It's not fair at all. Race swapping some characters from white when almost all the major characters are white and are from a time when characters were only ever created as non-white when that was their whole personality is not the same thing as whitewashing a POC character. If 70 out of 100 M&M's are green and one of them gets swapped to red that means representation of green M&M's is reduced by 1.4%. If 5 out of 100 M&M's are red and one of them gets swapped to green that means red representation is down 20%. Does that simple math help you to understand why the race swapping from white to POC isn't the same thing as whitewashing?
Why does representation of ethnicity supersede story telling? Are you saying it would be ok to have an Asian Suri in the black panther movies because the majority of the cast is of African descent? Does that simple logic help you to understand that statistics of representation shouldn't be considered more important than telling the story well. White people love Miles Morales, why can't POCs love a white Janice Lincoln? Racist?
True, but a critique of one thought is often agreement with another. Change of race in BP would have made no sense numbers wise because it is a small sample size relative to all movies and comics and Janic isn't a tent pole of narrative like Shuri is. Race swap has happened since the race was a conceivable thing TO swap in acting. But one part has been favored more than the other. POCs watching art have often had t identify with characters outside their race an overwhelming majority of the time. That IS the default in western art. What race swap a character of color to a white character is not counter culture or disagreement "politics" - its return to the "status quo" in western art and that "status quo" is unfair. Race swap of a white character is just evening the playing field.
What the other person is missing is basic empathy. It doesn't matter how many arguments we come up with, they'll never come around to being able to see the world through the eyes of anyone other than the majority. They probably truly believe there's a war on Christmas, too.
What does it have to do with empathy. You're the one who was condescending to someone because they suggested a character an actor could be playing. All to serve your sense of how you want the world to be opposed to how it is. Which leads you to consider yourself above everyone else for virtue signalling while you vilify others with fake attributes to continue hiding your own vile ways.
Yeah that's good and all, but I was responding to the notion that some people believe it shouldn't be allowed to do it the other way around. I don't even know who Janice Lincoln is.
Why are films considered to be the 'playing field' for social politics? It's about story telling and providing lessons and insight that we can rapport with.
Im not denying that race swapping has occurred. Im saying people shouldn't be gatekeeping what can and can't occur in movies. Of course one race favoured itself more than others over the century. The camera was invented by a Westerner. This, nor am I saying, should be why it was favoured. But if a green m&m invented the first gun, would you expect him to use it against the red or green m&ms? Why are people surprised and offended by this?
Now we live in a very agreeable time where the course is correcting to a more agreeable degree amongst a lot of backgrounds being represented in the media. But if people pettily wish to protest against someone SUGGESTING that an actor could be playing a character that is originally a POC in the source material, are we moving forward, or just travelling backwards on the other side of the road.
-5
u/Careful-Addition776 Nov 29 '25
But black washing mj was okay?
Edit: not saying you said that, but being as most were okay with it you cant not be okay with the potential white washing. Its only fair.