fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #1660 ]

[ SECRET POST #1660 ]

⌈ Secret Post #1660 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Sorry for late, epic traffic.

Secrets Left to Post: 04 pages, 90 secrets from Secret Submission Post #237.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 1 2 3 - too big ], [ 1 - this happened because people kept having 'secret wars' posting replies back and forth. The longest one I remember went for over 5 weeks ], [ 1 - repeats ]
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments and concerns should go here.

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19. http://i51.tinypic.com/a9rfpv.jpg

Write whatever and however you want to write. You're not doing anything wrong.

Taking risks in your writing is up to you to decide. I'd just like to say that having a different skin color doesn't make a person something you cannot possibly relate to, and to say that is kind of extremely stupid. If you're familiar with how people act in their everyday lives then why wouldn't you know how someone of different skin color acts?

+1 totally.

I was coming here to remark on their stupidity. Honestly, what I'm getting from this secret is that they have the idea that every single person of color is going to act in a way totally un-relateable to the author. There is a difference between writing a someone of a different ethnicity from another country, and writing someone who has grown up here.

In a fantasy setting, if this person is writing for a fantasy statement, unless racism is addressed in the world, or the characters treat different ethnicities different, I can't see why these characters would be un-relateable.

I'm thinking I'm losing my point here... but I'm just confused by this secret.

Well, you know that on F!S there always will be someone to say that if you're not a PoC, you will never be able to write a PoC right, hence you're a whinning white racist.
But this is F!S. Opener should just write what (s)he wants to write, and have good characters.

I agree but I don't think it's stupidity, nor is it fair to call it stupidity. It's ignorance due to lack of exposure, something that is relatively easily cured.

OP, a suggestion: Skin colour determines absolutely nothing about your personality. Don't try to write black characters, white characters, or hispanic characters. Just write characters, and just attempt to naturally let them be diverse instead of all the same race.

I'd say think about whether it makes sense or not. If you're writing something set in your environment or say, medieval England, it would feel odd to have racial minorities there. On the other hand, if you're writing about say, LA, it would feel lacking without any Asian characters there because there is a large Asian population. Figure out what makes sense.

If you need to write minorities you're not personally experienced with write them as third generation or so. Their families will have lived in the area long enough, it will feel natural that they won't have as many foreign customs. That and find one of the writing sites and look for a beta, then describe your circumstances to them privately and ask for feed back directly on that.

This was basically my thoughts... if you're writing in a setting where the real people are 99.9% homogeneous, it'd be weird to shoehorn in some diversity. But if you're writing about a place where the real people are heterogeneous, or would be expected to be, it'd be equally weird to have them all be the same race/ethnicity/religion/etc. In either case, unless your main character's sidekick is a black guy whose major interests are dancing good and running fast, I don't think anyone is going to get up-in-arms about you writing experiences you haven't lived.

There were black people in medieval England. The Romans, whose empire extended to parts of Africa, would send soldiers of any race to England while it was under Roman rule; there were Phoenician settlers; and although this isn't a terribly historical source there's even a token Moorish knight in the King Arthur mythos.

I understand what you're saying, and I'm sorry to pick you up on such a small detail, but English anti-immigrationists and racists like to insist my country was completely racially homogenous until the 1970s so I feel it's kind of necessary to call people out on this one whenever it's brought up, even if it's meant innocently.

(no subject)

(Anonymous) - 2011-07-21 21:33 (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

fireholly.livejournal.com - 2011-07-21 23:14 (UTC) - Expand

It seems weird that that would be quite SO alien, considering the greater diversity TV, the internet, etc?

I don't think this comment had a point other than, 'Huh, really?'

I think the point was eyestrain.

(no subject)

arostine.livejournal.com - 2011-07-21 01:39 (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

(Anonymous) - 2011-07-21 01:44 (UTC) - Expand

I think the last thing a writer wants to do is combine 2-3 TV characters to make their own. At the end of the day, no character is going to be as natural or well rounded as a real person, so you're going to be making an artificial character of an artificial character.

