The salt impersonated

I’m really disappointed to see you reblog this post. On the one hand, I agree with several of the core principles being expressed on both sides of it — I simultaneously share OP’s frustration with the negative response aroace identities often receive from fandom, and am protective of spaces that defend folk’s right to write and post whatever they want. And as an aroace-spec person, I’m even specifically protective of fic that explores aroace identity in a nuanced way that includes the ways in which it can intersect with romance and sex; I’ve found quite a bit of fulfillment in reading fic of that nature, that includes sex and romance from a perspective to which I can actually relate.

But the way this specific post equates frustration with the way in which fandoms often engage with aroace characters, and a desire to see these characters and their relationships treated with equal depth even when not engaging with romance or sex, to anti rhetoric, is BEYOND disrespectful and reductive. The final reblogs speak negatively of self-righteousness, but they’re exhibiting it themselves in cruel spades.

As an ace person myself, that was not how I read the post in question, and I apologize for causing upset: it was not my intention.

It resonated with me because, as an openly ace author, I have had people get upset with me when they thought a character they had decided was ace was about to get into a sexual situation--which is distressing both for the lack of courtesy toward another person, and because, again, as an ace person, I have gone into sexual situations willingly and as a complete human being who can decide "hey this is not so much my thing, but I'm bored/want the bragging rights."

I have also encountered the specific "someone looking for representation decided that this character would fit the bill, and then got very very angry because the character did something in canon that didn't match their ideas about them" anger, although not to the extent of death threats.

The original post is a very clear "allow me to play the world's smallest violin for you" post. The second post is mocking people who don't have the skill to write a friendship or QPR. The third post is about how anyone could write any character as aroace if they weren't a coward. Fourth post is about a reader who headcanoned a character as aroace attacked and sent death threats to a fanfiction author for not writing that fictional character in a way that matched the reader's headcanon (ie, the author wrote smut about a character the attacker had decided was aroace, even though canon may or may not have agreed).

The insistence that aroace characters /cannot/ have sex, or /should not/ have sex IS anti rhetoric, whether you like it or not. There's a HUGE difference between "I don't like reading about aroace characters that do sexual or romantic things" and "no one should write [or read about] aroace characters that do sexual or romantic things BECAUSE I don't like it." and the latter IS anti rhetoric.

The insistence that aroace characters are pure because they never do romance or sex is also hugely purity culture bullshit. The insistence that they can't be written any way but pure and chaste is purity culture bullshit leaking in. And let me tell you, that road leads directly down to "ace/aro/aroace people are childlike [because of said "purity"] and so having sex with them or falling in love with them is pedophilia." I have seen that pipeline more than once, and that may sound like fucking horse shit. That's because it is.

The line in the sand comes with action. You can personally not like to read fic that does X or Y or Z with characters, and choose not to read them, and choose not to write them. You can even be frustrated that there's not enough of what you do want to read. You can be frustrated that aroace characters are not treated as full people. That's all totally fine. The problem, and the point where it crosses into being a problem, is when you demand OTHERS do or do not do something that they do not or do want to do. The person who came into someone else's inbox and sent them death threats for writing a character they decided was aroace as having sex is participating in anti behavior. That person is directly attempting to censor the author based on their beliefs about the purity of the fictional character. That's anti behavior. Antis are pro-censorship and pro-purity-culture, and attack others who aren't following their rules they made up.

I do agree that the whole ask is shitty. Sean is a person, who has the right to post whatever she wants, and trying to virtue signal her about it is justt shitty and disrespectful.

However, this posts also reduces being frustrated about your lack with representation with being a fucking anti.

I am not agaisnt ace people having sex in fics, or aromantic people in romantic relationships in stories. It can be done, I know of it.

But the post that was reblogged wasn't about that, it was about people doing hyperbolics jokes, and someone deciding they are puriteens because of it.

I don't deny they may be some people with ideas of purity and aroace characters, but is is really that crazy that aroace people may want to see themselves represented? That having your orientation be constantly ignored because is "boring" not something you have a right to be mad about?

Because just like this person is free to do their own post, so could had done the third person. The third person could had let aroace people have their little thread of jokes, and they could had done their own post.

But that's not what happened.

I don't think aroace people should never be shipped, but, why are we only the only orientation to have thoundsands of different posts, being told that is okay to make our identities invisible, just because people have more fun without thinking in our existence?

