# Diversity (2 Viewers)



## Mark Twain't (Jan 19, 2022)

Maybe a sensitive subject for some but I've been going through my WiP and, looking at my characters, they're all white. I have to admit, I didn't give it a second thought. Is this something that anyone here gives any thought to? I know that the film industry gets a lot of stick about things like superheroes being almost all white but wondered about writers.

Just to clarify, some of my characters have blonde/fair hair and blue/green eyes but other than that, none are specifically described as being white.

I then ask myself, would I be able to accurately portray a black or Asian character? That said, I'm male and most of my characters are female so I'm probably overthinking it.

So who else is in the overthinking club.


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## Joker (Jan 19, 2022)

Okay...?

Is this Kansas in 1950? Modern day Brooklyn? China in 472 BC? The moon in a thousand years?

This stuff is context dependent dude.


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## Mark Twain't (Jan 19, 2022)

Joker said:


> Okay...?
> 
> Is this Kansas in 1950? Modern day Brooklyn? China in 472 BC? The moon in a thousand years?
> 
> This stuff is context dependent dude.


My story is contemporary England, mostly London so probably about as multicultural s you can get..... dude.


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## got2write (Jan 19, 2022)

It’s your story, so write what works for you and feels right. I agree that setting is probably the best driver. Might be a nice learning experiencing to write outside what you know best.I wrestled with this idea when coming up with the characters in my WIP. I ultimately looked up racial demographics in my setting (modern Minnesota) and used that data as my template - I figured this approach would at least lend to authenticity.


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## Joker (Jan 19, 2022)

Mark Twain't said:


> My story is contemporary England, mostly London so probably about as multicultural s you can get..... dude.



So then you know the answer to your question. Unless there's mitigating circumstances such as focusing on the social upper crust.


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## Joker (Jan 19, 2022)

got2write said:


> It’s your story, so write what works for you and feels right. I agree that setting is probably the best driver. Might be a nice learning experiencing to write outside what you know best.I wrestled with this idea when coming up with the characters in my WIP. I ultimately looked up racial demographics in my setting (modern Minnesota) and used that data as my template - I figured this approach would at least lend to authenticity.



Well even that isn't really enough. Small town Minnesota is a different ballgame from Minneapolis. There's differences in demographics in social class. Even hobbies have demographic divides. Not just racial but political, gender, religion, sexual orientation, blah blah blah.


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## Mark Twain't (Jan 19, 2022)

Joker said:


> So then you know the answer to your question. Unless there's mitigating circumstances such as focusing on the social upper crust.


TBH, I'm not sure I understand.


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## Joker (Jan 19, 2022)

Funny thing actually. I wrote that post waiting to pick up a DoorDash order in a Latin restaurant where I was the only gringo in sight. Demographics can shift on a time as you about your life like that.


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## Joker (Jan 19, 2022)

Mark Twain't said:


> TBH, I'm not sure I understand.



The wealthy and politically powerful in England are more likely to be Anglo-Saxon than the general population.


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## Mark Twain't (Jan 19, 2022)

Joker said:


> The wealthy and politically powerful in England are more likely to be Anglo-Saxon than the general population.


Yes, I understand that but I wasn't sure about 'you know the answer'. Are you saying that I should be including non-white characters?


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## Kent_Jacobs (Jan 19, 2022)

There's a difference in writing about a character that just happens to be black and writing a black character to tick some arbitrary 'diversity' box. Find independent films to watch and avoid Hollywood.


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## Matchu (Jan 19, 2022)

Joker said:


> The wealthy and politically powerful in England are more likely to be Anglo-Saxon than the general population.


No, they are Normans and the struggle continues to this day.  I married one.

…mainly said in jest but with vein of historical truth.


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## Joker (Jan 19, 2022)

Mark Twain't said:


> Yes, I understand that but I wasn't sure about 'you know the answer'. Are you saying that I should be including non-white characters?



Most likely, yes. London is something like 40% non-white these days. Unless there's a demographic group you're focusing on that's a lot whiter than that.


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## Joker (Jan 19, 2022)

Matchu said:


> No, they are Normans and the struggle continues to this day.  I married one.
> 
> …mainly said in jest but with vein of historical truth.



True. But that's a different rabbit hole.


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## Mark Twain't (Jan 19, 2022)

Joker said:


> Most likely, yes. London is something like 40% non-white these days. Unless there's a demographic group you're focusing on that's a lot whiter than that.


That's a fair point but I'm not sure it has that much of a baring. Mrs Twain't works in London. There are five in her office, all are white. It doesn't necessarily follow that if 5 people get together, 2 will be non-white.

We're sort of digressing though as my question was not if I should have non white characters but rather is it something other writers think about or do they just write characters as they see fit?


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## RGS (Jan 19, 2022)

Mark Twain't said:


> That's a fair point but I'm not sure it has that much of a baring. Mrs Twain't works in London. There are five in her office, all are white. It doesn't necessarily follow that if 5 people get together, 2 will be non-white.
> 
> We're sort of digressing though as my question was not if I should have non white characters but rather is it something other writers think about or do they just write characters as they see fit?


I typically leave mine undisclosed, for lack of a better term. In my latest, the main police character is named Garcia, which implies Hispanic. Aside from that, most of mine can be whatever ethnicity the reader wants to "assign" them.


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## Joker (Jan 19, 2022)

With me, everyone is too busy being mildly racist towards robots and majorly racist towards bug aliens to care very much about human skin color. Of my main characters, I imagine Corrit as vaguely light tan, Jefar is black, Chander is South Asian of some stripe and Silver is, well, yeah. 

Not very important. A good Ossian cares only about extracting sweet sweet mineral wealth from deadly rocks


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## bdcharles (Jan 19, 2022)

I do know that diversity is a desirable thing in modern fiction, be it from many readers, or commercially, from an agent or publisher, so if appealing to those groups is important, then it's definitely something to be aware of. Like you, I was at risk of defaulting to a they-are-just-like-me-state - my characters were all so terribly, terribly middle class. I do base my character appearances and characteristics on a very quick, flashed-up vision, so if I happen to have been watching a Samuel L. Jackson movie, the chances are good that the next guy is going to have something of the Samuel L about him, and racial non-diversity is not so much of a risk. Besides which, I like a messy, chaotic, non-homogenous, relatable fantasy world so diasporas and whatnot are a given - they are part of what I genuinely wanted. I wanted people to be shoved about here and there and come up against each other and just deal. But yeah, I see what you mean. I think it's probably just human nature to centre our fictional settings somewhat around ourselves in the first instance.


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## NajaNoir (Jan 19, 2022)

In my first story, I was rather ambiguous in my description of my main female character. I picture her to be a young black woman, but other people who have read it have seen her as looking more like a woman from India, and someone else pictured a tanned white girl. I do actively seek to write a diverse set of characters into my stories, it's easy with aliens and robots, but with people, I worry that I might not do it right. So I'm working on it.


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## Xander416 (Jan 19, 2022)

I don't concern myself with it. My characters more or less create themselves in my mind. If they're meant to be a given race or orientation, that's how they'll come to me. I don't work with any "checklist" in mind.


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## PrairieHostage (Jan 19, 2022)

Mark Twain't said:


> I then ask myself, would I be able to accurately portray a black or Asian character? That said, I'm male and most of my characters are female so I'm probably overthinking it.


You can never overthink your characters imho because they are the lifeblood of a story. It's a fair question. Certain agents in Canada don't even accept submissions unless it's about another ethnicity (e.g. Bukowski). The trend over the last five to ten years has definitely swung towards what we *used* to call _alternative _both in terms of sexuality and ethnicity. This has resulted in rich material and literature.

Today I listened to a podcast where an author recommended to read the highly acclaimed  YA novel Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe. I googled and read the plot, a 15 year old Mexican American coming to terms with his older brother in prison and the family who won't talk about it. My YA is about a 15 year old boy from Chilean immigrants whose father has done time. SHOOT ME NOW!
I hate when I discover pieces of my story in something already out there 

Back to your point, write what you know and love because you need to love your characters to take them to completion over many drafts. No point writing diversity unless we have a firm grasp of it. True, London is incredibly diverse, but depending on the nature of your story, ethnicity may not play much of a role. My Chilean immigrant just about got deported in the 1930s when mistaken for Mexican in California. Sometimes ethnicity peeks into our lives and sometimes it drives through line a Mack truck!


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## Joker (Jan 19, 2022)

PrairieHostage said:


> Certain agents in Canada don't even accept submissions unless it's about another ethnicity (e.g. Bukowski).



Yikes.


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## JBF (Jan 19, 2022)

Mark Twain't said:


> Maybe a sensitive subject for some but I've been going through my WiP and, looking at my characters, they're all white. I have to admit, I didn't give it a second thought. Is this something that anyone here gives any thought to? I know that the film industry gets a lot of stick about things like superheroes being almost all white but wondered about writers.
> 
> Just to clarify, some of my characters have blonde/fair hair and blue/green eyes but other than that, none are specifically described as being white.
> 
> ...



Nah.  

My chief protag starts in a place where everybody is socially, politically, racially, and materially similar to himself.  To be otherwise would be unusual given the time and place - and besides, the hero's journey has a starting prerequisite for the _familiar_.  His people, for lack of a better term, located in the sandbox from which he ventures out into the larger world.  

The further out he goes, the less familiar things are.  This still doesn't mean modern Hollywood Diversity, but it does reflect changes in the social/political/racial/material consist of life as he interprets and interacts with it.  Not only does this modify how he interacts with _this _world, it adjusts how he sees his own.  

He starts off a blue-collar white guy from small-town Texas.  He ends it the same way, settling in another small town and having gone out, done the formerly impossible, beaten death (twice, at least) set right a few wrong, been the good guy, been the bad guy, married a foreign national, won the respect of peers and contemporaries, sacrificed the lifelong dream for a higher good, gotten the t-shirt, and figured out that people are generally people wherever you go.  

Diversity is what you make of it.  Put it front and center and you lose readers.  Present it organically as part of a well-developed world and most probably won't even notice it's there.


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## Travalgar (Jan 19, 2022)

This recent "wokeful" diversity thing going on is a weird thing for me, at first. Coming from and growing up in an Asian household (not gonna tell you which part of Asia ), I watched Hollywood movies on TV and in theaters and never paid attention to the ethnicities of its actors and actresses. The same deal with Chinese period dramas, Mexican telenovelas, Indian Bollywood movies, etc. If all of the characters were brown, I raised no question. If they're multicolored, I paid no heed.

Fast forward to my teen days, I read English novels for the first time (translated to my native language at first, but as I slowly master English, I began reading more and more fictions in that language). My first was Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. Being new to the British culture at that time, I pictured all of the characters as white and Western-y. Even Parvati Patil and Padma Patil. It's not until I went to watch the movie that I learned that the twins were supposed to be of Indian ethnicity.

I never had any doubt that Cho Chang is Chinese, though. That name is *definitely *Chinese-sounding to me; probably because of my upbringing. The point is that I became more familiarized with diversity as I grow up and learn more things. Perhaps the same could be said for the global readership population. The world is getting more and more connected to each other, and nowadays it's simply not possible to ignore our neighbors anymore.

I agree that with good storytelling, superficial elements like the skin color of your characters will just recede into background noise, giving your story progression more spotlight. But guess what? Telling a good story is *hard*. And when there's nothing interesting in a story, audiences began to notice smaller, previously unknown details in the background, and then proceed into being _very critical_ about them.


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## Llyralen (Jan 20, 2022)

Mark Twain't said:


> That's a fair point but I'm not sure it has that much of a baring. Mrs Twain't works in London. There are five in her office, all are white. It doesn't necessarily follow that if 5 people get together, 2 will be non-white.
> 
> We're sort of digressing though as my question was not if I should have non white characters but rather is it something other writers think about or do they just write characters as they see fit?


Yes. I think about this daily.  I think the climate right now is scary and you should be aware that authors can get black-listed.  I WANT to be inclusive and that is almost what opens up the can of worms because then white kids NOTICE, which is really really sad, imo.  There almost can't BE a conversation.  A "darned if you do"/"darned if you don't" is happening the way I see it.  A lot of white Gen-Z and Millennials think that they understand stereotypes but they can't think or discuss intelligently about what is actually harmful and so I don't know why they think they can avoid harm themselves when they don't really understand it.   Look up what happened to Lindsay Ellis for just an obviously sarcastic remark.  Cancel culture is a very serious thing right now.  Last month I tried to discuss WHY a stereotype is hurtful and how to make sure I wasn't doing it and some Gen-Zs freaked out and thought I was trying to say the whole stereotype was okay.  Just discussing any of it seems to them like trying to argue, but it seems like they aren't trying to really understand any of it.  Anyway, , they will freak out at the first hint of the stereotypes that they have seen on their lists, whether they understand it or not. 
 I just wish I had more access to more people's minds who really do understand because they are the ones being affected and I could ask more questions--- but as far as I can tell from my best friend who is a member of one racial minority, white people are acting as crazy as ever and misunderstand all of it like usual without being able to put themselves into anyone else's shoes.  I know I've got a lot to learn, but I'm trying to learn it and that seems like something that can't happen with this current climate.  Like I said, I wish I could talk to more people--- make sure I really truly understand all the cultures I'm working to represent.

And... yes... I think a book set in London today should reflect the diversity of the real people there.


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## Kent_Jacobs (Jan 20, 2022)

Mark Twain't said:


> That's a fair point but I'm not sure it has that much of a baring. Mrs Twain't works in London. There are five in her office, all are white. It doesn't necessarily follow that if 5 people get together, 2 will be non-white.
> 
> We're sort of digressing though as my question was not if I should have non white characters but rather is it something other writers think about or do they just write characters as they see fit?


You just write characters that are appropriate for your story. Most writers draw from the people they know to create characters. If your pool of inspirations is all white or all black then the chances are your cast is going to be all white or all black (or all female ect). Nobody complains about an all black cast in a TV show, but you try only having an all white cast. It's progressive nonsense and is designed to create friction and division in society. 

Write what you want and don't worry about it. Don't get drawn into a political mindset perpetrated by organisations who make bank on pretending we're still in the past.

If you do decide to include people you don't have much experience of, then do some research just to make sure you've got elements that reflect them in a realistic way. That's all you need to worry about if you do include black people or gay people or transvestites for instance. Only a tiny minority of these groups actually get 'upset' if you get things wrong. Most of those groups would just laugh at a misconception or inaccuracy. It's just handy to try and avoid it if possible.


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## Matchu (Jan 20, 2022)

I wrote one story but found the ‘voice’ rather too close to my heart rather - and so I switched the characters and the voice to the Indian sub-continent - because there is such a large market of lit. mags in India and I read the story to myself only the other week and really quite enjoyed the story.  To my eye reading like a story written from the Indian sub-continental perspective. Nevertheless I returned my story to the drawer/hard drive.  I can hardly remember the title that took me months to write, really hope nobody ever finds the story, I suppose, when I am dead (and famous).  So box ticked.


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## PiP (Jan 20, 2022)

Diversity is fine but I would not try to force a square peg in a round hole to fit modern whims. I find the topic fascinating as we bend to the whim of a few keyboard warriors - and we as writers give them headspace. The UK recently screened a TV series about Ann Boleyn and 'they' cast a black actress to play the role. History dictates she was white. I watched for a while and found it rather bizarre and switched it off. In MHO We should not attempt to rewrite history to fit modern trends. It would be the same if they cast a white man to play Nelson Mandella I would find that offensive. AND this is what I find strange - it works both ways. Diversity whether gender, religion sexual orientation is great but it must fit the story. And incidentally, racism and stereotypes are not just about colour. I've experienced a lot of crap when I've stayed in France and to some degree in Portugal. In fact more so recently in the reverse black on white. Stereotypes can be funny and in an attempt to be overly PC we should not lose sight of _our sense of humour. So in conclusion would I write a novel or story to 'tick' all the social diversity boxes. NO, because if 'diversity' does not naturally form part of the context of the story why would I? _


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## Llyralen (Jan 20, 2022)

I have questions about the current trend of pretending racial tensions didn’t exist in a historical time period. My mind’s jury is still out. Hamilton and Brigerton are so fun and inclusive and colorful and vibrant and so liberating!  But are we neglecting the contributions and existence of thousands of people who were enslaved or oppressed by doing this?  I don’t know. Is it almost like white people re-writing history to pretend no oppression, slavery or genocides were going on?  Does it help or hurt people of minorities now? I don’t know.

These are my crazy questions for 2022.  I think we are on a knife point right now.

I know I want people to tell their own stories and I know that I want to encourage them and hope to be allowed also to join in to write people of different backgrounds and experiences. But is it really okay?  I don’t know.

The hate and distrust lines drawn in the past were evil and arbitrary and probably count for many of the worst crimes in history— but I don’t know if pretending they weren’t there is good or bad. And the thing is— they are still here!  Some people still love their old hate lines (lines of “us” and “other”). People commit crimes, terrorize and organize to keep those lines venerated—even though we are all just people. 

How I feel?
Diversity is variety, color, beauty and opportunity— or I believe this and it is what I want to stand for. Is my way of going about it helpful to giving freedom and expression to anyone?  I know if we completely erase “other” at this point we can then also be neglectful because other people see someone else as “other” and oppress them. I don’t want to be blind to that. So recognizing individual humanity but also recognizing group history can be a tricky line to try to re-draw and this is where I am at.  I don’t think we should pretend there are no lines now. I think people on every side of the lines should write about their experience, but I can try to erase current ones in myself while still seeing what’s going on outside of me.

 It’s all just so confusing. Culturally right now are there ever a lot of knee-jerks and trigger fingers set off constantly for those to whom the old arbitrary lines have really defined.


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## indianroads (Jan 20, 2022)

What's worse than NOT including POC is portraying them poorly or as a stereotype. When they first show up in my stories, I briefly describe their appearance, then write them as competent individuals.


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## Joker (Jan 20, 2022)

indianroads said:


> What's worse than NOT including POC is portraying them poorly or as a stereotype. When they first show up in my stories, I briefly describe their appearance, then write them as competent individuals.



Agreed, but there's also the matter of intent. Accidentally using a benign or neutral stereotype is a whole different ballgame than intentional using a malicious one.


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## Travalgar (Jan 20, 2022)

indianroads said:


> What's worse than NOT including POC is portraying them poorly or as a stereotype. When they first show up in my stories, I briefly describe their appearance, then write them as competent individuals.


How about including them *and* portraying them genuinely? If you intend your work to be read by others, you can't keep ignoring the growing trend. People are going to demand more of inclusion in the future. Being unable to write diverse characters won't be an excuse for any longer.


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## Joker (Jan 20, 2022)

Travalgar said:


> How about including them *and* portraying them genuinely? If you intend your work to be read by others, you can't keep ignoring the growing trend. People are going to demand more of inclusion in the future. Being unable to write diverse characters won't be an excuse for any longer.



Because there weren't any black people in Poland in 1276.


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## Travalgar (Jan 20, 2022)

Joker said:


> Because there weren't any black people in Poland in 1276.


That is definitely not what I'm talking about when I say portraying them genuinely.


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## Joker (Jan 20, 2022)

Travalgar said:


> That is definitely not what I'm talking about when I say portraying them genuinely.



Guess I misunderstood your point then.


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## Travalgar (Jan 21, 2022)

Joker said:


> Guess I misunderstood your point then.


I was trying to be concise, but I guess I inadvertently sacrificed context in doing so.

I never said you're supposed to insert POC characters in historical pieces where persons of color wouldn't have any historic reason to exist. That is *not *genuine. That is simply jumping into the woke bandwagon without any sense of direction.

But for stories set in the modern times inclusion is *almost *a must, at least if you're appealing to the taste of MIllenials and Gen-Zs in developed worlds. Like I said before, the world is getting more and more connected. We are growing up with friends and acquaintances of different ethnicities, sexual orientations, religions or creeds and political views. If you want your story to connect to the actual lives of your readers, your best bet is to embrace that our community is, in *fact*, diverse, and craft your stories to represent that. Art, after all, mimics life, and life imitates art in return. The cycle perpetuates itself.

(No offense to you if you actually grew up and live in a small town with a 100% Hispanic/Black/White/Chinese/Indian/Krogan/Klingon population, though.  There's no way I can ever speak for *all *of us.)

In *that *context, there's a very welcome space for a well-written, real, *genuine *POC character who acts just like a normal human being, their life and personalities shaped by a unique mix of cultures and traditions. You know, just like in real-life where we have real friends and acquaintances who were shaped by their very own unique mix of cultures and traditions.

Instead of shying away from it because of a self-perceived inability (or unwillingness), make an *effort *to embrace it. That is, of course, if you've made the conscious decision to include diversity in your stories beforehand. Nothing is wrong with stories set in appropriate settings without a diverse cast. I'm just saying that if you have two novels of a similar writing quality, both set in modern-day New York City, and one of them had a diverse cast while the other had 99% white characters and only one token black fellow, you had better notice which one would get the most readership, and why.

I hope I've made myself clear.


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## Ajoy (Jan 21, 2022)

Travalgar said:


> How about including them *and* portraying them genuinely? If you intend your work to be read by others, you can't keep ignoring the growing trend. People are going to demand more of inclusion in the future. Being unable to write diverse characters won't be an excuse for any longer.


I can attest to this from my recent queries. The vast majority of agents are specifically stating they want to see (and sometimes will even give preference to) stories with diverse representation and own voice stories from marginalized populations. 

In relation to the comments about people changing historical figures for the diversity points - I have not gotten the impression agents and editors want to see representation in the form of such gimmicks.


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## Fiender (Jan 22, 2022)

If you consider the possibilities for your setting and your characters' various potential demographics, and decide to write a story about a group of white men, that's fine. Some might say it won't be for everyone, but... no book is for everyone, that's a nonsense standard to reach for.

_But_ if you write your book without considering these things and end up with an all white cast/all male cast/all straight cast/etc, then I think that is a problem. It implies you did not consider the possible avenues for your characters or that you took the easy-for-you road. It's also very difficult to point at an interesting setting or place in time where every single person would have fit into the same boxes of race, orientation, culture, etc.

The world is, generally, a lot more diverse than we give it credit for. People these days are just more aware of that (whether they approve of it or not), and lots of people are expecting this diversity to be represented in their fiction. This is a trend that makes sense, to me at least. If you're worried about writing a demographic poorly, well, do your research. Every group has common stereotypes, and there _will_ be somewhere on the internet that they complain about it. 
And once you do write such a story sensitivity readers can be a huge lifeline, and the end result will be a book that has a greater chance of resonating with a wider pool of readers (imo).


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## Llyralen (Jan 22, 2022)

@Ajoy and @Travalgar  I have a question for you that I’ve been trying to dig into.

Someone in my critique group last week who is white tried to write his MC as black and I think he did it just fine. I don’t think for any of us under 45 we’re concerned. The writer is from the Millennial generation.  Our Baby Boomer Man  (who, btw, commits all sorts of sexist crimes in his works but is not really aware of it— because men who look down on women don’t listen well to women) got mad and said “POC want to write their own stories and will come unglued if they hear a white guy tried to write for them”.  And our older-than-me Gen-X or Boomer (I don’t know) woman said “You’ll need a sensitivity writer to write from this perspective.”  

I am writing a story that has 3 different POV characters and one is female black and one Asian female and likely later one male American Indian.  These are not stereotypes as far as I am aware, they all have their own strong motivation.   

I told the author I think that old feeling of not writing for someone else kind of HAS to go away if we want to write multicultural books. just like writing from a different sex’s POV has to go away if we want to include anyone.

Larry David qnd Seinfeld had to figure out how to write for an Elaine character after they were told an all-male caste wouldn’t do, and thank goodness for all Wlaine brought.  

Anyway, what would you both say about how this is all viewed?  I think I know, but I need more confirmation.


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## Ajoy (Jan 22, 2022)

Llyralen said:


> @Ajoy and @Travalgar  I have a question for you that I’ve been trying to dig into.
> 
> Someone in my critique group last week who is white tried to write his MC as black and I think he did it just fine. I don’t think for any of us under 45 we’re concerned. The writer is from the Millennial generation.  Our Baby Boomer Man  (who, btw, commits all sorts of sexist crimes in his works but is not really aware of it— because men who look down on women don’t listen well to women) got mad and said “POC want to write their own stories and will come unglued if they hear a white guy tried to write for them”.  And our older-than-me Gen-X or Boomer (I don’t know) woman said “You’ll need a sensitivity writer to write from this perspective.”
> 
> ...


