There was a great deal of hullaboo in the entertainment and cultural media recently when people began expressing outrage that Emma Stone, a white actress was cast as a character who is a quarter Asian, in the movie Aloha written and directed by Cameron Crowe. I felt like there was more protest to this issue than other casting issues, and director actually ended up posting an apology. But the whole thing seemed like the same process – where nonwhite actors were extremely and rightfully angered and hurt by this film representing like an 85% Asian landscape with no Asian faces, and on the other side, the white people are taken aback, completely surprised by the reaction, pointing to some tiny part cast with an Asian face as proof of their lack of racism.
I read about all this stuff and casting diversity is one of my favorite topics to talk about, but this one, I just don’t care. Why? Am I that tired? In other news, the leader of NAACP just got outed as white, spending years feigning to be black, which is a strange, strange story. I don’t even know where to begin, but in both cases, I don’t have an emotional, gut response when I normally would get bananas. Am I just fatigued? Am I bored talking about representations of race? Maybe. Or maybe it’s because I am feigning to be an Asian.