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sunnyskywalkerLet me make it clear up front: there are lots of things I enjoy about A Song of Ice and Fire. But for International Blog Against Racism Week, I'm going to talk about this thing that has increasingly pissed me off throughout the series.
It starts with Jalabhar Xho. He's the exiled prince from the Summer Isles who hangs around the court in King's Landing begging for help getting back his throne, and as far as I can tell, the only black person in the entire first book. And while everyone and his concubine in the court is busy scheming and backstabbing, Jalabhar Xho is... doing nothing. Except wearing feathers and maybe greeting someone or other at an official function. Even then, I think what he says is summarized rather than presented directly. Well, maybe GRRM is holding him in reserve and won't spring Jalabhar Xho's backstory and subtly hidden involvement in events until later, I thought.
But no. Three books go by, and Jalabhar Xho is still just hanging around, wearing his feathered cloak and going, "Hello, I am black! And also exotic in a tropical way! Also, I am still black!" while the white people ignore him unless they're commenting on a) his exoticness or b) how pathetic he is to hope that Westeros will ever help him. Now, clearly the characters' prejudices don't reflect the author's as a general rule, but here those attitudes coincide with the character also being presented as being totally incidental to absolutely everything going on. Again, everyone and his concubine is plotting and scheming - except Jalabhar Xho. The Prologue Redshirts get more pagetime and characterization than he does. What gives?
This would be bad enough, but in the second book, we meet Chataya and Alayaya, Happy Whores. You see, while most of the prostitutes in Westeros are either forced into the profession by necessity, severely damaged by past abuse with no possibility of forming normal human attachments (like Shae), or are at least aware that they're breaking with their society's mores for whatever reason, Chataya and Alayaya see their profession as sacred and noble. Now, I am all in favor of fiction featuring societies with different sexual mores. But is it really a good idea to give the "free (and spiritual!) love" attitudes to the only black women in the book? Because hello, stereotype of sexually "loose" non-white societies. Really, they're happy to work in a fancy brothel! It's their culture! Being the only black women on a continent where the white people can barely get along with shorter white people, let alone people of color from other countries, in no way contributed to them working in a brothel, because it's completely their choice!
And then they get beaten for helping Tyrion, and we never hear from them again. Because they're not important other than for helping Tyrion. Who is OMG OPRESSED for his differences, let us not forget. Why doesn't Jalabhar Xho, Chataya, or Alayaya get bitter at being treated badly and come up with witty insults or subtle revenge schemes? Everyone else in the series does. Even for non-revenge purposes, you'd think that with all the nobles patronizing their establishment, they'd hear lots of important news and have plenty of opportunities to subtly tweak events, but no. Like Jalabhar Xho, they exist in a bubble, almost entirely outside the plot. But at least they get lines! And help a main character! I guess we're supposed to be grateful.
And then there's the crew of the ship Sam & co. take from Braavos, who kindly help Sam with his sex life. And Jalabhar Xho getting put on the arrest list for allegedly sleeping with Margaery, because Cersei thinks that will be scandalous. The use of that particular trope (black man as sexual threat to white society! sexing up pretty white girl oh noes the perversion!) could have just been one more nasty thing Cersei thinks, and a sign that Westeros in general has some nasty stereotypes - except that in this case, the book kind of backs them up. The black characters are always either sleeping with the white people, pretending to sleep with the white people, or getting the white people to sleep with each other. Chataya and the ship crew independently agree that Summer Islanders see sex as natural and healthy and spiritual, and something to be engaged in frequently and without shame. So if Jalabhar Xho appears to have been doing nothing but standing around wearing feathers, it's perfectly reasonable to assume that he's been sleeping with some pretty white girls, even if they aren't Margaery - and it's unfortunately also perfectly reasonable to assume that he hasn't been doing anything else worth noting. For four books, every single black character has been a token or a sexually-charged stereotype.
Let me rephrase: for four books, the author has found no role for black characters other than tokens or sexually-charged stereotypes. That kind of long-term selectiveness over thousands of pages pretty much says that these characters aren't just appearing to be tokens or sexually-charged stereotypes to the other characters - if they had anything more to them, we'd have heard more about it by now. Given their placement right in the center of Conspiracy City, if they did anything else, they'd have been caught up in some important event or other ages ago. And unfortunately, at this point, if GRRM suddenly turns around and reveals that Jalabhar Xho has been doing... well, anything... behind the scenes all along, it's going to look pasted on, because he's there but rarely mentioned as even being present, let alone sticking around long enough to drop clues that he's up to anything.
