Seanan McGuire (seanan_mcguire) wrote,
Seanan McGuire
seanan_mcguire

  • Mood:
  • Music:

InCryptid Q&A, Part III: Race and gender issues.

So remember when I said that I would answer ten questions about the InCryptid universe? Well, I'm still taking questions, but here's your third answer!

professor asks...

"Given that the Covenant is a centuries-old organization that worships tradition and conformity, how do gender and racial identity politics within the Covenant work?"

I find it interesting that when we hear the phrase "hide-bound" or "traditional" in reference to an organization like the Covenant, whose stated mission is killing monsters, we immediately assume that they must be an organization completely dominated by white cisdudes. And I'm including myself in that "we": when I first started working on the organizational structure of what would become the Covenant of St. George, it was extremely old white cisdude-centric.

At one time, that was probably an accurate view of the organizational makeup. While they are no longer particularly religious in nature, or sanctioned by any major church, they did start out with strong church ties, and the church in the Middle Ages was pretty firm on its whole "gotta be a dude with a penis to come to the party." Add in the fact that large portions of the Covenant's leadership settled in Italy, France, and the United Kingdom, and you'd get a very white cisdude party. But here's the thing: the Covenant was good at their job. They still are, as much as they can be; remember that today's cryptids are the descendents of the ones who learned to hide from the raids and the cleansings. One by one, the big flashy monsters were killed off or driven into the shadows, and it got harder to be picky.

There was a time when any village in Europe would have been proud to have a son chosen to work with the Covenant of St. George. By the late 1500s, most of those same villages considered the Covenant a fairy tale, and would never have dreamed of giving away their sons. The Covenant began doing their recruiting from people who had actually encountered cryptids, who could actually see the value in fighting against them. This meant dropping virtually all restrictions against girls serving active roles, because sometimes, it was the girls who survived.

Most of the Covenant's early female recruits provided backup and support for the field teams, having not been trained to fight before they came to the Covenant. At the time, it was not standard within the Covenant for all recruits to receive field training. This changed in the mid-1600s, following the last successful attack on a Covenant stronghold. Half the support staff were killed, as were most of the children currently being housed in that location. After that, it became a prerequisite that all recruits learn to fight, even if they were not constitutionally equipped for field positions.

Resistance to women in the field continued for quite some time, although it had less to do with "women can't handle it," and more to do with "we're not really a powerful political or religious force anymore, and we don't want our male operatives arrested for traveling with women they're neither related to nor married to." Field team marriages became very common, because it was a way for women to get "out of the office" and out doing what they did best. Killing stuff. By the mid-1800s, women had a completely equal voice in Covenant activities.

If this seems like it took a really long time, please compare it to real-world history. The Covenant was surprisingly enlightened, largely out of necessity.

But that only addresses female equality, not race or gender identity. Race was actually addressed somewhat earlier, when the Covenant followed the various explorations, Crusades, and invasions of the rest of the world, either forming or making contact with similar groups around the world. Most local groups were sadly largely absorbed into the Covenant, because the Covenant had the resources and the manpower to make joining forces seem appealing. Those who weren't absorbed are still considered part of the Covenant today, and are not spoken of much outside the regions where their methods dominate. And here's the thing: since the Covenant, and its sister organizations, focused so strongly on "humans first," they didn't bother as much with racial divides. There would be time for those later, when the monsters were all gone. To be fair, if the Covenant had successfully wiped out the monsters in the 1600s, they would probably have turned around and started ethnic cleansing. But they didn't, and they didn't, and they wound up a fully integrated organization by the mid-1800s. They understand racism, and will use it to their advantage when possible, but the Covenant as an institution does not tolerate racial discrimination. Humans gotta stick together.

Sexuality and gender identity are harder, in part because the Covenant relies on "legacy children" for so much of its membership. You're really expected to have kids if you possibly can. While this isn't a law or anything, you'll get a lot of the "Have you tried not being a ________?" routine, especially if you were already slated for inclusion in the breeding program. But at the end of the day, again, they need trained members more than they need to be prejudiced, and have been QUILTBAG inclusive since the early 1900s.

Seriously, there was a time—a long time—where if you were a strong-willed woman who wanted to make your own choices, a gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transsexual teen, or of any race that didn't match the locally dominant racial type, the Covenant was your best route out of that life. If you heard about them, if you heard that they could save you, you took that chance. And the people who took that chance tended to become very loyal, because they were given lives that they could otherwise have only dreamt of.

The modern Covenant is very enlightened, except for the part where anything that isn't human is a monster. There's no room for discussion on that front. And really, that's the problem.
Tags: a few facts, common questions, incryptid, midnight bluelight special
  • Post a new comment

    Error

    Anonymous comments are disabled in this journal

    default userpic

    Your reply will be screened

    Your IP address will be recorded 

  • 36 comments
That's really interesting.

