Okay, I get that, but at the same time, I don't think it's a good reason not to try. Yes, you will screw up; but at the same time, it's *more* of a screw-up not to try at all.
Oh, that I feel awkward doesn't stop me from doing it! Primarily because I find all-white single-culture casts hideously boring. (...and to be honest, a little weird these days. Putting aside that half my friends are ESL speakers, I've lived in Japan long enough that I actually find it jarring when I go back Stateside - "Why is everyone here blond?")
And I don't think it should stop anyone else, either, though I do admit to having some sympathy for those shows which do have non-white characters and then get criticized for being overly PC or following stereotypes or whatever...the concerns are legitimate, often enough, but I want to give some credit for trying?
But, yeah. Some trends do seem to have gone backwards and I don't know why, and it's really frustrating. It's just...I don't want to quit fanning on TV just because so many show creators suck. It's not Rodney's fault (or David Hewlett's for that matter) that he's a white man; I don't like the character because he's white, I like the character because he's Rodney, who happens to be white. Ditto Tony DiNozzo, ditto a hundred others - I have precious few black characters on my favorite character list, which totally sucks and irritates me, but it's not because I'm racist; it's because the kind of characters I like are almost never cast as black actors. (Which is one reason I loved Hustle, because Mickey Bricks is totally my type of slick genius!) (For that matter I have few enough favorite female characters, and I have finally realized that no, that's not because I'm misogynist, that's because most female characters in genre fiction do not have those elements that appeal to me. Leaving it up to me to write some women that do - but while lately a lot of my ideas for original fic have centered around female chars, in TV shows I'm still more interested in the male chars who have what I like...)
And I'm losing my point again - I'm not trying to change your mind; I sympathize with your feelings. I don't know how to work this out in my own head or fannish heart, really; what do you do when a show gives you gold in one hand and shit in the other? Refuse it all on principle and hope that someday you'll get offered gold shit-free? Accept what you like and ignore the rest? Take both and spend your energy converting the hated stuff into something good? I really don't know...!
(--I also will confess a weird hope I had when Obama was elected - that if the majority of Americans - white Americans, even - can accept a black man as their representative to the world, then maybe TV and Hollywood could accept a person of color as the hero, as a character that everyone is intended to relate to even if their skin color doesn't match. We'll see, I guess...)
Re: part 2
Oh, that I feel awkward doesn't stop me from doing it! Primarily because I find all-white single-culture casts hideously boring. (...and to be honest, a little weird these days. Putting aside that half my friends are ESL speakers, I've lived in Japan long enough that I actually find it jarring when I go back Stateside - "Why is everyone here blond?")
And I don't think it should stop anyone else, either, though I do admit to having some sympathy for those shows which do have non-white characters and then get criticized for being overly PC or following stereotypes or whatever...the concerns are legitimate, often enough, but I want to give some credit for trying?
But, yeah. Some trends do seem to have gone backwards and I don't know why, and it's really frustrating. It's just...I don't want to quit fanning on TV just because so many show creators suck. It's not Rodney's fault (or David Hewlett's for that matter) that he's a white man; I don't like the character because he's white, I like the character because he's Rodney, who happens to be white. Ditto Tony DiNozzo, ditto a hundred others - I have precious few black characters on my favorite character list, which totally sucks and irritates me, but it's not because I'm racist; it's because the kind of characters I like are almost never cast as black actors. (Which is one reason I loved Hustle, because Mickey Bricks is totally my type of slick genius!) (For that matter I have few enough favorite female characters, and I have finally realized that no, that's not because I'm misogynist, that's because most female characters in genre fiction do not have those elements that appeal to me. Leaving it up to me to write some women that do - but while lately a lot of my ideas for original fic have centered around female chars, in TV shows I'm still more interested in the male chars who have what I like...)
And I'm losing my point again - I'm not trying to change your mind; I sympathize with your feelings. I don't know how to work this out in my own head or fannish heart, really; what do you do when a show gives you gold in one hand and shit in the other? Refuse it all on principle and hope that someday you'll get offered gold shit-free? Accept what you like and ignore the rest? Take both and spend your energy converting the hated stuff into something good? I really don't know...!
(--I also will confess a weird hope I had when Obama was elected - that if the majority of Americans - white Americans, even - can accept a black man as their representative to the world, then maybe TV and Hollywood could accept a person of color as the hero, as a character that everyone is intended to relate to even if their skin color doesn't match. We'll see, I guess...)