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angel-is-not-creative · 1 year

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Hetalia

I cannot rate this with a good conscience ❤

I have autism and Hetalia is my special interest so this is literally 3k words long and I have absolutely no regrets. I could have gone on longer but I wanted to remain relevant to the class. If you don't reply to me I will cry.

I'm gonna break this into a few sections so you can skip around. I'm going to try and stick to just season 1 with this discussion, which won't be too hard cause it's the most insane one. Also, I just want to say that I wrote this all before I read the attached article and I'm now seeing that I literally could have written that article because I know everything about Hetalia.

When do we cross the line between stereotyping and just straight-up racism?

Hey, why are we idolizing WWII Germany?

Oh, we are portraying war as silly and funny, okay cool.

Is this Japanese Nationalism? (a surprisingly controversial argument)

The Sub and the Dub are 2 totally different shows

The Fandom (and linking back to other class-related terms)

Okay I'll name one good thing

Alright, let's get started.

A lot of people will argue that Hetalia is not racist at all because they are making fun of everyone. If you are portraying all of the countries as their most common stereotypes then it evens out in the end. I would argue that this is in fact, not the case. Especially when you set your show during WWII. I will give Himaruya credit in that he mostly focuses on European countries to make fun of, making a lot of the stereotypes less so targeted at minorities. However, a lot of these jokes are still highly insensitive and frame some countries in a worse light than others

Just look at the difference between how Northern Italy is portrayed as opposed to Germany or Japan. Or how France is a predator, Belarus is into her literal brother, and Spain is seen as a creep. It is often times mocking an entire country's intelligence, appearance, or personality. While it is not always that serious, it does lead me to the second point.

When you personify a country and mock it, you aren't just mocking a piece of land, you are mocking an entire population of people. These jokes may seem harmless but they can still be hurtful. While I don't believe that liking Hetalia translates to your actual views on world events, it can unconsciously impact your real-life thoughts and behaviors.

(also why does Britain see imaginary magical creatures, what is that referencing? According to the wiki, it is some popular folklore story of a rabbit who lives on the moon but like.. what? If Himaruya was doing this much research into these countries' cultural backgrounds why is he portraying them like this?)

This show portrays WWII Germany in too positive of a light for my liking. I've noticed a trend in anime where they seem to love Germany (or Germanic aesthetics) a lot (AOT I'm looking at you). Now I'm not well-versed in the interpersonal relationships between Japan and Germany, but the idolization is not it. The way that Japan in this show is portrayed as being literally obsessed with Germany is the biggest example (Italy is also shown having an immense appreciation for Germany and is often gushing about his positive qualities, even writing him a song while he was being kept prisoner). But I mean look at how Germany is portrayed, even his stereotypes are mostly positive, he is hardworking but helps out his fellow allies, makes great food, and is super strong. His only negative trait is that he sometimes doesn't understand social scenarios and that makes him very awkward. However, he will always go out of his way to try and better understand his friends (like Italy) by purchasing books to try and help him learn the appropriate way to act in scenarios).

This is 10x worse in the dub but we will get there. When one of your main characters, the one you are portraying in the best light, is a literal war criminal hot anime boy, you can understand why I would be concerned. I mean they gave him the whole blonde hair blue eyed appearance like come on. Now I'm not going to go into depth on fandom or anything here but Hetalia knows that its demographic is young tweens (primarily girls) so how can you be surprised when this portrayal of Germany leads to WWII fanfics sympathizing with Germany and 14 y/o girls in German military uniforms doing questionable things. (also Germany becomes a canonically gay character in Hetalia in like season 4 or something and that just makes me so mad, like yeah, of course, the gay character is WWII Germany that so cool) (okay, I would like to clarify that technically Sweden is the only confirmed gay character. Sweden is bad representation though because he has one-sided feelings for Finland and makes him uncomfortable by constantly referring to him as his wife)

I mean yeah, obviously this isn't going to be an accurate portrayal of history but some of this is just totally misinformation.

Austria invading Germany is literally just Austria annoying him in his house for a really long time. But also there's like actual wars... and like all of the events of WWI are canon... and like there are some really serious episodes

Also, we literally see a bunch of countries going to war personally, like fighting on the frontlines. Which to me confirms that these people are all literal murderers, like mass murderers lowkey.

Do you know how many weird USSR jokes there are throughout this? So many. Lithuania is pretty much just in a running gag where he keeps getting manipulated by Russia into coming back to live with him. (Yeah, there are so many USSR fics as well).

ALSO! why is the American revolution portrayed as the saddest thing to happen thus far, the storyline is stretched out from episodes 16-20 and it is all drastically different from the tone of the rest of the show. Britain is literally on his knees crying saying that he can't shoot America (which also implies these countries can physically harm/kill each other). Like that is the war you wanted to make all sad and sentimental? Why? Is this how Japanese people think that we view the Revolutionary war? Because that is a pretty inaccurate view.

