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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 8500137" data-attributes="member: 42582">I don't think any of these assertions about authorial creative process, and publication decision-making, is controversial. But I don't see how they have any bearing on whether or not a work is racist.Quite a way upthread [USER=11]@el-remmen[/USER] linked to some essays he (? I believe this is the right pronoun) wrote about Black characters in Legion of Super Heroes comics. One of those comics involves the Black superhero Tyroc being presented by himself and his fellow Legionnaires as a criminal, when in fact he is not, as part of some subterfuge or other.[USER=11]@el-remmen[/USER] makes the point that it is hardly coincidence that the only Black hero is the one being handed over to the police. Although in the fiction the Legionnaires assert that they are "colour blind", it seems obvious that the creators of this comic take it for granted that a Black character will be more easily seen, by the comic's audience, as being plausibly a criminal, than a white (literally, or as "coded" in their presentation in the fiction) character. <a href="https://themiddlespaces.com/2020/11/10/say-it-loud-tyroc-pt-2/" target="_blank">Here</a> is the full analysis:Tyroc’s arrest and public humiliation at being accused of crimes turns out to be a ruse by the Legion to draw out a villain who brags about working at the police department while making a bomb threat. So Tyroc’s “rampage” was faked, an excuse for him to search for the bomb without the bomber knowing—as the Metropolis police were not in on it. But really, the details of the convoluted plot are not as important as the question of why does Tyroc have to be the one to play the criminal role? I can’t help the feeling (based on how Tyroc has been characterized) that writer Cary Bates felt he was the most “believable” in that role because of his race. That “believability” is heartbreakingly reinforced when Tyroc is drawn to say, “After the way I lost my temper, I don’t blame everyone for thinking I went on a rampage.” Furthermore, when Mon-El and Brainiac 5 discuss the “rampage” with the police they play up the expectation that Tyroc would go rogue. “Who else but Tyroc could be responsible? We shouldn’t have made him a member! I always thought he was too unstable!” and “He never really wanted to join our Legion anyway…” And while later it is clear that at least Brainiac 5 is in on the plan, the language they use leverages stereotypes about Black people, their inability to control their anger, and not making an effort to fit in with the dominant culture. Notice how one of them says “our Legion.”  The story itself gives no reason why Tyroc has to be the one to play the criminal role, except for a throw away thought bubble that explains that his voice “homed in on the bomb.” There was never any suggestion Tyroc’s voice had that ability, so another member of the team could have just as easily had their powers written to work that way. Tyroc’s race is a lazy way to make the story work, relying on the implicit bias against Black folks common in our society. And, since the supposedly race neutral perspective does not allow it, the story cannot even serve as a critique of law enforcement racial expectations and corruption. Instead, after he is temporarily imprisoned, the Legion themselves perform some well-intentioned corruption by manufacturing evidence to exonerate Tyroc, allowing him to continue his rampage subterfuge.[USER=59082]@Mercurius[/USER], I take your use of "mocking" to mean something like setting out to mock. An author might not set out to mock, and might think something is fun, and yet end up producing work that has the effect of mocking others. Sometimes authorial intentions misfire just as other intentions do.How does one world-build without drawing on stereotypical and/or racist tropes? I don't know. It's a big question. It is, in part, the topic of Teju Cole's critique of the Black Panther film:[MEDIA=medium]f76d771b0e80[/MEDIA]I love the video clip for The Stranglers' Golden Brown:[MEDIA=youtube]z-GUjA67mdc[/MEDIA]I think it's beautiful, and incredibly evocative. Part of me would love to play the RPG of that video clip. But how could it be done? Maybe some things we just have to forego. Sometimes human wishes don't, or can't, come true.</blockquote>

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