Animorphs and Discrimination
Oct. 2nd, 2010 10:39 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
blue_rampion posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
animorphsljBefore we get into the minor character discussions, there is a topic I've been wanting to bring up here - discrimination and how they are dealt with and portrayed in the books. We see examples of racism, speciesism, sexism, and discrimination against the disabled, but they're all examined to different degrees and in different ways.
With racism, we see that most prominently with Cassie ("I can turn white" indeed). Marco gets all of one line about being followed by mall security, but they're both characters that would have both dealt with racism in their lives. But overall, while it's brought up on occasion we don't really go too heavily into this issue.
Now, speciesism - that we see a ton of, and I'd argue that a lot of the issues that usually come up in a discussion of racism are in fact explored through speciesism. All of the various aliens have opinions and stereotypes of the other aliens - the Andalites are 'arrogant', the humans are just meat to the Yeerks, the Yeerks are all 'evil', and Hork-Bajir and all nice and sweet and stupid. They've all got preconceived notions of each other, some of them good but a lot of them not good.
Sexism isn't gone into too much, but the series touches on it every now and then - Rachel's got some strong feminist leanings, and we have the Axis of Awesome assuming that the Governor is a man.
And as for discrimination against the disabled...well, we definitely go into that, and this is definitely one of the major failings of Andalite culture.
There's probably also other forms of discrimination in the books that I can't think of, but my questions to you are: Do you think the series do a good job of depicting these issues? Could it (and should it) have gone into more detail on any of them?
With racism, we see that most prominently with Cassie ("I can turn white" indeed). Marco gets all of one line about being followed by mall security, but they're both characters that would have both dealt with racism in their lives. But overall, while it's brought up on occasion we don't really go too heavily into this issue.
Now, speciesism - that we see a ton of, and I'd argue that a lot of the issues that usually come up in a discussion of racism are in fact explored through speciesism. All of the various aliens have opinions and stereotypes of the other aliens - the Andalites are 'arrogant', the humans are just meat to the Yeerks, the Yeerks are all 'evil', and Hork-Bajir and all nice and sweet and stupid. They've all got preconceived notions of each other, some of them good but a lot of them not good.
Sexism isn't gone into too much, but the series touches on it every now and then - Rachel's got some strong feminist leanings, and we have the Axis of Awesome assuming that the Governor is a man.
And as for discrimination against the disabled...well, we definitely go into that, and this is definitely one of the major failings of Andalite culture.
There's probably also other forms of discrimination in the books that I can't think of, but my questions to you are: Do you think the series do a good job of depicting these issues? Could it (and should it) have gone into more detail on any of them?
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Date: 2010-10-02 03:23 am (UTC)Those are the two biggest possibilities I see about the lack of any real gender discussion in the books. Or just one really - I figure that the potential was ABSOLUTELY there, that it should have been there, and Applegrant knew damn well that not having any reaction or thought on the question of gender was just ridiculous, but didn't want to incur the wrath of parents or censors... and so they played it off as "oh the characters just wouldn't think about it anymore."
Bullshit. Sure, they're changeling kids used to being in lots of different bodies... but they are also TEENAGERS. A teenage boy or girl is not going to be in the body of the opposite sex without having A LITTLE BIT OF A REACTION.
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Date: 2010-10-02 03:32 am (UTC)possibly she just couldn't show what Marco was thinking about the situation because that would be x-rated and definitely not allowedI imagine it'd be less of a reaction than if you'd never morphed before AND SUDDENLY YOU ARE THE OPPOSITE GENDER, and perhaps even less than the feelings of people who are transgender, because they do know that this is only temporary...but I still wish we'd seen more. I wish I was the kind to write fic, because then I'd want to write a story does does look at how the characters actually react what it's like being the opposite gender.
Although maybe I should find a way to rp this instead, hehehe...