# Switching the Race of Characters **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 13, 2019, 2:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460 "2019-06-13T02:53:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 10
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/181 "2019-06-18T16:34:25Z")
Those two cases show that the public is OK with female action heroes in general. It doesn’t show that they’re OK with any random specific action hero being female. ---
**Author:** ![Omniscient](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omniscient/32/3290_2.png) [@Omniscient](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omniscient)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/182 "2019-06-18T16:50:04Z")
> [@BeagleJesus](#): > > This is it right here. A lot of white dudes (cuz let’s be honest, it’s almost _ALWAYS_ white dudes) quite simply lack the imagination to envision non-white and/or non-male people in roles that have been traditionally reserved for white guys. > > Superman: > > - Alien from another planet = disbelief suspended > - Super strength = disbelief suspended > - Ability to fly = disbelief suspended > - Shoot lasers from his eyes = disbelief suspended > - Invulnerable to damn near everything = disbelief suspended > - Looks like a black guy = WTF?!?! NO ONE IS EVER GOING TO BELIEVE THAT!!! > > The question I really want to ask is this: who are you guys trying to fool, us or yourselves? Because your actions make it pretty damn obvious what your hang ups really are. So oblique accusations of racism are okay now? Awesome, this is fun. BTW, casting Spawn as a white guy is just as absurd. But that doesn’t suit your SJW attack I suppose. ---
**Author:** ![Omniscient](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omniscient/32/3290_2.png) [@Omniscient](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omniscient)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/183 "2019-06-18T16:54:11Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Those two cases show that the public is OK with female action heroes in general. It doesn’t show that they’re OK with any random specific action hero being female. And where was that strawman erected? ---
**Author:** ![Cheesesteak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cheesesteak/32/3694_2.png) [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/184 "2019-06-18T16:59:18Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > Would it work with Superman? Maybe, but it would take a lot of fan-wanking. I’m thinking of Smallville, where race prejudice isn’t a thing and nobody thinks twice when Ma and Pa Kent adopt a black baby. But there would have also to be a substantial black community in Smallville as well. Lana Lang wasn’t the brightest bulb on the Christmas tree, but if Superboy shows up and is black, and Clark Kent is the only black kid in town, even she is going to catch on to his secret identity eventually. Who says Ma and Pa Kent have to be white? Even in 1930’s Kansas, black people existed. Families even, who had friends and farms and jobs and stuff. It’s not exactly fan wanking to say that the black skinned alien baby was found by a black human family, it’s just how you tell the story with a black actor in the role instead of a white actor. Write Smallville with a higher percentage of black population than would be historically accurate, OMG, inaccuracy in a superhero movie! None of those changes are a big deal to the story or the character. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/185 "2019-06-18T17:19:43Z")
> [@Dale\_Sams](#): > > Not to mention…this a lot of hoop-jumping just to…what?? Make a black Superman work? A good Superman story should be the priority over ‘making a black Superman work.’. Sure. And you can make a good story about a black Superman who overcomes racism, or a black Superman where nobody cares if he’s black or white, or a white Superman and the story doesn’t have anything to do with race because Earth has been invaded by four-dimensional space otters wearing Kryptonite tap shoes. But they are going to be different stories. And if you don’t take that into account, the movie isn’t necessarily improved if you replace Meryl Streep with Whoopi Goldberg to do the voice over for the space otters. Artistic creations need unity, says Aristotle. Thus everything in the movie has to work towards creating that unity. The more you slap stuff on because there isn’t enough work for the ethnic group of your choice, the less you are working for that unity. As the TV executives apparently [said](http://leemichaelwithers.tripod.com/sfh4_11_96.htm) to the writers of the _My Favorite Martian_ series - > [@](#): > > Please change the dialogue on page 14–a Martian wouldn’t say that. The secret of a good story is only to include the stuff that a Martian would say. _The Wild, Wild West_ bombed because, in part, a black Secret Service agent with his own train and magic gadgets in the 1870s wouldn’t say that - or at least, he wouldn’t survive if he tried. Regards, Shodan Fighting a Never-Ending Battle for Truth, Justice, and the American Way, Against Multi-ethnic Space Otters ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/186 "2019-06-18T17:20:32Z")
