#yes i Know the character is not real and the actor is not the character. at all times.
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20/10 stars little guy
#me (scrounging undetected autist whose ideal fashion sense is ''if i have to be seen at all: shrouded'') seeing encanto the other month.....#and on top of it all i LOVE slice of life. encanto being so focused on What It's About that there's so much of that + character / dynamic#also part of what i loved abt pixar luca. ppl like ''simple story but not a problem :)'' like YEAH thank god it's Also so slice of lifey#2021 what a year lol. though again i only Just saw encanto....tfw Studio Creative Control backs off a bit more than usual: Joy & Wonders#anyway i knew going in bruno wasn't an antagonist (fine if he was though b/c slay & b/c scapegoats can do whatever they want)#knew i'd love him b/c again Scapegoat shows up & i'm the Amazing Showstopping Totally Unique Never The Same gif on loop#but what a delight even beyond those expectations lol. love again how Focused the movie is on What It's About & Thee Points it makes#the Characters / Dynamics & the Metaphor & the plot stays right with all of that. the focus & importance re: thee scapegoats....#& bruno being disabled like whole layer of Yay Yay Yay spamming. that even when He's Back we're reminded he's not ''normal now'' or w/e#(i.e. presenting that as The Good Ending for the disabled outcast. vs just being embraced as part of the group again & accepted As He Is)#meanwhile was like hmm chat is there queercoding do we think? like is he queer: Yes. but is there coding? hmm#sure isn't cishet coded though. but i was also having the thought like fellas is it gay to [higher tenor tessitura or w/e] lol#made me go ''do i know this voice? ok do i know this name / face / actor? (i have never seen anything ever / bad w/names/faces/voices)''#indeed was like yeah haven't seen this; heard of this; seen it once ages ago no way i remember more than like 0.6 details#then from ''ohh haha I'm A Mammal That Cares....yeah i hear that'' to ''omg CHI-CHI RODRIGUEZ???? ;;0;;'' waaah fantastic revelation lmao#also the way Literal Future Seer ability was externalized to make it more wrangleable for plot is so impressive & fun & excellent#got a lot of [i like this thing i saw a lot] i got to say....guess i can do that w/the sideblog i made for one drawing i made last night#encanto 2021#bruno madrigal#also the way bruno is so Nervous + Hiding / Bold + Big Personality like yes ha ha ha Yes....tamped down as ''too much'' experience#also the [stuttering stumbling muttering mumbling] line: i fr nigh wept upon going back over a moment like what am i hearing here?#& realizing the answer was: it's bruno quietly stuttering a moment during this one line (& then (& then (& then)) i saw you) ;;;mm;;;#hang onnn....the first scapegoat who's driven off being Disabled is so real so ;m; that again they're like so he got Weirder; Okay ;;m;;#that we get jorge thumbs up nobody having an Aside to be like [ugh; this guy] or Anything. augh always have too much to say for 30 tags#fabric drape there sure not accurate but i was like okay if i try to really reference that i'm not getting this done tonight
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yknow i was a little miffed when yoimiya got her second story quest but i can't even be mad that cyno's getting his. he's been around since manga days he deserves it
#personal stuff#delete later#like good for him. also who is that. i know a playable design when i see one#like we are FINALLY GETTING PERMANENT HERMANUBIS LORE.#ARLECCHINOOO. OH MY GODDD#I CANNOT BELIEVE SCYTHE ARLE REAL. i avoided looking at leaks for so long and her animations are SO nice wtf#her WING???#OH MY GODDD??? SHE'S THE NEW WEEKLY BOSS???#SHE LOOKS SO FUCKING COOL. HER WINGS#HEY WAIT A FUCKING MINUTE. FURINA OR NEUVILLETTE STORY QUEST 2 WHERE?#are they pushing stuff back. no dain quest last patch no archon or equivalent quest this patch :(#yes i am soo excited to see her lines about the other harbingers#still biting the bars of my cage why are there so many black white and red hyv characters coming out at the same time#STILL CANNOT BELIEVE WE'RE GOING TO REMURIA. RIPS AND TEARS#OH SHIT IT'S RELATED TO PETRICHOR. WE'RE GETTING THAT TOO.#wtf kitty event was foreshadowing. new talking cat#so we're not getting dornman port... :(#oh hey cool dvorak is coming back#new horn instrument!! it looks neat#ah. windtrace :/ i'm not one for co-op events i was hoping fr something else. good for you guys though#NATLAN CRUMBS WOOO#okay. overall looks like a neat update i'm looking forward to petrichor a lot. PLEASE say gourmet supremos. PLEASE.#i've been waiting so long to see them please let them come back...#also arlecchino looks cool as hell.#a little disappointed that no furina or neuvillette or dain quest but what can you do.#maybe we'll get a dain one next patch since we're getting remuria now? probably not but i can dream#checked the voice actors list under the trailer. oh hey we're seeing childe again
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when I say down bad I mean the baddest of downs
#furiously searching up ‘is it normal to scour your bfs imdb for things of him whimpering and crying and being pathetic’#then ‘me and semi famous horror actors kissing’#my beloved johnny. why only two psychological thriller credits. waits patiently#anyways did you know he’s in a kill count skit. bc now I know :3#yes he had three lines and no real character buuuuut he was covered in blood :33