Anyways back to the original point. Some historical events should not be played for laughs sometimes. It is incredibly disrespectful for actual victims of these tragedies to portray these events as funny or goofy.

Though I will give credit because Himaruya does make all sides of the war look like idiots who have no clue what they are doing, which is a sentiment I can get behind.

As a both non-Japanese and non-Korean person I can not really give my opinion on this however I can share with you both sides of the argument. This is mostly in relation to the original comic strip, but has some relevance to the anime as well. I just wanted to bring it up because it is interesting to me. (This is briefly mentioned in the article but I wanted to expand on the argument).

You may or may not have noticed that there is no South Korea character in this show, however, there was in the original comic. In the comics, South Korea is a pervert who is constantly touching Japan and he also takes credit for the inventions of other countries. Now I'm obviously not going to go into the past history of these 2 countries because that would be incredibly long but the South Korean National Assembly reviewed Hetalia and determined that it was a "crime against South Koreans, akin to slander". So yeah, South Korean people were not happy with this portrayal and the character was inevitably removed from the anime before release. (This is a real picture of the South Korean National Assembly reviewed Hetalia, the corner shows South Korea groping Japan inappropriately)

There are two opposing views to the Japanese Nationalism take and I'll link them both (Belittling Japanese Nationalism Hetalia: Axis Powers is the title of the first one)

The first one pretty much argues that Hetalis is not Japanese nationalism because it paints Japan in just as negative of a light as all of the other countries, no one is left out of being made fun of. Japan is seen as socially awkward, emotionally repressed, and obsequious.

The second argues that Japan is often shown to be more intelligent than other characters as well as often being of the voice of reason (especially compared to China) and most of his negative attributes are not nearly as harmful as some others in Japan’s case, even his “negative” stereotypes are inoffensive, as they pose no threat of meiwaku.

I think we see in the dub that Americans are a little more willing to make fun of themselves. Though there are a few good Japan self digs, like the capitalism joke in one of the first episodes.

Oh boy I've been waiting for this.

The dub is 10x more offensive than the sub. Most people consider it a crack dub.

So many of the jokes are rewritten that it is practically a different show. The sub is from a Japanese perspective and the dub is from an American perspective.

First of all the accents in the dub are so bad like it is actually atrocious. Japan is really annoying because not only is his voice stereotypical but he always says 'nani?' instead of 'what?' as if that is a normal thing that people do. The narrator is the best part of the dub and she is hilarious.

So I don't really feel comfortable even typing out the jokes here so if you want to hear them I included the time stamps for the three nazi jokes I remember in season 1 (the last two being worse).

Episode 1 (1:35:1:38)

Episode 7 (2:13-2:19)

Episode 48 (1:28-1:31)

Those are just a few examples and it gets worse. The dub literally had no reason to include these jokes because there is not even an insinuation of them in the sub and it makes literally everything a million times worse.

I will give the dub some credit for being so utterly ridiculous that it's funny. I will provide a few timestamps for the funniest jokes that only appear in the dub from the first 19 episodes (but I really recommend looking up Hetalia dub funny moments on youtube because some of them are really priceless):

Episode 13: (1:45-2:05)

Episode 14: (1:12-1:22)

Episode 17: (0:59-1:15) (2:06-2:11)

Now I've had this post typed up for a bit and originally I wasn't going to talk about the fandom but after reading the article that he assigned (and going through the fandom unit), I see that there is a lot of reference to fandom in particular so I want to at least mention it.

Not the 2 biggest problems with the Hetalia fandom are racism and the fetishization of gay men.

As mentioned in the article, there have actually been multiple fan incidents of them dressing up in WWII German military uniforms Germany/Prussia cosplay, and standing in front of temples with fake guns or doing nazi salutes in convention photos (If we want to bring racism and fetishization of gay men together there were two people who kissed in a holocaust memorial museum in Italy and Germany cosplay... there is no picture of this so it might be a rumor but it was well-known so it is worth mentioning). There were also a lot of people using imperialist Japan flags in cosplay/fanart and writing incredibly inappropriate fanfiction about real-life events.

If you would like to see any of these incidents feel free to look up "Hetalia the Boston Incident" I don't really wanna include the photos here.

The fetishization is not unique to the Hetalia fandom, but it is amplified to the max. Obviously, within Hetalia, there are almost no female characters, so this leaves only male characters to be shipped with one another. Now suddenly Germany is an uwu gay bean and not an actual war criminal. At the moment of writing this Hetalia has 32105 M/M fics on ao3 which is only one of the three fanfiction sites, with ao3 not even becoming popularized until after the peak of the Hetalia fandom. (the most popular ship being America/England who refer to each other as brothers in the show as England raised America, showing another problematic part of the fandom). I would argue that Hetalia has one of the gayest fandoms (My Hero Academia is giving it a run for its money though) and I agree with the article that it is inaccurate to say that this is only done by straight cis women. The fact of the matter is a lot of queer teens used Hetalia as an outlet to express their own sexuality through these characters. The straight women that do fetishize BL are likely only doing so because anime creators suck at writing good female characters.

