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Diversity and Representation in Media

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A thread for discussing representation and diversity in all kinds of media. This covers creators and casting decisions as well as characters and in-universe discussions.

Historical works and decisions are in-scope as well, not just recent news.

Please put any spoilers behind tags and clearly state which work(s) they apply to.

    Original OP 
For discussing any racial, gender, and orientation misdoings happening across various movies and the film industry today.

This week, producer Ross Putnam started a Twitter account called "femscriptintros", where he puts up examples of how women are introduced in the screenplays he's read. And nearly all of sound like terrible porn or are too concerned with emphasizing said lady is beautiful despite whatever traits she may have. Here's a Take Two podcast made today where he talks about it.


(Edited April 19 2024 to add mod pinned post)

Edited by Mrph1 on Apr 19th 2024 at 11:45:51 AM

Swanpride Since: Jun, 2013
#15026: Apr 14th 2018 at 1:16:30 PM

I like to see more female villains which are not about jealously in one way or another...ie they did the remake of Lost in Space and gender switched the villain, and honestly, it was kind of refreshing.

Beatman1 Since: Feb, 2014 Relationship Status: Gone fishin'
#15027: Apr 14th 2018 at 1:44:06 PM

[up]They were never going to replicate the original Dr. Smith, but hearing she did a good job (I believe they said they made her a woman specifically to avoid those comparisons) is refreshing to hear.

FluffyMcChicken My Hair Provides Affordable Healthcare from where the floating lights gleam Since: Jun, 2014 Relationship Status: In another castle
My Hair Provides Affordable Healthcare
#15028: Apr 14th 2018 at 5:02:25 PM

  • post removed for responding to dated post.*

edited 14th Apr '18 5:37:12 PM by FluffyMcChicken

Beatman1 Since: Feb, 2014 Relationship Status: Gone fishin'
#15029: Apr 14th 2018 at 5:15:45 PM

[up]They wanted to take her in a different direction from the original Doctor Smith. It worked. And I’m glad they did something different.

FluffyMcChicken My Hair Provides Affordable Healthcare from where the floating lights gleam Since: Jun, 2014 Relationship Status: In another castle
My Hair Provides Affordable Healthcare
#15030: Apr 14th 2018 at 5:36:47 PM

[up] . . . Apparently, the post that I was originally responding to is several pages back. Sorry about that.

edited 14th Apr '18 5:37:51 PM by FluffyMcChicken

Beatman1 Since: Feb, 2014 Relationship Status: Gone fishin'
unknowing from somewhere.. Since: Mar, 2014
#15032: Apr 14th 2018 at 7:40:51 PM

Yeah is a shame they used those photos, they are not just out of context they are downright un glamorus and it almost look they used to stir controversy.

And about mulan...is shang and mulang relationship that good? I mean I always find Shang a little bit boring and flat as chararter and it kinda take me time to see what Mulan saw in him.

"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"
windleopard from Nigeria Since: Nov, 2014 Relationship Status: Non-Canon
#15033: Apr 14th 2018 at 9:45:56 PM

TBH, Shang and Mulan's don't have much of a relationship in the first movie. It's more romantic tension.

I've seen some people interpret Shang as gay or bisexual as they assume he's actually attracted to Mulan's "Ping" persona. Their relationship does get more focus in Mulan 2. YMMV on how well that movie handles it.

Swanpride Since: Jun, 2013
#15034: Apr 15th 2018 at 12:34:29 AM

I don't think that Shang is boring...he actually has his own little arc in the movie. In a way he is a mirror to Mulan - Mulan always felt that she was a constant disappointment to her parents, but Shang is kind of the overachiever, putting into command by his father despite his youth and not wanting to disappoint him no matter what. Shang coming into his own as a commander to a degree that he not just does a good job, but even goes a step further by buckling expectations of society and supporting Mulan in the end is a huge change for him.

Shang is actually one of my fav Disney princes, along with Eugene and Phillip. And it is not that I like Philip because I think that he is a complex character, but because me makes me smile.

