If you’re present in digital spaces, you’ve probably seen some discourse surrounding “representation”. You’ve probably also seen a lot of emotional, possibly even aggressive outbursts, when the topic is brought up – and like many others, you may even wonder why people can’t just have a calm debate about it. There are so many different angles to approach this and, to be honest, I’m not sure there is any one right way to do so. With that in mind, please bear with me as I share my personal experience and opinion on the matter.
First let’s define representation so we’re all on the same page, shall we?
Simply put, representation is a demographic – like gender and sexuality, for example, or race – being visible in the media, including TV shows, movies, and video games. How the media portrays and deals with those demographics is incredibly important. Why, you ask? Because this representation informs the audience and, as a consequence, can also shape their attitudes about it.
Now let’s get into the nitty-gritty. I’m going to pose some of the statements I’ve seen online, and counter them with my own perspective.
“IT’S JUST [INSERT COMPANY] PANDERING TO THE SJWS!”
Merriam-Webster defines pandering as “to provide gratification for others’ desires”. But that’s just good business, isn’t it, because a company would be remiss in ignoring a growing demographic within its client base. So what’s really happening here is that a company is observing and responding to a market change, and maybe those people complaining about it are no longer the priority in this new, expanding market.
And let’s talk about the term “SJW” or “social justice warrior”. The Oxford Dictionary added this to its lexicon in 2015 as an informal derogatory term for “a person who expresses or promotes socially progressive views”.
Hold up – “socially progressive views”? How is that an insult? It isn’t, and in fact it’s been used as a positive accolade since the 90s for those who’ve worked to improve social equalities. After GamerGate, however, this term was reinvented as a negative one by groups targeting and harassing women in the industry. It’s quite telling that this term is still used in discussions about representation now, mostly to disparage them.
“WRITE NEW STORIES INSTEAD OF CHANGING OLD ONES!”
On the surface this sounds like a good faith argument. Unfortunately, it comes from a place of ignorance. The truth is many of these stories that are being “rewritten” were originally created with diversity, and then toned down or changed completely due to political influence.
In the 1950s, the Comics Code Authority was established to provide moral guidelines that would discourage so-called “juvenile delinquency”. While there was no law that required comics to have the CCA stamp of approval, most mainstream publishers and distributors would not carry a book without it. The code covered many issues including representation of police and other authoritative figures, drug use, violence, and sex (specifically, “sex perversion”, “sexual abnormalities”, and “illicit sex relations”). There’s also record of books being rejected for having black protagonists and themes protesting racial discrimination. It was only in the 2000s that major publishers stopped submitting to the CCA and developed their own ratings to designate suitable audience age restrictions based on content.
For 50 plus years writers have had to either change their characters or “code” them. To code means to include characteristics associated with a certain demographic without the character being officially designated as such. Queer characters, in particular, have fallen victim to this kind of erasure. Given that our stories have been stolen from us for generations I think it is only fair that we get to reclaim some of them.
“I DON’T CARE ABOUT [INSERT CHARACTER HERE]’S ORIENTATION OR RACE, IT DOESN’T MATTER TO THE STORY!”
This argument is the laziest and most disrespectful of them all. In character development, as in life, one’s sexuality/gender/race/culture absolutely affects one’s story. The way the character sees the world and interacts with it is influenced by these qualities.
Let’s imagine for a moment that it doesn’t matter. In a world where this argument holds true, it wouldn’t matter if we had a black She-Hulk, a gay Superman, or a transgender Daredevil.
But it does matter, or it wouldn’t be so passionately debated. We matter! The world is full of diversity and the media and entertainment should reflect that diversity and embrace it. When I saw that Respawn Entertainment announced a non-binary hero for Apex Legends, I was positively giddy with excitement. A game that I played had a character like me! I felt seen, I felt validated, I mattered.
I’ve been gaming for years and for the first time, I was able to play as a character I related to. I can’t explain that feeling to someone who has never experienced it. It’s an incredibly emotional experience, and it stands to reason that emotion plays a part in the discussion.
My final rebuttal to these arguments is this – it’s not about you, anyway. We’ve waited long enough to be seen and heard. It might not be perfect but it’s ours, so let us have our moment and give us the space to make it our own.
ruthy0nfire is our Featured Content Creator this week. And when she isn’t streaming games on Twitch, she also has opinions about things like, you know, representation in video games.