It's Not That Men Can't Express Emotion But That They're Discouraged From Expressing Emotions Deemed

i can’t believe goli0n baptized akira/shiro in pure light and no one else

in other news, i designed bikinis up to a 5xl (~:

lashaunae.com

Your Meta has Meta

a response to the “canon did it first” excuse for racism

Whenever someone points out that certain metas/fics/headcanons have racist implications, the overwhelming response tends to be that it can’t actually be the product of racial bias—because it’s just “canon.” After all, if a character really is cruel, petty, or abusive in the source material, how can Fandom be held responsible for writing them in character?

On the surface, this can seem like a perfectly good argument—except that it completely sidesteps the actual implications.

Consider, for example, the following interpretations (all from real metas):

Finn from Star Wars is a predator—he’s obsessed with Rey.

Scott from Teen Wolf is a rapist—he attacked Derek.

MJ from the MCU is a fake MJ who should be replaced—her hair colour is wrong & she’s mean.

Iris from The Flash is a b*tch who should be killed off—she’s useless & whiny.

Each of these statements could be explored at length for the bad faith readings that they are, but for the purposes of this meta, let’s assume they are all correct.

What would be the implications of that?

If Finn, the first Black character with a leading role in a Star Wars film, is a sexual predator towards a white woman—a trope that has a horrific, racist history—why then is the meta using that discovery to explain why the white fave is superior, instead of a furious exposé on Disney’s racist depiction of a Black man?

If Scott, one of the few heroic Latino leads on US television, is a rapist and secretly the villain—when only 3% of all leading roles go to Latino men, as opposed to 22% of all Latino roles being related to crime—why then is the meta using that to elevate three white male faves, instead of calling MTV out for its bait and switch? Why is it not righteously angry at yet another racist depiction of a Latino character?

If Michelle, a mixed Black woman in the role of the most iconic superhero love interest of all time, is just a fake MJ and not the “real” love interest—when Black women are already relegated to less than 4% of all speaking roles in film, never mind the rarity of playing a romantic lead—why then is the meta focused on getting a “real” (white) MJ to take over her position, instead of pushing Disney to make her status as MJ as explicit as possible?

If Iris, one of the few Black women in a lead role on network television, is a b*tch who’s useless and whiny—when Black women are consistently over disciplined for being seen as louder/more disruptive than their peers—why does the meta choose to solve this by murdering Iris, instead of petitioning the writing staff to stop leaning into racist tropes?

This is only a sampling of popular metas—and only a few of the endgame conclusions that have to result—but the point is that the racism is not a bug; it’s a feature. If they were actually true, it would make the source material so reprehensible as to make supporting it unconscionable—but that’s not what they’re used for. Instead, time and time again, they’re just used to push the COC out of their own narratives.

If a meta wants to claim it cannot be racist because it’s simply restating what canon did, then it must consider whether or not that makes canon also racist. And if it does—what does it want to say about that? Is the meta going to continue that racist pattern? Call out the creators for their stereotyping? Create additional metas and fics to attempt to address the revealed problem?

And denying that—if none of those options seem tenable—then maybe the correct response is to question whether the original meta was all that accurate to begin with.

dead man walking

But it cuts so deep and it hurts so hard

and I cannot stop the stars that fall

quick mermay drawing before the month ends!

some would say the priest being the sole survivor of the shipwreck is an act of god but maybe its others who have taken a liking in him

pull my little ribs around you

Xe…ha…nort

Here’s the transcript of the explanation from episode 7.03: Lance: Wow, a lot of things have really changed over the past few weeks. Acxa: “Weeks”? What are you talking about? Allura: The last time we saw you. You were fighting us alongside Lotor. Acxa: That was three deca-phoebs ago. No one has seen you since your fight with Lotor. Keith: That’s impossible. Acxa: It’s true. After Lotor jettisoned us, we managed to make it to cover on a meteoroid. There we saw both Voltron and Lotor disappear. Eventually Voltron re-emerged… alone. But then there was an explosion and after that… nothing. That was three-deca-phoebs ago. Lance: Whoa. Allura: So, as far as everyone else in the universe is concerned, Voltron has been gone for three deca-phoebs? Pidge: That explains the discrepancies in the star charts in our Lions. I thought they were off because of our inter-dimensional jumping, which I guess they were, in a way. Because when you think about it, that must have been the cause of the time slippage between our experience and that of the rest of the universe.

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