Hey gang, can we recenter Lasan as an atrocity that happened to ZEB instead of a regret that KAALLUS gets to feel bad about??
There is obviously room for nuanced conversation about how each of them interact with the Massacre of Lasan post Kallus' defection / post Lira San move, but it is-- quite frankly-- not only tired but deeply disheartening and downright IRRITATING to read posts that forego ALL of that nuance in order to use Lasan as leverage to give Kallus an excuse to wallow in his own pity. I find it very unsettling to read or see things that imply that Zeb is "over Lasan," or "fully healed," because that is such an unfortunate mirror to how actual minorities in the real world are expected to CONSTANTLY be the bigger person and just "get over" their historical and continued oppression.
I dont want to make it sound like Im trying to be The Kalluzeb Police, but I think that conversations revolving around Lasan should be far more centered on the person who's life was stripped away, as opposed to the person who had to atone for it, just as I think those conversations should be centered in real life. I find it deeply tonedeaf to imply that Lasan was an atrocity that Zeb, a character coded to be anything BUT white, would be able to "get over," ESPECIALLY when there are global conflicts taking place-- currently, right now, in the modern day-- that ARE destroying peoples homes, livlihoods, and lives. With that, I double dislike when that "Zeb is over it" rhetoric is used to create a scenario where Kallus' feelings about Lasan are ALSO boiled down, and are made into something akin to white guilt that he ends up coddled by Zeb for having.
AGAIN, I dont want to sound like I am trying to be like Holier Than Thou, cause I'm really not trying to be, like I want all of us to be able to have fun playing with our dolls. With that, i want to make it clearly obvious that I understand that Zeb and Kallus are not real people who we can like genuinely offend, but I want to point out that they exist as allorgories for real people, and real atrocities. Again, play with your dolls, have fun, that's what fandom is for! Its just that sometimes when your dolls are addressing atrocities that happen in the real world to indiginous communities and people of color, its important to remember that nothing exists in a vaccuum, and the ways in which we talk about these characters and their experiences with war, trauma, and loss are going to be a reflection of how we are perceiving the world around us.
Im sorry, but the idea that Zeb is "over" Lasan, an event that ripped his entire life away from him, while Kallus is not? I dont think that's a fair assessment to apply to either of their characters, and I think its equally-- if not moreso-- unfair to any people of color who interact with this community to be put in a space where Zeb is being written to "get over it" for a white mans sake.
I just think it's point blank WEIRD to be centering a man who participated in a genocide rather than the man who survived it.
blakekathryn
tangentwithtanner
