Elf's Random Musings

I feel your frustration, Elf.

I'm trying to think back on the series.

Let's see.

Wasn't there the old woman who tried to warn Eric (his name is Eric right?) about the house?

The zombie story, I dun think there was?
Werewolf story, was one of the college kids? I don't even remember what they were, could be one of them.
New elf story, I don't think so unless the Templar Guy was.
And the dragon/faerie story, unless the banshee and/or the dragon was.

That's all I remember anyways.

I don't think the dragon/faerie story woulda fit, except maybe for the dragon, since Eric's mother is like Russian or something, the faerie part I think was Irish mebe, so yeah.
Zombie one, maybe.
Werewolf one, yeah definitely.
Elf one, I don't think so, unless we're going with Sanya, unless Templar Guy was Sanya.

Honestly, like half the characters could have been secretly latino or chinese in moczos stuff. Because while race may influence character, unless the guy is a stereotype or its beaten into you that they are DIFFERENT than white people you just wont even notice. Which is how it should be.

It's not about not noticing, it's about not making them caricatures. The character's ethnicity is an important aspect of their, well, character.

I don't think the right way to do it is by desaturating the story until everything's just a bland black and white. You gotta preserve some color in there. On the same token, too much saturation just makes it a mess to look at.


Basically, being color-blind, I think, isn't the right way to go about things.

. . . I think you guys are missing out on what I actually wrote.

You feel like you don't have a representative amount of LGBT/POC characters in your story and are noticing a serious lack of such characters in the Urban Fantasy genre, is what I got from what you wrote. I don't think that's wrong, but hey maybe I'm mansplaining it.

I think you are missing out on what I actually wrote.


One point is just a review of Mozco's stories on where such characters could have reasonably appeared, and still make narrative sense, without changing the overall plot of the story. As in, not shoe-horning in those characters to generate one of the "Token Black Guy", which is, as you implied, an undesirable scenario.

The other is just a critique of my interpretation of Kelnish's solution, which I read, perhaps harshly, as white-washing any distinctive features of an LGBT/POC character as part of a (misguided) view of a more representative world, one where there is no color, which I don't think should be desirable.

Originally Posted by ratstsrub

You feel like you don't have a representative amount of LGBT/POC characters in your story and are noticing a serious lack of such characters in the Urban Fantasy genre.

Well, one of my main characters is quite bisexual (and more importantly, isn't punished for it), but the more that I think about it, the more that I realize I have never really written a gay man before. POC not so much. One of my first published short stories had a Native American protagonist in it as the main character and the other had an Asian protagonist.

Originally Posted by ratstsrub

I think you are missing out on what I actually wrote.

There was something about trying to tally the POC in Moczo's story? It was kinda hard to understand.

I updated the last post to explain it a bit more.

To re-explain, it was separated into two parts. The first was a check to see if the criticism about the lack of LGBT/POC characters in his stories is fair, which required it be first true that they do have a lack. I'm sure you agree that actually verifying that fact is important.

The second aspect, to check if the criticism was fair, is to see if the stories themselves were amenable to having LGBT/POC characters.

For example, for a story about a rich old white men doing rich old white thing, criticism about the lack of LGBT/POC characters, may be missing the point, if the point was in fact their conspicuous absence. It's basically a context check.

I think Moczo's failed both, but eh, can't blame him much.

Good one Elf. Now stop trying to propose Fate/Stay Night adaptation with all-white actors

It was just sort of amusing when there was a fairly glowing review but he was apparently knocked because his cast wasn't diverse enough. Or something.

Which made me realize about how little POC are represented in the Urban Fantasy Genre as a whole.

The Anita Blake books (use to) gleefully point out when someone was black by over describing them. This being said, none of the main characters are POC.

The Harry Dresden Books? Okay, Susan was at least of Latino descent . . . And The Gatekeeper maybe Indian. There's Sanya. Shiro died, but there's Ancient Mai and Speaks with Wind. However POC are generally treated as foreign entities in the Dresden files.

