Animorphs and Discrimination

[blue_rampion]

Before 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?

Comments

[blue_rampion]

Hee, making Sims of people is always fun :P

idk that cartoon so I will take your word that it is awesome :P But god, I want a cartoon so much. Why did they have to make a freaking live-action? IT MAKES NO SENSE. also I would make icons of it Like a Boss

[sylverlining.livejournal.com]

I dunno man, but I am SO PRAYING that the reprint of books will bring a new surge of notoriety to it. New generation of fans? Hell yes. Even if they're annoying, I'd be glad they're there.

And OH HELL YEAH, animated show with icons would be AMAZINGS. YES.

(And yeah, WatXM was freaking amazing. So naturally it was screwed with and canceled. BAH.)

[blue_rampion]

I hope there are more fans so that they keep reprinting the books and more people read them AND EVENTUALLY WE CAN TAKE OVER THE WOOOOOOOORLD AHAHAHAHAHAHA!

It would certainly save me the trouble of trying to find PBs for rping. (DO YOU KNOW HOW HARD IT IS TO FIND MALE HISPANIC SMIRKING TEENAGERS?!?! THAT HAVE AN ACTUAL RANGE OF EXPRESSIONS?!?!?) And fanart's no help, since most Animorphs fanart is of the aliens (and good luck finding consistency in how they're drawn.)

[cxrdevil.livejournal.com]

[blue_rampion]

I'm sorry, I have no idea who that is orz

[cxrdevil.livejournal.com]

oh lol i was just joking around because you said "it's hard to find a smirking hispanic boy with a range of emotions" haha
it's Rex, main character of generator_rex, new cartoon by the teen titan/ben 10 folks

[blue_rampion]

Oooh, I see! :P

[lisacharly.livejournal.com]

I SECOND HOW FUCKING DIFFICULT THAT IS.

Also middle-aged Hispanic women who aren't Salma Hayek. LKASDGJFLKJGKSDJF. I nearly blew my brains out looking for an Eva.

If anyone knows any good PB sites for actors of color, I'll need it in the future too...WHERE ARE ALL THE SMIRKING BLACK KIDS.

[blue_rampion]

Have you tried Pb Updates? Sure, people of colour still aren't very high, but it's the best PB site out there. Hollow Art tends to have too many models, and don't like using models as PBs because THEY ONLY EVER HAVE ONE EXPRESSION