeply politically charged source material that fandom has proven time and time again they refuse to engage with and don’t understand why the “I’m just having fun” excuse is so frustrating when pointing out racism when it occurs in fandom.
The characters and the canon reflect real issues that are occurring in real time as multiple countries are slipping back into conservative and right wing authoritarian/fascism in REAL TIME. Fiction does not impact reality but it sure does reflect it and right now it’s really abundantly clear how fandom took a deeply political canon that has many things to say about race, jingoism, military power, gender roles, etc… and the fandom just straight up refuses to engage with that.
“but fandom is primarily about shipping and having fun!” and I agree, there is nothing wrong with shipping. I ship too. But I do not engage with the fandom from this shipping based mentality because this is not that kind of canon. TLW fandom utilizes these characters as vehicles for ships first, MAYBE characters second, and if we’re lucky understanding that said characters are representative of IRL social commentary. Because of this mindset of just seeing the characters as dolls, people’s implicit biases shine through loud and clearly and when called out on it they engage in thought terminating cliché arguments of ‘it’s not a big deal omg you’re just a hater’.
Let me be blunt: fandom does not gaf about applying racist stereotypes to Pete and Collie, ignoring Art and Hank in the overall narrative, and using covert ableism when handling characters such as Stebbins or Barkovitch, etc, etc, because they don’t care about the characters and just want to make two hot dudes kiss. Why else would Parkovich and Starkness be in the top 3 ships with Gavries and not Bakeson? Why is the ship that consists of a racist character and a MOC who is frequently objectified and sexualized in a racial manner almost half the fanbase? Why is the ship with two white guys who never interact the next most popular? And don’t think I haven’t noticed Starkovitch – another ship with two white guys who never interact – is also climbing the ranks to being in the top 5.
This large subset of fandom is obsessed with Barkovitch, Harkness, Stebbins, and Collie as an imaginary friend group and devotes their time into shoving them into these yaoi archetypes and do not want to examine why they are obsessed with those four and their nonexistent relationships. Because it requires looking inwards and admitting that they prioritize the conventionally attractive 3 white men and a MOC they can sexualize – because Hank as an Asian character is frequently infantilized and desexualized - and is lighter skinned than the two black men.
Collie, by virtue of being the only MOC in this subset of the fandom, is victim of some of the most heinous racism this fandom has to offer. He’s frequently put in the role of an aggressive and sexualized brown man with anger issues as a domineering top. He is put into this stereotypical role without thinking about how that plays into the Savage Native stereotype used to demonize Indigenous folks that plays into the racist belief that these “savage men” are here to rape and pillage and that they are no better than animals. I have seen Collie described in many ways that dehumanize him through sexual objectification and constantly invoking wild animal imagery to describe his behavior. And majority of the time this cut out of Collie is shipped with Barkovitch, the canon racist who engages in heavy microaggressions and literally uses the word queer as a slur but is woobified beyond belief.
Majority of Parkovitch involves twisting Collie and Barkovitch as character to make them fit into these pre-cut molds to fulfill the toxic enemies to lovers stereotype ship that gets people hot and bothered. Because shippers of this type of Parkovitch do not care that Collie is actually for the most part a pretty chill guy with a lot of anger in his heart directed at the regime, not afraid to cry over the love he has for his family, and while he is blunt to the point of insensitive it is not out of cruelty since he is willing to put himself on the line to stage a rebellion. Collie is a prickly emotional guy who cares deeply. But fandom don’t care about that. Shut up and have him kiss Barkovitch and teach Barkovitch the error of his ways by beating the shit out of him or being his caretaker. Because that’s the precut yaoi ship fandom wants Parkovitch to occupy.
