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My facebook has been ablaze with the War of the Rings of Power, and by that I mean Amazon putting out tons of propaganda to indicate that everyone is racist for not liking the the Rings of Power, followed by half of the people saying no that doesn't make us racist, and the other half saying they just don't like it because it's a bad show. A similar thing is going on for the Little Mermaid, too. Alas, that these evil days should be mine.
The thing that strikes me is that no one is saying the obvious. To me, and I'll guess to many others, I really don't mind diversification of media. Or, that is to say, I wouldn't mind it, if it weren't for the fact that it's now the norm, it's practically mandatory for any show that doesn't want to be cancelled by internet SJWs, it's crammed down my throat everywhere, and it's turned into a major moral issue where half the audience browbeats the other. I feel like I'm being subjected to someone else's religion.
But that woke audience always comes back to "Why are you against black people playing roles? What are you, racist?" Well, no, I honestly don't think I'm racist. But in the position I'm put in, I get that I am taking actions that a racist would. The only difference is that a true racist would be against black people being cast no matter what, and I am only against it being mandatory and moralized. But since we live in this world, where it is mandatory and moralized, does that mean that there's nothing that would really satisfy me short of black people not being cast?
I don't quite think so. Another point that the woke audience comes to is "They clearly just thought that Halle Berry was the best person to play Ariel". And really, I think the answer to that is, no, they clearly prioritize diversity casting. She is black and they want to cast lots of black people because it scores them points with the woke crowd (and possibly also because it drums up controversy, which may be good for business). And then on top of that, they thought she'd be fine for the part. I don't know how I can prove that, but it just seems evident to me that diversity casting for its own sake is something that is being given high priority. In some limited cases, it's possible to prove it, such as with Ryan Condal, the showrunner for House of the Dragon who indicated that they cast black people to play Valerians explicitly for the purpose of diversity-washing. However, I'm guessing that Condal regrets saying that outright, because it's not a good look. It gives the other side ammo and also casts doubt as to whether the people hired really would have earned the spot on merit alone.
At this point. I don't really know what it would take to convince me that most castings of black people are not just to fill a quota. But this puts me in a tough spot, because I don't really want to be racist in action, even if I know I'm not in thought.
So what's wrong with this anyways? If Amazon wants to cast more black / POC actors and actresses that's neutral if not good. I don't get the problem.
If they feel little need to stick with the source material when it comes to character depictions then why would we expect them to stick with source material in other, perhaps more significant elements?
Its more just a signal that their priorities lie somewhere other than producing a quality product. Staying true to the source is usually easy to do, so a deliberate decision to change it indicates some other underlying logic at work.
A pretty reliable signal, at this point. Are people not allowed to wonder why certain changes were made, and how this might impact the quality?
Ok, but why does it matter to you? I'm not going to prevent you from caring or say you're not allowed to care. But I don't get why you care about race specifically. Criticize them for making a bad series, not for using some black actors.
Yeah, that's the thing. If his garrison were all mixed, it would be less of a problem (yes, some people would still complain, but you wouldn't have him sticking out as so Obviously Different).
Of course, the show can't even bother to put in the time to develop the other Elves, so when they all get slaughtered by the Orcs and the Warg, it's very hard to get worked up over "Oh no, it is Arondir's best pal, Whosis, dying in his arms!" and then "Double oh no, his commander What's his face has been Boromired!"
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If I enjoy a particular series, I tend to want it to maintain a decent level of quality, and to stay true to the elements that led me to enjoy it. If I've devoted some substantial amount of time and money to it, I would like to think said time and money was well spent.
I don't have many ways to influence the quality of a given series other than voicing opinions and spending or not spending money on it. For extremely popular series, the influence of my input is probably close to nil.
It really doesn't matter to me in any way that influences my life, but I'd really prefer if we had more good media and less mediocre media, and I think I'm allowed to set my expectations accordingly.
I do criticize bad series, there's just so many of them. And the point was that they're using minority actors as a shield to deflect criticism by pretending that racism is the driving cause of the critiques. Which is patently and obviously false! They (a billion dollar conglomerate) are essentially claiming victimhood on behalf of the actors they intentionally cast!