It's so difficult to navigate. As far as I can tell, writing from the POV of a marginalized person when you are not from said marginalized group, especially when the story addresses issues that impact that marginalized group (which is hard to avoid if writing on the realistic side), is inadvisable. Then again, there are plenty of men who write women and even some who do it well. I think in our current climate, race, in particular, is such a touchy subject, making it really hard to navigate.

 I tend to write from POVs similar to my own for the above difficulties. Even including diversity in my non-POV cast of main characters is proving quite a challenge in my latest work. I'm trying to represent a Native woman as one of my main, but non-POV characters in my current project, and I'm finding it very challenging to strike the right balance. There are certain aspects about being Native that are just not my story to tell, but my story takes place in a near future, slightly altered version of where I live, and there is a significant Indigenous population here as our city is a hub for many Native villages. So it felt completely wrong to not have any Native characters. I'm in a local writer's group with two Native women and have been sharing my chapters with them. They've been giving me help to avoid red flag territory (things like phrasing I would think nothing of but ends up being a trigger to those affected by issues around MMIW or generational trauma), but I think I'll still need to pay a sensitivity (and language) reader when I finish.

I don't know if I answered your question. I do think there is a reason agents are asking for Own Voice stories though - the direction things are trending seems that traditional publishing is interested in representing works about historically underrepresented people from the voice of those same people. And they also want to see well-done diversity. So I guess research and sensitivity readers would be key...?


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## indianroads (Jan 22, 2022)

This may be controversial, and I may be forced to ban myself, but here goes:

In my book Inception, which takes place in the early 2040s, there is a sequence of scenes of the MC (an Irish white guy) engineer taking out a female FBI agent (a black woman) on a date. They’re already at odds – she’s under orders to dig up dirt on him and get access to his invention that will give the government complete access to everyone’s private lives, even their thoughts.

On the date, they argue about safety vs privacy. She insists that safety must take priority over the luxury of freedom/privacy. He counters by arguing that if the government watches and controls everything we do, we become their slaves.

She responds by saying that he’s white and knows nothing about the experience of slavery. He replies that she doesn’t either because it's been ~180 years since emancipation and that the Irish were slaves of the English for centuries, and for the most part, everyone’s over it now.

Their conversation dodges back into safety vs freedom after that.

It was a risky thing to write, and several times I thought of cutting it out, but finally kept it in because it showed the motivation and passion on either side of the issue. The FBI agent seeks safety even while serving under what would be her oppressors, and the MC is struggling to cut those chains. The entire book is a conversation about how much of our private lives that we give up for the sake of convenience and safety, that’s the point of the whole thing.

The book has only been out less than a month, and I’ve not gotten any negative feedback so far. I’m curious to see how it goes. Sometimes NOT talking about something keeps it alive and in place, while confronting it allows the chance of getting past it.


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## CyberWar (Jan 22, 2022)

I get that being "diverse" and "inclusive" is a big thing these days in the Western world, but sadly the efforts to include colored or non-binary characters in popular fiction are very often ham-handedly shoehorned in for no other purpose than virtue signaling, detracting greatly from work quality and making what could have been a decent story into another run-of-the-mill leftist liberal propaganda piece. Personally I think including minorities for no other reason than "being inclusive" and meeting minority quotas is also patronizing towards them, and people should really stop with this idiotic fashion of being more concerned about minority representation than most minority folks are themselves.

For this reason, I don't write much about my character ethnicity or any of their other "oppression checkbox" factors beyond a passing mention unless the storyline somehow merits it. It's the same old Chekov's Gun rule - if it is expressly mentioned, it better be relevant to the story.

Consider for example my latest WIP here on WF, "The American Refugee". The group of protagonists is what one would call "diverse" these days, including a Hispanic man, a Black schoolteacher and a woman. The only character who's ethnicity is discussed at any length is the second-gen Cuban immigrant Miguel, because it provides context for him being mistaken for Mexican during an altercation with a bigoted bar patron. The schoolteacher, Mr. Burton, is only passingly implied to be Black when he takes offense at being asked whether he sympathizes with a known Black supremacist group. At no point does character ethnicity or political beliefs become their defining element, being there for its own sake rather than to provide context for character beliefs and actions - the cardinal sin of so many poorly-written modern fiction pieces that I strive my utmost to avoid.


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## Olly Buckle (Jan 22, 2022)

indianroads said:


> the Irish were slaves of the English for centuries,


To degree, however in about 500ad  Dublin was the slave capital of the world, Norse raiders, collectively, but not  always accurately, known as vikings practically depopulated coastal areas of England. After being traded in Dublin most were exported to North Africa. Algiers was still capturing slaves from Southern Europe well into the eighteen hundreds and managed to see off American and Spanish fleets before an English one mounted the new carronade guns in the mizzen masts and was able to fire over the defenses after destroying the main guns. It seems like just about everybody has indulged in that particular evil at some time, it was still going on in Europe when I was born in '44, and someone said that with increased population there are actually more slaves now than ever before, even if the proportion of the population is lower. It is not really a black people white people thing, it can be anyone, so your Irishman was right, and the black woman talking racist rubbish.


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## Tyrannohotep (Jan 23, 2022)

I like having characters travel to faraway lands and encountering different cultures. The way I see it, if celebrated authors like Robert E. Howard and Edgar Rice Burroughs can have lots of White heroes venturing to Central Africa, the South Pacific, and so forth, I can get away with (to cite a handful of examples from my own work) a Sudanese warrior woman working as a professional assassin in feudal Japan, an enslaved Eastern European man being sent on an errand to kidnap the Queen of Great Zimbabwe for his Swahili master, or an ancient Egyptian princess playing a ball game in Mesoamerica. People have traveled far and wide as long as they've had the means to.


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## BornForBurning (Jan 23, 2022)

I almost just want to say don't worry about it. Almost. Obviously, it is a big deal, contemporaneously speaking, and publishers do care about this sort of thing. But who knows what the next turn of the cultural screw will be. If you want to pursue contemporary success, sure, have this discussion. But recognize that mass appeal can turn on a dime, and there's no guarantee that what's expedient now won't be negligible tomorrow. Generally speaking, I think it is better to just write what you find interesting (within moral boundaries, of course).


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## The Carcosan Herald (Jan 24, 2022)

As a writer, I incorporate diversity where it's warranted to do so, gauging the warrant with the themes, setting and plot. Say I'm writing a historical novel from the point-of-view of English king Henry VIII - it's very unlikely you'll find anything _but _white European characters in such a piece, so there'd be very little diversity. Writing from the PoV of Byzantine general Belisarius, though? White Europeans, Greeks, Arabs and possibly even the token black African if I want to abound.

As a reader, diversity isn't something I actively look out for, and when it does appear, it rarely makes me react with anything more than "oh". It recently came more to my attention when watching the _Eternals _movie a few months back, particularly with the infamous Phastos kiss so many people went to such lengths to either praise or vilify. But as a bisexual myself, I find the recent trend towards shoehorning diversity wherever and whenever to be _more _offensive than a lack of diversity. Imagine thinking you deserve to be put on a pedestal for portraying someone different to yourself as actually having human attributes...


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## Llyralen (Jan 27, 2022)

I think it’s really important to do homework on what marginalized people experience now.  Looking at statistics and looking at what marginalized people have to say.

This thread demonstrates that history gets re-written continually— by different groups at different times, often in a way that suits themselves and I think it’s important to not take a bit of history and call in a conclusion that is easy without finding out what’s going on now.

Black people in the USA are still affected by the history of slavery being connected to skin color here, past Jim Crow laws having to do with skin color and currently what is going on with many white people’s prejudice and views of skin color.  The experience of the Irish was different— although endentured servitude was likely very rough, it was a very different experience. I will also look into this More to make sure of what I’m saying, but I don’t think you could have your children sold away from you or be legally killed. The prejudice against Irish, though harsh, has definitely changed in the USA. You could not run the same statistics on the dollar, how many Irish descendants are in jails or have difficulty getting housing or employment. A lot of prejudice is still based on skin color in the USA and you cannot say the views held during slavery don’t affect a lot of people now. That hatred and viewpoint don’t change that easily.  I’m 45.  A friend of mine in Mississippi said there were 2 proms at his high school in 1994, a black and a white one, and he said no way would I have been able to be friends with both groups (like I said I would have tried) and still be safe. 

@Olly Buckle I have also heard that there are more slaves today.  I will have to look into that more to find out the criteria and/or the truth of the statement. I know there is a lot more human trafficking than people realize, I’ve looked into some aspects of that and there is even a large population of Native American women trafficked here, let alone kids whose data is harder to track.  Also that a huge population in North Korea are slaves— mostly making cat food for our cats, truth be known.

It was wasn’t just the Irish or just the Vikings that were into the slave trade during the whole last 1000 years and more. I have read of whole towns of Icelanders being taken by English pirates. Groups in the Middle East usually bought the slaves from Vikings.  (Yes, the finger can be pointed everywhere but what about now? ) The word slave is actually taken from “Slav” as in Slavic people (and I hate saying so because it’s so sad…and it’s irrelevant), but anyway…around 1600-1700 in Western Europe and the colonies slavery and skin color started to link up in the minds of the white majority.  I don’t think this can be denied given Jim Crow laws, and all we have to do is take a peek at what the white majority was saying about skin color at the time…and prejudice against skin color is still a big problem here in the USA. To deny the problem is to create another problem… one where crimes happen with no hope of justice.

Okay, enough from me, although I find it important to speak up when people don’t get listened to. I say we all do more research for the things we say… probably including me, but I think you guys know I try to research as best I can.


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## Olly Buckle (Jan 28, 2022)

As I had understood it the connection between skin colour and slavery was a product of the seventeenth century on. As people started to fight against the idea those making their living from it tried to justify it by denigrating those they were enslaving and transporting from West Africa to the Americas. That is an old idea, the Athenians  ran their silver mines using slaves convicted of serious crimes, working a silver mine was tantamount to a death sentence, but it was then taken up by the slave owners and applied to skin colour. American and British West Indian slavery differed in that sugar production killed slaves quite quickly, tobacco and cotton production was not so harmful. That meant that there were an increasing number of slaves in America, but a continuous need to import new ones into the West Indies, later replaced by indentured labour from India and China, which wasn't really that different. The main change there came from a few Quaker families who were big in the chocolate trade, and demonstrated that willing labour was actually more efficient than forced labour.. In America there was a growing black population and a justification for their enslavement was needed to oppose the anti-slavery lobby. Adopting the position that they were childlike and needed looking after was possible in an agricultural economy that did not kill them.
Note my first five words, I admit this is mostly based on hearsay, I have never researched any of it.


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## indianroads (Jan 28, 2022)

_*We're heading down the rabbit hole here, there is no 'my pain is worse than your pain' - pain just hurts, end of story.
So, let's back up and take a look at the original premise of this thread, shall we?*_

Consider the time and place of your story, investigate the demographics and include characters as fits your story.


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## Olly Buckle (Jan 28, 2022)

Mark Twain't said:


> Maybe a sensitive subject for some but I've been going through my WiP and, looking at my characters, they're all white. I have to admit, I didn't give it a second thought. Is this something that anyone here gives any thought to? I know that the film industry gets a lot of stick about things like superheroes being almost all white but wondered about writers.
> 
> Just to clarify, some of my characters have blonde/fair hair and blue/green eyes but other than that, none are specifically described as being white.
> 
> ...



So, to the OP, well my novel is set in an old people's home, my main characters among the residents are a gay ex-spy, a retired dominatrix with white colonial origins, and a black ex-trade union leader. They are joined by a retired cannabis dealer, white and a bit too young because he is there for a reason, only pretending to be retired. I reckon that's pretty diverse. Rumours that they are modeled on my friends and family may, or may not, be true.  
Seriously, I did enjoy writing them, and I found bits of them in people I have known.


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## indianroads (Jan 28, 2022)

Olly Buckle said:


> So, to the OP, well my novel is set in an old people's home, my main characters among the residents are a gay ex-spy, a retired dominatrix with white colonial origins, and a black ex-trade union leader. They are joined by a retired cannabis dealer, white and a bit too young because he is there for a reason, only pretending to be retired. I reckon that's pretty diverse. Rumours that they are modeled on my friends and family may, or may not, be true.
> Seriously, I did enjoy writing them, and I found bits of them in people I have known.


Life is full of bizarre folks, ain't it?


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## Llyralen (Jan 29, 2022)

Ajoy said:


> It's so difficult to navigate. As far as I can tell, writing from the POV of a marginalized person when you are not from said marginalized group, especially when the story addresses issues that impact that marginalized group (which is hard to avoid if writing on the realistic side), is inadvisable. Then again, there are plenty of men who write women and even some who do it well. I think in our current climate, race, in particular, is such a touchy subject, making it really hard to navigate.
> 
> I tend to write from POVs similar to my own for the above difficulties. Even including diversity in my non-POV cast of main characters is proving quite a challenge in my latest work. I'm trying to represent a Native woman as one of my main, but non-POV characters in my current project, and I'm finding it very challenging to strike the right balance. There are certain aspects about being Native that are just not my story to tell, but my story takes place in a near future, slightly altered version of where I live, and there is a significant Indigenous population here as our city is a hub for many Native villages. So it felt completely wrong to not have any Native characters. I'm in a local writer's group with two Native women and have been sharing my chapters with them. They've been giving me help to avoid red flag territory (things like phrasing I would think nothing of but ends up being a trigger to those affected by issues around MMIW or generational trauma), but I think I'll still need to pay a sensitivity (and language) reader when I finish.
> 
> I don't know if I answered your question. I do think there is a reason agents are asking for Own Voice stories though - the direction things are trending seems that traditional publishing is interested in representing works about historically underrepresented people from the voice of those same people. And they also want to see well-done diversity. So I guess research and sensitivity readers would be key...?


This has been one of the most helpful posts for me, just knowing there are others in the same boat. Thank you SO much for outlining the experience of those of us trying to celebrate diversity and get it right.

I signed myself up for a diversity in writing seminar.  I was very happy to find one available to me and I hope that there will be more and also that the info I get from it helps.  I’m hoping for the liberty to write more diversity and I agree with you that checking in with the people belonging to those experiences and histories is key.


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## bazz cargo (Jan 29, 2022)

Right. Lesson in thinking sideways.
Written a good portion of a story? Thinking, 'what can I do to mix this up a little?'
Try changing the gender of a key character. You could make a couple of characters disabled. Add a bit of culture clash, through colour and religion or philosophy... Perhaps someone is gay. 
This is not to make it real, it is to add' conflict and drama.' 
For an example: Sleepy coastal village (predominately white middle class) has young, tall, dark, possible witch move into the slightly run down cottage near the edge of town. Cue all sorts of prejudice and misunderstandings. Not so  much a book as a series of books.
Wait until they find the Vicar has been growing marijuana in his greenhouse behind the vicarage.  
Writing is fun, playing with the readers expectations is funner.


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## Matchu (Jan 29, 2022)

The writers switching a load of heads on sticks aren’t going to be writers anybody will be reading soon.  I am grateful for that.


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## bazz cargo (Jan 29, 2022)

Matchu said:


> The writers switching a load of heads on sticks aren’t going to be writers anybody will be reading soon.  I am grateful for that.


Sounds like sci fi to me.


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## Matchu (Jan 29, 2022)

I was just growling as my intro post to the forum.  Think of me shaking my head like a shampoo commercial in the slow-mo.

You wrote a nice post. xx

 'Diversity' threads trigger me.  I used to be the principle diversity 'guy'in the old job and still am really very-very diversity.  @Diversityme or princessdiversity@bogan on other websites.


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## Xander416 (Jan 29, 2022)

Ajoy said:


> It's so difficult to navigate. As far as I can tell, writing from the POV of a marginalized person when you are not from said marginalized group, especially when the story addresses issues that impact that marginalized group (which is hard to avoid if writing on the realistic side), is inadvisable. Then again, there are plenty of men who write women and even some who do it well. I think in our current climate, race, in particular, is such a touchy subject, making it really hard to navigate.


"Realism" sometimes doesn't favor treating race issues in the way the wider public expects, though. If I included truly accurate squad chatter between races to any of my military-based works, the average person would be horrified at the amount, frequency, and manner that slurs are used. Something that gets you cancelled and labeled a public enemy on social media is just casual conversation among a squad of US Marines, especially if they've seen combat together. Don't believe me? Watch the HBO miniseries Generation Kill.


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## Ajoy (Jan 29, 2022)

Xander416 said:


> "Realism" sometimes doesn't favor treating race issues in the way the wider public expects, though. If I included truly accurate squad chatter between races to any of my military-based works, the average person would be horrified at the amount, frequency, and manner that slurs are used. Something that gets you cancelled and labeled a public enemy on social media is just casual conversation among a squad of US Marines, especially if they've seen combat together. Don't believe me? Watch the HBO miniseries Generation Kill.


I was simply referring to the fact that if a story is meant to represent reality and intends to incorporate a race-based theme such as MMIW or BLM from the perspective of a marginalized character affected by those issues, traditional publishing seems to want Own Voice works. And I was saying that it's tricky to write a true-to-life story from the POV of a marginalized person while avoiding themes around the issues that surround their marginalization. 

What I was_ not _referring to was how writers edit real dialogue to make it sound natural without writing how people actually speak. That's a completely different topic. 

It all depends on each writer's personal comfort with diversity issues in writing. I'm personally not willing to write a true-to-life story from the perspective of a person whose marginalization I have not experienced. There are way too many subtleties and things I just can't know from my own perspective, even with research.  I'd rather leave that space for the right person to tell those stories from those POVs--and they'll do it better than I ever could. There are plenty of other stories left to tell and plenty of genres that allow for interesting POVs without outright appropriation.


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## Olly Buckle (Jan 30, 2022)

Ajoy said:


> What I was_ not _referring to was how writers edit real dialogue to make it sound natural without writing how people actually speak. That's a completely different topic.



Is it really that different. Isn't all fiction, from historical novels to futuristic sci fi , an attempt to translate real or imagined events into an acceptable and readable form? Not having been one would no more bar me from writing a black, working woman than a white, master of foxhounds. Consider who you are writing for, a 'true' depiction could be completely unacceptable, probably would be in either case for most readers, something that 'stretches' their understanding a little could well be entertaining on the other hand. 
The very word 'fiction' implies falsehoods.


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## Ajoy (Jan 30, 2022)

Olly Buckle said:


> Is it really that different. Isn't all fiction, from historical novels to futuristic sci fi , an attempt to translate real or imagined events into an acceptable and readable form? Not having been one would no more bar me from writing a black, working woman than a white, master of foxhounds. Consider who you are writing for, a 'true' depiction could be completely unacceptable, probably would be in either case for most readers, something that 'stretches' their understanding a little could well be entertaining on the other hand.
> The very word 'fiction' implies falsehoods.


Yes, fictional characters are made up, truth stretched for entertainment purposes. But again, that is not what I'm talking about. 

I am completely willing to take a stab at writing fiction where I depict the POV of someone who does not come from a real and living group of marginalized people. I'd also be okay trying out a POV character who does come from a group in which I personally have experience or understanding. As a white woman, I'm not risking harm when I depict the POV of a three-armed lizard goddess of the planet Bumble, but if I try to depict a realistic, real-world setting from the POV of a Native woman facing the issues Native women face, and I get it wrong (which is highly likely, even with copious research), I've caused real emotional harm to a group of potential readers. (Also, even if I get it right, I've taken the space of a Native woman who could have told her own story when there are plenty of other stories and POVs out there for me to tell. I do think including diverse characters is important and should be done with a lot of research, care, and effort. I just don't think there's any reason to be using certain POVs (that are beyond our own experiences) in contemporary realistic works.


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## Tyrannohotep (Jan 31, 2022)

Ajoy said:


> I am completely willing to take a stab at writing fiction where I depict the POV of someone who does not come from a real and living group of marginalized people. I'd also be okay trying out a POV character who does come from a group in which I personally have experience or understanding. As a white woman, I'm not risking harm when I depict the POV of a three-armed lizard goddess of the planet Bumble, but if I try to depict a realistic, real-world setting from the POV of a Native woman facing the issues Native women face, and I get it wrong (which is highly likely, even with copious research), I've caused real emotional harm to a group of potential readers. (Also, even if I get it right, I've taken the space of a Native woman who could have told her own story when there are plenty of other stories and POVs out there for me to tell. I do think including diverse characters is important and should be done with a lot of research, care, and effort. I just don't think there's any reason to be using certain POVs (that are beyond our own experiences) in contemporary realistic works.


I agree with you that POVs of people from real, living cultures can be harder to write than POVs from groups that are either wholly fictional or lived sometime in the distant past. If I were to write the story of a neolithic Ghanaian and get some details wrong, I probably wouldn't be roasted for it as harshly as I would if I were to write the story of a modern-day Ghanaian (I'm an Anglo-American dude from an upper-middle-class background). Nobody knows with 100% certainty what life was like for people living in Ghana in their neolithic period, but there are plenty of modern-day Ghanaians around who could object to a misrepresentation of their current generation.

That said, I think there are stories where you have more leeway in who you pick for your protagonist. If you're writing, say, military sci-fi about defending Earth from an alien invasion, it shouldn't matter whether or not your character is from Ghana and you aren't. It wouldn't be like writing about the life experiences and struggles of being someone in modern-day Ghana, if you know what I mean.


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## Matchu (Jan 31, 2022)

‘Native, Native Natives!’ stamped across my eyes.


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## indianroads (Jan 31, 2022)

Tyrannohotep said:


> I agree with you that POVs of people from real, living cultures can be harder to write than POVs from groups that are either wholly fictional or lived sometime in the distant past. If I were to write the story of a neolithic Ghanaian and get some details wrong, I probably wouldn't be roasted for it as harshly as I would if I were to write the story of a modern-day Ghanaian (I'm an Anglo-American dude from an upper-middle-class background). Nobody knows with 100% certainty what life was like for people living in Ghana in their neolithic period, but there are plenty of modern-day Ghanaians around who could object to a misrepresentation of their current generation.
> 
> That said, I think there are stories where you have more leeway in who you pick for your protagonist. If you're writing, say, military sci-fi about defending Earth from an alien invasion, it shouldn't matter whether or not your character is from Ghana and you aren't. It wouldn't be like writing about the life experiences and struggles of being someone in modern-day Ghana, if you know what I mean.


Interesting.
A story in my queue (not written yet, but eventually will be) is set in Neolithic times in the area around Gobekli Tepe, with a MC that wanders most of they year collecting amber from northern Europe to trade. A girl gets involved, and zany adventures ensue. 

I think it's important that we push ourselves and write things that stretch our abilities - basically, don't be like Edgar Rice Burroughs who pretty much wrote the same story over and over and over - ad nauseum.


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## Ajoy (Jan 31, 2022)

Tyrannohotep said:


> That said, I think there are stories where you have more leeway in who you pick for your protagonist. If you're writing, say, military sci-fi about defending Earth from an alien invasion, it shouldn't matter whether or not your character is from Ghana and you aren't. It wouldn't be like writing about the life experiences and struggles of being someone in modern-day Ghana, if you know what I mean.


This. This is part of what I was trying to get across. It's about what is being explored from the POV character's perspective.


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## Xander416 (Jan 31, 2022)

Ajoy said:


> Also, even if I get it right, I've taken the space of a Native woman who could have told her own story


Considering one can self-publish or simply start a website and blog, I find the notion that you'd take any "space" away from anyone to be downright absurd. There's more than enough room in the world for both you and this hypothetical native woman to each tell your own tales.

Simply put, if you feel confident enough in doing it, go for it. If not, find another subject.

Edit: And FYI, I have Cherokee ancestry, if that does anything to "validate" my opinion on this subject.


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## Ajoy (Jan 31, 2022)

Xander416 said:


> Considering one can self-publish or simply start a website and blog, I find the notion that you'd take any "space" away from anyone to be downright absurd. There's more than enough room in the world for both you and this hypothetical native woman to each tell your own tales.
> 
> Simply put, if you feel confident enough in doing it, go for it. If not, find another subject.
> 
> Edit: And FYI, I have Cherokee ancestry, if that does anything to "validate" my opinion on this subject.