Fandom wants Collie in that ship dynamic because truthfully, it’s all about Barkovitch and never about Collie. Fandom does not give a fuck that Collie’s deepest relationships are with MOC. Collie and Pete have an onscreen friendship, we see Collie’s relationship with Art develop in the background, and Collie and Hank at least had enough of a rapport that Hank – who is extremely private and withdrawn about his personal life – shared about his wife. If fandom gave a fuck about Collie and racism they would not be actively ignoring these relationships in favor of his putting him in a group consisting of 3 white men (one of which is again, the canon racist.)
But it’s fanfiction and fandom I can invent things and just have fun, that’s the point of fandom right? I’m just having fun! Don’t like, don’t read!
Yes, you can do all that stuff. No one can stop you, but don’t be surprised when people notice these trends that overall reflect experiences of IRL racist narratives taking place. And that the people who are not having fun because of all the bigotry get fed up and say something because they cannot escape the racism in their real life because its being invoked onto fictional characters who they find themselves represented in and see the implicit biases shine through. And when it’s brought up, the ones criticized victimize themselves and invoke the usual pity party routine rather than examine their behaviors because wow you’re making fandom unfun!! I have seen many a person in this subset of fandom claim they care about the bigotry in fandom and unironically participating in callouts of racist behavior when two posts later they will literally do the same thing with no sense of self-awareness.
As a quick aside, I am not critcizing kids who are still learning and growing. A lot of the time when I see this behavior, I am hoping it's a minor, only to click their profile and see this comes from people post-grad age and who proceed to throw a tantrum when discourse about racism gets kicked up and accusing people of being haters.
(Also, don’t like, don’t read is such a privileged view to have about people encountering racism and other forms of bigotry in this fandom. The principle of don’t like, don’t read is to be applied to personal tastes why something doesn’t gel with you, not of you don’t like encountering bigotry? Well just don’t read it lol!! It’s not like this attitude can’t normalize certain mindsets leading to unchecked biases running amuck!)
I have also seen the defense of “well now POC characters are not allowed to have flaws and that’s another form of racism!!’ used as a defense in the name of justifying racist/ableist/what have you narratives. And yes. I agree with this. I loathe Saint Pete characterization. Saint Pete takes all the textual richness out of Pete as a character. Saint Pete invalidates Pete’s I try hard monologue where he details how much he struggles to be a better person every day. That it isn’t easy and did not come naturally to him with his history. And he is not this perfect Black man bordering on Magical Negro that Saint Pete characterization can give off because guess what Pete is flawed. He backslides pretty frequently when interacting with Barkovitch! Saint Pete was borne out of a reaction to the Angry Jealous Violent Black Man stereotype that early Gavries fandom had. Basically treating Pete as Ray’s attack dog, which is racist for many reasons. And rather than correct that to Pete is a Black man who sometimes gets angry – because we are human – fandom swung in the opposite direction and created Saint Pete.
Because again. Pete is not a character first. He is a vehicle for shipping because that is the nature of how this fandom consumes this serious canon in a deeply unserious way. Art and Hank are straight up IGNORED and pigeonhole-d into cinnamon roll and funny meme guy on the rare occasion they are acknowledged by greater fandom. They have part of their characters dismantled and their traits distributed to others. Meanwhile a large subset of fandom will obsess over extremely minor character Harkness and his nonexistent relationships than two major supporting characters. Hell, there are periods of time I have seen that subset of fandom engage more with background walkers than Hank and Art.
Look I get it, the canon is fucking depressing and I 100% understand not wanting to play within the setting and have your happy AUs and whatever else is out there. I fucking get that. I myself kick around some. But it would be nice if fandom understood that a lot of these trends are borne out implicit biases and that the source material is deeply political commentary so when people see what these characters represent boiled down to “we are harmlessly smashing dolls together” is kinda fucked. They don’t exist in a vacuum. You can take them out of their political setting but you cannot take away that 4 of the characters are MOC and either being outright ignored or shoved into harmful stereotypes by greater fandom.
turnnoffyourmind
jimmyeatworldofficial
blakekathryn
yousharknotpass
ellievsbear
