Debate

I am against this house proposition because although I understand where people who agree with it are coming from. I don't believe that there aren't people who can effectively portray characters of another race other than their own. I believe that if we were to put this rule into place, it would truly limit films that have a lot of potential and that it'd result in an almost one-sidedness of events that may occur in a certain setting which would otherwise have allowed many perspectives to be experienced by audiences.

I particularly agree with the lady, Cindy, who we watched speak on the matter from an opposition perspective. This lady stated that where she grew up, in Canada, she was surrounded by people from an asian descent (speaking in terms of Indians, as opposed to orientals). As a result, she feels that she'd be able to represent these individuals in a film since she knew and had grown up with people from this particular background. She found it particularly surprising that she'd, according to this house's beliefs and suggestions, not be able to create a film including characters of this Indian ethnicity but would be permitted to produce content surrounding the lives of Chinese people with whom she'd rarely had encounters with. Similarly, I think that I could portray the lives of people living in England better than I could do of people in India because I've never actually been to India. My culture, living here, is more similar to that of a British person whether they be white, black, asian, hispanic or some other minority. Therefore, it seems nonsensical to me that I wouldn't be allowed to create a film surrounding this lifestyle when this is more familiar to me than the lives of a native Indian.

I also know, from studies that UCL have conducted, regarding cultural diversity in uses of social media, that anthropologists there have been able to live with and analyse the lives of people from 9 different areas, worldwide for at least 15 months. For someone to experience a culture and lifestyle for this long, in my opinion, is more than enough time, if used effectively, to understand the fundamentals of the society as well as be able to feedback to others about their experiences. Therefore, I don't see why this isn't possible in terms of filmmaking whereby the filmmaker and screenwriters would essentially be providing "feedback" by storytelling to the audience and informing them of their experiences.

I understand that house proposition believes that no matter what, a person who isn't from an ethnic minority will never understand it from the subject's point of view. However, I don't believe this to be true because if people are open and truthful enough, then this is possible; it all comes down to who is partaking in the filming process and how authentic each member of the team is, when producing the film.

I genuinely enjoyed watching this debate, which I didn't think would be of any interest, initially. I think my own conclusions, lie somewhere between both houses but closer to opposition since they're supporting more opportunities for freedom of speech which I something I strongly believe in, myself.