I simply answered a question that was asked and I gave both what trends I'm seeing with current traditional publishing as I attempt to navigate that world as well as what I personally am comfortable with as a writer. There is only so much space in traditional publishing (which is what I have been talking about in every post), and I am in a writer's group with completely non-hypothetical Native women--good writers--working to break into that world. I've listened to these in no way hypothetical women cite real examples of the hurt they felt after reading works written by non-Natives, works that depicted harmful stereotypes of Native women. And I've also listened to their joy at finding works by Native authors who represented themes and ideas that they were able to connect with on very deep levels.

I understand it's hard for all writers to break into the traditional publishing world, but I'm glad more and more agents and publishers are asking for Own Voice works. I'm glad the industry is consciously trying to be more inclusive when considering the few works they'll actually take on to publish.

For those who want to take on the POV of someone from an identity group they don't have personal experience with and explore the issues of what it is like to live in that POV, go for it. I get that research and sensitivity readers can be very helpful in such a situation. All I ever said was that is not something I feel comfortable doing. I'm feeling stretched enough trying to represent my diverse non-POV characters authentically and respectfully. I can't imagine trying to add in the most inner thoughts that a character might have about real issues they face as a member of whatever group they represent. But there are plenty of writers far more talented than me who might feel comfortable taking on such a challenge.


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## VRanger (Feb 1, 2022)

indianroads said:


> Interesting.
> A story in my queue (not written yet, but eventually will be) is set in Neolithic times in the area around Gobekli Tepe, with a MC that wanders most of the year collecting amber from northern Europe to trade. A girl gets involved, and zany adventures ensue.
> 
> I think it's important that we push ourselves and write things that stretch our abilities - basically, don't be like Edgar Rice Burroughs who pretty much wrote the same story over and over and over - ad nauseum.


Hey, sometimes Tarzan had to figure out which was the "good people" among rival cities of the Ant Men, another time a lost medieval civilization, another time a lost Roman civilization, two tribes of anthropoid apes ... obviously _all _different! ;-)

On the serious side, I regard Baum and ERB as the creative minds who installed world-building into literature. They had different styles, but both were brilliant at it. Also, ERB more or less invented the auto-pilot decades before it became a mechanical reality, and his combat scenes were always fresh. So he relied on unlikely coincidence to resolve 80% of his plot crises. Cut him a break. ;-)

If you try to read his series straight through, the formula gets old fast. If you were reading Tarzan or Mars two to three years apart as published, probably not so much.

A last note on ERB. After a series of failed business ventures and desperate for an income, he noticed the trashy pulps of the day and thought to himself, "I can write better trash than _this_!" He was correct. He only ever aspired to write what would sell and make an income, at which he succeeded fabulously. A few decades after he started, he lamented that movies did not depict _his _Tarzan, but that's another story.


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## indianroads (Feb 1, 2022)

VRanger said:


> Hey, sometimes Tarzan had to figure out which was the "good people" among rival cities of the Ant Men, another time a lost medieval civilization, another time a lost Roman civilization, two tribes of anthropoid apes ... obviously _all _different! ;-)
> 
> On the serious side, I regard Baum and ERB as the creative minds who installed world-building into literature. They had different styles, but both were brilliant at it. Also, ERB more or less invented the auto-pilot decades before it became a mechanical reality, and his combat scenes were always fresh. So he relied on unlikely coincidence to resolve 80% of his plot crises. Cut him a break. ;-)
> 
> ...


I read the Mars series straight through - after the first few, it was a test of my will to see if I could do it.


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## VRanger (Feb 1, 2022)

indianroads said:


> I read the Mars series straight through - after the first few, it was a test of my will to see if I could do it.


I've never managed to get through more than the fifth of the Mars series. But stretching Tarzan out with months between, I'm finally down to the last two or three of them. It's been a lifelong goal to read them all. That included reading the Pelucidar series, since Tarzan wound up down there.


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## Tyrannohotep (Feb 1, 2022)

VRanger said:


> Hey, sometimes Tarzan had to figure out which was the "good people" among rival cities of the Ant Men, another time a lost medieval civilization, another time a lost Roman civilization, two tribes of anthropoid apes ... obviously _all _different! ;-)
> 
> On the serious side, I regard Baum and ERB as the creative minds who installed world-building into literature. They had different styles, but both were brilliant at it. Also, ERB more or less invented the auto-pilot decades before it became a mechanical reality, and his combat scenes were always fresh. So he relied on unlikely coincidence to resolve 80% of his plot crises. Cut him a break. ;-)
> 
> ...


I do consider ERB to be one of my creative influences, even though I wouldn't call him a great writer. His prose tends to be overwrought and at times rambling, and of course, there are the blatant of-his-time prejudices affecting his portrayal of various groups. Nonetheless, I admire his imaginative world-building, even if it didn't necessarily involve a lot of research on what his real-world settings were actually like.


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## lithiumflower (Feb 9, 2022)

Mark Twain't said:


> Maybe a sensitive subject for some but I've been going through my WiP and, looking at my characters, they're all white. I have to admit, I didn't give it a second thought. Is this something that anyone here gives any thought to? I know that the film industry gets a lot of stick about things like superheroes being almost all white but wondered about writers.
> 
> Just to clarify, some of my characters have blonde/fair hair and blue/green eyes but other than that, none are specifically described as being white.
> 
> ...



Don't overthink this, I'm black...well black/biracial (mom is black, dad was white/American Indian and French) and only with this new story I've written are a majority of the characters black, but that's just because of the subject of the story. In almost all of the screenplay stories I wrote, my characters were mainly white. It's just because I feel more comfortable writing white characters than black because I have more experience with the "white experience and culture" than I do with the "black experience and culture." So, it's easier for me to write white characters - how they talk, act and etc, than I can for black characters - unless I sit down and start watching shows so I can research black people for the black characters that I plan to write about. 

So, if you have characters that are all white, it's not a bad thing. Write with what you're more comfortable with. Besides, readers - serious readers anyway, won't really care what race the character(s) are, because the story will be so good that they'll be more enthralled in that, than in with race.


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## indianroads (Feb 9, 2022)

I think it's also a matter of context - time and place. If you're writing a story set in Siberia during the 1930's pretty much everyone in that locale was white back then, forcing a POC into that story just wouldn't fit, on the other hand, writing a story set in the Congo during that same time and populating it with all white people would be wrong.


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## Tyrannohotep (Mar 4, 2022)

The novel I'm working on right now is set in prehistoric Africa around 100,000 years ago. So far, my biggest anxiety is not how I represent Black people in general (everyone in this setting is what we would consider Black today), but one supporting character I've just written in the current chapter who is what we would call a transgender man (or, in their words, a "man born into a woman's body"). Right now, he's acting all gung-ho about being a man and disapproving of women doing what he considers manly activities, which is rooted in what I figured would be a logical insecurity for a trans man (since he would be compensating for his being female at birth). However, the very fact that it's such an intuitive source of insecurity makes me wonder if the overcompensating transgender man is considered a harmful trope. Any transgender people out there have opinions on the topic?

(Without spoiling the whole story for you, I intend for him to have a little character arc where he unlearns his sexist attitudes towards women. So he is not supposed to be an unsympathetic portrayal of transgender people.)


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## S J Ward (Mar 4, 2022)

Personally, I like a book where you can place your own 'realised' identity onto each character. These characters don't need to be explained by the author as black, nor white, they're just characters. I like to imagine them myself without too much explanation. 
Height, weight, sex... okay.
Colour of eyes or hair or skin... me to decide.


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## S J Ward (Mar 4, 2022)

Clicked a button twice, sorry. 
Grrrrrrr mobile phones!


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## Ajoy (Mar 4, 2022)

Tyrannohotep said:


> The novel I'm working on right now is set in prehistoric Africa around 100,000 years ago. So far, my biggest anxiety is not how I represent Black people in general (everyone in this setting is what we would consider Black today), but one supporting character I've just written in the current chapter who is what we would call a transgender man (or, in their words, a "man born into a woman's body"). Right now, he's acting all gung-ho about being a man and disapproving of women doing what he considers manly activities, which is rooted in what I figured would be a logical insecurity for a trans man (since he would be compensating for his being female at birth). However, the very fact that it's such an intuitive source of insecurity makes me wonder if the overcompensating transgender man is considered a harmful trope. Any transgender people out there have opinions on the topic?
> 
> (Without spoiling the whole story for you, I intend for him to have a little character arc where he unlearns his sexist attitudes towards women. So he is not supposed to be an unsympathetic portrayal of transgender people.)


You could always seek out a trans beta reader when you have the novel ready. I have friends who are trans men, trans women, and trans non-binary, and none of them seem to outwardly struggle with issues surrounding traditional gender roles, but they're all at least in their mid-thirties and have been out a good while. I imagine some trans people do struggle with the insecurity you've described. I did read a book called "Dreadnought" by April Daniels, who is a trans woman. The main character in that book is a trans woman who does struggle a lot with insecurities about her identity, so I think what you have planned sounds like it would fall somewhere on that spectrum of human experiences and insecurities. But again, (I think) you're right to seek out a trans person for their opinions.


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## Tawdry Wordsmith (Apr 9, 2022)

Mark Twain't said:


> Maybe a sensitive subject for some but I've been going through my WiP and, looking at my characters, they're all white. I have to admit, I didn't give it a second thought. Is this something that anyone here gives any thought to? I know that the film industry gets a lot of stick about things like superheroes being almost all white but wondered about writers.
> 
> Just to clarify, some of my characters have blonde/fair hair and blue/green eyes but other than that, none are specifically described as being white.
> 
> ...


You can change some of the character appearances to other races, but the danger lies in changing their _character _as well. Don't do that. Change their skin color, hair color, eye color, etc., but leave their personality alone. Any attempt to make the black character seem "black" or the Asian character seem "Asian" will inevitably result in writing a stereotype.

I'm not fond of the notion that one _"accurately" _writes a black person. There is no such thing as a "white person" or a "black person" or an "Asian person." Instead there's a person who may happen to be white, or may happen to be black. Tokenism is the death of individuality, and ironically it gives way to the very racism the author was (supposedly) trying to avoid. When a black character exists in a book, that character isn't mean to embody or "represent" all black people. Just like some random white guy doesn't represent me. _I _represent me. Your characters represent no one but themselves, unless stated otherwise.

There are also, not to mention, more similarities _between _groups than within them, and this is something that is common knowledge in psychology. What does that mean, exactly?

Let's say you took two randomly selected white people.

Alright, now let's say you took two randomly selected chess players of different races.

The two chess players with different ethnicities will have more in common with each other than two randomly selected people within a racial group.

In other words, if you like kickboxing, you'll have more in common with a black or Asian person who also likes kickboxing than another white person who doesn't.

It nauseates me that intersectional racial politics have been so successful at confusing everyone about race and gender when everyone with half a brain eventually realizes, "Oh, yeah, people aren't defined by their skin color." Don't let the muddied waters confuse you my friend, if you want to change some of the character races, just do it. Don't rewrite their personalities to fit whatever stereotype of them you think would best "represent" their race or whatever.


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## Splinter (May 10, 2022)

This question is a true reflection of today's social pressures - the so-called need to be 'inclusive'. But as others have said, and I'm in danger of repeating myself here, it's ALL contextual.
Picture the scene if you will. You've finished your masterpiece, you hand it to a proof-reader or similar before publication and they tell you it's not inclusive enough.
For whom? Do you rewrite it just to include those who might be offended by being excluded?
Dear me, what a tangled world we live in.


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## VRanger (May 10, 2022)

Splinter said:


> You've finished your masterpiece, you hand it to a proof-reader or similar before publication and they tell you it's not inclusive enough.


Heinlein said, "Never rewrite, except to editorial direction." By that, he meant the person who's about to pay for the material. 

Does that make us literary whores?

Maybe. ;-) But Heinlein fought certain battles with his editor through the 50s, and he even won some of them. By the 60s, he didn't have to fight for content, only for length, and that not for long.


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## indianroads (May 10, 2022)

VRanger said:


> Heinlein said, "Never rewrite, except to editorial direction." By that, he meant the person who's about to pay for the material.
> 
> Does that make us literary whores?
> 
> Maybe. ;-) But Heinlein fought certain battles with his editor through the 50s, and he even won some of them. By the 60s, he didn't have to fight for content, only for length, and that not for long.


A benefit of self publishing is that we don't have to deal with that nonsense, but a well told story reflects the time and place where it occurs and naturally includes characters appropriate to that environment.

As an author, I resent content/diversity Nazis, and feel that their acts are a form of censorship. I'll wager a good deal of money that no one here is a racist, and the stories we write are based on our life experience - even the fantasy ones, because the singular character that is present in all our novels is ourselves.


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## Llyralen (May 10, 2022)

Diversity is an opportunity, guys….
it’s a way to reach more people, understand different and more and deeper of the human experience and challenge your beliefs. Diversity is beauty, spice, vivacity!  It is inclusion.  Who wants to be the exclusionary asshole?

I can’t think of one negative about diversity unless unfeelingly or insincerely or unrealistically approached— and so an opportunity and a challenge both.  Are we dominant culture folks up for it?  Can we get out of our bunkers and embrace all of human history?  

And I say this while I am shaking in my boots because young white ones think they understand more than they do and are super quick to “cancel”.  They need to do more research and listen— but that is also a good reason for those of us who are brave and earnest to try to listen and experience and write deeper.


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## Llyralen (May 10, 2022)

indianroads said:


> A benefit of self publishing is that we don't have to deal with that nonsense, but a well told story reflects the time and place where it occurs and naturally includes characters appropriate to that environment.
> 
> As an author, I resent content/diversity Nazis, and feel that their acts are a form of censorship. I'll wager a good deal of money that no one here is a racist, and the stories we write are based on our life experience - even the fantasy ones, because the singular character that is present in all our novels is ourselves.


The idea that people were ever not mixing has been challenged by DNA studies. My husband showed me a study about Viking DNA and it showed people from everywhere, he said “How do you feel about this?  Doesn’t everyone think they were all Scandinavians?” I said “Their own stories spoke about people being from all-over.  They traveled everywhere.  There is both African and Continental, non-Inuit, Native American blood in Icelanders that has been there for hundreds of years. In Sweden in the 1000’s buried females were from other countries, female infanticide was the norm there at the time. Their DNA reflects exactly what their stories say.  But what about us majority white folk in the USA?  Do we write about everyone living in the USA?  That my friend is Latina from Texas, both Native American and Spanish speaking and her family was never outside of what is now the USA?

Also, wasn’t the beginning of this thread about writing in London where it would be unusual if you took a handful of people off the street that they would be all-white?  

I am against re-writing true history, but a lot of the history we heard growing up was incorrect and white-washed.  

I used to live in Copenhagen and there were 3 people from other countries (mostly Africa and Middle East) to every Dane. If I didn’t write about them to describe NOW then I would be in danger of creating a fantasy… just like has often been taught to majority skinned folks and the Victor.

Let’s do more homework and ask more questions before we think we know all the truth, is my thought… and we can do better, ya know?  For everyone.


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## Splinter (May 10, 2022)

It's one thing to embrace diversity, but it's quite another to have it rammed down our throats at every turn.
I imagine that what is being referred to here is racial diversity as per the OP's thread title and second, gender diversity, neither of which do, have or ever will feature in any of my writing. Not because I'm racist or gender averse (or whatever appropriate phrase applies), but because it doesn't feature highly on my list of priorities.
Regarding diversity as an opportunity is all well and good, providing you have the knowledge, skill and awareness to include it in your work.
On the other hand, one might include token people of colour and token genders in a written piece, but that can often be seen as pretentious and forced.
I've yet to see a criticism of a novel along the lines of 'But you didn't include any African Americans and/or trans women in the book...'


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## Taylor (May 10, 2022)

I guess I'm kinda lucky in that I grew up in what is arguably one of the most diverse cities in North America.  Throughout my career I did business in fashion and finance in many other major centres in the world, so I engaged with a great variety of people.  Even in Canada, it was not uncommon for me to be in a meeting with 10-20 people with at least five or six different accents in the room.  And frequently, if we did a round table, I would be the only person who was born in Canada.  So that's just how I see the world.

I use my life-experience to craft my stories and they are based in reality.   When I write, I picture people I know or have met...so my characters are a medley of various ethnicities, orientations and backgrounds.  For example, my best friend at work was from Haiti and grew up in French Canada. Sooo...when my protagonist needed a buddy at work, she gets a Haitian-American with a slight French accent.  Simple as that!

I do mention skin, hair and eye colour as well as clothing style and romantic interests.  From there, I weave a multifarious tapestry with my cast.  But, like I say...that's just how I see the world.  I hope my readers like it....stay tuned....


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## VRanger (May 10, 2022)

indianroads said:


> A benefit of self publishing is that we don't have to deal with that nonsense, but a well told story reflects the time and place where it occurs and naturally includes characters appropriate to that environment.


Yes, self-publishing evokes a modified paradigm. There is no editorial censorship or interference, but at a price. There are more writers than good editors in the world, and more writers than not need a good editor. Sometimes that arm's length perspective is needed.


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## indianroads (May 10, 2022)

Taylor said:


> I guess I'm kinda lucky in that I grew up in what is arguably one of the most diverse cities in North America.  Throughout my career I did business in fashion and finance in many other major centres in the world, so I engaged with a great variety of people.  Even in Canada, it was not uncommon for me to be in a meeting with 10-20 people with at least five or six different accents in the room.  And frequently, if we did a round table, I would be the only person who was born in Canada.  So that's just how I see the world.
> 
> I use my life-experience to craft my stories and they are based in reality.   When I write, I picture people I know or have met...so my characters are a medley of various ethnicities, orientations and backgrounds.  For example, my best friend at work was from Haiti and grew up in French Canada. Sooo...when my protagonist needed a buddy at work, she gets a Haitian-American with a slight French accent.  Simple as that!
> 
> I do mention skin, hair and eye colour as well as clothing style and romantic interests.  From there, I weave a multifarious tapestry with my cast.  But, like I say...that's just how I see the world.  I hope my readers like it....stay tuned....


I'll see your 'most diverse city' and raise you a Silicon Valley. There were years of my life when I didn't work with or have friends that were white. 

Like you, I draw my characters from the people I've known, and they come in all cultures and colors. Yet, I'm triggered by those that insist I have specific percentages of my characters be one way or another... I left another forum (that will go unnamed) due to their lack of tolerance in this matter.


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## Taylor (May 10, 2022)

indianroads said:


> I'll see your 'most diverse city' and raise you a Silicon Valley.


Well I did say "one" of the most diverse cities in North America.  Silicone Valley is sub-region of San Francisco, where I spent a LOT of time as I worked for a company that had a head office there.  I also conducted major audits in SFO, including one of the largest Hi-tech companies...on a campus in Silicone Valley no less. 

Hmmm...whether it's a "see" or a "raise" is debatable...but I get your point!


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## Splinter (May 10, 2022)

indianroads said:


> I'll see your 'most diverse city' and raise you a Silicon Valley. There were years of my life when I didn't work with or have friends that were white.
> 
> Like you, I draw my characters from the people I've known, and they come in all cultures and colors. Yet, I'm triggered by those that insist I have specific percentages of my characters be one way or another... I left another forum (that will go unnamed) due to their lack of tolerance in this matter.


Yes, it's so much easier to paint a picture of someone you have known or actually know and then weave them into a character, which is what I did in my recent novel.
Some were even combinations of several people rolled into one, the point being that they acted as anchors because I could see them in my mind's eye.


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## indianroads (May 10, 2022)

Taylor said:


> Well I did say "one" of the most diverse cities in North America.  Silicone Valley is sub-region of San Francisco, where I spent a LOT of time as I worked for a company that had a head office there.  I also conducted major audits in SFO, including one of the largest Hi-tech companies...on a campus in Silicone Valley no less.
> 
> Hmmm...whether it's a "see" or a "raise" is debatable...but I get your point!


I've never been a gambler, so the vernacular is foreign to me.


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## Taylor (May 10, 2022)

indianroads said:


> I've never been a gambler, so the vernacular is foreign to me.


One is equal to and the other is greater than...lol!


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## indianroads (May 10, 2022)

Taylor said:


> One is equal to and the other is greater than...lol!


Oh... ok.


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## Llyralen (May 10, 2022)

Splinter said:


> It's one thing to embrace diversity, but it's quite another to have it rammed down our throats at every turn.
> I imagine that what is being referred to here is racial diversity as per the OP's thread title and second, gender diversity, neither of which do, have or ever will feature in any of my writing. Not because I'm racist or gender averse (or whatever appropriate phrase applies), but because it doesn't feature highly on my list of priorities.
> Regarding diversity as an opportunity is all well and good, providing you have the knowledge, skill and awareness to include it in your work.
> On the other hand, one might include token people of colour and token genders in a written piece, but that can often be seen as pretentious and forced.
> I've yet to see a criticism of a novel along the lines of 'But you didn't include any African Americans and/or trans women in the book...'


Diversity is reality. To not include means we had to not see, disregard as important, and also suppress.  Just like when history was all about men (with only few exceptions). Or history was all about the rich (with only few exceptions). What we choose to tell stories about shows a lot about our mind-set, and probably not so much about reality, unless we choose reality and to show diversity.

It’s not just an opportunity to me, it is morality, though. It is willful suppression of people to not include diverse people, in my opinion, as reality is diverse.


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## CyberWar (May 10, 2022)

There's a huge difference between organic diversity that we see in the cosmopolitan cities of prosperous nations with open borders, and the "diversity" of the Marxist liberal kind that so many Western media outlets seem hell-bent on drumming into us at every opportunity. So huge, in fact, that I am even loath to use the same word to describe both.

One is just a fact of life. It happens wherever there's prosperity and opportunity, and most people involved don't make much of it - that's just how the big cities have always been. The other is actually the same old racial bigotry in a new disguise.

Patronizing other ethnic groups by getting offended on their behalf and claiming that they need more representation, playing the white saviour by acting like the poor ignorant savages need saving in the first place and are too dumb to realize that, pretending to know their issues better than themselves, "colourizing" Western history and culture rather than showing that the other ethnic groups have cultures and histories of their own. Any of that ring a bell?


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## Llyralen (May 10, 2022)

CyberWar said:


> There's a huge difference between organic diversity that we see in the cosmopolitan cities of prosperous nations with open borders, and the "diversity" of the Marxist liberal kind that so many Western media outlets seem hell-bent on drumming into us at every opportunity. So huge, in fact, that I am even loath to use the same word to describe both.
> 
> One is just a fact of life. It happens wherever there's prosperity and opportunity, and most people involved don't make much of it - that's just how the big cities have always been. The other is actually the same old racial bigotry in a new disguise.
> 
> Patronizing other ethnic groups by getting offended on their behalf and claiming that they need more representation, playing the white saviour by acting like the poor ignorant savages need saving in the first place and are too dumb to realize that, pretending to know their issues better than themselves, "colourizing" Western history and culture rather than showing that the other ethnic groups have cultures and histories of their own. Any of that ring a bell?



No.  I see contradictions in it. 

I don’t think diversity only happens in cities. I’m living as rural as you can get and 30% of my town is Latinex and an Indian Reservation is a large portion of our county, but if I ask most of my co-workers (yes, they are pretty much 100% white, non-Hispanic) , they have no idea of the scope of our Latinex population. They also don’t know what the group faces or is up against or their huge contribution to the companies here. Most of our industries here would be dead without them. 

 I work for the biggest company in town in healthcare and there isn’t even a Spanish interpreter here on staff.  The need is being completely ignored, I’d say management don’t “see” the need. There was an interpreter here a few years ago. He often was here even at 3 AM, would work 20 hour days… I don’t know how he did it, and when there was some kind of company accreditation we didn’t get to allow him to continue, then we lost about 2000 people’s business who are often going without healthcare. Management knows how e lost revenue, but they choose to continue to not address the need. I see and KNOW this history here is lost on most of my white co-workers who would all say we live in a almost all-white town. I know for certain of this because I have a big mouth and big ears. 

But you bring up something that I had to research when this thread first came out. A decade or two ago it seemed like progressive thinking to just “let” (in our majority-minded heads that is) people who are from minority groups go ahead and tell their own stories, still keeping stories separate for minority and majority in our minds. This idea hasn’t worked since our systems have been selecting majority stories. It’s an idea that would work if the playing field was level, maybe, but it’s not. Everything is stacked.   It’s like inviting African American children into Little Rock white schools without the system being behind it for federal protection.  Basically, until there is system awareness and activism, things don’t change, and they need to change for all our sakes.  And a lot of businesses and systems are realizing this, luckily.

