I am so sick of Hollywood always using white, able-bodied actors and actresses with some well-known people of color making an appearance. Let me clarify that I, myself, am white and able-bodied, and I still notice how white actors typically get more lines than their minority counterparts. Although there have been improvements, it's not enough.
Each day I work or go to class, I see so many different people compromising many different backgrounds.
Why is it then that so much of the media consumed in the United States focuses on portraying the same people in the same normative relationships?
It's not realistic in the slightest because it excludes a huge percentage of the population. Additionally, with actors such as Scarlett Johansson repeatedly accepting roles that they are not fit to play (woman of color, trans man), it reinforces the ideas that those privileged individuals deserve to be heard over the voices of people who actually lived through that specific experience. Think of it almost like a cisgendered man trying to tell a woman what menstrual cramps feel like...doesn't make much sense, does it?
We need to tell the stories of minorities with minorities present in the production! It's not enough to just stick one actor in a film - we need writers, producers, and directors of all different backgrounds to uplift and speak the truth of their stories. Yes, I'm tired of seeing the same thing on screen, but I'm also over writing rooms full of white, able-bodied men trying to tell the stories of people they have nothing in common with. There has been an improvement, but we need to do better. Those in positions of privilege need to do better to advocate for those lacking it.
Amplify their voices instead of speaking over them.
To those people who are making a difference in the industry, thank you. The media with more diversity tend to be more entertaining and real because it's refreshing and representative of the actual population. Done are the days of another Nicholas Sparks' two white people predictively falling in love on screen.
