@RedsliverFor those who don't like to read, this is definitely TL;DR. Read the first paragraph or so (quote and my reply), then skip to the last two. It'll be fine, and certainly much better than deciding that I wrote the opposite of what I wrote.
I completely fail to see how it's possible to read:
If you see a white actor get through the machine: he's the best out of all possible actors. If you see a black actor: he's the best out of all possible black actors.
as NOT making the assumption that there is always a white actor better than any given black actor. It's inherent in the text. There's no way for that statement to work unless there is always a white actor better than any black actor - otherwise, you would never know if the white actor was the best out of all possible actors.
Converting it to a tournament:
Tournament X has only white people. A wins. A is the best white person.
Tournament Y has only black people. B wins. B is the best white person.
Person Z picks a face for the cereal box. Based on your statement, if you see A, they're the best person. If you see B, they're the best black person.
Suppose now there's a tournament Q in which everyone competes. B wins. B is the best person.
However, Z still puts A on the cereal box. Based on your statement, that means you know A is the best person. After all, you're seeing a white person, and if you see a white person, they must be the best.
Do you see the contradiction now?
I stated that a black person picked from a pool of all races had more competition than a black person picked from a pool of black persons.
You didn't actually state that. You might have implied that. It's certainly true, no dispute there, but it has little to do with anything.
There are more cars than there are red cars. True or false?
True, and also with little connection to anything.
Yes, your original statement might have simply been awful phrasing on your part, but it's extremely awful phrasing, and it absolutely does state, assume, and imply that there is always a white actor better than any black actor.
As for the rest... one casting call might (maybe) imply a double standard in one production. Maybe. I'm not even sure that it's a double standard, considering the two societies for which 'any actor may apply' are statistically more multiracial than the others (with the POSSIBLE exception of the 'African' character, if one includes South Africa and certain parts of North Africa).
Your twitter thread is interesting, but it's opinion, and it's absolutely not an opinion shared by everyone. Some people differ vigorously.
I make the statement that double standards hurt the people who are supposedly benefitted by them. - The optics of someone who was picked by a racist double standard [...]
Yes, you absolutely make that argument. The problem is that it relies on the assertion of 'double standards', which is subjective and on which reasonable people may differ.
I'm going to rephrase slightly to make it more obvious (note: I am using SoL's quote tool to highlight this, but I am not stating nor implying that this is actually a quote):
I make the statement that I perceive there to be double standards. I even showed an example that makes it clear to me that there's a double standard.
Because I see a double standard, anyone who doesn't get the job might have been hurt by that double standard. And because I see a double standard, I think it hurts the people who do get the job, because I'm going to question whether they were chosen for their merits or if they were just picked because they were fashionable.
These double standards that I see aren't fair, kind, or respectful to the actor who got the role because people like me might think they got their role unfairly.
Is it clear now? You are letting your perception cause you to make negative judgments of people who might well be the best possible actor for a role, and you're claiming that makes someone else biased and judgmental.
Suppose person X thinks that black people are always better than white people at sports (there unquestionably exist people like X). Person X thinks there's a double standard in place because sports-team owners believe white fans like having white players to root for (there are unquestionably people who believe that). Person X believes that this means that, when you see a white player, they're the best white player, but when you see a black player, they're the best player, and that, therefore, it's unfair, unkindly, and disrespectful when white players are hired. Does person X's perception of a double standard mean that sports-team owners should stop hiring white people?
Again: I'm not arguing that there are never double standards. Of course, sometimes there are. But I am making the argument that there are not always, or even routinely, double standards, and I'm also making the argument that sometimes (fairly uncommonly) there are double standards which work against members of minorities and for people who are in the majority group (for instance, casting in which all of the 'main characters' are white, but the 'supporting characters', particularly minor ones, can be white or non-white).
It is trivial to find casts which are all, or nearly all, members of a majority group, even where there's no particular reason why a group of people in that setting would be all members of a majority group. It's trivial to find casts where the minority group person was clearly cast to be a token. These are also double standards, but they're completely the opposite of the ones you're citing.
Admittedly, if one twists logic into a pretzel, it's possible to claim this is 'racist' against members of minorities not because they aren't considered for major roles but rather because their minor characters are 'tokens'. Much better for members of minorities if they can't get a job at all than if only minor roles are available, don't you know? No one will think they're a 'token' if they don't even appear at all, after all. Instead of dealing with the real problem - lack of major roles - we can cast an all-white show and claim we're completely free of any racial concerns at all while doing it.
There isn't 'a machine'. There are dozens of machines. Many of them operate completely differently from others. You're inventing an all-powerful machine, accusing it of racism, and using it to form assumptions which are unfair, unkind, and disrespectful to the very people you're claiming are being treated unfairly, unkindly, and disrespectfully.
Again: This whole thread started because some people are upset because characters who were never white in canon (some don't exist in canon at all), but only in some people's imagination, were cast to be played by non-white actors. In what way does this reference a 'machine' which is 'unfair' to actors of color? In what way is it unfair, unkind, or disrespectful to pick a non-white actor to play a not-canonically-white character?
This is not a one-off for Tolkien. Some people (not implying you, personally) went nuts over the inclusion of non-white people in Star Wars, notwithstanding that it's not even set on Earth, we have no idea what ethnicities are common in that universe, and (based on precedent) there do not seem to be significant social differences between people of different ethnicities. How can it be 'unfair, unkind, or disrespectful' to an actor to choose them to act in a Star Wars movie - even if their character was written explicitly to be 'diverse'? Because some fans will think bad things about them? Some fans will make unwarranted assumptions?
Boiling it down, and I apologize for being somewhat blunt: your argument is literally that it's bad to do something (with your own production!), that you think is a good idea, if doing that thing might cause some people to make unfair, unkind, and disrespectful assumptions.
To heck with the people who won't get a chance at a job at all because they're the 'wrong' ethnicity (again: for a character who is not defined to be white!). It's more unfair, unkind, and disrespectful to hire them than to not hire them, because some people will think they were hired due to a 'double standard'.
What is your proposed solution? We can't write new non-white characters for any existing story - that's 'racist'. We can't make existing non-specified characters non-white - that's 'racist'. Surely we can't make existing white characters non-white - that's 'racist'. Is the only way to be 'non-racist' to only hire white people when producing anything based on or resembling any existing work? How should a right-thinking, intelligent, caring production company handle casting in a way that doesn't play into anyone's possible theories of double standards and doesn't alienate anyone who only wants to see people who look like the people they've already seen? How many roles are you willing to completely bar non-white people from even being considered for in the name of treating those people fairly, kindly, and with respect? Is the only place for non-white people to be in pre-existing not-white roles or in completely new stories with no connection to anything existing?
As you said, you might have been misunderstood, and - if so - I'll await clarification. My argument is solely with what you've written, not what you might be thinking. As you said, you want your points to be clear, and I can't find a way to read what your words clearly say without it leading to the conclusions above - that because someone might have a perception of a double standard, that makes it fine to simply refuse to even consider anyone who someone might perceive to have benefited from that double standard, even if the role they are being hired for is a new character explicitly written for a non-white actor, or even if the character was never given an ethnicity at all by the original author.
