{"id":176422829,"date":"2013-07-25T01:28:38","date_gmt":"2013-07-25T06:28:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/?p=176422829"},"modified":"2013-07-25T01:28:38","modified_gmt":"2013-07-25T06:28:38","slug":"media-game-of-thrones-and-racist-fantasy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/2013\/07\/25\/media-game-of-thrones-and-racist-fantasy\/","title":{"rendered":"MEDIA: Game Of Thrones And Racist Fantasy"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"\" src=\"http:\/\/artthreat.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/artthreat-logo-tweak.png\" \/><\/p>\n<p>JUNE 15, 2013<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"\" src=\"http:\/\/artthreat.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/1002974_524254117610469_1777450813_n.jpg\" width=\"650\" \/><\/p>\n<div>\n<h1><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: xx-large;\">GAME OF THRONES AND <\/span><\/h1>\n<h1><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: xx-large;\">RACIST FANTASY<\/span><\/h1>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong><span style=\"font-size: medium;\">BY\u00a0<a title=\"Posts by Aamer Rahman\" href=\"http:\/\/artthreat.net\/author\/aamerrahman\/\" rel=\"author\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">AAMER RAHMAN<\/span><\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><em>Aamer Rahman has recently caused quite a stir among Game of Thrones fandom with his Tumblr post about the HBO show\u2019s very problematic representation of race, most notably that hideous last episode of season three. Rahman\u2019s original Tumblr post and his response to the massive backlash from \u00a0fans has been reposted below, with Rahman\u2019s permission. Spoilers throughout.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<h1><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: x-large;\">RACE FAIL:\u00a0GAME OF TROPES PART 1<\/span><\/h1>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" alt=\"newklingon\" src=\"http:\/\/artthreat.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/newklingon-322x500.jpg\" width=\"290\" height=\"450\" \/>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">I\u2019m late to Game of Thrones \u2014 but I caught up. And I couldn\u2019t help photoshopping this picture of Khal Drogo as a Klingon. Anyone sad enough to be familiar with both GOT and Star Trek knows exactly what I\u2019m talking about.<\/span><\/p>\n<p data-textannotation-id=\"062fb3704620bfa41645d3dd2781d900\"><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">The Klingons are the Dothraki of\u00a0<em>Star Trek<\/em>\u2014 the scary, warmongering Other from the Heart of Darkness out in deep space. The great thing about imaginary black and brown people is that white sci-fi\/ fantasy writers can project their repressed oriental fetishes onto a blank canvas without taking responsibility \u2013 \u201cWHAT DO YOU MEAN IT\u2019S RACIST, THERE\u2019S NO SUCH THING AS KLINGONS OR DOTHRAKI! How can we be racist towards people WHO DON\u2019T EVEN EXIST??\u201d Funny how it\u2019s always real black and brown people who have to play the role of the imaginary \u2018non-existent\u2019 warrior\/tribal\/primitive\/race. (With the exception of the original\u00a0<em>Star Trek<\/em>, which had white actors in blackface as Klingons.)<\/span><\/p>\n<p data-textannotation-id=\"3011186998a4f39958a3e849d36451f3\"><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">You can dress it up as fantasy, but we know who you\u2019re talking about.<\/span><\/p>\n<p data-textannotation-id=\"6b3e2d478dbdae72ae0d3a0857e177c6\"><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><em>GOT<\/em>\u00a0wasted no time in establishing the Dothraki as a horde of raping, warring animals who have no word for \u2018thank you\u2019 and enjoy public sex games and deaths at a wedding. The codes are never original: love of war and pillaging, and animalistic sex rituals (anyone remember this tender moment on\u00a0<em>Star Trek: TNG<\/em>?).<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/3hNMwxY4-Vk?feature=oembed\" height=\"488\" width=\"650\" allowfullscreen=\"\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/p>\n<p data-textannotation-id=\"c55c5b3387e483c5d21504a91602f174\"><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">Plus some \u2018noble savage\u2019 warrior code that glorifies conquest, authoritarian social order, growling, pumped up men and hyper-sexual women, beards, braids, boobs blah, blah blah. The Dothraki are a grab bag of every native\/ savage\/ other signifier you can think of.<\/span><\/p>\n<p data-textannotation-id=\"9ec9dbf6161f90003d6f8140e6923f6d\"><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">But this isn\u2019t just about imagery and brown people looking bad on TV \u2013 the Dothraki storyline is just a stepping stone for Dany\u2019s overall storyline which is more deeply racist \u2013 essentially, a liberal white woman who goes around saving and civilising brown people. The subtext of Dany\u2019s story is a cultural war where Dany\u2019s enlightened values triumph over lesser ones, where whiteness is both a conquering and civilising force.<\/span><\/p>\n<p data-textannotation-id=\"da6589eedff0858524fe17a62f7a9fb6\"><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">It begins with taming the savage Drogo who rapes her \u201clike a hound takes a bitch,\u201d on their wedding night (and every night after that) \u2013 until she teaches him the tenderness of looking him in the eyes when they sleep together. Then, the reforming of Dothraki customs: Dany prevents the rape of female prisoners and even gets Drogo to back her against the wishes of his riders. Finally, she establishes herself as a leader when she gives birth to her dragons (at this point the brown people literally prostrate themselves to her).<\/span><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/aamer-rahman.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-176422830\" alt=\"Aamer Rahman\" src=\"http:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/aamer-rahman.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"402\" srcset=\"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/aamer-rahman.jpg 300w, https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/aamer-rahman-223x300.jpg 223w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<p data-textannotation-id=\"01fc06767c8e4335bdc6288164fb54a5\"><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">Barbarian cultures who don\u2019t know how to treat women bowing in the face of superior technology and military arsenal (Dragons are basically the advanced fighter jets of the GOT universe) \u2013 does this feel familiar? She then goes from city to city freeing slaves who dutifully join her quest. Dany\u2019s story is, at its heart, a neocon wet dream. She is Laura Bush, advocating for the invasion of Iraq under the pretext of saving its women who are desperate to live a life like hers.<\/span><\/p>\n<p data-textannotation-id=\"2f78c40dccc82b9a8ca9312563de5ba0\"><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">I feel like we are supposed to root for Dany because she is becoming a strong woman; originally meek and abused by her brother, she outsmarts men at their own game. We are supposed to forget that she is fighting for nothing more than her own sense of entitlement to the throne, like some upper-class brat who loses her family\u2019s fortune and eventually manages to become CEO of her own corporation. Somehow all the grateful brown people she liberates are\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/io9.com\/did-game-of-thrones-finally-explain-where-power-really-512351788\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">happy to march behind her<\/span><\/a>\u00a0for the sake of an imperial project that they have no stake in. Oh \u2013 like every good white liberal, she manages to pick up a Black Best Friend (Missandei) along the way:<\/span><\/p>\n<p data-textannotation-id=\"29d1d0e54d2aacac18236ebb06277c66\"><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">The Season 3 finale took things to the next level; after liberating another city of slaves, Dany waits to see whether she will be greeted as a liberator or conqueror. (the writers try to get off the hook by acknowledging that she is aware of the difference). In fact, she gets a better deal \u2013 they claim her as their \u2018Mother.\u2019 She ends up crowdsurfing over the brown people like some kind of Tagaryan Bono with all of the smug satisfaction of a gap-year backpacker that has just built an orphanage in a village somewhere.<\/span><\/p>\n<p data-textannotation-id=\"4f47aa66953d60f17fde7824b2b5aab7\"><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">Anyway. It\u2019s just a TV show, right?<\/span><\/p>\n<p data-textannotation-id=\"8ceb95e86fa50c86aa4ca572e080e584\"><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" alt=\"Game Of ThronesEmilia Clarke as Daenerys Targaryen\u00a9 HBO Enterprises\" src=\"http:\/\/artthreat.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/dany.jpg\" width=\"690\" height=\"459\" \/><\/span><\/p>\n<h1><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: x-large;\">\u201cARE YOU CALLING ME A RACIST?\u201d <\/span><\/h1>\n<h1><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: x-large;\">\u2013 GAME OF TROPES PART 2<\/span><\/h1>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">Wow. Apparently Daenerys Stormborn\u2019s other title is Mother of Fandoms, since angry nerds across the world are telling me to STFU like I just insulted their mum.\u00a0 Here\u2019s a Top 10 list of the things angry GoT fans have said to me about my\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/aamerrahman.tumblr.com\/post\/52770211665\/game-of-tropes-racefail-spoilers\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">first post<\/span><\/a>, and my responses:<\/span><\/p>\n<div>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><strong>1. YOU HAVEN\u2019T READ THE BOOKS!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">You\u2019re right. I have other stuff to do.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><strong>2. BUT IT\u2019S DIFFERENT IN THE BOOKS!