Yoharie (part twenty-two)

Yoharie

Totem-World

(part twenty-two)

“Things have got polarized, don’t you think? I mean, say the next Spiderman should be a woman, you’d get death threats. Last time they actually got the project started, there was boycott talk right off. Neverers were a thing by then.”

“But if she was a woman, the Totem-Maker,” Val said, “how could she challenge Mumas to combat and not have him refuse?”

Trevor leaned into this. “Remember Totem World doesn’t always do the patriarchy, male role, female role. But also Southey wasn’t addressing the culture. ’72 was the Vietnam era. So the message was, to know someone, to decide about someone, you have to know them, you can’t dehumanize them with stereotypes. There’s a great article in the archives. I’m not gonna tell you who wrote it.”

Giarma didn’t ask, and Trevor said:  “Roberta Witticombe.”

“Oh, the wizard? She’s a Totem?”

“They don’t call themselves Totems,” Val said.

“I like wizard. I’m gonna use that from now on. Now don’t hate us…”

“I think I’m about to.”

“The fanbase uses place names from the book as communities, Monsecchers, Hezhnia, Balbaec, Suma Fortesa.”

Giarma raised a finger, clicked from her phone to Iron Seeds, searched Witt. Found “Power Dynamics among Southey’s Classes and Cultures”, 2013, Roberta M. Witticombe, PhD.

As Val was her prisoner, hers and Trevor’s, she a read aloud:

The experience of the person who holds the low place in society is not exclusively male or female. Each situation calls for a fresh weighing of what may be risked, and what may be gained. To have entitlement—to a standard degree of respect; to a standard set of rules in communication; to a particular thing given in interactions, a particular thing received—is a factor of powerholding, even among the working classes. For those outside the power structure, where society demands nothing in the treatment of you, your only protocols stem from what is observable by others, what is doable within some span of time, or within a certain proximity. Your ethical canon may be private to you alone, or it may be shared with others of your cohort. At times you have a chance to obtain something material, or to be given a little responsibility, or a little respect

“Brainiacs,” Val said.

“Please.”

“Seriously! You got the college gene…”

“From my Mom.”

“Uh huh. Then you look at Joanne, and you see why I’m stupid.” Val caught something, a look between his sister and Trevor, a shared urge to say why, you’re perfectly intelligent… “And don’t mess up my joke.”

23

Yoharie

Yoharie (part one)

(2019, Stephanie Foster)