holdouttrout

I have remained largely silent in posts about the race imbroglio, mostly because I don't feel like I have much to say; other people have been saying it better. I was challenged by

miriam_heddy's post Linking to Listen: Some thoughts on listening while white to break my silence in a way that is, hopefully, constructive.

First of all, if you don't know about the recent debate and discussion known as RaceFail'09, let me point you to

rydra_wong and her excellent and near-comprehensive links lists for the whole, messy story, or to

white_serpent's brief summary of events.

rydra_wong has another good summary post.

There are many entries I found particularly useful, or thoughtful, or appropriate. I have not read all of the posts. I have tried to read many of them, and I have a few that I'd like to recommend here.

Open Letter to Elizabeth Bear, by Avalon's Willow. I can't say I hadn't thought about whitewashing casts before, since I knew about Avatar before I read her post. But I *can* say that I er...honestly didn't know that Earthsea even had characters of color. I kinda fail at physical descriptions in books, unless there are certain phrases like, "green eyes," because I have green eyes, and get excited by characters that have them. Anyway, the post expresses frustration and anger, and shouldn't it? I had plenty of green-eyed heroines throughout the years--even some that weren't "slender" or "beautiful," and yet longed for more characters like me. Avalon's Willow gives many, many examples of canons that either marginalized their characters of color, failed them in other ways, or backtracked and erased them.

I Didn't Dream of Dragons, by

deepad examines privilege, the global exchange of ideas, cultural appropriate and indoctrination, and the role of children's literature. I would highly recommend reading her follow-up post, White people, its not all about you, but for this post it is, which answers some frequent questions about the first post, in an effort to curtail, "Yes, but," responses.

The Current Race Discussion and That Caught-in-the-Middle Feeling, by

ultranos_fic, which is about not fitting into anyone's box and the dangers of having boxes in the first place. What happens when you're not the default, but not the Other, either? Where are the stories about you?

Because There Aren't Enough Spoons on the Planet (Letter to Internet User #1,574,313,184), by

inalasahl. I'd highly recommend taking the time to not only admire the concept of this universal letter, but to read every single option as if it was addressed to you. Obviously, not all of them will apply, but I was surprised at how many things I'd said/done/thought that marginalized people of color--both online and off.

Online Versus Offline Behavior, by Justine Larbalestier, who wrote Magic or Madness and How to Ditch Your Fairy, and whose blog I actually read more or less regularly. In her post, Larbalestier not only condemns bad online behaviour by otherwise "nice people," but mentions the actual discussion of race in science fiction and fantasy.

whose stories are they? by

nextian, one of the relatively early posts from the discussion, which made me think about my Christian myths and stories and histories in a very different light.

ven ve voke up, ve had zese wodies, by

ciderpress. This discussion isn't just for mental catharsis for white people. "Oh look! I've read stuff and now I'm all enlightened, and wasn't this fun?" I don't know if I would have understood that without this post.

This list isn't at all comprehensive; I've read only a fraction of the total posts to come out of this, and I've linked a small fraction of that. There are also plenty of good resources that have been mentioned, too; posts that are more general to racism and privilege, but I wanted to compile something more specific to the discussion of race in writing.