To sum up, the three black characters with any screen time at all are 1) a useless, yet exotic and studly, black man who may be upsetting society by sleeping with white women, and 2) happy, sexually available black women. Not only do they fall into racial stereotypes, but gendered racial stereotypes. The other (really, really minor) black characters are 3) happy to be a major character's sex therapists.
There are also those sexy, dangerous (brown) women of Dorne, and the eastern (brown) societies that have an even worse social system than Westeros with slavery and interchangeable brainwashed soldiers. And (brown) nomads who help Dany learn to command and then conveniently leave so she can go rule other brown people. Except her two servants, who still haven't gotten any personality or desires of their own. One of whom dutifully pleasures Dany on occasion - pretty much the only thing that distinguishes her from the other servant-girl. We still don't know what she actually thinks about this, because her character doesn't matter.
I like the series, but it has skanky race issues.
It starts with Jalabhar Xho. He's the exiled prince from the Summer Isles who hangs around the court in King's Landing begging for help getting back his throne, and as far as I can tell, the only black person in the entire first book. And while everyone and his concubine in the court is busy scheming and backstabbing, Jalabhar Xho is... doing nothing. Except wearing feathers and maybe greeting someone or other at an official function. Even then, I think what he says is summarized rather than presented directly. Well, maybe GRRM is holding him in reserve and won't spring Jalabhar Xho's backstory and subtly hidden involvement in events until later, I thought.
But no. Three books go by, and Jalabhar Xho is still just hanging around, wearing his feathered cloak and going, "Hello, I am black! And also exotic in a tropical way! Also, I am still black!" while the white people ignore him unless they're commenting on a) his exoticness or b) how pathetic he is to hope that Westeros will ever help him. Now, clearly the characters' prejudices don't reflect the author's as a general rule, but here those attitudes coincide with the character also being presented as being totally incidental to absolutely everything going on. Again, everyone and his concubine is plotting and scheming - except Jalabhar Xho. The Prologue Redshirts get more pagetime and characterization than he does. What gives?
This would be bad enough, but in the second book, we meet Chataya and Alayaya, Happy Whores. You see, while most of the prostitutes in Westeros are either forced into the profession by necessity, severely damaged by past abuse with no possibility of forming normal human attachments (like Shae), or are at least aware that they're breaking with their society's mores for whatever reason, Chataya and Alayaya see their profession as sacred and noble. Now, I am all in favor of fiction featuring societies with different sexual mores. But is it really a good idea to give the "free (and spiritual!) love" attitudes to the only black women in the book? Because hello, stereotype of sexually "loose" non-white societies. Really, they're happy to work in a fancy brothel! It's their culture! Being the only black women on a continent where the white people can barely get along with shorter white people, let alone people of color from other countries, in no way contributed to them working in a brothel, because it's completely their choice!
And then they get beaten for helping Tyrion, and we never hear from them again. Because they're not important other than for helping Tyrion. Who is OMG OPRESSED for his differences, let us not forget. Why doesn't Jalabhar Xho, Chataya, or Alayaya get bitter at being treated badly and come up with witty insults or subtle revenge schemes? Everyone else in the series does. Even for non-revenge purposes, you'd think that with all the nobles patronizing their establishment, they'd hear lots of important news and have plenty of opportunities to subtly tweak events, but no. Like Jalabhar Xho, they exist in a bubble, almost entirely outside the plot. But at least they get lines! And help a main character! I guess we're supposed to be grateful.
And then there's the crew of the ship Sam & co. take from Braavos, who kindly help Sam with his sex life. And Jalabhar Xho getting put on the arrest list for allegedly sleeping with Margaery, because Cersei thinks that will be scandalous. The use of that particular trope (black man as sexual threat to white society! sexing up pretty white girl oh noes the perversion!) could have just been one more nasty thing Cersei thinks, and a sign that Westeros in general has some nasty stereotypes - except that in this case, the book kind of backs them up. The black characters are always either sleeping with the white people, pretending to sleep with the white people, or getting the white people to sleep with each other. Chataya and the ship crew independently agree that Summer Islanders see sex as natural and healthy and spiritual, and something to be engaged in frequently and without shame. So if Jalabhar Xho appears to have been doing nothing but standing around wearing feathers, it's perfectly reasonable to assume that he's been sleeping with some pretty white girls, even if they aren't Margaery - and it's unfortunately also perfectly reasonable to assume that he hasn't been doing anything else worth noting. For four books, every single black character has been a token or a sexually-charged stereotype.
