dragonlady7

via http://ift.tt/201fyRc:
I need a… racism beta?

I don’t know how to ask specifically for that. I’m having A Trouble with a Star Wars thing, because I’m trying to balance a fictional society in which the Atlantic slave trade never happened, with an audience for whom it did, and I got a note on a thing that’s innocuous in one context and irritating in the other, so I did what I do and had the characters banter about it to resolve it, and want to post the banter bit– but I don’t know if it actually addressed the possibly-icky thing, and I can’t tell, and I’ve been beating my head against it for two weeks now and– I got a wonderful spelling and grammar beta on it, but it turns out the spelling and grammar wasn’t what I was super worried about and so I need a Greater Societal Context kind of beta on it.

I have no idea how you ask for a thing like that. But like. I’m a Well-Intentioned White Ladytype and like, most of the people I know are Probably-Well-Intentioned White Persons, so I really don’t know how far outside that perspective I’m capable of getting. And I’ve been turning this over in my head for two weeks trying to think of a less-awkward way of discussing that, and I just can’t come up with it.

I mean, I could just, post it and take my lumps but I am so bad at taking lumps, it all became such a big deal because I couldn’t take lumps, I’d really rather attempt to take lumps in private.

And like also. It’s not a big thing. It’s a small thing. It’s short. It’s one conversation. I’m not trying to write Boring Issues Fic that nobody wants to read. But if you try to Deal With Something Important in a light-hearted fashion, chances are real good you’re gonna miss and come off flippant.

I don’t want a cookie for trying, I want a story that is going to say what I meant it to say and not just slap clumsily at somebody.