#plus who doesnt want to look at 500 BC statues or baroque paintings

[thevictorianghost]

thank you so much for calling out fellow white shippers for their racism. as a southeast asian, it’s the bare minimum, yet so many white bnf blogs have stayed quiet. there’s this fear, by some white fans, of speaking over bipoc voices which definitely happens. however, if white fans are for being in solidarity with bipoc, you must call out the behavior of fellow white shippers that bipoc have deemed problematic and yes, it includes your friends. no one is going to cancel you, we just want you to improve your behavior so other shippers feel safer. i also observe that some white shippers are hiding behind only a few poc that they will only agree with, not acknowledging the valid points that the other argument has made. they also will block blogs run by bipoc bc they rightfully criticized their behavior. i also don’t want ppl to think this is just fandom drama bc this is really a discussion about racism, from the white shippers’ treatment towards shippers of color to the way zuko and katara are portrayed in fanfiction. if you feel personally attacked, i’m asking that you take the time off from online to reevaluate yourself and ask what behaviors am i perpetuating that makes fellow shippers uncomfortable? why do i feel attacked? thank you again for your call out post bc so many poc like me have been disappointed by the silence of so many white bnfs.

TW racism

I appreciate you thanking me. I did it because it was the right thing to do. I wasn’t going to say anything at first because, again, I didn’t feel like I could add anything to this conversation about fandom racism, but then I saw someone (I’m on mobile, I can’t look up the post, sorry) saying they were leaving the Zutara fandom because of a slur used by (presumably) that anon and they were rightfully calling out White people for staying too quiet about this. So I knew I had to make that post.

I’m so sorry people (you or others, I’m not quite sure) have been silenced on this issue. People have every right to talk about the racism they’ve suffered from. And yet they’ve gone unheard by people who didn’t want to grow. I know it doesn’t mean much, but I’m sorry. The thing about conversations is that there’s many sides. Many opinions, many points of views. Unless it’s, idk, right-wing rhetoric for example, you should listen to all sides of a conversation. It’s only fair, especially about an issue as complex as racism.

I know this may feel like a tangent, but I studied History and Art History. One thing I learned is that there will always be something new to discover. Yes, many events or time periods are very well documented, but we’ll never understand them 100%. We’ll always find something new that will change our way of looking at things. New allegories on a painting, new languages on ancient scrolls, or new writings on the walls of temples. These all give us more insight into a given time period. Archaeologists consciously leave dig sites before they’re done because they know in the future, new technology will manage to dig deeper, to find better, and to cause even less damage in the process. The future is always full of possibilities - even about the past!

All of that said, what you learn in History is to keep an open mind. You learn to shut up and listen to multiple points of views. You learn to try and understand the multitudes of people who lived millenniae ago. And it’s a valuable skill you can apply to your every day life.

That’s what I’m trying to do.

(Btw. What does “White bnf blogs” mean? I’m unfamiliar with that term)

#zutara #zutara fandom #zk fandom #zutara fandom salt #zk fandom salt #again if i went out of line about anything in this post please tell me #history and art history helped me develop my analytical skills #highly recommend! #plus who doesnt want to look at 500 BC statues or baroque paintings