curl-6 said:
Soundwave said:
Or one group of people just need to get used to the fact that they don't live in a monolithic world where everything revolves around them.
Black/latino/Asian/native American/mixed people have navigated Hollywood being 95%+ white for decades and those audience demographics have also accepted that they don't get to see many people on screen that look like themselves for a long time, so now that they get a few roles here and there, why is it such a concern of yours that they need to be lectured and "put in their place"? Where you actively as concerned when the situation was reversed? Who is really being hurt by an Ariel being black when Disney has already made like 3 or 4 Little Mermaid movies with a white animated one? Why is that something that some people feel they must tear down? How many white actors get roles all the time based on just their looks and really not much else?
Of Ryan Gosling and Bradley Cooper and Matthew McCoungahey and Margot Robbie and Scarlett Johansen are they really actually the best actors in the world or are they getting their parts in large part because of how they look? This is a business where Ashton Kutcher gets nearly as many lead roles as Denzel Washington, Channing Tatum gets more chances than Sidney Poitier, Megan Fox was a bigger "star" at her peak than Angela Bassett ... is that based on acting ability? So I sorry I don't buy that "well PoC shouldn't want parts based on how they look", when white people have been getting parts on the basis of how they look for decades on end and that continues to this day.
It's not even like when there is the odd, small numbered role that gets race swapped to a PoC that there aren't still plenty of roles for white actors. They still get the majority of roles do they not?
It was different when white actors were stealing jobs like Prince of Persia or Emma Stone playing Asian roles because it's not like there were 50 other roles for a Persian/middle eastern or Asian actor to get instead. When that happened, it was effectively locking out entire ethnicities because those types of roles would be the only role they'd have a realistic shot at. Look at Mena Mousoud who played Aladdin in a movie that made a billion+ dollars at the box office, he can't get a role in other movies even despite being in such a blockbuster, now if that role of Aladdin was give to a white actor, which they probably would have done 15 years ago, dude would even be locked out of that.
If a white actor like Emma Stone misses out on a Little Mermaid role or something, they have 50 other chances at other parts as they are heavily favored over a PoC actor in 80%+ of their auditions guaranteed. Like maybe the people who are getting a stick up their ass about this should chill the fuck out, there's still a white Star Lord, white Peter Parker, white Ethan Hunt, white Thor, plenty of white actors like Jon Cena and Jason Satham have been added to the Fast series to make up for Paul Walker's absence, no less than 3 (4?) concurrent white Batmans (lol), there's been 11 Star Wars movies and the lead in all 11 of them is white, etc. etc. there are still the vast majority of movies that have a white lead. One doesn't need to act like a baby when other ethnicities get a chance at a big role 1/10 times (and that's being generous) or lecture groups of people on why they shouldn't want to see themselves reflected in some of the media they consume.
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You're painting an incredibly inaccurate picture. This may have been the situation decades ago, but it's not even close to true today.
In the 2021-2022 TV season in the US, 50% of regular roles were people of colour: https://www.statista.com/statistics/949671/characters-broadcast-network-programs-ethnicity/ This is more than their share of the US population.
People of colour also had 40% of lead film roles in 2020 and 2021: https://www.statista.com/statistics/696850/lead-actors-films-ethnicity/
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I don't think your numbers are accurate.
https://www.mckinsey.com/featured-insights/diversity-and-inclusion/black-representation-in-film-and-tv-the-challenges-and-impact-of-increasing-diversity
While their overall representation among film casts is broadly in line with the Black share of the US population (13.4 percent), Black actors play only 11 percent of leading film roles and are often funneled to race-related projects, which typically receive lower investment in both production and promotion.
Linear, old fashioned TV is OK for black actors, probably in part because black people watch more TV than any other demographic:
https://afro.com/blacks-watch-more-tv-than-any-other-group-nielsen-says/
But representation in modern platforms like streaming is still dismal, 5% of leads in streaming shows (Netflix, Disney+) are black.
The representation for Latino (the fastest growing part of the US population), Asian (2nd fastest), and other ethnicities is still dismal:
https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/tv/2020/10/22/black-representation-tv-grows-but-diversity-off-screen-lags-study/3720579001/
Although the study shows shows that Black characters have become better represented on TV, it points out that other minority groups are far from proportionally represented onscreen and elsewhere. Latinos and Asian Americans remain significantly underrepresented in nearly all industry positions; there is minimal presence in any job category for people of Middle Eastern and North African descent; and there's virtually zero representation for Native Americans on TV.
So basically black people get some representation on network/cable TV because likely TV execs are desperate as its a dying format (whoopity doo).
PoC having 40% of movie leads is just patently false. You can look at the top theatrical releases from 2022: Top Gun Maverick (white lead), Black Panther WF (black lead), Dr. Strange (white lead), Avatar 2 (well mostly blue people, but the lead live action is white), Jurassic World Dominion (white lead), Minions (animated), The Batman (white lead), Thor Love & Thunder (white lead), Spider-Man: NWH (white lead), Sonic 2 (white lead for live action), Black Adam (mixed ethnicity lead), Elvis (white lead), Uncharted (white lead), Nope (black lead), Lightyear (white lead character), Smile (white lead), The Lost City (white lead), Bullet Train (white lead), The Bad Guys (animated), Fantastic Beasts (white lead).
So tallying that up you get 15/20 have white leads, 3/20 have black or mixed race leads, 2/20 are animated animals/non-humans. 0/20 are Latino, 0/20 are Asian, so basically talking CG animals or cartoons have a better shot at leading a movie than a Latino or Asian.
I'd also ask what is the problem even if black people or any other ethnicity was over represented for a period of time on TV or film? You know perfectly well white people have been over represented in those areas and continue to be (see the movie breakdown above), why is it only a problem if it's blacks that have over representation once in a while? Ask yourself why there is this double standard, because you don't seem to complain when its white people being over represented.
Last edited by Soundwave - on 18 July 2023
