The Dr Speaks
Against my better judgement, I allowed myself to get dragged into the latest “is ‘Talons’ racist?” debate at Gallifrey Base. (You’d think, wouldn’t you, that this one would’ve been settled long ago and been filed away in the same drawer with “is the world a sphere?” and “is the Tomorrow People reboot bound to be shit?” but nope, apparently not.)
I won’t rehearse it here, since everyone likely to read this blog is likely to be able to imagine exactly what has been (and remains to be) said.
I just wanted to post this…
…which occured during my (increasingly and pointlessly irate) involvement. Click to make it bigger.
You know, I disagree with Phil Sandifer about a lot… but the above just made me want to hug him.
Jacob Nanfito
July 23, 2013 @ 3:21 pm
Although it's infuriating and never-ending .. it is an interesting discussion to have. It's always great to see you and Phil speaking out about it on GB. It seems to me that a lot more folks (including myself) have come around on this issue recently (and it's great to see someone like Kate Orman looking into it deeply and exposing the truth).
Not that I'm excusing the "10/10 Talon's is great!" folks — but I have to admit that I was among their ranks until relatively recently. I think it all has to do with positionality — it's hard for us (as privileged, white males)to truly recognize racism in all of its insidious forms. It's easy to say "what's the big deal?!" when you've never experienced any form of discrimination.
It wasn't until several University courses exposed me to some larger ideas, and I started reading things like this blog that I become more aware of stereotyping in popular storytelling, and the damage it does.
Hopefully, more and more folks will start to figure it out, too. Keep up the good fight, Jack!