Why are not even allowed to be mad about it? I get that shipping is an important part of fandom culture, I am well aware, I write mostly romance!

But I see aroace people who need to be blocking an obscene amount of people in order to curate their experiences, having a hard time finding peope who include our identities in their stories, and then told that if we are unhappy, is our fault and we just need to look harder.

Again, the ask is out of line. But the idea that the only explanation to wanting aroace characters to not be shipped, that being puritanism?

Because I need to make it obvious: Third poster should had never received death threats. That is horrible and not something anyone creating a story should experience. It is inexcusable.

That being said, connecting this to puritanism feels like arophobia/acephobia to me.

I am against censorship, I believe in ship and let ship. But I also believe that people have the right to rant and be exasperated.

And I am sorry, but, are lesbians routinely told, over and over in posts, that they need to be okay with the fandom shipping them with men?

Do you remember the last time someone say "Oh this character being gay is soooo boring, I just ship him with a girl because is more fun for me!"

I know those instances happen, but the amount of aroace characters being shipped, vs gay characters being shipped with straight people, have a BIG difference in ratio when it comes to fandom.

And mind you, you can't even make a post complaining about it, without someone getting in the reblogs to complain that you are bunch of puriteens for wanting to see your representation be respected.

I am not against, ace people having sex in fics, or aros in romance, that does happen in real life, and it can be done well in fics.

when i asked whether their autistic classmate's meltdown was dangerous or merely uncomfortable, they said, "i felt like i was in danger!"

yes you should, actually. that's life. upsetting things happen. no one should have to experience any discomfort. but we do. we get stung by bees and sunburns and headaches. we live in bodies in the world.

autistic people are human beings who have the right to exist in society, including during meltdowns. having one class of your entire semester interrupted by a singular meltdown is not anymore of an infringement upon your entitlement to education than having your class interrupted by a fire alarm or cancelled for a snow storm.

one of my peers once experienced a cardiac event 10 minutes into class. it was terrifying. it was desperately upsetting. i was contacted by the school and offered counseling because i happened to be the one who managed the situation until paramedics arrived. everyone was worried about my classmate first and foremost, and then about me. no one blamed anyone, and certainly when my classmate happily recovered and returned to school, no one thought they should be removed from the program.

In the US today, around a quarter to a third of aides and caregivers for the elderly are immigrants [1, 2], the vast vast majority of whom are women. (From what I can tell) a major reason for this is that nursing or social work degrees/certification programs provide a straightforward (well, relatively) pathway to citizenship or permanent residency; and many simpler caregiver jobs only require a high school diploma, which is useful for immigrants in the US who may not be able to attend college. While I'm sure many of these workers have a sincere passion for caregiving, in a world without severe immigration restrictions and these obvious pipelines the numbers would not be this skewed. I do not think most of these people would put these careers as their first choice.

For starters, they do not pay very much. Average base salary on Indeed for caregiver jobs was $16.83 an hour. For seconders, how often have you had to deal with older relatives making sexist, racist, or otherwise uncomfortable comments at family gatherings? Frankly, lot of old people suck to be around! So do a lot of mentally ill people! Mentally ill old people (so, a lot of the ones receiving home care or living in facilities) can extra suck to be around!! Sexual harassment, violence, and abuse towards workers is common in home care and facilities. [1, 2, 3]. Many caregivers of color experience racism from coworkers, patients, or patients families. Now, many of these people are not fully in control of their thoughts or actions (hence why they require care). And even if they were, being a racist abusive serial harasser doesn't mean somebody deserves to be tortured or medically neglected or left to die.

1- most of the people in caregiver jobs currently are not people who can really have their pick of whatever careers they desire. This is relevant because people often bring up "care provided for people who need it regardless of their sociability" in the context of like, what we as a society should work towards as an ideal. But in an ideal world, how many people would choose the career path of "care for the assholes nobody wants to deal with"?

2- many healthcare workers are nonwhite and experience racial harassment

unnecessarily juxtaposing the more-advanced middle east in the middle of a golden age with their less advanced European neighbors (as though the Islamic Golden Age can only be brought up in its relationship to the Dark Ages)? Essentially I’d like to portray the period accurate relationship between two fascinating areas of the world without demonizing one or the other. A lot of this will come down to research of course but I wondered if ya’ll had any thoughts about this type of problem. (2/2)

Juxtaposing Middle East / Europe in the Middle Ages

Europeans weren’t just viewed as dirty and uneducated, they were dirty and uneducated. Telling the truth isn’t victimization.