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I get that people are upset but "recast will byers! from now on I'm drawing him like THIS instead!" and he looks exactly the same but with a smaller nose? that's not helpful and tbh it's just antisemitic. did we not agree like less than a year ago that removing actor's ethnic features in fanart is racist? at best this is performative and at worst it is racism
#yes i am also appalled at the actors comments but will byers isnt real#will byers is a fictional character and thats wht he looks like#frankly i don't know how you even see them as the same person every part of their vibe and mannerisms is so completely different to me#i dont see characters as their actors#but whatever this fandom always struggled to separate fiction from reality#also theyre not going to recast him lol can we be a little realistic#i get that emotions are high but dont shit on jewish ethnic features#if you really cant bear to look at will rn then take a break#discourse
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i kinda want to write a deep dive essay on silence of the lambs WRT gender and transmisogyny bc it's actually a much more complicated topic than a lot of people realise
#like basically yes the portrayal is ultimately deeply transmisogynistic and damaging#even the actor that played the character admitted that while he'd gone very out of his way to play the character not as a trans woman but#as a deeply homophobic cishet man#and done a lot of research on LGBT issues and life at the time#the trans women he met during that research told him how the felt and he ended up reaching out to the community to make amends several time#so like this isn't new discourse either-- transfems of the time didn't like it#another issue is there's a lot of lines from the book that never made it into the movie#lines that make it very explicitly clear that not only is the character not trans but that the author does not view trans people as violent#“There’s no correlation in the literature to transsexualism and violence. Transsexuals are very passive.”#actual quote from the book#and the director has also acknowledged his adaption did not drive this point home well enough and apologised profusely for that#and to be clear i don't know if the author has spoken about this#it does seem he was working with the best standards at the time but likely hadn't actually spoken at length to a trans woman before#and i think that's the real problem here#like i feel like it really speaks volumes of how transmisogyny works that like#even if everyone involved goes out of their way to actively try to avoid and debunk transmisogyny in their writing#if you don't actually spend time around trans women in real life and rely solely on impersonal “research” you're gonna shit the bed#and end up making one of the worst trans misogynistic caricatures of all time while actively trying to do the literal opposite#and i think that relates a lot to how modern transmisogyny is the way it is like all these tme ppl online supposedly trying their hardest#to be trans positive#and maybe some of them genuinely think they are#but most of them also don't have any TMA friends or peers some of them have never even spoken to a trans woman knowingly before#and also have never unpacked that#like you can do all the research you want but ultimately there will always be a level of dehumanisation and a lack of touch with reality#if you aren't actually talking to the people involved#you cannot unlearn transmisogyny without interacting with TMA people#and just because you were trying to be trans positive doesn't mean you actually were trans positive#nor does it erase the harm done
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billions(tm): it's incredible how we just provide a little snippet of material designed to be "guy we all want to push down the stairs immediately somehow" and through this amazing acting alchemy it becomes gold. electric. magnificent. we can't get enough so we will just keep writing this loser character and the actor will somehow keep bringing the dazzling transmutation through his ability
actor will roland: [is aware autistic people are real]
#this is at least half humorous in several ways lmao but also like fr...#winston billions#will roland has pretty much said he is aware that autistic people real. and not [ppl's utterly off the walls assumptions abt what Defines#Autism or what an Autistic Person is like and how you would Know]#i don't think that Billions(tm) would be very much better at that than re: say; taylor's being nonbinary (surprisingly alright yet. u kno)#quant kid 2 could've been anyone but writing Winston is like so certainly the common deal of the inadvertently autistic character#drawing from all the autistic people allistic ppl encounter all thee time without being aware & deciding they're annoying / jerks / too#weird to live too pathetic to die / grating nerds / Funnily Odd in a way you deign to merely raise an eyebrow or scrunch your face at....#so on so forth. ''oh you know Those People we all know who are just Like That''#and deciding they must be ''just like that'' b/c they're either too arrogantly rude &/or clueless / Unaware to be neurotypically superior#also do not get me wrong lmao big old proponent of Did You Know That? Actors Act. Now You Know#so of course yes will's acting is off the shits i mean here i am am i right. and he is using it when he is acting.