#middle eastern people

Hollywood dehumanizes people of color on screen using racist media narratives in order to justify oppression and violence against people of color in real life.

These comics touch on a lot of complicated subjects about race and gender in media, but I realized mainstream representation metrics like the Bechdel-Wallace Test, Riz Test, DuVernay Test, and Aila Test don’t fully cover the criteria to discuss those issues, so I made a test of my own.

I didn’t want to name it after myself at first, but after years of experience in both comics and Hollywood and having my work and ideas stolen and reposted online too many times to count, I know that no one will give you credit unless you claim it, so I decided to put my name on it.

These are just a few of many stereotypical roles for POC but there are others, all designed to depict POC as inferior. Overall, the purpose of Hollywood is to produce propaganda to benefit cis-het white men—by lying about how pure and good they are—at the expense of everyone else.

Basically, films are required to fail this test in order to reach the screen—even with leads of color. Let’s use Asian American films as examples: To All The Boys fails 1, 4 and 6. The Big Sick fails 2, 4 and 5. Always Be My Maybe fails 6. It’s hard to think of a film that passes.

Some say representation is a frivolous concern, but the fact is that movies and TV are not an escape from reality—they tell us what our reality should be. Media messaging is an integral part of the systems that perpetuate state violence and oppressive policies against POC.

That’s why having tests like these matter—it forces us to think deeply about the kind of content we’re creating and consuming, and to push harder to do better. It requires that the world sees POC and other marginalized people as people, and to treat us that way, both on screen and off.

Note: I didn’t include non-binary POC in the comics because they tend to not get roles at all, and if they do, are usually put into either the men or women category. I also didn’t include white women, who are dehumanized as women but differently than WOC due to white supremacy.

(Please don’t repost or edit my art. Reblogs are always appreciated.)

If you enjoy my comics, please pledge to my Patreon or donate to my Paypal. I lost my publisher for trying to publish these strips, so your support keeps me going until I can find a new publisher/lit agent
https://twitter.com/Joshua_Luna/status/1134522555744866304
https://patreon.com/joshualuna
https://www.paypal.com/paypalme2/JoshuaLunaComics