Writing for Different Races, Sexual Orientations, Religions, etc.

[Nick]

What is your approach to writing characters drastically different than yourself, like a person of a different race or who may have a different religious background than what you were brought up with? How do you portray the character accurately while, at the same time, being respectful and considerate of them? Is this a concern you have?

 

[Tramuson]

As long as you're respectful with what you're writing, I don't think anyone has any reason to get up in arms about it. I'm not a fan of people who says you shouldn't have certain characters of a certain race if it isn't your own. If you're a storyteller, you should be allowed to storytell, ya dig?

 

[Nick]

As long as you're respectful with what you're writing, I don't think anyone has any reason to get up in arms about it. I'm not a fan of people who says you shouldn't have certain characters of a certain race if it isn't your own. If you're a storyteller, you should be allowed to storytell, ya dig?

For some reason, in recent years, I feel like this belief has been challenged a lot (I agree with you). A lot of that is because of our strides at progressing as a society (or our attempts to), and what is okay and what isn't. Everything is more complicated now and there are a lot of needles to thread in satisfying everyone's beliefs.

For example, if you're an actor and cast as a person in a wheelchair in spite being able to walk. Do you take that role? Is that disrespectful to other actors really in wheelchairs that can't find roles? You're an actor - you pretend to be a cowboy in the West or an old-school gangster. Where is the line on what's acting and what's not taboo? Sometimes, it feels like you only find the answer when you've gotten in trouble for it.

It's complicated and it doesn't have an easy answer.

As a writer, I command the right to write about whatever I want. No one will tell me what I can or can't write about. Nobody. However, as a person, I take on that right with a deep sense of responsibility and try to uphold myself to the best standard I can.

Thus, more often than not, I try to write people more than I try to write exact representations of races. All of my stories happen inside a fictional world with fictional religions and races, etc., and I try to show the fact humans are multifaceted and complex.

 

[Ravenfreak]

I think as long as you're not writing a specific character with certain stereotypes you should be fine. If it's a person of color that you're writing for, then you shouldn't write them to be a caricature of a person of color.

 

[kschang]

The problem here is many writers don't put in enough research. They think asking a few questions on Reddit is enough research to write something. Good research takes months or years or a whole staff assisting. Add in some Dunning-Kruger and you end up with gaffes.

I think AI research, like ChatGPT, can make the problem both better and worse. In my experience, if you ask ChatGPT to research something, it will get 20-30% of the facts wrong, so you are forced to double-check EVERYTHING, which you should have been doing ANYWAY, so it's not really much of time savings.