Not everything is about the US, just saying. If the author wants to show that war, why not? It's part of this country's histroy. Or are you so ashamed of your own history that you hate the fact that other people know it too?
People speculate about my country's history all the time, they make memes, funny stories and much more, and no one cares (including people from my country). But when it's about American shameful history we all need to pretend that it never happened, we need to stop talking about it and never address it.
Kind of weird if you ask me. I suggest you stop being this sensitive and start paying attention to other more important things :)
What topic are we on here? I'm Asian." Not everything is about the us" then why is the setting in the us? Why the American civil war? Are you okay? Why would anyone be ashamed like everything just flew up into the Air and swirl around because you're not engaging in anything I said all you did was like "okay? They talk about my country history too" there is a difference with talking and being ignorant and using that historical context that can make harmful narrative toward people who already get dehumanize on a daily basis. Man whatever
You completely missed the point.
Nobody said the American Civil War shouldn’t be depicted or discussed. The criticism is about how it was being used. There’s a difference between using a historical event to explore its realities and using it as the backdrop for a romance where the emotional focus is about sympathetic white protagonist and his oppressed indigenous slave.
Those are not the same thing.
And “people make memes about my country’s history” isn’t the argument you think it is. If those memes distorted history or reinforced harmful stereotypes, people would be justified in criticizing them too.
This isn’t about Americans wanting to erase history. It’s about whether you’re handling a real history of slavery, colonialism, and oppression with enough care that you don’t end up romanticizing or trivializing it.
saying "not everything is about the US" but the story is literally based in the US and their history??? ofc native and black americans are gonna have an opinion abt this because it's based on what their own ancestors went through. tr*mp and his administration is trying to rewrite the history of slavery as we speak. writing abt real world events with provable falsehoods is worse than not touching on the subject.
This is not just racism but the fact of the matter is how the setting and mentioned of the American civil war in bl story can has the potential to frame a harmful narrative toward black people/indeginous while making people sympathize with the aggressor.
The civil war was about the south not wanting their slave taken away from them because their wealth and economy were heavily dependent on slave intensive labour. The north however was industrializing and a free state BUT racial violence and discrimination still were very prominent. When Abraham Lincoln took presidency the south were on edge because they were scared to have their slave taken away from them and they decide to become a confederate state inside america. After a casualties war begin and Lincoln ultimately wanted to preserves the union/america as a whole but he has expressed that he does not want an expansion in slavery. After some loss, the union won during a battle, a very needed victory where He declared that slaves in the confederate state are no longer slaves to give the war a whole new meaning so that other countries wouldn't interfere in the civil war or support the confederate. Soon after they finally allowed black people to enlist and joined the army which majority of black people did enlist knowing full well that they might die in this war but they wanted to fight for their brothers and sisters rights and freedoms. Even after the civil war ended and the confederate surrender the racial discrimination are still there with laws that are exploitive that state that a black person without a proof of paper that they are employed or something could be considered a criminal and be forced into working for free. Natives ppl also suffer and had their land taken as well. Thousand of people are displaced without a home or family to go too.
So now we have JAXX story
We have the tag : love hate, trouble past bottom, revenge and a description of how Gerald heart kept racing blah blah blah
- Gerald the perfect son is told by his father to join the union and fight in the war
- Gerald the white man win the war and everybody is like "all hail Gerald! All hail Gerald!"
- Gerald family family died. Gerald depressed, sad, PTSD (hence the trouble past bottom)
- Gerald family has a desert ranch for him to inherit.
- Gerald want to sell the ranch."I'm no southerner" (OKAY???). Give the slave on the ranch money. Tell them they are free. Slaves genuinely confused. So basically Gerald is not like any other white ppl, he literally freed the slaves and gave them money! What a wonderful savior isn't he??
-Ezra: Mixed native...with blue eyes.... claiming the ranch is his. So here come the revenge part... indeginous people had their land stolen...and we have an indeginous man claiming that the ranch is his than call himself "I'm your humble salve"
So the tag and the story seem to be pointing to our trouble past white protagonist that will be dealing with PTSD after the war and the indeginous man whose people were oppress and got their land stolen from will be the one comforting the pitiful white dude.the revenge tag is 99% percent is Ezra...so now how do you think bl readers will react after they see their lil white depressed and catching feeling for the indeginous man will react to knowing Ezra is probably just minpulating him and toying with his feelings? "HOW COULD HE DO THIS TO MY BABY!" "Gerald isn't actually a bad guy! What is he supposed to do?" " Gerald genuinely love him so I feel bad. It's just fiction." Now considerating how sexual crime are being used in bl manhwa most of the time.....where they use questionable action that can exactly be label as coercion, sa and rape which they don't directly address it properly but they use it to create tension, sexual chemistry and to build their character feeling off of that......what do you think would happen if somehow JAXX make the indeginous man act in accordance to one of those in the gise of it being just for tension...? Will people say? People will surely sympathize with the mc Gerald right?
So to me it's like non of the tag is indicating to me that the civil war is brought up to actually be a bigger issues in the story but just something mentioned but the story is more focus on a the trouble past uke in a sympathetic light.....the story literally has the potential to villainized the indeginous man and bringing sympathy for the white man eventho in reality Ezra hatred is very much justified given the historical context. Does that not seem harmful to you..? Black people/poc/indeginous they are dehumanize everyday and seen as aggressive so this shit is a very risky and harmful narrative. I'd also add that it very off pudding to have "all hail Gerald!" Like baby...black people joined the war to fight for their people rights as well and if the story has no intention to touch so much on the oppression of black ppl/native or mentioned that again then that could be left in as a reason to minimize Ezra as an indeginous mixed race character because "Gerald fought for his people" LIKE DO YOU GET WHAT I MEAN??
The author save herself from falling into a deeper whole. You can't expect a Korean author to use American civil war as a backdrop if 1. Their intentions was never to address the dark topic such as slavery and oppression from the start but the emotional core of it is Gerald. 2. If they do not actual know enough about the American civil war.
Every new update would be a war zone. A lot of things can be true at once the author intentions was to never to paint that narrative because they probably never thought much of it which is a mistake on its own as historical event such as this one shouldn't be used as a setting stage but a subject to address which also shows ignorance on its own that JAXX acknowledge on their part and apologize for it.