In a nation that seems so strongly voiced in expressing and advocating for racial equality, you would think there would be more of an outburst for Hollywood’s problem with white-washing.

Now don’t be mistaken. White-washing isn’t when a film or story contains white people. That’s not it at all. “White-washing” is when more priority is given to a white person when casting, and when the origins of that story are in the viewpoint, history or experience of a person of another race and is instead replaced by a white actor.

There’s no denying that racial stigmas exist in so many aspects of our society, so why should Hollywood be one of the targets for this racial problem? If you’ve ever watched a movie in the cinemas, it most likely had its roots from and is associated with Hollywood. Though some may try to deny it, we are influenced by the story and the actors within the film. Regardless, in some shape or form, millions of others are watching these movies and are subconsciously absorbing what they have to offer. So when we see a white man playing a hero of ancient China ("The Great Wall"), a white woman playing a Tibetan role ("Doctor Strange"), or an Italian/Chinese/British man playing an Indian-American ("The Social Network"), we become exposed to the idea that it’s acceptable for non-white roles to be substituted with a white actor, and for racial stereotypes to be permitted all in the name of "art."

Often, directors and casting agents defend their choices to hire a white actor because there are not enough actors of color that are successful enough for the role, such as Ridley Scott ("Exodus: Gods and Kings:), Zhang Yimou ("The Great Wall") and C. Robert Cargill ("Doctor Strange"). While it’s understandable that directors would want a solid fan base in order to captivate an already interested audience, the directors and casting agents are failing to realize that there won’t ever be enough color in Hollywood if they don’t give anyone else a chance. Not only does white-washing in Hollywood take away opportunities for minority actors, but it also creates a strong assumption that white actors are more valuable and relevant than those of color. Constance Wu from Fresh Off The Boat puts it simply:

"If white actors are forgiven for having a box office failure once in a while, why can't a POC (person of color) sometimes have one?" she asked. "And how COOL would it be if you were the movie that took the "risk" to make a POC as your hero and you sold the s--t out of it?!”

Whitewashing isn't just having high hopes for high film revenue, but it's encouraging stereotypes and the idea that other cultures and histories are irrelevant.

Native Americans do this and look like this. Black people do this and look like this. Asian people do this and look like this. Hispanic people do this and look like this. The list goes on and on as we are constantly exposed to the white actor playing 'hero' while people of color play the minor, stereotypical roles or are simply replaced.

Take for example the upcoming film "The Great Wall," which features Matt Damon as one of the heroes set in China over 1,000 years ago during the Northern Song Dynasty. Zhang Yimou, director of The Great Wall, defends his decision to include Matt Damon as one of the main characters in the movie by claiming:

Our film is not about the construction of the Great Wall. Matt Damon is not playing a role that was originally conceived for a Chinese actor. The arrival of his character in our story is an important plot point. There are five major heroes in our story and he is one of them — the other four are all Chinese.

So because it's neither based on a real story nor about the Great Wall, and is instead just "casually" placed in a time period with historically inspired settings, it makes it acceptable to put a white man as one of his five heroes of ancient China? So what if there's a monster in the movie? Does that make it any less excusable to say that it is, and always has been, okay to drop a white guy in an ancient Chinese-based film? It's true that the film is fiction, Matt Damon is not being conceived as a Chinese man and that the rest of the cast is mainly Chinese. But it's also humorous to see the director defend himself by showing the film's many features of ancient Chinese culture, and then continue to use the white man as the face of the entire film (Let's be honest. How many times have we seen the other characters?).

"Exodus: Gods and Kings" uses star actors Christian Bale as Moses and Joel Edgarton as Pharoah. Director Ridley Scott explains that he didn't use racially appropriate actors set in Ancient Egypt because he "can’t mount a film of this budget...and say that my lead actor is Mohammad so-and-so from such-and-such". If you read the rest of his statement, you realize that not only was his reply pretentious, but his assertion is only further perpetuating how the white man is simply more worth it. David Ehrlich from Timeout: New York says:

"The ultimate takeaway is that if you can’t finance a $140 million epic about ancient Egypt with racially appropriate actors, maybe you shouldn’t make a $140 million epic about ancient Egypt.”

And I couldn't agree with Ehrlich more.

Many films even go as far as changing specific characters to fit the role of a white actor. Just take a look at Marvel's upcoming film "Doctor Strange" in which The Ancient One, who is originally written as a Tibetan character, is instead cast as a white woman from Nepal (which is Marvel's justification as to why she isn't Asian). Marvel went on to make multiple excuses and to defend that they weren't whitewashing anything. George Takei puts it best when said:

To those who say, “She is an actress, this is fiction,” remember that Hollywood has been casting white actors in Asian roles for decades now, and we can’t keep pretending there isn’t something deeper at work here. If it were true that actors of Asian descent were being offered choice roles in films, these arguments might prevail. But there has been a long standing practice of taking roles that were originally Asian and rewriting them for white actors to play, leaving Asians invisible on the screen and underemployed as actors. This is a very real problem, not an abstract one. It is not about political correctness, it is about correcting systemic exclusion. Do you see the difference?

It's not a problem that we see so many successful white actors.

It's a problem that we don't see as many successful other-ethnic actors standing with them, or at least given the same opportunity they have.

It's true that many audiences are understanding what white-washing means and what it does to all of us. Audiences are crying out against movies like "Breakfast at Tiffany's" (1961), "Lone Ranger" (2013) and "Pan" (2015), and are even bringing more awareness to movies that have not even started production yet, including the live-action "Mulan." While this is a huge step towards the right direction, there's still so much more to achieve in order to even slightly crack the barriers of racial stigma.

Are you willing to color Hollywood?