#the acting talent Is off the shits. the tiniest moments they give him & he CRUSHES KILLS it really is amazing i'm not waving it off at all#cue twitter randos so betrayed when kelly aucoin is not dollar bill & is like ''yes in my acting job i'm playing this fuckin asshole''#meanwhile i'm still following the interviewer who a) asked will anything abt billions b) talked abt the immediate striking intro of will's#as quant kid 2 And the immediate draw of / effervescent dynamic between winston & taylor. Someone Who Gets It#anyway it's like will can fathom that actually the people who are Always ''acting wrong'' w/their bad grating vibes no matter what they do#are not always Those People(tm) who We all know & loathe right....thee magic of knowing winston can be someone fully earnest#and of course always actually trying; & having perfectly comprehensible wants & needs. damn how's he doing that#bringing a certain je ne sais quoi to this Insufferable Loser Nerd material! so we don't mess with the process.#i.e. we will only ever let his role get dunked on forever b/c sure can't fathom anything else anyways. our Correct characters could never..#only tuk; adjacent in wrong nerd loserdom; can be his friend. rian who is correct but zany with it can be his abusive friend
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A very young Michael Cashman makes his screen debut as Syd Benson, the loyal son of an escaped convict, in Gideon's Way: The Tin God (1.14, ITC, 1965)
#fave spotting#michael cashman#gideon's way#the sandbaggers#good old sandbagger 3#itc#1965#the tin god#classic tv#character actors#uk politics#yes that last tag is relevant#bc this bratty little kid now sits in the house of lords#which is insane#I've seen these episodes before but had zero idea mike was in this one#i didn't even realise while watching ( i mean why would i? i had no idea he'd ever been a child actor)#watching this time i mean. but then i look at the credits and small cogs start to whir..#and whaddaya know. sandbagger 3 was also this kid from that ep of Gideon. he's playing Jennifer Wilson's son!#i thought while watching that the actor didn't look old enough to be playing the 13yr old character but actually that about matches#with Mike's age at this point. it would be another 15 yrs before he started to gain real recognition with Sandbaggers and then his#celebrated run on Eastenders soon after (as a groundbreaking example of gay representation on british tv)#another 15 yrs on top of that before he started seeing political success. but now there he is in the Lords...#i may be opposed to the House on the grounds of my politics... but Mike's a good egg. he can stay.#i didn't even mention Stonewall!! man what a life good for you Sandbagger 3
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me, encountering a photoshoot of or interview with an actor who plays a fictional character I am Not Normal about, out of costume and character and living their life as an actor, unexpectedly and abruptly reminding me that the fictional character does not in fact exist or have a life or interiority and is in fact portrayed by a Real Fucking Person who does exist and has thoughts and goals and dreams and a whole life entirely unrelated to that nonexistent fictional character, and could hypothetically stumble across my Being Not Normal On The Internet about one of many characters they pretended to be in exchange for a paycheque: ah lads not again
#yes I am aware that some actors do get as attached to (some of) their characters and flesh them out the same way I might#but also like. how fucking weird must it be to just be doing a job for a paycheque#a job you probably like! but still a job. and like. a role you have no particular attachment to you're just reading the lines they gave you#and some rando comes along with all these like. ~deep insights into the psyche of~ this made-up guy with your face#and all of those ~deep insights~ are equally made up#anyway I Know know that it's all just an elaborate game of pretend but sometimes. sometimes the real world intrudes unexpectedly#and sometimes you find out the actor's been reading fanfiction of his character smoochin' with another character#and could hypothetically have stumbled across your fervent and slightly feverish treatise on how that character likes to fuck#there is. a reason why we don't tell the people involved in making the canon about the fanfiction lol#to be clear. this dose of reality is not a bad thing. just makes it. extremely fuckin weird to think about the character for a bit.#yes i Know the character is not real and the actor is not the character. at all times.#but the reminder that the actor and I share a reality and they could hypothetically see me caring WAY too much about something they made?#unconscionable. when I am vampire witch queen of the universe actors will have to live in a pocket dimension where they can't get internet.#and can live their lives in blissful ignorance of the weird shit I want to write about nonexistent people who have their faces.
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always good to remind oneself that it is always an option to simply block and ignore people who are being Weird To You on your posts. it is never necessary to engage. If It Sucks Hit Da Bricks.
