T/F: "If your racism allegory imagines races as different animals with intrinsic differences it has already failed."

[joannekwan]

Relevant video with good points.

[indagold]

The fact no one i've talked to can come up with a clear understanding if the prey are the minorities or the predators are the minorities is really saying something cause I just assumed by default Judy was a minority but every vid on this paints Nick as a discriminated minority and I'm even more confused than when I watched it. It also fails to explain if it's a modern day tale or takes place in the past (50s/60s) because a lot of the allegories blur the time periods.

[Darth_Biomech]

There can be in fact many minorities not just "a" minority. As I understand it they're both minorities in the sense that they're victims of stereotypes about them and Nick in addition is also a carnivore minority. I like that nuance.

[Inspector_Spinda]

It really depends. I think zootopia was stupid because it relied too much on the predator prey dynamic which makes zero sense even on a basic level. Black people didn’t actually do things that caused us to fear them before we decided slavery was a good idea. And even if you look at more subtle or causal racism it is more like saying things such as “all elephants are scared of mice” and not like calling bunnies cute is the n-word. I think that was probably the dumbest line in the whole movie

[TAMAnnoying]

Honestly when I was writing my list of questions I genuinely forgot who was supposed to be The repressed people cause I couldn’t for the life of me remember if it was predator or prey since Both the main characters are looked at poorly for reasons that are understandable XD like I’m sorry a bunny can’t beat up a tiger in real life and foxes do in fact eat meat. The meat thing is honestly the biggest issue with This analogy cause the only people who tend to eat other people are cannibals and we kind of have a predigest against them for a reason so it’s just very Burly and very clearly a movie that they made for kids without caring how much sense it would make to Kids as they grew up.

[DokiDokiTsuna]

and not like calling bunnies cute is the n-word.

Actually, I think that was supposed to be more of an analog to stuff like calling Asians "exotic". It sounds like a compliment at face value, but it's clearly based on an idealized perception of an entire group of people, and that's what makes it not cool.

[Inspector_Spinda]

I would agree but Asians don’t call each other exotic either lmao. Black people say the n word to each other that’s why I thought it was suppose to be the n word

[indagold]

I don't call that nuance, I call that writers can't make up their mind on what they wanted to depict lol I haven't met a single person who can accurately pinpoint down what each group is suppose to represent and that's a problem. It's clearly trying to make real world analogies to the point they literally said "cute" is a racial slur.

Meanwhile Maus is more overt in this issue and it makes sense and can be easily distinguished whose who which zootopia seems to have muddied.

[WOSTR]

There's often a big grey area when using animals or fantasy creatures to portray real matters, portraying race divisions I wouldn't personally.
Is one animal one with a lousy reputation (vermin, pests), something scary (predators) or something seens as harmless or cute (e.g. a very fluffy sheep) are they essentially that same animal, if so is the species one with different breeds that couldn't look more different (birds, dogs) where they could fall into the categories of 'these are loved yet those are dangerous'.

One good example I saw was 'my little pony friendship in magic', where Zathora was introduced, they feared and oppressed her for being different, she is a zebra who has African jewelry, decor within her home and an accent, yet atleast she is a horse type being, essentially the same design mould as the rest.

I watched the first series of Beaststars, we have predator and prey animals coexisting in a society where predators can't be threatening in any way, nobody was portrayed as someone of any race or culture, we get a bunch of human situations, references to their species and questions raised as to if it's possible opposites can exist together.

[Seaby]

From what I've understood, the issue with race allegories that rely on different animals/racism occurring between members of two vastly different species is that the message that they try to portray no longer makes sense in the context of the narrative.

Generally, racism is an excuse to discriminate against other humans, justifying it through the differences between the 'us' and the 'them'. These differences - be it in skin color, minute variations of facial features, hair type - are clearly not reason enough to encourage the actions and mindsets seen in history and carried on today, because those things don't change the fact that they are still human. Now, this is undeniable.
But back in the 1800's, there were literally doctors trying to prove differences between the races, carrying out experiments on black slaves and testing to see if the size of their skulls were smaller (phrenology), or that they couldn't feel as much pain. None of these claims are true - obviously - but the point is, it was that misinformation that white slave owners used in order to excuse their treatment of African slaves at the time. If they're different, and they can prove it, then who's to say that they must be treated the same?

And the major problem with dividing the races through different species of animals is that there are actually physical differences between animals. This is seen more so in allegories that place a clear divide between races rather than doing the whole 'predator/prey' representation. If the allegory is about cats and dogs and how they should learn that they're equal to each other, the allegory fails because it is conceptually false. There can be no, "I guess we're not so different after all!" conclusion.
For example, a children's book might portray a straightforward racial allegory by putting two groups in different clothing. They're still the same people/animal inside and out, except those wearing red shirts think they're better than those wearing green shirts. It's simple and shallow, but it makes a coherent point. On the other hand, an allegory between two species of animals is like comparing humans to dolphins. The variation is too wide.

