I'm a longtime reader of Marvel comics and a weekly buyer with subscriptions and pull lists at my local comic store. I'm also an American of Romani descent who has spent years researching and writing about the function of pop culture in the systemic racism that my people endure. Much could be said about the record of Romani characters in superhero comics, particularly the Scarlet Witch, but I'm writing today to raise concerns about the character's throughline in the current X-Men era, which has come to a head with her apparent murder in X-Factor #10, written by Leah Williams. First, however, I would like to address the racial and sexual violence visited upon the character Prodigy, as depicted by Williams, who is a white author, and the history of racist microagressions and the objectification that many readers have observed in Williams' past work. In X-Factor #10, Prodigy, a Black bisexual, is shown to have been sexually assaulted and murdered by a predator who specifically targets Black bi and gay men. Prodigy's assault and death transpired while he was dressed in a drag-inspired look, an arbitrary decision which served only to further sensationalize the homophobic violence. This plotline was abrupt and underdeveloped, and leaped without warning into imagery that many Black and LGBT readers found traumatizing. This was not an authentic or meaningful exploration of Black and queer experiences-- rather it was an exploitation and objectification of the violence done to Black and queer bodies. Coming from a white writer, this is wholly inappropriate. Leah Williams being bisexual herself does not excuse that. I am particularly disturbed by the implementation of pro-police messaging, via white character Aurora, after we have all spent the last year protesting police violence against Black lives. At worst, this is tone deaf, but I, and many other readers of color, found it to be egregiously offensive. Readers of color, particularly East Asian readers, have long been wary of Williams and her treatment of non-white characters. The repeated and disturbing objectification of East Asian women in her series X-Tremists struck a serious nerve, particularly with Williams' original character, Nezumi, who seemed redolent of racist WWII-era propaganda conflating Japanese people with rats. Her over-sexed and racially tokenized treatment of Akihiro in X-Factor has also put readers on edge, although many bit their tongue and endeavored to support her new book on account of its numerous LGBT characters and plotlines. Unfortunately, it seems as though that tentative faith was misplaced, and we must reiterate that LGBT representation does not outweigh violent racism. The Scarlet Witch is a complex character with an ever-changing history. The most formative and consistent element of her origin, however, is that she was born to a Romani mother, and raised by a migrant, working class Romani family who faced racial discrimination and violent hate crimes. For context, the Romani people are a South Asian diaspora who are racialized in European society, and have endured systemic oppression ever since our arrival in the West, including an attempted genocide during the Nazi regime. Although Wanda is no stranger to taking a dark turn, the Decimation plot stands out as a uniquely damaging and harmful case of character asassination. You can imagine how the identity politics and acts of violence which were projected onto the character are offensive given her personal history, and the real-life history that she represents. For years, the vitriol and anger that were directed towards Wanda within this narrative, boosted by blatantly ableist tropes, shaped the way that readers and writers alike perceived her. That negative perception encouraged audiences to espouse hateful sentiments about Wanda without forming clear thoughts about their racist implications, or making any effort to better their understanding of Romani people and our needs regarding popular culture. The current era of X-Men comics has revisited the Decimation several times, but I fear that

they have done nothing to counteract the harmful messaging that was attached to Wanda during that time, and have only doubled down on her troubling political position in the mutant world. I shouldn't have to explain this, but characterizing a Romani woman as an interloper, and a bogeyman figure that Krakoans invoke to engender nationalism, directly parallels the racist propaganda that is used to subjugate real-life Romani people throughout Europe. Year after year, Roma communities face forced eviction, deportation, and property laws designed to weed out migrant travellers, while our lives are often endangered by violent hate. Earlier this month, on 19 June, 2021, a Romani man in Teplice, Czech Republic, was murdered in an act of police brutality, and the Czech state has refused to launch an investigation or deliver any sort of justice on behalf of his family. We have spent the last two weeks protesting for Roma lives. To be honest, witnessing Roma death on-page, particularly in the heartbreaking scene where Wanda's own son discovers her body, triggered a lot of the distress and emotional trauma that I've been carrying since the Teplice incident. Of course, the timing of it couldn't be helped, but I fear that Williams will continue to exploit our trauma and our pain in her upcoming series, Trial of Magneto, which promises to revolve around Wanda's death and Magneto's reaction. Given Williams' history, and her choices in this most recent issue, I simply have no faith, only grave misgivings. Leah Williams is a white woman who continues to profit from the exploitation racial trauma and stereotyping, and Marvel cannot claim to be inclusive while enabling her behavior. As readers, we feel we must demand her removal from upcoming and future Marvel projects. We cannot in good conscience support and continue to give money to the X-Men franchise with such creators at the fore. In general, Marvel needs to take a good hard look at how it employs. This won't be a solution to the company's ingrained problems, but removing Leah Williams would be a constructive place to start.