[ SECRET POST #2563 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #2563 ⌋

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

01.


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02.
[ao no exorcist]


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03.
[Leverage]


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04.
[Doctor Who, Sherlock]

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05.
[Star Trek: The Next Generation]


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06.
[Frozen]


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07. http://i.imgur.com/NKDHxDP.png?1?4348
[Big Bang Theory; warning for suicide/depression]


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08.
[Amy Poehler]


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09.
[Deep Space Nine/Babylon 5]















Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 035 secrets from Secret Submission Post #366.
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

[fscom]

01. http://i.imgur.com/uscYPA8.png

[fauxkaren]

Yeah but like... 9 times out of 10, the white dudes at the center of shipping ARE bland and generic.

Here's looking at you, Martin Freeman!

[(Anonymous)]

You have a point, and I agree with you. Unfortunately, I don't think the vocal majority will feel the same way. Good luck.

[feotakahari]

When I think of a generic white guy, I tend to think of the guy who's supposed to be an "audience stand-in." You can't really have two of those unless you're writing a crossover. (And granted, I don't watch much TV, but I can't remember the last time I saw a really generic white male protagonist who wasn't from a video game--most shows give the protagonist at least a little personality.)

[(Anonymous)]

I think there's a reason why people are attracted to generic characters, though... they're blank slates, you can imagine them to be as interesting a you want to be, which makes them easy to identify with. The fewer distinguishing characteristics a character has, the more easily this can be done.

This is my theory for why the Avengers fandom goes mad over Coulson.

[(Anonymous)]

But some characters ARE bland, generic white dudes who are only popular because they're bland generic white dudes. Obviously this doesn't apply to every white male character, but seriously, how else do you explain the fact that Agent Bland McWhiteypants Ward is featured in more Agents of SHIELD fic on AO3 than any of the other non-Coulson protagonists?

[(Anonymous)]

I really don't see how that's character bashing. If they're just complaining about them being generic and bland, that is. If it goes farther than that it can be.

[(Anonymous)]

You're not supposed to pay attention to SJWs. They are all retarded morons.

[(Anonymous)]

you're right of course that being a white dude character doesn't mean you /have/ to be generic and bland. that said: i find a large majority of the white dude characters that we're offered in media to be generic and bland as hell.

[(Anonymous)]

I feel like the issues of representation of minorities/women supercede that of character bashing - especially when the complaint that everyone is shipping the bland, generic white dudes isn't so much character bashing as it is a criticism of how a lack of diverse representation is mirrored in fanworks and/or that the writing in the original canon is bland and generic.

[(Anonymous)]

Well generic white male tears ARE delicious. Cry more and quench my thirst.

[(Anonymous)]

The label says it all. Bland Generic White Guy is a perfectly legitimate indicator that the characters are unremarkable and unmemorable because they're unnoticeable white guys who look like too many other white guys.

Your secret is as unbecoming as inserting "What about the men??" into any conversion, OP. At the end of the day, Bland Generic White Guys are still going to be the default. Get used to the complaints about it.

[silvereriena]

But there are white dudes who are bland and generic characters, just as there are interesting white dude characters. Unless you're talking about people who automatically dismiss all white dudes as bland and generic.

[(Anonymous)]

I've seen Pacific Rim five times, and I still can't tell the two young white guy actors apart just from still photos. I can't really tell the actors who play Thor and Captain America apart out of costume either. So when I hear "bland generic white guys" that's the kind of look I think of. Not anyone who actually has a distinctive appearance.

[(Anonymous)]

But if you really think about it, even with the abundance of white male characters in mainstream media, they're all pretty much shuffled into a set number of groups. So after awhile many of them do seem bland as hell, especially when your dash awash with 'em.

Though I think non-white, non-female characters also have a tendency to be generic... because only a few kinds appear to be even allowed in mainstream media, over and over and over.

[(Anonymous)]

The wank in this thread is so beautiful I think I might cry.

[(Anonymous)]

People shouldn't be taking it personally if I'm bored with something.

[elaminator]

I bet I've seen every single character that I like (white and male or otherwise) called bland at some point, so I just don't pay much attention to it tbh. Are there some bland white dudes? Sure. There are more white dudes in the media, so of course there's going to be more bland white dudes. I do agree there should be more women and minorities in media, but I def don't have anything against white dudes.

[(Anonymous)]

This plus a million!

[(Anonymous)]

It's not so much people shipping any white guys that bugs me, but the specific subset of slash shipping that involves shipping the Standard Hero Type, who is often or even usually white, with Standard Antagonistic Rival Who Fights Beside Him Despite Initially Thinking He's A Dick/Idiot/Upstart, who is slightly less likely to be white but often still is. Even that isn't always annoying, there are some of those pairings that I think are shit hot, but there seems to be a very strong tendency for those particular pairs to develop extremely strong followings out of nowhere despite having the most bog-standard storyline in fictionland, and that tendency does annoy me.

It's not that the characters themselves are necessarily bland, it's that many of the popular pairings follow the exact same model to the point where you can often watch a movie/show and predict straight off which pairing is going to be the slash juggernaut. And it will, often, be White Hero/White Rival-Turned-Ally.

It's just the regularity of it that's depressing sometimes, is all.

01 transcript

[(Anonymous)]

[image: a bunch of anonheads with ? in them]

It's started to annoy me when I hear people complain about fans shipping "bland, generic white dudes."

I agree that canon creators should give us more female characters and characters of other races, and that fans should pay more attention to the ones we have, and if someone wants to get mad about that not happening, I'm 100% in their corner and will get mad with them. But a character isn't "bland" or "generic" just because he's played by a white guy. There's no need to put down one set of characters just to prop up other ones that are overlooked.

tl;dr - Character bashing is shitty even when it's done in the name of diversity.

[(Anonymous)]

Aww. poor white men. They are everywhere and run everything and step on everyone, but it's so sad that not everyone loves them.

[(Anonymous)]

The internet has decided pretty much everyone but gay/bi female POC characters are bland and generic these days. (I mean, some certainly are, but come on, guys.)

[(Anonymous)]

Since this is complaints about white guys, can I just state here that I am so fucking sick of Benedict Cumberbatch?

[(Anonymous)]

I'll stop complaining about bland white dudes when they stop being so bland. There are some perfectly fine white guy leads, but there's a ton of boring interchangeable ones too. Channing Tatum's entire career can basically be summed up as "Bland Generic White Guy for hire."

And honestly it gets annoying to hear actresses constantly harped on for being wooden or stiff at the slightest hint of a bad line reading while male actors almost always get a pass. I can think of quite a few female characters and their actresses who are constantly getting criticized, "Oh, the actress plays her so boringly", "Oh the lines are so awful, she has no personality," etc. while the blocks of wood playing the white male lead gets swooned over as so deep and angsty and oh poor special woobie.