SBS2's “Date My Race” and The Danger it Poses to POC/CALD/Non-White Participants
This is an adaptation of my Twitter posts on the matter, as seen on Storify.
Going around my Facebook feed lately was a casting call for SBS2's Date My Race, a proposed documentary about race and dating in Australia. They were looking for participants of all backgrounds based in Melbourne who were single and had “strong opinions about dating” to be followed around for a few months as they navigate their feelings around race and their dating lives.
A part of me strongly considered applying to be part of the show. I’m relocating to Melbourne in early May — they only start shooting in August— and I could use more sources of income. I’ve been on TV before and quite enjoyed it. And, like most other things, I do have strong opinions about dating — particularly in ways that racism affects perceptions of attractiveness in subcultural communities.
But between the casting call, the application itself, and my past experiences dealing with racism in Australian media & society, the whole project just seemed like a disaster waiting to happen.
I have been on SBS before: I was a guest on the Brainiac episode of SBS Insight, discussing IQ tests and intelligence, and was part of a news report about racism in Australia. I also had a stint on ABC Australia Network’s My Australia, which followed recent migrants around as they tried new Australian experiences: I tried roller derby and busking, and it was super fun, one of the best gigs I ever had. So it was probably from there that Channel 9 found me and decided to get in touch.
In 2013 I got an email from the producers at Channel 9’s Can of Worms asking if I would like to be on a panel of an episode called “Is It OK To Be A Little Bit Racist?”. The title was already dodgy, but what made it even worse was when I looked up the other panelists and noticed that they were all White comedians.
It was very obvious that I was going to be set up to be the target, the one bearing the brunt of the joke. I would either be the humourless SJW killjoy or be coerced into saying that casual racism is hunky-dory just so I could be seen as “one of the cool ones, see this brown chick says it’s OK so stop being so oversensitive”. There was no possible way that this could have ended well for me. So I told them, in politer but firmer words, to fuck off and build a better panel & topic that wasn’t so obviously racist; maybe start with actually getting more POC on the panel, not just a token?
(They never replied. Hmm I wonder why.)
Date My Race looked like it could be the same sort of trap. On the one hand, if it was anything like my other experiences with SBS or even ABC Australia Network, it could be a great platform to talk specifically about race in LGBTQ and poly communities: how race and racism affects one’s ability to even be recognised as queer, let alone be seen as attractive by queer standards; how Western White polyamory is “radical” and “innovative” but polygamous marriages in Global South cultures are “backwards”; the Queer Uniform and its uneasy interactions with “ethnic” clothing; the annoyance of hearing someone describe being in poly community as being “like a kid in a candy shop!” knowing that hardly anyone in that community ever picked your flavour. So much potential in talking about dating beyond the White-cis-mono-heteronormative norm.
However, the introductory paragraph of its application form betrayed something of its true intentions:
When looking for love, is racial preference a form of racism? Or is it the same as having a preference for, say, redheads?
One of the things I find most frustrating about Australia’s approach to racism, even — and especially — by those in the progressive/radical/lefty/socially liberal set, is that it seems to be stuck in Race 101 — no, not even 101, the level before that. Everyone is more interested in asking “is this racist?” rather than start from “Yes this is racist/there is racism” as a given and moving on to “how do we defeat or mitigate racism in our structures and communities?”. Even the big anti-racist, pro-immigrant/refugee, or multicultural organisations tend to primarily feature Good White People who say Welcome to Australia, as though non-White Australians needed their pity and blessings to be part of the country. (Look at this “Expert Reference Group” for one of the bigger Australian anti-racist organisations: why are only one or two of them not White?)
This then leads to the attitude of — as said perfectly by White comedian and actual decent person Deanne Smith — “casual racism is quaint!”. Blackface and cultural appropriation are rife — and, of course, White people are writing thinkpieces about how it’s not really that bad so stop complaining while defending their peers’ racist actions. One of Australia’s biggest comedians works mainly with racist stereotypes — but it’s ok you guys it’s only satire! In the meantime, people with “ethnic” names are having a harder time getting their resumes read during job hunts, people of color are hard to find on television, and conditions for Aboriginal/Indigenous and Torres Strait Islander people are still abysmal. Even the other White-comedian-cum-actual-decent-person John Oliver has noticed the specific peculiarities of Australian racism.
