Imagine being an artist & working up the courage to share your drawing that you worked so hard on by posting it in the Full Sail University RWBY Grim Art Contest. Then imagine YOUR artwork was chosen as a top 5 finalist in the competition! This is exactly what happened to the fan artist Mayuki (@mayukiart), “I didn’t expect to get top 5,” she told me in a DM, “I still think it’s pure luck. I screamed and ran around my house when I saw it”. It’s not hard to see why she was chosen huh?
If you saw this posted on her Twitter, the first thing that would come to mind, would probably be something like, “I should congratulate her for doing such a fantastic job and make sure she feels at welcome in the community by liking her tweet” right? It was obviously made with a lot of love, and there’s no way anyone could have a problem with this right? Unfortunately wrong. Apparently a user didn’t like the fact that she called it a Wendigo, which is the mythical creature she took inspiration from. Also, I want to point out that Mayuki was wrongly accused of stealing this very design just days ago.
Full Sail came out and ruled those allegations to be false.
Coincidence? It sounds like there may be a possibility this user is just jealous her design made the top 5.
Now I happen to be 1/4 Cherokee Indian myself, my great grandmother was a full-blooded Cherokee Indian, and I have to say I have no idea what this user is talking about. She would tell me stories all the time, and the Wendigo did in fact come up a few times. She would tell me that the mythological creature would prey on those that would commit the terrible act of cannibalism, and that it could also prey upon you in your dreams. And yes, she did say that she did her best not to say its name. But did she throw a fit if she heard it? No. She understood that back in early Native American history cannibalism was a serious problem, due to the harsh winters of the North American and Canadian landscape. To combat this, the Wendigo was created and was said to prey upon anyone foolish enough to resort to the terrible act. Later on, the Wendigo was also associated with human greed and gluttony, while others believe it might actually represent the Native American’s response to the horrific violent acts unleashed on them by early settlers. Even if it is taboo to speak its name, the saying “God Dang” is also taboo to Catholics and I don’t see everyone who says that getting shunned.
After getting a lot of hate, Mayuki finally gave in and started considering changing the name to appease the people trying to cancel her. They speak inclusivity until someone says something they don’t like and then they jump straight to trying to cancel them. When I asked Miyuki how she felt about receiving hate like that she said, “With them saying not to vote, it ruined my chance to win. I was shaking and angry and upset when it all occurred.” She’s also an artist full time who works for commission, so something like this could really hurt her financially. I’m sure the poster, wanting her to consider her HIS feelings, already thought of what his post might do to her reputation and her chance of winning, and just decided to post it anyway. After going through all that, the very first thing she told me was, “I don’t want to send hate towards anyone”. She’s such a kind soul and I think she’s too good for Twitter. She should come over to Hero Hei’s Discord server, Hero Haven, there’s even a RWBY section in the discord that would love to see her art, and appreciate it.
We really don’t like to see good people subjected to cancel culture, especially those who don’t deserve it, so from us here at Nyannet, we’d like to send a big congratulations to Mayuki for making some wonderful artwork and making the top 5 in the competition! Hopefully, this doesn’t have to end up as a bad experience for her, which is why I hope all of you will consider voting for her here, to show that she did nothing wrong and isn’t something she should feel bad about. If you’d like, you can also give her a follow on Twitter here. Here’s hoping to see more great things from Mayuki soon, and please don’t give up on your passion, we all support you!
Video discussion;
One Response Comment