Headcanons and Heartcanons

[minoanmiss]

A brief fandom grump, because I have no sense of priorities. I should write about bunny rabbits and DC superhero girls and Mr. RedTed and all my roommates and the story I heard on NPR, but instead I'm writing about this.

People who confidently swaggeringly state "Hermione Granger is White", usually in response to the burgeoning trend of fanart that depicts her as a Black girl, piss me off so much. I can't help but envision them as walking up to a little Black girl who's drawn Hermione to look like herself, yanking the drawing out of her hands, and ripping it up while snarling, "Why did you draw Hermione so wrong and ugly?"

It pisses me off because learning the difference between "I don't personally prefer X" and "X is fundamentally wrong" is something useful, important, and ignored by so many people. There's a difference between a fact and a personal opinion. Although, honestly, I'd still be somewhat pissed off at someone who saw fit to respond to that child's drawing, or any depiction of Hermione as Black, with "Well I don't see her that way," even though they're at least doing better than the aforementioned "that's wrong [and awful], she's White [and has to be to be remotely sympathetic and believable as intelligent]." I think "I disagree with your headcanon" is a statement that should be made sparingly and only when really necessary. Headcanons are personal and important and opinions.

For example, I recently read someone's essay about Steve Trevor being a virgin. I loved their reasoning and what they're going to do with those ideas, and can see how much the ideas they're exploring mean to them, and see no reason to go disagree with them -- any counterargument I can even envision, such as "a Real Man is not a virgin", would be rooted in nasty ideas that shouldn't be promoted. Meanwhile, a headcanon I DO disagree with -- that Steve Trevor is the actual hero of _Wonder WOman_ because Diana "isn't a strong enough character" or whatever other bullshit that really means "only a guy can carry a superhero movie because girls are weak" -- is likewise rooted in some obviously sexist bilge. To make the effort to disagree with a headcanon is to say that it's rooted in unworthy ideas, and what's unworthy about the idea of Hermione being Black? Is it unbelievable or incorrect that a British child, or a heroine, or someone clever, could be Black? I think *that* is the unwrothy idea.

Plus, to be honest, I think a Black kid can gain more from seeing a Black Hermione than someone gains from saying Hermione can only be White. I think it's petty and cruel to want to take that satisfaction from us, and that if it really hurts someone's soul so freaking badly to see that someone else envisions Hermione as Black, that says more about the narrowness of their capacities than the accuracy of the art. Both Hermiones can coexist in fandom, so there's no need for someone who doesn't personally see her as Black to try to globally invalidate any and all instances of a Black Hermione except the desire to take her away from those who would like to envision her so. And that is, I do believe, obnoxious fandom practice.

And man, people's imaginations can be so narrow. In the most recently read discussion which set me off here, someone cited Harry's green eyes as proof that James Potter couldn't be South Asian (another nifty and embattled headcanon). There are, what, 1.5 or so billion people currently residing in South Asia, let alone their diaspora? Even if I'd never seen a green-eyed South Asian person, which I have, I'd think it plausible for some such person to exist. Why is that such a dealbreaker for some people, except which colors and shades they find sympathetic vs not?

In the end, I suppose, it comes down to People Being Wrong on the internet in fandom, which makes me a bit of a hypocrite, since I'm complaining about people's opinions about people's opinions. But I'm doing so in my own space -- I'd never post "Hermione is Black!" as a comment to fanart depicting her as White, the way fanart depicting her as Black is commonly flamed by people insisting the only possible Hermione is a White one. And I'm bothered because of some of the ideas that underlie the opinion. It does honestly bother me how many many people feel safe and justified in saying that a Black Hermione couldn't be believably smart, like they said a Black Doctor Who couldn't be a belivable authority figure, like they constantly complain that racebends are "ruining" and "uglifying" characters. It bugs me how many people are comfortably racist, because it scares me, because it has scarred me, and so many many other people like me. So occasionally I rant.

(I didn't get into JKR's opinion on the subject, though I like what she said around the casting of _HP & The Cursed Child_, because, to be honest, if an author said "X ccharacter has to be White to be a hero" I'd write an essay about why I think that author is wrong.)

