#whiteblr

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most days, I'm glad tumblr is my only social media because it's fun and unique, and all my friends are there, but jesus christ, some days I have to have the dumbest conversations trying to convince white people on here that having OCs of colour is a good thing even if they're private, merely because brown and black people live on the same planet as them.

you're not obligated to do it, but if you want to come into comment sections complaining, you can't shut down every reasonable response because then! you are a racist idiot :)

The prompt used for this story was found on my favorite dialogue prompt account @dialouge-prompts ! The account is great so if anyone actually reads this, y’all should check that account out. 

- Admin Hope

Prompt:

“I’m calling bullshit!”

“Well hang up, then.”

A lot of people, primarily white people, have treated these discussions of honesty, acceptance of valid criticism, and racism in the writeblr community as just another phase of “drama” that would soon pass.

I’d like to tell these people that, perhaps, getting to view racism as just another bit of petty drama that they can simply wait out is indicative of white privilege. Refusing to engage with discussions of racism when you are a white person simply enables and perpetuates racism.

White people, a discussion of racism is not a storm that you hide out from underground, squeezing your eyes shut with a stockpile beside you waiting for it to pass so you can come out safely again.

A discussion of racism is rather more like a group of victims who have been terrorized by a hydra for far too long finally taking action to defeat the monster. We’ve had enough, and hell, we’d even tried talking the monster out of it, but it persists, so now it’s time for some sort of confrontation. And guess what? Even the hydra heads NOT snapping at us are still keeping the monster alive, enabling the heads that ARE doing damage to continue to do so.

Your silence does harm. Your unwillingness to speak up and defend people of color when you see racism does harm.

That’s not to say that you MUST publicly make/reblog callout posts are whatever in order to be a True White Ally™ or something. There’s several white writeblrs who, during this whole affair, reached out to me privately to show support, or sent me friendly anons, or politely asked me questions, etc. Trust me, we understand! There’s issues like anxiety that prevent us from being able to confront our friends or make public statements. Still, do what you can, and talk it over with people. At the same time, keep in mind that the discomfort of having these conversations as a white person doesn’t really match the active harm that racism does to people of color, and remember that it’s important to do your best to use your privilege for good. A little bit of discomfort is bound to arise from discussions of racism in specifics, where actual changes in behavior and decisions can happen, as opposed to the general comfort of reblogging nebulous posts about how “brown ppl are valid!!!” White people trying to do good, we don’t want you to actively harm yourself, but we really do need you to help us out.

However, I’ve seen a trend of people resolutely not talking about this stuff, where they’ll get asks about their opinions on things and say, “Oh, well, I don’t want to comment on this. Stuff like this happens all the time!” and hint at their true opinions (i.e. siding with the racist) in the tags. Well, if you’re able to make those posts, white vaguebloggers, then why not instead take a look around you, realize how whiteness dominates your community, and criticize the racism accompanying that instead? Why not try to participate when POC are facilitating open, honest discussions of racism they see within a community we both belong to?

A lot of people have talked about positivity in writeblr, and how I’m spreading hate or something. But the fact of the matter is, racism is inherently negativity. And if you guys are so concerned about creating an actually positive space, well, the discomfort or “negativity” of having conversations critical of racist actions is SUBSTANTIALLY less that the actual harm that people of color feel when they see your racism. If you think that talking about racism in specific instances is just “spreading hate and toxicity,” consider that perhaps you have a substantial amount of privilege in not being negatively harmed by the hatred of racism that has been in the writeblr community for far, far longer than I ever made a post criticizing Boo directly. Racism has driven out and discouraged writers of color looking to join this community. Stop prioritizing the comfort of racist whiteblrs over the safety of writers of color.

Please don’t treat the discussions we’ve had as a one-off thing. Just because the brunt of the discussion is over doesn’t mean people should just sit back once more and let racism happen. The only way you can truly mitigate racism is by actively fighting it. Please, do your best and make sure stuff like this doesn’t happen again. The POC of writeblr deserve better than what we’ve been getting.

Hello Anon!! Thanks for bringing this up because this is another thing that I’ve been wanting to talk about but totally forgot to because I was busy dealing with other stuff at the time.

