#ethnocentrism

Ahh Jaysus lads here we go again. No Irish need apply to the Ivies or something.

God forbid a Slav do anything near a land-grant school.

"brown" is usually used in reference to Northern Africans, Middle easterner, southern Asians and Latin americans.

But all these people have a diverse set of skin tones. A diverse culture. A diverse set of language. A diverse set of history and lineage.

Speaking as a latino, we are racially diverse, our ancestry usually comes from Spain, Portugal, Africa, and south/central American indigenous people. But there are also Asian heritage and even a good portion of Jewish heritage. In latin america we don't define race or ethnicity or nationality the same way many western nations do. Instead if you were born here to citizens you are said cultural. I have met a Brazilian who's parents were Germans and became citizens he was a Brazil citizen and only identified as Brazil and spoke Portuguese. Is he brown??????? Despite being indistinguishable from a white American as long as you didn't hear him talk and know nothing about his culture.

The Dean looked at some sketches he'd made on a rock.

"How hard can it be to build a boat?" he said. "People with bones in their noses build boats. And we are the end product of thousands of years of enlightenment. Building a boat is not beyond men like us, Senior Wrangler."

"Quite, Dean."

"All we have to do is search this island until we find a book with a title like Practical Boat-Building for Beginners."

"Exactly. It'll be plain sailing after that, Dean. Ahaha."

so we've got Marius, this man whose entire identity is tied to inbuilt structures of ethnic supremacy, spending literally thousands of years in a toxic mommy-issues relationship with Akasha, a queen from an ethnicity he's historically programmed to look down upon. Marius clearly worships her but he violent denies this worship, battering and temporarily abandoning Bianca during an argument on the subject. besides basic shame about abandoning his proudly held atheism (itself not specifically ethnicity-based consider his lack of belief in Roman gods), it would be logical for these issues to be amplified by his not wanting to admit he's spent most of his immortal life worshipping a woman of "lesser" racial origins, especially one who won't give him the time of day.

Furthermore, she stands in for his own "barbarian" Keltoi mother, reflecting both Marius's own desire for that lost part of himself and his internalized ethnic hatreds. this also ties into his possessiveness of her: Marius's determination not to share Akasha with anyone stems from a mix of justified paranoia about her falling into the wrong hands, a desire to maintain his control over vampire knowledge, his apparent viewing her as an exotic trophy he wants to keep for himself, and his likely self-loathing at falling for such an "exotic" system of faith so completely.

of course of all this comes back to Amadeo, who is in every universe a kind of anti-Akasha (same way show!Antoinette was picked by Lestat for her role as an anti-Louis, meant to fulfill a perceived flaw in the primary partner). Marius seesaws a lot on this, but he originally picks Amadeo as a blank slate to carve into the perfect vampire, as opposed to Akasha whose "blank slate" nature renders her unapproachable and ultimately beyond Marius's control. if we're continuing with my hc about the way race operates in marikasha's relationship, then this would be Marius attempting (subconsciously ofc he's obviously not laying it for himself this explicitly) to find someone of a "lesser ethnicity" to sculpt into a proper vampire; i.e. someone who listens to him and responds to his orders, something Akasha never does. Both versions of Amadeo's fit the bill of a lesser ethnicity in Marius's eyes, although showmadeo's Desi origins are a more explicit representation of this than bookmadeo's Slavic ones. by controlling/creating him, I could easily see Marius trying to correct whatever balance in the ethnic structure he's created by worshipping a vampire woman of color.

moving into show territory (and thus more explicitly headcanon-based), I'm haunted by the line "worshipful mercy" and the apparent contradiction in Marius openly worshipping a brown boy after so long denying his worship for a woman of color. But of course what Marius is looking for is a solution to his shameful worship of Akasha so consider: Amadeo as an anti-Akasha who can be safely defiled and brutalized, who can be shared with others as Marius would never dare to share Akasha, who can soak up the violence Marius directs at him as Akasha never did.

when I look at shit like the adoration of the shepherds, I see Marius using the work of others (and possibly his own, but using others for this level of "worship" might be more effective) to render Amadeo as pale, pliable, and in service as a greater mythology as Marius quietly wishes he could render Akasha pale, pliable, and in service of (his) greater mythology. in the process, of course, he plants the seeds of internalized racism that are nourished by the CoD and lead to Armand wielding white supremacy against other poc, perpetuating the racial stratification that has shaped Marius's whole life.

I'm hoping that the writers of amc's iwtv are taking all of these possibilities into account when writing Marius/Akasha's relationship, which I personally consider one of the most pivotal bonds of the entire tvc universe and any universe that stems from it. like I said, the racial aspects here were never explicitly Anne's focus, but she was clearly chasing some kind of vibe with Akasha's non-Western origins clashing with Marius's endless fixation on Western philosophy, and I hope we'll finally get the opportunity to confront what that really means in full.

Like, no, I don’t actually think this is the worst country of all time forever, i think history is complicated and nuanced actually. Like yeah, we did do bad things, as has ever other country. We are still doing bad things we need to push against, as is every other country.

To presume America is uniquely bad not only gives an excuse to not try and push back against evil, but gives an excuse to be blind to the atrocities other countries are committing under the guise of “anything is better then america” like no. Incorrect. I think its horrific that china is doing ethnic cleansings and I hate ICE, two things can be true.

Our evil is not uniquely evil, or some inherent american flaw of ethics not present outside of the states. You cannot blame the entire world’s suffering on one country without an inherent belief about that country being somehow more special and unique and powerful then every other country combined. The states certainly arent blameless for a lot of things, but that doesn’t mean we’re the only thing to blame.

Its still ethnocentric to go “any country not this specific one is incapable of having the power or intelligence to do immoral acts without it being 100% a result of my own country’s actions” you still believe that a a specific country is the center of the world and most powerful figure imaginable.

Conversation with a coworker from a bit ago that won't leave my head