queerly coded

Generally, I consider myself too old to care about fandom idiocy. But for whatever reason, this post I came across on my Tumblr dashboard this morning really stuck in my craw. To the point where I'm breaking nearly a year's hiatus writing on this journal page to talk about it, apparently.

It was a post that was recommended to me by Tumblr since it concerned two characters I post a good bit about. (I really wish there was a way to disable that feature entirely.) The user was complaining about the characterization of these characters - say that ten times fast! Which would normally be old hat. You either lament alongside the user or roll your eyes, and move along. But what really got me was this: the user claimed that anyone who didn't characterize these characters in a specific way wasn't "a real fan" of them, shouldn't make content of them, and was in fact ableist for characterizing them a certain way. Now, I'm a grown ass woman. I'm not sitting here clutching my pearls because some sixteen year old says they're revoking my fan privileges. It just made me think - is this what we've come to as a community? 

What I haven't mentioned yet is that these characters are from Pokemon - specifically, they are from Pokemon Black/White. If you're involved in Pokemon fandom, you might already have an inkling of who they are - Emmet and Ingo, the Subway Bosses in Nimbasa City. While relatively obscured in Western fandom during the game's popularity (whole other story in Japan, but that's a story for another time), Ingo's re-introduction as a semi-important character in Pokemon Legends Arceus revitalized these two in the public's eye. As Pokemon storylines are historically great at doing, Ingo's role in PLA hints at a great deal of tragedy in his past underlining his stay in the region without actually fully exploring it. In step the fans, then, and we're suddenly hit with a tidal wave of imaginative submas ("Subway Masters") content to fill in the gaps. If Ingo is in PLA, he is clearly missing from Black/White's universe. Fans ask - how is Emmet handling the loss of his twin brother, his literal counterpart? Is it losing his mind with grief? Is he determined to find him no matter the cost? Has he given up hope? Is he keeping up appearances at work and breaking down when he's alone? Is he keeping up hope against all odds? These are all really fascinating questions that have powered many a fanfiction.

But the post I'm complaining about doesn't like this. It doesn't like this at all. It describes Emmet and Ingo as happy-go-lucky people who would never "go crazy" the way that fans are depicting them. That they're positive people first and foremost.

Here's what I like about Pokemon fandom, specifically, the games: we know fuck all about 90% of the characters. The most we get is a brief backstory ("This gym leader runs a bakery!" "This rival bases a lot of their self-worth on whether or not they can beat you!"). Writers and artists of the fandom get the privilege of filling in the rest. And a lot of these "fill ins", if they become popular enough, become accepted as near-canon within the community.

What we "know" about Emmet and Ingo come from fairly limited sources. In their original game, they don't do anything except talk to you before and after battling them (or in 2, where you can find them on a bench outside and talk to them). They give you a few lines of dialogue, and that's it. The only characterization we get from that is two things: one, they have a very (or should I say verrrry?) distinctive style of speech, and that they love battling pokemon, the latter of which is a trait shared by, like, 95% of the cast. We can infer that they know a lot about trains, given that they're the bosses of the system. We can infer that they're close thanks to the small bit of dialogue we get when you battle them together, and the fact that their designs and names very intentionally mirror one another. When we meet Ingo again in PLA, he says that he remembers "a man in white", clearly referring to Emmet, and shares some dialogue with us regarding his memories of the man. But even though he serves a more direct role in this game than Black/White, Ingo still isn't exactly a major character, and this dialogue is limited. Leaving us, again, to fill in the pieces.

So what exactly is this person complaining about? There is incredibly limited information on Ingo and Emmet's personalities even in the game that they debut in. And even if we were going to base everything off of that initial appearance, surely, their personalities could be subject to change given the severity of their situation (i.e., Ingo losing all of his memories and disappearing from Nimbasa, with Emmet most likely not knowing where he is or what's happened). But you're not a true fan for...let me see here...complicating what scraps we have of their personality in your fanfiction? You know, the entire point of writing it to begin with? Isn't it more of a disservice to Emmet to make him remain "happy-go-lucky" in your work when his brother is missing?

