DISCUSSION : Races in Episode

Japan is extremely homogenous, but even here there are cities with high percentages of foreign people. Yes, when I leave the house the people I see are like, 96% Japanese, but maybe 1 or 2 of the fifty people I see in town will be visibly foreign. Somewhere like Tokyo has even more.

And I’ll level with you - I haven’t seen many stories in settings where that excuse would hold true. Most of them are set in famous cities with diverse populations or in Nameless City, Undefined State, USA. And any story that really is set in a real place that’s apparently populated by 99.9% white people…
Well, if the author is so dedicated to those small details, then I expect to see some rich world building to go with my all white cast since the author is so dedicated to portraying reality.
If they’re attending a regular high school and shopping in a regular sized mall and only doing regular American teen/young adult things, then that’s where things start to get suspicious.

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I just want to emphasize that, IMO, including racial diversity in any story is possible if the author genuinely cares about it. And I don’t mean that cynically or patronizingly or whatever (although I do think it’s important and that all authors should strive to have diverse racial representation) because I truly think it comes down to your values. If an author really wanted to have characters of different races, ethnicities, and cultures, they would dedicate time and effort to developing creative yet realistic backstories that would explain their seemingly unfeasible presence in the story. However, if the author doesn’t prioritize diversity, then they’ll make all the characters look the same because that’s the practical, convenient choice. And, ultimately, that’s the author’s decision to make. But they can’t say that racial diversity isn’t an option at all.

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Yeah, it’s not exactly a stretch to add in at least a little diversity.
I could easily write a story set in Japan with a racially diverse cast and the population is approximately 98.5% homogenous.
Like you say, no one can force anyone to make their story diverse if they don’t want to… but if I can think of realistic ways to write a diverse cast in a country where only 1.5% of the population is composed of different races to the majority, “It wouldn’t be realistic” isn’t really a valid excuse.

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I think diversity in stories is incredibly important, but I also think that if you just add in diversity for the sake of adding in diversity, it does more harm than good.

Yes, stories should include diversity and most - if not all - countries in the world have some sort of cultural cohesion, if small. However, make sure you think about the story of why or how the character ended up in a strange place if is not a very common type of diversity in that country otherwise it’s not very realistic. There is always going to be different races in a country. That’s the beauty of globalisation! There’s no excuse in avoiding it. However, personally I’d argue that people should do a little research to see what kind of diversity the place they’re setting the story in has and thinking up how the character’s family got there if it’s purposefully unusual. Also, make sure said character has a purpose other than filling diversity quotas.

I had this discussion with someone online before: putting a Colombian character in Slovakia is unusual, so unless you comment on the fact that it’s unusual and explore the interesting and unique diversity, it seems really fake.

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I’m rereading what I wrote, and I was on some different level yall.

People don’t complain about white people being a minority in stories because that isn’t a thing. As it currently stands in western media, white is the default and everything else is considered a deviation. Most well known stories have a full cast of white people with separate and unique personalities with one POC who has no particular individuality separate from their race and no particular motivations past comic relief. POCs are usually placed to fill a quota or to serve as some sort of trope fulfillment. Very rarely are main characters black “just because”. Race has everything to do with how you experience the world around you, but it has almost nothing to do with how you are personally, hense why people hate stereotypes. Most of the white important characters I’ve seen in stories could easily be another race, but aren’t because that would be a deviation from the norm. The problem isn’t placing a POC in a story. The issue begins when you give them no life. No outstanding personality or motivations. No purpose besides comic relief or boosting your social justice beliefs (I need this Hispanic person in my story so just so I can explain to the reader why racism is bad). It also helps to have more than one POC in a diverse story. People with actual effect on the plot. People whose decisions have consequences. I won’t even touch on sexuality because that would require a much longer rant (and it isn’t on topic), but my point is that people are making this much more difficult than it actually is. If you have 3 developed, white characters in your story, making one of them Asian would change almost nothing about that charcter. Unless your story is a Shakespearean drama, their family problably doesn’t need an in depth explanation. Most episode stories have inexplicably absentee parents anyway. Lastly, I think the location thing, FOR MOST PEOPLE (in caps in case people want to come for me), is an excuse. Most of these stories take place in costal or metropolitan USA. You mean to tell me your story takes place in New York City but your whole cast, save one person, is white? There are a lot more POCs around than most people think anyway. Your one city being majority white doesn’t properly represent the local population. Not that it matters anyway. All of these stories are fiction and placing POCs in places where they stand out is the point. Maybe showing them interact with this type of environment could serve as good character development.

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Nah that’s dumb to me. There are PLENTY of black people in the UK, myself being one. :wink: It is probably a lack of care for diversity. There NO reasons for stories set it western countries to NOT have diversity in this day and age. Nope! Nada!

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It really amazes me how bent out of shape certain people will get over the mere idea of including people who aren’t white in their stories. “It’s my story, I can do what I want, don’t force diversity!!” Sure, it’s your story, you can do what you want, but don’t expect to not be called on it. Having the freedom to do something doesn’t mean you’re free of dealing with the consequences.

Anyway, diverse stories are great and this world can never have too many of them. Just a fact.

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One of my stories is set in Maine, which is over 90% white, but here’s the thing I don’t care, I wouldn’t care if Maine was 100% white.
These stories are fiction and in fiction we are given some creative license and if I can use that creative license to make my stories more diverse and give representation to marginalized identities you can bet that’s what I’m gonna do. Diverse stories are just more interesting.

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le bump

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I live in New York, and one of my stories got called out for being too diverse. What? I live in New York City. Everyone is there. Whites, Blacks, Asians, Latinos/Latinas, Hispanics, Arabs, Jamaicans, you name it! So of course, majority of my stories have a diverse cast of characters from various backgrounds.

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That’s dumb. " Too diverse"? What? :roll_eyes:

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Exactly! So, my point: Location matters.

I mean, it has a white protagonist, yes, but my other stories have a POC as a protagonist! My most recent one has a mixed person as the protagonist.

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That’s cool. I just recently started to add customization to my story however it’s limited. TAKE THAT :triumph: What was the name of your stories though?

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The one with “too much diversity”? Or the recent one, that has your character?

The one that has too much diversity.

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Oh! Cruelty of Ice.

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lel — I guess one can’t please everyone xD

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Too much diversity! :joy: :joy: :joy:

It was probably a white person being like
image

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