Let me rephrase: for four books, the author has found no role for black characters other than tokens or sexually-charged stereotypes. That kind of long-term selectiveness over thousands of pages pretty much says that these characters aren't just appearing to be tokens or sexually-charged stereotypes to the other characters - if they had anything more to them, we'd have heard more about it by now. Given their placement right in the center of Conspiracy City, if they did anything else, they'd have been caught up in some important event or other ages ago. And unfortunately, at this point, if GRRM suddenly turns around and reveals that Jalabhar Xho has been doing... well, anything... behind the scenes all along, it's going to look pasted on, because he's there but rarely mentioned as even being present, let alone sticking around long enough to drop clues that he's up to anything.
To sum up, the three black characters with any screen time at all are 1) a useless, yet exotic and studly, black man who may be upsetting society by sleeping with white women, and 2) happy, sexually available black women. Not only do they fall into racial stereotypes, but gendered racial stereotypes. The other (really, really minor) black characters are 3) happy to be a major character's sex therapists.
There are also those sexy, dangerous (brown) women of Dorne, and the eastern (brown) societies that have an even worse social system than Westeros with slavery and interchangeable brainwashed soldiers. And (brown) nomads who help Dany learn to command and then conveniently leave so she can go rule other brown people. Except her two servants, who still haven't gotten any personality or desires of their own. One of whom dutifully pleasures Dany on occasion - pretty much the only thing that distinguishes her from the other servant-girl. We still don't know what she actually thinks about this, because her character doesn't matter.
I like the series, but it has skanky race issues.
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(no subject)
Date: 2008-08-04 11:33 pm (UTC)I didn't really pay much attention to the racial divides at first--actually, I was mostly like "Can we get back to the northern dudes now?" and then "OMG YOU KILLED ALL MY NORTHERN DUDES! YOU BASTARD!"--but it really starts to make you antsy after a while. The Summer Islanders really don't have any agency, they're without exception subordinate to the white characters. The issues with Alayaya extend from race to gender and back again. It would be really interesting to look at her and Shae and Inara and the idea of the Happy Hooker.
And I would really like to examine the somewhat anti-Christian flavor of the whole R'hllor thing. Fiery heart? Lord of Light? Also they roast babies sometimes.
I love the books to death, but there are some thorny freaking issues in those 5000 pages. Of course, the English major in me can't wait to get her hands dirty exploring them. ;)
(no subject)
Date: 2008-08-05 12:31 am (UTC)At least with Shae, I think there's enough evidence that she's not actually happy but horribly, horribly damaged (from childhood) to the point where she can't form normal human attachments. I wouldn't expect the other characters to notice this, necessarily, since they're all a bit damaged.
Comparing Alayaya and Inara would be fascinating! Especially since, while I don't know the actress's ethnicity, I do know that she hails from Brazil. I'm sure it's just a coincidence that Joss picked an "exotic"-looking actress from a warm, southern country as the sex worker character. And that she's the Buddhist (ie, "foreign and exotic") character while the others are all Christian or lapsed Christian when they have a religious affiliation.
Hm, I hadn't thought of the real-life religious aspect to R'hollor. I guessed it was a sort of Zoroastrianism parallel. But there's definitely some crossover of concepts there, so hm.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-08-06 12:54 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-08-06 06:19 pm (UTC)I wonder if this whole subplot would have made more sense if the series had been a trilogy as originally planned. Because as it stands, you're right: we have so little information that just about anything could be happening. Just about every other "new" place introduced has already had tons of clues and foreshadowing at whatnot dropped about it beforehand, so it feels like a natural part of the puzzle. For example, we know Theon Greyjoy's essentially a hostage at Winterfell because of a war that happened years ago between his islands and the mainland, so the news that the Iron Islands are up to no good again makes sense. But we have no idea how the Summer Islands fit into the scheme of things.
And what about Asshai, Yi Ti, and the Shadow Lands? They're just kind of distant and apparently a source of arcane knowledge and spirituality. And shadows. This also slots neatly into stereotypes about the east.
It's also interesting that the whole eastern continent doesn't ever seem to have had trouble with white invaders/conquerers until Dany came along. It's all because of one troubled teenage girl? Odd, when you think about it.