Also, remember that Mulan doesn't REALLY have a romance. It actually ends with the start of a romance, not, like usual, with the conclusion. It is just Shang showing he is interested.

edited 15th Apr '18 12:36:13 AM by Swanpride

Luminosity Since: Jun, 2012 Relationship Status: Lovey-Dovey
#15035: Apr 15th 2018 at 3:02:18 AM

Also, remember that Mulan doesn't REALLY have a romance. It actually ends with the start of a romance, not, like usual, with the conclusion. It is just Shang showing he is interested.

Which is honestly the best way to do it in a movie's limited timeframe.

Punisher286 Since: Jan, 2016
#15036: Apr 15th 2018 at 10:22:15 AM

Unfortunately the sequel, which I detest, took everything that was good about the first movie and threw it away, sadly starting with Mulan's character.

AmbarSonofDeshar Since: Jan, 2010
#15037: Apr 15th 2018 at 6:28:16 PM

So I wasn't planning to mention any more of the stuff from my Criminal Minds rewatch but Season 4 episode "Bloodlines."

The killers are evil Romani who survive by picking pockets...when they aren't kidnapping little white girls (after murdering their parents) and marrying them off to their sons. What they do when they have daughters themselves isn't made clear; according to Morgan, however, the reason they forcibly marry their sons to kidnapped girls from another culture is "to keep the bloodline pure". At the end of the episode we find out this isn't just one family of bad Romani—there's an entire army of "Gypsies" out there, all across America, murdering innocent white Anglo-Saxon families; the episode fades to black as another set of Romani parents tell their son he's almost ten, so it's time for him to commit his first murder and kidnap his future wife.

Who wrote this episode, Ion Antonescu?

Draghinazzo (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: I get a feeling so complicated...
#15038: Apr 15th 2018 at 6:32:17 PM

Getting flashbacks to the Hunchback of Notre Dame novel since there's a vaguely similar plotline with Esmeralda being a non-romani girl who was taken away from her family.

Gaon Smoking Snake from Grim Up North Since: Jun, 2012 Relationship Status: Above such petty unnecessities
#15039: Apr 15th 2018 at 6:34:49 PM

I almost refuse to believe that is real because holy shit that is blindingly xenophobic.

"All you Fascists bound to lose."
AmbarSonofDeshar Since: Jan, 2010
#15040: Apr 15th 2018 at 6:35:55 PM

I would just like to note that, as of Season 4, the show had never had an episode in which actual neo-Nazis were the killers. They'd had an episode where a black serial murderer tries to frame poor, innocent Nazis by leaving swastikas at his crime scenes, and the episode I've talked about before where the militia are pro-African-American and aid the heroes, but an episode in which actual neo-Nazis or Klansmen are the killers? Never.

And then they do an episode that employs literal Nazi propaganda about the Romani. There's standard cop show bigotry...and then there's that.

FluffyMcChicken My Hair Provides Affordable Healthcare from where the floating lights gleam Since: Jun, 2014 Relationship Status: In another castle
My Hair Provides Affordable Healthcare
#15041: Apr 15th 2018 at 11:54:08 PM

There was also a CSI episode from 2010 that had a neo-nazi recruit who seems to have been murdered by his mentors for standing up for the African immigrant janitor of his high-school a bit too many times . . . only for The Reveal to be that said janitor is actually a fugitive Rwandan war criminal who stabbed the recruit - who otherwise was on the verge of renouncing his ways thanks to his friendship with the janitor - when the latter discovered his duplicity.

windleopard from Nigeria Since: Nov, 2014 Relationship Status: Non-Canon
#15042: Apr 16th 2018 at 12:04:50 AM

Speaking of Romani, did you guys know Dick Grayson is Romani in the comics?

https://thenerdsofcolor.org/2017/03/01/erased-and-ignored-dick-graysons-rromani-identity-comes-to-light/

Can't say I blame you if you don't since this is a fairly recent development (it came about in Devin Grayson's run in the 2000s) and is rarely ever mentioned in the comics. i bring this up because there's a minor controversy online due to the actor playing Dick on Titans not being Romani. Though this might be one of the more "forgivable" instances of erasure as even the comics don't remember he's supposed to be Romani.

