Hiii I keep seeing this one person on tiktok saying nightwing being romani is inherently racist (and it seems like maybe youβve seen them too π). I understand the arguments I see over how itβs written or if heβs white/POC or any other kind of nuanced stuff like that, but theyβre not even saying that, theyβre saying that at its core the retcon is racist bc itβs a stereotype. Iβve seen and enjoyed a lot of your posts about this topic but I was curious if you think this personβs opinion is valid/how you would counter it. Sorry if youβve answered this kind of question before and I havent seen it!
Yeah, Iβve definitely seen themβ¦
Spoiler: this is gonna be a vent/rant post lol
Part of me really wants to just reply to their videos with one of my own* and just stand there like π§ββοΈβhi.β Because, surprise, I am a Showman β my entire cultural identity is literally just defined as being a gypsy/traveller from the fairground/circus. Please, oh omniscient Tiktoker who isnβt even part of our closed culture, tell me all about how my very existence and the existence of the 20,000 other Showmen in the UK alone is nothing but a racist stereotype.
Maybe that sounds harsh, but it is something which does really annoy me. Our culture is closed, and as such, this information is not freely available, so it does make me question why people with no real tangible connection to our culture feel qualified to comment so definitively on the issue.
Iβm not saying that the representation of Dickβs heritage in canon or in fandom has been perfect. There definitely are times in which certain writers fall back or rely on racist tropes or caricatures in their writing (I hesitate to say βespecially Graysonβ, since Dickβs heritage is a lot more central to her storytelling than subsequent runs, so thereβs gonna be more opportunity to slip up. Generally, I enjoy her run). Similarly, as Iβve posted about before, there are also many in the fandom who have, even if well intentioned, fallen back on racist stereotypes, ironically, in an attempt to undo racist stereotypes. And, yeah, these examples can and should be called out and discussed (especially with the input of someone who is GRT, ideally), but as someone who is ethnically Romani, who grew up speaking the language and part of the culture, on the fairgrounds myself with my family in the circus, the idea that Dickβs heritage, even if it is a retcon, is racist is, simply, absolutely ludicrous to me because it is my lived experience! You canβt βsounds fake but okβ my literal life story, lol.
Also: something I find really common in those types of TikTok posts is discussion of what % Romani heritage Dick hasβ¦ which 1) is a very American perception of race which really weirds out my European mind, and 2) seems WAY more racist than the supposed racism they claim to be against. So many of these posts/comments try to claim that Dick is βonly 1/4 Romaniβ and therefore it doesnβt matter at all, which feels very much like theyβre trying to preserve their perfect WASPy gorja boy, which feels dodgy to me lol. My response here would be that I truly donβt know where theyβre getting that information from in current canon. I presume it comes from a mix of pre-Flashpoint John Grayson being Romani, uses of phrases like βRomani heritageβ in canon, the idea that Mary was a dental assistant (and thus could never be Romani because we all know that Romani people canβt have any job other than *checks notes* circus performer, fortune teller, Esmerelda, or thief), and William Cobb as Dickβs great-grandfather. And whilst I could argue that, since Rebirth, we could argue that Dick could be 7/8 Romani (if we consider βeverythingβs canonβ and thus Johnβs dad could be a diddakoi, since who is to say if Cobb is Romani or not, and Mary is commonly presented as Romani across multiple runs), I wonβt bother to argue that, because Iβd much rather say that unless youβre a real fan of the Nuremberg Laws, it doesnβt even fucking matter what % Romani he is. Iβve got a cousin who is, ethnically, 3/4 Romani and who grew up on the fairgrounds and is fully in the culture β her mum remarried a gorja man, and so my cousinβs half-siblings are only ethnically 1/4 Romani, and guess what β it doesnβt fucking matter; they are, in the eyes of everyone in the culture, Romani kids who grew up in the culture, speak the language, grew up on fairgrounds, etc etc. So if itβs good enough for us, why is it not good enough for random gorjas on the internet?
I also want to point out that I also donβt view the fact that itβs a retcon as being a bad thing. Even if youβre somehow a continuity purist and think this came out of nowhere, I think itβs totally possible to read a Romani/Showman background into Dickβs character, pre-Grayson. Many of Dickβs core personality traits are the type of beliefs which parents in our culture set out to instil into their kids, and the fact that itβs never brought up before also isnβt a big deal, because, tbh, I donβt really have much reason to talk about my ethnicity in such explicit terms in my real life, either. I personally love the fact that Grayson retconned this in, and that itβs gradually become more accepted in subsequent runs, because 1) I donβt think itβs too stereotypical, I think itβs believable, 2) rep is rep, and itβs not something we get a lot of (especially in a positive light), 3) even if she didnβt always get it right, Grayson tried! (Honestly, I think a lot of the fandomβs handling of Dickβs ethnicity is a lot more problematic than what we see in Graysonβs writing).
This ended up being way longer (and perhaps passive-aggressive lol) than I intended, but TLDR: even if Dick being a gypsy from the circus is stereotypical, that doesnβt mean itβs wrong, because there are plenty of us for whom that is our exact experience (such as myself!). In fact, I would even argue that the hoops in which these people go through in order to argue that Dick being Romani is racist is often even more racist than the thing theyβre arguing against itself! Anyway, you can pry Romani Dick Grayson from my cold, dead hands lol
*I wonβt, because I donβt like being on camera anyway, but especially not since I work with kids.
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