two years later and i'm making a pinned comment for this video. people comment yearly that i missed the point of the onion tweet and although i totally could go through each comment and respond, i don't want to anymore. i *know* the onion is satirical. no i didn't miss the point. if your satire about how cruel people are being to a little girl includes being just as cruel to a little girl, it's not good satire. the onion even deleted the tweet and issued an apology for this because although we can all agree it was well intentioned, it was horribly executed. how does piling on more insults about a child even highlight the absurdity and cruelty of how the child is being treated anyway?

"Why'd you cast a black person to play a black person?" "Cause she's a black person..." Sums it up well.

Holy shit "when I found out rue was black her death wasn't as sad"??? Bruh imagine being a young actress hearing that. That's so horrible

Her being black is actually really important to the plot in a way...the fact that Katniss sees Prim in Rue despite skin tone is actually a powerful message on anti-racism. She doesnt see Rue as BLACK, she sees her as a scared little girl.

i literally cannot fathom the fact that some people were not as sad when rue died simply because they "realised" she was black. people make me sick.

“When I found out Rue was black her death wasn’t as sad” Some people shouldn’t be allowed access to the internet

I like how a major argument was that because she wasn't white she wouldn't "remind Katniss of Prim." as if her personality wasn't... what reminded her of Prim...

People must’ve completely forgotten or ignored that line about “dark skin.” I imagined Rue to look pretty much exactly like she was in the movie, aside from the hair style.

I love the headcannon that katniss's dad was indigenous, with his knowledge of the land he passed on to his daughter as well as his olive skin and straight dark hair while Primm favors their white mother in looks.

Imagine reading the book wrong, thinking a major character is not black, going online and making it public that you read the books wrong.

I remember talking to a friend about this outrage when it first happened and her saying "well the book describes her skin as being dark enough to blend in with the trees and I've never seen a pink-barked tree."

It's kinda scary how many people can't see how Katniss could relate her to Prim in any way because.. she looks different from Prim? Like.. how shallow are your relationships? Where's the childhood trauma?

"political correctness" being used to describe diversity is appalling.

"I didn't imagine her as black" No shit I bet you imagine all character as white unless the writer screams their race at you

Rue was always black- I literally never understood the hate 🙄

"Oh, they're not white? Can't extend my empathy" My brother in christ, that is RACISM talking

I didn’t even realize that i had a “white default” when reading until a few days ago. I was watching a youtube video about dork dairies and they pointed out that the main character (Nikki)’s friends Chloe (latina) and Zoey (black) weren’t white. They stated this a good couple of times in the books but i just ignored all descriptions/context clues and “defaulted” them as white because Nikki was. I honestly feel robbed of a piece of my childhood because if i had actually comprehended that representation i would have felt a lot more seen, because a lot of the main trios/friend groups in books and other media at that time were white. As a black girl i feel sad that society has molded our brains to have white as the “default.”

‘when i found out rue was black, her death wasn’t as sad’ actually horrifying

isnt it ironic that Collins is literally showcasing how all children are innocent and can be gentle regardless of skin color... and then those comments can ONLY see someone as innocent if they are white?

as an author this is a problem that i see come up all the time. the current story i am working on features a black main character with multiple descriptions of him having dreads, his family members wearing their hair in protective styles, and just outright saying hes black. i sent a draft over to some peer-reviewers a few months ago, got positive feedback and left it at that. later, i sent them some drafts of cover art to figure out what might draw the most attention and most of them, without any shame, told me that they thought the mc was white, some saying they pictured him with blonde hair or blue eyes. its horrific to me that even today many readers, particularly white ones, still dont process any text that describes the characters as anything other than white.

Rue's casting was perfect. She was exactly like I pictured her when I read the book.

The funniest thing is, that Rue reminded Katniss of her sister because they both were little girls who needed someone to help and protect them. It's stupid to think that they needed to look alike so Katniss could feel sympathy towards Rue.

