I may not be 100% wrong, but I noticed a pattern. Whenever a story is led by minorities and white male characters are secondary, most of the time right-wing ideological white men start complaining and attacking the story. So if someone is starting to create a story, is it better to focus on a certain audience and not create white male characters? Or is that an exaggeration?

  • IHave69XiBucks@lemmygrad.ml
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    20 hours ago

    Make art you would like and dont worry about what people want. Youll develop an audience who like the same things you do.

  • FromPieces@lemmygrad.ml
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    24 hours ago

    Hmm… I haven’t observed that pattern myself so I can’t speak from personal experience but… if you’ve got right-wing-douches complaining about your work that might be effective advertising to your target audience?

    I have a question of my own that isn’t quite related but is in the same pond of water. I’m considering writing a story from the perspective of a post-op trans-masc person. I worry about a trans story coming from my mouth though, I’m a cis het white male American.

    I have begun composing the story based on the following logic. Before I worry if I’m the right person to tell a story, I might as well write the story first and judge its merit once it exists. Plus, I could then take the story to trans people and ask them if this story feels honest/respectful.

    My question is this I guess, does my logic make sense? Are there any points you would recommend I keep in mind as I work on this story?

  • Noel_Skum@sh.itjust.works
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    16 hours ago

    Unless melanin levels play a part in the story (Huck Finn, Mockingbird etc) then there’s no reason to even think about it. Describe to me how the following character looks: they go by the name Jordan and work in a Japanese restaurant in Cape Town. Everybody will picture someone different…

  • qyron@sopuli.xyz
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    2 hours ago

    Write as you see fit your story should be. You can’t please both greeks and trojans. If you think a given character is necessary, put them in your story.

    And taking a risk of sounding ignorant and out of touch: why such concern for skin colors?

  • josefo@leminal.space
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    20 hours ago

    They are going to complain about erasure then, you can never please the right-wing crowd, don’t try to.

    I have a half baked story about friends, and the only white guy is a decoy hero that turns out to be the villain and dies a horrible death, leading the way to reveal the actual enemies of the story, cats.

    What I say is, to hell with right wingers, they will hate your story if they are not the center of attention. Most media that includes minorities, does so putting them as token characters, so they don’t rob the spotlight to the white person. Write whatever story feels good for you, aim to write the best story you can, and even if right wingers attack, you had made people happy with your work.

  • JackDark@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    My advice is to not concern yourself at all with what right-wing folks want to get upset about when it comes to your art. Their bigotry should not influence what you want to create.

  • flashgnash@lemm.ee
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    4 hours ago

    As long as you’re not disproportionately representing one ethnicity as being worse than others ignore em and write what fits the story

    Imo the only issue is when they are written poorly and/or used as comic relief, in the same way that it kinda sucks when writers use gay guys as comic relief

  • j4k3@lemmy.world
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    23 hours ago

    Always tread the high ground. You do not need to make any statements or push any sentimental or ideological perspective.

    If you are into it, read The God Emperor of Dune for a great example of exploring complexity of characters and how to tackle the subject.

    Leto II is extremely dominant and authoritarian to he point of instability and terrorism and yet at the same time he is also the most altruistic and kind person in the Dune universe. Duncan is the lover ladies man and ideologue but also foolish and impulsive. Siona is a strong women and on of the main characters and yet there is not even the slightest hint of some feminist agenda even though this was written in the 1960’s to 1970’s. Hwi is a beautiful smart woman with depth that is torn between the love of two men. Nayla is a shallow but likable soldier with remarkable loyalty. She is part of an all women’s army called The Fish Speakers. There is even a passage where this army goes out of control and rapes men. This is the only element of the book that I felt like it was clearly delineating Frank Herbert’s stance that the women in this book were in fact a ideological choice and more than just great character building. Yet still, nothing about this was forceful, it was simply amusing in breaking preconceptions of my reality. I highly recommend the read.

  • Death_Equity@lemmy.world
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    20 hours ago

    Why does the story have to have race as a point?

    Does a character have to be white or Latino or Asian, etc?

    If the race or sex of the character adds nothing to the story, why include it in the first place?

    Is the story less if the reader to knows the character is a Hispanic female?

    If race or sex isn’t relevant to the story, then it is unnecessary to include and robs the reader of imagining the character based on their own biases and divinations your writing imparts. If you can write a truely great piece of work without saying what gender or race any character is, that would be remarkable.

  • Lodespawn@aussie.zone
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    24 hours ago

    Right wing ideological white men are the original Karen’s, they can’t help but complain about everything, especially if those things have literally no bearing on their existence whatsoever.

    They’re all like “Those people over there are having fun without bothering anyone else, how dare they! I’m going to complain to their manager. And then when their manager calls me a chucklefuck and tells me to fuck off I’m going to complain to a bunch of other right wing arseholes and see if we can’t ruin their fun forever with super fun bureaucracy.”

    If you don’t include them they will be mad, if you do include them they will also be mad.

  • lordnikon@lemmy.world
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    23 hours ago

    If you think about it and want to be cynical and game the system intentionally not making white men the protagonist. Will piss off right wingers. They boycot it and create a bunch of press then everyone else rush to your defense and you sell even more copies.

  • KittenBiscuits@lemm.ee
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    11 hours ago

    You can’t please everyone, so pick the audience you want to write to. If you don’t care what angry white guys think, then create your characters however you like.