z
It's just, wouldn't it be ok if I keep it seperate from the culture I'm trying to represent
You don't offend people by being ignorant, you offend people by being racist, and that takes actually doing something racist, like writing up some alcoholic caricature of a noble savage.
And don't let anybody on here talk you out of making things up when it comes to Native Americans or any other culture for that matter.
Megrim wrote:I really don't want to to scare people away from posting or trying out ideas. But...
Megrim wrote:I almost feel like the problem with this thread is that people are thinking Native American tribes and their spirit animal beliefs don't matter as much, don't get as much say. If someone was suggesting having a cult of black voodoo worshippers from Africa as their bad guys (yeah that's actually in Call of C'thulu :/), we'd be having a different discussion. If someone was suggesting having scheming Jewish bankers as the bad guys, every single response would be, "maybe you should think about how that comes across and, like, do something different." Nobody would be saying, "Don't let anyone talk you out of writing about Neo-nazis beating the evil Jews!" But with spirit animals, well hey, that's kind of mainstream. That's okay, right? Let's just ignore how that comes across, let's just ignore the voices of the members of that group when they speak up on the topic.
MissElaney wrote:Writing a rough draft of stupid, inane things that are inaccurate so that you can use it as a template to research and edit does not do real harm to real people.
MissElaney wrote:I’ll say it again: You don't offend people by being ignorant, you offend people by being racist, and that takes actually doing something racist, like writing up some alcoholic caricature of a noble savage.
MissElaney wrote:People taking offense is a different issue than you offending people and it will happen if you are ignorant and it will happen if you are historically/culturally accurate. You must not allow your fear of people taking offense to your work stop you from writing.
MissElaney wrote:The idea that something must be historically accurate in order to not be offensive is patently absurd because being historically accurate will not save it from being offensive in the first place.
MissElaney wrote:There is no sense in pressuring someone who hasn’t even written the first draft into making sure their content is historically accurate in the name of not offending.
MissElaney wrote:Yes, you can make up things about real cultures.
MissElaney wrote:Not even mentioning that making things up about real cultures is an inevitable fact of historical fiction
MissElaney wrote:...you must not forget that OP is talking about introducing supernatural elements into this story. As soon you assert that a certain cosmology or supernatural force works a certain way, that will invalidate anything that contradicts, throwing all the remaining cultures (Native American ones!) out the door with just as much disregard as if the story had asserted a Judeo-Christian supernatural world. Here’s a fine example: the Navajo belief of Skinwalkers. An accurate portrayal of the Skinwalkers, written by a Navajo person, would defy the traditions of other tribes who believe in Skinwalkers, such as the Hopi and the Ute and several Mesoamerican cultures (not to mention assert that the belief systems of tribes that don’t incorporate skinwalkers are just flat out wrong entirely).
MissElaney wrote:It has nothing to do with that spirit animals are mainstream. It has to do with the fact that there are, in fact, countless Indigenous cultures in the Americas and with such a grand canvas of potential cultures to choose from, it is more practical for a writer to go ahead and write enough of their first rough draft, step back, and look at it in order to pick out the topics of research that they can use in order to refine it into an adequately historically/culturally accurate story. Again, your rough draft sitting in your notebooks or thumbdrive isn’t going to start morphing into Mein Kampf when you're not looking.
MissElaney wrote:The problem with this thread is that it’s full of people who insist that you shouldn’t “other” Native Americans, and then go straight onto lecturing a minority about how Native Americans are some special class of people that you cannot write about without an in-depth tutorial series and instruction manual.
MissElaney wrote:The problem with your post is that you are the one shoehorning advice on the process of writing and researching for historical fiction into a discussion of ethnicity. You the one are inserting moral hierarchy where there is no moral hierarchy. You are the one asserting and attaching morality to ethnic identities where there was no peep of morality.
MissElaney wrote:It's as if the only diversity that you don’t care about is intellectual diversity.
MissElaney wrote:Is that the case, Megrim?
Writing a rough draft of stupid, inane things that are inaccurate so that you can use it as a template to research and edit does not do real harm to real people.
Rosendorn wrote:Do your research before even beginning to touch this idea, because right now you have gotten a lot wrong in the very premise.
Rosendorn wrote: avoiding researching the heritage isn't the way to represent Natives. Researching, researching, and researching is the way to avoid offence.
ChildOfNowhere wrote:You also offend people by refusing to acknowledge or address your ignorance once you realise it/are called out on it by the people who belong to the group you described and/or have more experience and/or know about the topic more than you do.
ChildOfNowhere wrote:...which I don't know why we're talking about, really, since the OP said they weren't writing historical fiction
ChildOfNowhere wrote:But that's not an issue. (ed: the fact of supernatural elements invalidating other cultures’ lore) That's how belief systems work anyway.
MissElaney wrote:This entire thread has been “Don’t write, you don’t know enough, you’re not smart enough, your brain has been poisoned by pop culture and so your work is rotten from the start, you have to educate yourself before you’re worthy of writing again, and you need other peoples’ permission in order to use your creativity.” A young writer will never succeed in that environment and it is shameful that this isn’t the first time I’ve seen it happen. You’ll notice I’ve been a lurker since February.
Gender:
Points: 171
Reviews: 3