[ SECRET POST #4569 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #4569 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 18 secrets from Secret Submission Post #654.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

Am I living in bizarro world or something?

[(Anonymous)]

So I just finished a book recommended by a coworker. I didn't like the book for a whole bunch of reasons, but one of them is this:

"He was playing the race card. I wasn’t a racist. I had exactly one black friend, a few Hispanic friends, and I’m pretty sure that I had some Native American blood running through my veins."

Yes, that's an actual quote, used by the main character as an argument for harassing a black guy who did nothing wrong, who a page later she wishes prison rape on (and much later you find out she physically assaulted him, when, again, there was no evidence he had done anything wrong).

Coworker asked what I thought of the book, and I said I disliked it for multiple reasons, one of which was that the main character, who we're clearly supposed to like/root for, was racist. She seemed shocked and asked what I was talking about. I gave her the above reasons. Her reponse was that I was being "too sensitive and PC" and that it wasn't racist. None of the reviews, on either GoodReads or Amazon, mentioned anything about it.

Am I living in an alternate reality or something? I thought the "I have a black friend" argument was pretty well established to be racist, but suddenly it's overly sensitive and PC? WTF?

Re: Am I living in bizarro world or something?

[(Anonymous)]

Was your co-worker white?

Seriously. I completely get you, but I think there are still lots of people who wouldn't. Because LOTS of people have kinda racist thoughts and beliefs that go largely unexamined, so when they see it in media it doesn't register as "racist", it registers as "normal", i.e. as in like them and their attitudes. So when someone like you calls that out, well, that person can't be wrong, because they'd never be racist because racism is bad and they're not bad. Therefore the media isn't really racist, it's YOU who's too sensitive!

Re: Am I living in bizarro world or something?

[(Anonymous)]

ayrt

Was your co-worker white?

Yep.

And thanks for the comment, I think you're exactly right. It's just frustrating how common this kind of thing is.

Re: Am I living in bizarro world or something?

[(Anonymous)]

I don't know what this book is and agree that the main character is very racist, but are you sure the reader is supposed to like her and not think she's racist? I could understand that if all she did was use the "I have a black friend" argument, but I can't believe a protagonist who assaulted someone is a character you're supposed to think is in the right. And it sounds like the fact that she did it was a surprise reveal, so it might have been trying to get you to like the protag at first only to turn the tables and show you she's actually not as nice as you thought.

Re: Am I living in bizarro world or something?

[(Anonymous)]

ayrt

That's what I thought at first, that clearly the readers were supposed to dislike her, and that she was going to turn out to be the villain. But nope. I mean it showed over and over that she was not particularly nice (she also sent death threats to the black guy and looked for hitmen to kill him although she didn't go through with it, all because he dared to be friends with her daughter, she also beat a few other characters with various heavy objects, she destroyed other people's property because she was mad, etc.) but in the end it turned out everyone really was out to get her and they were wrong and she was innocent (but it never acknowledged all the awful things she really did do, it was "well, she didn't kill anyone, so it's all good, the end!"). The black guy ended up getting killed, and at first the cops thought she did it, but no, the bad guys did it and framed her for it, and then when she found out he really was innocent, she was suddenly talking about how he was such a great friend to her daughter and she became friends with his family (why they'd want to be friends with her after all the shit she did to him, I don't know). It was just...bad.

Re: Am I living in bizarro world or something?

[(Anonymous)]

nayrt

Weird. I could get it if the protagonist is supposed to be likeable but flawed (with the intention the readers roll their eyes at "I have a black friend"), and I could get it if the protagonist is an anti-hero and just not a good person, but what you describe just sounds like some kind of kooky power fantasy written by a prejudiced person with a victim complex.