Token diversity

I’ve been a media professional for over 20 years now, 16 of them in the US. Last 6 years of my career, I spent in a casting industry. I’ve seen stereotypes and labels created by white creatives of another race and heard things from them during casting sessions I wish I could un-hear.

This person is “too Black” “makeup is too Latino”, “the hair is too ethnic” , “the clothing is too ethnic”, “this person sounds too Black, Latino or Asian” — 80% of casting to this day will end up picking a person who essentially behaves, talks and dresses like a white person but has a different skin color to check the diversity box. Over and over again I’ve seen my brothers and sisters from different races whitewashed. People who made those decisions were all white creative professionals. They were not bad people, the kind of racism they exhibited comes through on a very subconscious level. I don’t think any of them realized what they were doing, how dangerous this path, to false represent someone’s race was, but they did it and I was a silent witness. Not anymore. Being ethnic myself and assimilated in American culture I realized that because of this type of casting, we are so separated right now, don’t know much about each others ways, true colors, true culture. When people try to type cast, stereotype and whitewash multitude of different cultures, identities and colors of humans, along with their daily realties, they are unknowingly participating in perpetuating cycle of racism and discrimination. This is essentially the reason why I started Oncata and our mission evolved over time.

So what is token diversity?

Using an individual in your media content and altering the story, the way they look and dress. Not honoring their experience and only showing what is pleasant for the brand. Only using people who look “safe” in your content. Not taking risks of stepping outside the box of what a “normal” community member looks like and behaves. That means no dads with face tattoos or professionals with purple hair. Writing a story about an ethnic group without true knowledge about the ethnic group. Then trying to retro fit any individual of color, you find in a modeling agency, in your story. All of it is a token diversity.

I am sharing this in hopes that perhaps white creatives will start checking themselves when they are creating content with people of color and different ethnic groups, but also for community to recognize what diversity tokenism is and call it out when they see it. Maybe also with a tiny hope that all creative professionals who are creating media content, will stand up for justice and choose it over money when they are confronted with the choice.