Okay, so first off, seeing how @incandescent-creativity responded to me when she wasn’t even the one being criticized (it was during the whole Boo thing) she.....clearly does not care about women of color like myself. This is the reply she left on my post about Boo, and my response to aforementioned reply: http://lilquill.tumblr.com/post/180912650978/incandescent-creativity-replied-to-your-post. And it’s just.....really fucking racist lol and REEKS of white entitlement. Her attitudes towards other people asking about the all-white cast (screenshotted and linked in that post) also just show total apathy towards people of color. She also displayed Really Fucking Bad white fragility when Osie criticized her, shown in this post where Osie has screenshots: https://owlsofstarlight.tumblr.com/post/181388687146/ok-so-if-youve-follow-me-you-should-probably-be. (And this post once again plays into the whole “Oh well Sakshi why weren’t you nice to Boo??” thing because, well, this is how these people respond when you’re nice to them because they just don’t fucking care lol. The entire point is, other people HAVE tried being nice, and these assholes just don’t care AT ALL.) @incandescent-creativity literally got feedback from me about her all-white cast (like I responded to an anon saying that she could literally just have side characters who are poc, it’s literally that easy) and just....ignored it I guess! She deleted her reply, didn’t apologize for being racist to me, and blocked me! Like, she’s proven that she cares more about her own comfort than the well-being of poc. So, sure, she’s writing women of color, but she responds Like This when she gets feedback from women of color, so those WIPs sure are gonna end up a dumpster fire lol!

Also, as for her having woc as protagonists? Having a couple token protagonists doesn’t just.....mean you’re not racist. The fact that this is how she responds when addressing racism tells me more about her view of poc than the fact that she’s writing a couple woc.

Also, I haven’t even really addressed her racism, specifically related to the way she talks about her racist white woman antagonist. I’m going to write that post soon but I’m holding off because it pisses me off SO MUCH and is so genuinely upsetting to me in her apathy that I like....get too mad to finish writing it. (And this is also what I mean when I weigh the impact of racism on poc vs white people, by the way. Being around racism is actually deeply more harmful to poc than to white people. This is how we end up with such a white space here in writeblr, and this is why that little cluster of whiteblrs is......like that.)

Also, as a South Asian woman myself, I take issue with the way incandescent-creativity writes her South Asian woman protagonist. Here’s a post that really defines my feelings about this:

Right, so, she basically has a sad :( brown girl learn how to be happy!! :D through this white boy. I’m really very...hmmm....at this white boy talking to a woc when she literally thinks her family is dead. Like, culturally speaking, family tends to be more important to South Asian people than white people, and also especially when you’re a diaspora kid, family is the way you connect with your culture, so it’s extra traumatic. But, it’s okay! Because this white boy can totally reassure her out of it! And also, I really...dislike the way that the perspective of the woc is just a lens to fawn over this white boy with. Like it strongly comes off to me that she really likes this white boy more than her woc. You can say I’m overanalyzing or whatever, but my intuition is giving me Bad Vibes based on this lil excerpt and also IC’s behavior in response to a woc (me) criticizing her, so there! Let’s see if she takes that feedback. So, Elizabeth, if you’re reading this (and I’m sure it’ll find its way to you somehow), please take a nice, good, long, hard look at the way you write about poc.

(And that wasn’t even something I was planning on addressing in the bigger issue with how incandescent-creativity treats racism, but, there ya go.)

And also having a couple woc in her work doesn’t excuse the overwhelming whiteness present in both the way she talks about these characters and also....the rest of her casts. And also the way she treats racism and eugenics in her SOLE project is really deeply dehumanizing and bad.

Listen, there are plenty of authors who have very white casts and then learn to grow. Rick Riordan comes to mind; the original Percy Jackson series had a pretty white cast, for instance. And did people of color point this out? You bet! And what did he do? He actually apologized and WORKED HARDER TO INCORPORATE POC IN HIS WORK. Hell, he even started a thing to promote authors of color. THAT’S what actual allyship and a genuine response to criticism looks like. And even then? Rick didn’t pull this shit where he randomly used racism as a plot device to justify his own overwhelmingly white cast; he acknowledged that he could do better and DID. So, Elizabeth, take notes and DO BETTER. Because you DON’T support writers of color, you DON’T listen to poc when we’re trying to talk to you, and you DON’T work on self-improvement to acknowledge your own privilege and work towards equality.

Thank you for sending me this, anon. I’m glad you’re coming to me and asking good, interesting, genuine questions to hear me out. At the same time, I’d like to ask if you’re also talking to the whiteblrs behind this stuff alongside sending me this ask; even if you thought some of my stuff is unfounded, you must agree that that’s less bad than the ableism and abuse apologism and racism in Elizabeth’s work, as pointed out in @owlsofstarlight‘s post. (This isn’t an accusation against you, of course! You’re anonymous so I have no idea who you are, but I would like to point out that the actual shit Elizabeth is pulling is a LOT worse and more harmful and “negative” than whatever I’m doing.)

Also, I can't get your tags to work. White fragility came up but not tone policing. Is it something I should do from a a desktop? Thanks!

@katekarl http://lilquill.tumblr.com/tagged/tone%20policing so yeah, desktop.

What? Should people maybe also write your entire wip for you as well? Also? 

I ... wow. Y’all are preaching about being all open to criticism and shit and reblog moodboards with brown ppl and resources about writing diversity and yet your cattiness and defensiveness betrays your true feelings.