#sixcourse

[six-costume-refs]

The transphobic/fatphobic hate and vitriol stemming from a current cast member’s fiancé (whom they actively talk about and promote all over their SM, and got engaged after Megasix all over YouTube) is literally so disgusting to me… like am I wrong for feeling frustration toward them for it? Like I’m of the belief if you stay w/ someone w/ problematic beliefs then they aren’t deal breakers for you and stuff like that just… should be a deal breaker right???

Agreed.

[queerbauten]

When Six animatics have Anne Boleyn destroying a rosary/cross/other religious symbol… I don’t think the real Anne would appreciate that at all

[a-little-slice-of-fandom]

Vaccines save lives. Masks save lives. This pandemic wasn’t planned. These are all true statements and to insinuate otherwise when you have a very large platform of very young and very impressionable fans is incredibly dangerous

[appleflavoredkitkats]

been into six for two years (ever since the og w/e cast) and damn, youtube comments never change. it’s always a backhanded compliment or a flatout insult whenever a queen performs and it boggles my mind how many fans of six STILL miss the point of six entirely

(esp towards queens of color, zara and cj always get the short end of the stick whenever they perform and it really sucks ass)

[theatricallythespian]

Let’s Talk: Is Six Racist?

The answer: Yes, but it’s complicated

Disclaimer: As fans of SIX, this post is not to disrespect or undermine the brilliant people involved in it, but to evaluate and critique SIX in the context of race. Gifs used in the post are made by the lovely @karisoka​ on Tumblr

Note: This was written before Carly Mercedes Dyer was announced as Seymour on 2UKT, however, the fact that it took over three years to cast a non-white woman as Seymour is still embarrasing. Because she is the exception, all points regarding Seymour still stand.

The racial problems with the show largely arise from the casting of the show. There are clear casting trends for each character. These trends derived from each principle actress per character and are as follows:

Aragon: Non-white actress with a medium to dark skin tone

Boleyn: White actress 

Seymour: White actress 

Cleves: Non-white actress with a dark skin tone

Howard: White actress 

Parr: Non-white actress with a light to medium skin tone

These casting trends result in an approximately half-white, half-non-white cast, but looking at the cast of each production, this does not hold up, especially as rehearsal swings and covers are counted. Productions with less than 30% non-white actresses are: Edinburgh, 2UKT, Breakaway, and Bliss 2.0. Productions with 30%-50% non-white actresses are the original Arts production, 1UKT, Bliss 1.0, and Australia. The highest percentage of non-white actresses are in the West End production (10/18) and the US cast (7/10). From this, we can clearly see that higher profile productions have a higher percentage of non-white actresses, whereas less-visible productions like the cruise casts have an extremely low percentage of non-white actresses.

Another instance where less visibility results in a lower percentage of non-white theatre artists are the Ladies in Waiting–9 out of 45 total band members have been non-white (Note: Rebeca Caldera (Bliss) and Julia Subatin (Breakaway) are Argentinan and considered non-white here). The original Arts production, the first UK tour, and the West End production have not had a non-white musician in the band. Even Broadway, with a total of 11 band members for the different tour stops only had one woman of colour total. For a show that touts diversity, these statistics seem extraordinarily low. 

The casting trends may have started out as an innocuous way to pay homage to each queenspiration, the female pop icons who inspired each queen's song and style, and as an attempt to be equitable and cast more women of colour, but these trends are hugely problematic within the context of the show itself, as they create unbalanced racial dynamics and enforce stereotypes within a text that most likely did not intend to create.

One example of the former is Cleves' storyline–being rejected for her looks. While may have been historically true, it is curious when the “ugly” character  is often played by the actress with the deepest skin tone out of the entire cast. In the two exceptions where Cleves was played by a white actor, one is nonbinary and one is a plus-sized woman. Here, ugliness is Black, trans, and fat. The arts cannot be separated from societal context, and given that white beauty standards have an immense influence due to an extensive global history of colonization, this is clearly problematic. In addition to this, there’s one particular scene where Howard makes comments about Cleves’ looks. The original intent was simply to add a #savage quip that aligns with Howard’s character, but given that Howard’s casting trend is skinny white women, the scene becomes rife with uncomfortable racial tension.

In regards to stereotyping, we can talk about how as characters with a white casting trend, Boleyn and Howard can exist beyond being promiscuous characters, or even about how Parr, the empowered woman, is a woman of colour with light skin, but here we'll be focusing on Aragon, Cleves, and Seymour. Aragon and Cleves both exhibit racist stereotypes surrounding Black women, whereas Seymour, who has never been played by non-white principle actress, is seen as the epitome of purity. Please note that this section is based on both the original text and fandom perception of the characters as presented by the text. Of course, the show is not in control of the fandom, as evidenced by problematic fanart, including whitewashing dark-skinned actresses or even depicting a white actress holding three non-white actresses on leashes, but there are elements of the projections of the characters by the show that exacerbates racist ideas.

