" ...dog is a dog, blood's thicker than water...."
Ever since Barristagate, and especially since Racefail09.01, there's been an uptick in the number of people who have suddenly decided that (1) fandom is interesting and needs to be studied by academics and (2) people of color in fandom talking about race and representation are *really* interesting and need to be studied by academics, in depth .
Which I guess is fine, but there's this thing where some people seem to think that any and every time people of color discuss these things its fair game and free reign for 'research'. Regardless of just how much the POC involved are actually interested in being a part of their my little pony herd research and analysis.
So. Let me make this really, really clear. In the same way it deadbro does not exist for purposes of 'educating' people who want to learn about racism, it is also does not exist to provide lurking academics with free access to useful 'data' (ie, real live people of color discussing, analyzing, and reacting to genre and speculative fiction and media).
If you want 'data'? Go find some people of color in fandom to talk to.* If you dont know any? Maybe *that* should be the focus of your research.
I'm just saying.
But I'm seriously over some of the bullshit I've seen paraded in the last six months as academic interest in people of color in scifi. My priority is creating and maintaining a safe space for people of color-- not cossetting random voyeurs, even ones in the halls of academe.
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* There's also the part where plenty of people in this community are academics themselves, and would be writing this stuff up for academic consumption themselves if they wanted to take it there. And actually, some of them already have.
Which I guess is fine, but there's this thing where some people seem to think that any and every time people of color discuss these things its fair game and free reign for 'research'. Regardless of just how much the POC involved are actually interested in being a part of their my little pony herd research and analysis.
So. Let me make this really, really clear. In the same way it deadbro does not exist for purposes of 'educating' people who want to learn about racism, it is also does not exist to provide lurking academics with free access to useful 'data' (ie, real live people of color discussing, analyzing, and reacting to genre and speculative fiction and media).
If you want 'data'? Go find some people of color in fandom to talk to.* If you dont know any? Maybe *that* should be the focus of your research.
I'm just saying.
But I'm seriously over some of the bullshit I've seen paraded in the last six months as academic interest in people of color in scifi. My priority is creating and maintaining a safe space for people of color-- not cossetting random voyeurs, even ones in the halls of academe.
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* There's also the part where plenty of people in this community are academics themselves, and would be writing this stuff up for academic consumption themselves if they wanted to take it there. And actually, some of them already have.