Oh my fucking goodness it is 8AM in the morning and I am already crashing out over some people in this fandom
(This isnāt targeted in any way btw and applies to all fandoms actually, itās just what I think)
I woke up today to some jaw-droppingly gorgeous SOTR fanart on Instagram and it practically made my day. The illustrations were completely based on the books(as much as I adore the movie cast, I love me some book-based fanworks too) and a lot were similar to how I imagined them in the books. HOWEVER, what ruined my day were the comments. I honestly think I should stop opening comment sections on Instagram atp :D Literally 70% of the commentsāinstead of praising the skill and effort and amount of time it must have taken for the artistāwere āwhy are they whiteā and āracistā and āew.ā
And I just had to sit with that for a moment
Number one, basic empathy. The artist took their time to make that work and post it for you to enjoy, and if you didnāt enjoy it, then thatās not on you nor the artist, just look at it and move the fuck on. I donāt know how anyone can lack enough empathy to comment something like ādisgustingā with no explanation at all on something that probably means the world to someone else. And I can tell that many of those comments werenāt from artists or creators, because in what world would you want to have a comment like that on something YOU created?
Number two, people interpret things differently. Now I wonāt get specific because I donāt want to put the artist in a spot nor the commenters, but if you interpreted a character as black, GREAT. Thatās wonderful, youāre not wrong, and you stick to that vision when you read. If you interpreted them as any other race, also GREAT. Youāre not wrong, either, unless it was stated obviously in the book. Now, of course if a characterās race extremely implied, and you choose to ignore that to change the characterās race, then thatās would be disrespecting both the character and the authorās choice, and yes, in most cases that would be classified as being racist. Listen, this is all just my opinion, and I honestly think that there was nothing wrong with the way the artist decided to portray the characters, itās not as if they made LD deathly pale or Burdock blond(honestly in my opinion they werenāt even white in the art but maybe Iām just blind idk apparently I am). But if you think the artistās interpretation was wrong, thatās also fine, which brings me to
Number three, LEAVE THEM THE FUCK ALONE. It is seriously not that hard to scroll past. āOh but by posting on social media they subject themselves to both compliments and criticismā yea so thatās actually called basic human decency and look if you want to criticize the art thatās honestly fine just donāt do it in a destructive way that leaves absolutely nothing for the artist. āBut itās racism and needs to be called outā Itās not racism because racism is discriminating by race. How do you know that the artist didnāt draw other races in the past? Did you care to actually look into the artist before labeling them with a terrible accusation? Again, being vague, if we donāt get much about the character, itās okay to assume their race. What else are we supposed to do? And itās art. Not saying that itās completely okay, but if the artistās interpretation wants to draw characters in a specific race when their ethnicity is not stated in canon, itās their preference. And if you want to have more representation with those characters, then great make your own fanart and share it. Literally nothing is stopping you.
And if anyone is thinking āoh youāre saying that just because youāre whiteā or some shitāIām Asian, and(not trying to put down other ethnicities or creators Iām just providing an example) I think we donāt get much representation in this fandom(which is no oneās fault btw) and I totally see why. My point is that Iām not being bigoted, this is a completely just opinion from my perspective but ofc Iād love to hear yours if youāre being respectful about it
YES representation is important, but so is empathy!!