First, let’s talk about Aragon and Cleves–Angry, sassy, masculine, and gold-digging, just to name a few traits. Just looking at the show and casting trends alone, Aragon and Cleves, both played by women with medium to dark skin tones, have the deepest vocal parts. This by itself might not seem like a huge deal, but combined with race-based casting trends and the show’s perpetuation of stereotypes surrounding Black women, small things add up.

In Six, each queen’s solo song defines their key character traits. For Cleves, Get Down puts an emphasis on Cleves flaunting her wealth and her obnoxious behaviour. She refers to her palace numerous times, flexes that she isn’t fake because she’s paid for her acres and acres with her own riches, and there’s even this line–’Now, I ain’t sayin’ I’m a gold digger, But check my prenup, and go figure.’ In moderation, many of her characteristics would be fine–we love us some confident women, however, Cleves only has these two characteristics, even during her bits of dialogue. For Aragon, No Way is a valid response to her husband cheating on her and her issues with religion despite her devotion to the Catholic church. However, there are no other qualities portrayed other than anger. The vulnerable moment during the bridge is extremely brief and in the show, is a comedic tool to segue back into indignation. While her anger is entirely justified, this lack of nuance makes for a very one-dimensional character, making it easier to pigeonhole her into stereotypes.

On the other hand, Seymour is perceived as the pinnacle of femininity and motherhood. Even her costume is the most conservative compared to the other queens, with no cutouts aside from that one strap underneath her collarbones, long sleeves, and a full knee length skirt. Heart of Stone revolves around her love for Henry VIII and her role as a mother and a wife rather than her characteristics as a person. Because of this, the only exhibited characteristics are ones attributed to a caretaker–she’s a loving person, whose love is set in stone, and she’s dependable like a stone and can weather whatever storm comes her way. Thus, when she doesn’t align with this characterization, such as in the queens fighting scene where they compare miscarriages among other tragedies, it’s forgivable–after all, she is a grieving mother. On the other hand, when Aragon exhibits the same behaviour, it’s non-permissible as it aligns with and supports her existing characterization, reinforcing the idea that she is indeed an angry Black woman.

So, can Six’s issues with race be resolved? Like its racism, the answer is: it’s complicated. The ideal course of action would be to break casting trends, but it’s quite difficult to do so in an equitable manner. To cast a white woman in existing non-white roles would be to prioritize whiteness even if the casting is mixed up between all characters. A good step forward would to cast a 100% non-white cast and at least a 50% non-white band. This is the only way to respectfully break casting trends and prioritize inclusivity, especially seeing as Toby, Lucy, and most, if not all, of the creative team are white. Going forward, Six as a whole needs to actively be anti-racist and prioritize women of colour.

[babeebobo]

I was talking about this with my friend and she agreed so ima put it on here:

While what happened with Cassy and Adrianna may seem similar they’re actually very different. With Adrianna she was following a Christian account on Instagram (cause she is Christian) and was liking posts that she thought were LGBTQ+ friendly, but were clearly not. She has apologized on multiple occasions, and has stated she’s not homophobic (and from what I’ve heard has talked to LGBTQ+ people at stagedoor about it, don’t quote me on that just something I heard) Cassy on the other hand actually said/typed these things. She knew her words were hurtful (and as of right now) seems to be standing my them. I’m not saying what happened with Adrianna is okay, I’m not trying to make excuses for her because she hurt many people including myself, but to say that what’s happening with Cassy and Adrianna are “the same thing” is kinda ridiculous because they’re really not.

[tlvangelsm]

reading stuff about why men should be in six is making my brain rot

[queencamden]

Do you think that the SIX fandom has become very toxic ????

That’s rather complicated. I’m not totally well-versed in fandom drama, as the major fandoms I’ve been in previously (School for Good and Evil, Six of Crows and Three Dark Crowns) are all fairly chill. However, I have noticed that it has gotten a lot less unified as time went on. I first joined around July (before I got my account, just looking at posts) and it seemed much more supportive then.

I think the fandom has just become very DIVIDED. I, like several others, have become more in the Tudorblr community than the Six fandom at this point, and because of this I’ve noticed a big divide in terms of views of historical accuracy. (That’s the lens I will be focusing on, as I don’t care much about other discourse)

The divide between history fans and Six fans (and the toxicity within fandom this leads to) can be summarized in three main points.

1. History blogs and history-loving fans don’t understand/ are weirded out by fandomey fans.

2. Fandomey fans do not bother to consider the history.

3. Both sides are very aggressive on what they think is right.

Let’s start with the history blogs

They don’t understand the fandom

I hate to say it, but we’ve become the next Hamilton fandom: most Six fans get their info only from the show, and from this have developed their own, fandomey versions of the characters. The Anne Boleyn that the Six fandom loves is not the real Anne Boleyn. The Katherine Howard the Six fandom loves is not the real Katheryn Howard. However, (I saw a post about this once) the fandom is quite good at separating the characters from the actual people. (Most of) us know that the Angry Bible Aunt, Chaotic Heely Gremlin, The Mom Friend, The Dog-Loving Badass, The Babey-Brat, and The Sleep-Deprived Academic are NOT the Six Wives of Henry VIII. Because that is how fandom works. You take the most exaggerated versions of the characters in question and work off of them. ESPECIALLY in theatre fandoms, where most fans can’t even see the whole show. I think that’s why Theatre fandoms have a reputation for being cringy. The exaggerated, fandom versions of the characters are all they know.

