Writing Advice: Diversity and Representation.

After being on this site for about two weeks now, I've noticed a trend. Nearly every protagonist (and side character, and villain, etc.) in everyone's fictional worlds are all… nearly underweight and white. Before I get into this, I have to commend you all. I've seen a lot of LGBT+ representation, people with disabilities or mental illnesses, etc. You've got that down.

However…

Not everyone in the world is white. Not everyone is an athletic blonde with blue eyes or a lithe red-head with green eyes and a smattering of freckles. Some people look different than that. And they'd like to be heroes for once. They'd like to see themselves in fiction, too! It's both boring and unrealistic to not include nonwhite, overweight or even just average weight protagonists. It's easier for readers everywhere to connect with characters who aren't all the exact same. I've seen many different personalities, different species, different everything! Except weight and race. It's important to represent others that look different from you. They exists. They're out there. And they should be here, too.

"But random girl!" you might say. "It's not unrealistic because…" And I'm going to stop you right there. If all your main characters are white, then it's unrealistic. If all your characters are skinny, unless its a post-apocalyptic society or everyone is starving for a good reason, then it's unrealistic. Point blank period.

TL; DR: Branch out! There's a whole world full of different races and cultures and peoples and it's vibrant! It's rich! Explore it. Use it.

You're a writer. Own it! Tell everyone's story.

yes, thank you! i'm tired of skinny cis white girls being the norm. i made my three protagonists (nova, luna, and sol) poc because they are essentially goddesses of the night (they're not really goddesses, but that's the easiest way to describe them) and in a lot of myths those goddesses are dark-skinned. it makes sense with the whole star theme. also sol is tall, taller than some of the men she encounters, because it's exhausting seeing skinny cis white girls who are also smaller than their male counterparts. also hardly anyone in my series is straight. nova and elowen are lesbians. luna is pansexual. sol is asexual. mason is transgender. lynden and nash are gay. it's not that hard to make someone explicitly lgbt (jk rowling i'm looking at you), and it's not that hard to give someone dark skin (and don't fall into the trap of dark skin = villain, do not do not do not).

I agree. My story doesn't even take place in the real world and I still have diverse characters. My main character is white, but she has minor Asperger's based on my sister, and her build is muscular. My main supporting characters (one of which I'm still unsure of what they look like and such); one is has a weight-lifter build (so when relaxed is chubby, but when flexing has muscle) and very dark skin. She has vitiligo, so she has blotches of pale skin covering parts of her body. Due to in-universe reasons, she has bipolar disorder and ADHD. My other one has light-brown skin (based on desert areas of the world i.e Mexico or Iraq), is short, and average weight. She has a lot of anxiety that she tries to hide with false cockiness.

Just because there are tons of different people in the world doesn't mean there are tons of different people in every individual region. What would you say to a story about Native Americans living in the 1600s? All you'd see is Native Americans. What about a story about vikings who live in the frigid north and are all basically white? Is that wrong?

Representation is important, especially when it's just realistic (come on, people!). Writing about someone living in the DC area in the US? That's an explosion of different cultures and races coming from all over the world. They most definitely will not all be white, you'll embarrass yourself and possibly upset the people who live there.

But some of the people you've seen on here who have all white characters might be writing what is realistic, not because they're not representing. If you're from the US or Canada or some other countries, you'd be used to people of all sorts of different races living together. But not all countries are like that. And there's something to be said about white people originating from cold parts of the world, and so therefore still dominating Northern regions, and vice versa with darker skin colors. Weight and size also depends on culture and genetics lots of the time. Indonesians tend to be small, for example.

Not saying that all the people you've seen using white characters are doing it for good reason, though.

Just once I'd like to see a story with an overweight protagonist.

Since I like reading action adventures a lot of the time, books that I've read with overweight protagonists usually have them get in shape by the end.

But the Lord of the Rings has hobbits saving the day! The whole message is that these soft, round, plump, peace-loving creatures saved Middle Earth, not the buff warrior-men. Sure, they lost weight on the journey because food was hard to get by. But when they got home, they plumped back up again. They enjoyed life, dang it.

@TopazWyrmlet~ i think (though i may be wrong) that eleanor & park by rainbow rowell has an overweight protagonist (plus interracial love interests!!). i haven't read it yet because contemporary teen romance isn't my thing, but i love rainbow rowell (i did read her fangirl which is amazing and carry on which is even MORE amazing.)

@TopazWyrmlet~

Well, if no one else is gonna do it, you might as well do it yourself. That's what I always say.

@Masterkey and I get that! But most people on this site have books/stories/comics based either in a fictional world or in America/the UK. I've never seen a cast of all POC characters, but I've seen exclusively white stories. The discrepancy is the problem, not the accuracy. If you get what I mean lol.

@writelikeyourerunningoutoftime True, true. Usually people who are white themselves tend to write white characters, too.

I think the worst is when they literally CREATE their own world and everyone is white. How more obvious can you get? There are no excuses with that world, since they made it like that.