i’ve been seeing a lot of people complaining about archie’s appearance in usum on on my dashboard, which is totally fair! i’m disappointed in the sense that i prefer his oras design myself. there’s literally no argument to be had about how it’s the better, more fleshed out of the two, because it absolutely is in every way conceivable.
but i also want to point out that gamefreak is clearly using archie as well as maxie’s rse designs for a Reason. there’s no way they would do the extra work to remodel their older designs in 3D just for the heck of it when they already had their newer 3D models ready and raring to go from oras. and this explicit extra work is to tip us off to the fact that these characters we’re seeing are from the universe that doesn’t have mega evolution! which is a differentiation that would be pretty important to make, because the differentiation between the universe that has mega evolution and the one that doesn’t was Extremely important to oras! namely during the delta episode post-game. it may turn out to be just as important in usum’s post-game.
my main point being, as much as it’s something we should constantly be bearing in mind and questioning of media, there is absolutely NO white washing transpiring here. they share the same name and similar motivations, but as confirmed by the contents of xy and the delta episode in oras, rse archie and oras archie are two totally different characters in the context of the pokemon main series game multiverse.
complain all you want about how much you miss oras archie otherwise! i’ll be complaining right along with you, but please don’t insinuate that gamefreak is doing anything racist or otherwise nasty by using his predecessor instead of him. they’re assuredly not.
here’s something else that i totally neglected to mention! some people were kind enough to allude to it in their tags.
the region of hoenn is based on a place in japan, like 4 out of our 7 main line game regions thus far. more specifically, kyushu. this means that archie, or as he’s named in the original japanese games, aogiri, ISN’T WHITE regardless of his skin tone! he’s a japanese character in a setting inspired by a real life location in japan. dark skinned representation is always going to be important, but we also need to remember that a character’s paleness isn’t necessarily an indicator that they’re caucasian!
like im sure you’re very proud of your wall of text about your own journey to discovering that you’re too smart for and personally ‘Tired of’ the humor in cool games inc or whatever other projects this guy was involved in but you know that uh….. thats so staggeringly far from the issue here? this isnt a scandal about your taste in youtube videos or podcasts women were victimized by this guy and have to live with it i sooooooooo don’t want to hear your text post dissertation on the troubling emergence “McElroy Culture” or whatever the fuck unless its truly, earnestly, purely, & un-egoistically intended to actually help prevent harassment like this from happening in the future
every single person jumping on the bandwagon saying “I always hated his content” needs to take a long look at themselves and whether they actually care about harassment victims.
accepting that nobody will ever be perfect, educating the people who are willing to listen, and encouraging them to grow and learn from their mistakes, is IN
How obtuse are you really being if you respond to this talking about Nazis and Kim jong un what the fuck you KNOW THATS NOT THE POINT OF THIS POST WHY ARE Y’ALL LIKE THIS
like don’t be fooled “oh this game looks so cool it’s got poc and women what a nice departure from edgy white man games and it’s got cool robots i love robots” DON’T BELIEVE IT!!! THE GAME IS MADE BY DAVID “IT’S BAD WRITING” CAGE
this is not me putting down ppl who are excited, like this is a legitimate warning. david cage has a history of horrible misogynistic writing and this game looks like it’s gonna have some racist bs in it too… save urself
Yesterday, we revealed some pages for our graphic novel adaptation of the first Adventure Zone arc, and received some criticism of the direction we went with for Taako’s coloring. This artwork reveal came some months after the first reveal of some of our characters, for which we also received criticism of our three leads, all of whom were white in these initial designs. Us and the graphic novel team realized that, yes, that is extremely bad, went back to the drawing board, and had several long discussions about how to best rectify this situation, resulting in the artwork revealed yesterday.
More or less all of the criticism we’ve received centers on Taako, whose skin is a pale blue color in these designs. What we’ve heard most is disappointment that Taako is not realized in these pages as a person of color — or, to be more specific, a Latinx or explicitly Mexican character. There was concern we had failed to follow through on an opportunity to get better representation for Latinx listeners, instead opting to take a safe route, and make Taako a fantasy color without any kind of real-world connection. Much of the criticism also focuses on how that color (or, to be more specific, green skin) has anti-semitic connotations.
This conversation was happening in certain corners of our fandom long before the graphic novel art reveal took place yesterday. We’ve heard criticism from some folks over our policy of not having canonical visual representations of any of our characters — a policy that has resulted in a genuinely humbling ocean of fan art, but also some instances of in-fighting between members of the community who take umbrage with one another’s disparate interpretations of these characters. Another criticism of that policy is that it inherently does not foster good representation, and in fact represents a noncommittal way of handling racial representation on this show.