I think that the "level of gayness" turns straight fans away from watching the show (again MHA is the same way today) as it is hard to interact with the fandom without seeing some yaoi content. However, many people view this as something wrong or cringy, when in reality it is a normal part of fandom culture. When gay people have such little content that is actually gay, you cannot blame us for creating our own through characters that we like/relate to. Again, I think the only issues that arise here are the problematic ships that give young people a bad impression of relationships (abusive, incest, pedophilia, etc) or the arguable problematic ones like China/Russia or Lithuania/Russia as again these are real countries with real political relations. (However, I will never forget the time that there was Russia/China fanart on the news, maybe they approve and I shouldn't be complaining)

The thing is, Hetalia only seems so bad because the fandom is so large and so young. A lot of shows have fandoms that sexualize the characters and have kinda problematic fans, but the sheer volume makes things seem worse. This is something that we covered when we watched Genshiken, but there is a lot of negative stigma behind this fandom in particular, but it is just a loud minority that gets a lot of news coverage between fandoms.

It also raises the question "Is a show responsible for the response of its fans?"

Because while Himaruya has no control over what people do with his characters or how they interpret a plot, if a majority of people are leaving your show spouting vaguely racist rhetoric and interpreting your show one way, isn't there some validity in that interpretation? I think a creator has to be aware of their audience, which in this case is a very young and impressionable audience who might not understand how offensive some of the things they are doing really are. They don't hold the same ability to separate fiction from reality.

That being said Hetalia had a large impact on fandom culture as a whole, largely starting things like 'ask a character' panels (along with like homestuck but we don't talk about her). If you go to any convention you will probably find a Hetalia cosplayer, and if you watch any dub there is probably a voice actor from Hetalia there.

I also want to mention Hetalia is also a fandom full of cultural capital, If you don't know every niche fact, you're not a real fan, If you haven't read Auf Wiedersehen Sweetheart you haven't even met the entry-level requirements to be a fan. There are also no characters that are too sacred to be altered within the fandom. If you want to put Germany in a maid dress have at it, if you want to see all the characters as girls you're in luck cause Himaruya literally drew them. Fanfictions can take place anywhere from WWI to the present day and you can put any characters in any scenario and make it believable. There are thousands of pieces of fanwork, fan art, fangames, and fan AUs. These characters are malleable to fit your personal preference and there is really no way you could be mad at this as Himaruya does this himself, with no real established canon.

a Hetalia fan once said, "No one cares if Hetalia was written by a Japenese Imperialism apologist when you're 31 chapters deep into a human Au soulmate fic about Austria inviting Prussia to see his boyband perform in Berlin"

Himaruya is also the king of moe characteristics because he turned these Hetalia men into any cute thing he could think of, Chibi versions (Chibitalia), female versions (Nyotalia), and cat versions (Nekotalia). He has no reservations about drawing the characters in a dress or in cat ears. He gave the characters human names to allow for more standardized human AU's and made a DS dating game. He encourages fans to take his characters and use them in their fanworks as they see fit, canon is up to interpretation itself. I think Himaruya himself was a huge part of fandom culture (not that I could tell you cause no one knows anything about the guy) and saw how the female characters were often treated by fans and turned it on its head, allowing for females to sexualize the males this time.

Also, none of the male characters in this show resembles a Hegemonic form of masculinity. Even the most masculine character in the show (Germany) can be seen doing more "feminine things" like wearing a dress or proposing to a man. Which, you know, I guess is a good diversion from things you would typically see in an anime of this nature (but again there are a lot of instances of characters being feminine being played for laughs, like a man being girly is something inherently funny). Feat. Germany proposing to Italy with a tomato ring.

I am Hetalia's biggest hater, however, I cannot deny the impact that it has had on my life and how much I love to talk about it. Hetalia is what introduced me to anime and fandom (and tumblr) for the first time. I met a lot of people I still talk to today because of this show. It encouraged me and a lot of other people to actually get interested in history. Thanks to this show I can identify every country in Europe, and it was a lot easier to remember historical facts if I just imagined the Hetalia characters. Also, Auf Wiedersehen Sweetheart is a literary masterpiece and there is a reason it almost has a five-star rating on goodnotes (https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/22064556) I love you George DeValier I hope you're doing good wherever you are.

I would like to make it abundantly clear that despite everything I've said that might make me sound like a woke blue-haired liberal, I don't really think this show is some horribly racist show or that the people who enjoy it are racist. I just wanted to provide a deeper outlook on the impact a seemingly dumb show can have on real people. I can't really blame the show for the terrible response of the fandom and it did honestly get better in later seasons that are not focused on WWII.