#gav gab#sometimes people will invest their entire personality in being pr/osh/ip or whatever#and then they will take any post they can get their hands on and use it to be like#OH SO YOU HATE PEOPLE WHO WRITE FICTION? YOU HATE QUEER PEOPLE?#YOU DONT KNOW THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN REAL AND FAKE?#YOU THINK THE HUNGER GAMES MAKES SUZANNE COLLINS A CHILD KILLER?#YOU THINK PEOPLE WHO WRITE TEEN CHARACTERS IN RELATIONSHIPS SHOULD DIE?#and you just gotta look at those people and go#wow! okay! you seem normal! and then you move on#i simply dont have time for people who are gonna leap on any opportunity they can to try and trap me into an argument#about whether or not it is weird for people to be writing hardcore smut about characters who are in middle school#Do Not Start Shit With Me Over This Post#neither pr/osh/ip nor an/ti/sh/ip but a secret third thing#(a person capable of holding nuanced and situation-based opinions who writes a lot of quote unquote 'dark shit')#(but who also thinks that 'chill bro it's fiction you're the purity police youre the fan caps youre a puritan catholic whatever')#(is not a free pass to do whatever you want forever without criticism)#(no people who write a fic that happens to include rape or torture or suicide or whatever aren't monsters or whatever)#(yes people who write uhhhh rpf rape smut about teenage actors or whatever are engaging in seriously fucked up shit they shouldn't be doing)#(NUANCE. CRITICAL THINKING. NOT PRETENDING YOU DONT KNOW THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THOSE THINGS. IMAGINE IT!)#like yeah searching out a one sentence personal post i made two months ago to reblog it and accuse me of being some kinda puritan#because it had some vague language (about something not actually related to fic at all - it was abt tagging unreality) that you interpreted#as me expressing distaste for whatever gross shit you take offense at having referred to as 'gross shit'#that's totally normal and chill and non-harassing behaviour#unlike the people you're screaming about in every other post at the speed of light#good job you won being the rational adult here lmfao
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not to be a bitch but it's so funny how most henry stans just like. totally ignore everything to do with will as if this show doesn't exist all because henry went after him and refused to let him go. as if will is not his perfect character foil. as if it's not all leading to what happened in the upside down and how the only stories left to learn are those of will and henry. like... . .. ok. this is me, ur resident gatekeeper, officially snatching away their stanning licenses until they pass their necessary continuing education courses aka rewatch the show 🤨
#(i'm kidding abt tht last part don't come 4 me u kno i'm an obnoxious little shit 🫣 BJDHFBDJ)#yes eleven is the one that opened the door for him in every way and made him but. this story started because of will. because YOUR man#couldn't let WILL go. like ........................ ok#brenner couldn't let henry go which meant el couldn't let henry go and when he came back henry couldn't let will go .#the show starts bc everyone is looking for will they keep el around bc she helps them look for will steve comes back bc he feels bad but#he only got roped up in it bc nancy got roped up in it and jonathan and he got roped up in it bc will went missing#like. almost every single character ....... goes back .................. to .................. w-[GUNSHOTS]#even the actor tht u thirst over says it like 😭#sorry i know he's not real i KNOW henry isn't real it doesn't actually matter idc idc idc idc do whatever u want#but it's just Funnie to me. how do u ignore like. 1/3 of his story like that especially when it's gonna be the focus next season LMAO#and that's not even mentioning how they totally ignore will AND what he did to him with the mind flayer. I'm Sure It's Not Related At All#Tho Right? Right Guys....?#i have 2 laugh. anyway! lov n light 🫶
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watching a movie with my most special guy in the whole wide world in it now. i’m aware of the time. i don’t have to finish it i just wanna see him <3
#i might. overuse ‘special guy’ a lot. but this guy is THEE special guy. some know him. many do not.#well none of you know him personally but some of you know that EYE love him more than anyone else ever. including most real people.#yes i am projecting my favorite character onto the actor that plays him. we all do it#this guy has been in three movies in his life can i just have my crumbs in peace#saw two minutes of him in the race car movie and got sad. i need this#beth.txt
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my favourite dw episode being written by moffat is just me trying to keep people who want to box me into a specific type of dw fan on their toes
#dw shit#yes i hate the man yes i think his era's good points do Not make it worth it against all the bad but yes#also he wrote my favourite#i have Layers#honestly it was funny#bc i saw somebody the other day say that the dialogue in chibnall's era is weird and off and it was better in moffat's#and honestly most of the time i feel like moffat's era is unlike any and all human conversation#in real life#... not All the time#but you know how 12 breaks the 4th wall a lot?#the dialogue feels catered to the audience rather than the characters to me a lot of the time#which is not actually a criticism#it's a viable choice#but the Big Speeches and the like feel like i'm watching an actor deliver a#soliloquy on stage rather than watching a person communicate#meanwhile the Lack of those in chibnall's era make it seem more like human interaction to me#eh#each to their own#but framing changes perception imo
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Part of me is really into the Snape v. Marauders discourse and part of me is just thinking a lot of people seem to argue like there's a right or wrong when that's not how people work? Everyone has their own truth. You may disagree with it, and that person will disagree with you, and it's not always fine but that doesn't mean that your blorbo is objectively right and your anti-blorbo is objectively wrong. Just because you think a character is in the wrong for their actions doesn't itself make your blorbo be in the right. The most interesting thing is the complexity of what makes a character grey.
