“Too Ethnic”?
by Jin Lovelace, HSM team writer & filmamker
So, what I heard recently is how certain fashion apparel just doesn’t appeal to some Home users because the apparel is too ethnic.
I’ll reiterate: some users in Home lack enough of an open mind to give cultural items a chance — either for personal use, for modeling or for an accurate cultural representation when used in conjunction with skin tone — because it’s too ethnic.
This worries me.
What you’re about to read will, I hope, help dispel this narrow, hollow-minded thinking that everything — skin tone, culture, etc. — is just one homogenized shade. This isn’t a rant, but an experience. And I hope you’ll look at it thus.
When Lockwood announced the Bollywood clothing for Home, my initial reaction was one of excitement. It was about time! I’ve always had nothing but love for the Bollywood fashion designers that have expanded and broadened their horizons, creating Hindi cinema-inspired costumes and making them easily accessible around the 1960’s. Absolute trendsetters.
Lockwood really nailed these garments. But do we fully accept this as a trendy fashion spectrum in Home? While I understand not everything will hit with everyone due to different tastes, there’s a hearty “hell no” from me that rebuts this pull quote:
Wait, what? Too ethnic?
I’ve heard the saying a few times, but it’s something I don’t get at all.
While anyone can surmise a theory behind the statement, let me clarify this: if you don’t like it, you don’t have to buy it. Yes, I get it; the fashions don’t suit your taste. But to state how it’s “too ethnic” rubs me the wrong way on so many levels. Because, first off, regardless of how culturally acceptable particular items are, I see this as one big contradiction. If you can give high praise to developers like Granzella for creating an opulent Cheongsam dress (commonly known as the Mandarin gown), why is it you can be open minded about this but not Bollywood fashions?
Seriously, the veneration of Japan Home by some of the Nipponophiles out there has to stop. Last I checked, buying used underwear in vending machines was one of the nastiest trends to ever be concocted and justified as a social practice, yet somehow everyone has an open mind for that.
It’s funny to me because, though I don’t mention this often (if at all), I’ve been approached several times to create fashionable outfit designs for darker-skinned avatars. Do you wish to know why that is? Because the depiction of the skin tones in Home — at least, in a lot of popular marketing materials — are, well…not entirely accurate.
I’m not the one to talk race cards here, but look at the majority of the PlayStation Home fashion videos, be they user created or developer curated. Now, take those videos and line them up on your Tabs and take a look at each one.
When you’re set, I want you to fish out any PR video that doesn’t feature the stereotypical depiction of a black man or woman. You know: the full lips, big nose sort of thing that you find on the seemingly average black person.
Yeah, I’m going there.
In fact, I’m still having a hard time trying to find any Granzella video or their PR content that features any black models for their clothing.
To be fair, VEEMEE features them, and so does JAM Games at times, but for all of the developers on Home: you DO know there is a wider demographic on Home that do enjoy your products, right? So why not note this and actually depict models with different skin tones in your works, to showcase how certain colors could compliment their tones usefully?
“Not all colors look proper on a black avatar,” says a user who didn’t do their homework.
Not every Home user is a WASP.
What’s funny to me is that my avatar, depicted with a Black/Sicilian skin tone (which is a part of my heritage, believe it or not), wasn’t as socially acceptable in Home. In fact, I was recently excused from a modeling shoot — which I specifically supported by creating some very unique ensembles to feature — due to my refusal to use a lighter-complexioned character.
Inquiring as to why, they simply told me: “Because it wouldn’t fit with what we’re doing.”
Fit in? Seriously?
I’m not saying every Home user needs to suddenly dress like a Bollywood star and listen to Miles Davis. This isn’t about trying to ramrod some political correctness agenda down everyone’s throats. Not every Home club needs to look like that satirically ethnically diverse family from Date Movie. But isn’t it more than a little disturbing that in a virtual world, where we can take on any appearance we want (including dressing like animals, robots or a freaking trash can), we’re somehow still encountering barely-euphemized racism based on skin tone?
Fashion can — and should — include darker-skinned avatars. And let’s knock off this ridiculous double-standard where certain Asian cultures are venerated, whereas darker cultures are dismissed. Some complained how VEEMEE’s urban apparel — Street Style — was “too cliche” for their taste, only to turn right around and salute Granzella’s kimono collection. Then you have other complaints like how the colors “don’t look right” on the skin tone, or how it doesn’t achieve its natural essence unless it’s on a Caucasian avatar.
There is nothing wrong with ethnic diversity in Home apparel. The market will ultimately decide what sells and what doesn’t; let’s at least have the human decency to respect cultures that we may not personally find appealing.
An inspired Hindi Fashion design by Hope “Formula HT”
I’m not calling anyone racist at all (except for those idiots at the aforementioned fashion shoot); this is just a matter of awareness. Something I’ve viewed and something I feel this needs to be expressed. In fact, I wish to give the following statement:
For the Home users, models, fashionistas, whomever you are: if you wish for diversity in your fashion wardrobes, start having an open mind. Don’t dismiss cultural fashions as being “too ethnic”. You don’t need to shade your skin tone to conform to the fashion; just wear it, or let others enjoy it without feeling marginalized.
