: Re: Is it wrong if I kill off a black character? He is one of two supporting characters that die in my screenplay. My wife says I shouldn’t make him black if he’s going to die. Would it

@Sent2472441

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It's a trope to kill of the black character first and perhaps that's racist of the writers in some cases (and satirical, or realistic, in others), but it's not unrealistic to have your American black characters die of murder more often.

According to the FBI, 3.021 white people vs. 2.451 black people were murdered in 2014, so it would be realistic in the case of murders to have approximately 3 white people be murdered for ever 2.5 black person, if you "correctly" represent US black people at around 1/8th of your cast.

So: a bit more white people "should" die in absolute numbers, when you have a setting in the US and blacks are represented at around 1/8th of the cast. If you have two deaths it's most plausible for one black person and one white person to die. That would slightly over-represent black people as homicide-victims, so you could choose to let them die last to "compensate" for that.

If you have higher black representation e.g. 50%, they would have to have a much higher share of victimhood to match reality. In the case of 50% black representation, assuming 1/8th black representation in the US population and the 2014 FBI homicide numbers: 15% white victims and 85% black victims, or 500% more black than white homicide deaths.

Here's the stats I used:
ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2014/crime-in-the-u.s.-2014/tables/expanded-homicide-data/expanded_homicide_data_table_6_murder_race_and_sex_of_vicitm_by_race_and_sex_of_offender_2014.xls
Make sure not to over-represent white people as murderers and murder victims, or you're a disgusting racist who's oppressing white people. If you're white and you do that it's even worse, that means you're self-hating and an "uncle Tyler", a Kit-Kat White.

... I'm kidding, but I'm also serious. It's the identity politics viewpoint. I think it's an unproductive and divisive oversimplification, one which is all too popular in "our" mainstream media. It seeks to reduce the true diversity of race, ethnicity, culture and religion to one big "melting pot", a divided and identity-less mass to be controlled through money and media.

I think you should not let statistics and political correctness influence your artistic decisions.

This is your work. This is your art. Make it yours.

You live in a free country: act like it! Be free and empower yourself.

If you bow to postmodern/neo-Marxist ideology, that reduces life to victimhood and oppression, you've already lost. You'll never completely satisfy that ideology; there is no "diverse enough". Nothing short of the complete destruction of the majority... and there's always a new majority.

P.S.: Although I think my back-of-the-envelope calculations are steady, suggestions for other data (or: interpretations of) are welcome, this isn't my doctoral thesis. To the author: if I'm mistaken in your locality let me know, it's a blind guess and I could add a section tailored to you.

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