Diversity and Representation in Media

Re: characters in anime

Every person I talked to who had a default assumption about anime assumed anime characters were white.

re: voltron

Talking about motivation through the lens of the writer is a valid form of criticism and communication. it's not pointless. Instead of "this character has agency" it becomes "this was a good depiction of the character's agency". It's a subtle difference that just leads to a differently focused convo.

TBH while the fandom was bad, there were a lot of issues in the show that exacerbated it a lot. The ending did not help, and showed off some of the weaknesses of the show as a whole.

Anime characters are very much white-passing whether fans or animators realize it or not. If you show an anime character to the average citizen, I bet most will say "white."

Edited by erazor0707 on Dec 16th 2018 at 8:25:34 AM

How many of those people spoken to were themselves white?

Edited by Tuckerscreator on Dec 16th 2018 at 8:37:09 AM

Is that for actual anime characters or just people drawn in the anime style in general? Because that's a pretty weird assumption to make sans context. Like, if you look at Studio Ghibli's filmography, you have some stories that are set in fantasy!Japan or otherwise steeped in Japanese folk traditions and mythology, and others that are clearly set in fantasy!Europe.

Re: Anime characters.

I actually didn't remember caring about race of anime characters. I'd usually just see them as Japanese or Asian looking if the story is set on a fantasy land.

And of course, saying that characters with obvious Japanese names are white is just trying to excuse whitewashing with anything that you could.

In hindsight, I really had a hard time seeing anime characters as anything but drawings. It was only when I started reading more grounded/"realistic" stuff that I started to notice race.

Edited by KazuyaProta on Dec 16th 2018 at 12:15:22 PM

This is related to something that bothers me a lot: I often see the trope Ambiguously Brown applied to any anime character that looks even a bit tanned. Apparently not many people realise that even East Asian people can have a multitude of skin colours.

I will fall into the camp of something see the chararter as white or a least pale if anything, it dosent help that animation style you cant only see asian is for face feature at times so anime just look.....there.

There is reason why anime tends to portray foreigners either as blonds with blue eyes or have them feature really really huge noses Well okay main reason is probably that Japanese really believe in stereotypes, but secondary reason is to make it more obvious that character is supposed to be foreigner

Edited by SpookyMask on Dec 17th 2018 at 10:58:17 PM

Sooo, The Green Book, that “inspiring” movie about a black musician in the 60s and his white chauffeur?

Turns out it’s, uh, mostly made up?

Dr. Shirley’s family are very angry; to the extent Mahershala Ali apologized. How on earth did the filmmakers not bother to talk to Shirley’s relatives?!

Also, a flag from their home country too, so you can guess it. If is a girl, better use a American Flag Bikini. Because Murica is like that.

Yeah, Green Book is... bad. Really bad. For the sake of propping up Viggo Mortensen’s “I just really want to show off my Italian gangster impression”, it flattens Shirley into a man supposedly disconnected from black culture, when the real Shirley was in frequent contact with his brothers, friends with MLK Jr, and marched at Selma.

Edited by Tuckerscreator on Dec 17th 2018 at 4:58:26 AM

The biggest takeaway I had from Green Book was “man, I really wish this was a Don Shirley movie.” As a black person, some of Shirley’s actions felt off and he was just there to prop up Viggo Mortenson’s character. It really felt like a “safe” civil rights movement era movie along the lines of The Help.

And it wasn’t even really about the Green Book.

Edited by MegaJ on Dec 17th 2018 at 4:48:41 AM

The thing about anime is that Mukokuseki is more about Artistic License to make their characters stylistically different. When paired with Only Six Faces and a non-naturalistic style (such as Dragonball Z's angular eyes and their eyebrows sitting right on top), it just reads differently in other cultures. That alone does not necessarily imply Ambiguously Brown, but often there is an artistic intention behind it.

Samurai Champloo is very clearly in a Japanese setting, and the example given says that Mugens darker skin tone is based on how the Japanese traditionally depict those from Ryuku/Okinawa. While that may technically eliminate the "ambiguous" part of the trope, I found that to be a fascinating exploration of the Values Dissonance that makes the trope exist. In a related idea, in there was a character visiting from Holland and the others point out his reddish hair and blue eyes as the key factors that indicate he is not Japanese. In animated form, yes, but in real life those would be pretty low on the most obvious indicators.

Is mostly because "Serious" animation often use face structure which for most part anime barely use, I mean at best you can see western(read: US) in anime with more square feature but that it

Apart from clothes and language, I don't see what could make you stand out more than having an exotic hair color. An exotic skin color obviously, but the Japanese are quite diverse in that regard.

Edited by gropcbf on Dec 18th 2018 at 7:46:14 PM

Comic series from Native American creator, based on Navajo folklore.

Edited by windleopard on Dec 18th 2018 at 11:58:57 AM

And yet they still refer to him as "Navajo" instead of Din`e

James Wan is no longer producing the Resident Evil reboot.

And we have our first look at Guy Ritchie's Aladdin.

I've heard conflicting info on whether to refer to them as Navajo or Din'e.

Not sure how I feel about Smith's Genie costume.

dear god the comments section is a cesspit

... Is that Will Smith as a Genie?

Yes, yes it is.

Bet you never thought you'd live to see that happen.

That is an awful, awful poster. The costumes and hair/makeup are awful, Jasmine looks bored, Aladdin looks weirdly smug, and I just realized casting Will Smith as the magic enslaved genie is ..... magical negro trope. Oh god why.

That... did not occur to me.

They should have just CG Ied the Genie,they likely have had the budget,allows his cartoony zanyness to shrine through,and yes he should be blue.

I can't imagine Genie being portrayed by a white man would make things any better,right?

Edited by Ultimatum on Dec 19th 2018 at 11:12:13 AM