#so critiquing it and arguing against it by comparing it to populations that don't have that history is not going to work

[seductivejellyfish]

Making this post against my better judgement but:

It is 100% true that decolonization does not have to include mass expulsion and/or revenge and those are scare tactics and false flags used by colonizing powers to prevent decolonization actions.

However, it is ignorant, willful or accidentally, to ignore the history of Jews as a group specifically when imagining the future for Jews in the middle east after Palestine is freed.

White people in the US, for example do not have a legitimate reason to fear that they will be expelled from their homes in the event of landback successes. That fear is manufactured and based on nothing.

Jews absolutely have reason to fear that they will be expelled from their homes in most countries in the world. That fear is more or less legitimate in various places due to a variety of factors, but it is not built on nothing, it is built on the history of Jews being expelled from nearly every country in the world, and a current state of the world that is still rife with antisemitism.

The region around Palestine is not on the whole wholly hostile to the state of Israel because of humanitarian support for the people of Palestine. That is absolutely a large part of the motivation for action for many people in the region and around the world, but on the governmental level, many of these countries are also deeply antisemitic and have eliminated the Jewish populations of their own countries.

It is reasonable and logical, not invented, for a Jew to fear expulsion from their home in the middle east without a Jewish state to protect them.

That does not mean that Palestinians want to force Jews out, kill them all, etc. Those are still false flag claims to discredit the movement.

It also does not mean that Jewish safety should ever come at the cost of Palestinian lives and safety. Palestine must be freed, and it is not on the suffering Palestinians to reassure Jews that they won't be 'taking revenge' or anything like that. It also doesn't mean that there shouldn't be any physical returning of home and lands - there absolutely must be.

But it it disingenuous to compare the situation precisely to other decolonization situations in this respect and gets in the way of communication. The Jewish fear of expulsion is not a fear built on nothingness and guilt, though those of course contribute to the fervor of that feeling among settler Israelis. Jews have real historical and current reasons to fear expulsions from governments of the world, even if they do not have immediate reasons to fear mass expulsions from a specifically Palestinian government.

And a second time, for good measure: It also does not mean that Jewish safety should ever come at the cost of Palestinian lives and safety.

#just sort of tired of the 'its not complicated' and 'its just like every other ethnostate' crowd #yes there are absolutely many useful and productive ways to analyze israel by viewing it as a colonial ethnostate like many other #colonial ethnostates #but that doesn't mean that there are not also things that are unique about the situation #just like there are things that are unique about every other situation in the world #it may be 'uncomplicated' to say that you unequivocally #believe in freedom for palestinians and an end to genocide #but that doesn't have to mean that the situation is not complicated #and saying that the situation is unique complicated etc. #does not mean you don't believe in the above! #“you need israel to survive anywhere in the world as a jew” #is absolutely propaganda by the israeli government and is not true #but that doesn't erase the fact that jewish communities are still at risk in many places #and the feeling of unsafety even in relatively safe places is based on actual history not imagination #so critiquing it and arguing against it by comparing it to populations that don't have that history is not going to work

[freedom-of-fanfic]

I've been reading through your blog, and while I don't agree with everything I think you make some good points. One question though, I can't really wrap my head around the "fiction has no bearing on reality" argument? if fiction is 100% divorced from reality, then why bother critiquing racism/misogyny/etc in media? it's generally agreed that unquestioned depictions of bigotry is bad, so why doesn't that hold true for unquestioningly portraying, say, a 15yo and a 30yo in a relationship as good?

I don’t think I’ve ever argued that fiction has no bearing on reality. in fact, I can’t think of any instances of seeing an ‘anti-anti’ or ‘pro-shipper’ discourse blog argue that fiction and reality have no relationship whatsoever. I’d disagree with anyone who asserted that, because it’s plainly evident that’s untrue.

