I’d like to take this conversation as an opportunity to discuss both Rick Riordan’s and the fandom’s treatment of Leo Valdez. I know some of the things I’ll say are easy to disagree with and a lot of people probably do which is ok, but I would appreciate anyone who reads trying to keep an open mind towards my perspective and personal experience.
For so long, I couldn’t figure out why Leo’s misogyny, flirtation, and bullying were all held over his head. These are all traits I can admit a thousand times over he has in canon. I thought of similar characters, like Piper, who was admittedly a very “pick-me” type of girl, who was stereotyped by Rick Riordan because of her Cherokee heritage, commonly written with a feather in her hair, or wielding a cornucopia as a weapon. This is just one example; and this is, so obviously, bad writing. She was so clearly a victim of her author, and as a fandom it’s really extraordinary how recognized these negative stereotypes that play into racism are. I’ve seen so much fanwork of rewrites, not necessarily removing her “pick-me” traits, but reworking them into a plausible conclusion; something Riordan never accounted for, because his own biases led him to believe that these stereotypes didn’t need a conclusion. I truly believe saying that Leo’s flaws were written with full intention is genuinely dishonest. Men being misogynistic isn’t stereotypical; but *Latino* *boys* being misogynistic is. There’s no reason to attempt to adultify a non-white minor character by calling him a man instead of a boy, there’s plenty of that already, especially in real life.
It’s hard to see that Leo is undeniably cut less slack for the same poor writing as other characters because latino stereotypes often go so unrecognized; because they’re so, so normalized. I can’t express how disheartening it is to come to the conclusion that Leo’s egregious stereotypes go unrecognized as such because so many of these readers truly think of latinos this way. I don’t want to point fingers, that isn’t what this is about, but Latino/as are so sexualized and fetishized in so many ways, *especially* teenagers. To see Leo’s flirtatious nature be so clearly the Latin Lover stereotype and another author playing into the horrendous sexualization of latino/a minors just to see people hate the character for it is indescribable; especially when you see other people allow other characters who were victims of the same author be allowed leniency. I know originally the discussion was about Will Solace, who I’m not particularly interested in. I WILL say that I think, while I believe unintentionally, leveraging extreme racism towards a character to uplift your favorite ship isn’t cool.
I’ve had the unique experience of being in the fandom for almost a decade, since I was maybe eight or nine when I began actively engaging with fandom content. I can say, so confidently, that I have seen more hate towards this character in the past 2-3 years than I did in almost 10. I don’t think it’s a stretch even a little to say that this increase in hate is inline with the current political climate regarding latinos. Consistently uprising, I’ve seen more and more News and Social Media reports and stories painting latinos as aliens, criminals, sexual criminals, anything hateable. I know it’s a little silly and someone will probably tell me that I’m reaching, and/or getting too worked up over a book character. But I want it to be known that when you’re racist to a character, it affects people in real life. It is so hard to turn off the News where everyone hates latinos, and log into your favorite fandom just to be reminded that everyone hates latinos here, too. This post isn’t specifically to stop hate towards the character, not at all, everyone is entitled to their own interpretation, but I wish so badly people would be more mindful when going about it. I don’t want bad blood with anyone I’ve replied to or disagreed with, I respect these people and like their content. I just wanted to put my perspective out there, and ask that some people be more careful and ask that some people be more careful and aware of any subconscious biases they might have before speaking on latino characters this way, especially in today's political climate.
I’ve been feeling this way for a long time, and up until recently, I struggled a lot to find the words for it. Thank you for reading this