Despite all the bad stuff, it is a relatively funny little 5-minute watch, and you can really just jump in at any point you want to. If you don't take it as seriously as I do you might even enjoy it a little.

If you actually read this far I have major respect for you, I'm really excited to see what the general consensus on this show is.

Prussia and South Italy were my favorites in case anyone cared

If you're wondering why I didn't do my presentation on Hetalia despite my extensive knowledge, it is because I would be incredibly biased and I would go off the rails I think.

Also, my biggest fear is current Hetalia fans finding this and killing me, that might seem irrational but the Gundam fans found me last time so I wouldn't put it past them.

#jpt1311 #why did you do this to me #im sorry #blame the autism

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mdhwrites · 1 year

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I'm sorry to vent about something Owl House related again, I imagine you're getting sick of it by now, but

Maybe it's just cause I love Lilith, but the duel in Agony of a Witch kinda bothers me because it feels like it invalidates Lilith as an equal to Eda.

With Convention, it felt like Lilith, while often mocked, was Eda's equal. Their duel feels evenly matched, maybe with a slight edge to Eda because she plays dirty and Lilith doesn't, but in terms of sheer power they feel equal.

Then Agony of a Witch throws that out the window by showing that Eda is so much more powerful that she can be dying from her magic-draining curse and still kick Lilith's ass with no problem.

And I know it's satisfying to see a hero wreck a villain, but it has the side-effect of making Lilith no longer appear as a powerful character, which is made worse because her only "fights" from that point on are punching a racist (which is cool but not really "apex of arcane power") and getting one-shot by the Collector. Retroactively it takes Eda's relationship to Lilith from "plausible threat" to "Just humoring her"

and not to compare two bad bitches because I do love these shows, I think Amphibia did this better with King Andrias. Despite being knocked around on occasion, and having plenty of humiliating moments, Andrias retains his menace in part because he's never actually beaten by the heroes. At worst he gets blindsided before composing himself and returning to being terrifying.

I dunno, maybe I'm biased by I would've liked it if Lilith got to remain a badass instead of being reduced to just comic relief. Make her duel with Eda more even, and have Eda ultimately gain the upper hand through cheating, dirty tricks, and being more desperate

(I don't mind the TOH asks at all. No one has even asked about Willow yet somehow so to say there is so much more to talk about this show is an UNDERSTATEMENT. Honestly, I just wish people would also throw story concept pitches at me from time to time too so I can actually remind people that I do writing as well. XD Not that I expect to write those stories but just how would I handle them and what not.)

I think the problem is more that last paragraph you bring up than anything else. Mind you, I actually do agree that it would have been cool to see Eda's strengths being more in cheating and dirty tricks versus years of training and secret knowledge only able to be accessed by an EC coven head but… Man TOH just kind of pushes the idea that you're born gifted or not. There is no real inbetween in power for most people and that really sucks.

I don't think the fight in Agony of a Witch is bad though, mostly in that I see it more as the emotions Eda is channeling effectively is overclocking her. If Lilith could last even another minute, it wouldn't be the curse that beat Eda: It would be running out of magic. A candle that burns twice as bright burns half as long sort of thing which works well for the emotional climax that's supposed to be happening there. Narratively, it works well.

Also, while Lilith is the definitive loser there, she doesn't come off as weak. It just finally feels like we're getting to see what Eda could have been without the curse. Back in Covention, we see what she is because of it. Does that suck for how strong Lilith actually is? Yes but Eda is literally years younger than her and back in school this was the same case where Lilith could just see "Oh… I'm fucked because my sister is strong… For reasons." It works for S1's tone, leaning into issues with the fantasy genre honestly (but remember, Episode 2 said no chosen ones so shouldn't merit, you know… matter? How much effort you put in?) but…

Then we get to S2 and Lilith is FRUSTRATING for me in S2. She gets such a good first episode in S2 with handling no longer having magic, dealing with the loss of her place in the world, her ambitions shattered and making a new friend. She stumbles a bit during King's episode but hey, it's okay for a character to be comedic for one episode. And she get's to actually represent the curse in Affearances!… Before being a joke for the rest of the episode about mommy issues until she turns into the Owl Beast.

And then when we see her next she has fully transitioned into "Look at me! I'm as bad as Hooty! Take me seriously? DON'T YOU DARE!" And it is… awful. There's no two ways around it. People go "Oh, but it's returning to better days for he-" No. No it's not. Every single portrayal of young Lilith wasn't funny or about history or anything like that. She was a driven young girl who wanted to be the best witch she could. She wanted to be the top of the class. She took pride in her effort and success. She had ambition and was more serious than her sister.

