Girls and Race

The HBO Show du Moment Girls is getting some shit for being so "white." On one hand I'd love to pounce on this as another reason the show sucks; on the other, I have several pockets of girl friends here in NYC, and I'm not sure any of them include a black woman in their circle. So then the question becomes well, is it MORE offensive for Lena Dunham to do the ol' "look I'm so diverse, I have a black friend!" than simply ask us to live with what may be natural for a quartet of 24 year-old white girls in NYC? I have no idea - personally, I find the small number of opportunities available to women of color BEHIND the camera more offensive than the idea that it hasn't occurred to anyone to cram a black character onto a show just for it's own sake. THIS ARTICLE musing on the show's "hipster" relationship with race finishes with this comment:

None of which makes Girls' portrayal of urban millennial life unrealistic. I've been to plenty of dinner parties where everyone was white, including myself. In fact, I'd argue that the show, taken as a whole, is even more accurate for these shortcomings. It really is the voice of a generation: a generation of white people who suck at talking about race.

I wrote here four years ago:

My first friend was black. Well, actually, I guess he still is (ba-da-bump.) Buuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuf!!!

All my years growing up in Virginia and even during a brief stay in Mississippi, I had plenty of black friends. Yet here I am in New York City, the melting pot of melting pots, and I don't have a single black friend. Isn't that something.

Living in NYC doesn't automatically turn your hipster loft into a post-racial mix of diversity any more than living in Bumfuck, Iowa automatically makes you a white supremest.

Oh shit - I forgot about my one black NYC friend: Smiley!