(emily)
everyone writing ~slavic fantasy~ needs to get that it's not just a safe (white) place to write what you perceive as exotic without getting accused of appropriation.

it's exhausting to watch authors protest that they did their research, and then it turns out they just read academic writing on folktales or "slavic witchcraft". They peel cultural artifacts away from history and politics and I'm sick of it.

eastern europeans have been bringing this up in sff spaces for years, but they get ignored, and the people who turned half of europe into an aesthetic get big splashy publications.

What burns me most in these stories is that... they're the bad guys. The thick Russian accent, the cruel torturer with thick furs, etc.

truly I hate this.

Unless the Slavic writer decides it doesn't matter and want to focus on something else, right?

eastern european writers have their own relationships to their histories. that's a different conversation.

(ACAB Whisperer)

Lol- It's funny to me because I've been hearing this same refrain from asian, african, middle eastern, chinese, and native writers for years now. And I like that it is feeding back into what 'european' fantasy really consists of.

It's the problem of whiteness.

It's why a lot of social scientists et al point out there is no white culture. Irish, Rhine, Slavic - no White.

white supremacy whitewashes EVERYTHING, including European history and culture.

(Laura Urkel)
How can you white wash white history?

Some people are so white, they have a white caste system. Not America right now, but Europe works like that.

Isn’t Europe the ultimate white society though?

White is not a monolith, neither are black, asian, indigenous. Painting it all with the same brush is whitewashing.

Common sense is needed here. In an ideal world skin color is meaningless, but in the actual world it’s all anyone talks about or refers to.