And now she's a complete joke. A complete joke that claims to have been bad at her job, even though she seemed so happy anytime she was inspiring people, mentoring them, seemed more than competent if not just amazing. She was the head of the Emperor's Coven and she seemed to deserve that position.

And then they did literally nothing with her in regards to that. There is a slight nod to the concept of her wanting to strike back at Belos for the lies and damage he'd done to her but it's instead framed as just a prank and kindness to Eda. Because that Scrying Spell should have been the start of her real arc. Her wanting to get back at the man who wasted so much of her life and learning that devoting one's self to only a single goal is unhealthy no matter what.

Personally, I still wish Lilith had harnessed Luz's anger about the petrification, the coven system, Belos, etc. and helped her be a rebel LOOOONG before Hollow Mind. Trying to be her new mentor in how to take down Belos and possibly corrupting Luz with her own anger and fixations until something goes wrong and both are taught to be more reasonable. To actually lean on others. To not only fixations.

Or, I dunno, we could entirely ignore the fact that Belos tried to murder three of them and wants into the human realm and instead just focus on a bad but sad boy who's now a main character instead of the SISTER OF EDA AND NOW REDEEMED VILLAIN LILITH.

When people tell me more time would have made the show better, shit like this makes me go, "No," because the writers had no focus, no idea of how to actually follow up their plot or character hooks and it's just a complete, fucking mess.

A mess that makes me very sad because focus could have made it so much more amazing than it was. Could have made it rival Avatar. But I guess you wouldn't get "Cool Aunt Lilith" so who am I to complain?

#Lilith #TOH #Rambles

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unicornprincessinthetardis · 6 years

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My (often relatively reasonable) dad: ...so Enoch Powell was right, what he said has happened.

Me: and you don't think maybe he could've said it without inciting racial hatred and literally saying that in time the rivers might run with the blood of 'native' British people because of immigration, do you?

My dad: no, you're being ridiculous, it had to be said, and there really are areas of cities that are majority black or Muslim now so he was right in his predictions, and it didn't change how things were anyway

Me: *goes away to calm down and read up on the 'Rivers of Blood' speech*

[I already knew some of this but here's a précis for those unfamiliar: in April 1968, in Wolverhampton, UK, a Conservative MP, Enoch Powell, made a speech, about the proposed 'Race Relations Bill' (which subsequently made it illegal to refuse housing/ employment/public services to people on the grounds of race/colour/ ethnic & national origins).

The speech was strongly anti-immigrant, calling for 'voluntary re-emigration' and for moves to be made to stem the tide of immigration, else Britain would be 'overrun' and sooner or later white British people would find themselves fully second-class citizens, and that in some ways they already were. He also talked about a "tragic and intractable phenomenon which we watch with horror on the other side of the Atlantic", which I take to mean immigration in the USA to the similar end of white people no longer being in charge - which in 1968 was so far from the truth, and just horrible baseless fear-mongering, playing on people’s xenophobia and racist prejudice - and compared pro-immigration/anti-discrimination newspapers to the ones that had denied and hid the rise of fascism and threat of war in the 1930s. Plus, he talked about a constituent of his, a woman who lived on a street that had become occupied by mostly black people, who lost her white lodgers and complained to the council for a tax rate reduction because she wouldn't take black tenants, and instead basically got told not to be racist, and presented it as a bad thing that she'd been treated like that.

The speech's common name comes from a phrase he quoted from the Aenid (because he was also a Cambridge-educated classics scholar), 'I seem to see "the River Tiber foaming with much blood"', although he just called it 'the Birmingham speech' and seemed to be surprised by the uproar he caused.]

Me (to self): So it didn't change things did it? How do you explain the attacks against nonwhite people where the attackers literally shouted his name and repeated his rhetoric? Oh, they would definitely have happened if he hadn't made that speech, wouldn't they? And the British people of foreign descent who were so afraid they might be removed from their lives just for not being white they always had cases packed to go? And the fact that experts says he set back progress in 'race relations' by about ten years and legitimised being racist/anti-immigrant in the same way UKIP and some pro-Brexit types have done within the last few years here (fun fact: immediately after the Brexit vote, people were being racially and physically abusive to visibly Muslim and/or South Asian people, telling them to leave because of Brexit, which was of course extreme nonsense because their presence would be nothing to do with the EU, and more likely the British Empire and the Commonwealth, but they were doing it because it seemed suddenly okay to be openly racist, because Nigel Farage and his ilk, and a legally non-binding vote surrounded in lies, said so) and others have done elsewhere, in the US and Europe and Brazil and so many other places.

Powell was interviewed about the speech in 1977 and stood by his views, said that because the immigration figures were higher than those he had been 'laughed at' about in his speech, he was right and now governments didn't want to deal with the "problem", were passing it off to future generations and it would go on until there was a civil war!