#But then I also feel like some people get really into character analysis without literary analysis#we're not actors doing background work for a role ya know?#yes yes death of the author etc. but these characters all came from one person's mind and reflect how she views the world#for better or (often) worse#I don't know I guess I'm just really aware that I process my own baggage through characters#so I don't get that into defending them or attacking other ones because like... they aren't real#I do this for fun why would I argue with some asshole who thinks a character I find value in sucks#if I wanted to get a headache justifying my basic truth I'd just call my folks
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not a self-shipper, not a two characters ship blog/one character main blog, but a secret third thing (revolving hyperfixation blorbo show around in my head & occasionally v casually shipping the lot of them with each other in nearly any combo, whatever's fun)
#nothing against the y/n ppl u do u it's personally a squick for me but that's just because fandom has always been about escape for me#(squick = personally v much Not For Me but not a judgement <- ye olde fandom phrase)#i guess it's about escape too maybe for self ship ppl? is it? but for me i wanna jump into a whole different world & live thru characters#but hey if no one's get hurt whatever's whatever! ❤️ be creative have fun#& i'm developping a thicker skin to it squick-wise because there's so much of it in this fandom hahah#& ppl who ship only one combination of characters i admire u & again no judging i just wanna play with all the playdough colours & for fun#my post#always everything in fandom for fun#the self shipping with actors worries me a little just because with real people u don't know them & can take a Lot of psychic damage#if/when stuff comes out about them :( but!! ppl have had crushes or idolised celebs since forever it's just now we know too much about#who they actually are. but again that's worry for u guys not judgement!!#was this post necessary no not rly ok good morning have a good day!!
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oh, update, y'all: four (4) pages in, and THE ACTOR AND THE TARGET is already rewiring my brain, what a BOOK
#text#personal#reading#books#the actor and the target#declan donnellan#i think i love reading outside my lane actually this is fun#ALSO#yknow that thing about 'youre more interested in things you already know a little bit about'??#i just realized that ~Writerly Research~ broadens that net significantly for me#like sure in my real life i know about birds and words and knitting#but every character comes with at least a LITTLEA bit of research#and thats a foot in the door#and then im like Ah Yes Lets Investigate Further and then here we are#anyway im having a great time so far!!
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No, That’s Not ‘How Color Works’. - Whitewashing
Whitewashing, as defined by Merriam-Webster:
"to alter (something) in a way that favors, features, or caters to white people: such as a) to portray (the past) in a way that increases the prominence, relevance, or impact of white people and minimizes or misrepresents that of nonwhite people and B) to alter (an original story) by casting a white performer in a role based on a nonwhite person or fictional character"
In fandom context, we know it to include:
Making someone’s skin lighter
Making someone’s hair a thinner texture
Changing someone’s nose to be thinner
Shrinking their lips
Changing the character in their entirety to be someone else
The Normalization of Whitewashing
Remember how I mentioned last lesson that despite the nature of poorly drawn Black characters, most audiences are not turned off enough to discourage the action in professional works? Similar idea with whitewashing. Not the same- unlike the Ambiguously Brown Character, which claims to have plausible deniability, overt whitewashing is usually enough to make fans speak up! But that’s the key word here- overt! It has to be “bad enough” to make enough people speak up, but as we’ve seen many a time, “bad enough” seems to have a much higher threshold for nonblack viewership (sometimes the limit doesn’t exist!)
Some visual examples
This is a link to my personal thread on a Netflix show I was watching- Worst Ex Ever. Now, while the show itself was quite enlightening, there was something I could not get over. I thought I was going crazy. And that was that no matter how dark the person of color would be in real life, the animated portions would draw this light pinkish-brown. Every. Single. Time. It's like they couldn't fathom scrolling down the color wheel. And this is a Netflix original! Netflix has plenty of money for someone to have caught this in creation. But... it was produced. And put out. And they're making more of it.
I asked all of the Dragon Age fans about the series, and uh… I didn’t know things were this bad, guys! Apparently this is a man of color, but it doesn't seem like the creators want you to know that 🤣. Jokes aside, as I’ve discussed before, the noticeable whitewashing- and that was one of many racist things I was told- was not enough to prevent sales... so why would they stop? I can only hope this new game, with all the updates, is enough to turn the tide. But the series has gone on for a while now, that if they’d chosen to do ye same olde… there clearly would not be a lack of financial support to prevent it.
Colorism as a Tool
Even when actors of color are cast, colorism often plays a role in normalizing whitewashing to audiences, even to Black audiences! People think “oh well at least they’re Black!” as if that is the only important part. It is not.
While Aaron Pierre, the actor cast for John Stewart of Green Lantern fame, is a GORGEOUS, STUNNING man, he is not the dark-skinned man that John Stewart is supposed to be and should not have been cast! To me, this is overt colorism, but clearly for many people this is not “enough” to warrant concern or even prevent the casting itself- including the studio behind the movie! Black fans have plead for years for the character of Storm to be played by a dark-skinned, preferably African, woman, and it has never happened.
