Journalist and Gamilaroi and Gomeroi woman Brooke Boney has delivered an impassioned speech on The Today Show on the current world climate, whereby TV shows and films are being removed from streaming services based on their racist depictions of people of colour. Boney argued that the solution could be problematic, and the way to make real change in the present is to hire people of colour in writers’ rooms and focus on inclusive and responsible storytelling.
“There is a problem with representation of people of colour on our screens — we know that,” she began. “We also now know that blackface is inappropriate, there’s no question about that either.
“Does going back through the archives and tearing down art that’s been made in the past really help us move forward? If I have children, I don’t want them to see and to think that that is how they fit into the world, but I’d also like to be able to show them how poorly our people were thought of and treated in the past.”
Boney added that one of the issues with these portrayals was the way they “punch down” at people “on the bottom rung of society”, pointing out that “lasting change” will come from companies willing to support and champion new talent.
“If they truly want to make a difference in the way that we tell stories about who we are as a society, then we don’t do that by deleting things we’ve done in the past. We do it by making sure that we don’t do it again in the future, and being more inclusive and more responsible with our storytelling. So if you’re gonna do change, make it meaningful.”
Watch the powerful speech below:
