The Minority Displacement Thread

[yogaflame]

If Rictor is a "white Mexican" (white is relative and means different things in different countries, in Australia Southern Europeans are Wogs, and I think even in the USA their white status wasnt solid for decades) he should be identical to a Spaniard.
But even then, Spaniards (or Iberians) can be pretty swarthy themselves (they are a varied bunch). And there have been Spanish actors playing Mexicans, like Antonio Banderas.
But calling them brown seems a bit ridiculous to me. It would imply the conquest of the Americans was brown on brown violence, when whiteness was born as a concept during the Spanish colonization, to refer to the Spaniards.

Well, the black Moors had already ruled Spain for hundreds of years before the Spaniards came to the Americas, so yes, there would be many "swarthy" Spaniards even then. However, there would have also been bone white Spaniards. I tend to think Empath is more of an old money, very white Spaniard. But I think Julio would be at least more of a 'tan' type Mexican. I don't think of him as a white Mexican, even if the coloring for him over the years has been all over the place.

[yogaflame]

I think Rictor is supposed to be more of number 2 than number 1. But of course Mexicans come in all shades from alabaster to onyx.

[Jackraow21]

Deadpool 2 made me want Bedlam back. Bring back X-Force and put him on it.

[lurkerforyears]

Deadpool 2 made me want Bedlam back. Bring back X-Force and put him on it.

I have liked Jesse Bedlam since Age of Apocalypse. I didn't like how they explained his powers in 616. I prefer him as someone who has the psychic ability to destroy or disassemble anything created by an intelligent mind, machines, pipes, weapons, but also stuff like shoes or clothes.

[Mr MajestiK]

But about racial representations America stunted when it comes to human representation.

Idie Okonkwo....Idie I believe is an Islamic name, Okonkwo is Igbo whom in modern Nigera often find themselves at odds with the Islamic Hausa (primarily) or Fulani (the former rulers of the northern Nigerian Sokoto Caliphate), and is code named Oya a Yoruba Orisha/godess.

The Igbo who got off bad when they tried to form Biafra in the 80's, they thought the sort of christian Yoruba would side with them against the Islamic Hausa. But the Yoruba sided with the Hausa and the Igbo were badly defeated, and starved. all in the 1980's.

Just type in Yoruba-Igbo movies and you get the nollywood equivalent of guess who's coming to dinner.

Why is Idie Okonkwo, named what she is named. Okoonkwo is the protagonist of "Things Fall Apart", and Igbo gods are incredibly specified to an area not unlike Japanese god of mountain _____. Yoruba Orisha are simply better known to the west because they are not dissimilar to western panthions such as the Asier or Olympians.

I mean, I suppose Jubilee is Han Chines, but nothing has ever been stated. I don't even think her heritage has been addressed besides "Parents from China".

Very impressive post.

Slight correction though.

The Nigerian Civil War (genocide against Igbo's) started in 1967 and ended in the early 1970's.

I'm Igbo and self Identify as Biafran.

[Jackraow21]

I have liked Jesse Bedlam since Age of Apocalypse. I didn't like how they explained his powers in 616. I prefer him as someone who has the psychic ability to destroy or disassemble anything created by an intelligent mind, machines, pipes, weapons, but also stuff like shoes or clothes.

I thought his powers were explained quite well in the movie and could be useful. “Distorts electrical fields, including the ones in people’s minds.” Might be cool to see him able to hold a charge and discharge electrical fields too. Perhaps a secondary mutation or new way in which he learns to use his power?

[lurkerforyears]

I thought his powers were explained quite well in the movie and could be useful. “Distorts electrical fields, including the ones in people’s minds.” Might be cool to see him able to hold a charge and discharge electrical fields too. Perhaps a secondary mutation or new way in which he learns to use his power?

The distorts electrical fields in people's minds thing makes him too similar to his brother Terry. In AoA Jesse can ruin and destroy things (generally machines) and Terry ruins minds, after he attacks people they are left speaking in gibberish, random words.

[anyajenkins]

What did happen to Bedlam?

[lurkerforyears]

What did happen to Bedlam?

Jesse Bedlam died crucified along with Skin in Austen Uncanny XMen

Terry Bedlam was depowered in M Day

[Mr MajestiK]

Incoming wall o' text.

The inherent problem with that is that you're delving into different stories in different worlds -- the fictional world of the X-Men or the real world.

In the X-Men's world, you don't see much in the way of stories about real world oppression on the news. They don't touch on Black Lives Matter, or Islamic Mosques being burned or gay kids being targeted with violence. For all we know, as things have been shown in recent years with people of all races banded together in hating on mutants, there is no longer significant human bias against human minorities. The bigotry is saved for mutants, in the X-Universe. If it's brought up at all, like a reference to concentration camps with Magneto, or Kitty's infamous N word dialogue from God Love, Man Kills, it's to draw a parallel to what mutants are going through. The reason for that is because mutants were created to be a fictional minority group and the X-Men are fictional members of that minority group who battle the unwarranted hate and fear directed at them. It's a metaphor.

You have mutants who can choose to hide what they are that run parallel with real world minority groups based on religion or orientation, then you have mutants who cannot choose to hide what they are to parallel racial minorities.

Now, before anyone gets angry with me, let me finish.

I do think real world minority characters are underrepresented in the X-Men, as well as across the board in comics in general. I expect it's chiefly because of the era in which most of the characters were originally created and the fact that fans, especially of Marvel and DC, don't want to read about some new guy, they want to read about Thor or Iron Man or Wolverine or whatever. People interested in reading about the new guys tend to gravitate to Indie titles, which focus on new material, rather than classic.

