What if the Player is Black?
Brenda Brathwaite writes:
A friend of mine, Sheri Graner-Ray, has a well known signature on all her emails: "What if the player is female?" Today, I received a call from an industry colleague of mine who had a similar question:
"What if the player is black?"
You might wonder, "Why didn’t he call a black game developer?" Two reasons: a) He didn’t know anyone well enough to call them, and b) Something I’ll call "politically correct fear." It’s a concern at the base of every person who is not the demographic they are curious about.
"If I say to someone, ‘Can I ask you about how you perceive blacks in games?’" my friend continued, "will he think I am a racist? And is it okay to say ‘black,’ or should I say ‘African American’?"