Society exists. That doesn’t mean stories are immutable. A black Superman could 100% work. You’d have to make some decisions: -Which is more important, a Superman that lives in an America with the same history as real-world America, or a Superman that doesn’t face racism? -Which is more important, that Superman has a white adoptive family, or that Superman has an adoptive family that looks sort of like him? Any of the answers you come up with could be really interesting. Black Spiderman 100% worked, and it worked by setting the character in a society that has some racism, but not making that racism the focal point of the story. They could equally have set the movie in an alt-New York where racism had never existed (or where it functioned in a way that didn’t impact multiracial kids), but that wasn’t the choice they made. It’s great seeing authors make cool new choices, especially when they do so in a way that opens up the kinds of people that make it to the big screen as big heroes. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/187 "2019-06-18T17:26:08Z")
> [@BeagleJesus](#): > > How you can suspend your disbelief to accept a god like alien then turn around and throw up a million and one hurdles as to why that alien shouldn’t look like a black guy is confusing as hell to me. It’s almost like you think this is something other than make believe. Humans expect fiction that makes sense? SHAME AND SCANDAL! Humans want fiction which _doesn’t_ white-wash the history of bigotry? UTTERLY INCOMPREHENSIBLE! Humans know that Blacks were treated differently from Whites in 1939 New York City? BAN THIS SICK SHIT! Wow. It’s almost… _almost_… as if certain changes _might_, in _some obscure circumstances_, become… what is it… what’s that term… _plot relevant!_ Utterly amazing! ---
**Author:** ![Cheesesteak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cheesesteak/32/3694_2.png) [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/188 "2019-06-18T17:39:58Z")
> [@Derleth](#): > > Wow. It’s almost… _almost_… as if certain changes _might_, in _some obscure circumstances_, become… what is it… what’s that term… _plot relevant!_ Of course changing race may be plot relevant. Characters can be written into many different plots and still be the same character. There’s nothing about the Superman character that requires him to be white in order for him to be Superman. His origin story would adjust to be race appropriate. There’s nothing inherently nonsensical about that. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/189 "2019-06-18T17:43:08Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > Society exists. That doesn’t mean stories are immutable. > > A black Superman could 100% work. You’d have to make some decisions: > -Which is more important, a Superman that lives in an America with the same history as real-world America, or a Superman that doesn’t face racism? > -Which is more important, that Superman has a white adoptive family, or that Superman has an adoptive family that looks sort of like him? > > Any of the answers you come up with could be really interesting. Black Spiderman 100% worked, and it worked by setting the character in a society that has some racism, but not making that racism the focal point of the story. They could equally have set the movie in an alt-New York where racism had never existed (or where it functioned in a way that didn’t impact multiracial kids), but that wasn’t the choice they made. > > It’s great seeing authors make cool new choices, especially when they do so in a way that opens up the kinds of people that make it to the big screen as big heroes. Of course. However the whole thing becomes a pretense when you say “This is a list of characters who could never be played by an actor who is X,Y, or Z category because of all these other decisions I’ve made about the piece that are really, seriously set in stone because I say so. It’s just an unavoidable reality that X, Y, and Z category actors are unsuited for a vast majority of roles, especially leading ones. Nothing can be done about it.” The answers to the objections are generally of two types, and both might be applicable—(1) what you’re calling an impediment isn’t really an impediment and you can change the race or gender or sex of the actor and still have your story (2) what you’re calling an impediment results from a decision you made, one that can be changed, so don’t tell me that’s immutable. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/190 "2019-06-18T18:04:35Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > Of course. However the whole thing becomes a pretense when you say “This is a list of characters who could never be played by an actor who is X,Y, or Z category because of all these other decisions I’ve made about the piece that are really, seriously set in stone because I say so. It’s just an unavoidable reality that X, Y, and Z category actors are unsuited for a vast majority of roles, especially leading ones. Nothing can be done about it.” Yup. As I said, it’s especially cool watching people make NEW choices, especially when it opens things up. When someone decides to make the old, cliched choice–“ooh, ooh, I know, I’ll write a fantasy story starring all-white characters and set it in an analogue of medieval Europe!”–I don’t get that excited. When they make choice that close things off–“ooh, ooh, I know, I’ll tell a story about samurai, only instead of a Japanese protagonist I’ll have a white dude as the protagonist!”–I don’t get that excited. Artists get to make choices, absolutely. But ferchrissakes, make those choices interesting; and if you work in a racist system like Hollywood, be aware of how your decisions affect the lives of actual workers in that system. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/191 "2019-06-18T18:10:28Z")
Well, ultimately, everything is a choice you made. You could choose to write stories only about four-dimensional space otters, and then race would never come up. But that doesn’t mean that when someone writes a story where race does come up, you can just say “It’s your own fault that race came up; you should have chosen to stick with the space otters”. Sometimes someone will say that the race of a character is absolutely inherent to the story they’re trying to tell. And sometimes, when they say that, they’re wrong. But sometimes, they’re right. If you’re trying to tell a story about an astronaut who gets left behind on Mars and has to figure out how to survive for the year or more it’ll take for rescue to get there, then sure, you can make Mark Watney black if you want: It won’t change anything. If you’re trying to tell a story about the astronauts on Apollo 13 who had to figure out how to survive getting back to Earth when their service module exploded, well, now race is at least somewhat relevant: The first black astronaut didn’t fly until over a decade after that, which says something about the culture of NASA at the time of Apollo 13, which is at least part of the story you’re trying to tell, though not necessarily the most critical part: It’d be a distraction to make Jim Lovell black, though maybe you could pull it off, if you were very, very good at it. If you’re trying to tell a story about the struggles faced by NASA’s first director of the IBM operating group in being accepted by NASA and society, you can’t make Dorothy Vaughn white, because that defeats the entire point of the story you’re trying to tell. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/192 "2019-06-18T19:07:42Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Well, ultimately, everything is a choice you made. You could choose to write stories only about four-dimensional space otters, and then race would never come up. But that doesn’t mean that when someone writes a story where race does come up, you can just say “It’s your own fault that race came up; you should have chosen to stick with the space otters”. > > Sometimes someone will say that the race of a character is absolutely inherent to the story they’re trying to tell. And sometimes, when they say that, they’re wrong. But sometimes, they’re right. > > If you’re trying to tell a story about an astronaut who gets left behind on Mars and has to figure out how to survive for the year or more it’ll take for rescue to get there, then sure, you can make Mark Watney black if you want: It won’t change anything. If you’re trying to tell a story about the astronauts on Apollo 13 who had to figure out how to survive getting back to Earth when their service module exploded, well, now race is at least somewhat relevant: The first black astronaut didn’t fly until over a decade after that, which says something about the culture of NASA at the time of Apollo 13, which is at least part of the story you’re trying to tell, though not necessarily the most critical part: It’d be a distraction to make Jim Lovell black, though maybe you could pull it off, if you were very, very good at it. If you’re trying to tell a story about the struggles faced by NASA’s first director of the IBM operating group in being accepted by NASA and society, you can’t make Dorothy Vaughn white, because that defeats the entire point of the story you’re trying to tell. I totally agree. Where we get problems is when people are like, “No, I don’t want race to be an issue for this character, so lemme make him white.” White Superman is definitely a choice, and his character’s interaction with the powers-that-be in Metropolis reflects that choice. Unless you’re writing about an alt-world without racism, writing a story set in, say, the last 400 years (at least) in the United States, race is an issue, whether your story deals with it explicitly or not. We also run into problems where people keep deciding to tell the same damn story, and as a result, the same damn people keep getting shut out of paid work. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/193 "2019-06-18T19:08:05Z")