I think a lot of the time, more history-focused blogs don’t get that aspect of fandom. Yes, Tudorblr has its own memey versions of these people (Anne Boleyn being extra, Henry being Garfield) but the content that they make are not solely these characters- because in the end the meme versions are characters. It’s hard for history blogs to understand that the fandom versions of the characters, are NOT what the fans actually think these people were like. This can lead to mocking, and attacking Six fans for being “dumb” or “cringy”. Certain blogs that are within the fandom that like the historical figures hate on fan blogs and that is NOT OKAY. For example, I saw a post where someone was making fun of Six the Kids, because they “would never be friends in the modern day”. Yeah..... neither would the Queens. And this is explicitly set in the universe of Six. History blogs should stop being high and mighty over fandoms having fun. HOWEVER.....

Fans don’t understand the history.

This show IS about real people. Who actually existed. In real life. And Six fans who ONLY reduce them to these characters can be very frustrating for people who are interested in the real people. Because Six is so popular the ONLY versions of these people you can often find on Tumblr are the Six versions. And I get it. Really I do. I used to be one of those Six fans who called KH “Kitty” (only for clarification purposes between the Katherines but still) and made memes about Anne being a chaotic gremlin. And then I looked up the actual history and I STOPPED. Not everyone has to go that deep, of course, or stop making these memes (most of them are very funny) but it would be good to respect the historical figures. I understand that it’s hard to do that in an incorrect quote, but maybe do what @sabrianna said in an earlier post and tag the characters as, say Katharine of Aragon- Six, so as not to clog the tags of people searching for the actual historical figure.

Like I said, the problem is not with making exaggerated versions of the queens. That is part of BEING a fandom. It’s not even a problem of using the characterizations from the show (such as chaotic Boleyn) What is the problem, is that many fans DON’T care about the history, or think they know everything about it. They make roleplays, ship the queens, e.t.c. but it’s all very out of character to the real women. I said earlier that most people can differentiate between the fandom queens and the real queens and that’s true. But some fans don’t. Some fans only know the queens from the fanon and the musical and because of that we get stuff like UwU Babey Katheryn Howard or people shipping Boleyn and Aragon, which is actually kind of disrespectful to the historical figures. At best, this leads to ire and harassment from Tudorblr, at worst to actual misinformation about the queens being spread by the fandom.

Both are overly aggressive in what they think is right

This is the big one and the major component of the “toxicity” of the fandom. Six is a musical about raising your voice, so it makes sense that it’s fans would be very outspoken. But it falls into a problem when they refuse to see the queens any other way. When it gets to people harassing others for stating differing opinions just to defend YOUR interpretation of a real person who actually lived, that is wrong. Because often your interpretation is NOT right, or at least limited. For example people who view Elizabeth and Mary as a black-and-white ‘good sister, evil sister’ dichotomy, when in reality they were both just as grey and complex as anyone else. But people will straight-up harass and argue with others who are just trying to explain that Mary’s background caused a great deal of her problems, and that Elizabeth did bad things too.

There’s just a lack of LISTENING which is a problem for a fandom based on history. (I know Six isn’t historically accurate, but a lot of fans are interested in the real queens). History is subjective. In my time researching historical!Katheryn Howard my opinion on her has changed around three to four times and that’s good. You are allowed to have multiple views on a thing, and when someone is trying to explain something to you, you don’t have to dismiss it. This goes for the history fans to. When Six fans make a factually incorrect statement, many history fans tend to condescend or belittle them which, as a Six fan, does NOT make us want to learn more. Simply telling us the true, often much more interesting, situation, DOES. Also, friendly reminder, most of the Six fandom are teenagers, and from what I’ve seen of Tudorblr it’s more of a mix of teens and adults. IF YOU ARE AN ADULT, DO NOT BELITTLE TEENAGERS FOR BEING WRONG. WE ARE ALREADY INSECURE ENOUGH.

Tldr; History fans, treat Six fans with respect, and acknowledge that their fandomey queens are not the queens you know and love. Six fans, respect the queens (and the history fans), do some research, and put *Queen’s Name*- Six in the tags, so that history blogs don’t ALWAYS have to see Six content. Both groups, respect others opinions. Stop constantly trying to prove you’re right. In the case of Six fans, you’re probably not (sorry) and in the case of history fans, most of the Six fandom are new to this and still learning.

Sorry for the long post @thedeadqueensclub I meant to have this finished a while ago. I don’t really know of any other fandom drama aside from the Tudorblr Vs. Six thing, so this is all I got for fandom toxicity (though there is definitely a lot more I haven’t covered)

I really enjoyed answering this, and would love if I got more asks (though it might take some time to answer them) It’s really nice to talk to all of you!