On Race in Films/TV

Growing up, I‘ve mostly watched a lot of Chinese films and Chinese TV shows. I honestly cannot tell you if there was any conscious thought of “I see representations of me in this media so I choose to watch it (over Hollywood which doesn’t)”, but I can tell you that I watched a lot of it because my parents did. Partly so I can be more in touch with my Chinese side living in Canada, but also for them because they weren’t fluent English speakers. And having Chinese TV comforts them in a foreign country.

I was never bullied for wanting to “be Chinese” at school. Thankfully, most of my friends and classmates came from an Asian or non-white background in the school I ultimately spent the most time in. That's to say I definitely can say that I come from a more privileged standpoint on this issue.

So when the movement for more non-white representation in Hollywood came to be a thing, I didn't really feel... much.

Of course, I thought it was great. After all, Hollywood is huge. It's been sort of the hub for not just America media, but a hub for international media. Everyone in the world consumes it in one or another, and as such, it made sense for an INTERNATIONAL hub to represent not just white (and western) identity but also minorities. Especially when a majority of North American is settled by immigrants.

But otherwise, I didn't feel anymore excited for it. I can't pinpoint why exactly.

Perhaps because some part of me thinks that it's not expected for western media to have to cater to other race groups. After all, if I wanted to watch “my people” act, I just watch Chinese TV in Canada, or from China. Or Hong Kong.

Perhaps progress is still slow to really integrate minorities into Hollywood that really, there's not much to write home about. It feels like it's such a no-brainer that, really, is there anything to clap away about? Should we really pat Hollywood in the back for basically doing the human equivalent of breathing?

Or perhaps, it seems like Hollywood is just plugging in minorities into movies simply because they're minorities and calling it a job well done. It doesn't feel right when someone is just doing it for the sake of doing it, but not put any meaningful thought into the purpose and if it's necessary to even have a minority in that role/movie.

These days I notice that some TV shows are jumping the bandwagon to add a minority into their show just so they can check it off the list, call it a day and avoid the "race criticism". But some of these minority characters don't even add any depth or story development.

They are simply just... there.

Likewise, we don't NEED to plug minorities into roles that don't fit them simply because we need to check off some sort of "anti-critics" list, do we? Like The Witcher, for example. Is it really a win for minorities in Hollywood if we're just randomly plugging in race into pre-existing characters that were clearly created as white characters?

Personally, I'm not so sure if I can call it a win.

I guess you can argue that it's better than them plugging in minorities to fill in their normal stereotypical roles (eg, as a comic relief, criminals, etc), but we don't need to settle to just have minorities for the sake of having them. It's possible to give minorities meaningful roles and have them fit into some pre-existing characters, but not sacrifice story development.

Particularly, I think Marvel movies do a good job of that.

Or, create new meaningful characters in their own Universes. A lot of pre-existing media (remakes, reboots) exist in a predominantly white society. I understand that. But is replacing a white character with a minority in a story Universe that's created for white folks, and a white background can't be that much fun to watch, can it?

It’s sort of like when Hollywood took Ghost In The Shell and cast Western people in a Japanese-based story. Only this is reversed.

I definitely think in the case above, it's up to the producers and writers to rewrite the character completely. Put their creativity to use to make sure the character fits snuggly into the story. But I don't often times find it very rewarding or entertaining (just like how no one I personally know found Ghost in the Shell rewarding, other than ogling over ScarJo I guess). Not because I don't like that there's a minority character, but the writers just often don't do a good enough job fully integrating characters into such a story. A shame when this happens.

Recently, I saw a Twitter interaction about a minority-focused movie. Someone expressed that the movie was simply not their cup of tea. Another tweet took offense of the opinion and was quick to label this someone as basically “racist” for disliking the movie.

In this instance, first of all - do we really now live in a world where we can’t express our (dis)interest in a movie without being called a bully or a racist? I understand these movies about minority life can be very personal. We often relate better to things we have an attachment to. But especially if they are personal, you can’t expect everyone to understand and have those same personal attachments which makes the movie enjoyable for you. If someone doesn’t like the movie, it definitely speaks more to the storytelling and the skills being put into use to create the production.

I know I sound quite negative about minorities in Hollywood. Maybe perhaps the main reason being I really don’t see Hollywood as the “gold standard” for entertainment. Yes, I know the industry and how society views it says otherwise… and so in that case, there’s a lot to think about.

Is seeing minorities in Hollywood simply enough even if the content and story is lacking? Or is it okay as it is as these movies will be meaningful to someone somewhere out there?

Are we focusing wrongly on the part of media that needs minority coverage?

I don’t have the answers. This topic is overall very loaded. I would not be surprised if someone took offense to my views. But I wanted to share them anyway because everything to do with race and Hollywood seems rather… what’s the word?

Short-sighted?

Lacking?

Forced?

Whatever it is, I hope we continue to take the right steps forward in the future.