Anyway, I notice this way of thinking of “your story” and “my story” is not in the younger generation’s mind. It has passed— probably with Hamilton and now with Brigerton.  And just as men are often writing women (not always well. Not without mistakes anyway…  just the other day I read a best-selling male author who wrote his female character “hopped” into her pantyhose… no one ever in history “hopped” into pantyhose… but I digress…) I think this model of men writing women is how the younger generation and myself have decided to tackle writing stories from people of different backgrounds. Research is a big part of the key, otherwise our readers should justifiably hop away.

As I said to a young writer discussing Brigerton with me , “It’s so fun and inclusive and exciting! But is it really okay? Or is it really the worst kind of pretending…white-washing to pretend that skin color didn’t matter in the past? And people did not suffer? How are African Americans feeling about it?” 

“Oh, I see what you mean. I don’t know.” She said, “But what? Just go back to boring white?”  

My conclusion as a historical fiction writer is: we could tell stories from the time that show all of society at the time. It would be good to try to show everyone, Upstairs/downstairs/Uptown/backstreet, very ambitious but very inclusive and yeah, I think that’s what needs to be attempted. And we (all of us) do NEED it.  Lets see if we can actually write about our human condition and see if we can develop sympathy and understanding, which I think many people wiser than me have said is why literature is important.


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## Splinter (May 10, 2022)

I'm glad you mentioned Brigerton because that series was clearly made with an inclusion lens and it comes off as highly pretentious. There is of course a smattering of truth that Queen Charlotte (1744-1818) may have had African roots, but it hasn't been conclusively proven. Anyway, that's beside the point and I found the series unbearable, not simply because of its over the top inclusivity, but because it simply irritated me.


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## Matchu (May 11, 2022)

What everybody is saying is how they like their steaks. 

Still - from a long surveying of the Youtube and TicToc videos - comes the confirmation - how American steaks are really too large for the most ordinary appetites of the rest of the world.

And I vouch how many of us real 'men' surely might enjoy a salmon fillet occasionally for the sakes of their relationships?

Metaphors are complex. 

I  come to, and I reside on this forum sometimes - a battered, a defeated former diversity professional at the highest level.  Why did they choose me?  Was it my stupid face?  The tedious, the virtuous lifestyle, unpaid,  drives me in my later years to embrace bigotry, prejudice, theocratic doctrine, the Rhodesian nostalgia websites etcetera


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## Theglasshouse (May 11, 2022)

The fact that we can empathize and share emotions according to durkheim has to do with the sociology of emotions. Race shouldn't be considered imo when making a decision to incorporate people imo when declaring race. Race shouldn't be considered an identity such as when filing papers. In Latin America it isn't considered where I am from when applying to a college. Or even when running for office. No one talks about it in other countries that are latin. I think diversity as lyralen pointed out is strongest in my experience in Latin American populations. Policies are based on a uniformed identity.

If writing diversity a Latin person's experience could be a strength and provides a voice that any writer could try to use for their own benefit.

Skin color creates a false assumption. That we should act, behave, and believe certain beliefs. Eyesight isn't a guide. It is like the Shakespearean sonnet that says my eye and heart are at war with each other.


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## Splinter (May 11, 2022)

Theglasshouse said:


> The fact that we can empathize and share emotions according to durkheim has to do with the sociology of emotions. Race shouldn't be considered imo when making a decision to incorporate people imo when declaring race. Race shouldn't be considered an identity such as when filing papers. In Latin America it isn't considered where I am from when applying to a college. Or even when running for office. No one talks about it in other countries that are latin. I think diversity as lyralen pointed out is strongest in my experience in Latin American populations. Policies are based on a uniformed identity.
> 
> If writing diversity a Latin person's experience could be a strength and provides a voice that any writer could try to use for their own benefit.
> 
> Skin color creates a false assumption. That we should act, behave, and believe certain beliefs. Eyesight isn't a guide. It is like the Shakespearean sonnet that says my eye and heart are at war with each other.


Where I live, Argentina, diversity is embraced in all senses, both racial and gender. However it's a dichotomy because in many ways, it's one of the most racist countries I've lived in.
But one has to take care when literally translating Spanish expressions into English because they could mean something entirely different. I often hear the expression "Es un negro de mierda!" which is strong language. However, it isn't a reference to colour, but to social standing - a scrounger, a conman or a wanker if you like.


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## Theglasshouse (May 11, 2022)

I now understand that Argentina is not like that in every Latin American country. As someone who is of mixed race, I feel completely neutral I suppose since my country is not classified between two political parties being majority and minority. It is not like that when applying to the university. It's this experience that also extends to other races. There are no partisan politics if I had to compare it to the United States (race isn't what determines who you vote for in politics, but the system is still corrupt). Of course, there will always be some controversy like in every other country. Nowhere do you see people where I am asking questions about your racial identity in institutions. I think since this is such a touchy subject I will probably not give many opinions about this. In many countries there is always a war against classes in my experience whatever the income level. This could be about social and economic class differences.

I will say you are most likely right about where you lived your life. However, power struggles where I am from on the government level are not based on race. Those who hold the power can change the future of a country. They are more important in determining racial relations if I had to hypothesize why some countries are considered to be. People are the sum of their environment as well. I think history does great harm to minorities as do cultural divides because of the politicians (history and culture do share similar ideas regarding how it influences people when adults).

I will then change my opinion and to help add to the discussion say a mixed-race character wouldn't be a bad idea to have in a story. That's in case they want to accuse the writer of writing with prejudicial confirmation bias and so on.

Also, if writing a different race, or gender, then the person must understand their suffering. There are many essays people can read on such topics. It would make the portrayal more accurate. For more information, I recommend Philip Lopate's guide on writing nonfiction (essays). I posted a short reading list a while back. If I can find it I will post a small list here again. It was in a thread that Green shield created that had to do with race which I contributed some posts. It had a list of some works he recommended in his craft book "To show and to tell."


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## BornForBurning (May 11, 2022)

> As someone who is of mixed race


This is like the biggest plot twist. I always thought you lived somewhere in the caucasus...no idea why I thought that, lol. 


> drives me in my later years to embrace bigotry, prejudice, theocratic doctrine, the Rhodesian nostalgia websites etcetera


Sometimes, Matchu, I think you are either a genius, or an idiot.


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## tonsonenotany (May 11, 2022)

If you are interested in writing diverse characters (in terms of race, gender, class, political orientation, etc), read stories by those authors. It takes a while but the mind composts what you feed it and new seeds sprout.


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## indianroads (May 11, 2022)

My fear with this talk of diversity is that it will evolve into a quota system:
Of your characters,
62% must be White.
16.9% must be Hispanic.
12.6% must be African-American.
5.2% must be Asian.
3.3% must be something else ... Trafamadorians I think.

If that ever comes to pass, all my characters will be purple.


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## PrairieHostage (May 11, 2022)

When I worked in Ottawa, I went to Montreal several times. I think it's Canada's most diverse city. It's beautiful.


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## Matchu (May 11, 2022)

It would make an enjoyable write: ‘Ottawa’ /the ‘New Zealand horror’ type of a novel, probably a short story 2000:

‘What shall we eat,honey?  Pan-fried noodle tonight tic-toc or the fill your face-ache belly pork noisettes?’ wailed Duncan, his voice  sounded all at once nasal and high-pitched.

‘Potato,’ said Samantha, I want a fukkin potato.’

‘Whaddya mean a potato?  You got mental health disorders?’

He looked away, his disgust palpable on the teeth…if she could see his teeth.

‘At least take a look at the view!’ he said and suckled now  the green juice from the rucksack holster strapped to his belly.

Samantha watched this suckle and her heart sank forever, stuck here with him, here in the view.

[ach - ‘double belly/repetition’ - go again and also insert context, ehmm, and ehmm less noodle-centric in dr2.]


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## Ajoy (May 11, 2022)

indianroads said:


> My fear with this talk of diversity is that it will evolve into a quota system:
> Of your characters,
> 62% must be White.
> 16.9% must be Hispanic.
> ...


Who would enforce something so ridiculous? Or do you mean traditional publishing would push that? I'm struggling to envision who would find this a good idea. I can't imagine those pushing for such extremes would have the power or numbers to make this a thing.


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## indianroads (May 11, 2022)

Ajoy said:


> Who would enforce something so ridiculous? Or do you mean traditional publishing would push that? I'm struggling to envision who would find this a good idea. I can't imagine those pushing for such extremes would have the power or numbers to make this a thing.


Actually, I was thinking of another authors forum. They were really into that stuff. It was a toxic place, and I’m glad to have found WF.


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## CyberWar (May 14, 2022)

Ajoy said:


> Who would enforce something so ridiculous? Or do you mean traditional publishing would push that? I'm struggling to envision who would find this a good idea. I can't imagine those pushing for such extremes would have the power or numbers to make this a thing.



It's already being done. Ever heard about those instances where literature classics are pulled from libraries over their (historically-appropriate) use of ethnic slurs or sometimes replaced with sanitized editions? If the PC police continues to get their way, minority quotas in literature could very well become the next big thing in mainstream publishing.

---

The good news - never underestimate the ingenuity of writers and their audience. For example, in the Soviet Union all publishing was centralized under strict state supervision. To get published in an official source, an author had to be a member of the Union of Soviet Writers, which enforced strict ideological guidelines on its members. For an outsider, it was very difficult to get published legally, and usually involved patronage from a union member or a Party official who would vouch for him. All works would be passed through censorship before publishing to ensure the content did not contain anything that could be interpreted as anti-Soviet or un-Marxist. Still, a lot of writers opposed to the regime managed to sneak in disguised anti-Soviet messages in their works, typically by using euphemisms and culture-specific allegories. Because the censors were usually centrally-appointed by Moscow, most of them were Russians and generally not familiar with the local culture or language in the Soviet republics they served in. Consequently, writers who had to present their work for the censor's approval could get inventive with their interpretations of the content, such as by presenting a poem allegorizing their nation's struggle against a foreign oppressor as being about class struggle.

Those authors who didn't want to follow or pretend to follow the official rules would have to find other means to spread their message. Despite being illegal, the Soviet Union had a burgeoning underground publishing scene, the "samizdat", where citizens themselves copied and distributed banned works by hand or typewriter. Samizdat wasn't limited just to literature - musical records (typically of contemporary Western pop music) were also duplicated by using available materials, such as spent X-ray films (used as substitute for vinyl records). Later tape recorders became more available, so tape became the preferred medium. Consequently a Soviet citizen could easily be up to date with the latest literary and musical trends in the West despite most of the content being officially banned.

Long story short, in times of oppressive censorship, authors will still find ways to get politically-incorrect messages through censorship, and people will find ways to obtain such works.


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## chrismhayes1980 (May 14, 2022)

I'll be honest with you I kind of look at it this way I possibly May offend more people trying to write as a different race then I actually am because I might misstep and use the wrong verbiage or body language or something of that manner to where it would possibly upset many different readers for different purposes nowadays with the climate the way the entire world is it's just best to stick with what you know
 and yes you can sit there and have multiple different races as secondary characters without a doubt but don't try to make it to where it's a main character because you might accidentally step into a social faux pas you can't back out of and you didn't even know that you stepped into to begin with


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## Parabola (May 15, 2022)

As far as the diversity "trend" goes, being emotional about that as a power structure vs. being apathetic to white leaning stuff always seemed a little off to me. For instance, I've heard some authors venting about "the radical left" yet the extreme on the other end doesn't seem to inspire equal vehemence, at least in some.


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## indianroads (May 15, 2022)

A biker saying: 'Just shut up and ride.' Some will sit around and agonize over every detail of a ride before starting out, and thereby lose the day.

Writing can be like that - we become so concerned about being canceled or criticized that we never produce anything, or what we do create is a flavorless compromise that has no worth or meaning.


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## Xander416 (May 15, 2022)

Llyralen said:


> Latinex


Champions diversity, then uses a term that 97% of the people it's intended to refer to have in fact rejected, many simply because it's difficult to pronounce in Spanish.


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## CyberWar (May 16, 2022)

Parabola said:


> As far as the diversity "trend" goes, being emotional about that as a power structure vs. being apathetic to white leaning stuff always seemed a little off to me. For instance, I've heard some authors venting about "the radical left" yet the extreme on the other end doesn't seem to inspire equal vehemence, at least in some.



Well, that's probably because the radical right-wingers aren't nearly as big of a problem as the leftists, at least in the Western world. If you look at the general state of Western society, it's safe to say that left-wing liberal ideas have been mainstream for quite a while already, and increasingly radical forms of leftist ideologies are actively pushing towards becoming mainstream as well. Hard right-wingers, on the other hand, for most part just react to these efforts, having neither the resources nor the popular clout to go mainstream, even if the failures of the lefties in power have allowed them to make some limited headway.


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## BornForBurning (May 16, 2022)

The truth is, I actually totally agree with and affirm writing diverse stories. What I wish such authors would realize is that the 'diverse' story is just one kind of story, and it has no more or less bearing on reality than a story which represents a racial monolith. Diverse societies are real. Homogenous societies are real. We don't get anywhere by trying to pretend that the 'realest' depiction of the world is necessarily diverse, or that history was always 'really' diverse. Neither would it be accurate to say that all stories must necessarily be rooted in a homogenous racial particular. Ultimately, choices like these are the prerogative of the author. I am happy there are authors excited to champion diversity. I hope they will be equally excited to champion the various racial particulars many of us inhabit, and that are equally real.


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## Parabola (May 16, 2022)

CyberWar said:


> Well, that's probably because the radical right-wingers aren't nearly as big of a problem as the leftists, at least in the Western world. If you look at the general state of Western society, it's safe to say that left-wing liberal ideas have been mainstream for quite a while already, and increasingly radical forms of leftist ideologies are actively pushing towards becoming mainstream as well. Hard right-wingers, on the other hand, for most part just react to these efforts, having neither the resources nor the popular clout to go mainstream, even if the failures of the lefties in power have allowed them to make some limited headway.



I mean, this seems like a heavily slanted view. On the flip side of the coin to what you're saying, many leftists would argue they are reacting to white supremacy etc. 

That aside, while I said the diversity "trend" seems a bit forced at times, that seems a response to not being inclusive enough to begin with.


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## indianroads (May 16, 2022)

The story comes first, then populate it with characters that reflect the time and place it occurs.


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## Cephus (May 16, 2022)

indianroads said:


> The story comes first, then populate it with characters that reflect the time and place it occurs.


As you should. The whole idea of forced diversity and checklists is positively idiotic, a way to score political brownie points and not to write a coherent, cohesive and entertaining story.


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## Parabola (May 16, 2022)

Cephus said:


> As you should. The whole idea of forced diversity and checklists is positively idiotic, a way to score political brownie points and not to write a coherent, cohesive and entertaining story.



Focusing on forced diversity as opposed to other kinds of biases is similarly thoughtless.


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## BornForBurning (May 16, 2022)

To engage in racial identity politics a bit, I do think that the primary tension around this issue is that, while many publishers / authors / editors claim to champion 'diverse voices,' what they really mean is that they champion 'non-white' voices. And that seems unfair. Even if you acknowledge that white supremacy is / was embedded in the publishing industry, it seems deeply unjust to argue that one person's voice is more important than another's merely because the latter happened to have the misfortune of being born into a race that was historically privileged. 

If this is _not _the issue, I see no reason why we must argue regarding diversity. The person that wishes to write by diversity checkbox is entirely within their right to do so. I do not personally find such an exercise interesting, but that is my taste and it has no bearing on whether or not the exercise is legitimate. Fads will come and go. That does not mean that the current fad of diversity is evil. As I stated previously, it is one kind of story. The trouble comes when we argue that all stories—and thus, in a sense, all peoples—must necessarily reflect the highly particular 'diverse' society we see popularized today.


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## Parabola (May 16, 2022)

BornForBurning said:


> As I stated previously, it is one kind of story.



This is what I'm getting at. Sure, it's a fad etc, but I've noticed it seems to get knocked around more, where "soft white supremacist" points in literature seem to be glossed over. It is one kind of story, and even though I'm not embedded in those diverse spaces, I can acknowledge most things have the capacity to be done well.

I'll put it this way. You said "it seems deeply unjust to argue another person's voice is more important simply because of race" and yet, there are forms of critique out there that point out an implied racism in literature that previously most people didn't have a problem with.

Both conservative/progressive spaces have values attached to them that can be taken in a direction "too far" so it seems, to me, an exercise in grasping the nuances.


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## BornForBurning (May 16, 2022)

> Sure, it's a fad etc, but I've noticed it seems to get knocked around more, where "soft white supremacist" points in literature seem to be glossed over.


Different communities react negatively to different things. The majority of the writing community is, at the moment, quite liberal. WF is an outlier in this sense.


> I'll put it this way. You said "it seems deeply unjust to argue another person's voice is more important simply because of race" and yet, there are forms of critique out there that point out an implied racism in literature that previously most people didn't have a problem with.


I am not an expert, or even well-read, in neo-marxist literary criticism or critical theory. I have been exposed to it. If you see such criticisms as carrying legitimacy, I encourage you to explore that school more deeply. I don't exactly understand how my point regarding race and voice correlates with your point regarding implied racism.


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## Parabola (May 16, 2022)

BornForBurning said:


> Different communities react negatively to different things. The majority of the writing community is, at the moment, quite liberal. WF is an outlier in this sense.
> 
> I am not an expert, or even well-read, in neo-marxist literary criticism or critical theory. I have been exposed to it. If you see such criticisms as carrying legitimacy, I encourage you explore that school more deeply. I don't exactly understand how my point regarding race and voice correlates with your point regarding implied racism.



I guess I meant to communicate that putting an emphasis on forced diversity/prioritizing non-white voices as "unjust/negative" vs a more entrenched implied racism, which is deeply problematic in itself seems to indicate a bias. For some writers, they focus on the former (when it comes to criticism) and not the latter.


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## Cephus (May 16, 2022)

Parabola said:


> Focusing on forced diversity as opposed to other kinds of biases is similarly thoughtless.


Well, it is a thread on diversity, so...

However, if you actually want to promote equality and egalitarianism, you just stop caring about race and gender and sexual orientation. Instead of artificially pushing an agenda, you just stop making a big deal out of it. Of course, nobody wants to do that because it gets in the way of virtue signalling and ego stroking, which is what it's really all about.

So if you don't mind, I'll go back to not giving a damn about diversity and just writing stories about people without regard for their external physical characteristics.


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## Parabola (May 16, 2022)

Cephus said:


> Well, it is a thread on diversity, so...
> 
> However, if you actually want to promote equality and egalitarianism, you just stop caring about race and gender and sexual orientation. Instead of artificially pushing an agenda, you just stop making a big deal out of it. Of course, nobody wants to do that because it gets in the way of virtue signalling and ego stroking, which is what it's really all about.
> 
> So if you don't mind, I'll go back to not giving a damn about diversity and just writing stories about people without regard for their external physical characteristics.



Why bother with this diatribe when virtue signalling and ego stroking exist on the other side as well?


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## Cephus (May 16, 2022)

BornForBurning said:


> To engage in racial identity politics a bit, I do think that the primary tension around this issue is that, while many publishers / authors / editors claim to champion 'diverse voices,' what they really mean is that they champion 'non-white' voices. And that seems unfair. Even if you acknowledge that white supremacy is / was embedded in the publishing industry, it seems deeply unjust to argue that one person's voice is more important than another's merely because the latter happened to have the misfortune of being born into a race that was historically privileged.
> 
> If this is _not _the issue, I see no reason why we must argue regarding diversity. The person that wishes to write by diversity checkbox is entirely within their right to do so. I do not personally find such an exercise interesting, but that is my taste and it has no bearing on whether or not the exercise is legitimate. Fads will come and go. That does not mean that the current fad of diversity is evil. As I stated previously, it is one kind of story. The trouble comes when we argue that all stories—and thus, in a sense, all peoples—must necessarily reflect the highly particular 'diverse' society we see popularized today.


Very much the case. You don't see people complaining about diversity and representation on black shows, do you? You don't see anyone demanding more white representation on channels like BET. Now I don't care, but it's clear this isn't about trying to get true representation. It's about whining about white folks. The simple fact is, there are far more gay characters on TV today than could ever be seen within regular society. That's fine to a certain degree but it becomes painfully obvious that Hollywood is pushing an agenda rather than actually seeking out any kind of realistic representation congruent with reality.

There comes a point in time that the only way to actually address "racism", whatever the Hollywood elite want to define it as these days, is to stop caring about race at all. Hire the best actors for the job, regardless of skin color. Stop celebrating how diverse you are. Just make good content! That goes for books too. Just write good books without playing these ridiculous ideological games.

It really can't be that hard!


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## Cephus (May 16, 2022)

Parabola said:


> Why bother with this diatribe when virtue signalling and ego stroking exist on the other side as well.


Go ahead and demonstrate it for us, why don't you? Please show us where there's a White Entertainment Television network. Please show us where anyone is pushing their marketing based on how many white actors they hire. You made the claim. Back it up.


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## Parabola (May 16, 2022)

Cephus said:


> Go ahead and demonstrate it for us, why don't you? Please show us where there's a White Entertainment Television network. Please show us where anyone is pushing their marketing based on how many white actors they hire. You made the claim. Back it up.



Ego stroking doesn't have to delivered in the same manner. Racism is a thing, and conscious countering of that (diversity stuff) is fine. It might be heavy handed in some cases, but the same could be said of "regular" stories.

You seem to be suggesting that promoting  equality means to stop caring about race/gender and so on. There is racism/sexism, and then there is a response to it. That would seem fair enough.

As to your marketing point, all white shows have been a thing for quite some time.


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## Tyrannohotep (May 16, 2022)

Parabola said:


> Ego stroking doesn't have to delivered in the same manner. Racism is a thing, and conscious countering of that (diversity stuff) is fine. It might be heavy handed in some cases, but the same could be said of "regular" stories.
> 
> You seem to be suggesting that promoting  equality means to stop caring about race/gender and so on. There is racism/sexism, and then there is a response to it. That would seem fair enough.
> 
> As to your marketing point, all white shows have been a thing for quite some time.


Have to agree. Colorblindness might sound noble to some people (especially those from demographics that have plenty of representation in fiction and media already), but in practice it has the effect of sweeping very real inequalities and imbalances under the rug. If you're from a group that doesn't find as much good representation in fiction and other media, I can understand you wanting to see more characters that are also from that group.

That said, as far as novelists and other authors like us are concerned, I don't think there actually is a substantial movement to force writers from dominant demographic groups to write more characters from marginalized ones at gunpoint. If anything, what a lot of people object to is writers from dominant groups mishandling the marginalized-group characters they do write. What I have seen quite a bit is the sentiment that writers who are from marginalized groups should get more coverage and exposure, that their stories should be heard and read as well. It's more "we need more stories from minority writers getting attention" than "majority writers should write more minority characters".


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## Cephus (May 16, 2022)

Parabola said:


> Ego stroking doesn't have to delivered in the same manner. Racism is a thing, and conscious countering of that (diversity stuff) is fine. It might be heavy handed in some cases, but the same could be said of "regular" stories.
> 
> You seem to be suggesting that promoting  equality means to stop caring about race/gender and so on. There is racism/sexism, and then there is a response to it. That would seem fair enough.
> 
> As to your marketing point, all white shows have been a thing for quite some time.


So, in other words, you can't actually prove a thing, you're just going to make excuses. That's what I thought.


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## Taylor (May 16, 2022)

*Sometimes we have to agree to disagree. Let's express our own opinions and allow others to do the same.  *


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## BornForBurning (May 16, 2022)

I do not want to forget about race. Race and racial identity is interesting if only as an aesthetic construct and as something that real people actually struggle with. I will be the first to admit I have written white characters with the explicit purpose of exploring a 'certain kind' of white person whom many people (white or otherwise) would desperately wish was voiceless. On the other hand, I am nervous of both autobiography and ventriloquism. I do not see fiction as primarily a medium to 'express oneself' or one's viewpoint. I see it as sub-creation, and as a medium for expressing truth.


