Representation

Dear Blog Diary,

Representation matters. Lived experience matters. But when done poorly…

In early X-Men reboot discussions Marvel considered making Magneto black.

This is wrong.

For starters Magneto is Jewish, a minority.

More importantly, Magneto is a man deeply convicted to protect mutants even ruthlessly BECAUSE of what he experienced in the holocaust.

He saw what humans are capable of and what mass groups will do when instructed by the state. To make him black changes who he is fundamentally. May be similar, but no tattooed number.

Upcoming HBO reboot, Severus Snape is now black.

We have to wonder even for a moment, was James Potter racist? James, Sirius, Peter, Lupin…bunch of white kids hazing the black kid?

It changes everything.

I’m not saying death-eaters can’t be black, but it’s odd to me for a black wizard to oppress the muggle-born and call them mud bloods.

The irony is that when you race swap for race swap sake, you’re changing the vision of the artist who made that art but more importantly you’re saying that lived experience and race don’t matter.

“Have him make the same decisions and act the same but just make him Asian. Not on board? You’re racist.”

Fuck you.

James Bond is a good example. Any change changes things, but there’s nothing inherent that James is white. A man, yes. British, yes. But if you make James a Japanese immigrant woman born in Somalia, she’s probably going to have conflicting ideas about risking her life defending a nation as a proper gaijin. Unfairly she’ll be slut shamed by the audience because James gotta fuck at least one lady per movie. It’s the rules.

Here’s what you do:

Make Ryan Coogler the new Chris Nolan. Throw buckets of money at him. Let him make original screen plays that articulate brilliant sentiment (aka Sinners). Then repeat with diverse directors actors etc.

Give them their own stories. Let everyone celebrate them.

Just because it’s diverse, don’t mean it’s good. Just because it’s homogeneous, don’t mean it’s bad. Parasite was flawless.

Proper representation matters.

It matters to me.

Best,

E

#ARTiculate