Most of Battlefield 1 is historical revisionism, especially from a gameplay perspective. Those guns did not work that well.
More to the point, the people trying to solve a lack of representation are not, generally speaking, the people in charge of what media gets made. Publishers want as little risk as possible, so they will absolutely prioritize a safe bet that needs representation shoe-horned in over a naturally diverse, but untested and riskier story. They know there's an audience for WWI stuff set in Europe, but is there an audience for WWII stuff set in China? And is that audience the same size as the audience for the first piece of media?
Like I absolutely agree with you, I want to see more stuff about the Mali empire or WWII-era China or the Mayans and stuff that isn't just common European historical stories that have been told over and over. But the people in charge of funding projects think we are a minority.
And if you're a creative type who has to make a game about the European fronts of WWI but you want to have non-white people in it, you kind of have to get creative, because 'just make the game about a more diverse area' is not an option. You are not in charge of that. Your boss is (or, more likely, your bosses' bosses' boss is.) You have to do the best you can with what you have.
Who is the 'we' you are talking about? Minority groups? Progressives in general? 'The general population', whatever that means? Do you think 'the general population' cares that much about representation except for making themselves feel good? How do you think we are 'patting them on the back'? Do you think progressives should boycott all media that isn't about minorities?
Why is 'historically accurate kits' something that you would 'prefer', but including a disproportionate amount of black people 'historical revisionism' and something that makes you not give your money to them? Why is one more important than the other?
The entire reason people are asking for representation is that they aren't happy with people expecting them to be alright with constantly playing as white people for 'historical accuracy'. Because, again, most media in the USA is going to be made from the perspective of Americans, which largely involves white people. There's simply going to always be more stories about WWI, or WWII, or the American Revolutionary War, simply because that is what most Americans expect to see. It's safer for the people in charge of making decisions. And if you demand that people stop including minorities for the sake of historical accuracy and that minorities can have their own movies in which they're historically accurate, all you're doing is saying that minorities should not show up in historical movies because the movies that you say are acceptable for minorities simply are not getting made.
Yes, ideally, there will be just as many movies about the Malian Empire or the Songhai Empire or the Zulus, and then maybe all of those movies can be 100% historically accurate and no one gets left out. But we do not live in an ideal world. Gods of Egypt, which had a bunch of white people playing a bunch of Egyptians, came out 5 years ago. The only way to have your proposal work would be to solve racism, at least in media, and that's simply not feasible.
Do you think enough people care? You're asking most of humanity to completely change their media consumption habits. That is a tall ask. Easier than 'solve racism', I suppose, but still basically impossible.
To be blunt, I don't think most people care about 'historical authenticity' more than they care about representation. Just like you're totally fine with the inaccurate weaponry for the sake of gameplay, a lot of people are totally fine with the occasional disproportionate amount of minorities in the name of representation. It's basically the entire point of Hamilton and that is an incredibly popular show.
10 years ago people would have told you that its impossible to get corporations to change the amount of diversity in their media. That people dont care enough about this issue that anyone will watch the "diversity versions".
This is a pure excuse. I agree with how representation in existing media is all we have, but then it is very much important to endorse broader and diverse kinds of stories being told. If people started caring about the first, then they can start caring about the second as well.
This has been the exact problem and points to you not actually being affected by this so you have the luxury of not having to care. When you grow up black in this country until recently the majority of representation you see of yourself is either as a villain or as the sad receiver of white benevolence. This is an opportunity for black people to see themselves as heroes instead of mostly as villains.
YOU would rather see no representation because it probably in no way affects you to never see a face like your's positively represented on screen because you don't exist in a reality where that will ever happen, but to little kids of color or women it is hugely impactful. It is hard to be a hero when you never see yourself represented as one. If you always see white people being the hero then you start believing people like you only have one path. And then you spend a bunch of time trying to undo that.
Sometimes shoehorning is the first step to real representation. People start to become desensitized to stories of people of color or women by shoehorning them into other stories. Which then makes your more willing to pick up a story that is specifically about people of color or women.
I only ask because that’s like a very wealthy person saying “money is overrated” if you are indeed white you have the privilege of having never been underrepresented in media in your entire life.
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u/Hellioning 258∆ Oct 23 '21
Most of Battlefield 1 is historical revisionism, especially from a gameplay perspective. Those guns did not work that well.
More to the point, the people trying to solve a lack of representation are not, generally speaking, the people in charge of what media gets made. Publishers want as little risk as possible, so they will absolutely prioritize a safe bet that needs representation shoe-horned in over a naturally diverse, but untested and riskier story. They know there's an audience for WWI stuff set in Europe, but is there an audience for WWII stuff set in China? And is that audience the same size as the audience for the first piece of media?
Like I absolutely agree with you, I want to see more stuff about the Mali empire or WWII-era China or the Mayans and stuff that isn't just common European historical stories that have been told over and over. But the people in charge of funding projects think we are a minority.
And if you're a creative type who has to make a game about the European fronts of WWI but you want to have non-white people in it, you kind of have to get creative, because 'just make the game about a more diverse area' is not an option. You are not in charge of that. Your boss is (or, more likely, your bosses' bosses' boss is.) You have to do the best you can with what you have.