(Regarding the Apollo 13 example) See, there’s where your cultural assumptions are elevating race over dozens of other factors. There are a lot of ways in which Tom Hanks and Tom Hanks’s portrayal of Jim Lovell make him different from Jom Lovell and the portrayal deviate from real life. You’re choosing to draw a line around the perceived race of the actor and make that an uncrossable boundary. It’s “distracting,” not because it’s inherently distracting but because your assumptions about race and it’s importance are making it distracting. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/194 "2019-06-18T19:38:36Z")
Because that’s a difference that would have been relevant in the time and place where the movie is set. Like, I don’t know what Jim Lovell’s real hair color was, off the top of my head. But it doesn’t matter. NASA, at the time, would have treated a brown-haired astronaut the same as they treated a blond-haired astronaut. So you can cast an actor with any hair color in the role, and not worry about it being authentic. But NASA, at the time, would have treated a black astronaut very differently than they treated the white astronauts. So that is relevant, and so it’s much more difficult to work around casting an actor of a different skin color. And it’s not my assumption; it’s historical truth. Nowadays, or in the near future when _The Martian_ is set, NASA does treat black and white astronauts in the same way, and so for a film set now or in the near future, the skin color of an actor playing an astronaut is as irrelevant as their hair color. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/195 "2019-06-18T19:43:11Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > (Regarding the Apollo 13 example) See, there’s where your cultural assumptions are elevating race over dozens of other factors. There are a lot of ways in which Tom Hanks and Tom Hanks’s portrayal of Jim Lovell make him different from Jom Lovell and the portrayal deviate from real life. You’re choosing to draw a line around the perceived race of the actor and make that an uncrossable boundary. It’s “distracting,” not because it’s inherently distracting but because your assumptions about race and it’s importance are making it distracting. “I got a great idea! Let’s remake _Apollo 13_, but this time we’ll cast Gabourey Sidibe as Jim Lovell!” “I’m not sure that casting will work, Bill.” “What are you, some kind of racist?” See also: the mime version of _Schindler’s List_, and a remake of _Old Yeller_ starring Fritz the Wonder Hamster. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![BeagleJesus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/5daacb/32.png) [@BeagleJesus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BeagleJesus)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/196 "2019-06-18T19:51:19Z")
You guys realize this is make believe, right? You can literally make the story to be anything you want it to be? If you can’t envision a black superman without having to change the story at all then that is a failure of your imagination and a product of your personal hang ups. You can sit there and say you want your superhero stories to make sense and not white wash history (think about that for second) but the only thing stopping it from making sense is your sense of what is right and wrong. ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/197 "2019-06-18T19:58:02Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Look, I know all white people look alike, but … that was Scarlett Johanssen. 😕 But…but the Major has PURPLE hair. Scarlett is a BLONDE… 😕😕 So is Charlize, of course. I knew that. ---
**Author:** ![you\_with\_the\_face](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/ecccb3/32.png) [@you\_with\_the\_face](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/you_with_the_face)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/198 "2019-06-18T20:07:34Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > And they get to ride that argument on the back of people who combine their biases with their failures of imagination to say “oh, believe me, it just won’t work.” > > No, actually, there’s no reason to believe you. > > A black man just can’t be a leading man. Will Smith leads some fairly successful action films. (But!but!but! Will Smith is the only black leading man who will travel! :dubious:) > > A superhero movie can’t be headlined a black man. Black Panther becomes the second highest grossing superhero movies of all time. > > A superhero movie can’t be headlined by a woman. Wonder Woman and Captain Marvel are the 9th and 10th highest grossing superhero movies of all time. > > Can’t can’t can’t. Until it can. Oh, that’s an exception. **Meanwhile all the bombs that were led by white men somehow are always exceptions.