Reflection and Analysis

The Racebending Revenge Challenge (5/13/2022)

Today I want to write about the Racebending Revenge Challenge, a fanfic challenge I am actually quite supportive of despite my issues with the Race Lift trope as noted in the previous two reflections I've written despite the fact I feel the word revenge is a bit strong and may have led to some of the confusion regarding the actual goals of the group.

Effectively, the Racebending Revenge Challenge is a place where the Race Lift trope is done for well-intended reasons with a well-intended goal and it is from this challenge, but it is from this particular challenge that the idea of Black Hermione first appeared and not because Black girls have always seen themselves as Hermione because they honestly believed she could always be Black.

More importantly, I think the claim that Black girls have always seen themselves as Hermione because they thought of her as Black is an outright lie, though when I say this I am not including girls who are of Black mixed ethnicity for whom the descriptor of Hermione was an apt descriptor of themselves, yet in this same regard it's not these girls that the movement wants to represent. Those who thought in this manner were few in number, with some being individuals who honestly believed only Black people could have "bushy" hair which in itself reveals a level of internalized racism where they've decided race based on descriptors that constitute a racial stereotype which is not always accurate.

The reason though I say this is because if one looks back practically everything for Black Hermione is post 2010 which is when the Racebending Revenge Challenge was launched as well as the "chromatic recasting meme". But in saying this, I also think promoting Black Hermione so that their's more Black representation is a major misrepresentation of what the goal of the challenge is as well as what the meme was about. Here is a quote from the challenge.

"Some critics of the chromatic recasting meme pointed out that racial identity was integral to the characters because whiteness was not in fact a blank slate. We agree. We want to know how a man called Sherlock Holmes in Victorian England would function if his skin was the colour of soot, or what Latino Dean and Sam Winchestor would do to convince people to trust them, and if Buffy the Vampire Slayer can be Asian and still save the world (a lot)."

However, the essay I read the other day which spurned both the previous reflections to be written - and this is I admit from what I remember or the essay - did come across as believing that Hermione's whiteness was in fact a blank slate and that her whiteness didn't in anyway effect who she was as a character, yet I've seen comments when the question comes up about whether Blackwashing is okay where people claim that if a person is white, the race doesn't matter. Of course, there is as one of my readers pointed out also the issue that certain Black people have grouped everyone with light skin including Asians as being white, which means the act of Blackwashing is in fact racist.

Yet, in saying this, what the Racebending Revenge Challenge does is not Blackwashing. Blackwashing was never the intent, but I'd argue that The Wiz which reimagines the Wizard of Oz and the modern adaption of Annie are examples of what this challenge strives to do, to show how the character narrative would change if the skin color changed, but both of these works are favorites of mine, albeit I haven't ever written fanfic for either one. And in both it adds something, it's transformative and thinking about the work in a critical manner.

I think part of the confusion arises from why the RRC started which stems from the Last Airbender movie.

Which - I do need to add here that I'm actually someone who wasn't against the casting choices for the movies because I honestly believe at the time that was the best we could do - that the casting we're now getting would not have been possible ten years ago. And I say this honestly believing there was executive meddling regarding the actress who played Katara. Which, I also wish to note that the actress who played Katara, contrary to what people say, isn't white but because she looked white despite her actual ethnicity she got slammed. Nor would I call her performance for the movie any worse than what was saw for the first Harry Potter film.

And I am all for championing Asian actors and actresses to have more roles of significance within the film industry, yet in saying this I was bothered by how an actor or actress needed to be "Asian enough" to count, that dark-skinned Asians and those of mixed-Asian ethnicity who didn't look Asian enough even when playing a role that was of mixed ethnicity was a problem. Those of mixed Native American heritage who looked Asian weren't good enough for a role where the cultures drew from multiple Asian races.

I can't tell you how lucky we are to actually have a Native American playing Katara. The fact we are able to shows progress in regards to the lack of opportunity for Native Americans to enter into the film industry which despite the casting is still a problem. Yet I also can't deny the fact I actually outright feared Katara would have ended up Blackwashed because of how the fad thing to do in Hollywood these days to show that they're politically correct and earn the necessary points is to cast a Black actor or actress in a role that wasn't originally a Black character. And I think that's what would have happened had Bryke been working on the adaption.

As for the reason for bringing all of this up, to understand where the misconception behind why Black Hermione became prevalent stems directly from the fact the Racebending movement (not to be confused with the Racebending Revenge Challenge) was two fold.

- First, to bring attention to the whitewashing of Asian characters and by extension Native American characters, though to be honest the latter was an afterthought.
- Second, to bring attention to the lack of Asian rep.

The Racebending Revenge Challenge though is just focused on the first issue while including any POC group to help signify that ethnicity is important to the character whether the character be white or non-white. It was never, though, about lack of rep within media. It was specifically about whitewashing and it's effect, yet in this same regard it covers why changing the ethnicity of a character is always important.

To which I also wish to point out that there is not a lack of rep for Blacks in what's currently being released. I reference back to the poll I saw I think in 2016 where Blacks had 5% more rep than the population with that 5% being taken from Asian and Hispanics and that is I believe just American media. The Black population in the UK is actually even smaller, but it is actually quite possible they're even more overrepresented over there as they show up as much as they do here in the US despite having a smaller population.

And I feel it should be noted that the collection for Dark Agenda contains absolutely no stories where Hermione is Black. The character chosen was instead Lily, Harry's mother. It wasn't really until 2016 when Cursed Child came out that while Google currently turns up 277,000 results for "Black Hermione" prior to December 31, 2015 when casting for Cursed Child came was revealed is only 170 not including similar results removed. It's 120 in 2014, 110 in 2013, etc.

That's not a significant number of people imagining Hermione as Black particularly when the search results also happen to showtimes when say Sirius Black is mentioned right before Hermione's name with a comma in between or similar circumstances where the word black wasn't in reference to her being Black. In other words, it's something that happened after Cursed Child came out in theater which in turn was where certain individuals started claiming the color of Hermione's skin wasn't relevant to who she was as a character, something for which the Racebending Revenge Challenge.

They're the best actor or actresses for the job - the more limited the casting choice is the more believable that excuse is which is why the original casting choice for Hermione for Cursed Child wasn't a problem, but as not one, not two but all three of the actresses picked are all Black. None are Asian, or Hispanic, yet the question of whether anybody who isn't Black is welcome to audition for the role is also there is a definite fad of blackwashing characters with light skin.