He also said he wasn't a 'racialist' (racist) because he believed a "'racialist' is a person who believes in the inherent inferiority of one race of mankind to another, and who acts and speaks in that belief" so he was in fact "a racialist in reverse" as he regarded "many of the peoples in India as being superior in many respects—intellectually, for example, and in other respects—to Europeans." (I mean, I know I can't hold him to our standards but a) that's still racism and b) he did think that mankind was divided into very distinct, probably biologically so, races, which, yes, normal for the time, but the whole 'each with different qualities and ways in which they were better than others' is iffy)

Me: *goes back to Dad to make my point and definitely not get upset* So here are some things that literally happened as a consequence of the 'Rivers of Blood' speech...

So even if he was correct to say what he did (I mean, he wasn't but you have to tiptoe around Dad and I had points to make), he shouldn't have said it the way he did

My dad: so you think the truth should be suppressed? You're only looking at this from one perspective (he thinks he knows better because he was alive at the time and my brother and I weren't despite the fact that we're both into politics and history and, y'know, not into scapegoating, behaving oddly, and laying blame because people are different to us - he and mum also have issues with trans people and we're trying so hard to change their views/behaviours but I'm not sure it's working & that's a whole different story) and there are these areas that really are Muslim-only (because informal lending and wanting to keep the community together is such a crime, right?) and they don't integrate and want to impose Sharia law (only he couldn't remember what it was called right then) and you don't know what it's like (he is an engineer surveyor and travels all over to inspect boilers and cooling systems and all sorts of stuff, and this includes into majority-Black or -Asian (Muslim and otherwise) areas in Birmingham - which is not a no-go area for non-Muslims, I'm a deeply agnostic white woman, it's my nearest big city and I wish I went there more often but it's tricky as I don't drive, public transport is bad/inconvenient, and I have no friends to go with except depression and anxiety [which are worse 'friends' than the ones that I found out only liked me in high school because I always had sweets and snacks at lunch so when I got braces and my mouth hurt too much to eat much of anything which meant I certainly didn't have snacks, they dropped me pretty quickly] so apparently he's the expert on all such matters)

What I wish I'd said: *staying very calm* well, and that's your opinion, I'm going, I've got sewing to finish *leaves*

What actually happened:

Me: have you considered that they are able to buy up areas like that because white people leave because of their prejudice against the 'influx'?

Dad: they buy up great areas because they buy in groups (I think this refers to a sort of community lending thing to be compliant with various parts of Islam? [Please correct me if I'm wrong] which is effectively what building societies/credit unions were, at least to begin with, and he doesn't take issue with those) and want to stay together. Why do they do that? Sikhs don't do that, they buy big houses and aren't bothered about being close together.

Me: different religious ethoses? I don't know... But you do know that they people who want the UK to be a caliphate ruled by Sharia law are just a minority, and that most Muslims would not want that at all, just like you?

Dad: but they still do want it, and it could happen, if there was a charismatic leader,

Me: *incredulous* you know it's about as likely for that to actually happen as for strictly Orthodox Jewish people to be able to make this country into another Israel, right? Besides, there are the police, and the armed forces, and intelligence agencies, not to mention the Government and civil service (thought I'd got a win there, he hates the unchanging upper-class-public-school-Oxbridge nature of the people who effectively really run the government, constant no matter the leaning of the elected party, but no) who have a vested interest in preserving themselves in their current state so would be able to stop anything like that

Dad: yes, but the cutting of funding to police and public services means they might not be able to stop it (I realise now that he's oddly economically left-wing but also really quite socially conservative in some ways)

Me: *getting angry* but it's still an absolute minority, most Muslims would be horrified if it really did happen, and have you ever considered that maybe they wouldn't be so ill-disposed to us and to integration if we didn't demand it of them the moment that they arrive, demand that they assimilate or go away (he often uses the phrase "yes, but they're in somebody else's country, they should make an effort") and maybe young people wouldn't be so easily radicalised and people generally mistrust the people who don't try to understand them, you know, want them to change everything about themselves (for instance, Dad is violently opposed to the burqa etc and not really a fan of the hijab - still doesn't get that it's a choice and people can do what they want because apparently 'anyone could be wearing one of those things' - burqas/niqabs, I presume - and that it must all be forced because who would possibly choose to dress like that - I have half a mind to show him those sites about Christian modest dressing (one was a shop and a lot of their range was pretty cute!) that I once found, just to see if that'll prove to him it is a choice thing) *tries to leave*

Dad: *angry* You stay there and listen to me! You're just looking at it from one perspective and that's not the truth, you're so biased and closed-minded, you only look at things your way!

Me: *furious* Really? Really? Am I? *Scoffs/incredulous exhalation* I'm closed-minded, am I?... *Storms out, shouts as I go* I'm not the one who said Enoch Powell was right!!

