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Jul. 29th, 2009
Things I have been thinking about.
Jul. 29th, 2009 09:01 pmI got all posty and thoughtful a while ago about RaceFail 09, and then my posts on race and racism stopped. I haven't stopped reading, or thinking, or looking our for, or noticing. I've just run out of spoons to gather all of that into articles I can then go on to defend or explain further. I have to say more than grawr: racism=bad or grawr: racism=everywhere. I would like to discuss sci fi books still being published with protagonists who are not white, but appear misleadingly white on the cover, because 'characters of colour don't sell'. I would be able to give a brand new example. But I have no brain. I would do reviews of books I have read, but I am back to the same old white-written brain candy. I have a Books I Want To Read list, and no spoons to winnow through the list and buy the ones I could deal with reading just now.
I would discuss how Neville Shute writes of New Australians in a sympathetic way, but scrubs Aboriginal Australians from the narrative. How this is not remarkable. How Ray Mears *doesn't*, but how he is remarkable for bothering to remember that his same surviving explorer heroes were despoiling holy sites kept sacred for thousands of years. Admirable people doing terrible things. I have no links though, and no ability to hold the ideas together to explain how indigenous peoples get disappeared, treated as irrelevant, by the media and press.
I would point out yet more adverts that rest on the idea that the viewers of an advert will be white, and will view other countries as exotic and strange and their people as Not Like Us. But I have forgotten which adverts those are, other than the flash of annoyed disgust as I recognise the same old othering game being played out once more.
What I do know is that, when I get better again, when I have spoons, and a brain that can put these ideas together, I won't be short of brand new, topical, relevant examples to link to, from the news and current media. I will be able to spend a single day looking, and come up with hundreds of examples. I have no spoons now, but I haven't forgotten that those posts still need to be written. Be assured that, when I can, I will write my share. I haven't forgotten and it hasn't gone away.
I would discuss how Neville Shute writes of New Australians in a sympathetic way, but scrubs Aboriginal Australians from the narrative. How this is not remarkable. How Ray Mears *doesn't*, but how he is remarkable for bothering to remember that his same surviving explorer heroes were despoiling holy sites kept sacred for thousands of years. Admirable people doing terrible things. I have no links though, and no ability to hold the ideas together to explain how indigenous peoples get disappeared, treated as irrelevant, by the media and press.
I would point out yet more adverts that rest on the idea that the viewers of an advert will be white, and will view other countries as exotic and strange and their people as Not Like Us. But I have forgotten which adverts those are, other than the flash of annoyed disgust as I recognise the same old othering game being played out once more.
What I do know is that, when I get better again, when I have spoons, and a brain that can put these ideas together, I won't be short of brand new, topical, relevant examples to link to, from the news and current media. I will be able to spend a single day looking, and come up with hundreds of examples. I have no spoons now, but I haven't forgotten that those posts still need to be written. Be assured that, when I can, I will write my share. I haven't forgotten and it hasn't gone away.
(no subject)
Jul. 29th, 2009 10:28 pmAnd then I didn't remember or mention that it is International Blog Against Racism Week as of, I think, the 2nd of August. Find out about it. I can almost guarantee there will be some great posts.