Swanpride Since: Jun, 2013
#15043: Apr 16th 2018 at 12:32:52 AM

Isn't it also kind of a cliché that artists are Romani?

Julep Since: Jul, 2010
#15044: Apr 16th 2018 at 2:03:03 AM

Not really - for circus artists at least. The nomadic lifestyle means that circus arts have an overrepresentation of people belonging to the Romani ethnicity in the widest sense.

"Romani" however is about the largest possible term to define those nomadic people, who do not belong to a unified ethnicity. That is similar to saying that a Hungarian, a Swedish and a French man are "Caucasian". I do not know much of the fictional biography of the Flying Graysons but they probably were Romani of the [x] group - likely Romanichal due to AFAIK being American.

Side-note: since they are also called "Rumneys", it's very possible for Mitt Romney's name to come from them.

To quote Stephanie Beatriz: "There's no way that a network is gonna cast two latinas. That doesn't happen."

edited 16th Apr '18 2:08:27 AM by Julep

thatindiantroper Since: Feb, 2015
#15045: Apr 16th 2018 at 2:40:21 AM

“Though this might be one of the more "forgivable" instances of erasure as even the comics don't remember he's supposed to be Romani.“

It was also an element introduced fairly recently and by a writer who was...really weird regarding the character. Her name is Devon Grayson and that isn’t her original last name if you get what I mean.

She also had him raped and justified it as “not rape but just non consensual sex”. So you can see why not that many writers have cared to follow up on that.

thatindiantroper Since: Feb, 2015
#15046: Apr 16th 2018 at 2:42:11 AM

“There was also a CSI episode from 2010 that had a neo-nazi recruit who seems to have been murdered by his mentors for standing up for the African immigrant janitor of his high-school a bit too many times . . . only for The Reveal to be that said janitor is actually a fugitive Rwandan war criminal “

All other things aside...damn these cop shows got weird for a while there.

windleopard from Nigeria Since: Nov, 2014 Relationship Status: Non-Canon
#15047: Apr 16th 2018 at 3:08:22 AM

She also had him raped and justified it as “not rape but just non consensual sex”. So you can see why not that many writers have cared to follow up on that.

That rape seems to be about the only thing people remember about her run. Or about her work at DC in general.

[up]I recall another CSI episode where a black cop was shot and killed by a white racist police officer. This was during the time Laurence Fishburne was head of the crime lab. The show seems to not be sure if the guy is supposed to be racist or not (he's heard on the radio calling the guy he shot a "black son of a bitch") but then he insists the black guy, who had filed a complaint against him for racial slurs, was being insensitive and the show does nothing to disprove that. Things start getting weird when we learn one of the black witnesses even tampered with the crime scene. Finally, after the cop commits suicide, we learn that he had an eye condition that caused him to mistake the victim for an enemy shooter. It ends with the his exchange:

"Who's the villain here?"

"You tell me."

The last bit is spoken by Launrence Fishburne's character.

Basically, this was one of those t.v episodes that seemed to want to make a commentary about racism but didn't have the courage, freedom or even intelligence to truly tackle the issue.

SpookyMask Since: Jan, 2011
#15048: Apr 16th 2018 at 3:13:30 AM

All those examples sound awful ._. At best they are really edgy attempts at being morally gray, but even then I'd think writers for those episodes were racist

edited 16th Apr '18 3:14:11 AM by SpookyMask

Julep Since: Jul, 2010
#15049: Apr 16th 2018 at 3:33:29 AM

It was also an element introduced fairly recently and by a writer who was...really weird regarding the character. Her name is Devon Grayson and that isn’t her original last name if you get what I mean.

Unless I misunderstood something, her Wikipedia page mentions that she renamed herself "Grayson" before learning about comics - early 20's vs mid 20's.

edited 16th Apr '18 3:34:38 AM by Julep

TommyFresh Since: Aug, 2013
#15050: Apr 16th 2018 at 5:22:04 AM

Damn, I used to watch Criminal Minds fairly regularly and while I remember some really questionable episodes I didn't remember it being that bad so consistently. Glad I stopped watching a long time ago.


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