On one hand, it makes me feel good to see LGBTQ+ people represented anywhere on television and in the media. On the other hand, the fact that we’re showing up in all these advertisements but not really in actual shows and stuff just tells me that we’re at a point where we’re good enough to be marketed to but not to like exist outside of a consumerist context.
This is exactly what I’ve been wanting to articulate.
Tag: representation matters
Hi again, I think I’m you’re Lexa anon :-) some of us are trying to build support with campaigns to get Lexa back on the show even if only for the finale. would you participate?
Hello again Lexa anon, I enjoy your questions (and I’m not ignoring the most recent one, I promise to work on it – it was a big question). 🙂
I have so much sympathy for fans who want to see Lexa return to the show and I do agree that it would be a good idea, in some capacity, but there is this: the people who decided to kill off Lexa (and what she represented for much of their audience) manipulated that audience for months and when it all went sideways, ran to ground and hid instead of engaging with those fans whom they harmed. They took no responsibility for their actions. Their actions were an abuse of their privilege and they’ve shown no interest in the fans they used (for ratings and renewal), no interest in their well-being or ‘making up to them’ in any capacity.
On one hand, this is likely due to the network not wanting them to admit any fault since that might bring up some potential for a precedent on how audiences can redress a grievance – something the industry, no doubt, doesn’t want. They want to be able to create their programmes and not have to deal with any repercussions elsewhere. Right now, they’re getting away with it. If you’ve noticed, use of Lexa’s image, talking about her even (as they did last summer) keeping ADC away from any of their publicity events (like SDCC, DayDream Con), no images of her tweeted to promote the show – all of it likely to keep legal teams happy.
I’m sympathetic, but I’ve no interest in participating in any campaign to ‘beg’ or plead with those very same abusers to give back something that, for them, was only a means to an end. It says that the abuse is somehow forgivable and will be washed away if they comply. This can’t be so. It takes away our dignity as human beings.
I spent several nights up with young fans who were depressed and in danger of self-harming, with suicidal thoughts after episode 7 aired. I take very seriously what happened to them. It can’t be undone this way. Forgiveness and healing need to happen, yes, but not at our expense. Not again.
granted, i don’t know how the actual interaction transpired but, even with only the little context given, i really think this filmmaker is a fuckface, and how the audience reacted to the person’s question as well as the fact that this person who replied to the tweet actually seemed to consider this the worst question he’s ever heard at a film Q&A shows that his white fans/target audience seriously aren’t any better. like for a provocateur, Refn can’t even seem to fucking handle something simple as someone actually questioning his limited reality and perspective.
but i really don’t get the need of people of color (and woke white people) to have diversity and representation of people of color in media created by white people who are complicit in creating images of misogyny, racism, homophobia, and xenophobia and upholding conservative and traditional values that are prominent in film like hyper-masculinity. like why not use all of that effort towards supporting works by people of color and by people in non-western countries? why not question the canon as well as the other institutions that have made people like Refn well-recognized and his films critically acclaimed in his field while there are other filmmakers
as talented asway more talented than him who can’t even make most of their dream projects into a reality? why not question the violent images that white people have created of other countries, of people of other nations instead?This isn’t specifically about women directors but I agree so much with what is being said here.
My heart breaks for the girl who asked the question but their are so many women of colour out there who have made it a priority to nurture woc characters. They are out there making films often with less money and with less acknowledgement than their white peers.
Indiewire came up with a list of 115 films by and about woc (FYI I noticed that a few of these movies are either by or starring white women and were erroneously included because the list is user generated).
I also came up with a small list of my own (scroll to the bottom for the list)
I know many of my followers are hungry for this type of material and I hope this helps them discover some really wonderful directors whose art is underseen and underappreciated.
‘limited reality and perspective.’
Doesn’t this describe most of the Hollywood film making community?
Change cannot come too soon.
mellissa herself said plenty of times at comic con she didn’t like that superman was not in her story that it felt strange missing such a big part of karas life so why are you upset about superman being there? its only two episodes
Regardless of how much or how little screen time he actually gets, the fact of the matter is that the first official promotional photos the CW has released for the season have been of Kara with Superman, and the vast majority of the press and publicity for the upcoming season has been centered around Superman, Tyler Hoechlin, how does Tyler Hoechlin feel about the suit, what advice did Supermans of franchises past give Tyler Hoechlin about being Superman / about manscaping / about peeing in the Superman suit, oh look iconic Superman villain Metallo (played by a pasty white dude), is Tyler Hoechlin’s Superman actually going to turn into an antagonist and is Mon-El (yet another white boy) here to help Kara fight him??? (regardless of the truth of that last one, it’s an article that was written, it’s indicative of how Superman fanboys are using this as an opportunity to take this show and MAKE it about Superman—make it about them—regardless of how much actual plot Clark is getting).