There are quite a few minority characters that exist across the X-Men line that haven't made the cut long-term, though. Probably the most diverse team ever created were the New Mutants, but only one of their number truly made it out of the kiddie class and into the Big League, and her hold is tenuous, at best, right now. (Magick)

What we have are a handful of well developed minority characters, significantly more that were once developed but left to languish years ago, and the rest fall into tokenism.

Four characters that I really love in the franchise happen to be minorities. I say "happen to be" because them being a minority isn't the specific reason I love the characters. I love the characters for being great characters.

Storm and Bishop
They're interesting, well-developed characters of color who are mutants. Bishop has suffered abysmally, story wise, but I hold out hope he'll one day find the right writer and be fixed. Lord knows he needs it. If ever Marvel was going to relaunch Excalibur, for example, Bishop would be a perfect choice for the by-the-book element in the original cast....the straight faced man as a backdrop for the humor associated with the title.

Storm is tragically marginalized these days and I think it boils down to no writer having a clue as to how to write the character correctly. (Amusingly enough, I thought Jason Aaron, in the Quest for Nightcrawler arc did a pretty good job of capturing the substance of Storm and not relying on feats, as most writers seem to want to do with her.)

The other two are more controversial, and open another portion of the subject at hand called "not my minority".

Nightcrawler and Psylocke

eth·nic·i·ty
noun
the fact or state of belonging to a social group that has a common national or cultural tradition.

Nightcrawler is ethnically a gypsy from central Europe. If you've ever lived in central Europe, you're probably familiar with just how harshly this group is treated, as in they still have their camps burned down and are chased away from towns by the authorities . It's socially accepted bigotry, as I witnessed first hand when my youngest child was in kindergarten, in listening to her teacher talk.
The character's heritage is overshadowed by the fact that he looks like a blue devil. Why not use his heritage more, like Claremont did?

Psylocke was raised a white woman of privilege, but she's been in an Asian body for many years now. Does that completely discount her? It appears to, based on what I've read from other fans. I mean, I'm not defending the original story line or anything, but she is actually a race other than white, and she's also bisexual. Again, neither are addressed, overly much. Why not?

This is where we get into the territory of not my minority group. Is there really a right or a wrong answer to this? Isn't diversity about inclusion of all groups? Why discount those minority groups that don't represent what you're personally interested in? I see it happen all the time.

The final thing is this, in response to what to do about it. In my opinion, if you scream and demand diversity, the response is an uptick on token appearances, or at least that's what I've seen so far. Why was Iceman written to be gay? Because Bendis needed a token minority in his classically all white O5 group, after such an outcry over lack of diversity in the line-up. That's what I believe, anyway. With as little as Storm has done in Gold, she seems more like a token black character on the cast, rather than an A-list X-Man. I'm sorry, but that's not good enough.

In X-Men Red, three of the cast are a part of real life minority groups. Instead of people being excited on these boards for the book, I see them bashing the cast and whining about it. (Now if this ends up as another team book that is written like a solo with supporting, I'll probably join the whining. )

Maybe instead of complaining to Marvel and demanding more characters who'll just end up in limbo, it would be better to say we'd really like the ones we have to be used and a significant part of the franchise once more? Make them great characters again, don't just make more lackluster characters.

That's my 2 cents on it.

I rarely (if ever) visit the X-forum but I must say that this post (and your post) are quite refreshing.

[BroHomo]

What did happen to Bedlam?

Jesse Bedlam died crucified along with Skin in Austen Uncanny XMen

Terry Bedlam was depowered in M Day

I knew this but it still annoys me lol Dazzler is immortal ...Guido is back from hell kittyWON'T stay away....Multiple Man? More like Multiple deaths.... Psylocke rises again
We got 2 or 3 different versions of each of the 05 'bout 4 or 5 Wolverines.
Like Damn
Can a brotha get some resurrection over here?

[Mr MajestiK]

Going to be blunt. I'm a white male, like almost every person on earth I will have some bias in favor of my own sex and race. I get people, I understand that people like characters like them.

Liberal America is an odd place, you glorify the idea of quotas. I get the world is diverse but this isn't a charity, there is an audience to appeal to. If you like diversity that's your choice just don't pretend it's morally superior.

Reading that list at the start really highlights one of the issues you people have created in making characters who aren't white males harder to write for. You are a lot more likely to take things personally, it's the reason risks where taken with Cyclops that could have potentially ruined his character and Storm has done nothing of note for decades. Who wants to take risk experimenting with non-white non-males not-straight characters when everything negative that's done to them is seen as a slight to a group.

Edit: I haven't read the X-Men in over a year, they are owned by a group that have turned their comics into nothing but advertisements for the movies and all the diversity quotas to keep the "progressives" cower so they don't notice that the movies only use white's, blacks and Asians because they are profitable and remove any trace of gays because the Chinese would never allow it. But lets pretend these people care.

Wow.

This post is amusing to say the least.

[BroHomo]

Wow.

This post is amusing to say the least.

The very least

[Mr MajestiK]

The very least

Indeed.

The level of tone deafness it embodied was astounding but not unexpected whenever subjects of this nature are being discussed.

[Paleo_Rage]

When reading some of the replys.. I wonder the cant just say they want all characters even those that are poc's to appear white point blank period. Even though we know via emprically through lived exp that when pocs and white folks have children the result is not what we see in comic books. Futhermore, we also know that a result of the intitutions of slavery, colonialism, and imperialism many pocs have white ancestors and that doesnt take change the fact that they are still a poc.

From Monet, Sunspot, and Blink not being able to be blk to Rictor not being brown.. I guess we can say thank good for Gold balls.