It naturally happens in fan spaces as well, which is another indicator that colorism as a tool for whitewashing is quite effective for audiences. If I see one more Zendaya fan cast for Kida from Atlantis, I will scream. It’s been happening for years, and I don’t think any of the people who just want to see her and Tom on screen either understand or care that Kida is a dark-skinned character. Zendaya doesn’t look anything like Kida- it doesn’t matter if she’s Black too! Just because someone is Black does not mean they can play every single Black character! I’ve even seen people fancast Emilia Clarke of Game of Thrones fame, to which… I don’t have the words. I can’t fathom what would cause these decisions other than racism.
The Common Excuses
I must be honest. I don’t really feel like re-iterating how certain things are not okay and how to fix them, because I’ve already discussed these things in massive detail. So I’m just going to direct the excuses I regularly hear to my lessons, where you can read up on them.
“Their hair/eyes are like that because they’re biracial so-”
Relevant Lessons: 2.1, 2.2, 2.3, 8, 9, 10
There is nothing wrong with having biracial characters with a range of features. I am not saying that! Because yeah, genetics do happen!
But I mentioned this in my last lesson, and I will re-emphasize here, that using biracial identity as a way to whitewash is a sinister form of racism. The intention here- the real intention- is the issue here! The idea that somehow this character can only look the way you want them to look by "diluting" their Blackness… I don’t know how you can explain yourselves out of that one.
You don’t get to use us as an excuse for diversity while still trying to maintain your preference for Eurocentric beauty standards. Black biracial people don’t always look light skinned, thin-haired and ambiguous, and even the ones that do don’t deserve to be treated as your fetish for pretend antiracism. If you just want to draw a white person with a tan, do that. But don’t change a character’s entire look just so you can work in some whiteness. If you want to claim that canon Black character’s mother was white, then I guess they inherited some of her personality because their features should not change.
“It’s my style/It’s the color-”
Relevant Lessons: 3, 4, 10
I hate all excuses for whitewashing, but I’ve grown to despise, hate, abhor and loathe this one the most as I’ve become an artist. I wish there were stronger words to describe just how much I hate the “style” and “color” excuse.
Are style and use of color oft intertwined? Absolutely. I’m not saying they aren’t. But out of everything, there are two things I want artists to understand:
1. Style does not cancel out racism! No style forces you to choose ashy greys and to change peoples’ features. That’s you! If you look at something, and it looks offensive, you change the style. You grow as an artist!
2. “Everyone who is brown will look ashy so I just-” if you recognize that your Black characters look strange in comparison to your nonblack characters, then it’s time to try something else! I don’t understand this sudden need for “realism” when it comes to color and lighting, but not when it comes to hair, for example. No one cares about realism when giving every and all Black characters wavy tresses they probably wouldn’t have, but suddenly milquetoast watercolor attempts at brown and off-putting lighting is “how it works”. That’s not fair.
The color picker is an available tool! I use it often!
Dead giveaway of purposeful whitewashing: if someone gets the outfit color palette right via color picking, but the skin color is multiple shades lighter. That means they were looking at that character and chose not to proceed.
Dead giveaway of purposeful whitewashing: if the white characters in the show are completely correct in their palettes. Again, that means they cared enough to look at everyone else… and not the Black characters.
If you use the color picker and the color picked is… disrespectful, you do not have to use that! You can simply choose a better color that is still similar to the brown that ought to be depicted!
“It’s the lighting-”
Relevant Lessons: 4, 5
If your white characters do not shine like snow in the sunlight because of your lighting, then your lighting does not make your Black characters suddenly light tan.
If your Black characters look bad in your lighting of choice- for example, putting a very dark-skinned character in electric white lighting can be ghastly- try changing the intensity or the color of the lighting. DON’T change your character’s skin color!
I'm going to show you some pictures of South Sudanese model Nyakim Gatwech. Pay attention to the choices of light, color, and makeup.
Look how BEAUTIFUL she is! Look at the choices of intensity and color of light, and how they make her look different in each image.
Now look at this image in comparison:
In this image, whoever did her makeup and took this picture did not take into consideration her skin tone. She's also under this really intense lighting. This is an example of "increasing the lighting does NOT make an image "better"". She didn't need to have lighter skin or "more lighting" to look good. She needed BETTER lighting, lighting that worked with HER.
To see this as an example in drawn art, @dsm7 makes an excellent argument for proper lighting and color, why it is an issue to use it as an excuse, and how to solve that problem.
‼️DISCLAIMER FOR NEXT EXAMPLE‼️
Okay. I am about to show y’all a fan-created example from my personal experience. It is a TEACHING EXPERIENCE ONLY. I am not including the artist’s name in this image. It happened a couple years ago, and it’s over- they’ve chosen to be who they are despite me kindly confronting them about it. The only reason I’m including it at all is because I feel like it would be remiss to have such a clear-cut, multi-level example, and not teach with it. That said, no, I am not telling anyone to act out towards them. Again, that is not what I’m telling you to do. The last thing I need is a literal lynch mob of angry nonblack viewership for trying to teach you all, and y’all sitting there watching it happen to me. Every example of whitewashing is not going to be so obvious, but I hope you learn how to spot the examples in the art you see and share.