The point is it’s drawing attention away from Kara, which was the very reason I was apprehensive about this in the first place, and also the very reason the writers/producers gave for purposefully not showing his face in season 1 (yes, partially it was probably a budgeting / rights issue, but it was also a creative decision). Tyler Hoechlin’s opinions about spandex and what Superman represents (with very little if any mention of Superman’s relationship to Supergirl, which should have been the focus if he was going to talk at all about Superman) have been dominating the conversation about the upcoming season in the media for weeks now—there has been more focus on him than literally anything else, even more than the potential superflarrowverse mega musical crossover (and the rumor about that potentially being directed by Joss Whedon. Plus the episode that is actually being directed by Kevin Smith).
They could be talking about so many other things, things that actually will and should play a major part in this season and in Kara’s story: Maggie Sawyer (Floriana Lima is a new SERIES REGULAR, and having a woman of color playing a lesbian on a show that has struggled a lot with representation in those arenas is HUGE. AND YET. Tyler Hoechlin is in literally two episodes, as you pointed out, but his literal bodily functions have gotten more press than she has), Miss Martian, Cadmus & Jeremiah, Lena Luthor, Kara’s new job at Catco, President Wonder Woman—basically anything that is not yet another cishet white man.
But no. People are talking about Tyler Hoechlin and this white dude from Vampire Diaries playing superboy and this other white dude who looks like
a kylo/hux lovechidevery angsty whiteboy villain ever playing Metallo (and everyone has to mention that this is an iconic Superman villain) and what’s it going to be like for Kara to be able to interact with Barry and Oliver and all these other white male heroes and oh isn’t it exciting that even more white men that fanboys love are potentially directing episodes…Because yes this show had some not insignificant problems with representation in s1, it was overwhelmingly straight and white, but at least the focus was very much on Kara and Kara’s relationships with the women in her life. That was literally and explicitly the whole fucking point. And now, even if the focus on the show is still on Kara in s2, it is an undeniable fact that the focus of the larger conversation surrounding the show is focused on Superman and other cishet white men. I’ve seen maybe two interviews that have mentioned James, a handful that have talked about J’onn, barely any more that have talked about Alex (and tbh I’m counting the “there is going to be A Gay on one of the shows” articles as talking about Alex but those really shouldn’t count). I don’t remember the last time I saw an actual interview with Melissa, and pretty much all the speculation and discussion about Kara as a character and her personal growth in the upcoming season talk about her in relation to Clark and in relation to Mon-El and in relation to Snapper Carr (who, okay, is not white so at least that’s something).
And that is the one thing that was never supposed to happen. She was not supposed to be defined by her relationship with men, and yet that is what is happening, if not in the actual show then at least in the conversation surrounding the show, which does matter. Public perception and media coverage of a story matter a lot. It’s how the story is told, how the story is framed. (And it’s also a point that they make explicitly time and time again in the series itself—she literally works for the queen of all media, and framing the narrative and keeping the focus of the public story on Supergirl as her own hero and not as “Superman’s Cousin!” is a huge part of the first season.)
I do understand to an extent why they’re doing this. Hollywood is a business first and foremost, and they (both the marketing/publicity team at the CW and the reporters in the press who are covering the show) are kind of obligated to give Superman at least some press because it would be financially irresponsible of them not to.
They’re trying to broaden their audience. Which is good I guess, but the problem is they’re doing it by appealing to Superman fans—by appealing to people who have seen Superman portrayed on screen, who have seen themselves represented on screen, time and time again (and literally at this very moment they already have a Superman to represent them). And in doing so, they’re alienating the very fans—the young girls who don’t have very many other female superheroes (certainly not ones that are headlining their own major network television shows) to look up to—that they were trying to represent in the first place.
They’re teaching young girls that no matter what, no matter how much you are told that your story matters and you should not be defined by the men around you, in the end the story is always going to come back to the man. That the world is always going to care more about the man’s story than yours. That, given the slightest opportunity, the world would rather focus on his struggles and his opinions about the most inane things and his relationship to men that have come before him and how he is going to fight his villains and what kind of icon he is meant to be.
Supergirl is a show in large part about how media shapes the conversation and the power of words and the importance of public perception in constructing a narrative in order to convey an actual message, and right now they are failing at shaping their own narrative and directing the conversation surrounding this show in the media in real life. It doesn’t really even matter what the truth is when it comes to his presence in the show itself (though that does present its own potential issues). The problem I have with the media attention surrounding Superman stands on its own. The media has power, and regardless of what we see on screen in October, right now Supergirl is failing the very people that this show—that Kara herself, as a character and as a hero—is supposed to represent.