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## ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord (May 17, 2022)

Tyrannohotep said:


> That said, as far as novelists and other authors like us are concerned, I don't think there actually is a substantial movement to force writers from dominant demographic groups to write more characters from marginalized ones at gunpoint. If anything, what a lot of people object to is writers from dominant groups mishandling the marginalized-group characters they do write. What I have seen quite a bit is the sentiment that writers who are from marginalized groups should get more coverage and exposure, that their stories should be heard and read as well. It's more "we need more stories from minority writers getting attention" than "majority writers should write more minority characters".


While I agree that minority writers should get more attention, I think the difficulty with this viewpoint is it can turn into a hyper-critical attitude of any minority character written by an author not part of that group. "Is it _perfectly _accurate? Is the character stereotypical in any way (_any _way at all)? Are related political issues mentioned (but not _too _much)? Is the culture brought up (but not _too _much)?" This can even come to the point of suggesting that an author cannot write outside of their racial or cultural group, which I think cuts against one of the most powerful aspects of writing -- the ability to step outside of your experience. The truth is, the search for perfectly accurate representation is a futile one, since groups are not monoliths and every person's experience is different. The person looking to "see themself in a story" will not find it. No one character can "represent" all of a group. That would be impossible.

And, one person's stereotype might be another person's representation. An example of this is how websites like disabilityinkidlit will decry books that portray "stereotypical" autistic characters who like trains, etc. -- meanwhile even the most progressive of autistic subreddits will have some autistic people shyly admitting that they are the stereotype and have a train special interest (I'm autistic, and I totally had a train phase).

Now, that doesn't mean we shouldn't be cautious of _harmful _stereotypes or flat-out inaccuracies, and it doesn't mean that writing more minorities isn't a good thing. I think it _is _a good thing (personally, very pleased with the recent films _Coco _and _Encanto_; my Guatemalan siblings can see Latin Americans in heroic roles and not just goofy sidekicks or villains). But I think the focus on representation has had a few negative results:

First, majority-group authors are afraid of writing minorities, even if they have personal experience with those minorities, because a small mistake (or even just a deviation from what's acceptable) can and does lead to backlash.

Second, minority authors are pigeonholed because the fad has become all about "writing their experience" (what if they don't want to write their experience? What if they just want to write, say, a black character, without it being ABOUT "the black experience"?).

And third, the discussion about diversity and representation, from what I've seen, gets mixed up with other ideological concerns and constraints, which can lead to accusations of racism when there is really just a difference in ideology. An example of this: I stopped reading WritingWithColor (Tumblr blog that gives advice about writing diverse characters) when they said that an author shouldn't write Christian Native American characters, because that's "colonialism" (or something along the lines of this; I don't remember the exact post).  This is clearly not about representation, since something like 66% of Native Americans identify their religion as Christianity. So what it is it about? There's, I gather, a certain kind of Native American character which the bloggers want to see, maybe one which falls closer to their own beliefs. It isn't about diversity at that point.

Fourth, I've noticed that ALL authors are pigeonholed into having to make reference to real cultures when writing characters of different skin colors. I've heard it bandied around that if you're writing dark-brown-skinned characters in a fantasy or sci-fi setting, you must make reference to real African cultures. And why on earth would I have to do that? Africa _does not exist _in some universes; that doesn't mean people with dark brown skin don't exist. And some sci-fi universes are set so far in the future that very little reference to existing cultures remains -- _and that's okay. _The idea that "accurate representation" must be constrained by existing cultures in purely speculative universes is bizarre.


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## VRanger (May 17, 2022)

ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord said:


> Is the character stereotypical in any way (_any _way at all)?


Stereotypes exist because of visible groups of people who behave similarly. It's not insult, it's reality. That doesn't mean we want to lean on stereotypes, but the occasional stereotype is as true, often MORE true, than characters we push the envelope to make more interesting.


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## ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord (May 17, 2022)

VRanger said:


> Stereotypes exist because of visible groups of people who behave similarly. It's not insult, it's reality. That doesn't mean we want to lean on stereotypes, but the occasional stereotype is as true, often MORE true, than characters we push the envelope to make more interesting.


I have noticed that this is particularly true of complimentary or benign stereotypes. Some negative stereotypes (especially very negative ones) seem to form from mere hearsay or misunderstanding with a dash of hatred. But "Autistic people like trains" or "Midwesterners eat bland food"? They do come from somewhere. A lot of people from the Midwest are from Scandinavia and the dishes there are not very spice-heavy. Trains follow structures (both in their mechanical workings and in their organized journeys) so some autistic people are drawn to them. Of course not everyone, and maybe not even the majority, follows the stereotypes, but it's not like they appear out of thin air.


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## bdcharles (May 17, 2022)

ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord said:


> "Autistic people like trains" ... Trains follow structures (both in their mechanical workings and in their organized journeys) so some autistic people are drawn to them.


Trains are just plain awesome. What the hell kind of philistines _don't_ like trains?


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## KeganThompson (May 17, 2022)

To address the OP's post I'd say I don't think about 'how diverse' my cast of characters is for any story. (or try not to) I just see them and they are what they are. Usually, the majority are white because I'm white and I grew up in a small town with a majority of white people. (Like 99% very few minorities) I remember when I was like 12 or 13 I was writing a story and the main character was of Hispanic descent. I even named her Abril. Looking back on it, I probably shouldn't have done that not because its 'wrong' but because I didn't really know much about the culture in general apart from what I saw on TV so I don't know how good of a job I would've done.lol (then again i was 12/13 the whole thing was probably trash. Luckily, it 'vanished.' auto-save wasn't a thing 10/12 years ago lol)
But yeah, there was no malice there, I wasn't gonna make her race or ethnicity a big thing in the story anyway. I just saw a character who _happened_ to be Hispanic in my mind and I went with it.

I have a story in mind that has a deaf character but I don't plan to write it anytime soon because if I were to do that, I'd put a lot of time into research and talking with deaf people because I'd want it to feel like a genuine character.  What I like to write the most are realistic characters. (what plot or wold building? lol) i enjoy learning about people. I'd like to work on my craft more before I'd take on a project/ challenge like that though.

Regarding what's going on in the media and entertainment industry as a whole, I am not a fan. I like more ethnically diverse characters, that is not the problem, it's _how_ they are doing it. I feel like they can't let a story just be a story without pretending to take the moral high ground. Often times it feels forced and not genuine. They gotta add the agenda (ideology) along with it as if the two things can't be mutually exclusive. They treat people like groups, people aren't just groups, we are individuals before anything else. Not everyone agrees. It's more about ideology than diversity or genuine empathy.  I dont mind digesting a movie/ tv show with things I don't necessarily agree with but when its just too obvious/ forceful to the point it overshadows any redeeming aspects of the movie, book, or show, yeah no thanks...
i do my best to avoid those,_ not _look for them...which unfortunately is most of the stuff coming out atm. 



ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord said:


> A lot of people from the Midwest are from Scandinavia and the dishes there are not very spice-heavy.


That explains a lot, my mom's side must be Scandinavian then lolol  ( and yes, i live in the Midwest lol)


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## Cephus (May 17, 2022)

ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord said:


> While I agree that minority writers should get more attention, I think the difficulty with this viewpoint is it can turn into a hyper-critical attitude of any minority character written by an author not part of that group. Is it _perfectly _accurate? Is the character stereotypical in any way (_any _way at all)? Are related political issues mentioned (but not _too _much)? Is the culture brought up (but not _too _much)? This can even come to the point of suggesting that an author cannot write outside of their racial or cultural group, which I think cuts against one of the most powerful aspects of writing -- the ability to step outside of your experience. The truth is, the search for perfectly accurate representation is a futile one, since groups are not monoliths and every person's experience is different. The person looking to "see themself in a story" will not find it. No one character can "represent" all of a group. That would be impossible.


The problem with this fake diversity nonsense is that it actually harms the way people look at minorities. When a minority actor gets cast, there's an automatic question of whether they actually deserved the role or they were just checking off a box on a diversity checklist somewhere. When a minority author wins an award, is it because they are really good or because they happened to have a skin color that the award-givers wanted to promote? It inherently raises questions that shouldn't have to be raised, yet so many people are just running around promoting minorities because they are minorities, not because they've earned it, that it becomes inevitable.


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## Cephus (May 17, 2022)

VRanger said:


> Stereotypes exist because of visible groups of people who behave similarly. It's not insult, it's reality. That doesn't mean we want to lean on stereotypes, but the occasional stereotype is as true, often MORE true, than characters we push the envelope to make more interesting.


Yet we seem to see a lot more obvious stereotypes from the "diversity" crowd. You'll get people screaming because black characters don't have the right kind of ghetto background to match some perceived "lived experience" when black people live in all kinds of circumstances and are, in fact, no different than white people (or any others), period.

Ultimately, these people are making it harder, not easier, for people to be represented as they actually are, not as the stereotype that particular political ideologies would like to portray.


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## D. L. Keur (May 17, 2022)

So what about discrimination against Whites and Mixed Bloods in Black, Asian, Native, and Latinx cultures?  What about shunning and worse that happens there? Everybody acts like it's WHITE FOLK FAULT.  Sorry. Not reality. It's a human condition to pick on those who don't look or act the same as members of the dominant group or tribe.  And it's not limited to race.  LGBTQ+23?  1% maybe of the population, but require acknowledgement and their choices applauded out loud by the other 99%?  I don't notice heteros demanding that LGBTQ+23 embrace their choices.  My position is, race doesn't matter, nationality doesn't matter, sexual preferences don't matter, and gender doesn't matter, age doesn't matter. It's why I liked it online when the Net was young.  Nobody knew what gender or race or anything else you were unless you told them.  Oh, well.  Never mind.  Carry on.  One thing, though.  Keep up the culture wars, and your hate ON ALL SIDES will come back to haunt you.


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## Tyrannohotep (May 17, 2022)

ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord said:


> And third, the discussion about diversity and representation, from what I've seen, gets mixed up with other ideological concerns and constraints, which can lead to accusations of racism when there is really just a difference in ideology. An example of this: I stopped reading WritingWithColor (Tumblr blog that gives advice about writing diverse characters) when they said that an author shouldn't write Christian Native American characters, because that's "colonialism" (or something along the lines of this; I don't remember the exact post). This is clearly not about representation, since something like 66% of Native Americans identify their religion as Christianity. So what it is it about? There's, I gather, a certain kind of Native American character which the bloggers want to see, maybe one which falls closer to their own beliefs. It isn't about diversity at that point.


This was back in 2015, but I'll never forget that blog posting an article that claimed that the Olmecs of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica, the Chinese of the Shang Dynasty, the Minoans, and various other ancient non-African peoples were actually Black African people. Now, I'm hardly Eurocentric in my outlook on world history, much less the history of Africa, but..._come fucking on_. There's drawing more exposure to precolonial African history and challenging anti-Black racist narratives about it, and then there's blatant pseudo-history with possible Black supremacist undertones. It's practically a mirror image of the racists claiming ancient Egypt or Great Zimbabwe had to have been built by White people.

Not that I actually want to open the whole can of worms about what race certain ancient peoples would have been here, but since that blog has been invoked a few times in this thread, I wanted to mention how uncomfortable some of their past posts have made me feel.

As for your larger point, I agree that fairly representing certain demographics (especially those outside your own) can indeed present challenges. But what I wanted to say is that I don't blame people from some of those demographics for wanting to see fair characterizations of people who resemble them in some way.


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## ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord (May 17, 2022)

Cephus said:


> Yet we seem to see a lot more obvious stereotypes from the "diversity" crowd. You'll get people screaming because black characters don't have the right kind of ghetto background to match some perceived "lived experience" when black people live in all kinds of circumstances and are, in fact, no different than white people (or any others), period.


This is why I think the search for perfect representation, or to perfectly "see myself in a story," is a futile one. No one character can match the "lived experience" of an entire group. People are upset because they are looking for something that is impossible. I'll sometimes even see takes like "Well the rep was pretty good but I wish they included [some highly specific experience that's part of their life but not even remotely part of the life of everyone in that group]." And it's like, at that point, maybe write your own character (?).



Tyrannohotep said:


> This was back in 2015, but I'll never forget that blog posting an article that claimed that the Olmecs of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica, the Chinese of the Shang Dynasty, the Minoans, and various other ancient non-African peoples were actually Black African people. Now, I'm hardly Eurocentric in my outlook on world history, much less the history of Africa, but..._come fucking on_. There's drawing more exposure to precolonial African history and challenging anti-Black racist narratives about it, and then there's blatant pseudo-history with possible Black supremacist undertones. It's practically a mirror image of the racists claiming ancient Egypt or Great Zimbabwe had to have been built by White people.
> 
> Not that I actually want to open the whole can of worms about what race certain ancient peoples would have been here, but since that blog has been invoked a few times in this thread, I wanted to mention how uncomfortable some of their past posts have made me feel.
> 
> As for your larger point, I agree that fairly representing certain demographics (especially those outside your own) can indeed present challenges. But what I wanted to say is that I don't blame people from some of those demographics for wanting to see fair characterizations of people who resemble them in some way.



I don't blame people for wanting to see fair characterizations of their race, culture, neurotype, etc.

Part of where I'm coming from is that WWC seemed at first to be a blog that espoused "Hey, we could use more black princesses and heroes!" (a sentiment I agree with), and it slowly became (or perhaps it always was this way, and I began to notice) a blog with various undertones of racial supremacy, erasure of Christian minorities (or other minorities that didn't fit with their idea of "the right kind" of minorities), and bigotry to the point of saying that authors should not even humanize police officer characters.

And I've seen the entire representation discussion follow a similar trend, though not to that extreme. "More representation" has unfortunately turned into a pharisaical extreme of "But is it _the right kind_ of representation?" And no one can even agree on what _the right kind_ is. So -- I'll go on with writing minority characters, maybe do a bit of research if it's set in current or historical time and not a fantasy world, but I'm not ascribing to these rigid standards because 1) they come from political ideologies which I have mixed at best feelings about and 2) no one can even agree what these standards are.

--
Another thought, now that I'm thinking about WWC -- I remember they and other proponents of "good representation" would say that it's important for minority characters to have their own arc and not just be there to support a non-minority protagonist's arc. And it's something I've been thinking about more, since being diagnosed with autism, so now I can think about it in terms of my own experience. _Does _every autistic character have to have their own arc, and not just be there to support a neurotypical protagonist? Tbh, I think the answer is No. It is _totally fine, _IMO, if a side character is there to move the plot forward, give good advice, show some aspect of the protagonist, or be rescued.

In real life, I have probably been the "weird side character" to many a protagonist, so why wouldn't that appear in fiction? The one thing that makes me uncomfy is when disabled characters appear as a kind of moral measuring stick in a work (if a character is mean to them, they're bad; if a character is nice to them, they're good) because it feels like they're being put in a position both above and below the rest of humanity. But other than that, or other attitudes that put people below others -- Yes, I think it's totally fine for an autistic character or other minority to be a side character and have little to no arc except as support. A character is not being put below just because they aren't the center of that particular story.


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## indianroads (May 17, 2022)

IMO stereotypes only exist in fiction. In my life I've known many POC, and every single one of there were different, just as ever white person was different. 

IMO (again) we're here to tell stories. Sure some may have a subtext regarding politics or whatever, but the story should take precedence.


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## Parabola (May 17, 2022)

D. L. Keur said:


> So what about discrimination against Whites and Mixed Bloods in Black, Asian, Native, and Latinx cultures?  What about shunning and worse that happens there? Everybody acts like it's WHITE FOLK FAULT.  Sorry. Not reality. It's a human condition to pick on those who don't look or act the same as members of the dominant group or tribe.  And it's not limited to race.  LGBTQ+23?  1% maybe of the population, but require acknowledgement and their choices applauded out loud by the other 99%?  I don't notice heteros demanding that LGBTQ+23 embrace their choices.  My position is, race doesn't matter, nationality doesn't matter, sexual preferences don't matter, and gender doesn't matter, age doesn't matter. It's why I liked it online when the Net was young.  Nobody knew what gender or race or anything else you were unless you told them.  Oh, well.  Never mind.  Carry on.  One thing, though.  Keep up the culture wars, and your hate ON ALL SIDES will come back to haunt you.



As far as LGBTQ goes, being more "out there" with wanting acknowledgement is understandable if they face discrimination on a much grander scale than, say, straight people.


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## Cephus (May 17, 2022)

ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord said:


> This is why I think the search for perfect representation, or to perfectly "see myself in a story," is a futile one. No one character can match the "lived experience" of an entire group. People are upset because they are looking for something that is impossible. I'll sometimes even see takes like "Well the rep was pretty good but I wish they included [some highly specific experience that's part of their life but not even remotely part of the life of everyone in that group]." And it's like, at that point, maybe write your own character (?).



It absolutely is. It's also kind of racist to even care about that. It tends to come from groups that push the "we're different" narrative. No, you're not. You're not special and that's another  thing that a lot of these ideological positions love to push. The idea that if you're part of the oppression Olympics, somehow that makes you special. It makes you stand out. It's just wrong. The whole thing is just childish.

It's when I'm writing, I don't care about representation. I write characters the way that they seem to me at the time I create them. I wrote a trilogy last year where the main characters were two black brothers and a Vietnamese woman. Never once was their races even brought up. They were just people who happened to be black and Asian. So what? I've written about gay characters, I've written about trans characters, never once did any of that impact the story that was being told. People are people. Those who can't get that through their heads need to grow up.



ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord said:


> I don't blame people for wanting to see fair characterizations of their race, culture, neurotype, etc.
> 
> Part of where I'm coming from is that WWC seemed at first to be a blog that espoused "Hey, we could use more black princesses and heroes!" (a sentiment I agree with), and it slowly became (or perhaps it always was this way, and I began to notice) a blog with various undertones of racial supremacy, erasure of Christian minorities (or other minorities that didn't fit with their idea of "the right kind" of minorities), and bigotry to the point of saying that authors should not even humanize police officer characters.
> 
> ...


I just think people need to stop caring about seeing themselves on screen. I can watch a movie with primarily black actors and not care at all if I can see myself on screen. I watch tons of Japanese dramas, I speak the bloody language and my oldest daughter is a professional Japanese translator, but I have never thought "gee, there aren't enough white people on this show!" That's just stupid. The problem isn't diversity and representation, it's people only viewing the world through the lens of race, gender and sexual orientation. I don't care if you're black, I care if you're a good person. People need to learn to be effectively color blind, but that doesn't seem to be a problem for regular folks, it's primarily an issue on the diversity side. Maybe they need to do something about that.


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## Sinister (May 17, 2022)

Serial killers hunt primarily within their own ethnic groups, supposedly.  I think that shows a lack of effort.  We all know that we treat our characters like shit.  Even in the happiest book, we'd pray to all space to never have to answer to our characters for what we put them through.  I say, be an equal-opportunity deity of torment.

-Sin


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## Parabola (May 17, 2022)

ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord said:


> I have noticed that this is particularly true of complimentary or benign stereotypes. Some negative stereotypes (especially very negative ones) seem to form from mere hearsay or misunderstanding with a dash of hatred. But "Autistic people like trains" or "Midwesterners eat bland food"? They do come from somewhere. A lot of people from the Midwest are from Scandinavia and the dishes there are not very spice-heavy. Trains follow structures (both in their mechanical workings and in their organized journeys) so some autistic people are drawn to them. Of course not everyone, and maybe not even the majority, follows the stereotypes, but it's not like they appear out of thin air.



That's a bit like saying if some white people like trains, therefore the stereotype "must come from somewhere." Now I'd like to be responsible for making this a stereotype.

White people who love trains. It's a thing.


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## Sinister (May 17, 2022)

I've got a better question, or at least a more selfish question(Disclaimer: might be the same exact question but a more self-centered way of phrasing it.)...

I have a major WIP where my main character is black.  Now you might not know me...  But I'm white.  I'm really white.  I'm #$@^ing Belgian and Irish with a tiny kiss of Shawnee.  The only thing my MC and I have in common in this WIP is that we're both southern and we have both met Black people at one time or another.

Do I have any right to write about this man and his family?

He feels like an old friend and his family problems feel like my family problems.  His old family house is based on my old family house.  But is that correct or am I creating a beer milkshake with tomato-based whipped cream?

The reason I ask, is I remember playing an MMO(That's a Massive Multi-Player Online Role-Playing Game for those not in the know) where my character was black.  When it was discovered I wasn't as black as my character, I was quickly called a racist.  Now, I didn't understand it at the time...  Or wait...  I still don't, really...


-Sin


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## D. L. Keur (May 17, 2022)

Sinister said:


> I've got a better question, or at least a more selfish question(Disclaimer: might be the same exact question but a more self-centered way of phrasing it.)...
> 
> I have a major WIP where my main character is black.  Now you might not know me...  But I'm white.  I'm really white.  I'm #$@^ing Belgian and Irish with a tiny kiss of Shawnee.  The only thing my MC and I have in common in this WIP is that we're both southern and we have both met Black people at one time or another.
> 
> ...


Write what you want, as you want to, and fuck the nay-sayers.  Good story is good story.  And, yes, there will be naysayers, but bad publicity is just as valuable (and sometimes more valuable) than accolades, especially in selling books!!!  If you just wither and withdraw, you discredit yourself and your readers. JMO.


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## ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord (May 17, 2022)

Parabola said:


> As far as LGBTQ goes, being more "out there" with wanting acknowledgement is understandable if they face discrimination on a much grander scale than, say, straight people.


LGBTQ is interesting because it is inherently not just an issue of representation but beliefs about sexuality. i. e. if I were to write a character who was attracted to the same sex but chose to remain celibate because they believed in traditional sexual morality, that would probably be viewed as "bad" representation by the community, even though people like that do exist.


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## ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord (May 17, 2022)

Parabola said:


> That's a bit like saying if some white people like trains, therefore the stereotype "must come from somewhere." Now I'd like to be responsible for making this a stereotype.
> 
> White people who love trains. It's a thing.


I guess that's a fair point . I guess it's more accurate to say: sometimes stereotypes come from a real cultural pattern. Other times they come from the fact that some people fit it and a degree of hearsay led to the whole group being characterized as such. In the case of trains, it might be because a train special interest is more noticeably different than, say, a video game special interest or a TV show special interest.


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## ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord (May 17, 2022)

Sinister said:


> I've got a better question, or at least a more selfish question(Disclaimer: might be the same exact question but a more self-centered way of phrasing it.)...
> 
> I have a major WIP where my main character is black.  Now you might not know me...  But I'm white.  I'm really white.  I'm #$@^ing Belgian and Irish with a tiny kiss of Shawnee.  The only thing my MC and I have in common in this WIP is that we're both southern and we have both met Black people at one time or another.
> 
> ...


To say that authors can't write outside of their racial or ethnic groups seems to be essentially saying that people can't understand people outside of their race, which is, IMO, really, really wrong. I know the reigning sentiment in the current diversity fad is to constrain authors by their race, but this seems to be a very extreme version of standpoint epistemology in literary form. And, like I mentioned before, it doesn't just constrain white authors, but minority authors, too. Every book by a minority author now suddenly has to be about "the x experience." It isn't right. An author is not their protagonist. Like, I'm not Asian, or adopted, or neurotypical, or a dinosaur, but I've written many characters in all those categories. So, write characters that are different from you. It's something authors do with regards to most other aspects of life; why shouldn't it apply to race?


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## Parabola (May 17, 2022)

ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord said:


> I guess that's a fair point . I guess it's more accurate to say: sometimes stereotypes come from a real cultural pattern. Other times they come from the fact that some people fit it and a degree of hearsay led to the whole group being characterized as such. In the case of trains, it might be because a train special interest is more noticeably different than, say, a video game special interest or a TV show special interest.



Yeah, I get what you mean about cultural differences etc.

Here's the thing with "forced diversity." I don't always agree with how it's handled, and there are certain instances where it seems heavy-handed, but then it makes me curious if diversity is indeed more enforced than, say, previous expressions of racism (or any "ism") that was embedded in the culture. It might be expressed differently (social media), than before, but focusing one's indignation over that vs how it's been handled in the past ("all white stuff" or how LGBTQ were portrayed etc).


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## RGS (May 17, 2022)

At the end of the day, any given work is likely to offend someone who's likely to be offended, and that's all you can say. Of course I don't think anyone should issue a blanket insult directed toward any particular demographic, but let's be real here. As said above, people are people and we're very diverse.


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## Cephus (May 17, 2022)

Sinister said:


> Do I have any right to write about this man and his family?