This is all heavily paraphrased, because I've been writing this for literal hours now and I was angry and don't remember well at the best of times, it may have been worse than how I'm writing it

Also, going to be tricky to patch up but right now I stand by what I said, because I know my perspective is limited, but at least I actually admit that and try to find out what people different to me think, rather than basing all my opinions and things on my own experiences which can't be universal, as he seems to

Other bs my dad said during the two conversations: "don't get so upset about it, it's only history" (which is bold, considering it was the 50th anniversary this year and he was literally 11 years old when it happened so probably saw/heard news coverage)... "Yes of course far right groups use 'Enoch was right' as a slogan, it doesn't mean anything"... Reiterating the 'nothing changed' thing multiple times... Dismissing the fact that Powell said there'd be a civil war because apparently just because the British/Europeans were aggressive conquerors anyone else who came in numbers anywhere would eventually have that aim and how ridiculous that view actually is... Dismissing the fact that Powell basically incited racial hatred and violence with the inclusion of an irrelevant Classical phrase which spread fear on all sides...

I could go on but I'm so tired and don't want to make myself more upset

I love my parents but I really don't like them very much lately but I don't know if I just put up with it or leave sooner or later and if I do leave I don't know where I'd go because no friends

Basically I'm so sorry for my parents' prejudices which I'm still trying to unlearn myself - I apologise wholeheartedly to all Muslim and Jewish people and honestly pretty much everyone they're prejudiced against

#personal #personal post #my ramblings #my rambles #ramblings #rants #my rants #family #british politics #politics #rivers of blood #enoch powell #religion #anti-immigrant sentiment (not mine #i'm so done #and so alone #i just want a friend #and ideally an income of some description #but if i register for jobseekers' allowance/universal credit i will have to try all the time to get jobs of all kinds and i don't know what #i want to do/am qualified to do/can do bc potent cocktail of autism/anxiety/depression/no self-esteem/perfectionism/home situation #im just horribly stresssed and worried about everything and mum won't go to the doctors about her failing physical health to spite me #and dad has the cheek to say don't worry!! oh thanks i'd never thought of that before!#mum had an ovarian cyst when i was a kid & she didn't go to the dr till it was so bad she could hardly walk so she was in hospital for week #and it could've been dealt with so much more easily if she'd gone earlier so i'm so scared it'll happen again #i mean i'll be able to look after us if it does happen again which is good bc grandparents absolutely can't now #anger #very long post #long post #islamophobia tw #racism tw

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crimson-phantom-designs · 6 years

Text

NEW BEGENNINGS

Part 1 of a small one shot I did a few months ago.

"Jesus kid, I almost blew your head off! I thought you were a ghoul...."

Hancock paused a good thirty seconds staring at him as he had just stepped outside the brush, knapsack in tow. "You're serious?...." The corners of Hancock's mouth twitched into a smirk. "What good of a detective are you if I gotta point that out?"

"A... feral one, John. Christ, son get over here and behave for once- and what is that in your hand?"

"A guitar, Sherlock. Shit I gotta point everything to you or what?" Hancock held the dirty, blood stained instrument up proudly. "To the living deserve the spoils. I hadn't played one on years."

"You didn't kill somebody for that thing did you?" Nick interrogated flatly.

"Nah nah... bruiser was already dead. Like awhile. So lucky me, eh?" He chuckled.

"Just sit down." Nick dismissed him like talking to a child.

Hancock waved him off as he dropped his satchel at Nick's feet to walk off and stand outside the fire's edge as Nick searched the spoils the ghoul was sucessful scavenging, something useful he hoped, through the nearby houses. If they could be called that anymore.

Being in Commonwelth made Nick often wonder what things looked like before the war...

Hancock's loot was some rusty knives, cables, a coffee pot, a few bottles of beer and an ash tray. Most notably was the one, scrawny small molerat.

Nick grimaced at the foul thing as he held it up for inspection. It was moments like this he was grateful he didn't have a stomach but he promised to feed the one who did if he managed something...

Nick skinned the rat with one of his razors and chopped up what he could before dropping it in the pot with a few carrots he picked and set it over the fire.

He saw Hancock rustling in his coat as he leaned against an old light post looking over the fields they just cleared of feral ghouls. It wasn't often Nick left his town or his office for that matter but these little missions helped him stay sharp and this pack had been growing from what he heard to a point it even had Hancock nervous for his own town and request his help dealing with them. Not to mention drifters or traders using the roads that were getting picked off.

Nick wondered how Hancock took it killing ghouls. If he thought about them at all like himself, he didn't seem to care though he had his reasons. Sure they were wild creatures that seen even Hancock as a meal but they looked so much like him and were treated just about the same as he was and his band of misfits from Goodneighbor. John always related to the ghouls though, he made himself one willingly to escape the tyranny of his social family.

He had been through so much, the drugs had morphed him into another being entirely... When the burned ravaged man in a red coat approached him a year after he left he didn't even realize it was the same blonde haired, browned eyed scrawny boy of the McDonoughs and almost turned him away. It was his voice and how he carried himself that triggered the realization. It made Nick wonder as he watched the man from his perferial view.

