OpEd: Making the titular character of HBO's 'Velma' South Asian might seem like an innocuous, or even positive change. But so far, the character is an unwelcome successor to a tired pop culture legacy of relentlessly deriding brown girls' appearance.
In this op-ed, writer Sakeina Syed unpacks HBO’s new show Velma and the trend of appearance-based jokes about brown girls on TV.) is now South Asian. At face value, it might seem like an innocuous, or even distinctly positive change. But in tandem with the release of the first two episodes came scenes that spoke otherwise. So far, the only material Velma's newfound brown skin has brought to the series are punchlines about her appearance.
Minutes in, the show is littered with quips about Velma’s appearance — in an early scene, two cops joke about her “hairy gorilla arms” and her weight. Later on, Velma struts into school with a makeover. For a split-second, her classmates respect her. “You’re not a total dog anymore,” says one character. It might be funny in an alternate universe where this hasn’t been done to death in dozens of shows and movies. But in the world of South Asian Velma, somehow, the jab is still expected to land.
Growing up as a young brown girl in the early 2000s, I was no stranger to feelings of insecurity. It’s funny now, but when I was ten years old I took a pair of kitchen scissors to my eyebrows, snipping away haphazardly. I was desperate to do something about an ethnic feature that every piece of media seemed to equate with ugliness. Shockingly, it didn’t work.
should be positive or aspirational. It would be juvenile to expect that every brown character on screen loves themselves and is viewed glowingly by those around them. But it’s a little absurd that we’re still being spoon-fed monologues and lists explicitly detailing the ugliness of South Asian features. Regardless of how the same scenes are being couched as “edgy” comedy, with flawed heroines or arcs of internal growth, they just aren’t landing.
It’s undeniable that Kaling is an integral part of the conversation surrounding portrayals of brown women onscreen: Writing for
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