Are the ponies xenophobic?

[DPBOX 71]

Early on in My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, we find out that the ponies are absolutely TERRIFIED of Zecora the Zebra and dragons, so what does this say about their society and what is it like?

If they are so scared of zebras and dragons, are they scared of each other? Would it be realistic for them to start splitting apart in a matter of months in Season 9 when they have lived together for thousands of years?

And then you have Twilight Sparkle and her friends trying to spread friendship throughout Equestria and even beyond into other kingdoms where other creatures live. But are Twilight Sparkle, her friends, and the tight bond they have with each other indicative of the greater Equestrian society or are they an anomaly in the society and there are actually not a lot of friendships in Equestria?

If a yak from Yakyakistan or a griffon from Griffonstone came to Canterlot or Manehattan or Appleloosa looking for a place to live and/or work, would the residents behave the same way the Ponyville residents did when Zecora came to town?

[Gaines 1,221]

I would assume ponies are just way too used to being around other ponies  Also, I wouldn't say ponies are afraid of zebras. As far as we know, it was only Zecora who was wrongfully rumored to be evil.
I think it's pretty understandable to be afraid of dragons though  Not trying to dehumanize them, but if you came across a literal giant person who had sharp teeth and claws, breathed fire, and could fly, no metaphor, well... you either like 'em or you don't like 'em. 

 

[Pentium100 2,122]

Don't forget that ponies used to be racist against other types of ponies and only stopped for a while because of a common enemy that wanted to kill all of them and fed on hatred. 

And then later ponies went right back to hating each other (G5). 

So yeah, I'd say they are racist and IMO a lot of ponies have opinions similar to those of Chancellor Neighsay.

[Comrade Friendship 436]

In my opinion, that's kinda the thing with FiM. I mean, I don't know if I'd say it applies to everypony in Equestria, but I think Celestia is kinda representative of how pony society didn't really know friendship that well.

After all, at least in my headcanon (based on FiMfics), Celestia obviously wasn't great at friendship if her sister turned evil and Sunset left her (yes, I know that can sound like victimizing, I'm not putting all the blame on her, but hear me out). She definitely had good intentions, but I feel that she just didn't have the experiences to know true friendship. Thus, Equestria could be assumed to be in a similar mindset. 

However, once Twilight and the gang figured out the magic of friendship, then Celestia finally realized its fulness and, with Twilight becoming the princess of friendship and the map sending them to different places, they started to spread this knowledge and magic. Its kinda like the Renaissance, where what was once known (at least in my headcanon), was rediscovered.

In short, IMO, yes, the ponies were essentially xenophobic at the beginning, but in FiM we see the journey of those who helped bring friendship to everypony (and yak, and griffon, etc).

[DPBOX 71]

1 hour ago, Comrade Friendship said:

In short, IMO, yes, the ponies were essentially xenophobic at the beginning, but in FiM we see the journey of those who helped bring friendship to everypony (and yak, and griffon, etc).

So, with that being said and with all of the work Twilight Sparkle and her friends have done as the series went on, then why are all of the ponies suddenly splitting apart in a matter of months at the end of Season 9?

[Comrade Friendship 436]

uhhhh, here, have a muffin

[DPBOX 71]

8 minutes ago, Comrade Friendship said:

uhhhh, here, have a muffin

What? What does that have to do with what I asked? I don't understand.

[Hadrien 950]

19 hours ago, DPBOX said:

Early on in My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, we find out that the ponies are absolutely TERRIFIED of Zecora the Zebra and dragons, so what does this say about their society and what is it like?

I think Zecora is a more fitting example of how ponies tend to be, at the very least, racist toward other races. Like yeah they don't trust her, close shop and talk behind her back, but they don't just run her out of town or tar and feather her on the spot for being a Zebra. Same thing with Gilda in S1. If they were truly Xenophobic, no way they would've let her come into town. Ponies tend to be very fearful of other species, since they've repeatedly been at odds with them (mostly predator like griffins or changelings). For Zecora, it's her penchant for "voodoo" magic and potions, which are not at all widespread in Equestria because Unicorns, and thus they don't know how to react and panic. But once they know she can be useful, and she's friendly, they warm up to her.
 

17 hours ago, Gaines said:

I think it's pretty understandable to be afraid of dragons though  Not trying to dehumanize them, but if you came across a literal giant person who had sharp teeth and claws, breathed fire, and could fly, no metaphor, well... you either like 'em or you don't like 'em. 

This, 100%. At least before Amber shows up and start developing relations with ponies.

15 hours ago, Pentium100 said:

Don't forget that ponies used to be racist against other types of ponies

They were, and that's exactly why they *had* to develop friendship as the norm. If they didn't live in a world where being friendly toward each other was a survival trait needed to survive, I don't think they would've develop the same type of society.
 