- SK

I am not sure what you are asking. It’s not like history is a popularity contest. One region was going through a period of political tumult, religious extremism and instability while the other was relatively stable. Is it bad to point that out? I mean, one of these regions thought diseases could be cured by blood-letting and huffing toilets while the other was coming up with algebra. It’s difficult to argue that Europe was doing well by any metric after the collapse of the Roman Empire. 

If it makes you feel better, the most cosmopolitan, populated city in the world at the time and its empire were both also imploding in China. 

WWC cannot infer what we are not told

First, our answer would have been more detailed if OP had been specific about their time period. As the notes correctly point out, “the Medieval period” is extremely long and varies by region —but how is WWC expected to know whether the story is set before or after certain advancements have been made? 

This is why it is important to be as specific as possible when asking WWC questions: The burden is on the asker to describe their problem accurately. It is not WWC’s failure that the time period is not specific. 

Marika based their answer around OP listing the Islamic Golden Age (Abbasid Caliphate) and the “Dark” Ages (Which still vary depending on if we are talking Western Europe/ Holy Roman Empire or Byzantium). As many note, because “Middle Ages” is such a vague descriptor for “Europe, before Renaissance, After Rome”, the only clue of time period was the Islamic Golden Age, narrowing the window to a slightly shorter time period: approximately 8th to 13th c. CE. 

Again, If we are given generalities, we can only respond in kind, and cannot be held responsible for subsequent misunderstandings.

Europe vs The World

Though Europe had its own significant cultural & technological developments between 700 - 1300 CE, we feel these pale in comparison when put in the broader context of concurrent global developments.

A snapshot of historical developments that influenced the European region* during this time period include:

By Region:

North Africa and Al-Andalus: The Moors revitalizing Spanish and Sicilian civilization through agriculture, architecture, astronomy and restoration of Roman sanitation systems

China: The invention of gunpowder during the Song Dynasty** 

Mali - Timbuktu: Mansa Musa giving away so much gold during his hajj that he crashed the price of gold in the Mediterranean***

South-East Asia: The Javanese Mahapajit Empire’s naval advancements and expeditions, including but not limited to: the creation of massive jong/junk transport ships in the 8th century that would go on to dwarf European, Arabic and Chinese equivalents for almost 800 years, usage of compasses and magnets in navigation, and the refinement of astronavigation for cartography.**** 

By Trend:

Medical Advancements: Reconstructive surgery (India), linking non-potable water to gastrointestinal illness (Egypt), Ibn Sina expansion of the ancient Greek germ theory of miasma to include disease spread during epidemics via air, water and physical surfaces (Persia) 

Print: Movable type (wood - China), plate printing (metal - India) and the expansion of mass paper production from East Asia (Pioneered in 2nd century BCE China) to the Middle East (Or: How the Abbasid Caliphate built the House of Wisdom, preserving and disseminating much of the ancient Greek and Roman scholarship not already maintained by European Christian monasteries)

Trade: Notable trade regions during this period include: Swahili Coast linking the Mediterranean with East Africa, the Middle East and South Asia, Abbasid and Moorish controlled Mediterranean trade, and Mahapajit trade across all regions bordering the Indian Ocean.***** 

This also does not account for the many European advancements that are a direct result of interaction with the Islamic Golden Age and what was learned from West Asian, South Asian, and North African scholarship. Much of Europe viewed aspects of these societies as worthy of being emulated, because they did. Frequently.

On Sanitation

Many prominent non-European capitals had much better sanitation than their European counterparts. While they didn’t always have running water (An accomplishment distinct to Baghdad, Al-Andalus, and other parts of the Islamic world), they had the following advantages: 

More robust, segregated systems for sewage collection and disposal 

Artificial canal systems

Strict regulation and maintenance of public drinking water wells

Usage of human waste instead of animal waste for farming via daily municipal night-soil collection, especially in regions where livestock manure was not widely available.

It’s important to remember that religions like Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism linked the regular act of bathing the entire body with piety. This included overall cleanliness: teeth cleaning, hair washing and daily laundering of undergarments before or after bathing. Thus, many non-European civilizations were heavily invested in regular, rigorous personal hygiene. Similarly, bathing the whole body was prioritized in much of Asia and Africa for personal health. By contrast, prevailing European medical theory was concerned more with humours and vapours and prioritized bathing parts of the body (E.g. Face, neck, hands, feet)  that corresponded to the relevant treatment or prevention of the affliction. 

