Cheryl Lynn isn't quite sure who she is, but she's pretty sure of what she wants to be. A warrior woman. A bad-ass mamajama. Perhaps an earth goddess extraordinaire. She spends her days abusing keyboards and screaming at computer screens while she waits for her cult following to finally show up.

She changes her mind more often than extras in rap videos change thongs.

Remember: save to your own server, sweets!

Reading SELF Magazine.

Writing To-Do lists.

Hearing Thunder.

Watching General Hospital.

Building Nothing.

Eating Vitamins.

Drinking Iced Tea.

Buying Comic books.

Thinking "It is HOT!"

Playing Episodes from Liberty City.

Adoring Cold water.

Saying Very little.

Abhorring Bigotry.

Feeling Calm.

Hoping To get in gear.

Wednesday March 05 2008

Green for the money. Gold for the honey.

Am I the only one who thinks that Skrull Cage is kinda hot?

Cheryl Lynn @ 09:20 PM EST Link

I'm grumpy. No cute title here.

Fuck.

Yes, it's going to be one of those posts.

I knew this was going to happen. I knew this shit was going to happen as soon as I saw Willow's post linked on When Fangirls Attack and Racialicious. Thirty-six responses on Racialicious. And the majority of them are not focused on the fact that non-white female characters are whitewashed more often than their male counterparts. The responses plug other books. The responses drift to other topics. The responses tell the black woman that she's pointing out a problem that doesn't exist. It's just a coloring error.

It is not just a coloring error. This does not fucking happen with the same frequency (if ever) to Luke Cage and Shang Chi as it happens to Storm and Jubilee. Skin colors are lightened. Features are changed. Why? I would really like to know why. But every time a person stands up and asks why, she's shouted right down. She's ignored. You're seeing things that aren't there. Let's talk about something else. Right?

Fuck that shit.

The problem exists. I know it exists. You know it exists. We can joke about the Wasp no longer being Asian in Ultimates 3 (insert plug for 4th Letter awesomeness here) and make snarky comments about Storm's features, but when it comes time to man up and talk seriously about this shit, everyone disappears. Except for the minority women. And no one's fucking listening to us anyway. They just nod until they can interrupt and tell us how wrong we are or divert attention away to a topic they find important. You aren't hearing us.

Which is pretty much why I decided to shut up. I lie. I never shut up. I just pack it up and take it elsewhere. But I'm putting this post here because there might be drama popping off from this one, and I don't want the ladies at Torchbearers having to deal with any trollish shit. And I thought I might give one last try to see if I can actually get through to someone.

First off, let's acknowledge the fact that some of you are poor artists. You will never be able to accurately depict women of minority ethnic and racial backgrounds because you simply do not have the skills. Let's be honest. You couldn't even accurately depict a scene featuring Wonder Woman, Barda and Zatanna sitting in a steam room. People would wonder who the new triplets in the DC universe were. I'm not going to call you out because you are honestly doing the best that you can. Though I'm not sure how you keep getting work.

Next up are the artists who are heavily dependent on photo references. Hey, do what you gotta do. Just start selecting photos with your head instead of your penis. Yes, Pamlela Anderson is the hottest woman on earth and every woman looks like her in your fantasy. You are not being paid to draw your fucking sexual fantasy. Stop choosing the same damn celebrity for every fucking female character you draw. For all of the unfortunate crap Mack is getting for his photo references, at least he's picking photos of women of color to use when depicting women of color. Can't the rest of you do at least that fucking much? Ten minutes with Google Image Search too strenuous for you?

Last, but certainly not least, are those artists who have wonderful artistic skills but simply think that white women are the most beautiful women on earth. Scratch that. The only beautiful women on earth. And because they believe that all heroines should be beautiful, the result is that they depict non-white heroines with stereotypically white features. They give a character like Storm the features they think a beautiful woman should have instead of the features a beautiful woman from Kenya would likely have.

And that's a problem. How do you resolve it? Well I certainly wouldn't want anyone to change what he or she finds to be beautiful. Hell, that's impossible to do anyway. But those artists will have to work against their brains a bit. Those artists may think that giving a character a wider nose or eyes without lid creases will make that character unattractive. What needs to be realized is that the audience has a much broader definition of what is attractive. Have you ever given someone a gift that you didn't like but you knew the other person would love? You put the other person first. Those artists need to put the audience first.

But there's another problem. How do you know which depiction is the right one? Simple. Check out a few images from the character's origin. Here's another problem. What if you're creating a brand new character? Say you're creating a new heroine from the Philippines. You figure you'll take a look at a few photos, right?



Well, that didn't help. Let's stick closer to home. How about Cuban? African-American? Don't even bother. No matter what race or ethnicity you choose, you'll have a wider range than you could ever imagine. So how do you choose? See what fits best with the character's history. If your heroine comes from Negros Island, you'll probably pick the second photo. And if the character's history is no help in narrowing it down? Meh. Flip a coin.

I think it would be fun to change things up a bit. What was so fun about Love & Rockets was seeing all of the different physical types within the same family. There's no reason that both of Black Lightning's daughters had to be dark brown. And it would have been nice to see Ultimate Scarlet Witch with a deeper skin tone than her white peers. Some of my favorite characters broke the mold physically. Take Voodoo and Cecelia Reyes:



If I asked you to pick which character is African-American and which one is Puerto Rican, would you guess correctly?

Probably not.

Well! I feel better. Which is good, because my birthday is tomorrow and I didn't need all of that shit weighing down on me. And now that I'm in a good mood, let's talk about another group of artists! The artists who actually take the time to make female characters look like unique individuals. The artists who don't have to rely on colorists or inkers to depict women of different backgrounds. The artists who bust their asses daily honing their skills because they saw something missing in their art and aimed to fix it. And succeeded. Seriously. As in I would like to stick Most Improved stickers on their foreheads at the next con, but that would be considered rude. But I see you. And would like to bake you cookies.

And yet these artists still aren't getting the respect they deserve. They get tossed low-selling books while their peers get high-profile titles. They get the cover of a book hovering near cancellation while lesser artists are bragging about their big con installations. I just don't get it.

Y'know what? I'm going to make it a point to meet some of those artists at NYCC and tell them in person just how much I enjoy their work. Those artists need some appreciation once in a while. Or else they might run off to become architects and then comics would really suck.

In conclusion, sometimes admitting that there is a problem can help to alleviate the bad feelings concerning the problem. Telling the person shedding light on the problem that he or she is making things up and then circling the wagons? Not helpful. Even if you're circling the wagons to fix the problem internally, the person standing on the outside is going to remember the silence. And silence never solved shit.

Thank you for your time while I flipped right the fuck out.

Cheryl Lynn @ 05:53 PM EST Link