Of course, it depends on how much the author tries to emphasis the significance of the different species. As was mentioned by @Awesomeness_Studios, Spiegelman made the choice to represent the Germans by using cats, and the Jewish by using mice. It's a clear metaphor and makes it easy for the reader to understand the power disparity between the two groups. But the reader is not under the assumption that the book is about cats and mice - it is easy to see that they still represent real people as the dialogue, setting, and clothing support that point.

I'm not necessarily trying to say that racial allegories using animals are correct or incorrect, it depends on how the author approaches the issue within the narrative. And of course, how the reader decides to interpret the story - do they want to read too far into it, or do they want to apply it to real life? It's simply one of the reasons why an allegory might fail from the get-go.

[darthmongoose]

I kind of feel like this is why the attempt at allegory with the mages in the Dragon Age series tends to be a bit weak at the seams.
So in Dragon Age, some people are born with the ability to cast magic. This basically makes them as powerful as a well armed and armoured warrior when they're just walking around unarmed. They also have a not particularly low chance of getting possessed by demons and turning into abominations, horrible and very powerful mindless murder monsters, and have to practice a lot of self-discipline to avoid this. It can happen to literally any mage at any point in their life if overcome by strong emotions or emotional instability

The way people get around this is they keep the Mages locked up in these special schools where they just study, hang out and train. These places are pretty comfortable and nice, and while they are full of trained mage hunters ready to kill you if you turn into a monster, they're decent enough if you don't. When a mage reaches a certain power level, the mage hunters, or Templars as they're called, have the mage deliberately face demonic temptation as a test. If they succeed, yay! Full rights to be a mage and work for the government! If they fail, they either turn into a monster and get killed OR if they're too emotionally unstable, they're made "tranquil" which is a sort of... magical lobotomy where the person's emotions are taken away; they have no personality or emotions, they're just a sort of drone that does basic tasks.

Now you'd think that given their high chance of becoming demons (and it's clearly a high chance given the outrageous number of abominations you have to fight on a regular basis in the game, which may be just an unfortunate by-product of the fact that Bioware thinks "encounter design" means "throw waves and waves of loads of enemies at the player" and has no idea how to make anything interesting with small numbers of enemies) that the narrative was framing it as a very unfortunate necessity that these mages do need locking up.
But as the series progresses, in Dragon Age 2 and then especially in 3, the narrative starts to really push Mages as an oppressed minority and very clearly as an allegory for marginalised people in a sort of X-men way. The problem is that mostly the mutants in X-men, while they have the "as powerful as an armed person" element, the vast majority have control of their powers and a not-insignificant number have completely benign or even purely cosmetic mutations. Some of them choose to deliberately use their gifts to do bad things, but mutants, unlike mages, don't have a high chance of turning into deadly monsters purely by accident. Yet the narrative in Dragon Age continually pushes the idea that the diplomatic and caring choice is always to let the mages be free, not stuck in towers, and that anyone who is even kinda cautious around them is an authoritarian bigot.

The problem with this is pretty obvious. Despite what bigots in real life say about marginalised groups, it's not true. The bigoted people at my old church said that gay people destroy families, even if we don't mean to and think we're being harmless, but of course, this is untrue and it's easy to prove with science that we gay people actually make pretty good parents and kids we raise are caring, stable and emotionally resilient. Similarly, despite racists saying black people are violent or making movies like "Birth of a Nation" depicting them stealing pure and innocent white ladies, there is no evidence to support the idea that this is anything close to true. Black people are just people and racism, or any bigotry is based on arbitrary bias.
In Dragon Age, it's proven time and time again that you know... maybe the Templars...kinda have a point? An awful lot of these mages DO turn into hideous killer monsters or use their powers to raise undead, maybe they should actually be monitored, even if it does suck if you happen to be born a mage that you will have that life forced on you. At most, making the lives of mages more comfortable, or swapping the towers for maybe like... a nice fenced estate where they can go outside and have hobbies seems pretty reasonable. Honestly the "mages should be completely free!" crowd kinda feel... a bit like the anti-mask protestors? Yes, wearing a mask so you don't spread a deadly virus is uncomfortable, and yeah it kinda sucks that it's legally enforced so you have to do it.... but it's to stop you from spreading a deadly freaking virus , geez, suck it up, asshole!