Of course you do. Anyone who says otherwise is... well... someone we won't really discuss here.


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## RGS (May 17, 2022)

Sinister said:


> Do I have any right to write about this man and his family?


Absolutely. The first half of my last novel takes place in late 1800's/early 1900's London. I wasn't alive then and I've never been to London. If that's the standard we're going to be held to, then no one could ever write a book about anything that doesn't fall within their own time frame and their own "demographic."

Speaking of which, I almost hate to use the term "demographic," because it's such a broad brush. Each and every one of us falls into at least twenty distinct "demographics."


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## Parabola (May 17, 2022)

ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord said:


> LGBTQ is interesting because it is inherently not just an issue of representation but beliefs about sexuality. i. e. if I were to write a character who was attracted to the same sex but chose to remain celibate because they believed in traditional sexual morality, that would probably be viewed as "bad" representation by the community, even though people like that do exist.



I mean, I could see that possibly written as an "agenda" depending on how it's done (implying that homosexuality is wrong). Many people seem to be against this kind of writing, so then if it seems to be written in a way that encourages celibacy for gay characters, thereby enforcing an agenda, it would be difficult not to see that as a contradiction based on the values they (the anti-agenda brigade) seemingly have set.


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## D. L. Keur (May 17, 2022)

Homosexuality is not the problem, IMO.  The problem is religious intolerance and religious indoctrination, to the point of calling for the death of those who are homosexual or trans or anything other than cis- and hetero-monogamous.  What IS a problem for me is when the LBGTQ+23 insist I must watch their interpersonal interactions and not be dismissive.  Excuse me?  I'm dismissive of watching interpersonal interactions between hetero-s.  I find it summarily boring and completely a turn-off.  On with the story, please.  And I certainly don't want to see any of it of any stripe in public spaces.


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## indianroads (May 17, 2022)

D. L. Keur said:


> Homosexuality is not the problem, IMO.  The problem is religious intolerance and religious indoctrination, to the point of calling for the death of those who are homosexual or trans or anything other than cis- and hetero-monogamous.  What IS a problem for me is when the LBGTQ+23 insist I must watch their interpersonal interactions and not be dismissive.  Excuse me?  I'm dismissive of watching interpersonal interactions between hetero-s.  I find it summarily boring and completely a turn-off.  On with the story, please.  And I certainly don't want to see any of it of any stripe in public spaces.


I agree completely. I don't want to see anyone, regardless of their polarization, macking it up in public.


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## Ajoy (May 17, 2022)

D. L. Keur said:


> Homosexuality is not the problem, IMO.  The problem is religious intolerance and religious indoctrination, to the point of calling for the death of those who are homosexual or trans or anything other than cis- and hetero-monogamous.  What IS a problem for me is when the LBGTQ+23 insist I must watch their interpersonal interactions and not be dismissive.  Excuse me?  I'm dismissive of watching interpersonal interactions between hetero-s.  I find it summarily boring and completely a turn-off.  On with the story, please.  And I certainly don't want to see any of it of any stripe in public spaces.


I'm confused if this is about PDA, watching steamy scenes on shows/movies, reading novels, or all of it. And are there queer people really insisting you consume such content? To what end? 

I write queer characters because I like reading stories with people like me, but I also don't mind sex scenes in novels (queer or not)...as long as they don't go on in explicit detail for seven pages - I'm talking to you, Laurell K Hamilton. (This is somewhat of a joke because I find she over writes so heavily, making her sex scenes complete erotica, and yet I've read a lot of her stuff...I just had to learn to skim through multiple paragraphs to get back to the story or listen on X1.75 speed.) lol


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## D. L. Keur (May 17, 2022)

Ajoy said:


> I'm confused if this is about PDA, watching steamy scenes on shows/movies, reading novels, or all of it. And are there queer people really insisting you consume such content? To what end?
> 
> I write queer characters because I like reading stories with people like me, but I also don't mind sex scenes in novels (queer or not)...as long as they don't go on in explicit detail for seven pages - I'm talking to you, Laurell K Hamilton. (This is somewhat of a joke because I find she over writes so heavily, making her sex scenes complete erotica, and yet I've read a lot of her stuff...I just had to learn to skim through multiple paragraphs to get back to the story or listen on X1.75 speed.) lol


Books, movies, television, and right downtown Snotpiddle, Idiotho.  And often straight out of the blue.  I'm sorry.  I do not need an edjumacation in hetero- or homo- sex acts.  (I really do find most descriptions and depictions of the in and out club to be summarily BORING.  Obviously, these people have never had a real lover who knows what he/she/it's about.)

And then there's the insistence at the supermarket door of Rainbow People as well as the Uber-Religious Right, both shoving their propaganda pamphlets at me, practically simultaneously, I do not need.  Nor do I want to see a man and a woman, two women, or two men or any threesome of similar, rubbing against each in a public space.

The worst is that, me with shorn hair and in hard physical shape, often gets approached by lesbian women who insist I must be a butch dyke.  I have gay/lesbian/homo friends--artists, authors, and, yes, PhDs, too, and they don't care that I'm hetero-.  But these strangers?  Explaining that to them very kindly winds up with them claiming I should try it.  I'd like it.  I'm sorry.  Now they've gone way too far.  "Get the FUCK out of my face and our of my space." <-- Yes, I find it offensive.  I don't do that to them--tell them they should 'try it, you'd like it' when it comes to what's contrary to their choices!

*In books, in TV series, and in movies, it's practically a CAMPAIGN* to get Americans accustomed to alternative choices in sexuality, yet, if you look at the percentages, it's nowhere near as common as portrayed on screen and in books ...except, of course, for the kids following trends because they think it's the thing to do to get them accepted in their circles.

Not trying to offend, here, @Ajoy .  I'm trying to avoid being accosted by what I consider should be personal choices, not something shoved down my throat that I HAVE to publicly embrace or be called out as prejudiced.


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## indianroads (May 18, 2022)

I embarrass easily, and so won’t write or read explicit sex scenes. I will set things up so the reader knows what’s coming, then skip to the aftermath.


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## D. L. Keur (May 18, 2022)

indianroads said:


> I embarrass easily, and so won’t write or read explicit sex scenes. I will set things up so the reader knows what’s coming, then skip to the aftermath.


And thereby he leaves himself vulnerable to all sorts of good-natured pokes in the ribs!


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## indianroads (May 18, 2022)

D. L. Keur said:


> And thereby he leaves himself vulnerable to all sorts of good-natured pokes in the ribs!


I’ll cover my eyes.


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## D. L. Keur (May 18, 2022)

indianroads said:


> I’ll cover my eyes.


And that makes you even MORE vulnerable.


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## indianroads (May 18, 2022)

D. L. Keur said:


> And that makes you even MORE vulnerable.


Great video.


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## Xander416 (May 18, 2022)

ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord said:


> Second, minority authors are pigeonholed because the fad has become all about "writing their experience" (what if they don't want to write their experience? What if they just want to write, say, a black character, without it being ABOUT "the black experience"?).


This is a something I've thought of throughout this thread, but never brought up. It should be acknowledged that there's a difference between having a character that's black, Asian, whatever and telling a story about _being_ one of those.


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## Taylor (May 18, 2022)

*Not sure how you guys got to sex scenes.  This thread is about Diversity in your writing.  Can we steer it back, please?  

Thanks, @Xander416 *


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## D. L. Keur (May 18, 2022)

Sexual diversity isn't part of diversity in writing?  Ah, ok-a-aaay.  News to me.


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## Ajoy (May 18, 2022)

indianroads said:


> I embarrass easily, and so won’t write or read explicit sex scenes. I will set things up so the reader knows what’s coming, then skip to the aftermath.


I'm comfortable with a little more range, but I don't like it super explicit/detailed/drawn out. A few words go a long way in steamy scenes and super detailed mechanics and body part descriptions are too much for me. On the other side of the spectrum, I don't mind reading/writing fade to black sex scenes either though...

I seem to trailed off of the OP so I'll reiterate that I feel this way about both queer and straight scenes. : )

Edit: I posted this before seeing the redirect. Sorry.


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## Xander416 (May 18, 2022)

Taylor said:


> *Not sure how you guys got to sex scenes.*


Why is water wet? Why isn't hair blue or green naturally? Why hasn't this kid been signed by the UFC?






Mysteries we'll never know the answer to.


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## Ajoy (May 18, 2022)

Xander416 said:


> This is a something I've thought of throughout this thread, but never brought up. It should be acknowledged that there's a difference between having a character that's black, Asian, whatever and telling a story about _being_ one of those.


I agree with this. It comes down to the POV for me. I wouldn't be comfortable telling a story from a POV that I have very little ability to understand (even with a lot of research), but I still try to include a diverse cast of characters (as is logical for the story).


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## ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord (May 18, 2022)

Ajoy said:


> I agree with this. It comes down to the POV for me. I wouldn't be comfortable telling a story from a POV that I have very little ability to understand (even with a lot of research), but I still try to include a diverse cast of characters (as is logical for the story).


I think it's absolutely okay to tell a story from a POV different from your own. Different racial/ethnic groups _can _understand each other's perspectives or experiences. If I can understand the perspective of a man, or a person from a different country than me, or a person with a different set of core beliefs, or a person with a different neurotype, why couldn't I understand the perspective of someone of a different race or ethnicity? 

I _do _think it's a mistake if a book is pushed as "speaking for" a group, or representing all of their experience (because who could do that, even as someone from that group?), but writing from the POV of people different from you is fine, IMO.  

TBH, for me, it's more of an empathy stretch to write a neurotypical character or a character that believes in double predestination or a Unitarian than it is to write a character of a different race, especially if the setting isn't historical or contemporary (since those require more research).


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## Ajoy (May 18, 2022)

ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord said:


> I think it's absolutely okay to tell a story from a POV different from your own. Different racial/ethnic groups _can _understand each other's perspectives or experiences. If I can understand the perspective of a man, or a person from a different country than me, or a person with a different set of core beliefs, or a person with a different neurotype, why couldn't I understand the perspective of someone of a different race or ethnicity?
> 
> I _do _think it's a mistake if a book is pushed as "speaking for" a group, or representing all of their experience (because who could do that, even as someone from that group?), but writing from the POV of people different from you is fine, IMO.
> 
> TBH, for me, it's more of an empathy stretch to write a neurotypical character or a character that believes in double predestination or a Unitarian than it is to write a character of a different race, especially if the setting isn't historical or contemporary (since those require more research).


I should clarify that I’m speaking more to contemporary/realistic stories about less represented groups with the story centered around problems unique to that group.

I (personally) don’t feel confident about taking on such a POV when I believe there’s someone better than me to tell it. Own voice stories are so sought out, I think, because they lend authenticity to the POV character.


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## Ultraroel (May 18, 2022)

I'm an avid hater on diversity just for the sake of diversity. It pisses me off. Most of the stories I write are fantasy, based on my own races that have nothing to do with real life. I have races that have almost transparent skin or have no eyes.

However, when I write something in an alternate reality, I do care about accuracy for as much as possible. If I write a story in Europe in the 1600s, it's likely my characters will be ranged throughout European looks. If they travel to the "New world" they will meet indigenous people. I care more about accuracy or common sense, rather than diversity for the sake of diversity. 

If I read a book that feels like it does that, it will ruin the whole experience for me.


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## Taylor (May 18, 2022)

*Sexual diversity discussions are relevant here, sorry for the confusion. Carry on.*


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## Cephus (May 18, 2022)

indianroads said:


> I embarrass easily, and so won’t write or read explicit sex scenes. I will set things up so the reader knows what’s coming, then skip to the aftermath.


I don't get embarrassed, I just don't see the point. Any time sex comes up in my books, it fades to black. If that's what someone is into, there's Pornhub.


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## D. L. Keur (May 18, 2022)

So what happens if you are White and you want to write a story from the POV of a Black person or vice versa?  Can't do it?  And, so, following that logic, does that mean that, to avoid castigation today, a woman can't write a story from the POV of a man and a man can't write a story from the POV of a woman?  How about writing about aliens like I do as Aeros?  Or, worse, writing multi-POV novels where the players are from varied genders, various races, various nationalities, various disabilities, etc., ad infinitum?  I mean, heavens, I'm introducing a man suffering dwarfism in my mystery series!!!  (And, no, I'm short at 5'5", but I don't suffer dwarfism--no short jokes, please! My husband teases me enough!)


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## indianroads (May 18, 2022)

D. L. Keur said:


> So what happens if you are White and you want to write a story from the POV of a Black person or vice versa?  Can't do it?  And, so, following that logic, does that mean that, to avoid castigation today, a woman can't write a story from the POV of a man and a man can't write a story from the POV of a woman?  How about writing about aliens like I do as Aeros?  Or, worse, writing multi-POV novels where the players are from varied genders, various races, various nationalities, various disabilities, etc., ad infinitum?  I mean, heavens, I'm introducing a man suffering dwarfism in my mystery series!!!  (And, no, I'm short at 5'5", but I don't suffer dwarfism--no short jokes, please! My husband teases me enough!)


VERY good points!
We shouldn't let anyone put a muzzle on our creativity.


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## Tettsuo (May 18, 2022)

D. L. Keur said:


> So what happens if you are White and you want to write a story from the POV of a Black person or vice versa?


So long as you understand the social pressures related to that race, gender and/or sexual orientation, go for it.

I'm probably going to make some people angry, but I think straight, white, Christian men have the hardest time relating to other people not in their specific group. This specific group has the most to learn as they've never had to be socially thoughtful (so to speak). They are considered the baseline. Any deviation from the baseline has to be explained. They are also the least restricted group on Earth in modern society. Women are the most restricted, evidenced by the US overturning Roe V Wade. The fact that it's even in question whether or not they will be forced to have their bodies used for reproduction is proof enough.


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## D. L. Keur (May 18, 2022)

Tettsuo said:


> I think straight, white, Christian men have the hardest time relating to other people not in their specific group.


I don't.  I think Muslim men and certain more primitive tribal males fit that much better, but, even there, it's not a given across the board.  In the few matriarchal tribes that exist in the world, the problem exists within their cultures, as well. Blanket categorizations of Western males, White OR Christian OR otherwise, leads to dangerous generalizations and assumptions.  The less insulated and less indoctrinated a person, the more open they are to new ideas; the more insulated and indoctrinated, the more new ideas are spurned.


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## Cephus (May 18, 2022)

D. L. Keur said:


> So what happens if you are White and you want to write a story from the POV of a Black person or vice versa?  Can't do it?  And, so, following that logic, does that mean that, to avoid castigation today, a woman can't write a story from the POV of a man and a man can't write a story from the POV of a woman?  How about writing about aliens like I do as Aeros?  Or, worse, writing multi-POV novels where the players are from varied genders, various races, various nationalities, various disabilities, etc., ad infinitum?  I mean, heavens, I'm introducing a man suffering dwarfism in my mystery series!!!  (And, no, I'm short at 5'5", but I don't suffer dwarfism--no short jokes, please! My husband teases me enough!)


Not only can I do it, I do it. Works just fine. Nobody has ever complained and I wouldn't care if they did. Anyone who doesn't like it, I'll direct them to a very long pier that they can jump off of.


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## PiP (May 18, 2022)

Tettsuo said:


> So long as you understand the social pressures related to that race, gender and/or sexual orientation, go for it.
> 
> I'm probably going to make some people angry, but I think straight, white, Christian men have the hardest time relating to other people not in their specific group. This specific group has the most to learn as they've never had to be socially thoughtful (so to speak). They are considered the baseline. Any deviation from the baseline has to be explained. They are also the least restricted group on Earth in modern society. Women are the most restricted, evidenced by the US overturning Roe V Wade. The fact that it's even in question whether or not they will be forced to have their bodies used for reproduction is proof enough.



Can a Muslim man write from a woman’s POV as to what it feels like to be confined in a Burka any more than I can crawl inside the mind of a serial rapist? I don’t know,  but as writers we should be able to adapt. That said, perhaps we stick to writing genres we feel comfortable with. I would have no problem writing a love story between a black man and white woman because I would focus on relationship… etc


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## D. L. Keur (May 18, 2022)

Cephus said:


> Not only can I do it, I do it. Works just fine. Nobody has ever complained and I wouldn't care if they did. Anyone who doesn't like it, I'll direct them to a very long pier that they can jump off of.


Ditto for me.  You took the words right out of my brain, but said it better.


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## Cephus (May 18, 2022)

Tettsuo said:


> So long as you understand the social pressures related to that race, gender and/or sexual orientation, go for it.
> 
> I'm probably going to make some people angry, but I think straight, white, Christian men have the hardest time relating to other people not in their specific group. This specific group has the most to learn as they've never had to be socially thoughtful (so to speak). They are considered the baseline. Any deviation from the baseline has to be explained. They are also the least restricted group on Earth in modern society. Women are the most restricted, evidenced by the US overturning Roe V Wade. The fact that it's even in question whether or not they will be forced to have their bodies used for reproduction is proof enough.


No, because that assumes commonality across all people in a specific group. People are people, people are not a monolith. There is no universal "black experience". There is no universal "gay experience". There are only people who have their own experiences, based on their surroundings. Welcome to reality. This is a problem that I've pointed out many, many times, that there is a desire to see everyone as being just like you are.

That's not how it works. That's not the real world. Everyone is different. The reason it's been assumed that everyone is the same is so that political factions, primarily, although it's also done for religious reasons, can control them easier. It's how being black was weaponized into a voting bloc, by telling them that they were all oppressed, even though they weren't. "You have to behave like us and do what we tell you because we're 'your people!'" No, there is no 'your people'. There are only people. Yet certain political ideologies refuse to give it up because that's how they stay in power. The same goes for many religions, who preach oppression and discrimination so that people will keep filling the pews and handing over their money.

Ultimately, it's all a scam. I hope nobody is surprised.

And you're wrong, the worst out there right now are Muslims living in Muslim-majority countries. They don't have to adapt because their religion is all-pervasive. The Qur'an says gay people are evil so they throw gay people off of roofs. You don't typically see Christians doing that, unless you go to some places in Africa, where they're every bit as bad, but that's because most Christians, at least in the western world, don't have the same kind of political and social power that allows them to bend society to their will. Granted, Christians have their own problems, just like Hindus and Buddhists and all the rest do. When you're running on pure fee-fees, it's no wonder you don't know what's actually going on in reality.

This isn't meant to be overtly political but it's really one topic that is impossible to talk about otherwise. As authors, we need to understand the world. This is what's really going on.


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## D. L. Keur (May 18, 2022)

Cephus said:


> You don't typically see Christians doing that... at least in the western world, [they] don't have the same kind of political and social power that allows them to bend society to their will.


No longer true in the U.S., it seems, and it's getting worse, especially for women and their bodies.  Reactionary Christians want a theocracy, not a democratic republic, and they're boldly going after it.


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## Cephus (May 18, 2022)

D. L. Keur said:


> No longer true in the U.S., it seems, and it's getting worse, especially for women and their bodies.  Reactionary Christians want a theocracy, not a democracy, and they're boldly going after it.


Mostly because I think we're in the last generation or two that people in the western world are going to take religion seriously. In Europe and the UK, religion is a minority position and has been for a while. In the U.S., non-belief is the fastest growing demographic around. What I think we're seeing today is that a lot of the moderates have left religion, leaving only the fanatics behind and they're terrified that their numbers are dwindling. That's not to turn this into a religious discussion, certainly this isn't the proper place to do that, but I didn't bring it up either. I do find it interesting to note that the same methodology used by the fanatically religious is virtually identical to the methods used by political groups trying to push for diversity. It's all "you have to be like we are or we're going to come after you," which is really childish. That's effectively the same thing as what goes on in playgrounds. I find that very, very sad.


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## D. L. Keur (May 18, 2022)

Cephus said:


> Mostly because I think we're in the last generation or two that people in the western world are going to take religion seriously. In Europe and the UK, religion is a minority position and has been for a while. In the U.S., non-belief is the fastest growing demographic around. What I think we're seeing today is that a lot of the moderates have left religion, leaving only the fanatics behind and they're terrified that their numbers are dwindling. That's not to turn this into a religious discussion, certainly this isn't the proper place to do that, but I didn't bring it up either. I do find it interesting to note that the same methodology used by the fanatically religious is virtually identical to the methods used by political groups trying to push for diversity. It's all "you have to be like we are or we're going to come after you," which is really childish. That's effectively the same thing as what goes on in playgrounds. I find that very, very sad.


Agreed.


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## indianroads (May 18, 2022)

Tettsuo said:


> So long as you understand the social pressures related to that race, gender and/or sexual orientation, go for it.
> 
> I'm probably going to make some people angry, but I think straight, white, Christian men have the hardest time relating to other people not in their specific group. This specific group has the most to learn as they've never had to be socially thoughtful (so to speak). They are considered the baseline. Any deviation from the baseline has to be explained. They are also the least restricted group on Earth in modern society. Women are the most restricted, evidenced by the US overturning Roe V Wade. The fact that it's even in question whether or not they will be forced to have their bodies used for reproduction is proof enough.


I think it depends on the environment they grew up in and in general life experiences.


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## Theglasshouse (May 18, 2022)

The voice of authority can be chaotic from the many perspectives or points of view of experiences people have pointed out. Religion has Pope Francis who has been more vocal about supporting sexual orientation that is viewed as different (against discrimination).

I agree though with tettsuo and cephus and felt the political views of government should believe in collectivism ( I think I am using this correctly but could be wrong)I will say. Or collectivism versus a deterministic government or big government regulation ( not necessarily a United States Democratic perspective this last point).

Still since there are social justice movements to win rights where territory is encroached because of disagreement and so on. I think while diversity is a subject that is open to multiple interpretations there is not sadly much we can do about it in the political system in many countries. I think depicting authentic experiences will need research. Sometimes seeing what other writers have done opens up some possibilities of what can de done to see how to do it better.

Those who became successful writing  the other person's work should be critiqued by the inner critic of people who read literature who enjoy understanding a person's emotions regardless of background.

Just like we are our own inner critic for our work. We must understand why some stories worked and others didnt with regards to "diversity". The bestsellers success we ought to examine. Some say interview people, and others say read experiences of people with a specific mindset ( some teachers of nonfiction).


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## ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord (May 18, 2022)

Ajoy said:


> I should clarify that I’m speaking more to contemporary/realistic stories about less represented groups with the story centered around problems unique to that group.
> 
> I (personally) don’t feel confident about taking on such a POV when I believe there’s someone better than me to tell it. Own voice stories are so sought out, I think, because they lend authenticity to the POV character.


Well, personally, I wouldn't take on such a POV of a group I'm _part of. _I don't find such stories interesting, and I'm the last person to assume that most people in my group would relate to me. Maybe someday I'll make something more autobiographical, but right now it's really uninteresting to me.

And while I see the value of ownvoices and know that people outside a group can make silly mistakes, I think I've grown a bit disillusioned with the ownvoices movement in recent years. First of all, an outside author _can _write that sort of story -- maybe it's harder, but that doesn't mean it isn't a worthy artistic goal. I am glad that the white, male, middle-aged author of _A Cry of Stone _didn't avoid writing his story about a young woman Ojibwe artist.

Secondly, ownvoices doesn't solve the problem of "good representation". I've seen it happen before -- some book comes out that some find fails to represent an experience well, they assume it's written by a non-minority, turns out it's ownvoices, the criticism gets gentler but still remains. Rinse and repeat. It just doesn't work to demand that an author reveal who they are to legitimize a work. The invisibility of the author is something I really value, and I think ownvoices can cut against that.



Tettsuo said:


> So long as you understand the social pressures related to that race, gender and/or sexual orientation, go for it.
> 
> I'm probably going to make some people angry, but I think straight, white, Christian men have the hardest time relating to other people not in their specific group. This specific group has the most to learn as they've never had to be socially thoughtful (so to speak). They are considered the baseline. Any deviation from the baseline has to be explained. They are also the least restricted group on Earth in modern society. Women are the most restricted, evidenced by the US overturning Roe V Wade. The fact that it's even in question whether or not they will be forced to have their bodies used for reproduction is proof enough.





D. L. Keur said:


> I don't.  I think Muslim men and certain more primitive tribal males fit that much better, but, even there, it's not a given across the board.  In the few matriarchal tribes that exist in the world, the problem exists within their cultures, as well. Blanket categorizations of Western males, White OR Christian OR otherwise, leads to dangerous generalizations and assumptions.  The less insulated and less indoctrinated a person, the more open they are to new ideas; the more insulated and indoctrinated, the more new ideas are spurned.