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">Good. I watched the TV show and my comments are about the TV show.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><strong>3. BUT IT DOESN\u2019T WORK OUT FOR DANY, YOU\u2019LL SEE!!\u00a0 THEY\u2019RE SUBVERTING THE TROPE!!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">It doesn\u2019t matter if it works out for Dany or not.\u00a0\u00a0This is not about whether she ultimately wins or loses (we know this show loves setting people up for a downfall) \u2013 it\u2019s about the foreign cultures she encounters and her relationship to them.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">If she learns a harsh lesson about how she can\u2019t win by liberating people it doesn\u2019t change the fact that the show clearly presents a central West and a foreign, exotic East with savage practices like slavery \u2013 clearly outlawed in Westeros.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Once again, the Other serves as a convenient prop piece for the journey and development of a white character, and we read and approve\/disprove of their culture and practices through her eyes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">Failing to liberate\/ unite\/ save\/ the Other in the East might be a harsh lesson in realism for Dany, but will not undo the fundamental dichotomy presented in GOT \u2013 a West that is roughly grounded in a culture and history we recognise, versus the savage, exotic Prince of Persia\/ Aladdin fantasy theme park of the East.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><strong>Plot developments like that might question whether it\u2019s possible to tame\u00a0\u00a0\u2018savage\u2019 and \u2018dangerous\u2019 cultures \u2013 but not why people should be presented as \u2018savage\u2019 or \u2018backwards\u2019 in the first place \u2013 why there are such \u2018civilised\u2019 vs \u2018uncivilised\u2019 worlds in this universe to begin with.\u00a0\u00a0Just like the material failure to \u2018liberate\u2019 Iraq and Afghanistan in the face of a growing \u2018insurgency\u2019 have not proven to the West that its notions of cultural supremacy are fundamentally flawed and racist from the outset.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><strong>Below:\u00a0<\/strong>(1) Ain\u2019t no party like a Dothraki wedding, AMIRITE? (2) some good old-fashioned arm-swinging, fire-dancing (3) NOM NOM NOM! Finger lickin\u2019 good \u2013 personally, I prefer my stallion hearts medium rare (4) \u201cI WILL RAPE THEIR WOMEN!\u201d What\u2019s not to love about this dude?\u00a0\u00a0Such a romantic.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" alt=\"GOT_tumblr\" src=\"http:\/\/artthreat.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/GOT_tumblr.jpg\" width=\"500\" height=\"277\" \/><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><strong>4. WHY DON\u2019T YOU TALK ABOUT SEXISM? GAME OF THRONES IS SUPER MISOGYNIST!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">Really? The show where women get sold and hired and raped all the time?\u00a0\u00a0And when people aren\u2019t being raped, people are trying to rape them or threatening to rape them or talking about how they will probably be raped?\u00a0\u00a0This show has more rape references per episode than an average season of Law and Order:\u00a0<em>SVU<\/em>.\u00a0\u00a0Pretty sure people have mentioned that already.\u00a0\u00a0Still, GoT\u2019s approach to gender figures into its premises about race.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">Despite the show basically celebrating rape through its casual, graphic fetishism, GoT attempts to construct a certain moral code around its characters\u2019 attitudes towards sexual violence.\u00a0\u00a0Dany\u2019s evil brother touches her.\u00a0\u00a0Joffrey, a villain, brutalises prostitutes, publicly has Sansa sexually humiliated, and threatens to rape her.\u00a0\u00a0Tyrion demonstrates his nobility when he rescues Sansa from Joffrey, outright refuses his father\u2019s orders to rape Sansa for the sake of an heir, and falls in love with Shae despite her being a prostitute and off limits to someone of his standing.\u00a0\u00a0Brienne takes her revenge on three Stark soldiers who admit to raping a girl, and even Jaime Lannister gets a redemption story when he saves Brienne from getting raped by Locke and his men, at the cost of losing his hand.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">Khal Drogo, on the other hand, casually rapes his wife on their wedding night and makes an epic speech pacing around a fire where he proudly claims that he will rape the women of Westeros while his troops cheer him on.\u00a0\u00a0Rape is simply presented as an inherent, celebrated element of Dothraki culture.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><strong>5. IF YOU GO LOOKING FOR RACISM, YOU WILL FIND IT.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">I have never gone looking for racism, racism finds me and slaps me in the face.\u00a0\u00a0<strong>HOW DOES IT ALWAYS KNOW WHERE TO FIND ME?