Korra Is Not Tan

Queen of All She Can See: So I just got a fanmail ask:

fangirlingforeverz:

What is all this about Korra being racist or something? I just watched the leaked episode and I saw NOTHING of all the stuff DPWPS. I think if anything, what was shown was that Korra was in for a wake-up call about how people are treating each other but I didn’t see the entire ‘she mistreated a homeless guy’ or most of the other things DTWPS mentioned. Besides, this is the first fucking episode; we were to really expect THAT much exposition for a complex story this early?

KORRA SPOILERS AHOY:

You have been warned —

Korra has, since the White Lotus first discovered her, lived in a PRIVATE, locked compound under the protection of the white lotus, and not in her parent’s home. She has been forcibly secluded from the world, and has never (to our knowledge) left the South Pole before. All of her elemental masters have come there to the compound. So this girl, the Avatar, lives mostly alone, and has not seen much of the outside world.

She goes to republic city for the first time without money (She’s going straight to Tenzin’s, and hey, she grew up in a compound, in a tribe community where they probably don’t use money in the same way as a metropolitan city does); a shop keeper tells her “LOL NO CASH, NO FOOD” so she leaves. Instead of just demanding the food because she’s the Avatar, she goes to fish her own food (like people in the South Pole do) with Naga.

There, she meets a homeless guy, and is confused, because she misunderstood Republic City. She didn’t know people were homeless. She (as she says) thought everyone was living it up. If at this point you do not know the story of the Buddha, maybe I can refresh you in the quickest summary ever: Rich Indian prince grows up in a secluded compound, sees the homeless/sick/dying when he leaves it, has his little perfect secluded world shattered, and then decides to do something about it, thus walking the path towards enlightenment.

The Buddha is known to reincarnate into many different lives. So Korra not knowing that people are homeless? FITS THE STORY. First things first: She’s not a ~white savior~ she’s a representation of the Buddha, if you’re talking about Archetypes (and you can damn well bet that is EXACTLY what Bryke intended). But Korra’s not disgusted by this guy, she’s just genuinely, legitimately confused. She doesn’t know what she needs to learn, she was more than happy to feed him, if not a little surprised that he was living in a bush. She did not know people were homeless. This is shocking to her, and she walks by non-benders screaming about being oppressed.

Which, duh, Korra handles badly because she’s the Avatar.

But here’s the thing: She didn’t know about the Triple Threat Triad lands (AKA a bending Mob that literally functions as a Mafia). She had no idea that the people who were systematically hunted down and killed before, have now started using their powers to hurt and threaten people. But Amon’s solution to this problem is equally bad: Kill all the benders. (Hey guess what, I’ve been roleplaying on a website that HAD an organized group of Anti-benders who wanted to kill benders because they were ~oppressive~ or whatever and I’ve been on that site since 2008. Never once did I think this group of radical anti-benders who functioned as a terrorist organization was actually analogous to POCs being oppressed by white people.) They’re not ~~radicals~~  this is outright “We will kill the benders.” They’re not justified because lots of benders are dicks.

Also hey guess what: If non-benders are oppressed in this backwards ass logic, where we say that benders = white people, and non-benders = POC, if a group of POC gathered together and publicly called for the murder of all the white people in the city, you can bet that the police forces/military/etc would be called in and have their asses in jail. Can you imagine that ACTUALLY happening? I can’t. Because if a POC can’t walk with a pack of skittles without getting shot when he did NOTHING wrong, then they sure as hell can’t organize in public and call for the death of all the white people.

So let me just say that whooolllleee analogy is fucked. Non-benders clearly have the police protecting them (or trying to, as they arrest the Triple Threat Triad mobsters who are also benders), and they have the ability to go out in the middle of public and say “Let’s get rid of ALL the BENDERS.” And DTWPS apparently forgot every single instance in the original show where it was proved that non-benders were ALSO excellent fighters and formidable warriors? (Re: her comments that ofc you take out the benders in a war first because they are the warriors.) Oh, gee: Sokka, Suki, Ty Lee, Mai, Piandao… none of them counted?

Korra’s in for a helluva wakeup call that NEITHER side is purely right or wrong, and as far as I can tell there’s gonna be a shitton of grey areas, because she done goofed in the very first episode: i.e. went after a mob of benders who were outta line, but wrecked the streets and a shop, then went and yelled at the anti-benders, and basically just got herself mired in a mess where the politics of it all is WAY MORE COMPLICATED THAN “These benders are the good guys, and these non-benders are the bad guys.” Which is why she doesn’t pull a shit fit over Tenzin saying he has to stay behind: because he clearly NEEDS to help this city that is becoming super corrupt. This is the roaring 20’s after all. Think of the Mafias. Think of the corrupt politicians. The citizens are bad, the government might be iffy, (Lin is the hardass cop who is probably good but there’s so much WRONG in her city she can’t fix it), Korra is walking into a powder keg landmine…

THIS SHIT HAS SO MUCH POTENTIAL. FORREAL Y’ALL, I’M SUPER EXCITED TO SEE KORRA STOP BEING NAIVE, AND REALIZE THAT HER HOT HEADED TEMPER WILL MAKE SHIT WORSE, AND THAT TO HELP SHE HAS TO WAIT AND LISTEN AND THEN ACT. This has the possibility of being super complex and deep and interesting and Riley is just condensing it into a privilege complex that…is super one side or the other. Do you honestly think that after how they approached the fact that the Fire Nation WASN’T all evil bad guys, but that good and evil existed EVERYWHERE they would drop the ball on this one too? The story line is supposed to be more mature and complex but if you can only handle “This guy is good, this guy is bad, you can tell by the color they wear” maybe you shouldn’t be watching Avatar in the first place.

THIS ISN’T EVEN THE WHOLE FIRST EPISODE? WORD ON THE STREET IS LIKE A:TLA, THE FIRST EPISODE IS A TWO-PARTER sooooo I expect another half hour of this show?

Just all of this. ALL OF THIS.