Here’s the truth of the matter: I think all of this comes from this underlying friction between where The Adventure Zone and us, its creators, were when we started doing the podcast, and where we, the show, and you, the community, are at now.
I find it a little disturbing when someone says ‘I don’t trust anyone who reblogs these things because they must’ve done something’ It’s almost like saying you don’t trust anyone who treats someone with basic human respect because they must have done something wrong… boy, do I sure miss pre-2012 tumblr…
i interpret it more as “nobody would feel the need to say such things unless they were on the defensive”. which i find troublesome because it seems to assume a lack of selflessness and compassion as a majority or default state. or maybe i’m reading too much into it.
accepting that nobody will ever be perfect, educating the people who are willing to listen, and encouraging them to grow and learn from their mistakes, is IN
WHY ARE PEOPLE LINKING FIDGET SPINNERS IN THE NOTES
anyway what i was going to say before that is that i don’t trust people who make these kinds of posts, like at all, because even if it sounds pretty reasonable, ops of posts like “stop black and white morality/callout culture/witch hunts/being mean/whatever” has almost always done something
anyone who wants to look for dirt on me is welcome to try. i have nothing to hide.
The fidget spinner commenters are probably bots which comment on popular posts or posts with the word “trend” in so they can sell spinners.
But anyway: people being pro-black-and-white morality are the ones I don’t trust because they believe that they’re somehow more morally superior than everyone else.
Morality isn’t a one-sided thing, it’s an individual set of beliefs that are the result of our cultures, religions, education, and experiences. That’s why there’s so much discussion about the ethics involved in so many things: people on each side of the argument believe that they’re the ones who’re most ethical.
Think of it like this: most of us believe hurting people/animals is wrong overall. However, if needed, many of us would use violence to protect ourselves. Many others might never raise a hand to defend themselves, even if their lives were in danger.
Neither groups are more ethically correct than the other, but each
chooses to act the way they do because of their individual beliefs.
Black and white morality says that either violence is always okay when necessary, or that violence is always wrong, and therefore it’s a refusal to acknowledge the individual’s beliefs in the matter. Morality doesn’t have a single correct side, it has correct sides on a case by case basis, so understanding that things like this aren’t always going to be black and white is the best way of talking about morality/ethics. (if you want a more thorough example, the Heinz Dilemma is a good breakdown of some different stages of moral reasoning; i also used ethics and morals interchangeably though in some contexts they’re different things)
We all have the ability to progress in our understanding of right from wrong, so maybe if you honestly believe someone’s doing something wrong, try educating them on what they’re done wrong so that they actually stop doing those ‘somethings’… you know, kinda like what the OP was trying to say in the first place?
U gotta understand that SPECIFICALLY the phrase “black and white morality” or “black and white thinking” is hugely loaded with ableism in this context, and that’s no accident esp taking into account what @normanbates said – what better way to reprimand victims/supporters of victims than essentially call them crazy??
There are ways to encourage learning and compassion to those still learning without pushing this nasty ableist shit. Use a different word. If you aren’t specifically attacking ppl who view things in “black and white” (I.e. ppl w/ PDs), then you can use another word.
First of all I wanna apologize to my followers, because I know y’all didn’t sign up for a bunch of fuckening discourse. But I’m getting real sick and tired of this.
I’ve had a lot of people accuse me of being ableist for this post, specifically against autistics and people with BPD. I’m autistic and have BPD. This is something I struggle with myself. But I also recognize that it’s a problem, and that I am capable of doing something about it. I’m working on it in therapy. I’m not saying it’s fucking easy, because it’s not, but it also isn’t something where I can just say “this is the way I am and we all gotta deal with it”. If you have a personality disorder or neurotype that predisposes you to this way of thinking, it just means you have to work harder at it than others.
Also, what the fuck do you mean by saying “black and white” is ableist phrasing? It’s not used specifically to attack neurodivergent people. It’s literally what this kind of thinking is called, no matter who’s doing it. If I wanted to attack people who split, I would have specifically said splitting. But that wasn’t what I set out to do. I made the original post because there’s a disturbing trend on social media sites, especially left-leaning ones like Tumblr, of attacking people who say anything that’s even the slightest bit problematic (or something that can be misconstrued as such), without taking any sort of context or personal circumstances into consideration. Kind of like you just did with me. It’s a culture of no mercy, no forgiveness, guilty-until-proven-innocent that kills a lot of productive discussions before they can even start and often just punishes people for literally not knowing better.