And thus, I'm not criticizing them for using black actors. I'm criticizing them for deflecting honest complaints with a blatantly misleading, dishonest tactic. They're the ones intentionally using the tactic, and pointing out the tactic seems justifiable.
If they would just cast characters based on what makes sense for the work in question and not center all the marketing on how diverse and progressive their casting choices are then perhaps we'd see improvements in quality and thus a reduction in complaints/critiques.
Top Gun: Maverick pulled this off. Added in female, hispanic, black characters, didn't make it a big deal, made a fun movie, and people absolutely fucking loved it.
Just a thought.
Is there anyone who doesn't think this scene in Aliens II is fabulous? Whatever your opinion about women in the military or realism or anything?
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I think Top Gun proves my argument because nobody was distracted from the "authenticity" by minority and black casting. People say they're just bothered by LoTR being a bad show but they keep talking about the black actors. Nobody cared about it with Top Gun when Top Gun did exactly what people say they don't like by taking an existing franchise and including black people.
People keep saying that criticism of LoTR has nothing to do with diversity, but then they keep criticizing diversity.
I'm biting my tongue very hard here to keep from swearing. Top Gun: Maverick is explicitly set in our current day world, where yeah, minority and BIPOC and even female women of the feminine persuasion exist and join the armed forces. You are trying to make it parallel that someone saying "Why is there a black Elf in Rings of Power?" is on the same level as someone saying "Oh my stars and garters, why is there a coloured person who is not a servant in that movie set in 2016, and what is more, they allow him to be on terms of equality with his white betters?"
Given that there have been black soldiers in the American military since the Revolutionary War, that would indeed be a thinly-veiled racist question. But imagine a movie set in a world where there had never been any black soldiers at all, and this new movie had one (1) black soldier or pilot amongst an otherwise all-white cast. I think that there could legitimately be asked "who is this guy and what is he doing here and where did he come from?" without it being racist. Is he from a country where they always had black soldiers? Is he meant to be the first black soldier? Is this a propaganda movie trying to get black people to enlist in the army?
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I mean, do you not see how the settings of these two works might cause 'diversity' to be less distracting and noticeable in one, compared to the other?
Especially when, again, the creators center marketing around it and make it out like they're doing something brave and special... and show that they're not prioritizing the source material.
If Maverick were set in, say, WWII and there were female fighter pilots added in, you think that might stick out a bit and cause some dissonance?
And even then, there are certainly ways they could do it effectively! But it helps to not intentionally stir the controversy and then play the victim.
Again, RoP's creators made the deliberate choice on casting as they did, and further deliberate choice to emphasize said casting. Why did they do it? What creative process led to this outcome, and how much of it was related to the quality of the series?
I could ask Maverick's creators why they did cast the way they did and maybe they can give answers that relate to increasing the strength of the story. Or they can say "well we literally just chose the best actors we could find because the characters' racial and gender identities doesn't effect the plot." I don't know if they would, but they have that out.
They especially have that out because they made a great movie from start to finish.
Can RoP's creators do the same? It just seems obvious that the choice is made specifically for the controversy and not to serve the story.
And indeed, it may have led to the story being less good.
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Or take the Fast and the Furious movies. It's almost certainly the most racially diverse film franchise in Hollywood, yet I've never heard a single complaint about their diverse casting. Turns out it's not the diversity per se that bothers people, it's the feeling that they're being lectured or pandered to that they don't like.
This seems like such a self-evident conclusion it should take active, extensive effort to somehow ignore it. I can't even steelman the case that audiences aren't tolerant of 'diversity' (in AMERICA, globally it may be different) because the counterexamples are just too plentiful.
If it weren't for the culture war background to all of this, I'd be baffled as to how Hollywood manages to make it into an actual issue.
I also feel like growing up in the 90's making movies and films with diverse casts was the standard. Like Captain Planet, they'd have a 'token' member of various races and only occasionally would this be remarked upon or milked for drama.
You can certainly make an argument for why tokenization is not ideal and could contribute to stereotyping, but holy cow there's just no argument that audiences raised on 90's media are somehow mad about diversity in their entertainment. NONE.
I have yet to see a decent argument for why our current setup, where diversity is treated as the entire point of the exercise and excoriating anyone who protests is actually better for anyone.
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