Taking Diversity Too Far

I know guys, It’s like the third time I’m discussing this particular subject on my blog… but what can I do? It certainly has quite a punch and new things about it (albeit quite irritating) keep popping up.. So, I need to vent…

Let me just start by saying that I’m not anti-diversity per se (which apparently is a thing now) and I understand that we need to go from one extreme to another in order to stablish a balance… that’s how life works…

However, I find it ridiculous and irritating when I read reviews and comments about (Own Voices) books that are supposedly not diverse enough… Let me give you an example… I read a few comments a while back discussing how Wicked Fox by Kat Cho wasn’t Korean enough… I mean she is Korean American and she incorporates her culture heritage on her book… at least tha was my grasp on it.. when I read it

But what’s even more upsetting it’s that those who are making the comments aren’t Korean… What in the world? It’s like I’m writing a book about Venezuela and suddenly someone from Japan tells me that I’m not Venezuelan enough… WTF?

And that’s not all, the same thing happen with another book but this time it was about plus size representation.. and to cut the story short it wasn’t accurate enough!! or so the Diversity police determined…

I get that we want to have accurate representation.. I love reading books about Latin American characters that go beyond the gang member, or the ubber religious and over the top family… But here’s the thing we seem to forget that even though we are different in many ways… we are also simmilar…

I’m a Latino woman and to be honest my every day life isn’t much different to the life of any of you… I work, talk to my friends, read, eat, sleep… So, the differences are in the way we see life, our foods, traditions, some of our beliefs… If you were to write a novel about that.. then how could you let everyone see that?… through family interactions and food sharing… that’s how!

But when was it that these simple things became insufficient? Do we really need to become some other type of stereotype (let’s call it a “good” one) for everyone to be happy with the amount of representation portrait in a book? Because I really don’t see the point in it…

I have said before, I want diversity and accurate representation but I wanted it to feel natural and not forced.. I want to be able to believe in it and not to chalk it up to a positive stereotype (if such a thing existed)…

Those are my rambling thoughts on this corner of the ridiculous extremes that “Diversity” is throwing us… Let me know in the comments How you feel about it, Do You Agree or disagree?

As Always

Happy Reading