Also, this is something that needs to be driven home: dark skinned does not equal trolling material. Blackface-type comedy went out a long time ago. And it is insulting to be asked to change my avatar’s skin tone to fit a fashion shoot’s “needs.” Be comfortable with whom you are, yes, but be willing to accept the existence of skin tones and fashions that may lie beyond your particular culture. Diversity is not a dirty word — especially in a virtual community.
Enough of how certain clothing is just too ethnic. Get rid of that excuse. Doesn’t appeal to you personally? Fine. But the moment you use the “too ethnic” line, you are actually showing your true colors.
May 23rd, 2014 by Jin Lovelace | 7 comments
Jin Lovelace is a machinimist and team writer for HomeStation Magazine, as well as the founder of Twilight Touch Inc. -- http://twilighttouchinc.com and http://youtube.com/twilighttouchinc. When not found in PlayStation Home, Jin studies graphic design and illustration (character design and fashion), gaming, and the culinary arts.
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Seconding this. I have a hard time finding outfits that suit me and my skin tone. (Let alone in a nice deep shade of blue, when female clothes in Home all tend to be white, pink, red or black, but that’s another story.) “Ooh, that outfit looks nice on her, maybe I’ll get it!” Then I get it and bam, it’s way too bright for dark skin, or clashes, or otherwise doesn’t work nearly as well as it did on the white girl. (Whether the white avi I saw wearing it, or the inevitably-white preview in the store, or whatever.)
Even makeup is pretty inaccessible (without coughing up a lot of money for Plus), since it’s calibrated for white girls and thus winds up being brighter than a black girl’s skin: put even a little bit on and you wind up looking like a clown, so you need a very careful touch on the slider.
There’s tons of ethnic clothing in Home! It’s just that almost all of it is American, Western European or Japanese; those are pretty much the only ethnicities represented.
Reading between the lines of complaints about “ethnic” things, and they’re basically either saying that they themselves are ethnically-neutral (which is a very ignorant/Privileged thing to say), or that only their own ethnicity matters (which is outright racist). And self-insulting too: it’d be like saying that men are genderless, or that English isn’t even a language. Go ahead and tell a guy that he’s “unmanly”, see how he likes it.
Sure, if you ask a white person, they’ll acknowledge that they’re white, but they normally don’t think of themselves in racial terms, they don’t claim a racial identity, because they don’t have to. Throw a black person in the mix and suddenly they have to think about race, and they don’t want to. (As though black people have that choice!)
But, take it as a challenge! Fashion for dark-skinned people works a little differently, which is an opportunity for designers. Deep, bold colors look great on black people, for example, or at least I think so.
(Now if only they’d have color-adjustable clothing in Home. Then nothing would ever be the wrong color!)
You’ll want to go to http://twilighttouchinc.com and check out my article “Shades of Ethnicity” which speaks on certain fashions on Home that conforms on darker-skinned avatars.
To be fair, the skin shades on Home aren’t truly accurate. No matter how hard I try to depict an Asian skin tone, no such color for it exists.
I’m all for racial equality. In fact, I still get different conversations when I get on as my darker-skinned avatar as pose to my lighter variant but both are depictions of me; I’m still the same regardless what color I am.
Thanks for your input!
I’m curious -- if, say, a developer created traditional or even derivative fashions from Africa (say in this image here (http://www.overlandingwestafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/Beautiful-Gambia-Ladies.jpg) or even the West Indies (one of my closest friends is of Haitian/Creole decent: http://www.africasounds.com/Images2009/103108parade24wf.jpg), would you be interested in them, even if they might get some of the smaller details wrong, either due to limitations in Home, or lack of intimate experience or knowledge of the garments in particular?
I’m asking this because a good majority of Home’s developers are male and white, and I know this because I’ve either met or spoken with a lot of them one on one over the years. I can say with significant confidence that in the case of Lockwood, we do a fair serious bit of research into what we bring to Home and its fashions, but not everyone or everything is 100% foolproof.
(BTW, if you really want to get your ideas noticed with regards to fashions for people of color, post sample images of your ideas to the monthly suggestions thread Tempest Fire posts on the forum: http://community.us.playstation.com/t5/PlayStation-Home/May-2014-Suggestions-Thread/td-p/43478944 This is where Lockwood got the idea to create Bollywood fashions. A great many people were posting and re-posting their desire to see these fashions realized.)
I love the styles in those pictures and I would buy them the minute they were produced!
I would wear them on Home. They look very cultural and one that can showcase awesome experience for Home users to don the fashions they normally have to pay a serious grip for!
Thanks, Terra!
Jin,
I keep thinking about this article and came back today and re-read it for the second (or maybe third) time. I think it’s one of your best pieces for style AND content. I just wish the world were different and you never had a reason to write it.
Thank you for standing up for what’s right.
I think any outfit released on home will be put down to being a fashion item and nothing more. I have to agree though how anyone can say they are too ethic is beyond me. Bet if Lockwood called them something else like kingdom of elephant outfits they would buy them without a second thought. Skin tones is another issue some tones get you trolled and others are used by trolls so the easier option is to be inconspicuous.