I'm not trying to argue what black is and black ain't. I think if you re-read my comments you see that I think anything BUT black people all think the same. Otherwise how could I state that some say a character is 'too black' while others argue they're 'not black enough'.
Well it's really two-fold. One is complaining about the things that black readers have been complaining about forever and yet nothing changes. At some point I think I'd take shredder's idea and go where the gold is. Seems a lot more satisfying and fruitful than complainign continually about things that the complaining has done nothing to fix.
Second is complaining about racist undertones when there may not even be any. And again, I have stated that if you write a character a certain way (colorblind) you have half the black audience complaining that he isn't black enough ( I was reading this a while back in the black superheroes thread) but if they tweak him to make him a little more identifiable as black, the other half accuses that he is a stereotype (I read that in that thread as well). It is the reason, IMO, that Disney is so hesitant to put out a BP film and instead go with safer options. They don't face that danger with any of the other movies they say they're releasing. I have stated it repeatedly (apparently to deaf ears) that whether it matters to black readers or not, or whether they even believe it, a big company will bend over backwards to avoid getting hit with the racist label. I have pointed out examples of people already making remarks about things that are in the comics that they better not put in the movie because it would be construed as racist. If Disney is faced with being labeled as racist either way (either for not putting out a BP film or putting one out that someone (guaranteed) will find something racist against black people in, I'd say they'd probably just take the easier option and not worry about putting out a BP film especially when there are so many safer options (and I don't mean financially safer - I know GOTG is going into new territory) where the racist label is not a risk. As I said, when someone is damned if they do and damned if they don't, they usually don't bother.
First off, I think we have to define what is 'complaining'. It seems that you take any criticism to be complaining, which by implication, is something illegitimate and unworthy of discussion and debate.
Though I agree with you that not many companies want to be labeled with the tag 'racist' I don't think that's stopping any companies or many people that are accused of being racist. FOX News is going strong, Imus has a new show, and the Bachelor has weathered the charges made against it so far, for example. Hollywood continues rolling even after annual charges about how non-diverse TV and movies are. So I don't think the charge of racism has the sting or have people cowering in fear like you seem to think. If anything I think we there have been effective counters against the charge of racism, such as the usage of the term 'playing the race card', or of blacks' or non-whites's having 'grievances', or the muddying of what racism is so that now some whites believe that blacks are racist for mentioning racism, so it's not as clear and companies or others who might be labeled racist can thrive in that ambiguity.
How can one be certain regarding racist undertones not being present in some suspect works? The history of Hollywood and mass media was built off racist depictions of people of color, its ingrained into the very DNA of the entertainment industry. So while there might or might not be racist intent on the part of some creators today, I don't think it's beyond the pale to check, critique, and question the depictions of people of color, especially when the people who are mainly devising these depictions are not people of color.
Regarding what is black enough or what isn't, why do you think that portraying characters as 'more black' would be necessarily stereotypical? I think you need to take a look at what you consider is the black normal or standard. Also what does 'colorblind' mean to you, a white person with brown skin?
I don't see a problem with depicting blacks as three-dimensional characters with a some sense of cultural awareness and knowledge of their history. I don't get why that is so hard to do. However when we have one group (white males) largely creating media representations of all groups, we have this racial/ethnic/cultural disconnect.
I wonder how many black people listen to Straight Outta Compton while stating they don't like the proliferation of the image of the black convict in the mass media.
I listen to Straight Outta Compton. But I also like to Kind of Blue. And Johnny Cash and Muddy Waters and Etta James and Donny Hathaway and Katy Perry and Norah Jones, etc. The issue is not censoring images of black criminals, but the overrepresentation of those images vis-a-vis other images.
As someone said, this is only a small part (the negative, if you will) of the Luke Cage story compared to the much more positive (Cage rising above his past, making the right choices in a spot where it might be easier to be bitter and go down the wrong path) but some want to focus in on that one little negative. This is exactly the mentality that I think Marvel fears in trying to do a BP film. They could try their best to put out the best BP film they could but some hypervigilant viewers are bound to find something in the film they will claim is racist and it doesn't take a lot to fan those flames. There's a saying: 'when all you look at is race, all you see is racism'.
I look at race because of racism, not the other way around. I know that's an idea some whites-and blacks-like to tell themselves to explain away the racial disparities that continue to plague our society. But it makes little sense when you look at history, and I think this is an ahistorical retort.
And as I stated before, I thought what black readers wanted was to show diversity among the black heroes. In fact of the black heroes I can think of, who else other than Cage even has a criminal past? So it's ok to have an African king, a super-genius millionaire, a high-ranking military officer, an African queen/goddess but not someone with a criminal background (even if they were framed to receive that)? What exactly is your definition of diversity?
I think this is an interesting reply. How many white heroes are convicts? White heroes can run the gamut, and most of it positive background depictions, yet blacks have to accept a "diversity" that plays into stereotypes of black male behavior? I don't mind Luke Cage, but I would definitely like to see other heroes get a movie before him. I want to expand the media narrative of who black people are and what they can be. Your argument would be a little easier to swallow if we just didn't have another movie season where genius white male billionaires save us all in the Avengers and Dark Knight Rises.
When I think of black people I think of Michael Jordan, Herman Caine, Chris Rock off the top of my head. I can't think of who would be 'the worst' among black populace - Tiger Woods? I mean, everyone screws up sometimes and it seems he has gotten past all that and risen again so there's that.
I like what JB-the-hunter said earlier. You should go back and read it. I have black friends who tell me exactly the same thing. Being black for them isn't a hassle just because they're black. They don't allow anyone to lump them together into one identity. They are individuals and they don't let themselves get angry over the silly ignorance of others. They take responsibility for everything that goes on in their lives and their actions and understand that just because everything doesn't always go the way they want it to, it isn't attributible to someone hating them. As I said if you're always looking for/at that kind of stuff, you're always going to see it.
I can't discount the experiences of your friends, but those are not might my experiences. For example, I was stopped by a cop for what I call "walking while black" and a group of my friends were pulled over for no other reason than we were a group of black males in a car and they were on a fishing expedition for drugs or some contraband. I don't think it does our society any good to ignore continued racial disparities, or unequal justice like mass incarceration and racial profiling. You ignore it at your own peril. I definitely think you should be vigilant about such things, you should look for such things. President Reagan said "trust but verify" and when you have a nation with a history of racial discrimination to act like even the possibility of racism is impossible to conceive just doesn't make much sense to me. It sounds more like wishful thinking than a real examination of the state of where our country is today.
I don't know if your remark about judging is true or not but it certainly could explain why there seems to be a push in the media to make every white male appear like a complete buffoon who can't do anything without his wife or his black associate. I think the media's ridiculous regardless and however they want to portray people racially in advertising makes no difference to me with the exception that I find it amusing how different reactions would be if the rolls were reversed.
I have read criticism about the depiction of white males, though generally the articles just say males, since white is considered the default in our society, and though it is generally looked at in gender rather than racial terms, I have no problem if someone looked at it through that prism. I do have my issues with the the generally undeveloped black assistants, bosses, or black best friends on TV and in movies today that exists mainly to amuse or comfort the main white characters. Sometimes the black bosses are there solely to provide an easily surmountable obstacle. Though the point you bring up about white males being depicted as buffoons highlights that not just blacks but other people of color as well do have issues with their depictions, you've just got to know where to look, like sites like Racialicious. And some whites also have criticisms, like Italian-Americans, have long had issues with the mafia depictions and now the Jersey Shore stuff.
