The delicious tears of bigots - "forced diversity"

"Force" diversity? Hell, anybody looking at what I'm currently doing is probably going to tell me that I need a fair bit less diversity...



O.H.

Uh.........

Stats? Figures? Evidence?

DanielSTJ said:

Uh.........

Stats? Figures? Evidence?

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This has actually been an issue in spec fic for the last ~5 years. Actually much longer than that, but a few years back some folks organized and weaponized the entire idea. (Currently they seem to be focusing on comics.)

It's of course not true that white men can't get published, as any visit to a bookstore demonstrates (and I think OP was being sarcastic there). But there is indeed a subset of spec fic readers who get a bit shirty when the MCs aren't buff hetero white guys, and who insist the success of non-hetero-male authors is because people (publishers? Readers? Not sure what the logic is here) are pandering.

Of course there are persistent diversity issues in publishing, although the bias is not against hetero white men. People are well-intentioned, but change is slow. Awareness is not a substitute for getting some diversity into the agent/publisher/marketer/publicist food chain as well.

And there is the support.

Just wasn't aware of such a thing.

Hm. Food for thought.

Still plenty of books with all-white casts being published, at least in SF and F. Still plenty of books about dudes with dude problems where any women or girls are in a support role. Plenty of books where the protagonists and major characters are all straight. Sometimes it makes sense for the books to be this way, but not always. I definitely notice a lack of diversity when I encounter it in a book now. Once upon a time I just accepted it as "normal" too.

I guess that people who still think of lack of diversity as an unremarked norm for all of humanity notice every single book that isn't monochrome, male-dominated or heteronormative. To them, such characters and books feel unnatural and forced, and they assume the author is making a strongly politicized point, and they perceive these titles as occupying a much higher percentage of the total published than they do.

there are also false equivalencies. One person told me that since African Americans are about 14% of the US population, that numbers stating that only 20% of books had black characters in them were above mark. He missed the fact that it's a much tinier fraction with black protagonists, and that 14% of all characters in books aren't black.

I know you know this, Roxxsmom, so please take my response as addressed to the person you're talking about.

Roxxsmom said:

there are also false equivalencies. One person told me that since African Americans are about 14% of the US population, that numbers stating that only 20% of books had black characters in them were above mark. He missed the fact that it's a much tinier fraction with black protagonists, and that 14% of all characters in books aren't black.

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What he missed is that books aren't about representing reality, spec fic in particular. What he missed is that most of us have spent our lives reading about people who aren't like us, because we didn't have any other choice. What he missed is that the wide variety of human experience, and all the varied storytelling that comes out of that, is marvelous, exhilarating, mind-expanding entertainment. What he missed is that non-white non-hetero non-men have been writing spec fic all along.

What's most frustrating is that publishing is still pretty ossified on this front. Some imprints do better than others, but I've seen up close and personal some of the biases that still pervade the industry, even if they're championing your work. And then we get a pack of white guys shrieking "unfair!" because every once in a while a story not helmed by a white man does well? It's crazymaking.

(ETAA: Removed previous ETA. I can't say it right. I'm just kind of gobsmacked at the nerve of this guy who thinks authors owe him some kind of precise reflection of his personal vision of the universe. HELL NO, DUDE. That's why I write science fiction.)

kindratiah said:

Um, in case anyone couldn't tell...I am not under the impression that books with all white male casts can't get published. This post is sarcastic and meant to mock people with that viewpoint.

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Yeah, I missed the boat there. Sometimes sarcasm goes over my head.

kindratiah said:

Um, in case anyone couldn't tell...I am not under the impression that books with all white male casts can't get published. This post is sarcastic and meant to mock people with that viewpoint.

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I know that. I was expressing annoyance at the folks who still feel this way. I run across them fairly often in SFF circles.

lizmonster said:

I know you know this, Roxxsmom, so please take my response as addressed to the person you're talking about.



What he missed is that books aren't about representing reality, spec fic in particular. What he missed is that most of us have spent our lives reading about people who aren't like us, because we didn't have any other choice.

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That too. And if you are writing SF, the US (or other society) of the future may be a lot more diverse, It's also possible to represent speculative cultures where white people are the minority, or absent entirely.

And yes, everyone deserves to see that they aren't disqualified from being a hero, or from having interesting stories told about them, just because they aren't white, male, straight, fully able etc.

Roxxsmom said:

And if you are writing SF, the US (or other society) of the future may be a lot more diverse, It's also possible to represent speculative cultures where white people are the minority, or absent entirely.

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I write spec fic that's nominally our future, and I have a diverse cast specifically because it's not credible that the future will be populated by Mostly White People. Apart from the fact that white people aren't the majority on this planet today - if we don't deal with our species' apparent propensity for racism, we're not getting a future of any kind.

I closed this because:

Too many people missed the attempt at irony
This isn't really an Office Party thread
There's a little too much malicious mockery in some posts

You're welcome to appeal to Ol' Fashioned Girl, the mod, if you want it re-opened.

Don't bother appealing to Ol' Fashioned Girl. She agrees wholeheartedly with AW Admin.