Unlike people with brown skin or whose sexual preference isn't restricted to cis people of the opposite gender, mages are actually, legitimately dangerous, and feeling scared of them or thinking they need to be controlled isn't pure bigotry. The same goes for stories where the marginalised group are legitimately dangerous because they're anthropomorphic wolves that are twice the size of the rabbit people who make up most of the world and have predatory instincts they must constantly fight against to avoid going on a rampage, that's just not comparable to marginalised black people who are literally just human beings who look a bit different but are hated on and treated like they're scary and dangerous based on no actual evidence.

[Snickerdoodles]

Then again, the allegory might go even deeper. The prejudice against Dragon Age mages can be a way for players to experience what real-life racist people feel about the groups they're racist against. Mages are a legitimate threat to society, and that's just how bigots view people of color and the LGBT persuasion. As elements harmful to the status quo. Of course, the status quo becomes increasingly indefensible the more you get into it, but that's another conversation.

I'd also like to shine the spotlight on the old CrossGen comic Scion, which was a high-fantasy setting with a major plot point of freeing a genetically-engineered slave race from the control of their human masters. The slave race were basically orcs and goblins and were referred to as "The Lesser Races" while their masters-slash-creators were basically white people with a standard European fantasy culture. The allegory in this case broke down real fast because (1) the setting was actually sci-fi and the tech level made slaves redundant and (2) everybody kept using the term "The Lesser Races." Like even the good guys and the orc-goblins themselves.

[KRWright]

There are only two books I can think of that use animals well for this reason: Maus and Tusk Tusk. In Tusk Tusk, all the characters are elephants and it's only their colours that are different. Maus is Maus.

[vothnthorvaldson]

I've always understood the Dragon Age mage possessions as an allegory of mental illness, though I see how it can be interpreted differently.
And thus, I can easily understand both sides (free the mages, or lock them up), but I consider the real ethical issue is the fact not enough is done to protect mages from these demons, there is not enough will to tackle the issue, they are just using the same old methods even if they proved not very efficient. Just like it very often happens with mental illnesses.

Otherwise, on the general topic... to me anything that says "if blah blah... then it has already failed" is bullshit. Everything can make a good story if it's handled carefully; at most, I would maybe say it's not the easiest to tackle for beginners.

[TAMAnnoying]

I’m honestly suprised we’re talking about mages being the race allegory in dragon age when that was clearly the elves? Mages where much more of an intresting question of what dose it mean when you can actually just start lighting people on fire and summoning real demons. What can a society do when this happens? Do they take the terviner (I forget how it’s spelled) approach and have mages rule the world and abuse all “lesser” creatures or do we take the Sten option of cutting off tongues and using chains and collars. I thought it was a very interesting piece of world building especially with The tranquil being a part of “options” with how to deal with people who have fire balls at their finger tips. making it about race alagories feels like missing the forest through the trees. (Also they fucked up their story and world building after the first game so 🤷‍♀️)

[vothnthorvaldson]

Well, as racial issues are varied, and intertwined with many other social issues, I don't think it's impossible to have two different communities being allegories of different aspects of race-related issues.
But yeah, for the mages, the racism allegory is not what come to mind first, for me.
I'm not a big Dragon Age fan, so I'm not sure how quick 'reading too much into it' begins.

[KRWright]

I always thought the mages were LGBTQ allegories considering Dorian's/Fenris' plot line and Gaiden's interviews. The franchise has been hugely influential in normalising queer relationships as options in the gaming industry.

[TAMAnnoying]

Well to be fair "reading too much into it" can start with reading past the fact that they are simply mages being mages in a fantasy world. You can def use it as a "this is what happens when we discriminate towards people" but relating it to race or mental health or lgbt might take it a bit far when its perfectly natural to want some kind of laws against throwing fireballs

Like i cant find it right now but there was a joke thread on if D&D fire balls are real and if they should be "regulated" like how we respond to guns in our real world. "should they be allowed to have it/do they need licenses" and stuff like that. You can make "allegories" for anything if you dig deep enough but sometimes things are just what they are "what if" when you do world building. In this situation mages are scary and different countries are dealing with it in different ways and some people prefer some techniques more then others.

[DiegoPalacios]

ike i cant find it right now but there was a joke thread on if D&D fire balls are real and if they should be "regulated" like how we respond to guns in our real world.

Not even having bat guano as a spell component in d&d 3.5 has stopped mages from casting it. XD

I remember there was an interesting worldbuilding thread here in Tapas about magic legislation.

In Harry Potter they tried to tackle the race analogy with Voldemort and the death eaters hating muggles, but almost everyone in-universe seem to be unsetingly okay with domestic elf slavery......

[TAMAnnoying]

Bruh! you know players would buy a "pet" bat just to prove to their dms that they have enough guano for fireballs for days >)