** This is an excellent post. Take a bow. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/199 "2019-06-18T20:26:24Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Like, I don’t know what Jim Lovell’s real hair color was, off the top of my head. But it doesn’t matter. NASA, at the time, would have treated a brown-haired astronaut the same as they treated a blond-haired astronaut. So you can cast an actor with any hair color in the role, and not worry about it being authentic. > > But NASA, at the time, would have treated a black astronaut very differently than they treated the white astronauts. So that is relevant, and so it’s much more difficult to work around casting an actor of a different skin color. And it’s not my assumption; it’s historical truth. If you knew Jim Lovell personally, Tom Hanks’ portrayal may have pulled you out of the movie due to hair color, mannerisms, or accent. But 99.9% of the public doesn’t know the real astronauts so it isn’t a problem. I would argue that some large percentage of the movie going public today has no real idea of how black astronauts would have been treated at NASA in the 1960’s (or don’t really care about a movie’s portrayal) and so a black actor portraying Lovell wouldn’t bother them. The story isn’t fundamentally changed by this one historically inaccurate element. The Sgt Rock comic book had an African-American soldier introduced in 1961, 13 years after Truman fully integrated the military. While there were some black soldiers serving along side white soldiers in WWII at times (which is when the comic was set) it wasn’t as depicted in the comic. I’m sure it brought some people out of the moment, but to most young comic readers of the day I don’t think they cared that it was historically inaccurate. The writers didn’t ignore race, but neither did they let the past dictate how they told their story. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460/200 "2019-06-18T20:26:58Z")
Wow. I never thought I’d have to be on this side of the debate, defending when it is appropriate not to change the race. But them’s the breaks. Yes, obviously, you can choose to make a character be whatever you want. But that’s with new characters. This thread is clearly about preexisting characters. So it does boil down to “is their race important?” They already have some story already, and it matters whether or not that story is changed by a change in race. They already have a character, and it matters whether the character will change. Sometimes, the change just doesn’t really matter. Other times, it matters, but that’s the point. But sometimes it matters in such a way that, if you’re not making a specific point, you might as well make a new character with a new story. Superman being black? That definitely changes things. Even if we keep him being found by farmers in Kansas, one of two things will happen: he’ll be found by black parents, and then face the racism of a small town, or he’ll be found by white parents, and have the unique experience there. Either can happen, but it becomes the point of the story. It becomes “What if Superman were black?” If that’s not your point, then you’d probably keep him white, where his backstory can remain unchanged. (Sure, you could rewrite the world not to have that racism, but then it will feel like whitewashing racism, so that’s not a great idea.) I would be fine either way. Now making Hermione Granger black? Meh. It was the 1990s, and she spent most of her formative years in a magical world where the racism is of a different kind. It would be easy for anything that would be different for her being black just to not show up in the stories. Especially assuming she remains middle class, the daughter of dentists. Super Mario being Latino: changes nothing really. He’s only ever in this magical world, and it can just not have racism. No big deal. The only thing that changes is his stereotypical phrases and accent. Maybe he says “ay ay ay” when he gets killed instead of “Mama mia!” Archie Bunker becomes Asian? That’s a completely different character, even more so that Superman. Even if you’re wanting to tell a story about an Asian with similar bigotries, you might as well make him a different person. I mean, he’s gonna have to have a different name, even. Why pretend he’s the same guy? The only reason I can see to do it is some stunt colorblind casting, probably for comedic purposes, and I wouldn’t trust that type of comedy to not actually be bigoted. I’m sure there are other ideas. But surely at least that last one gets the point across, without needing to be about playing a real life person. Archie Bunker’s whiteness is essential to the role. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460.md?page=9) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/switching-the-race-of-characters/835460.md?page=11)