Well, I actually don't think all of the objections are racist--and you've heard me say this before, haven't you?
People try to figure out minor characters, and they sometimes put a lot of work into it. Blaise Zabini offered the opportunity to write about a Slytherin who wasn't Draco Malfoy, and who hadn't already been described as ugly, stupid and mean. (For Americans, especially teens and twentysomethings who grew up with the regrettable American notion that any remotely euphonious male name should be appropriated for girls, because heaven forbid an American boy should be named something less butch than well, Butch, it was doubly confusing.)
Despite all the tortured explanations for how Zabini could legitimately be an "African" name, the fact remains that it IS an Italian name, with origins in the Tuscan area where the Italian witchcraft tradition of stregheria (not to be confused with Riley's 'strega' in Pawn to Queen--I actually do like that fic but her definition of 'strega' has nothing to do with consensus reality whatsoever, not to mention that streghe are from Tuscany, not Sicily). Now, when you consider that Imperial Rome and Renaissance Italy (and Florence is in Tuscany, btw) are eras rife with Slytherin potential--we're talking about the folks who brought us Machiavelli--it is quite understandable, I think, that people are attached to the fanonical Italian Zabinis. (And really I would have to understand it since I've more than done my part to contribute to this piece of fanon.)
"I'm keeping him the way I see him" is not necessarily a racist battle cry at all when it is attached to as much work as has gone into something like World Well Lost, not to mention the works of wemyss and luciademedici.
I will not argue with you about the people who can't understand how he could be both sexually attractive and black. That is racist. I don't think not being attracted to people outside your own ethnicity is racist (mostly because I do not think people can or should be expected to be able to decide who they are sexually attracted to--are straight and gay people sexist?), but I think not being able to understand how they could be attractive is.
But I think the tortured etymologies put forth by some of the black Blaise supporters as reasons why he was never, ever meant to be thought of as Italian are equally fanciful and say just as much about their origins, especially when accompanied by artwork and icons that depict BlackPowah!Blaise as ebony dark with incredibly short tight hair as though he were no more than a generation out of Africa.
I mean, Europe is full of mixed-race people. Why couldn't he be both black AND Italian?
My biggest problem with Blacktivist Blaise is that I don't think his mother's a very attractive portrait of blackness. The phrase "black widow" for a woman who murders her husbands may not be as common across the pond as it is in America, but anyone who knows about the habits of spiders can make the connection--and to make her actually black comes uncomfortably close to being a totally-non-racist I swear ethnic joke. The sort of thing I'd rather expect from Jo Rowling.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
For once, using my default icon on purpose.
Date: 2005-11-15 06:00 pm (UTC)People try to figure out minor characters, and they sometimes put a lot of work into it. Blaise Zabini offered the opportunity to write about a Slytherin who wasn't Draco Malfoy, and who hadn't already been described as ugly, stupid and mean. (For Americans, especially teens and twentysomethings who grew up with the regrettable American notion that any remotely euphonious male name should be appropriated for girls, because heaven forbid an American boy should be named something less butch than well, Butch, it was doubly confusing.)
Despite all the tortured explanations for how Zabini could legitimately be an "African" name, the fact remains that it IS an Italian name, with origins in the Tuscan area where the Italian witchcraft tradition of stregheria (not to be confused with Riley's 'strega' in Pawn to Queen--I actually do like that fic but her definition of 'strega' has nothing to do with consensus reality whatsoever, not to mention that streghe are from Tuscany, not Sicily). Now, when you consider that Imperial Rome and Renaissance Italy (and Florence is in Tuscany, btw) are eras rife with Slytherin potential--we're talking about the folks who brought us Machiavelli--it is quite understandable, I think, that people are attached to the fanonical Italian Zabinis. (And really I would have to understand it since I've more than done my part to contribute to this piece of fanon.)
"I'm keeping him the way I see him" is not necessarily a racist battle cry at all when it is attached to as much work as has gone into something like World Well Lost, not to mention the works of
I will not argue with you about the people who can't understand how he could be both sexually attractive and black. That is racist. I don't think not being attracted to people outside your own ethnicity is racist (mostly because I do not think people can or should be expected to be able to decide who they are sexually attracted to--are straight and gay people sexist?), but I think not being able to understand how they could be attractive is.
But I think the tortured etymologies put forth by some of the black Blaise supporters as reasons why he was never, ever meant to be thought of as Italian are equally fanciful and say just as much about their origins, especially when accompanied by artwork and icons that depict BlackPowah!Blaise as ebony dark with incredibly short tight hair as though he were no more than a generation out of Africa.
I mean, Europe is full of mixed-race people. Why couldn't he be both black AND Italian?
My biggest problem with Blacktivist Blaise is that I don't think his mother's a very attractive portrait of blackness. The phrase "black widow" for a woman who murders her husbands may not be as common across the pond as it is in America, but anyone who knows about the habits of spiders can make the connection--and to make her actually black comes uncomfortably close to being a totally-non-racist I swear ethnic joke. The sort of thing I'd rather expect from Jo Rowling.