Racebending.com

Welcome to your weekly dose of Saturday Link Roundup! This week is full of surprises… or are they?

Minority births in the US are increasing and women are playing video games; a documentary about a Japanese-American Black Panther is being made and a Sikh man has graduated from Army officer school. Reality is upending the so-called “conventional wisdom”– what will happen next?

• Minority births on track to outnumber white births– via Hope Yen of Yahoo News/Associated Press

Demographers think that 2010 might be a racial “tipping point” in the United States, where the number of babies born to ethnic minorities will outnumber that of babies born to whites.

In 2008, 48% of the kids born in the U.S. were children of color.  About 25% who were Hispanic, 15 % black and 4 % Asian. Another 4%  were identified by their parents as multiracial.  The 2010 Census should also yield interesting results.

This decade, there will be more children of color growing up in America than children who are white.  Yet, studios like Paramount  have decided to erase characters’ ethnicities and limit opportunities for actors of color in children’s films like “The Last Airbender.”

• Inside the Minds of Girl Gamers– via Gillian Reagan of Business Insider

CableTV network Lifetime conducted a year-long, in-depth study to go inside the minds of women gamers. The study, “She’s Got Game: Women & Gaming Study” busted some stereotypes about women and gaming, pointing out that women actually play more frequently than men, especially online. Contrary to the stereotype that women play games to be social and casual, the study found that 83% of women gamers like to play on their own, and that about half of the women gamers surveyed were competitive gamers.

• The Bachelor/Bachelorette White Elephant– via Thea Lim of Racialicious

Why is The Bachelor reality show series so uniformly white? What does it say about America’s acceptance of interracial dating? Representation of people of color on television and in romance? What can be done to make the series more diverse and what would the implications of that be?

• The Japanese American Black Panther– via Nalea J. Ko of Pacific Citizen

Two Chinese-American fledgling filmmakers make a new documentary about Richard Aoki, “the toughest Oriental of West Oakland.”

• Study finds median wealth for single black women at $5– via Tim Grant of Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

This link comes from The Hathor Legacy:

Women of all races bring home less income and own fewer assets, on average, than men of the same race, but for single black women the disparities are so overwhelmingly great that even in their prime working years their median wealth amounts to only $5.

The article compares different demographic groups to each other and considers the possible reasons behind this phenomenon.

• Disney restyles ‘Rapunzel’ to appeal to boys– via Dawn C. Chmielewski and Claudia Eller of the LA Times

Citing “The Princess and the Frog”‘s poor box office receipt, Hollywood decides to retool their “Rapunzel” project so that it appeals more to boys. We marvel again at Hollywood’s ability to blame the “failure” of a film on the main character’s gender and/or race, when that character does not happen to be white or male.

• Zoe Saldana : Center Stage– via Luke Crisell of Nylon Magazine

Nylon features actress Zoe Saldana on her cover this month, and the magazine interviews her about Hollywood casting.

“When they say ‘We want to go white,’ they have a very smooth way of saying it, and the recent one is the word traditional,” Saldana said. ” ‘Oh, you know, you’re just not what we were looking for, your skin is a little darker.’ Compared to what?! My skin is just my skin. It’s dark if you compare it to someone who’s lighter.”

• One Kid’s Take on “The Last Airbender”‘s Casting Fail– via Corrina Lawson of Wired.com- Geek Dad

GeekDad blogger Corrina Lawson asked her 16 year old daughter to explain why she and her siblings feel “nearly all the creative decisions in converting the cartoon to the movie have been the wrong ones.”

“Avatar already has a huge core audience,” her daughter writes. “They do not have to draw in additional people through some sort of race-wipe, because their target age already loves the show and they could take the “risk” of casting ethnically appropriate actors to the characters, and there would not be any real problem.

“Instead, they have alienated the fans in a way that is not only racially inaccurate and offensive, but untrue to the characters or archetypes.”

• UC Regents tackle intolerance, hate crimes on campus– via Sue Fishkoff of Not In Our Town

Not In Our Town (a national organization that responds to hate crimes and encourages inclusive communities) discusses the recent rash of racist incidents across the University of California system. The piece summarizes a number of the incidents, from the anti-black events at UCSD to homophobia/anti-Semitism at UCD.

• 1st Sikh in decades graduates Army officer school– via Michelle Roberts of Yahoo! News

Angry Asian Man reported on this news from the Associated Press: for the first time since 1984, a Sikh man has graduated Army officer school without sacrificing the articles of his faith. A special waiver was granted, allowing Capt. Tejdeep Singh Rattan to retain his beard and turban while serving in the United States armed forces.

Before the Army’s regulation change in 1984, Sikhs served in the U.S. military during every major armed conflict going back to World War I. Those who joined before the change were allowed to serve with their beards and turbans, but the policy effectively prevented new enlistment of Sikhs.