What I usually say about the relationship between fiction and reality is one of these two statements:

fiction does not have a 1:1 affect on reality. meaning: humans don’t just blindly accept what popular fiction (such as mainstream media) tells them as truth, or assume that what happens in fiction is 100% safe to imitate irl. our cultural and individual absorption of the messages in a work of fiction are complicated and colored by our life experience, existing culture cues, and more. (x)(x)

reality affects fiction affects reality. meaning: works of fiction are often inspired by real life. if a work of fiction is popular enough/viewed widely enough (such as mainstream media), its messages are assimilated and filtered and absorbed into culture, affecting people in real life. reality and fiction are connected by a complicated ecosystem of ideas, culture, assumptions, lifestyles, upbringing, etc., and fiction is rarely the sole originator of a bad or dangerous idea. (more likely it’s highlighting - on purpose or on accident - a cultural assumption that went mostly hidden before.)* (x)(x)

Regarding the examples of how fiction can have an effect on reality in your ask:

it’s a matter of scale.

let’s take a moment to remember that anti-shippers who assert that fiction is harming people irl are generally using that argument against transformative fanworks, not big-scale MCU-level productions or bestselling book series.

transformative fandom is, on the scale of things, a very small place with a strong culture of tagging/warning for potentially squicky/triggering/kinky/etc content and populated primarily by marginalized people who are not likely to be tomorrow’s movers and shakers when pitted against rich (white, straight) cis men. for that reason, our ‘problematic’ works are more likely to be products of societal issues, not the cause of those societal issues. (we tend to take pop culture/the works that we’re fans of and use our creations like funhouse mirrors to problematic society - not necessarily better, but often different.)

my blog deals with allowing fans - mostly small-time creators making little or no profit off their work and rarely more than a few thousand people in their audience - to be allowed to create their small time fanworks without restriction and just make sure the content is warned for when put out in spaces with mixed audiences. that doesn’t mean ‘don’t point out racist tropes in a fanwork’, but it does mean ‘don’t treat the fanwork creator like they’re the source of all racism when you point it out’. scale your critique to the situation. (x)(x)

take care not to compare apples to oranges.

to be honest: I don’t think comparing a mainstream media depiction of casual bigotry to a mainstream media depiction of a sexual relationship between a(n implied innocent kid) 15yo and a(n implied predator) 30yo is very valuable. 

Why? because we already socially condemn sexual relationships that have even a whiff of pedophilia/taking advantage of the sexually innocent. (that’s why people who take sexual advantage of underage people try to paint those underage people as sexually aware - because (disgustingly) it’s the lack of innocence that makes a victim of a sex crime ‘fair game’.) and if a person is tagged as sexually harming kids/anyone too young to be ready to consent? they’re scum.** we have no mercy.

bigotry that goes unchallenged is a lot more widely ingrained. people with race privilege don’t notice racism. cis men don’t notice sexism. etc. it has to be super blatant for them to go ‘oh, that’s bigotry.’

a mainstream media 30yo/15yo depiction that’s remotely realistic? that 30yo character will be tagged as a creep. we’ll all hate the 30yo together, probably.

a mainstream media depiction of bigotry that’s remotely realistic? will fly under the radar of viewers who aren’t personally affected by it, and hurt those who are.

as broad examples I call these apples and oranges (they’re so broad it would be easy to bring them together as well), but the point is this: 

let’s stop comparing fictional depictions of sexual/romantic relationships and how ‘healthy’ they are irl to racism/sexism/queerphobia in fictional works - especially fanworks. They’re not the same thing. (and I’m tired of people using racism/bigotry as a subexample to prove why we need to be so careful with our sexy fanfic being ‘sexually healthy’, ugh.)

tl;dr: remember that fiction - perhaps especially fanfiction - and indeed, all of fandom, doesn’t spring into existence in a vacuum. we all are cooking in this cultural pot, and we need to examine fiction and reality with that in mind.

*so if a work of fiction strikes you as carrying a dangerous or immoral message, it’s worth asking yourself which came first: a cultural message (you may not have ever noticed) or fiction about the message?

**there’s a reason antis try to get everyone they hate labeled as a pedophile.

#fiction vs reality #fiction is reality #reality affects fiction affects reality #racism in fandom #responsible critique #Anonymous