The Iron Druid Chronicles? Lots of white redheaded Irish people running around. For being only 10% of the population, there are a lot of gingers in this series. However, Jesus was portrayed as a black dredlocked hippie which was cool.

Originally Posted by Tiresias

Good one Elf. Now stop trying to propose Fate/Stay Night adaptation with all-white actors

Hey, some of the Servants should be white! Like Saber and Lancer especially.

Originally Posted by Kelnish

Honestly, like half the characters could have been secretly latino or chinese in moczos stuff. Because while race may influence character, unless the guy is a stereotype or its beaten into you that they are DIFFERENT than white people you just wont even notice. Which is how it should be.

This is very true. You don't really have any way to describe someone as being non-white other than focusing on their non-whiteness.

I can have a character named Kevin Smith and have him be black in my mind, but whether or not a reader sees him as black generally depends on their own interpretation. I shouldn't have to have a Treyvon or a Shaniqua running around for the express purpose of labelling them as black, for example.

And even on that note, labelling someone as white is blindly meaningless as well. Would you call someone from north Iran or the Levant white? They look typically "white" in appearance, while there are some dark Spaniards and Italians around. Are they not white?

I don't think there's a point in writing a non-white or non a heterosexual character just to represent any specific group. That is kind of racist in itself.

The only media that could be argued needs more representation is film, because then the appearance of characters is set in stone.

I think a lot of steam is being blown over nothing. Moczo wrote a great story and got an overall great review, but to knock him on the lack sufficient LGBT/POC is down right asinine.

This is an issue that affects all forms of media (except non-fiction...unless it's translated into a movie...) It's not strictly limited to 'Urban Fantasy'...

Five made a good point a character being of one race in the authors mind, but being something else in the reader's mind. Frankly, unless you go out of your way to describe every character - even the minorest of minor ones - you won't know.

Example, if I were to write a scene where a meeting takes place in a park and lightly commented on there being a cute couple here or there, because this detail isn't important, what would you think the couples were? Inter-racial? Gay? It's all down to what you perceive these unimportant background characters to be - otherwise your story is going to sound like a list.

It's both one of the saddest and interesting points of literary fiction. Your experience as the writer and reader of a story reflects your own experiences in life and in reading. i.e. I picture a lot of the protagonists of my original works as white male protagonists - and I'm an Indian/Malaysian mixed female. A lot of the cast is also male heavy, and there are few females...now, this does not at all mean that I have no pride in my culture or family history - I love where I come from, but I also love where I've been raised and the people I've come in contact with. My choice with my writing could simply be from the influence of other authors - a lot of books I've read feature male protagonists, and so it's a subconscious thing. This choice could even be a representative of how I ultimately identify myself - largely masculine in nature, but feminine, and no different than the stereotypical white Englishman.

I don't really identify myself by my skin colour, ethnic background, religion or sexuality, because I don't think they're as important as who I am as a person and I apply the same to everyone else - even the characters in books.

So overall, it really shouldn't matter whether there is a strong presence of LGBT or POC in fiction, because you could just be imagining it wrong, and an author doesn't have to disclose unimportant details like that for every character they introduce.

I'll note that the review in question was for After Expenses, which is actually a collection of six different stories (as ratstsrub alluded to). A remark that one story lacks non-heterosexual-white characters is an irrelevancy. A remark that they all do is, as Elf pretty well alluded to, a "hmmmm." Not a critique, not a scathing remark, just a point. (A point which, I may add, Moczo seems to have taken into consideration himself; "Old Flames, New Fires" has people of color in the roles of major supporting cast member and major antagonist, for example.)

(Elf, you'll want to add Shadow Hearts From The New World to your videogame list. JRPG set in 1920s America (and spots throughout the Western Hemisphere). Of seven PCs, two are Native American and two Latin, with a heavy Magical Native American theme throughout the game. Stereotypes are pretty heavy...on the other hand, it's basically a UF comedy; the other two PCs besides the main character are a magical girl vampire and a giant talking cat.)

People actually like the Iron Druid series?