Topic on Forum:Trope Talk

Humans Are White seems like Complaining About Casts You Don't Think are Diverse Enough.

The description suggests it is supposed to be a cousin of Creator Provincialism, but the name seems poorly chosen and needs a rework in general.

Well, it can have a legitimate use, as a story in which only white humans are depicted when there is no cultural or plot based reason why they had to limit the options to just humans of peach toned or lighter skin can be valid. It can also explain the logic behind how the trope is cited as 'true' in racist fiction like The Turner Diaries.

It would definitely be a subtrope of Creator Provincialism, though, but it's not necessarily bad in terms of name if you ask me, but it's purpose could be made more explicit.

How about All Demographics Are American?

This is a subtrope of Creator Provincialism/Audience Provincialism and is a supertrope to Politically-Correct History. The idea is that a work must represent the racial etc. diversity of the American population, no matter if it fits the setting and regardless of where or when the work was made.

Edit to add: I was tired when I wrote the previous part, but I probably should have mentioned that I meant this as a new possible related trope. This proposed trope has become increasingly prevalent, and I'm not just talking about science fiction.

If the work is historical, certainly.

If the work is SF, then one would need to explain why the demographics are skewed away from humanity's most common skin colour and toward white.

The name is not poorly chosen if it describes exactly what is going on.

But the description says it has nothing to do with whiteness.

It also is genre specific but has no indicator in the title.

I wonder if after the original trope creation the trope description had been edited to exclude silliness like those complaints about Harry Potter not having enough African American characters and therefore being racist.

Even if not, it probably will. So, needs a clear description.

And maybe supertrope/subtrope split (cough, Anime, cough).

I think the trope name itself being too wide is the problem. The current description does narrow it down, but the fact that we're even having this thread suggests that there is a problem.

Everyone Is White in the Future?

If we include the word "white", then we continue having the problem that the trope name doesn't cover Bollywood or Anime.

The best alternate name I can think of right now is "Monochrome Humanity", which is descriptive but boring.

What we have de facto is:

1. this trope - as named or "Monochrome Humanity", simple and limited, closely related to Monochrome Casting. AND/OR the version re-spun to involve scope ("All Earthlings Look Alike"?)
2. its supertrope, that would cover demographical idiosyncrasies in general - including Anime stuff, age ghettos, "tokens" and others - and be marked as sister trope to Creator Provincialism.
3. related trope, about line-of-sight casting (including "technical" version of Monochrome Casting), that also covers Bollywood, but obviously does not cover Anime things

To un-blur the definitions, these cases need to be explicitly distinct, that's all.

How about "Demographic Centric Future"?