i think
if you’re a person of color
you can draw yourself and your people as racist or not racist as you damn well please
because only you can do it in a way that is sensitive and has the point of view of someone that is part of that race
and if anything it’s your responsibility to push the envelope in ways that people outside of your race wouldn’t be able to do
because as that person of color you can humanize what we consider racist symbols- slit eyes, big lips, wide nose, flat face, etc
and escape the constant battle of “how do i exaggerate this person’s physical appearance without making it look racist, and is it not somewhat fucked up that i’m afraid to make this person look like how they actually look for fear that someone will think i’m dehumanizing them?”
and repurpose them into something that shows the variety of your people and all their different face and body types
so we can elevate the conversation of drawing people of color to something a little more complex and thoughtful than “that character’s skin isn’t dark enough for me”
racial imagery is a constant visual conversation we have with each other as a society and as artists
and we can talk as much as we want about whether or not the way someone draws technically counts as racist or not
but the fact is there just aren’t enough PoC voices in that conversation period
even if the artist is a PoC, a lot of times the style and influence is something handed down through generations and generations of white men
so until we fix that, the conversation is inherently going to be racist until infinity
so yeah
in summary i wish people drew more PoC in new and exciting ways