Speaking of, Hancock's family was the reason Nick was here. He had tried talking to John before but setting out together to clear out the threat perhaps the information was fresh on his mind. He seemed lost in thought at the moment.

Richard was sick for awhile and the doctors were running out of options. It seemed the entire McDonough family wasn't exactly stable perhaps genetics. Martha their mother died a year ago from heart failure who John was very attached to, and before that Patrick the father and well... That was another story entirely. What drove a devide between the brothers - violently- and perhaps John still held onto that guilt. Patrick might still be alive if he hadn't run into those ghouls searching for John that night afterall.... Guy never let John forget it though Nick doubt he ever would and soon after was when chased out all ghouls as soon as he was elected mayor and John left for good.

The brothers were the last of their family and soon just John not that John seem to mind anymore.....

It was then when he heard the familiar puff intake he busted more people than he cared to admit from the ghoul as he descretly huffed the canister with his back to him. Nick's head shot up with a burning yellow glare made worse from the fire's reflection.

"You sure that's a good idea? Didn't that stuff nearly kill yah?" Nick spoke just over a scolding.

"What?..... No....." Hancock chuckled, shuffling innocently. As he was caught already he gave that up and went ahead and puffed the chem again with a shiver as things electrified about him in vibrant psychedelics and he staggered to his little nest of blankets and coats under the makeshift tarp he made. Shaking the empty canister with a frown he tossed it on the ground. Oh well, he had more and was probably going to need it.

Nick raised a sceptical brow. "Tells me you're lying."

Hancock laughed his eyes wide as it looked like two of Nick for a moment. Aside it being a trip how horrifying could that be he was a synth so it was actually possible. Oh god. He hoped he remembered that later. "The experimental shit... yeah maybe." He chuckled again as he slouched back numbly. "My skin fell off and grew back all fucked up, my hair fell out. The hair didn't grow back but eh whatever, oh the high though... it was so worth it. I felt like I was soaring with the strength of ten men.

"Uh huh..." Nick only appraised with a scowl. "Before or after you woke up vomiting blood and your heart stopped beating having to be jerked back to life by an addictol shot to the chest?"

"Ehhhhh heh before.... but my point is Jet nah Jet it's cool, is like..... the best girlfriend I've ever had." He said fondly with a loop sided smile. "She's always made me feel better and she was always available. So why say goodbye?"

"Even the best girlfriend will fuck you up eventually, you know?"

Hancock chuckled looking down at the empty jet cartiage feeling the chem start to wear off sadly. "The straight ones maybe...." Hancock barely remarked before shrugging it away as Nick glared at him. His expression slacked as he glared back before sitting down as he muttered quietly. "It helps me cope... besides there's medicine that will prevent me turning... anymore. Ferinhiet gets it for me and she's around if things go south."

"You're always full of jokes.... You stop doing the damn chems and you got nothing to worry about unless that's not weighing on your conscious."

Hancock groaned, rubbing his head. Yep the drugs had worn off. "You know, I always miss you until you're here."

"Because I care about you not overdosing and throw responsiblity in your face? That's cute. I came with you because I felt like we could talk..."

"No."

"John, hear me out."

"Not if it's about my brother." Hancock snipped sitting down and pulling the guitar in his lap. "And it's Hancock... stop calling me John. I'm not who I used to be for a reason..."

Nick sighed roughly not realizing he was holding it in. "John, come on. Talk to me. Get out of your pity bubble and be serious for a second."

"Hey, remember when you were chewing my ass out about shooting up? Gee, that was fun." Hancock snipped with a sarcastic smirk.

"I'm serious.... Your brother is really sick and you're not gonna go see him? That's not normal..."

"You're right, I'm not normal." Hancock gasped dramatically lifting a hand to his mouth. "Wait... did you not know we weren't normal!? My bad, shit I should have told you. I'm a ghoul and a drug addict, you're a condescending robot while my brothers a racist fuckhole who hates all those things. Shit, you must be very confused right now."

Nick scowled. "Look, stop grandstanding you egotistical shit... I get why you're holding on to this but enoughs enough. Look at you, you're living your life the way you want it. You don't have to keep fighting the world. I mean, isn't forgiving him easier than not?"

"Oh, Christ. Are you fucking serious right now with this shit right now?" Hancock huffed getting up to pace before sitting back down and figiting. He snatched the guitar picking at it as his scowl softened.

Still feeling the burn of those electric eyes on him he sighed. Softening slightly as his walls of defense broke down showing who he really was yet still he fought to maintain a stern face as he barely looked up to him.

"Sometimes what it looks like is all anybody can see..."

#hancock #nick #nick valentine #john hancock #fallout #fallout 4 #fanfiction #fiction #rp

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