34 minutes ago, DPBOX said:

So, with that being said and with all of the work Twilight Sparkle and her friends have done as the series went on, then why are all of the ponies suddenly splitting apart in a matter of months at the end of Season 9?

Again, mostly fear. Ponies are a reactionary race. When something goes wrong they run, hide and/or try to find someone to fight. In that case it was more of a "everypony for themselves" and it just so happen that most Unicorns are in Canterlot, most Pegasi are in Cloudsdale and Earth ponies are everywhere else. So when you see the pegasus retreating in their flying city and the unicorn shielding their city, as an earth pony it's kind of hard not going "well, guess screw these guys for not helping us normal folk". But again, because of their history and the elements of harmony helping them, they quickly realize it's not the way to go, and end up helping Twilight.

[Comrade Friendship 436]

34 minutes ago, DPBOX said:

What? What does that have to do with what I asked? I don't understand.

It seems my plan worked 

11 minutes ago, Hadrien said:

Like yeah they don't trust her, close shop and talk behind her back, but they don't just run her out of town or tar and feather her on the spot for being a Zebra.

 uhhhhh

You're just watching MLP casually and then all of a sudden there's an angry mob in ponyville driving Zecora out with pitchforks

I guess we gotta teach kids about hate crimes at some point, right?

Edited October 14, 2023 by Comrade Friendship

[Hadrien 950]

Moments ago, Comrade Friendship said:

You're just watching MLP casually and then all of a sudden there's an angry mob in ponyville driving Zecora out with pitchforks

I mean.........

[DPBOX 71]

15 minutes ago, Hadrien said:

and it just so happen that most Unicorns are in Canterlot, most Pegasi are in Cloudsdale and Earth ponies are everywhere else.

Oh, so are you saying that the ponies even in Friendship is Magic are kind of sort of already segregated? I never realized that.

[Comrade Friendship 436]

Well, I stand corrected

 

On 2023-10-13 at 5:32 PM, DPBOX said:

Oh, so are you saying that the ponies even in Friendship is Magic are kind of sort of already segregated? I never realized that.

Maybe there just isn't enough helium production to sustain sufficient numbers of ponies living in Cloudsdale with balloons.

Edited October 15, 2023 by Comrade Friendship

[Hadrien 950]

1 minute ago, DPBOX said:

Oh, so are you saying that the ponies even in Friendship is Magic are kind of sort of already segregated? I never realized that.

I mean, they kind of have to be. They don't work the same kind of magic, so they don't learn the same thing growing up either. Unicorns *will* have to learn magic at some point and pegasi from Cloudsdale almost exclusively work on the weather. I might be remembering wrong, but I think they specified that Ponyville was "special" for having such a diverse population type.

[Xada 371]

I don't don't think they are quite xenophobic but something in between. Like herd mentality with a little siege mentality.

Edited October 15, 2023 by Xada

[Comrade Friendship 436]

On 2023-10-13 at 5:36 PM, Hadrien said:

I mean, they kind of have to be. They don't work the same kind of magic, so they don't learn the same thing growing up either. Unicorns *will* have to learn magic at some point and pegasi from Cloudsdale almost exclusively work on the weather. I might be remembering wrong, but I think they specified that Ponyville was "special" for having such a diverse population type.

Yeah, in my opinion, they were suggesting that when the CMC's were trying out for the Equestria Games opening ceremonies thing and they wanted to represent Ponyville by showing all three.

[Landi 600]

I've heard this statement said before about ponies, and I don't really think that it's a fair assessment. The world in which MLP takes place is a vast fantastical world with a large variety of creatures. Some of these creatures, such as dragons and griffons, have predatory traits like claws or (in the case of dragons) fire breath. It makes sense that smaller and more peaceful creatures, such as ponies, would have some level of fear of these outside creatures. It also doesn't help that some of these creatures have actually been aggressive towards ponies in the past. All this is to say that it makes sense in the context of the show for ponies to be skeptical of outsiders.

As for the claim that ponies are in general bad at friendship, I really don't understand this. The show has established that what makes Equestria different from the pony civilizations that came before is that in Equestria ponies live and work together in friendship and harmony. The fact that Equestria has prospered for so long is a testament to how deep friendship between ponies is. Yes there are likely to be outliers, but as a general statement, Equestria is doing well in the friendship department. The previously mentioned line in "Flight to the Finish" is likely a throwaway line that was only put in there to set up the premise of the episode. It's my understanding that most Equestrian cities and towns are composed of some sort of mix of the three pony types, and cities like Cloudsdale and Canterlot are exceptions.