[thebigman433]

> There are a host of "woke" modern themes that find their way into western media in general

I dont see how stuff like this is complained about though, especially since most shows dont actually have more than token representation anyway. Whats the actual complaint here? That the average cast of a show is slightly different now than it was 10 years ago? People complain about "woke" themes but I hardly see concrete examples of them, and explanations as to whats wrong or what should be done differently.

And fwiw I think using Star Trek as an example is funny* since the show has historically been based on diverse groups of people.

[xyzzy123]

I don't think it's the identity of the characters per se, it's more subtle than that, a kind of fetishisation of identity?

In Star Fleet the fact that someone happens to be a polygamous tri-sexual trans-species cat person should pass mostly without comment.

But modern sensibilities set up a dynamic where nobody is just a character.

Everyone is seen as representing "their team" - a race, or a class. This is a big responsibility, so everyone has to take themselves super seriously.

I think we're in a transitional phase for TV. Representation is a priority (great!) but the industry isn't fully confident with it yet. It's OK, TV has always been about the zeitgeist as much as the show.

Perhaps what we need is also more diversity among writers/producers. Right now it feels like a lot of writers are handling their "diverse" characters with kid gloves which can leave them a bit wooden and gets in the way of telling a good story.

[johnny22]

> I think we're in a transitional phase for TV. Representation is a priority (great!) but the industry isn't fully confident with it yet. It's OK, TV has always been about the zeitgeist as much as the show.

> Perhaps what we need is also more diversity among writers/producers. Right now it feels like a lot of writers are handling their "diverse" characters with kid gloves which can leave them a bit wooden and gets in the way of telling a good story.

This is the answer. Seems like just a bit more time is needed for things to find less wooden footing.

[Siddarth1977]

Wow. Fascinating that you're unable to see them, but I guess I also read about people in Russia not seeing anything amiss about their media so I shouldn't be shocked.

Here's a handful of "woke" things I've grown tired of, more because they're such overused cliches or unrealistic things that break my suspension of disbelief than any opposition (I'm a far left, pro-LGBT+, progressive atheist feminist to disclose any biases), but in no particular order:

Every show having an "overcoming sexism" or "overcoming racism" narrative, where inevitably a white guy is the evil villain who underestimates, mistreats or is unfair to the protagonist and then the female/poc character gets to overcome this systemic injustice. (Sometimes this is central to the whole show, sometimes it feels like just an obligatory scene in an otherwise unrelated story).

Casts that have an unrealistic "forced diversity" element. You might call it token representation, but if the scene is a random office in middle-America and the 6 characters are 6 different races or when each character is designed specifically to be the inverse of a stereotype, it makes the show feel less authentic and genuine. Related is changing characters from existing stories to be more diverse according to contemporary American notions of identity.

Men being depicted as so absurdly rapey, or the general overuse of sexual harassment or threatening behavior.

Exaggerations of nepotism, sexism and racism in most shows.

As to your question of "whats wrong or what should be done differently", I think there are a few challenges. For instance, we all sort of accept action movies being full of guns and explosions while recognizing they're not at all representative of reality. However, there does seem to be some evidence that these movies contribute to European misunderstanding and to greatly overestimating the likelihood of encountering gun violence in America. The current set of media might bias a generation of young women to fear there's a rapist in every room and that every career disappointment is a manifestation of systemic discrimination.

An easy parallel might be looking at the over-use of depictions of Black men as gang members, drug dealers or criminals in 1980s and 1990s Hollywood. Any one particular movie scene or tv show might be fine on its own with such a character, but when similar characters and scenes show up in dozens of unrelated titles and as a disproportionate representation it becomes problematic. It's different groups now being the recurring villains, recurring fools, etc, but it's the same fundamental issue.

[the_omegist]

Very good comment. When things become forced and systematic, they lose their genuine intent and just feel (because they are) hypocritical and just a marketing tool.

[the_omegist]

Are you genuinely surprised (a lot of) people complain about this? No idea where you live but at this point it became memes material.

No one complains about the fresh prince of Bel-Air having a 100% black cast. But I doubt you wouldn't mind if a reboot was made with 80% white cast because it's a show "from 15 years ago".

What many people hate is the lack of creativity and the "corruption" of already-existing shows for ideologic views.

[DaltonCoffee]

Star treks' historical diversity only applies to nationalities and is a reference to us solving our petty skin/flag squabbles long ago.