*rereads, laughs a bit at myself* I do go on sometimes. *hits post*

Comments

[acelightning]

I'd be very happy to read what you have to say about bunny rabbits!

And Steve Trevor, at least as portrayed by Chris Pine, is too (conventionally) good-looking and (conventionally) charming to be a virgin :-D

[gingicat]

As in, he's the sort of movie hero assumed to have had his pick of women?

A friend of mine, who was at the time in her forties, married an extremely handsome man of the same age. He was a virgin.

Being panromantic graysexual, I tend to assume that others are the same.

[acelightning]

In the real world, it is, of course, possible for even the most handsome, most charming man to be a "40-year-old virgin". But in the movies, the hero always gets the girl(s). And, since it's a movie, Chris Pine is also there as eye candy, in a nice little bit of role-reversal (like Chris Hemworth playing the sexy-but- airheaded receptionist in the all-female Ghostbusters). As I said in my own "review" of Wonder Woman, it's fun to have both the male and female leads played by people who are good-looking and good actors.

[thnidu]

Rock on, my friend!

[killing_rose]

Yes, very yes to all of this. There's a reason why in the fic that I may never publish, James comes from a long line of South Indians and Hermione is definitely Black. (Since it's also shamelessly self indulgent, exactly one of four of the founders's heirs is white.)

[amaebi]

With you.

And here is my disjointed response: I am so tired of White people.

[corylea]

Some people believe that fandom belongs to them or to people like them. Lots of men think that men own fandom, and lots of white people think that white people own fandom. They're all wrong, because fandom belongs to everyone who's a fan.

No one can keep you out, and no one can keep me out, because fandom has no real gatekeepers, and those self-appointed would-be gatekeepers can be ignored as the silly, deluded, and pretentious people they are.

[ororo]

Well put.

[corylea]

Thank you!

[lb_lee]

What's especially upsetting to me is, folks are apparently clueless that these people actually exist in our real world, and ergo should be reflected in our fiction.

There's a webcomic I really love that ended up turning off comments, because people kept being dicks about this fun, FREE webcomic. There's a character who's black and in a wheelchair, and someone was just this total ass, like, "Oh, I'll bet you'll make her GAY too," with this air like of COURSE black gay folks in wheelchairs don't exist, they only exist in the world of liberal brownie points.

And I actually went after that person, because it was a douchey thing to say, and also because GUESS WHO WAS ONE OF THE FIRST BIG GAY COMICS CREATORS. A black dude who later ended up in a wheelchair. (Rupert Kinnaird, I think his name was. I need to track down a copy of his book, it's out of print but what little I've seen makes it look really good.) But do we get to see folks like him represented in our comics? Noooooo because obviously nobody would ever make such a character except to curry favor or something. Ugh, made me so mad.

(The webcomic character totally ended up queer though. To my delight. I kinda wonder if the creators did it out of sheer spite or something, since at the time of Mr. Grumpy Commenter, they said they hadn't decided yet.)

--Rogan

[minoanmiss]

You said it magnificently. :D

[sabotabby]

I once got into an internet argument about South Asian James Potter and ended it like this:



After which point no one could argue that green eyes couldn't be South Asian and they also could not concentrate on anything other than Hrithik Roshan's eyes.

I really like the trend of Black Hermione. I have no skin in the game (pun not intended...well, okay) but it's a cool bit of fan creativity and if it means one little Black girl gets a role model who looks like her, it's a good thing.

[minoanmiss]

... holy moly he's beautiful. What were we talking about agin?

[sabotabby]

Exactly! He's a great way to derail conversations.

[weepingnaiad]

I think it's a very sad state of affairs and speaks so loudly of privilege and bigotry that people would dare to dismiss a Black Hermione or a South Asian James Potter. Their inability to envision others as heroes does speak to their limited imagination. And it proves that we must have diversity and representation. People come in all shapes, sizes, colors, and abilities and none of them are better or worse than any other.

But fandom does seem to have its share of assholes (like the Stark stans) who feel entitled to claim that their way is the only "right" way. Which is the opposite of what fandom is all about. I mean we're creating things outside of the canon creators and that's okay, so why not genderbending or racebending etc?

I love your musing on fandom!