I don't have any evidence for this other than anecdotal, but sometimes I suspect it's more about temperament than demographic, beliefs, or exposure. I've met people from really insular sects in the middle of the country who were pretty open-minded, and while they may have not agreed, could understand that people had different beliefs and experiences. Meanwhile there are plenty of people from my university (very cosmopolitan and international) who can't seem to wrap their mind around the fact that some people have a very different set of core beliefs. Open-mindedness can be both a blessing and a curse, and some are more naturally inclined to it than others.

As for the abortion discussion that's sprung up, I just have to say that you will never understand the pro-life side if you continue to insist it's about men wanting to control women. Most pro-life activists I've met/seen _are _women. Pro-life people believe that there are two sets of human rights involved in the question, not just one. Pro-life people would say that if it's a women's rights issue, it's as much the rights of the women inside wombs as outside. It's simply a strawman to say it's about control or theocracy (there are plenty of secular or even atheist pro-life supporters). Few would call a ban on infanticide "forced reproduction" -- and, yes, most pro-lifers do not see a significant difference between abortion and infanticide. I don't want to derail the thread, but I also dislike seeing this strawman bandied around casually as if it was an agreed-upon fact. If you actually ask a pro-life person why they believe what they believe, they will tell you.

And this is, I think, an important thing to note when writing those with different worldviews than you. It is much better to take their word for it and try to understand their perspective, _as stated_, than to think, "No, there must be some hidden reason." I see this problem in the way modern authors interpret medieval ascetism. It's like, you don't need to come up with some complex psychological thing behind it. You can read their writings -- they believe it brought them closer to God. I think that's a mistake, absolutely, (I am not an ascetic) but you're never going to understand an ascetic by making up your own psychological speculation if you're not even willing to believe their own account of their motivations.


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## Theglasshouse (May 18, 2022)

This also ties in with people who are of a specific culture writing about cultures of their countries. Junot Diaz is a very vocal critic of people who want to be inclusive when including writers no matter the background or where they come from. I believe there are are more views and movements than ownvoices since some writers write about culture. Junot diaz's essays which can be found on the internet on the subject sees too many authors being published considered not to be majorities of a country.








						Why This MIT Professor Requires Students Watch 'Star Wars' Before His Class
					


"You look at this country and you look at this world and you need to understand it in complex ways."





					www.huffpost.com
				




In one way there is an argument that the more complex characters can be gleaned and understood by exploring characters that don't look like you.


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## D. L. Keur (May 18, 2022)

ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord said:


> Well, personally, I wouldn't take on such a POV of a group I'm _part of. _I don't find such stories interesting, and I'm the last person to assume that most people in my group would relate to me. Maybe someday I'll make something more autobiographical, but right now it's really uninteresting to me.
> 
> And while I see the value of ownvoices and know that people outside a group can make silly mistakes, I think I've grown a bit disillusioned with the ownvoices movement in recent years. First of all, an outside author _can _write that sort of story -- maybe it's harder, but that doesn't mean it isn't a worthy artistic goal. I am glad that the white, male, middle-aged author of _A Cry of Stone _didn't avoid writing his story about a young woman Ojibwe artist.
> 
> Secondly, ownvoices doesn't solve the problem of "good representation". I've seen it happen before -- some book comes out that some find fails to represent an experience well, they assume it's written by a non-minority, turns out it's ownvoices, the criticism gets gentler but still remains. Rinse and repeat. It just doesn't work to demand that an author reveal who they are to legitimize a work. The invisibility of the author is something I really value, and I think ownvoices can cut against that.


Any group that demands exclusivity , that practices discriminatory methods to silence others, and employs punitive methods to curtail the expression of others is guilty of repression and tyranny.  They are, in fact, a dangerous mob. 



ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord said:


> Abortion commentary


Some of us perceive that a fetus, wholly dependent upon its life being sustained by acting as a parasite inside the woman's body, is just a fetus, *not a person until and unless it can sustain its own life outside the womb*, historically deemed alive when it can and does draw breath. To demand a woman who becomes pregnant to become enslaved to the fetus, forcing her to abnegate her rights to its, whether the pregnancy is the result of irresponsible sex, because of contraceptive failure (happens in 1% of the cases), or because of rape or incest, is denying that woman autonomy.

You can claim abortion is infanticide all you want, but a fetus is not viable life until it can breath on its own. Until then it is, in fact, a parasite, and, personally speaking, and this will get me stoned, I know, I have no problem at all with feticide. The problem with some religious adherents is that they perceive that human "potential life" (Alito's draft opinion) -- that would be the 'seed' of the man and the ova of wo(mb)man) -- is sacred (...but only in humans, of course). So, in the eyes of certain religious, *even contraception is contrary to their "god's" will*.  And that is where* those who adhere to these certain religious beliefs are fine with shoving their beliefs down everyone else's throat, mine included*, me who does not perceive humans as superior to any other thing, the living or inert.  If a pro-lifer doesn't want to get an abortion, nobody is forcing her to.  Why should a pro-lifer think they should be able to dictate to someone who doesn't share their values about a piece of protoplasm growing inside their bodies?

You have your perspective.  I have mine.  We live in a representative democracy called a republic.  More than 60% of the U.S. does not agree with Alito or the pro-life position.

The interesting thing to me is, whether it's OWNVOICES or the PRO-LIFERS, to name just the two mentioned, it's one group demanding that everyone else OBEY their dictate, a dictate and position THEY want heard and respected, yet they utterly refuse to respect the voices and rights of others, minority or majority, with whom they disagree.  *That's ultimate hypocrisy.  *


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## Ajoy (May 18, 2022)

ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord said:


> Well, personally, I wouldn't take on such a POV of a group I'm _part of. _I don't find such stories interesting, and I'm the last person to assume that most people in my group would relate to me. Maybe someday I'll make something more autobiographical, but right now it's really uninteresting to me.
> 
> And while I see the value of ownvoices and know that people outside a group can make silly mistakes, I think I've grown a bit disillusioned with the ownvoices movement in recent years. First of all, an outside author _can _write that sort of story -- maybe it's harder, but that doesn't mean it isn't a worthy artistic goal. I am glad that the white, male, middle-aged author of _A Cry of Stone _didn't avoid writing his story about a young woman Ojibwe artist.
> 
> Secondly, ownvoices doesn't solve the problem of "good representation". I've seen it happen before -- some book comes out that some find fails to represent an experience well, they assume it's written by a non-minority, turns out it's ownvoices, the criticism gets gentler but still remains. Rinse and repeat. It just doesn't work to demand that an author reveal who they are to legitimize a work. The invisibility of the author is something I really value, and I think ownvoices can cut against that.


I don't disagree with your well spoken points. 

In general, I think I just have a different perspective on it all. I seem to feel less bothered by diversity efforts than many on here (and that's just fine). And again, I'm really just speaking of my reader preferences and comfort with diversity as a writer--not trying to tell anyone else how to think.


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## ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord (May 18, 2022)

Ajoy said:


> I don't disagree with your well spoken points.
> 
> In general, I think I just have a different perspective on it all. I seem to feel less bothered by diversity efforts than many on here (and that's just fine). And again, I'm really just speaking of my reader preferences and comfort with diversity as a writer--not trying to tell anyone else how to think.


Yes, that makes sense! I think I've just been thinking more about the diversity issues because of the recent discovery of "Hey, I'm a minority, kinda." (autism diagnosis) I'm not bothered by efforts for greater diversity, either -- more by standpoint epistemology (i. e. "only Black people understand and can speak on Black experiences", or "only autistic people understand and can speak on autistic experiences") which is something I increasingly find myself disagreeing with.

------

@D. L. Keur  I understand that from (most) pro-choicers' perspective, a fetus is not a person. It would be a misrepresentation on my part if I said, "Prochoicers just want to murder children!" which is obviously not their motivation. My point is that it's a misrepresentation of the pro-life position to say that the goal is to control women. From their perspective, the goal is to stop killing innocents, and religion may or may not enter the conversation -- just like religion may or may not enter the conversation for someone who believes that, say, corporations should be restricted in their treatment of workers.

While_ I _believe that all life (even non-human life!) is sacred in some way, for many pro-lifers the question of sacredness never even enters the conversation -- it's just that they believe you shouldn't kill humans, and that somebody's rights only stop where another person's rights begin.  As I mentioned before, there are pro-life atheists. To most pro-lifers the best definition of a human person is not "a being capable of drawing breath" (after all, people on ventilators, or babies born premature, don't cease to be human), but a human organism, independent of maturation stage (is an infant less human than an 1-year-old?) or ability (is a person in a coma less human than an athlete?). Under no real biological definition is a developing fetus considered a parasite -- no scientist would call the eggs on a male frog's back parasites, or the seeds of a fruit parasites, so why would such logic be applied to humans?

It's something to think about when representing the views of characters who don't share our opinions -- are we fair to their motivations and beliefs? I can't remember who it is, but some writer talked about the importance of "ironmanning" your villains. It's the opposite of strawmanning. Give them the _best _arguments, the most logical motivations -- then it's more interesting, while also more difficult, to prove them wrong. A good question to ask, in both debate and character-making, is: what is the _most convincing argument possible_ your opponent could make, and does it fail? If it does fail, how?

Sincerely,

A Lump of Protoplasm
(sorry I had to. I mean, we all are, right?)


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## D. L. Keur (May 18, 2022)

ArrowInTheBowOfTheLord said:


> Yes, that makes sense! I think I've just been thinking more about the diversity issues because of the recent discovery of "Hey, I'm a minority, kinda." (autism diagnosis) I'm not bothered by efforts for greater diversity, either -- more by standpoint epistemology (i. e. "only Black people understand and can speak on Black experiences", or "only autistic people understand and can speak on autistic experiences") which is something I increasingly find myself disagreeing with.
> 
> ------
> 
> ...


Part of my perspective, to give you insight into me, is that I, a virgin at the time, was gang-raped at university coming out of a night lab, wound up pregnant (and aborted the _*detested*_ result --yes, a parasitical growth spawned of ugliness -- of the violence done me), and, because of the damage done me both physically and psychologically, couldn't finish my choice of career as a veterinarian ...because I was hospitalized and traumatized.  I am very much opposed to *ANYONE* *telling me what will or will NOT happen to my body*, no matter their reasons, no matter their status in society, no matter the laws of the land, no matter if it's a gang of MDs insisting I 'must'.  No I must *NOT* until and unless I -- repeat *I* -- *give my express consent*. * I'd rather be dead than have anyone dictate what happens to ME.  And that is final.  No compromise!!!*


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## RGS (May 19, 2022)

Cephus said:


> Not only can I do it, I do it. Works just fine. Nobody has ever complained and I wouldn't care if they did. Anyone who doesn't like it, I'll direct them to a very long pier that they can jump off of.


But can you really relate to what they're thinking as they jump off that pier, with them being of a different race, religion, or sexual preference?


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## Cephus (May 19, 2022)

RGS said:


> But can you really relate to what they're thinking as they jump off that pier, with them being of a different race, religion, or sexual preference?


I really don't give a damn.


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## PiP (May 19, 2022)

RGS said:


> But can you really relate to what they're thinking as they jump off that pier, with them being of a different race, religion, or sexual preference?


RGS, I am curious. Why does any of the above matter? They are people.  Writers create stories from the POV of dogs, cats and all sorts so are you saying you never write from the POV of anyone other than a white male.  I smile because you have not included women in the above list.


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## bdcharles (May 19, 2022)

Mark Twain't said:


> Maybe a sensitive subject for some but I've been going through my WiP and, looking at my characters, they're all white. I have to admit, I didn't give it a second thought. Is this something that anyone here gives any thought to? I know that the film industry gets a lot of stick about things like superheroes being almost all white but wondered about writers.
> 
> Just to clarify, some of my characters have blonde/fair hair and blue/green eyes but other than that, none are specifically described as being white.
> 
> ...



When I wrote _The Story of Echo_ (and currently in its followup), I included a variety of colour and orientation simply because I thought it would be cool, it would be cliché-avoidant, to have a fantasy world with just that contemporary diversity to it. I didn't want to focus too much on those details too much other than to dob a visual hint here and there to sketch the scene. And yes, I elected to change a few food metaphors. And yes, I went through the same shebang with the white folks too - again, to further avoid cliched writing by not doing it. But mostly I simply made the characters and had them act as authentically to themselves as I could. I wouldn't call this overthinking though. I'd just call it thinking. And then deciding what I want. And then doing it.

If however there is one area my characters are not all that diverse in, it's class. The bulk of the major ones really are quite middle class. I did try and suggest a more working-classness to some though. And some extreme poshness to others. Actually the poshness came direct from the character themselves and I excitedly went with it, massive houses and all. The fact of the matter is class is quite the "theme" - the joys of it but also how it gets weaponised.


----------



## RGS (May 19, 2022)

PiP said:


> RGS, I am curious. Why does any of the above matter? They are people.  Writers create stories from the POV of dogs, cats and all sorts so are you saying you never write from the POV of anyone other than a white male.  I smile because you have not included women in the above list.


The above was said in total jest. I honestly think that everyone on the planet is way too sensitive these days about their "category" in life. But technically, I've written from the perspective of several different people of several different situations.


----------



## Tettsuo (May 19, 2022)

Cephus said:


> No, because that assumes commonality across all people in a specific group. People are people, people are not a monolith. There is no universal "black experience". There is no universal "gay experience". There are only people who have their own experiences, based on their surroundings. Welcome to reality. This is a problem that I've pointed out many, many times, that there is a desire to see everyone as being just like you are.


Then I have to agree to disagree with you. There are many shared experiences between groups of people. Many mothers have the shared experience of childbirth. Many American black men have the shared experience of knowing more about the law then the average person would deem necessary.  Many Jewish men would have the shared experience of their religion and their connection to it. The list could easily be many pages long. If you truly believe that people in specific groups don't have shared experiences... I'm baffled.



Cephus said:


> And you're wrong, the worst out there right now are Muslims living in Muslim-majority countries.


Disagree. Depending on the country, you'll have a vastly different experience for Muslims men. Muslims in Indonesia will not have the same social rigidity as men of the same faith in Afghanistan.


Cephus said:


> They don't have to adapt because their religion is all-pervasive. The Qur'an says gay people are evil so they throw gay people off of roofs. You don't typically see Christians doing that, unless you go to some places in Africa, where they're every bit as bad, but that's because most Christians, at least in the western world, don't have the same kind of political and social power that allows them to bend society to their will. Granted, Christians have their own problems, just like Hindus and Buddhists and all the rest do. When you're running on pure fee-fees, it's no wonder you don't know what's actually going on in reality.


The only thing that keeps the Christians of America from being as insane as Muslims in Afghanistan is the separation of church and state... and they want to do away with that as well. Just look at the similarities between the Taliban and Christian fundamentalist in America. Very little difference.





In fact, there's very little difference between the Qu'ran and the Bible.


----------



## D. L. Keur (May 19, 2022)

Tettsuo said:


> The only thing that keeps the Christians of America from being as insane as Muslims in Afghanistan is the separation of church and state... and they want to do away with that as well. Just look at the similarities between the Taliban and Christian fundamentalist in America. Very little difference.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Truth there.  True about all of the fundamentalist Abrahamic religions.


----------



## D. L. Keur (May 19, 2022)

Tettsuo said:


> Then I have to agree to disagree with you. There are many shared experiences between groups of people. Many mothers have the shared experience of childbirth. Many American black men have the shared experience of knowing more about the law then the average person would deem necessary. Many Jewish men would have the shared experience of their religion and their connection to it. The list could easily be many pages long. If you truly believe that people in specific groups don't have shared experiences... I'm baffled.


That obfuscates the point.  Of course, there are similar experiences.  We're all part of one species and are, pretty much, the same anatomically speaking. And there are some similar experiences between members of various types and cultures of people, however the grouping may be defined.  

However, the generalization that one self-identified group, (A), all share a common experience at the hands of some other group (B), group B being defined by group A, then moving to code into legis that anyone that can be identified as part of group A deserves special consideration, status, and compensation while all those identified by group A as part of group B deserve retribution and disenfranchisement is the point.


----------



## Tettsuo (May 19, 2022)

D. L. Keur said:


> That obfuscates the point.  Of course, there are similar experiences.  We're all part of one species and are, pretty much, the same anatomically speaking. And there are some similar experiences between members of various types and cultures of people, however the grouping may be defined.
> 
> However, the generalization that one self-identified group, (A), all share a common experience at the hands of some other group (B), group B being defined by group A, then moving to code into legis that anyone that can be identified as part of group A deserves special consideration, status, and compensation while all those identified by group A as part of group B deserve retribution and disenfranchisement is the point.


I think you're reading too far into what I'm saying. My point is quite simple. People who have similar traits tend to have similar experiences. That's as simple as I can phrase it. Unattractive women tend to have similar experiences. Poor people tend to have similar experiences. Overweight men tend to have similar experiences. Heck, Sociology basically studies such patterns in societies. Understanding the baseline experiences for a particular group is important in understanding the group. Can there be outliers? Of course! That does not alter the fact that there's a baseline for that particular group you're writing about.

IMO, if you're going to write about a person in a group, it's important to understand the baseline for that group. If you're going to write about a scrawny boy, and you've never experience life as a scrawny boy, do your research and understand their experiences. If I write about prison rape, I have to go and do some research about that experience because I've no understanding of that or how it could alter that character's life.

There's a reason why people have created support groups.


----------



## D. L. Keur (May 19, 2022)

Tettsuo said:


> I think you're reading too far into what I'm saying. My point is quite simple. People who have similar traits tend to have similar experiences. That's as simple as I can phrase it. Unattractive women tend to have similar experiences. Poor people tend to have similar experiences. Overweight men tend to have similar experiences. Heck, Sociology basically studies such patterns in societies. Understanding the baseline experiences for a particular group is important in understanding the group. Can there be outliers? Of course! That does not alter the fact that there's a baseline for that particular group you're writing about.
> 
> IMO, if you're going to write about a person in a group, it's important to understand the baseline for that group. If you're going to write about a scrawny boy, and you've never experience life as a scrawny boy, do your research and understand their experiences. If I write about prison rape, I have to go and do some research about that experience because I've no understanding of that or how it could alter that character's life.
> 
> There's a reason why people have created support groups.


That I agree with.  Well said.


----------



## Cephus (May 19, 2022)

Tettsuo said:


> Then I have to agree to disagree with you. There are many shared experiences between groups of people. Many mothers have the shared experience of childbirth. Many American black men have the shared experience of knowing more about the law then the average person would deem necessary.  Many Jewish men would have the shared experience of their religion and their connection to it. The list could easily be many pages long. If you truly believe that people in specific groups don't have shared experiences... I'm baffled.



That's the story told to you by the people who want your allegiance. You have to notice your own phrasing. "Many people have similar experiences". Sure, but not all and that's the narrative being pushed. All people with a certain characteristic are identical and must be portrayed as identical to keep the narrative going.

That's nonsense.

It's the same thing often done in religion. You'll get a lot of Christians or Muslims declaring that all atheists really know their gods are real. Funny, they seem to have forgotten to run that past any actual atheists. All of this is intended to comfort the already faithful, it has nothing at all to do with reality. All of it is an ideological scam meant to fleece the gullible and keep people under control.

No thanks.


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## D. L. Keur (May 19, 2022)

I want to get back to the OWNVOICES problem, and, to me, it is a problem.  Placing limitations with the threat of ruining someone's career as a writer, castigating them for their creative choices, and demanding that they NOT write a character outside their own nationality, race, sex, orientation ... blah, blah, blah ... is, in my opinion, destructive, counterproductive, and just plain wrong. I can't have a Creole woman be the best friend of a white woman?  Really?  I can't write a crossbred Cree man because I'm crossbred Potawatomi woman?  I can't write a Black character as an integral member of a strike team because I'm not Black?  I can ONLY write White/Potawatomi crossbred hetero- female characters because that's my genetic heritage and miscellany?


----------



## Cephus (May 19, 2022)

Tettsuo said:


> I think you're reading too far into what I'm saying. My point is quite simple. People who have similar traits tend to have similar experiences. That's as simple as I can phrase it. Unattractive women tend to have similar experiences. Poor people tend to have similar experiences. Overweight men tend to have similar experiences. Heck, Sociology basically studies such patterns in societies. Understanding the baseline experiences for a particular group is important in understanding the group. Can there be outliers? Of course! That does not alter the fact that there's a baseline for that particular group you're writing about.


And you're wrong. We keep pointing out that black people have a wide variety of experiences depending on their background, upbringing and location. A black person living in the antebellum south is going to have a very different experience than a black person living in modern-day Chicago. A black person living in the ghetto on Los Angeles is going to have a very different experience than someone living in the upper crust in Manhattan. You can't just look at someone and say "oh, you're black, I now understand your experience!" You're just wrong!


----------



## Cephus (May 19, 2022)

D. L. Keur said:


> I want to get back to the OWNVOICES problem, and, to me, it is a problem.  Placing limitations with the threat of ruining someone's career as a writer, castigating them for their creative choices, and demanding that they NOT write a character outside their own nationality, race, sex, orientation ... blah, blah, blah ... is, in my opinion, destructive, counterproductive, and just plain wrong. I can't have a Creole woman be the best friend of a white woman?  Really?  I can't write a crossbred Cree man because I'm crossbred Potawatomi woman?  I can't write a Black character as an integral member of a strike team because I'm not Black?  I can ONLY write White/Potawatomi crossbred hetero- female characters because that's my genetic heritage and miscellany?


Even within the whole OWNVOICES nonsense, you had people being told that they were wrong because their voices didn't agree with the interpretation of others, often others who weren't even the same race or gender or whatever! It was often a bunch of white people telling black people that their experience was wrong because it didn't agree with what they thought the black experience ought to be.

How stupid is that?


----------



## D. L. Keur (May 19, 2022)

@Cephus  and @Tettsuo : I think you both are basically saying the same thing.  The communication bridge is failing to correctly translate.  I say that because I agree with both of you and don't particularly see a disparity, beyond, perhaps, minutia.


----------



## Tettsuo (May 19, 2022)

Cephus said:


> And you're wrong. We keep pointing out that black people have a wide variety of experiences depending on their background, upbringing and location. A black person living in the antebellum south is going to have a very different experience than a black person living in modern-day Chicago. A black person living in the ghetto on Los Angeles is going to have a very different experience than someone living in the upper crust in Manhattan. You can't just look at someone and say "oh, you're black, I now understand your experience!" You're just wrong!


No, I'm correct. You're being obtuse here.

Do you not see how YOU have created a group to even explain your point? A black person living in antebellum south and a person living in modern-day Chicago. Do you not agree that men living in antebellum south would have a lot in common? Do you not agree that poor white men and poor black men living in Chicago would have many similar experiences? Do you not agree that Asians living in San Francisco would have a very different life experiences from those living in rural Asia?


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## Tettsuo (May 19, 2022)

D. L. Keur said:


> I want to get back to the OWNVOICES problem, and, to me, it is a problem.  Placing limitations with the threat of ruining someone's career as a writer, castigating them for their creative choices, and demanding that they NOT write a character outside their own nationality, race, sex, orientation ... blah, blah, blah ... is, in my opinion, destructive, counterproductive, and just plain wrong. I can't have a Creole woman be the best friend of a white woman?  Really?  I can't write a crossbred Cree man because I'm crossbred Potawatomi woman?  I can't write a Black character as an integral member of a strike team because I'm not Black?  I can ONLY write White/Potawatomi crossbred hetero- female characters because that's my genetic heritage and miscellany?


You can write whatever you want. We still have many white writers writing about the people of different groups being published. OwnVoices is about people from a group writing about that group in addition, not the exclusion, of your voice. And I agree with that. We do need more people from various groups to do their art from the perspective of a person in that group. That can only expand the range of understanding. There is a depth of understand I can't get from simply researching the life of another. I'll never fully understand the life of a gay woman, certainly not to the same depth as a gay woman would.


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## Cephus (May 19, 2022)

Tettsuo said:


> No, I'm correct. You're being obtuse here.
> 
> Do you not see how YOU have created a group to even explain your point? A black person living in antebellum south and a person living in modern-day Chicago. Do you not agree that men living in antebellum south would have a lot in common? Do you not agree that poor white men and poor black men living in Chicago would have many similar experiences? Do you not agree that Asians living in San Francisco would have a very different life experiences from those living in rural Asia?