In short, while Europe was likely less squalid than popular media suggests, their cities and people were still probably dirtier relative to Asian and African cities of the same size during this time period because their priorities differed with respect to how to treat human waste and city infrastructure. Similarly, their daily rituals and habits with respect to hygiene were grounded in different philosophies and logistical realities.

White Fragility, European History, and Reader Bias

WWC has pointed out multiple times that there is only so much an author can do to coddle their readers’ biases. If white readers are upset that Europeans are shown as not the “most advanced” (as imperfect as that metric is) society on the planet, then that is their own white fragility they must work through.

European history is well-trod, often easily Googleable, and doesn’t lack advocates or nuanced representation.

Writing with Color is a blog focused on integrating non-Western, non-European, non-white perspectives into stories. Many writeblrs focusing on European/ Western oriented content often don’t even address or explore PoC settings and PoC  history. Thus, why are we, a PoC writing blog, being expected to cover both our own histories as well as those of the European societies that marginalized us with equal levels of nuance, when this expectation is not yet reciprocated by many of our peers? We invite our readers to interrogate their own defensiveness. Why do they feel the need to defend European history when a few people of color state they simply don’t find this era within Europe to be especially compelling? 

This is exactly the kind of reaction the asker seems worried would happen, and why perhaps they chose to solicit us when a blog focusing on Medieval Europe would have been a better fit (We think, again, the question was extremely vague). Yes, Europe was often better off than movies will lead you to believe, but that is comparing Europe to its media representation, advanced mostly by earlier centuries of white scholarship and white popular culture. What about comparing Europe to a literal golden age that laid much of the foundation for modern education, technology and urban planning, that many regions in Europe copied in order to recover from the upheaval that followed the fall of the Roman Empire? 

We are a writing blog for the marginalized, and you may look elsewhere for blogs that wish to deep-dive into mainstream European history if that is your priority.

WWC

They brought before me a knight in whose led an abscess had grown; and a woman afflicted with imbecility. To the knight I applied a small poultice until the abscess opened and became well; and the woman I put on diet and made her humor wet.

Then a Frankish physician came to them and said, “This man knows nothing about treating them.” He then said to the knight, “Which wouldst thou prefer, living with one leg or dying with two?” The latter replied, “Living with one leg.” The physician said, “Bring me a strong knight and a sharp axe.” A knight came with the axe. And I was standing by. Then the physician laid the leg of the patient on a block of wood and bade the knight strike his leg with the axe and chop it off at one blow. Accordingly he struck it – while I was looking on – one blow, but the leg was not severed. He dealt another blow, upon which the marrow of the leg flowed out and the patient died on the spot.

He then examined the woman and said, “This is a woman in whose head there is a devil which has possessed her. Shave off her hair.” Accordingly they shaved it off and the woman began once more to eat their ordinary diet – garlic and mustard. Her imbecility took a turn for the worse. The physician then said, “The devil has penetrated through her head.” He therefore took a razor, made a deep cruciform incision on it, peeled off the skin at the middle of the incision until the bone of the skull was exposed and rubbed it with salt. The woman also expired instantly. Thereupon I asked them whether my services were needed any longer, and when they replied in the negative I returned home, having learned of their medicine what I knew not before.[xxxiii]

RIP Thabit

is Tel Aviv the only city they’ve ever heard of?

I mean I think it's ugly and awkward, the random joined up letter and the disproportionate curve of the g look really clumsy? Why is the r like that?

problem solving steps

there was once a little boy.

he is born disabled. his body hurts, and he can’t walk properly the way the other children do. he doesn’t understand why. he’s a little boy. but he plays with wooden boats and pulls toys on a string.

somebody makes him a tunic. they sew ducks onto it in red and green and yellow and blue. the bright colours of a child.

the little boy is eight years old, and he’s going to be king now. there’s a big ceremony about it. he doesn’t really fully understand what’s going on, because he’s eight, but he wears the tunic with the brightly coloured ducks for the occasion because he loves it. look at his ducks! aren’t they great?

he is a child. the adults around him manipulate and coax him to gain more power for themselves. he still plays with toys.

as a teenager, not yet an adult, he fathers children. they do not survive. he’s not even old enough to have full agency in his job and is still being manipulated, but he had babies and they died.