<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><strong>6. ARE YOU CALLING ME RACIST FOR LIKING GAME OF THRONES?<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">I have no idea whether you are racist or not. But your violent reaction to me calling out some pretty obvious points about imaginary people on a FANTASY TV SHOW makes me wonder.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><strong>7. IN GAME OF THRONES, ALL CULTURES ARE SAVAGE AND EVERYONE\u2019S A BARBARIAN.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">It\u2019s true, in GoT almost all cultures go to war, everyone fights and people from all cultures are shown doing unsavoury things.\u00a0\u00a0But not all barbarians are created equal.\u00a0\u00a0Only certain cultures demand that a woman eat a raw stallion heart in front of people wailing in a made up language.\u00a0\u00a0Only certain cultures allow and exist entirely on slave trading and slave-based economies.\u00a0\u00a0Only certain cultures have violent sex orgies at their weddings, and only certain cultures sell armies of castrated brown warrior-eunuchs (the Unsullied).\u00a0\u00a0And none of these things happen to be in Eurocentric Westeros.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" alt=\"tumblr_inline_moetkpi8WB1qz4rgp\" src=\"http:\/\/artthreat.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/tumblr_inline_moetkpi8WB1qz4rgp.jpg\" width=\"500\" height=\"321\" \/><\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><strong>8. WHAT ABOUT THE WILDLINGS?\u00a0\u00a0AREN\u2019T THEY ALSO PORTRAYED AS BARBARIC?<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<div>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">The Wildlings are interesting.\u00a0\u00a0Throughout the show we hear about them being everything from savages to bestiality loving cannibals, but when we finally meet them they turn out to be, well\u2026regular white people in matching furry parkas.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">White culture exists as a spectrum in the GOT universe; the Lannisters are the rich, entitled, aristocratic upper-class toffs, the Starks are the honest, hard-working aspiratonal middle class, and the Wildlings (and Hilltribes) are the working class.\u00a0\u00a0The whole Jon Snow\/ Ygritte storyline is as Disney as GoT gets with its nobleman-in-love-with-the-common-girl dynamic.\u00a0\u00a0At one point they agree that they even come from the same ancestors, and question why they are fighting at all.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">White people in GoT have an array of competing desires, internal conflict, and interesting moral issues to grapple with.\u00a0 They come from different classes and backgrounds which inform their view of the world, creating believable relationships and interactions between characters.\u00a0You know, like real people.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><strong>9. IT\u2019S JUST FANTASY!!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">Fantasy reflects your subconscious desires.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><strong>10. ARE YOU CALLING ME RACIST?<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\">See (6).<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: medium;\"><em>Aamer Rahman is a standup comic based in Melbourne, Australia. He is one half of the standup comedy duo Fear of a Brown Planet.\u2019\u00a0Follow him on\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/aamerrahman.tumblr.com\/\" target=\"_blank\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Tumblr<\/span><\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/aamer_rahman\" target=\"_blank\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Twitter<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&gt;via:\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/artthreat.net\/2013\/06\/game-of-thrones-and-racist-fantasy\/\" target=\"_blank\">http:\/\/artthreat.net\/2013\/06\/game-of-thrones-and-racist-fantasy\/<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; JUNE 15, 2013 &nbsp; &nbsp; GAME OF THRONES AND RACIST FANTASY &nbsp; BY\u00a0AAMER RAHMAN\u00a0 Aamer Rahman has recently caused quite a stir among Game of Thrones fandom with his Tumblr post about the HBO show\u2019s very problematic representation of race, most notably that hideous last episode of season three. Rahman\u2019s original Tumblr post and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","_s2mail":"yes"},"categories":[6],"tags":[4,12,11],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176422829"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=176422829"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176422829\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":176422876,"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176422829\/revisions\/176422876"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=176422829"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=176422829"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=176422829"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}