[js8]

"If a story is written about how a Japanese immigrant went through struggles coming to America, it would be disgraceful to have a white woman play that role."

I disagree. For example, recently I was at a play about Jewish holocaust survivor. I don't know if the actor is Jewish, I think he is not, but I don't care. It doesn't retract from the experience in any way.

Now, white woman playing an Asian woman could cause issue with suspension of disbelief. An Asian actor would be ideal, but other than that, it's not going to be a big deal. If it was a really good play (as in writing and acting), I would forgive them the characters didn't look in a realistic way.

"The reality is that the majority of Americans see trans people as different. It would be wonderful if that weren't the case, but until then, any cis (non-trans) person playing a trans person is going to be a caricature of the trans experience"

I disagree again, and I don't follow the logic here. Certainly, the producers of the said movie about TG people didn't considered them to be different enough to worry about whether the role is to be played by cis or trans woman.

And I personally think it would be better for trans people to get the story out rather than point out that it is a caricature. If you argue that we should not think about these people as being different, then it is not a caricature. It's a human playing a human.

I personally don't care if person is LGBT and what letter. It's something that is relevant in the bedroom and I couldn't care less. It makes almost no difference in all other interactions. But you Americans are just weirdly obsessed with sexuality for some reason.

[kupiakos]

Being trans isn't limited to the bedroom. It's not related to sexuality, although there are correlations. The sort of "human playing a human" argument is exactly what is talked about in the Riddle scale. Watching cis people play trans characters feels like watching Hackers, the terrible 90's movie.

[yorwba]

> Watching cis people play trans characters feels like watching Hackers, the terrible 90's movie.

I think that's a great analogy. But two questions come to mind:

1. Are there any movies that are not terrible for people who know enough to compare them to reality? Gell-Mann amnesia comes to mind. Most productions focus on telling a story and will happily ignore constraints of the setting if that allows for more dramatic scenes.

2. What about trans people playing cis people? Maybe they would be better suited for the role because of spending more time as their preferred gender, but otherwise the argument feels pretty transphobic if you simply switch cis and trans.

[js8]

I find the Riddle scale weird, because I am completely indifferent to somebody being gay. It must be an American thing, because I work in an office with 300 other people, so statistically, some of them are gay. But I have no clue and it makes no difference for me whatsoever.

It's almost as if when you're an atheist and people who believe in god say that you're a believer or that you had a bad experience with religion etc. No, it is simply an indifference.