thewhiteproblem

[thewhiteproblem]

Decolonising Media

First written in March 2017 and posted now as a resource for a conversation between white people on how we can tackle The White Problem.

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I grew up in a small majority white city at an almost completely white school surrounded by media - advertising and tv - that did nothing but re-enforce my whiteness. Yes there were black and brown people there, but to me they were just people. Being brought up in these overwhelmingly white surroundings creates the My First Experience of Race, ever problematic argument, 'I don’t see colour’. Because 99% of all the faces I see, whether 2D or 3D, are white and anything else becomes quite ignorable in its difference.

Here’s our level one decolonisation step - we need to stop thinking of white as a norm or a base and everything else as other. From medical forms, White/british/other, to the term People of Colour, which homogenises everyone that isn’t white - whiteness and white fragility are centred and protected constantly and it’s time for us to acknowledge and change that. (I’d like to point out here that I know a lot of people use the term People of Colour as a self identifier which I’m not trying to undermine, I just want to draw attention to the language we use when talking about race, and how that often revolves around the white experience



Black and brown people come in every colour, including white if you’re albino or white passing. This is the problem of the man made system that is race, there is no room for complexities, we try and split each other into skin tone but the reality is latinxs and anyone of mixed race can appear white, and people from ‘white’ countries can be dark skinned like Italy and Spain. The concept of race is made up, not to say racism doesn’t exist because the repercussions of race are real. but the reality is its a shitty describing systems that is full od holes and flaws, it defines how we see race still. the other box - ‘The racial categories used in the US census are a product of the political history of the united states. People who we’d consider white, black and hispanic here might be categorised totally differently in Brazil, where different demographics and history have lead led to different race concepts.’ *cue wtf is latino vid. Is it your name? Your accent? You’re ability to speak the language? The fact you get racially profiled from your appearance? The truth is there’s no clean answer because.. This is also true in Europe where.. dark skin italian arguments. Mixed race people perceiving themselves as half something and half something else. the first time i realised i was black - guardian article. We have to stop speaking for others and know what boundaries our identity lies within. Race as social identity not genetic Having said that its a social construct we cant ignore the implications of the effects of race, the effects are real which is why whitewashing is an issue


Non-binary artist Jacob V Joyce in their book 'The Alphabetical Anthology of White Liberal Proverbs’ refers to 'a slavery that evolved instead of ending’, and that is what is happening with colonialism as well - it has evolved instead of ending through how we represent black and brown people in media. Whitewashing is the first point to address - taking black and brown stories and telling them through and for white eyes. If we take it all the way back, a huge part of the message in white washing is ‘I can play you better than you can play you’ which can be found in ‘entertainment’ like the Minstrel shows from the 1840s onwards. White people dressing up in blackface to demonise and ridicule black people is overt racism that we can now all agree is completely unacceptable, so over time it has had to morph and evolve to spread unchallenged. It becomes less blatant but the message does not change. I can play you better than you can play you. To this day, white people continue to be cast in roles that weren’t written for them, taking stories that aren’t ours to tell. The message we are sending here is clear - we see your story, we think it’s cool and we are going to profit from it, with or without your consent.

“I’ve become the butt of many jokes,” she said, referring to her role in Aloha. “I’ve learned on a macro level about the insane history of whitewashing in Hollywood and how prevalent the problem truly is. It’s ignited a conversation that’s very important.”

In defense of her casting, she offered: “The character was not supposed to look like her background which was a quarter Hawaiian and a quarter Chinese.” The obvious lesson to learn here is that race is more than skin colour and what someone looks like, it’s a cultural heritage you tap into, that is passed down. It’s personal. It’s as intimate as sexuality. And no one should be explaining it to you/validates it for you.

The flip side of whitewashing is a more insidious perpetuation of colonialism - tokenism. Whilst genuine multiculturalism and cultural sharing are great and important and make us stronger, tokenism - using faces to claim diversity - is a pathetic attempt to tape over the deep scars in our societies that were left and continue to be re-opened by centring whiteness. This is a point at which white liberals especially fall down - those who do see racial inequality as an issue that needs to be addressed but think it can be fixed purely through visual representation. Yes, seeing yourself on screen and in media is crucial but that is not where it ends.


To truly start decolonising our media we have to engage in genuine research. Simply showing a brown or black face is not the answer, it is just the start, really the bare minimum that we have all been resting on so far. The WritingWithColour tumblr blog, in their essay 'A Discussion on Culture and Erasure' explain that 'While we are no different from the majority in terms of our minds, our passions, our ideas, we are different in where we come from. Our experience was shaped by our culture and in order to show us as true characters, you must give your own characters our ethnicity’s history. Our comforts will be different from yours because we grew up being comforted by different things.’ 
 Creating media invariably includes research, so why do we shy away from researching existing cultures that are different to our own? We will happily create entire fantasy worlds of wizards, dragons, witches and elves, and post-apocalyptic wastelands where we can indulge in a fantasy of surviving in ruins, having nothing and maybe even being hunted by intruders - just imagine! And if it gets too much, don’t worry you can just turn off the tv. Simple right?

For all the effort put into creating these worlds, there is a clear reluctance to get into deep honest research of black and brown cultures that is respectful and accurate and insighful. ‘Our comforts will be different from yours because we grew up being comforted by different things’ is a key line here that goes back to the idea that white is 0, white is a neutral base. It’s not. To continue to treat it like it is forces whiteness onto your audience, you characters and your work

Names are a huge, easily solvable part of tokenism. Alex Parrish in Quantico, for example, played by Priyanka Chopra. The name Alex Parrish says that it was assumed this role would be played by a white person and when ABC landed Priyanka Chopra to play the part, it wasn’t deemed important enough to change her name so she could be represented in a more genuine way. Whether the character has an in-depth back story or not, culture is part of identity, the pinnacle of which is a name.

Representation is seeing yourself on screen, GOOD representation is seeing your life on screen, treated with the same respect and detail that every other character’s is. This happens regularly to queer people in media too, the most ‘acceptable’ forms of gay relationships (read: skinny white cisgender able-bodied people) are portrayed, and still have drastically reduced screen time compared to their straight counterparts. Their stories will not run as deep, with backstories at times being overlooked entirely.

Representing only a single facet of a character’s complex identity - one that you deem to be most easily digestible is not only lazy, but a harmful perpetuation of the idea that you must conform to be accepted. You make them gay but not too gay, you make them brown but not too brown. The centring of white heterosexual fragility is at this point embarrassing. We need to sharpen up and address our shortcomings in how we create media, and make moves to fix them. More importantly still, we need to make space for and support black and brown writers and creators who have been dealing with this shit from day one, and are waiting for us to catch up. Remember that their achievements are not our failures, and everyone wins when we take responsibility for our privilege and decolonise our media.