Sure, but that's not how it's being defined. It isn't "all black men in the antebellum south are the same", it's "all black men (and women often) are the same". It doesn't matter if it's Rodney King or Barack Obama, they're all the same and that's simply not the case!

That's the point!


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## D. L. Keur (May 19, 2022)

Here's a sample test: (It's only a test. You won't get a bad grade, because it's just a sample test.  Not even graded on a curve.)

1) Man.  White.  Raised a Montana cowboy.  Retired logger, then retired sawmill worker.  Liberal or conservative?  MAGA or not?

2) Woman.  POC, specifically LatinX.  Medical assistant.  Mother.  Liberal or conservative?  MAGA or not?

3) Man.  POC/White.  Raised in Idaho.  Dad owned a big logging company.  Mom was an alcoholic, then found The Lord.  Liberal or conservative?  MAGA or not?

4) Woman. White. Raised in NYCity.  Runs a charity for the homeless. Liberal or conservative?  MAGA or not?



Spoiler: THE ANSWERS WILL SURPRISE YOU



A) Next door neighbor of mine: Liberal, anti-Trump and company
B) Conservative, MAGA, Pro-Trump
C) Husband: Liberal, anti-Trump and company.
D) Conservative, pro-MAGA as in Make America Great Again, anti-Trump and Trump extremists



What's the point?  There are no real stereotypes. People are all different in their experiences and perspectives.  It's WRONG to ASSUME.


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## RGS (May 19, 2022)

D. L. Keur said:


> What's the point?  There are no real stereotypes. People are all different in their experiences and perspectives.  It's WRONG to ASSUME.


Agreed. I have a friend of Puerto Rican descent who grew up in New York City, and he's a die-hard Trump supporter. I have an aunt who grew up in the deep South who's as left as they come. You really can't judge a book by its cover.


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## Tettsuo (May 19, 2022)

Cephus said:


> Sure, but that's not how it's being defined. It isn't "all black men in the antebellum south are the same", it's "all black men (and women often) are the same". It doesn't matter if it's Rodney King or Barack Obama, they're all the same and that's simply not the case!
> 
> That's the point!



I'm not sure what battle you're fighting, but it's not with me. I believe in outliers. I believe that group dynamics exist. The more you expand the group, the more differences you'll find in that larger group. The smaller and more specific the group is, more similarities you'll find between its members. This is really simple science.

I cannot write about life of fair skin black women in the 20s without doing a lot of research. And this is coming from a black man. I'd have to ask my grandmother (she's in her 90s) who's a blue eyed black woman who could pass. The story would be far better if she wrote it, though as she would have far more insight that I would.

That IMO is the essence of OwnVoices.


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## Tettsuo (May 19, 2022)

RGS said:


> Agreed. I have a friend of Puerto Rican descent who grew up in New York City, and he's a die-hard Trump supporter. I have an aunt who grew up in the deep South who's as left as they come. You really can't judge a book by its cover.





D. L. Keur said:


> Here's a sample test: (It's only a test. You won't get a bad grade, because it's just a sample test.  Not even graded on a curve.)
> 
> 1) Man.  White.  Raised a Montana cowboy.  Retired logger, then retired sawmill worker.  Liberal or conservative?  MAGA or not?
> 
> ...


The fact that you both thought to bring up those people is proof that they aren't the baseline. They stand out from their respective groups. Their lives would be interesting because many would like to know what created them, placing them outside of their group.


----------



## RGS (May 19, 2022)

Tettsuo said:


> The fact that you both thought to bring up those people is proof that they aren't the baseline. They stand out from their respective groups. Their lives would be interesting because many would like to know what created them, placing them outside of their group.


I see your point and it's a valid one. But the common question seems to be about writing from the perspective of someone who's different from ourselves. And I still say that it's perfectly fine because when we apply "rules" and characteristics to ________ demographic, it's doing them a disservice.


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## D. L. Keur (May 19, 2022)

Tettsuo said:


> The fact that you both thought to bring up those people is proof that they aren't the baseline. They stand out from their respective groups. Their lives would be interesting because many would like to know what created them, placing them outside of their group.


I beg to differ about thinking human beings.  Thinking humans, INDEPENDENT THINKERS, and, yes, RUGGED INDIVIDUALISTS are, in fact, the only hope for a fair and equitable future.  If, however, you are defining the 'baseline' as the indoctrinated, braindead, low IQ functioning followers, i.e. lemmings -- the pitchfork wielding, tar-and-feather everyone with whom they're told to disapprove -- if you perceive humanity's future as based upon the demands of those, then humans have no future. JMO

@Tettsuo : I know a lot of people, from uber conservative to falling-off-the-extreme-edge progressives.  What they all have in common is an ability to listen to the other side, to present their arguments without resorting to violence and name-calling, to change their minds, and, most of all, to respect the rights of each and every other, regardless of how they may disagree politically and ideologically.


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## Tettsuo (May 19, 2022)

RGS said:


> I see your point and it's a valid one. But the common question seems to be about writing from the perspective of someone who's different from ourselves. And I still say that it's perfectly fine because when we apply "rules" and characteristics to ________ demographic, it's doing them a disservice.


As I've said earlier, I agree with everyone that we should write about "others". Sometimes, those "others", like my grandmother, aren't writers and is falls on us to get their story out. I just want writers to understand the world the people they're writing about live in. What I've read and seen is sometimes people who have no clue about the "others" they're writing about and falling back on stereotypes of the answers. I want them to actually do some research, to actually understand the people they're writing about. It's no different that me, a black dude, writing about the life of a white southern belle. I'd have to go do some work to understand that character's world if I want to write about it.

Years ago, I took a trip to Thailand, visiting my Muay Thai trainer and his family. After a few days, his sister was surprised that I was smart. I thought to get upset, but my trainer explained to me that their opinion about black men was born out of movies. That'll tell you something about the media we are feed.


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## RGS (May 19, 2022)

Tettsuo said:


> I thought to get upset, but my trainer explained to me that their opinion about black men was born out of movies. That'll tell you something about the media we are feed.


If there's one thing we can all agree on, it's that the media sucks.


----------



## Tettsuo (May 19, 2022)

D. L. Keur said:


> I beg to differ about thinking human beings.  Thinking humans, INDEPENDENT THINKERS, and, yes, RUGGED INDIVIDUALISTS are, in fact, the only hope for a fair and equitable future.  If, however, you are defining the 'baseline' as the indoctrinated, braindead, low IQ functioning followers, i.e. lemmings -- the pitchfork wielding, tar-and-feather everyone with whom they're told to disapprove -- if you perceive humanity's future as based upon the demands of those, then humans have no future. JMO
> 
> @Tettsuo : I know a lot of people, from uber conservative to falling-off-the-extreme-edge progressives.  What they all have in common is an ability to listen to the other side, to present their arguments without resorting to violence and name-calling, to change their minds, and, most of all, to respect the rights of each and every other, regardless of how they may disagree politically and ideologically.


No. The baseline is the shared experiences people within a similar demographic have. Those experiences tend to inform similar viewpoints. So, if a person from a group has a very different viewpoint, one would have to ask why. Again, I'm not saying everyone in the group is exactly the same as the others in the group. I'm saying they TEND to have SIMILAR experiences. Those experiences TEND to inform SIMILAR viewpoints.


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## D. L. Keur (May 19, 2022)

RGS said:


> If there's one thing we can all agree on, it's that the media sucks.


It does!!!!!


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## D. L. Keur (May 19, 2022)

Tettsuo said:


> No. The baseline is the shared experiences people within a similar demographic have. Those experiences tend to inform similar viewpoints. So, if a person from a group has a very different viewpoint, one would have to ask why. Again, I'm not saying everyone in the group is exactly the same as the others in the group. I'm saying they TEND to have SIMILAR experiences. Those experiences TEND to inform SIMILAR viewpoints.


I don't get the 'No.'  Explain which part or meaning of my comment elicits a 'no'?


----------



## Tettsuo (May 19, 2022)

D. L. Keur said:


> *If, however, you are defining the 'baseline' as the indoctrinated, braindead, low IQ functioning followers, i.e. lemmings* -- the pitchfork wielding, tar-and-feather everyone with whom they're told to disapprove -- if you perceive humanity's future as based upon the demands of those, then humans have no future. JMO





D. L. Keur said:


> I don't get the 'No.'  Explain which part or meaning of my comment elicits a 'no'?


The bolded part in the first quote.


----------



## indianroads (May 19, 2022)

I think the point of all this discussion is that we should get to know the characters we write - but we should be aware that they are a slice of ourselves, and guard against polarization. In a sense, we should follow Aristotle's view that the mark of an educated person is the ability to entertain a thought without accepting it.

Personally, I'm a hillbilly, martial artist, biker, miscreant son of outlaws, libertarian, atheist, that happens to enjoy writing novels. My political leanings are toward the "GET OFF MY LAWN" party. In life, I follow Sonny Barger's credo: Treat me good and I'll treat you better; treat me bad and I'll treat you worse.

I'm known and enjoyed friendships of many people, and they came in all colors and political leanings, and use my memories of them to develop the characters in my stories.


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## Matchu (May 19, 2022)

_the media sucks_

I don't agree with that.

I am rather more concerned when I sit down aside a new colleague: he elicits his theories about the 'BBC licence fee, them chem trails up there, the 9/11 CIA conspiracy, you cannot trust the mainstream media...' he says, his eyes all a boggle, and I wonder how to bridge this gap with a [middle-aged] person I will/shall never choose to speak with ever again? Until the morning,  'Blah blah blah blah QAnon blah blah...he says.
...
Or, my mother over the telephone, she says:

'Sandra's children have gone all QAnon, y'know?'

'Mummy, nothing any of us can do, they are on their own, these people...perhaps there's some book, they could read a book?'

'You damn liberal....'

'Mummy..?'


----------



## D. L. Keur (May 19, 2022)

Tettsuo said:


> No. The baseline is the shared experiences people within a similar demographic have. Those experiences tend to inform similar viewpoints. So, if a person from a group has a very different viewpoint, one would have to ask why. Again, I'm not saying everyone in the group is exactly the same as the others in the group. I'm saying they TEND to have SIMILAR experiences. Those experiences TEND to inform SIMILAR viewpoints.


Here's my 'shared experience' -- right wingnuts demanding everybody else conform or else; left wingnuts demanding everybody conform or else.  Right wingnuts claiming the right to govern according to their edicts; left wingnuts claiming the right to govern according to their edicts.  On the right wingnut fringe, we have the bible-toting, gun-waving my way or the highway group; on the left wingnut fringe, we have the gun-toting 'kill whitey/castrate all white males' my way or the highway group.  The right wingnuts demand, you're either with us or against us; the left wingnuts demand you're either with us or part of the problem.  Both are less than 10% of the majority.  And in the majority, here in the middle, we have a bunch of folks who would like ALL the wingnuts to fade into the woodwork, leave us alone, and let us get on with living, loving, and FIXING what IS wrong, but leaving what isn't wrong alone.  America today is a far, far cry from what it was in the 50s, 60s, and 70s.  Right wingnuts want to take us back to before the 40s.  Left wingnuts want to take us to an alternative reality where they hold the whip in tyranny.  Both are equally destructive forces trying to make everybody else conform to their demands, and the media thrives on it, so they amplify it to stir more controversy, conflict, and violence. JMO!!!


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## D. L. Keur (May 19, 2022)

Matchu said:


> _the media sucks_
> 
> I don't agree with that.
> 
> ...


I noticed you put in '[middle-aged]'.  Are you one of those Millennials or Gen Zers who thinks all persons should be eliminated who are older than those arbitrary and very questionable segregations? 

Second question:  If people believe in fairy tales, do they not have a right to so believe?

Third question: If somebody has an opinion that differs from yours, do they have the right to be heard and respected for their opinion?

Just asking.


----------



## indianroads (May 19, 2022)

D. L. Keur said:


> Here's my 'shared experience' -- right wingnuts demanding everybody else conform or else; left wingnuts demanding everybody conform or else.  Right wingnuts claiming the right to govern according to their edicts; left wingnuts claiming the right to govern according to their edicts.  On the right wingnut fringe, we have the bible-toting, gun-waving my way or the highway group; on the left wingnut fringe, we have the gun-toting 'kill whitey/castrate all white males' my way or the highway group.  The right wingnuts demand, you're either with us or against us; the left wingnuts demand you're either with us or part of the problem.  Both are less than 10% of the majority.  And in the majority, here in the middle, we have a bunch of folks who would like ALL the wingnuts to fade into the woodwork, leave us alone, and let us get on with living, loving, and FIXING what IS wrong, but leaving what isn't wrong alone.  America today is a far, far cry from what it was in the 50s, 60s, and 70s.  Right wingnuts want to take us back to before the 40s.  Left wingnuts want to take us to an alternative reality where they hold the whip in tyranny.  Both are equally destructive forces trying to make everybody else conform to their demands, and the media thrives on it, so they amplify it to stir more controversy, conflict, and violence. JMO!!!


Welcome to the GET OFF MY LAWN party.


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## Cephus (May 19, 2022)

D. L. Keur said:


> Here's a sample test: (It's only a test. You won't get a bad grade, because it's just a sample test.  Not even graded on a curve.)
> 
> 1) Man.  White.  Raised a Montana cowboy.  Retired logger, then retired sawmill worker.  Liberal or conservative?  MAGA or not?
> 
> ...


I could have given you similar answers from people that I know who don't fit stereotypes. Like I keep saying, people are people. I've got plenty of black, conservative friends who just look at this identity politics nonsense and laugh. It's all a scam, perpetrated by people who want the money of the gullible and the power provided to ride into office. It's an insanely old con man tactic. Invent a problem that isn't real, then try to sell people a solution.

It's just sad to watch.


----------



## D. L. Keur (May 19, 2022)

indianroads said:


> Welcome to the GET OFF MY LAWN party.


Well, I'm one of the keep off my property people, and enforce it.  The buggers think my forest is their personal 'I'll take a shit here' spot because they 'forgot' to go at the big gas station three miles south.


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## Matchu (May 19, 2022)

_I noticed you put in '[middle-aged]'. Are you one of those Millennials or Gen Zers who thinks all persons should be eliminated who are older than those arbitrary and very questionable segregations?_

Yes, I am youthful, or I 'am young' as those horrible aging shits might say.
_
Second question: If people believe in fairy tales, do they not have a right to so believe?_

Yes, they do have that right.  

As I too, myself actually,  have some 'duty' to combat ignorance and bigotry, but this gentleman, he is a straightforward kind of a chap and best left be - with his social medias pastime.  A nice man in other respects, 'only a bit thick' as we do say/I might say once home alone, barricaded indoors.  It gets more complicated when he pens the speculative fiction, I'll come down with heavy hands and persuade him towards model railways or operating a drone type of a hobby?
_
Third question: If somebody has an opinion that differs from yours, do they have the right to be heard and respected for their opinion?_

I'm not really keen on fascists, I am interested *in* fascists, but not being a fascist.  I'd probably have to do *something* about fascists - but then dogmatic behaviour of all types meets at their looping extremities, be it left or right wing. If you're proposing some kind of 'prole pastimes' in the Orwellian sense, I would welcome the discussion, dream-catchers and that type of thing is fine by me.


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## Cephus (May 19, 2022)

indianroads said:


> I think the point of all this discussion is that we should get to know the characters we write - but we should be aware that they are a slice of ourselves, and guard against polarization. In a sense, we should follow Aristotle's view that the mark of an educated person is the ability to entertain a thought without accepting it.


I think the point, to try to bring it back to actual writing which is what we're supposed to be doing, is that people are people and that you can't just stamp a label on anyone just because they have a certain physical characteristic. Even if you could prove that "most" people with characteristic X have experience Y, that's "most", not "all".

Here's the thing. I'm writing fiction. None of the characters I write about exist. They're all things I made up in my head. Therefore, my characters don't need to fit into anyone else's stereotype. If you don't like what I write, don't read it. It's that simple. Anyone who thinks they get to tell me what I can write, they can shove their opinions where the sun don't shine. That's also simple. If you want to write a checklist-driven book about characters that are absurdly stereotypical, if not remotely realistic, feel free. I'm not going to read it. Best of luck to you. But don't think you get to tell anyone else what they have to do because them's fighting words. I'm not interested in your opinions, I'm interested in your facts and people on that side of the aisle, they don't tend to have a lot of facts, just childish fee-fees and temper tantrums and frankly, those aren't people I choose to waste any of my time on.


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## indianroads (May 19, 2022)

@D. L. Keur : Ok - off topic but kinda funny story:
When we were still dating I took my future wife to visit my parents in La Honda, where I grew up. She's a city girl and was kinda freaked out by the fact that we didn't draw the drapes at night (our house was about a mile down a dirt road with no neighbors - so who is gonna walk through a pitch black redwood forest just to peek inside?). Anyway, we spent the night on a pull out sofa. While I was laying there enjoying the silence and darkness, I felt the bed shift... then shift again. I asked: _what are you doing?_ And she replied: _I can't see my hand._ It turns out that she couldn't sleep because... wait for it... it was too dark and too quiet.


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## Cephus (May 19, 2022)

indianroads said:


> @D. L. Keur : Ok - off topic but kinda funny story:
> When we were still dating I took my future wife to visit my parents in La Honda, where I grew up. She's a city girl and was kinda freaked out by the fact that we didn't draw the drapes at night (our house was about a mile down a dirt road with no neighbors - so who is gonna walk through a pitch black redwood forest just to peek inside?). Anyway, we spent the night on a pull out sofa. While I was laying there enjoying the silence and darkness, I felt the bed shift... then shift again. I asked: _what are you doing?_ And she replied: _I can't see my hand._ It turns out that she couldn't sleep because... wait for it... it was too dark and too quiet.


My wife and I, every time we move, we move farther away from people. We don't want to be in the middle of nowhere but there's a big difference between wall-to-wall bodies, traffic jams and rampant crime and being the only ones for twenty miles. Where we live now, the cops are bored. If there's ever a minor fender bender, every cop in town shows up because they have nothing else to do.

I much prefer it that way.


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## Matchu (May 19, 2022)

My favourite cop - from the old days - the sergeant used to send him away on the night shift and he'd have a snooze in his car.  He said 'nothing ever happened.'  It made a great contrast to all of my previous perceptions.


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## D. L. Keur (May 19, 2022)

Matchu said:


> _I noticed you put in '[middle-aged]'. Are you one of those Millennials or Gen Zers who thinks all persons should be eliminated who are older than those arbitrary and very questionable segregations?_
> 
> Yes, I am youthful, or I 'am young' as those horrible aging shits might say.


You didn't answer the question.  I realize you're 'youthful', and I will question your use of the phrase 'horrible aging shits' because, babe, believe it or not, you're going there.  Just wait.  The question was:  *Are you one of those Millennials or Gen Zers who thinks all persons should be eliminated who are older than those arbitrary and very questionable segregations?*


Matchu said:


> _Second question: If people believe in fairy tales, do they not have a right to so believe?_
> 
> Yes, they do have that right.


What of those who do not believe in fairy tales?  Do they have a right NOT to believe?


Matchu said:


> As I too, myself actually,  have some 'duty' to combat ignorance and bigotry, but this gentleman, he is a straightforward kind of a chap and best left be - with his social medias pastime.  A nice man in other respects, 'only a bit thick' as we do say/I might say once home alone, barricaded indoors.  It gets more complicated when he pens the speculative fiction, I'll come down with heavy hands and persuade him towards model railways or operating a drone type of a hobby?
> 
> _Third question: If somebody has an opinion that differs from yours, do they have the right to be heard and respected for their opinion?_
> 
> I'm not really keen on fascists, I am interested *in* fascists, but not being a fascist.  I'd probably have to do *something* about fascists - but then dogmatic behaviour of all types meets at their looping extremities, be it left or right wing. If you're proposing some kind of 'prole pastimes' in the Orwellian sense, I would welcome the discussion, dream-catchers and that type of thing is fine by me.


I'm not proposing anything.  I just find that you may or may not be bigoted against those who are beyond a certain age, a prejudice and discriminatory attitude and practice called 'ageism'.


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## D. L. Keur (May 19, 2022)

Cephus said:


> My wife and I, every time we move, we move farther away from people. We don't want to be in the middle of nowhere but there's a big difference between wall-to-wall bodies, traffic jams and rampant crime and being the only ones for twenty miles. Where we live now, the cops are bored. If there's ever a minor fender bender, every cop in town shows up because they have nothing else to do.
> 
> I much prefer it that way.


I could live a thousand miles from the nearest person ...and have ...and be perfectly fine, thanks.    It requires planning, but, oh, the bliss!


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## D. L. Keur (May 19, 2022)

indianroads said:


> @D. L. Keur : Ok - off topic but kinda funny story:
> When we were still dating I took my future wife to visit my parents in La Honda, where I grew up. She's a city girl and was kinda freaked out by the fact that we didn't draw the drapes at night (our house was about a mile down a dirt road with no neighbors - so who is gonna walk through a pitch black redwood forest just to peek inside?). Anyway, we spent the night on a pull out sofa. While I was laying there enjoying the silence and darkness, I felt the bed shift... then shift again. I asked: _what are you doing?_ And she replied: _I can't see my hand._ It turns out that she couldn't sleep because... wait for it... it was too dark and too quiet.


I am amazed by folks who are disturbed by silence, by lack of light, by quietude.  I have similar experiences with urban and suburbanites visiting here.  It really freaks them out.  The moose coming up on the porch and the bear behind the house also freaks them out.  What freaks me out?  Masses of people, the unending cacophony, and the blazing lights everywhere, no darkness, no silence, no emptiness.


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## indianroads (May 19, 2022)

I think we've beat the subject of diversity to a pulp - maybe it's time we take it out back and bury it beside it's kin?


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## Matchu (May 19, 2022)

_I'm not proposing anything. I just find that you may or may not be bigoted against those who are beyond a certain age, a prejudice and discriminatory attitude and practice called 'ageism'._

When I think about their old wrinkly skins and the out-dated & the irrelevant constant references to some big world wars - Napoleon, Washington, Hamilton, I think 'you guys, what about my rights to my party all night long, and I am naked if I want to be, and with other young  interesting young people of every color that I choose them.  I probably choose all of the other colors as my right.


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## D. L. Keur (May 19, 2022)

Matchu said:


> _I'm not proposing anything. I just find that you may or may not be bigoted against those who are beyond a certain age, a prejudice and discriminatory attitude and practice called 'ageism'._
> 
> When I think about their old wrinkly skins and the out-dated & the irrelevant constant references to some big world wars - Napoleon, Washington, Hamilton, I think 'you guys, what about my rights to my party all night long, and I am naked if I want to be, and with other young  interesting young people of every color that I choose them.  I probably choose all of the other colors as my right.


And you just proved my point, Bigot.


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## Matchu (May 19, 2022)

I am sorry @DL - I'm just being an arse. My wife told me off, I'm quite old.  I'm sorry for being a jackass.


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## D. L. Keur (May 19, 2022)

Matchu said:


> I am sorry @DL - I'm just being an arse. My wife told me off, I'm quite old.  I'm sorry for being a jackass.


I don't care a whit your age or persuasion.  I do know I don't associate with cads and idiots. You are now on my ignore list.


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## Cephus (May 19, 2022)

D. L. Keur said:


> I don't care a whit your age or persuasion.  I do know I don't associate with cads and idiots. You are now on my ignore list.


I don't waste time on people who pretend to be jerks, then say it was all a joke. Jokes are funny. That is not.


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## PiP (May 19, 2022)

indianroads said:


> I think we've beat the subject of diversity to a pulp - maybe it's time we take it out back and bury it beside it's kin?


Good idea, IR. The topic has been well-aired from all perspectives and the discussion is now circular.
The OP has offered no further input so I have closed the thread.

For those who want to continue please don your hard hats and tasers and start a new discussion in Dante's


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## VRanger (May 19, 2022)

Cephus said:


> I don't waste time on people who pretend to be jerks, then say it was all a joke. Jokes are funny. That is not.


Neither you nor Dawn has a clue about Matchu. Almost everything he writes is in parody. Parody is acceptable. You get it or you don't. Once I finally "got it", his posts are quite funny.


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