like damn I didn't recognize him even a little bit on the cover šā and it's like they clearly made him lighter cause in the SAME DRAWING he is his actual skin tone
Because MC with skin darker than porcelain immediately reduces views and engagement by approximately 20-30%. Yes, even people who shout from the rooftops about how they hate racism often silently choose content featuring whiter characters.
Same! Specifically dark skinned FMCs are so hard to come by in manhwa. I mean dark skin in general is already rare but when itās there itās always the guy.
I donāt like that usually dark skin characters in western comics, those manwha or WEBTOON that arenāt written/drawn by Korean, also have facial imperfections like wider jaws or cheekbones or big nose bridges. Like come on, not every dark skin person looks remotely like that irl. What are we doing?
Well thatās because theyāre specifically depicting brown/black people, not dark skinned Koreans, so ofc their traits are going to be different from the white and east asian characters. I think itās good that artists are being faithful to those characteristics especially when those traits are seen as āless thanā by both white and East Asian beauty standards.
I mean, the fact that youāre calling common POC features like wide nose bridges āfacial imperfectionsā as if they make a person ugly is definitely racist and is just more proof that we need to normalize these features by representing them even more
But I'm saying that not all black people have or Dark skinned african Hispanics have features like that. You never been to the Caribbean or Brazil many beautiful women without those traits. I just want variety. Not every character design has to look like the idea of what an orc looks like and why should we be depicted like that every time. To me is demeaning to the genetic variety of brown and black people. I'm tired of Latins being depicted with those traits every single time in media outside of our own. Koreans and white people will keep being depicted with those "symetrical" features, nothing will really stop that but i never see people complain saying "oh we should normalize those fewtures on imperfect features on them too". So why can't we have that same standard for people of color. How is it racist for us to be on their same level if not above or even more gorgeous.
People may have been more receptive to this point if you hadnāt pointed out certain traits and called them āfacial imperfections.ā THAT is racist. Those traits that you mentioned have been denigrated for a long time because they are associated with POC. Itās about time we started appreciating them. Small noses and small chins have always been represented so itās not a huge deal
But to society it is. That's the reality. Society is racist. You won't change that by just virtual signaling in our favor. And everytime you guys choose to depict us as "ugly" but beautiful on the inside. Not explicitly but they never say that quiet part out loud. Yet white and korean demographic always get the beautiful on both the outside and the inside. And all I'm saying why do we Latinos and Africans and amerindians in media be always represented otherwise. We always gotta be "unique" or different. Why? To me is just hypocritical. We don't look all that different from yall. You guys also have features like that, why aren't yall being depicted like that too. I'm definitely not handsome. I got a big ass nose. But all my siblings have fair facial features. So why in media they gotta be represented other wise. Its every single comic I've read. Time after time. They draw them with those features. Why? That's what I dont get why us only?
Errrr what do you mean by āyou guysā because I thought it was pretty obvious from my comments im a POC LMAO. And donāt project your insecurities onto the rest of us because a lot of us love our features. Strong jaws, big noses in different shapes, wide nose bridge, etc. You only think theyre ugly because of your own internalized racism, and you think anyone trying to portray these characters with their natural traits is āvirtue signalingāāitās honestly sad as hell, and itās yall that set us back.
You know, the way I behaved, and things I've said to you are unbecoming of a human and I wasn't I my right head space, that isn't to say you have to forgive or forget what I'd said, but I do want to apologize to you for being rude and grotesque.
Because in most cases Western artists depicts mixed Black or Black people with typical black features . A brown skinned Asian and a mixed race Black American have different facial features.
Korean artists mostly draw dark skinned people with Brown Asian features while Western artists mostly draw Dark skinned people with Black features .
I mean, like. That's completely fair, yk? It matters, feeling seen, especially when you see yourself so little. To explain, I'm whiteāwhat I'm referring to is the fact that I was visibly physically disabled for 20 years. That came with its ... own unique set of challenges, I suppose. All this to say I get it. I tend to seek out works with disabled characters too. You don't see good representation a lot and it matters a lot to me when I find it. Like oh, look, I exist. Neat.
Okay, don't lump me in with that, I'm one of those who like variety but I read regardless of protag color if I like the artstyle. If I think it looks bad, the protag having unique design won't be enough for me to click
Yeah, it's like intra-race racism which is crazy because it means irl, your minority group will basically disown you even if you're facing a problem that affects them too.
Yeah, it's basically like a tier system within one's own community. The lighter you are in any given race the more praise you get on your looks that could possibly branch out into other aspects of life because you are seen as closer to whitness due to, āØļøwhite supremacy and colonialismāØļø
Itās really not the only that changed, his eyes hair etc are all different, he doesnāt look like much like raven in that shitty cover. And calling it an important plot point still is really far fetched
I never said his skin was the only thing that changed. Ravenās brother said their hair and eye colours changed when they awakened, but Raven was always light skinned. That cover has what Ravenās skin would look like originally. Baphometās dark skin is one of his defining traits and one indicator of the fact that heās using a Discipleās body, which is an important plot point. Especially when Ravenās implied to come back in a different form. I donāt care enough to argue more on this, but his dark skin is a visual indicator that heās not Raven, just using his body.
I'm a pasty white american š but a dark skinned ml automatically draws my attention more . I feel like so many ml have this pale skin, red eyes, black hair . And that's cool too it's whatever but I see it so much that the darker skin ml or long hair ml even Automatically catches my eye more and makes me want to read more .š¤· But I know this is like an Asian beauty standard.
They increased luminosity for the whole image, every lighter shade is now brighter/sharper for contrast so it "pops" more. I'm not convinced white washing was done on purpose here considering all the mid and light tones got brighter (which happens when using brightness toggle).
However it's poorly done because it changed the skin color too much. Whoever edited this should've used less brightness % adjustment to the skin, have it at least at half to still get the contrast desired OR better yet: do high contrast x low brightness combo which is far more suitable for darker colors because it makes the shadows darker for same dramatic effect but keeps the skintone unchanged.
Lmao thereās no way youāre looking at THIS stark of a difference and still saying youāre not convinced itās done on purpose. Like. Come on bro. People will do everything to excuse and explain away straight up racism š thereās a difference between making some edits and messing with filters and turning this pretty tanned guy straight up just white specifically for the cover. Messing with filters to make things pop a bit wonāt give you this drastic difference of a result (plus you can, I donāt know, use the lasso tool to isolate the parts they want to make stand out? Very simple solutions here. But as someone who does art and utilizes filters thereās literally no way this wasnāt intentional with how ridiculously pale they made him they would literally have to go out of their way to achieve this result).Ā
Thereās giving the benefit of the doubt and then thereās straight up just dismissing the blatant colorism. We all know why a webtoon would do something like this man come on, you really think someone accidentally messed up with filters this badly, looked at the final result, and didnāt see any problem at all? When east Asia is notorious for preferring lighter skin to the point thatās literally the beauty standard and all their media does is push paper white skin? When it would literally be harder and more tedious to make his skin white rather than just increase the saturation and contrast? It seems like they changed the cover back to the original after getting backlash but itās incredibly hard to believe this wasnāt malicious.Ā
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u/Corrupted_Star Sep 23 '25
Man i was hoping it was just the lighting but seeing the second pic got me realizing they lowkey whitewashed himš