Admitedly, I also just sort of assumed that it was dominated by white cis-dudes. But this is much more interesting...and it makes me have to respect the Covenant a bit...but only a bit.
That's the thing: they need to be believable as an organization that people would belong to. And they inspire loyalty for a very good reason.
I think it's more interesting that the Covenants are so enlightened when it comes to minorities than them having the extensive hierarchy of 'straight white cis-dudes on top of other humans' to go with the 'and non-humans are below every human'. Because you do get these characters whose family histories tell how the Covenant saved their ancestors and gave them a Purpose besides being kicked around by imperialists/being brood mares for their husbands/etc., which adds conflict to the 'but they are responsible for wiping species, some sapient, off the face of the Earth'.
Exactly. Why should anyone turn their backs on the Covenant, when it's historically done so damn much good for them and for their families?
This is awesome. Thanks for answering my question. I can absolutely see the logic behind all of this, and it's fascinating.
Yay!
This actually makes a *lot* more sense out of the Covenant for me - the fanatical loyalty aspect was largely a "suspension of disbelief" thing without this context.

And of course one of the reasons I adore and (yes, fanatically) recommend you is that "white cisdude" is a thing in your lexicon, and you don't cite QUILTBAG and really mean "gay, lesbian, and likely bisexual." :) I hadn't even noticed how much I got the anticipatory cringe of exclusion until I ran across moments like this where it did NOT come true, and thank you for that.
You are very welcome. :)
What's that line from somewhere in Pratchett? "Black and white lived in perfect harmony and ganged up on green."

Very interesting. Thank you!
Yup!
Huh. This is really...strange reading after I spent the better part of two years in classes on Jewish History that addressed a lot of gender/etc.* issues between 1400 and present. What a strange concept, that women would be co-equal in the 1800s! I'm gonna have to think about that one some more.


*I paid more attention to women's roles in Jewish life than I did to things like QUILTBAG or racial issues, partially because there just wasn't much of that information in history/religion classes centered on a patriarchal religion, and race didn't seem to be much of an issue until present day (granted, this could be partially due to biases of the professors teaching the courses; I'm not an expert in the field).
It's a very strange situation, to be fair, and they couldn't afford human discrimination when there was a much better enemy to be going up against.
I like how the diversity of the Covenant goes against the grain of a white men only mentality-- does the fact that monster hunting open ups impossibly new opportunities in life that are historically difficult for its potential members keep the regular schisms from happening to the Covenant like every other human institution in history?

Was there every a equivalent of the Reformation in the Covenant history? Maybe like the domestication of some of the non sentient cryptids for human use or debate of the classification of what is an cryptids (how did the platypus survive them). I can't name a human movement or institution that hasn't mutated or multiplied off into different tangents organizations in his life (Catholic Church-->Protestant churches, Prussia-->Germany etc.)
There were a few Reformations; most of them were very bloody, and did not end well.
And all of a sudden, fanfic ideas spring in my head like Athena from the brow of Zeus.....
Yay!
Oh, I like this.

And now of course I am curious about the Covenant's approach to non-dominant religions, especially those religions that don't believe anything not human is a monster and must be killed.
Those religions are wrong (according to the Covenant, that is).

Deleted comment

skelody

4 years ago

This is awesome, and a great insight into the Covenant. As for the QUILTBAG folks, I can see them also being like, "Maybe we can't breed, but the Covenant has a prodigious death rate that results in a lot of orphans, and we can take care of those kids in-house."

Plus, I love that when you reveal that your "bad guys" are complicated and generally also good guys if seen in the right light, and/or at least have done good things for some people, your fandom goes "Ooh yay complicated moral stuff!" instead of "Wait, it's not black and white . . ?"
I always try to make sure that my bad guys are the heroes in a parallel universe. Like there's a world very much like this one where Discount Armageddon was about a brave Covenant agent convincing a rogue descendant of a schismed family line that everything she knew was wrong.

vixyish

4 years ago

Deleted comment

WTF?

Deleted comment

Deleted comment

Deleted comment

Awww, shucks.
Wow. That's pretty awesome.

I now also have the mental image of a Victorian era set Covenant woman hunting monsters, who is a kick-ass queer woman of color. Dammit, woman, I think this is the first time I've wanted to write fanfic since I was a teen. LOL.
My work here is done!
Now want ALL the QUILTBAG Covenant member fanfic/fiction. Oh dear.
They're the good guys in their own minds!
It's always great to see a universe where the bad guys being the bad guys doesn't mean they're bad in every conceivable way. I get really TIRED of villains who are misogynist or racist because those are bad things to be and they have to fill out the villain checklist. I want some complexity in my villains- I don't want a caricature.
I actually really like the Covenant. They're incredibly messed up, but they have reasons for everything that they do.

swevene

4 years ago