Diversity

[Blaxland 89]

1 hour ago, Matt said:

Did I try and justify this? However, with Leah being Greek and the Morgans as half-Asian, I don't know whether you could consider it an "all-white cast". However, and I've said this before, and I'll say it again, the lack of is better than having one for the sole purpose of tokenism.

No you didn't. And I didn't say you did. That last part of my writing wasn't targeted at anyone. That is the last time I write an opinion on here 

[Angelica]

On 22/08/2017 at 10:51 AM, Jen said:

Oh that is interesting. I'm not sure that parents are necessarily trying to "hide the truth", but maybe it is the case of their core demographic being on the conservative side of things. I'm thinking about when I used to watch the show with my mum and how she is still uncomfortable about the whole same-sex marriage thing. So yes, I definitely think the execs are trying to keep that audience happy. Because, as @harrietjames put it, they were the ones who kicked up the fuss about the Charlie/Joey storyline. And why Joey literally disappeared on a boat and never came back.There definitely is an audience of those who do not think their child should be educated about other sexualities or the rights of people to marry those of the same gender - hence why we also had all this drama about the 'safe sex' schools program - because parent's wanted to make the decision about when to talk about these issues with their children.

On the other hand, sometimes if you're not being talked about at all, then that's just as bad? No publicity is bad publicity? I don't know, but I would be interested to hear from someone higher up about what they perceive their main target audience is. What seems to happen is potentially writers are happy to do these sorts of storylines and then they get vetoed or something. Again, just speculating and joining some dots.

 

But what I don't understand is how same-sex couples can be more controversial than say - murder, rape or drugs (topics that have come up  recently). I guess it is that old age paradox of film ratings and how people seem to be more confidence with gratuitous violence being shown to children than anything sexual. 

But I would rather the show have no LGBT people, than only include homosexual people as perverts or stalkers (see Sarah and her Eve/Zoe, Spencer's stalker etc) 

[harrietjames]

18 hours ago, Matt said:

However, with Leah being Greek and the Morgans as half-Asian, I don't know whether you could consider it an "all-white cast".

Even these are pretty white - more Ben Lee than Bruce Lee...  If we didn't know that they are supposed to be half Asian, I'm not sure that you'd pick it. All actors could play non-Asian characters. It's easy to forget Leah is Greek too...

[gutterboy]

18 hours ago, Angelica said:

 

But what I don't understand is how same-sex couples can be more controversial than say - murder, rape or drugs (topics that have come up  recently). I guess it is that old age paradox of film ratings and how people seem to be more confidence with gratuitous violence being shown to children than anything sexual. 

But I would rather the show have no LGBT people, than only include homosexual people as perverts or stalkers (see Sarah and her Eve/Zoe, Spencer's stalker etc) 

Yep...... exactly. The same reason some conservative people complain about all the sex/nudity in GoT but don't blink an eye at all the violence. Get a grip people.

[atrus]

And let's not forget that there don't even have to be any sexual scenes in order to have gay characters. Neighbours doesn't have any sexual scenes, and it's had plenty of gay characters now. H&A has always had more sexually suggestive scenes than Neighbours (bedroom kissing etc), but can't even feature non-antagonistic gay characters in passing. Priorities are definitely all over the place here.

ETA: Also, I really get tired of hearing about having 'token' minorities being worse than having no minorities at all. I don't deny that tokenism is undesirable, but it would have to be a really gratuitous level of tokenism to become worse than 'no minorities ever'. If you have even the slightest faith in the writing team, it's obvious they aren't going to introduce regular characters who are 100% there because of their race/sexuality/disability. They're going to be integrated in the community and have storylines and personality traits and relationships like everyone else. Sometimes I worry that arguments about 'tokenism' are just an excuse to keep things exactly the way they are.

[Jen]

On 8/25/2017 at 6:52 AM, Angelica said:

 

But what I don't understand is how same-sex couples can be more controversial than say - murder, rape or drugs (topics that have come up  recently). I guess it is that old age paradox of film ratings and how people seem to be more confidence with gratuitous violence being shown to children than anything sexual. 

But I would rather the show have no LGBT people, than only include homosexual people as perverts or stalkers (see Sarah and her Eve/Zoe, Spencer's stalker etc) 

Totally agree with this first sentiment, and that's why this whole thing is so stupid. 

H&A need to write complex, real, flawed characters who happen to be queer. *sigh* One day...

[harrietjames]

On 9/1/2017 at 8:34 PM, Jen said:

H&A need to write complex, real, flawed characters

This. Full stop.