I'm obviously a Hades fan, particularly of Patroclus- despite my disdain for the lack of effort in his canon character design. So I've seen a lot of things. That said:
“Well it’s just MY design of them-”
Relevant Lessons: ALL
The sepia coloring did not do this. The lighting did not do this. The design is the exact same as the Hades version, even down to the shape of the hair curling in the back. The only thing that is different… is the man himself.
Y'all. Y'all! You CANNOT take a pre-existing Black character and say “oh well this is my design of them” …and the design is of a whole white person. Because if the rest of the fit is the same, and the only thing that changed is the Blackness… Racism. If you’re going to “make up your own design”, then do that!
“Blackwashing”
Speaking of: I’m sure someone edgy out there thinks they’re so smart as they retort to the screen: “but if that’s not okay, then why is Blackwashing okay?” To which I say- shut up. 😐
The “definition” by fandom: making a nonblack character Black, usually an anime character, but characters in general.
Funny enough, the actual definition in the dictionary (or closest to) is “to defame”, in contrast with whitewash (as in whitewashing history). Maybe racist fans ARE using it correctly when they say you’re blackwashing their characters, when they mean you’re making them “less likable because they’re Black now”. 🤔
Anyway: Blackwashing is not real for the same reason reverse racism is not real.
Me painting these characters brown is not going to take away from the fact that there are far more of you in media than there is of me. Me saying that I ‘headcanon a character as Black with 4C hair’ is not going to make the studio go “oh! Well they must be Black with 4C hair now!” Me saying “oh I think I’d like this character better if they were Black” as a beta tester (less overtly, obviously, because I’m not racist!) will never make a studio change that character. Black viewers have minimal value in comparison to the power of the white viewer’s dollar. I could draw white characters Black every single day of every single game media… and they would still produce majority white characters. There has not been centuries- if not millennia, when we consider Jesus Christ himself, even- of purposeful “Blackwashing” with the intent of removing the original ethnicity- and thus importance- of white people. No one has ever been allowed to forget when someone is white. No one has ever been allowed to forget or not acknowledge white people.
How it could be "solved"
Personally, I love Black edits and I welcome them here. I find them creative and fun. But if you really, REALLY didn’t want us to make those edits, then naturally, we need more Black characters in all of our media!
I wouldn’t have to make edits if I saw more of me to begin with in the things I like to watch- but when we have those characters, racists act an ass about them. We’re not allowed to even be present! I’ve seen too many gamer bros mocking the existence of Yasuke in Assassin’s Creed, and he was a real ass man. But if we made a game about African peoples in African societies, how many of the gamer bros would actually play those games? Do you think there’d be as much support, when we hear so much about Black characters that are treated so abhorrently? How many games do we have where people would love their faves just as much if they were Black? I even learned that Solas was apparently supposed to be a man of color. IMAGINE how many people would not have liked that man, with the same exact plot and characterization.
Something I’ve noticed recently: apparently "Blackwashing" is not a thing when White fans “allow” it. Take this recent trend with Miku. International Miku was beloved! But if you draw any other character as Black on any other day, there will be people that are horrid about it. Ask any artist, Black artists and Black cosplayers especially, who’s ever done it what their comments are like. I’ve read entire missives akin to white supremacist drivel on how it’s somehow morally wrong to make characters Black. Meanwhile no amount of “hey maybe you shouldn’t do this” prevented the movie Gods of Egypt from being created, with a cast full of British White people.
Solutions to Avoiding Whitewashing!
1) Using References!!
Do I think you should know what Black people look like? Yes. We’re humans. It’s 2024. Everyone knows what we look like when it’s time to hate and discriminate against us, so you know what we look like when it’s time to love and depict us. If you’re on Tumblr, you have access to the Internet. ESPECIALLY if you’re in the U.S., as Black people are the source of damn near every piece of online pop culture. If you can find my dialect to make my jokes, you can find pictures of me.
Would I rather you use a reference every single time so that you can only strengthen your depiction of my people? ABSOLUTELY.
Anyone on the Internet telling you not to use a reference or that you shouldn’t need a reference? Unfollow them. You don’t need that negativity in your life. Why would you deprive yourself of a tool to create? The greatest portrait painters in history had to look at their subjects! You are not getting paid nearly as much to do this as Hans Holbein, and he had to stare at Henry VIII correct else lose his head- you can pull up multiple references. I’d far rather be judged for using hella references than be judged for being a racist!
