Thoughts

You are so necessary <3

?????? is the setting not a korean prison? theyre all Korean; from a western perspective, they're all poc....

Racist may not be the right term because if they are all Korean then it might not apply, but colorist may be the right word. Worldwide people with dark or darker skin colors may be seen as more aggressive. It might not be as explicit because it is a toxic BL and as many of us know it's pretty common to see toxic tops in BL. Not sure if I can pinpoint where the unintentional colorist is coming from though.

This will be a little long, apologies.

Suppose I didn’t think of it that way. I’m a korean american, so I forget when things are supposed to be korean oriented or white oriented since I am surrounded by both lmao. Regardless, I understand there is still a distinction between light skin and dark skin poc. Dark skinned poc are still treated worse than light skin poc due to appearance alone.

This I understand from being within poc communities and hearing their experiences. As well as my own partner, who is an east asian dark skinned person. His chinese light skinned colleagues never face issues with their skin tone, whilst he has had his parents say things like “it’s unfortunate you are not more fair” since he was young.

“White passing” poc people are also spared of much of the racism people who are “visually poc” face.

All in all, poc are still poc, but dark skin poc have been heavily misused by asian writers in many BL’s I’ve read. To rephrase I suppose;

“The author wrote the dark skinned character to be an asshole, which is too common in BL, and has racist undertones.”

I’m not saying its intentional, however, this is typically a result of interalized racism that is “natural” to some, therefore harder to identify. This is also very common in the traditional Korean mindset from what I know of my own family, some of which are unfortunately blatant racists to black people.

I feel some, especially Koreans who live in South Korea, have poor understandings of how to deal with race and skin tones. I am very fortunate to have been surrounded by other poc people of different tones and ethnicities, but I can still criticize the issue at hand.

I hope that clarifies enough.

I appreciate your kind words!!

Just replied to this comment then got your reply lol. I agree. If the character is a korean with dark skin, my point still stands that this is at the very least, colorist. If the character is not korean, perhaps south east asian or another darker asian ethnicity, then we return to racism. Either way, I see this as a problem too often in BL sadly.

srry, i think you may have misinterpreted what i had meant. i simply thought that you assumed dark skin = poc and light skin = non-poc by the way you used "person of color" in your original post. its more so just confusing as to what you meant by it rather than an issue with your topic of discussion/perspective.

colorism is racism, so referring to it as racism is fine. no issues with that

Omg I like this explanation so much!!!!

i don’t mean any offense with this comment but i don’t understand how anyone could click on a manhwa like this and not expect rape. in fact i think it should be expected with a plot like this.

Ohh I see I see. Apologies for the misunderstanding.

Yeah, it was mostly based on the issue of skin tone, and how darker toned people are depicted in these stories, generally as very toxic. I am glad that is cleared up!

Glad you do! I’m just the type to share what I think wherever whenever, and I didn’t expect such a positive response from so many! (Wow, almost 80 likes now haha)

Your words flatter me, thank you!

No offense taken, I understand where you are coming from.

Another long response, can’t help myself I suppose;

I did expect rape or generally unpleasant themes from this one, but I wanted to give it a shot regardless, again, because I was interested in the story itself. The prison theme and such. I’ve been pleasantly surprised before, so I try to give everything that piques my interest a shot. Nonetheless, I feel it’s still valid to voice my dislike for the rape. It’s a “disappointed but not surprised” kinda thing.

All I’m saying is that it would have actually been interesting if they had excluded rape, but still made the darker or gross themes work without that addition, which is not even being used tactically here as a story device, but rather to lead up to “sex” scenes with the main character and the others. If they depicted and treated rape as a more serious thing rather than a way to fanservice, even then perhaps I could excuse it. As well as the fact that it’s been drawn to be pornographic in nature, to directly gratify people who either don’t see rape as serious, or are even into it. So in that sense, it does not seem to strongly add to the story itself. It feels out of place and in poor taste.

My solutions would be either:

Allow the MC to offer his body willingly to the long haired man for favours and protection. Allow a slow process of going from vanilla type sex to more kinky types. Show the MC “barely tolerating” it at the start, but begin to enjoy it over time and come to be conflicted with his feelings, alongside other characters. Like the white haired one, to try it with him. This would allow character development in sexuality and the understanding of pleasure for MC.

or

While I do not prefer it, depict the rape as brutal, not sexy, not fun or pleasurable, and for what it is. Show the long haired man to be a terrible person (dislike this more because he’s dark skinned… alas) and show how MC becomes more mentally affected by these experiences which eventually lead up to some sort of action. Likely a revolt that would stop the assaults on him. It could lead to him becoming the most respected / feared person instead, going from the bottom to the top of the food chain. This would be more on the psychological side of the genre.

Don’t worry about the long responses I actually liked your post. i rarely see people share their thoughts like this so passionately ╮(￣▽￣)╭

Now I see your point more clearly, and I agree with it! I like the second option. It would be really exciting to see the MC have some sort of revenge arc against the long haired seme, we usually don’t see much of that in BL (unfortunately) and with the MC’s personality I think this would make the story so enjoyable.

I personally don’t see the manhwa as something to be seen as “romantic” which is probably why the rape scenes didn’t bother me?? or i didn’t feel completely thrown off by it, they are all in prison for a reason after all lmao. but yes i agree the scenes could be handled a bit more seriously but then again it’s a BL manhwa ...(￣∇￣")