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Comment by unmole | Hacker News Reader

I am not American but the overwhelming majority of the media I consume is American. Given the near hegemony of American popular culture, that is likely true for millions of non-Americans. All these people consume American content because they find it enjoyable and at some level relatable despite living in very different countries and not speaking English as their first language. At the end of the day, the human condition is universal in spite of the cultural frameworks in which it is experienced. I find it absolutely mind-boggling that Americans feel unrepresented by their own media because of the colour of their skin.

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I think a certain geographical segment of America (coastal areas mainly covering NYC, LA, SF, Seattle, Miami, and a few others) is frequently portrayed in the media, but this segment of America is not actually representative, and over-represents itself.

The context you're missing here is that "Black culture" in the U.S. really means "a blend of many African cultures of only poorly-known detail, plus a dose of some parts of western European culture, as heavily mediated by slavery and discrimination". It's associated with skin color most predominantly because that's the connecting factor for most people who were stripped of their original cultures and forced into slavery.

This is a bit reductionistic and over-sells American media. People in other countries may watch American-made media in addition to their own country's media, unless it simply doesn't have any. Foreign media, is also just that: foreign media. It's an entirely different context when watching, say, dramas made and set in Taiwan or Korea.

The fact of the matter is that in American media, most of the actors, writers, and producers are from one group in terms of looks. How is it "mind boggling" to think about how it feels to rarely see someone who looks like you in popular media (and almost never for leads in films)? Or when someone like you is depicted, it's usually a tired trope or racial stereotype?

America is extremely diverse and yet our media disproportionately represents one type of person, and only very recently has begun to correct itself. It's easy to say "hey, we're all Americans", when most people in media look like us. Would you say the same thing if most tv shows and nearly all lead roles in films were solely of Asian-Americans? The answer is clearly no.

Unless you live on a huge country (china, india, russia, etc), for an ordinary person, they will consume more media from the country that influences them, than their own country.

Big productions are in a huge % american media, national media for some ~40million population country, limits itself to talkshows, entertainment world, sports and so.. not movies, series or sitcoms

its not too hard to find people explaining that they do, and why they do (just google "representation matters" and im sure you'll find a lot). sounds like youre not open to learning about other peoples experience, or you simply dismiss it as whiny

General Motors got strong armed by a black media group made up of billionaire media owners for not spending enough advertising dollars on TV companies owned by blacks. Make no mistake this kind of stuff is usually about the dollar bill more so than "representation".

Even if that were true, the racial disparities in income and especially wealth remain large. It doesn't seem untoward to advocate improvement there.

I think its clear by your statement that you have no idea about America.

Please don't be an asshole on HN. If you know more than someone else, that's great, but then please share some of what you know so the rest of us can learn. If you can't or don't want to, no problem—but then please don't post poisonous putdowns. They just make everything worse.

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