Some good news and a few reminders

[aang_aint_white]

First of all, we want to announce that the Media Action Network for Asian Americans has spoken out publicly against the casting of The Last Airbender. They've posted an open letter to the producers on their site, offering to help Paramount Pictures steer this project in the right direction. From that letter:

The Asian American community, and the

Comments

[on_earth]

I'm so glad on this news (and I'm actually reading the letters) but there's a few thoughts I've had on my mind since after the Oscars that I don't know where else to post, so I'll just say them here.

I think after last night's Oscars, especially with the awards going to a lot of asians (example, that japanese man winning for best foreign language film) or much more diversity (like Sean Penn and embracing the gay community) and now that Slumdog Millionaire won not only a vast amount of awards but was best picture AND that amazing song medley with the dancers, and along with the fact that Dev Patel is a part of all that, I think the whitewashing is going to be more apparent especially with all that news I'm hearing of M. Night trying to scope for the right "asian-like buildings". It seems like now that Hollywood and the Oscars are willing to accept a LOT more diversity if the story is extremely well done and moving and hopefully the studios will see that and try to change their minds. I HOPE.

That and along with these two letters, maybe there's still a chance?

(If this comment is out of place, it's ok for it to be deleted.)

[aang_aint_white]

It's not at all out of place <3

Is there particular article about that location scouting you can link us to?

[nthdraft]

this is from racebending: read the entry first (hilarious!) and then click the link...

http://community.livejournal.com/racebending/756.html

[nthdraft]

oh duh, that's the link for the "casting Asian-looking buildings" article. I almost shot Theraflu out my nose re: the comment about the Bulgarian castle. :-)

[on_earth]

I found it on racebending here: http://community.livejournal.com/racebending/756.html

I seriously believe though the studios are going to be making a BIG mistake with the way they are handling Avatar now. With the huge big push for diversity and embracing different ethnicities (at least, embracing asian ones), especially at the oscars, they could have a potential oscar hit on their hands -- at least they could for visual effects, makeup or art direction even, if they did this RIGHT. If a studio overlooks THAT, then they definitely are making some big mistakes even if the reasoning is a bit misplaced.

[xneoninja]

It would be great if they asked a few reps from Aang-Aint-White to go to the meeting. Considering this community did spearhead the whole uprising of protest and spreading the awareness. Heheh. But I'm sure they could more than handle it.

Just wanted to say everyone here has gone a very very long way since around December when M. Shyamalan started announcing the cast. I'm proud to be a member here. Lets get together and rally the troops for another protest to continue to show we mean business! Can't let our protest falter just because we got some higher ups helping us right? (nothing against them, we love them for doing this.)

[xneoninja]

Sorry for double post, this is the link Aang-Aint-White requested.

http://wfmz.com/view/?id=638220

[on_earth]

I wonder if they would allow reps from lj communities there? That would be a VERY interesting thing happen if it did. Though, with the considerable presence EWP and MANNA has with Avatar (animation), that might actually not happen, especially in the latter's letter, saying they had a liason with Nick during seasons 1 and 2 to help out not come out with cultural butthurt (ok, those are my words but it's still the same thing).

Hopefully this means that people from those two organizations might actually help with the protests (either from them officially or members who are part of it who manage to wander our part of the net) while their higher ups manage to talk to the studios. It looks like (at least with the CCs attached), that they might drag along Bryke for the ride, or at least, have them either at a meeting where they all meet or to just them as leverage to help corner the studio, who knows. This is allll just speculation though.

[on_earth]

Yeah, we know that we are finally making progess with two impportant Asian American agencies backing us 100%, I believe that we finally did it.

With MANAA and EWP now involved, can someone contact the blogger at angryasianman about this news? This is something that can't be passed off.

With these two organizations helping us, lets hope that they can make a difference for this.