Then there's the claims of ableism. It's been long held in fanon that Ingo and Emmet are autistic due to their distinct speech patterns and facial expressions (with Ingo always frowning, and Emmet always smiling). There's nothing wrong with this headcanon, and I'm glad a lot of folks can see themselves in these characters through it. But the poster claims that writing Emmet as being "unhinged" or "crazy" in your work is ableist because of the way he's "coded". Thing is, though, Emmet isn't coded as anything. That's fanon. These are traits that autistic people can have, yes. But that doesn't mean that these characters have to be interpreted as autistic. I'm not saying that there haven't been people who have written offensive works with an autistic Emmet. But this assumption that every depiction of this character is inherently autistic, and therefore writing them a certain way makes you a bad person - I mean, what is that? Have we really lost touch with the concept of fanon/canon? I get that there's so little material to go off of that once a certain headcanon is accepted in the fandom (Emmet and Ingo are obsessed with trains. Emmet has a sweet tooth and Ingo likes bitter things. Emmer and Ingo are best friends with Nimbasa's gym leader, Elesa. So on, so forth), it feels like it's fact. But at the end of the day, it's just an interpretation of the character. Honestly, if you're married to the autistic Emmet headcanon, I'm a little worried that taking a stance that Emmet can't do bad things in his search for Ingo, or that he can't take certain actions that make autistic people look bad, is infantilizing in of itself.

Anyway, there's not much more to say on my end. I just wish we allowed for a wider breadth of fan characterization without immediately assuming ill-intent if someone's vision doesn't match up with our own.

A bit late, but here's some of the articles I read over the month of June, as well as some of my favorite quotes from each.

Art

• Inside Istanbul's Underground Queer Scene - I-D, June 10th, 2022

  • “While expecting to be understood and accepted, we shouldn’t forget to try to understand and accept others as well. Be tolerant, receptive and questioning . . . being productive and expressive . . . is the thing that will heal us.”

  • “I wish patience and fortitude to future generations in their struggle to hold on to their own truths when they are seduced by unoriginal thoughts.”

• Heidi Gustafson Recounts How She Established an Archive of Hundreds of Samples of Humanity’s Oldest Art Material - Colossal, June 7, 2022

  • “When you get into the nature of color . . . you start to realize color symbolism has a lot of direct, solid foundations in geomorphology. Red that feels “intense or energizing” is often made of 500 million-year-old ancient volcano spew. Yellow that is “sunny” might be ochre made by spring sunlight interacting with microbes to create fresh iron hydroxide. Blue that feels “mournful or spiritual” could be made from vivianite (iron phosphate) forming in dead bodies. There’s a mythic geology to every single natural pigment that tells deep time and place stories, as well as conveys artistic and scientific knowledge. Color is always ecological, and for humans, also carries cultural heritage and insight. I love imagining and feeling how a rock could be exposed to heat, freeze, water, storms, mythic drama, earthquakes, drought, stampedes, violence, human hubris. In that way, color is a language of the gods…. usually weather gods!”

Culture

• The Changing Nature of Lubunca, Turkey's LGBTQ Slang - Atlas Obscura, Sept. 15, 2017

• The Human Toll of Fallout 76’s Disastrous Launch - Kotaku, June 8, 2022

Politics

• What an Archive of Testimonals Tells Us About Abortion Before Roe - LitHub, June 3, 2022

  • “In Japan, abortion was decriminalized after World War II—not out of a feminist sensibility, but to improve the “racial quality” of the nation. Tellingly, the bill that decriminalized abortion also included a clause enabling sterilization, both consensual and forced . . . this is an archive of agency, but it also reveals how US women’s ability to have abortions outside United States borders was based on curtailments of reproductive freedoms, elsewhere.”