Part of the issue is people draw what they’re used to, what they’re comfortable with (thus last lesson). But if what you’re used to is not what someone will look like… That’s not okay. Their features are not the issue, your skills are the issue. Learn! Practice! There is no rush. No one is rushing you to be perfect at drawing Black characters, and no one is rushing you to post them. You can just practice! If you’re not a professional, you can take as long as you need to draw! If you need to draw that piece of hair over and over until you feel like you have down the shape, you do that! If you need to use a tool that would draw the hair for you, you get that tool!
If you want to post, you can say you are practicing! If you make clear you are practicing, then be willing to accept that people may have feedback. I’d far rather deal with someone saying they’re unconfident and practicing, than someone posting a whitewashed caricature and closing their ears because “well at least I’m trying!”
2) Empathize! Care about actual Black people when you create a Black character!
Imagine, if you will, in the Twilight Zone: you went to an artist, and you asked for a white character (I typed in “regular looking white dude” on google). There’s hardly ever any white characters, you’re so super excited about this one! You paid good money, because you’ve seen just how amazing this artist creates! They’re so good at drawing characters of color! But no matter how many times you ask, they send you back an image of… Assad Zaman.
That man might be fine as hell! Gorgeous! Beautifully done! Chef’s kiss. Stunning! But… He’s not white. That’s not what you asked or paid for. You can’t even fathom how they mixed this up, they don’t even look alike! And when you confront them, they gaslight you, they call YOU the issue for not understanding how you can’t tell that this is a white man! They would never get this wrong! They have white friends, you’re the racist! But you’re not stupid, and you have functioning eyes- you can SEE what this drawing looks like! And… It’s not you.
It’s dehumanizing. It’s being told that there’s a “better way” to look like you, and that’s by… Not looking like you. You, as you exist, are what’s incorrect. Your identity is incorrect, not their drawing. It’s better to have thinner hair instead of an afro or locs, it’s better to have lighter skin, it’s better to have a straighter, thinner nose over a round one, and smaller lips.
And what makes it worse is knowing that people who don’t look like you? Probably won’t care. They won’t be willing to see- not unable, but unwilling- that playing with this caricature is harmful, that they’re propagating harm by not acknowledging it. They’re letting you know that your humanity means less to them than the clout received with a whitewashed or half-assed Black character, and that people will applaud them for that ‘attempt at inclusion’. And people will applaud! They will be entertained by the mere performance! And that hurts.
I’m going to say this, and it’s awkward and I try not to say it directly on here, but… Having Black friends and/or being around actual, real life Black people would help. I can tell from some of the questions I receive that Black characters and their traits- especially things like our hair and our cultures- are being treated as… alien concepts. But even if, for whatever reason, you legitimately don’t know any Black people, you do not need to know us individually to care about our humanity as a whole! Even if you do not know we’re there, we are, and we could possibly see your work!
By acknowledging Blackness and making room to understand what it means- and that includes how we can look- you are doing the bare minimum of acknowledging our personhood. If you cannot do even that, you don’t need to be drawing us.
Conclusion
Here’s the thing: if you want to draw a white man with tanned skin, do that. Just do it! You do NOT have to erase me to have more of you! There is not a single fandom where the majority of the white fans ever said “gee, not another white guy!” It simply doesn’t happen. God knows we wish it did sometimes. You will always have an audience for white characters. There’s no danger to any of you of “being erased”.
(Without putting on my political hat, I will say that a lot of white people who consider themselves to be far from white supremacist will express beliefs in line with great replacement theory if you push them hard enough. It is unfortunately not as uncommon an idea as you might think. I would do some self-evaluation.)
People are going to notice that you only ever draw white people, but… To be frank, that has never stopped anybody from being successful. Again, Jen Zee, at Supergiant with the terrible dark-skinned characters… Still has a job. at Supergiant. A professional studio. Dragon Age. Multiple games of consistent whitewashing and racist writing. Still going. If racism prevented creation and popularity, I wouldn’t have to have this blog. Alas, that is the society we currently live in.
But if you ACTUALLY want to depict Black characters, if you ACTUALLY want to do right and be respectful- not because you want the clout, but because it’s the right damn thing to do- then you need to commit! This means drawing them as they are meant to be! Accept that you’ll likely lose some fan base, who was there (whether they were aware of it or not) for the white and lighter skinned characters. Accept that this means that trying to appeal to those people by whitewashing characters is 1) wrong, 2) racist, which is 3) something you chose to do when you could simply have just… Drawn more white people.
I’ll say it again: antiracism is hard. It’s hard doing the right thing in a society that rewards racism so easily. It’s really hard knowing that people will stop supporting you or caring as much about your work when you start including Black characters as actively as you do white ones, especially if you start talking about the importance of it. But in my honest opinion, I’d far rather be someone that cared about others, with genuine fans, than someone that was racist for the fleeting internet clout of strangers. And that may be less ‘hopeful’ than I normally am in these lessons, but… People make choices. And people who have been informed- as you are now- are aware of the choices they are making. It’s the thought that counts, but the action that delivers- let’s choose better actions.
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