I didn’t even want this post to become popular. I was venting my frustrations and for some reason people kept reblogging it.
valid criticisms towards the popularity of fidget items:
a lot of people don’t realize they’re useful for children (especially neurodivegent children) and treat them like bad distractions instead of useful devices
invalid criticisms towards the popularity of fidget items:
”you’re stealing something that’s useful for neurodivergent children only” this might surprise yall, but you cant expect fucking 6-11 year old kids to know that they’re neurodivergent. What you brush off as NTs treating your tools as a fad, could be a young child unknowingly finding a device that helps them focus. like what do yall want schools to do? psychoanalyze every single child there to see if they’re worthy enough to own a fidget item.
“they’re treating it like a fad” normalizing fidget toys can make a lot of neurodivergent children more comfortable with owning them.
“NTs are getting them banned from classrooms!” little kids aren’t getting the toys banned and pinning the blame on them solves nothing. the real problem are uneducated adults who fail to understand that these toys have a purpose and value.
Neurotypicals have been teasing us for using fidget items for LITERAL DECADES. We have had our items taken away, we have been mocked incessantly. We have been ostracized, bullied, and relentlessly abused for needing fidgets. And now suddenly because fucking NT’s use them they’re ‘acceptable’? No, Sorry. Brrrrt. Wrong answer. Maybe next time.
YOU DO NOT GET TO SUDDENLY ENJOY SOMETHING YOU USED TO MOCK SOMEONE ELSE FOR.
what the fuck kind of argument is that
you ABSOLUTELY get to develop an appreciation for a thing you previously disparaged, you’re allowed to reconsider stances you previously held in light of new insight or perspective, you’re allowed to stop trying to distance yourself from the needs and interests of those you’ve been encouraged to see as weak or defective
also NTs are not a collective consciousness and therefore it is impossible for a third grader to have been doing anything for “literal decades.” It’s not reasonable to punish small children (who, as the OP points out, may in fact be neuroatypical and have simply not been tested/diagnosed yet) because their elders are acting slightly less egregiously unkind than your elders did
the problem is not the normalization of stim toys, it’s the lack of understanding of stimming itself, and that’s not going to be fixed by treating the toys like some kind of holy relic that can be profaned by unclean NT hands
”you’re stealing something that’s useful for neurodivergent children only” – the OP has a good response to this (that, hey, you don’t know which children may or may not be neurodivergent!) but i think it misses a larger point
you can’t be “stealing” something if it’s not a limited resource
making more stim toys available, mainstream, affordable, and present in classrooms will only make them more accessible to ND kids who need them. nobody’s taking a stim toy out of the hands of a neurodivergent six year old to hand it over to some greedy collective of NTs. do you mean that you’re stealing the utility of the thing that’s “useful for neurodivergent children only”? do you think that these toys will stop being helpful to ND kids if some critical threshold is passed where too many NT people have them? Will it somehow make stimming ineffective? how exactly would that work?
so i know i mention this fairly often but since the general atmosphere in fandom (what fandom? all fandoms) lately is so chaotic i can barely believe it, i want my followers to know that they are accepted no matter what they ship or what they enjoy in fiction.
there’s no “except…..” following this statement.
even in cases where i don’t personally share your interests/kinks/otps, don’t ever feel like you need to apologize or feel guilty about it here. don’t feel like you have to justify your “weird” ships, don’t feel like you have to share your past to explain your unconventional kinks.
i also sincerely hope that anyone following me treats others with the same decency. i hope none of you think it’s okay to wish death upon someone based on which cartoon characters they ship. i hope none of you engage in call-out culture. i hope none of you force others to reveal very intimate and private information so they have an “excuse” to ship.
please be aware of that you can make literally any relationship seem abusive/toxic/unhealthy/unacceptable if you try hard enough. please remember that the mere existence of a problematic dynamic isn’t necessarily promoting it. please be critical of any and all call-outs you see on tumblr. please be aware that strangers on the internet will never and should never be responsible for your wellbeing.
and please, please respect content creators, they’re all just regular people who wanna have a good time with the shows they’re watching, the comics they’re reading, and holding them up to impossible standards is just plain cruel. without artists, writers, translators, without fans that spend so much time and effort and money into keeping fandom alive, there is no fandom.
i'm very gay. i'd like a few dollars. 