I LOVE STEPH
@markruffalo
‘We shape perception, we are culpable.’
Can we share this with all the entitled content creators who think their bubble of privileged artistic license should never be popped?
Marvel is bringing a live-action ‘Runaways’ series to Hulu!
According to the report, this new series features LGBTQ teens.
Warning to Hulu/Marvel: Don’t. Mess. With. My. Kids. Please hire diverse writers. Queer writers, POC writers, queer POC writers, WOMEN and anyone who doesn’t give a fig for the gender binary.
Not asking for a pledge, but maybe you could hang a sign in the writer’s room that says something like ‘LIVING REPRESENTATION MATTERS.’
Good luck.
“When there are few representations of something, the ones that exist matter more.”
“While I can convey the reasoning behind this from an academic standpoint (stories are important; we internalize who gets to be the hero; if we never see ourselves as the hero, we never believe we can be that in real life), it’s harder for me to put the emotional side into words. I know it’s a visceral thing. I know my heart still beats faster whenever I see a woman of color onscreen or on the page getting to Do Stuff. Looking for that representation feels like searching for a wifi signal in the desert, all of your internal circuits lighting up when you finally find it. Suddenly all of the hopes you’ve held onto for so long get pinned to that one character. Because if she’s not what you want, what you’ve been reaching out for so desperately, how long will you have to wait for another character to come along?”
yup, that’s my comrade-in-arms @sarahkuhn talking straight about representation in media… this is the good stuff, my friends, go and check it out!
http://the-toast.net/2016/06/22/challenges-of-representation-writing/
…Because if she’s not what you want, what you’ve been reaching out for so desperately, how long will you have to wait for another character to come along?”
What the 1OO did to us …
The other day when I was watching Wentworth I knew what was coming. I knew as soon as Bea and Allie showed happiness. I knew when they had their time together, and she got up alone to go to the shower what was coming.
My comment was “they are about to Clexa us”
Even after I happened, I couldn’t even be sad. I was just numb. I knew it was coming, and after Lexa, I can’t really be shocked anymore. I just turned it off and went on about my day.
They have taken away our ability to trust and to enjoy the relationships we see on TV. We just sit back and wait for it.. Wait for us to be “Clexa-ed” again.
this is not a bash on Wentworth. We weren’t baited as with Clexa, and I felt they foreshadowed this many episodes ago. This is a bash against the The 1OO and how they have sucked the hope from the joy of TV relationships.
The people who make telly/film need strong reminders that what they create can be like a beacon to those who have little hope or representation. It can influence, shape imaginations, dogmas and political affiliations. I blame my sense of humour on watching Monty Python and Bugs Bunny and Danger Mouse as a kid. My interest in science and learning might have come from Doctor Who. Television (and film) are powerful and potentially dangerous to the norms and customs of our time.
Maybe it is time for a new crop of content creators to take hold. If I have any hope over what happened with Clexa, et al – it’s that young writers and filmmakers today will take what happened seriously and avoid the traps of arrogance and ignorance that created Clexa in the first place.
No one should lose what little bit of joy we can find in this life because those in control have no concerns for us, for our well-being. We have to take charge of what we see. We are the ones who can make it better.
Because I’m seeing these terms bandied about a bit, I’d like to put this out there:
When you’re dealing with an oppressed minority, ideas like ‘respect’ and ‘professionalism’ can take on new meanings: they can become euphemistic language to police this oppressed community into ‘behaving.’ You have to see who really benefits from seeking such ‘behavioural modifications.’ Historically, this is how a patriarchal society has long oppressed women.
It’s wrong and if you can’t understand that, give yourself some time. Take about ten years then look back. Time brings clarity to many things. Including ‘what seems’ vs. ‘what is.’
‘Respect’ and ‘professionalism’ can work well when everyone is equal. But things are not equal and never have been.
Respect should be an unconditional human right – whether you ‘behave’ or not.
I can’t believe that Layne Morgan, a queer woman, got kicked out of clexacon, meant for queer people, because some people got angry about the comments she made about a straight white guy taking advantage of the some of us. Honestly this whole thing is such bullshit.
SUCH utter & complete bullshit. I stand with Layne.
This.
The folks behind Clexa Con have damaged the legitimacy of their event catering to the ego of a questionable ‘ally.’ How do you take their message seriously at this point?
The Doctor Is Out 