Rosoff has said a good many disparaging things about me that I'm ignoring. This one, I will not ignore.
Like millions of people, I love Star Wars. But Rosoff is wrong in calling those of us who point out stereotyping, bias, and misrepresentations "stormtroopers." She's trying to cast us as evil for what we do. She is equating us with Nazi stormtroopers.
We're not bad guys. As Rene Saldana said, he thinks of me as a Jedi Knight. Lot of people said they want to make t-shirts with Rosoff's phrase on them, but we say who we are.
Let's do something like this instead:
Jedi Knights in Solidarity:
Fighting Crimes Against Diversity
or how about this one:
Jedi Knights in Solidarity:
Fighting Ignorance, One Rosoff at a Time*
There's a lot of writers, librarians, critics, teachers, parents... working on diversity! I'd love to see what people come up with! Adding graphics (and adding a note about them. Elsewhere, Meg Rosoff indicated she didn't know "squaw" was a problematic word. Hence, I use "Ignorance" here. I'm ignorant of a lot of things, too. We all are. It isn't the Native American word for women. That is something that has to be unlearned.)
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*I said "fighting ignorance" because Rosoff said she looked it up and did not know the word "squaw" is, quoting her: "sometimes (not always) considered insulting."
Update: November 2, 1:38 PM
Cynthia Leitich Smith tweeted this... and I love that hashtag! #diversityjedi
Update: November 3, 5:05 AM
The #diversityjedi hashtag took off yesterday afternoon and evening! If you're in Twitter, take a look!
