There really isn't a reason for it, though. A country with a population that was 85% white (As when these characters were created) made white looking super heroes? Do people go to china and shame them for their Chinese mythological heroes? Saying we need to add diversity "because racism", is just trying to shoe horn in racism where it doesn't fit. Comics were always super progressive, they were discussing racial issues in metaphor for quite a long time.
But comics are also mythos, and mythological figures arealsoa reflection of the society they come from, and America didn't have 12+ million Hispanic migrants then, and the black population was sub 10%, if race is really important (Like some people think who get angry at white washing) then the diversity of mythos should reflect the diversity of races, which Marvel's characters actually did.. There were black heroes, yeah, 9 out of ten heroes were "white", but if the goal of race is to reflect diversity in a country (Because race is so important) why should a smaller population be over-represented? Unless racedoesn't matter(Which is what I believe), then we shouldn't care about thisat all....Either way, the double standard doesn't make sense (IE if race is important, than a proper reflection of race is logical, and only 13% of the U.S. is black, if race is NOT important, then it doesn't matter, at all, either way--bring on Idris Elba as Iron Man). I totally get why Marvel wants the growing diversity in there, and that's fine, hell, I think it's great--but the hostility toward a white actor playing a minority role also has to stop.
Making the argument now that because characters reflected their writers makes a double standard okay is not a powerful argument. You could argue that because of racism, it's needed--but again, is that a good argument when there isn't scant evidence it was actually about racism? And isn't that really a punitive argument? I just don't see how you can logically argue for a double standard when attempting to achieve some kind of equality, it's the antithesis of equality. Maybe I'm missing something though.
