Saturday, March 7, 2009

A Letter

Dear Orcing Hordes,

I wish we could all go out to dinner. I wish we could meet up, and have curry and wasabi and blueberry shortcake and lassis(es?) and mango chutney and fried dumplings and more. I wish we could hug each other and make jokes about hair petting and maybe sigh a little that 2009 is not even a 1/3 done and OMGWTF.

I wish we could squeeze hands and roll our eyes and talk pretty man-flesh, and pretty woman-flesh and giggle and be ridiculous. I wish we could MSTK POTC and Chronicles of Riddick and who knows what other shows, with the actual popcorn.

I wish we could have a reading of the many wonderful stories from The Rymyth Project. And we could hear each other's SF short stories and maybe play a table-top game run by (Cool As Fish) Bankuei, from one of the incredible worlds he builds up.

We are only likely to meet in two's and fives throughout the year, maybe tens at WisCon. Still, I hope that the big dinner meet environment is there, whenever groups of us meet, wherever we meet and that we continue to cut a path for those who follow behind and beside us.

Thank you my sisters and brothers (in the Horde) for your strength, humor and buoyant voices saying "Oh Hellz Nah!" whether or not you found the patience of Job to try and talk to some individuals.

Thank you for taking time out of your life to write all you have written and to read all you've read and to put forth energy in raising a voice.


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POC In SF & F Carnival: Intra-POC Dialogue / De-colonizing The Mind - Deadline March 27th 2009

Asian Women Blog Carnival: 1st Ever! - Deadline April 3rd, 2009

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12th POC in SF & F Carnival. Now Live! @ Hathor Legacy

18 comments:

  1. But ey-ey -- yuh make me start bawling, gyul!

    Reading your fond daydreams of what our imagined dinner together would be like makes me wistful that we can't actually do that, but at the same time it's such a warm, cosy wistful that I can't feel entirely sad about it.

    Thank you for your voice in all this; I've learned so much about how to engage/disengage, and most of it from you.

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  2. Hail Orc Leader Most High!

    Um. I like you so much. I admire and respect your stamina.

    I now only want to read good stories by us or good stories about us. I still read white people, but, I actively seek out white writers that are doing nonfiction that interests me in terms of food, art, architecture...

    There's just so much written by poc, good and bad, that I'd rather dive more deeply into that. Going to DragonCon and hanging out with landrews (lj) and chesyaburke (lj) and indigoskynet (lj) (primarily) and really holding me up and having my back made a world of difference to me. And for me. I'm still disappointed in sf and f as a whole. I believe it is no more welcoming of me than any other white community, but I'm willing to take it on my terms.

    I had a wonderful experience with landrews, but I don't expect every light-skin or white person to be that down or cool. I view them as wraith until proven otherwise. They've taught me that. People like landrews or Peter S. Beagle, or Robert Picardo, B. Bridges have taught me that some white folk are made of awesome, at least in regard to me (or in the case of LKH, are awesome toward one black person). Which was *unexpected* and *a nice surprise* and did I mention UNEXPECTED? Other people like Rainbow Sun Francks and Cirroq Loften and James Kyson Lee taught me that men of color can and often do rock *so* hard. Which, heh, wasn't as surprising. Though them being so pretty and sweet was a bit of the unexpected. :D

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  3. Bossymarmalade:

    Someday yes? I want to say 'Next Year In Horde Homeland' - cause it's a slightly similar sentiment to Passover.

    Of course we didn't get passed over in this. But maybe "Next Year, VERB NOIRE!" is the best way to encapsulate the feeling.

    And we can pray that VERB NOIRE is so successful that we get the chance to create Orcing Noire - A Non White Furturism & Fantasy Con.

    PS: I'm... still trying to disengage in some places. But if I've managed to be a positive example - that's pretty damn sweet.

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  4. Skywardprodigal:

    I wrote in a later post to this one today that I'm done with SF & F. But then at the end, I relabled some things to Non White Futurism & Fantasy. So I guess I'm done with the old genre and I'm moving to a new genre. Because I feel quite like you.

    If I haven't heard something good about an author specifically concerning their race issues - either from their mouth/blog site or from a trusted POC? Me nah won deal wid dem.

    And RSF sounds like sweetness in a bottle. I'm still mourning Ford.

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  5. I say we plan an ORC's night out at wiscon.

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  6. Maevele:

    Isn't one already planned for Wiscon? Or some kind of POC safe space? I thought I had heard things - but as I'm not going I didn't pay too much attention.

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  7. Oh, I want this dinner! I want this feeling! I mean, I have it here, on the net, but I want to have the reality of our cocoa-cashew-raisin skins and yes-you-may-actually-touch-my-hair bodies.

    ::hugs::
    Once again, respect and affection to you!

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  8. Um ... thanks to playing D&D for years, I've long thought that Orc-women are sexy.

    No, seriously.

    It would seem I am not alone in thinking this:

    http://www.furnation.com/black_rabbit/beastess.htm

    So, even the attempts to insult you have failed, because your critics probably did not mean to call you a term that would make me fap every time I hear it.

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  9. Am now contemplating an Orc Horde convention of sorts... It would be fun! We could scare white people and match up who is being mind-controlled/sock-puppetted by whom!

    But honestly, thank you. I am not sure what I would have done without your voice and the voice of so many other people.

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  10. Kirk:

    You are a strange, strange, man. But compliment (I think) and support accepted.

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  11. Definitely a compliment.

    Orc-chicks are, like, She-Hulk, plus tusks (that I'd imagine would feel thrillingly dangerous when a gal is nibbling on your neck) ...

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  12. yes, there's the PoC safe space and seekrit events, but as a white orc, i don't wanna crash that.

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  13. Maevele:

    Technically I think white allies are: Pallid Swamp Goblin Auxiliary. Or at least that's the term I've seen around.

    But a general "Of Orcland For Orcland" shindig? An Empire meet & greet? Yeah, that'd probably be pretty cool.

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  14. I'll take being Pallid Swamp Goblin Auxiliary to orcs if the party's gonna be as cool as the one you describe. For the Horde! ;)

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  15. I wanted to comment to say that your post made me understand something about safe spaces that I had previously not understood. I'm glad you posted it, and I'm glad that you're continuing to post. I can imagine that a lot of this must be exhausting, especially when so many people seem reluctant to learn.

    I realize that your point wasn't to educate my clueless lilly white ass, but even silly stupid people like me can get an education if we listen and learn.

    So thank you for posting and keeping on. I know it's not for my benefit, but I am benefiting, and I feel I owe you my gratitude, if nothing else, for that.

    I hope you do get to have a party like that, and many more parties like that, because they sound positively wonderful and wonderfully positive. And I hope no stupid white people crash that party.

    But mostly, I want to say thank you.

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  16. This Pallid Swamp Goblin would like to agree with the above comment that being called an orc can be quite the compliment. I played World of Warcraft for many years (ironically, I quit ultimately because of bigotry), and I always found the orc female character designs especially attractive. I dunno much about She-Hulk, but they are muscly-sexy, powerful, and tusked.

    WoW has, uh, major racial sketchiness, but I do give them credit for that, even if the vast majority of players don't appreciate it.

    Shit, now all this conversation is doing is make me want to go write Thrall/Jaina smut.

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