Not everybody watches TV though. When I was a kid my mom's house didn't have TV or the internet. When I read books I tended to assume everyone was white unless the cover art depicted them as otherwise. My exposure to people who aren't white is pretty damn recent. When I came to the big city I was pretty much slapped in the face with how completely ignorant I was of other cultures or racial stereotypes or anything. I literally thought the rest of the country had the same racial makeup as my hometown (read: 99% white) because I'd never been to a big city before.

I can kinda sympathize with the OP.

Just...write good characters. And write them honestly.

If you're just going to be shoehorning in minorities...don't do that. If you feel you have a minority character who needs to be written about, write away, but writing some "type X" character just for the sake of having them never ends well.

You've done nothing wrong. Write what you want honestly. Who knows? You may end up with a character of a different race soon enough, without having to force it.

The problem is, all these race discussions always focus on race, which won't be applicable in all cases. The huge parts of the world get left out because they have ethnic diversity instead of race diversity.

The author (say, OP) might already have minority characters in their plot. It's just that these character(s) are white. And that might make the author feel guilty, because that's what is being instilled in us all by SJ warriors on the internet. They just don't realise that white come in different flavours, too.

(no subject)

(Anonymous) - 2011-07-21 03:54 (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

xenafox.livejournal.com - 2011-07-21 04:17 (UTC) - Expand

Just as long as you don't make minority characters stereotypical bad guys who get killed off in a few seconds, do whatever you like.

But there really isn't much you need to familiarize yourself with. We're all human and that's all you really need to know to write decent characters. :p You don't need to have lived the experience of someone who looks different from you to write about them.

who let the stupid white women in today?

The weirdest thing I see about this secret, that is really confusing me, is the idea that if you think you have to create a couple side character to address the lack of minorities in your stories, then you have you're answer right there. If you are just phoning a person who has a different ethnicity from yours, I'd really suggest not doing it.

Edited 2011-07-21 02:43 (UTC)

a character is a character bro. I think usually the way people act is more influenced by their surroundings than their skin colour...

If you're writing fic about some show or book which includes minority characters, then you should include those characters -- omitting them would be a mistake. Think of them as individuals, listen to their voices on the show or read the book for their dialogue and thoughts and you won't go far wrong. And don't be shy about asking for a beta to help you capture a certain character's voice or experience.

Recognizing that increasing the diversity in your fics might be a stretch, but a good stretch, is a start. But the best way in is probably through a character you already "know" from a source you like. It's worth the effort!

Good luck, OP!

Yep, characters are characters. My suggestion is, don't shoehorn anyone just to earn brownie points, but start reading up on other cultures, religions and such as a way to expand your horizons a little bit. Don't go like "read wikipedia page on hinduism, write hindu character"; just read about something you find interesting and file the information- the time will come when a character will come to you and they'll just happen be of a different ethnicity. They'll have a different background but their emotions and motivations are still the same as the characters you're used to.

Characters are characters, people are people.
Don't force a minority because you feel like you need a token whatever-race character, but don't deny yourself the opportunity to write a minority character either. Unless you're writing a piece that includes a race-based or racist issue, race can be irrelevant in lots of genres or styles of writing. For example, in the Harry Potter books, both Angelina Johnson and Dean Thomas were black and Cho Chang was Asian, but it was never really mentioned past original descriptors because race isn't an issue in the wizarding world, and therefore never needed further qualifiers and didn't affect their characterization.

I think it depends on where the story is set. A story set in New York with only white people would be unrealistic in a statistical sense (unless there's an specific plot reason for it); but if it's set in your country hen it wouldn't.
On the other hand, if it's a fantasy world, then it's yours to do whatever you want, and in any case, you can just leave most characters' ethnicities unmentioned, and let people imagine them however they want.

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