History

• 19th-Century ‘Lover’s Eye’ Jewelry Was the Perfect Accessory for Secret Affairs - Atlas Obscura, Sept. 15, 2017

 100ships

#01 – Adamant	#02 – Snow	#03 – Lion	#04 – Spark	#05 – Amber
#06 – Lust	#07 – Bronze	#08 – Mint	#09 – Arctic	#10 – Black
#11 – Moonlight	#12 – Sunlight	#13 – Blue	#14 – Navy	#15 – Tea Style Savvy, Rosie Mayfield/Camilla Scarlet
#16 – Neon	#17 – Twilight	#18 – Blush	#19 – Wine	#20 – Nude
#21 – Rhythm	#22 – Brown	#23 – Linen	#24 – Ember	#25 – Thistle
#26 – Cherry	#27 – Orange	#28 – Vanilla	#29 – Bone	#30 – Harlequin
#31 – Cadet	#32 – Chocolate	#33 – Peach	#34 – Lead	#35 – Cream
#36 – Sand	#37 – White	#38 – Crimson	#39 – Pink	#40 – Ocean
#41 – Dove	#42 – Platinum	#43 – Yellow	#44 – Earth	#45 – Midnight
#46 – Pearl	#47 – Frostbite	#48 – Pumpkin	#49 – Electric	#50 – Purple
#51 – Coral	#52 – Salt	#53 – Crow	#54 – Rainbow	#55 – Cloud
#56 – Flame	#57 – Red	#58 – Ash	#59 – Rose	#60 – Slate
#61 – Green	#62 – Ruby	#63 – Olive	#64 – Lipstick	#65 – Spice
#66 – Grey	#67 – Denim	#68 – Rust	#69 – Flirt	#70 – Sunset
#71 – Sable	#72 – Desert	#73 – Jade	#74 – Sage	#75 – Buff
#76 – Jet	#77 – Plum	#78 – Leather	#79 – Liberty	#80 – Metal
#81 – Sepia	#82 – Lavender	#83 – Scarlet	#84 – Crystal	#85 – Chestnut
#86 – Shadow	#87– Lemon Bluey, Judo/Bluey	#88 – Mystic	#89 – Silver	#90 – Coffee
#91 – Seafoam	#92 – Lime	#93 – Punch	#94 – Pickle	#95 – Champagne
#96 – Copper	#97 – Bittersweet	#98 – Honey	#99 – Candy	#100 – Gold

For the past few days, I've been undergoing what I'll affectionately refer to as my "fandom midlife crisis". I've been churning out fanwork at a pace I haven't even attempted since 2016.

I've always been worried about feeling "included" in fandom culture. In all honesty, that fear hasn't been negated. It's a little embarrassing to sign up for these prompt challenges and bingo boards, only to have to request a "fandom: pokemon" tag be added. It feels a little bit like party crashing. I could care less for Marvel and Harry Potter, but I'll talk your ear off about my favorite Gym Leaders if you let me. But I think my drive to create content for characters I adore sparked something in me. My girlfriend joked that I'm going through my "autistic train phase" late (she is autistic, I am neurodivergent), which made me laugh. But it's true. Ever since getting diagnosed with ADHD, I've been kind of reckoning with the fact that I have a developmental disability. That's a huge deal! I now understand why I've always felt a little off kilter from others, or why my brain runs in such different tracks. I think something about that translated to the way I approach fandom.

Me and my girlfriend were reminiscing on how we both used fandom to cope in our teenage years, especially since they're going through a similar "crisis" at the moment with the Spiderman series. We agreed that it was sort of a "I have nothing else to look forward to in my life" sort of deal. But now that we have each other, and somewhat of a stable life, we not only have the time to engage in our passions, but a new appreciation of them.

Anyway, most of our conversations lately have devolved into us trading factoids about our respective franchises. Being neurodivergent is pretty sick.