Dealing with racism and life as a person of colour in the United States was extremely different to how it was in Australia. In Australia, being outspoken about racism in the burlesque led to very public hatred and eventual blacklisting, while the radical socialist queers hosted “anti-racist” meetings with no other non-White people and expected the sole POCs to do all the outreach. Despite being in a relatively major city, I was isolated from the other politically-minded people of colour interested in similar issues, since we were way more spread out in smaller numbers. I was also the target of continued harassment and hate mail, including people anonymously sending me news reports of crimes involving immigrants while telling me to “go back to my country and leave Australia”.
In the United States, when I spoke up about racism in various subcultures, I was heard: even though there were plenty that reacted badly, there were a lot more that had my back and gave me space to process and vent. There was enough of a critical mass that provided resources, support, and energy around anti-racism that went past Race 101 and into more concrete and nuanced territory. The U.S. is far from being an anti-racist utopia (for one thing, its U.S.-centrism is grating) but at least the feeling of hitting my head against a brick wall while trying to address racism all alone was significantly reduced. And hey, no anonymous messages about how I should leave the United States — in fact, people wanted me to stay! (And I would, if it weren’t for visas.)
The prospect of returning to Australia — and thus returning to the same tokenizing arrested development around race relations — frankly fills me with dread. There seemed to be some improvement around diversity in the arts in the last four years, but is it enough? Discussions around racism in Australia are becoming more common, and in a way the existence of this documentary could be seen as a slight nudge in that direction, but are there enough resources for people negatively affected by racism in Australia, enough avenues for them to find support, build livelihoods, talk about their experiences openly and honestly while given respect and validation?
Or would participation in something like Date My Race just make people of colour much more visible and open targets?
The casting call for Date My Race didn’t seem like it thought through the implications and repercussions for non-White participants — especially not with lines like these:
Are you ready to go outside your comfort zone to test your own (often subconscious) tastes when it comes to dating?
Whose comfort zones are we talking about here? Is it fair to compare the comfort zones of White people, who have the pick of the litter when it comes to dating, with the comfort zones of everyone else who may be forced to date outside their race since there are little to no viable options?
And why are people of colour being offered as tests? Why are we being drafted into your social experiments? Are you encouraging people to just date us to learn how to become more tolerant, so we can provide a ~learning experience~ for your White participants? What about the people who didn’t sign up for this documentary but get pulled in because they were dating your participants? Did they consent to being part of a thought experiment? Can they consent?
Is this show going to pull an Avenue Q and claim that “everyone’s a little bit racist!” if the POC participants decide to only date people of their own race or decide not to date White people? Even if the main reason is because they’re tired of White supremacy and White exoticism and want to date people who actually understand what it’s like to be a racial minority?
What would happen if a participant fails to land a date during filming, particularly if the participant was not White? Would their failure be seen as a result of racism, or would it get brushed off as “well it’s just you, maybe if you changed your look/your attitude/your personality then people would date you, but stop pulling the Race card”?
And what happens after the show? Will participants, particularly POC participants be supported and protected by SBS2 after the show airs? Reality TV stars are already struggling with mental health issues brought on by the stress of filming and post-show repercussions — and many have turned to suicide. Being on the show could make a participant more famous and successful perhaps, but it could also lead to a loss of jobs, broken relationships, and increased harassment and abuse, simply because people can’t seem to draw a line between On-Air and Off-Air and think that seeing someone on TV gives them license to treat that person any way they see fit. Visibility and exposure aren’t always good things — especially when you’re trading off security, privacy, and personal livelihoods.
And that’s what I mean about POC participants being open targets: they’re asked to contribute their emotional labour, to be vulnerable and intimate and authentic, mostly for the edification of White people — whether they’re part of the documentary or watching it at home. Yet they are given very few recourses for dealing with the negative fall-out, and probably will not get as much recognition or rewards compared to the White participants who so bravely “overcame their comfort zones” and learned how to be more “tolerant and open-minded” while dating.
We really don’t need more social experiments. We don’t need people continually testing our experiences around racism and trying to gaslight people of colour by claiming that their experiences “weren’t really racism anyway”. What we need is for people to take our experiences seriously, to move past figuring out whether something is racist or not and move towards actually dealing with racism head-on.
Date My Race could be a much better show if it started with the premise that racism in dating is a given, centered the voices and experiences of marginalised people, and gave them space to be honest and forthright with their perspectives while being protected from predatory editing and without expectations of providing “teachable moments”. As it stands now, it’s a show that would mostly benefit White participants and viewers without any sort of benefit for the rest.
Not being on the show isn’t going to protect me from racism, particularly not in dating, but being on the show isn’t going to do me any favours. I think I’ll pass.
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