he does not make it to his twenties. at eighteen or nineteen years old he dies, and is buried. his babies, so tiny, are buried with him.

and so is his tunic with the little ducks that he loved so much he kept it long after it no longer fit.

yeah i think that like. especially with historical figures in your mind people who were kings and queens or important nobles were adults. even if you know how old they were it doesn’t really click. it doesn’t seem real

but then you get something like a little tunic with brightly coloured ducks on it and it hits you like a fucking truck that this really was a little kid and no matter how far removed you are a little kid is still a little kid. their brains didn’t develop any quicker back then. he was just as developed/mature mentally as any 8 year old now. he had cartoonish animals on his clothes and he played with toy boats and probably terrorised the local cat population.

tutankhamun was a child and he didn’t make it to adulthood because he was unfortunate enough to be a very important child

his dad died when he was 8. he saw his own babies die when he was still just a boy himself.

tutankhamun had a little pair of sandals with ducks on them. he had earrings decorated with ducks. he kept those, and other items of childhood clothing. some toys. keepsakes. things he loved, and treasured. he kept them all in a little wooden chest. the chest… was carved with ducks.

and that little duck chest, filled with things he kept from his childhood, was buried with him. maybe he was keeping them for the little babies who did not make it. maybe they just reminded him of good days and fun times.

WITH PLEASURE

(greyscale makes it hard but the duck head is on the right above the toe strap. always takes me a while to find it too)

By definition you can't accidentally queerbait. Queerbaiting is specifically using a same sex pair from the show to market the show to queer audiences with no intention of ever following through on a romantic relationship.

There is officially licensed Destiel merch signed off on by Kripke. Teen Wolf had a commercial with the actors for Derek and Stiles draped over each other talking about being "on a ship." Both shows actively used scenes between them as marketing while actively mocking fans for wanting them together. Sherlock has multiple characters refer to Johnlock as a couple, including characters we're supposed to believe are never wrong about human behavior and pushed those scenes in marketing. Then they acted insulted when fans saw them as a couple.

That's queerbaiting.

Done on accident it would just be queer subtext. Done because they had no other choice due to censorship is queer coding.

The specific meaning of the word is really starting to get lost and it's a pretty important one to keep accurate. It describes a very specific phenomenon that was done repeatedly and maliciously for decades and is meant to examine that specifically.

That's just the thing though – I don't think they do. I think they think different rules apply to us. But you're right that it IS the start of the slippery slope.

The "It's just fiction it doesn't hurt anyone" reasoning doesn't work for racist stereotyping. It doesn't work for misogynistic stereotyping. It doesn't work for xenophobia. It doesn't work for demonizing mental illness. It doesn't work for queer stereoypes or erasure. And systematically acting like the parts of people on the asexual and aromantic spectrums that make them different from everyone else and excluded as a result simply do not exist or can be ignored/symbolically fixed IS erasure.

Anyone who has to face shit because of THE WAY THEY WERE BORN can be hurt by fiction invalidating their existence. It wouldn't be argued for other orientations and it shouldn't be argued for ours. There are no exceptions. And sure, there'll be bad actors who'll use that reasoning to perpetrate MORE stereotypes or try to defend genuinely harmful behaviors, but that doesn't mean our wellbeing should be thrown under the bus for the sake of convenience – or indeed even the sake of "this activates the happy neurons in my brain so I can just casually ignore any harm it can cause to a whole minority group and act like it never exists", which, granted, mankind as a whole is super-guilty of all the time, I don't think any of us is exempt from that honestly. Buuuut yeah. Idk if I'm part of the group that IS affected I sure as hell am not gonna shut up about it and be convenient, I don't think that's how it works, or how it oughta work

Anyway. I should also preface that like with exploring queer identities, or themes such as mental illness, there IS a difference between demonizing something, stereotyping something, erasing something, and exploring it with respect and nuance while DOING PROPER RESEARCH and BEING SYMPATHETIC TO WHICHEVER GROUP YOU'RE WRITING ABOUT (I think both of those go pretty much hand in hand). I don't think any of us is arguing that. But just like any endeavour for inclusion and representation, that requires work, the kind of work that it seems not many people are willing to put in. And yet, when they do, entertainment as a whole can make big strides and lead with hope for improvement for the future even if things aren't perfect as they are by a mile. We've seen it before so many times with so many minority identities and legit I don't see why aspecs should be an exception by any logic.