Racism in the Hidden World

[MiracleGrow]

Urban Fantasy, especially the ones with masquerades, have always been something I loved. So it comes to no surprise that I am actively working on my own original fiction in such a setting. And may even post a quest of it when I gather the confidence.

But there is something I'm struggling with. That is well, portraying racism. I'm not talking about stuff like different races in the hidden world being racist towards each other. No, I'm talking about racism from man to man. It's terrible ideas and concepts seeping into the hidden world in unexpected ways.

Trying to fit this into the story that didn't feel completely off is being extremely difficult for me.

Like, for example in the quest I'm working. The main character is a 'magician', essentially a magical construct that looks human. Her main job is acting as a investigator of any violent crimes that people of the hidden world have done to the known world. She is to be frank, completely clueless on most humans social dynamics, politics, and cultures. Enough so that she frequently comes across as extremely offensive by accident. This isn't helped by the fact that she is kind of an asshole.

The problem is, that the first case she is working on has a very clear motive of being a hate crime against people of color. A fact that she completely misses until her human assistant points out that it's a very clear trend in the violence. The assistant in this quest is essentially the second protagonist. She is a woman of color who had to face the worse of racism and other prejudices but on the flips side is still very much new to this whole hidden world thing.

I want to be able to sit down and write a believable character progression where the magician slowly goes from 'Oh that silly human shit, not sure why it matters and I don't see it effecting the hidden world' to 'Okay this is a serious issue and we are missing it all in our own arrogance'. But what is stumping me is show how this stuff has infected hidden world. Like I have some ideas on how the academies that pick up people who awakened to magic frequently pick humans from privileged positions over unprivileged positions. Or how incredibly racist misconceptions ended up brewing in places that barely interact with man.

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I guess this thread can also be where people can discuss on how to engage with these issues in their stories. So I must also ask, how do you all portray things like this in your own urban fantasy settings?

 

[Arkalest]

IDk, define "Hidden world" cos that's kind of the rub? Racism exists on a systemic level, so what sort of system is the hidden world? Like what sort of society it is, what cultures you took clues from to build it, etcetera.

 

[CoreBrute]

Well taking ideas from American Gods, a lynching literally caused a ghost to curse a town. Racism leaves it's scars in history and people, it makes sense it would do so in the magical world too.

Take it another way, in many settings wizards live for a really long time. Think of a black wizard whose spent the last 300 years pretending to be subservient to mortal white people because he was forced to keep up the magical masquerade. The indignity of not being allowed to use his powers to demand the right to be treated as an equal, or to protect his family from racial violence or inequality, has twisted him into someone who despises the masquerade. Perhaps he supports terrorist anti-masquerade groups, or creates/summon magical serial killers to go after the family of those who wronged him over the last 300 years. You could do something similar for vampires or other long lived creatures, when the MC struggles to understand a motive, reveal it's the pain of dealing with racism.

You could also look at it the other way, as instead of the view of a magical victim to someone who benefits from the system. In many urban neighbourhoods in America, Minorities and immigrants do not call the police when crimes happen, due to a general distrust of police. This makes them a perfect target for creatures who need/want to feed on mortals such as werewolves or zombies, so there may be a disproportionate rate of Hidden World related deaths in minority neighborhoods, which forces your MC to consider why this area and why it's not reported. It might even be that people in this area are more aware of the supernatural because of this but keep it to themselves because it's so unbelievable. Perhaps another Hidden World figure is using this as a way to build a following, offering magical protection from the werewolves hunting them down in exchange for service.

 

[Arawn_Emrys]

One example to look at might be Jonathon Strange and Mr. Norrell. The fae king of lost hope literally can't comprehend the idea of racism and doesn't remotely understand why the 19th century English would take issue with a black king. It simply doesn't make sense to him.

 

[MiracleGrow]

Thanks for the responses. I'll come back with more info on what I'm writing so I can dig into this topic more.