Absolutely broke my heart when Quvenzhané replied to the reporter "I'm still a little girl." :'(

1. the actor for Cinna (forgot his name sorry) was exactly how I envisioned him. A person that looks and is very calm and trustworthy. Tbh, I didn't imagine him as black or white! 2. the actor for Rue (also forgot her name sorry) was super cute and I could not stop crying when she died. I honestly wanted to kill all the people who were being racist. SHE WAS DESCRIBED AS BLACK AND YOU GET MAD WHEN SHE IS BLACK?! So annoying. It's so sad how literal CHILDREN are being called disgusting and "ew". Sad thing is this is happening again with the cast for Annabeth Chase in the new Percy Jackson show.

this is why for the Ariel situation when people say "they shoudlve just made a black character/story" I always point them to this. Rue was written black. She IS a black girl in the books. Yet the immense backlash of her character in the movie also being black... just the same for ariel. it doesnt matter whether its a black character, written by a black person, originally black or not, they hate black people and hate seeing black people on screen.

“Not to be racist or anything” *then proceeds to say racist and hurtful things*

As a black woman who read the book, I was overjoyed when I read the character description and immediately imagined a dark skinned adorable black girl. Not hard to do. Didn't get, olive, blonde, or light out of it anywhere.

*looks at literal small tiny child* “So did ya watch Annie as a little girl?”

Rue’s death being “less sad” is a crazy take. It reminds me of when that KZfaqr interviewed the head of the KKK and he said he felt bad for “fatherless black children” but not as bad as he feels for white kids 💀

“Because POC only exist for political correctness and not because they’re people” 👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾. Can we get an applause for that statement.

It absolutely broke my heart when Quvenzhané had to stop the interviewer and say “well I’m still a little girl”. She is such a smart and well spoken child!

How???? How can they call a little girl all these names??? And then claim "not to be racist"??? For goodness sake, she did such a wonderful acting job and I cried so hard❤

The quote about Rue not being an innocent white girl at the beginning hit me hard like... it's right out of the racist handbook. The characters I remember being pained to see die were Cinna and Rue, and I def cried when Rue died, because she's a sweet little girl. You can't make this shit up, from the commercialization of a book addressing class and revolution, to racists devaluing people whose characters are commentary on thier actual lower social status

It's always made me mad that even in cartoons, the black female characters would have lighter skin than the black male characters. Like lighter skin = more feminine or some shit.

How could anyone look at Amandla as Rue and think she’s not cute, sweet, and innocent? How? She’s too pure for this world! Being black doesn’t change that!

Isn’t it Crazy that something as meaningless as our skin color matters so much to some people like forreal it’s not being pOliTiCaLlY CoRrEcT people are just born this way and the fact that bothers these people sooo much is crazy 🤦🏾‍♂️

I cried during Rue's death in the movie, because I cried over her death while reading... It doesn't matter that she looked almost EXACTLY how I imagined her while reading; she was an amazing character portrayed perfectly.

When he said “have you watched Annie as a little girl” and she said “well I am still a little girl” my jaw dropped wtf

the fact that so many people were saying "it doesn't suit the character" dude what? so your skintone affects your personality sheeeshhh how did I not know that?

It helps the story that rue is black- firstly it distinguishes prim and rue design wise, secondly it helps show that Karina doesn’t care about the superficial stuff

I think a really poignant anecdote I read was Kerry Washington (a gorgeous woman) was portrayed as a 'Damsel in distress' in Django. When asked about this trope, her response was 'There are no woman of colour ever portrayed as this in mainstream American movies' and she didn't take any grievances with this - the opposite actually. As a white dude even thinking about it I never even considered this. Most woman of colour are portrayed as angry and physical; not beautiful and feminine. It made me reflect a lot on my own cognizant biases. To say the actress who portrayed Rue as anything less than a beautiful and talented little girl is baffling.

The book literally described Rue and Thresh as black. Even Suzanne Collins said she meant to write them as black characters. Racists were mad that the little girl they spent weeks crying over was black instead of the white girl they had envisioned because they refused to believe the words that were staring them straight in the face.

How the comments called the actress "not cute" and "not innocent" just for being black ended me. Like how can you say that and still try to say youre not racist. She was perfect as Rue.

also, I hate that in the past as nowadays all little girls that are black in the media have a sass atitude, throw shades and are rebelious. I like when they are portraited as fierce or confident, but they fall all in these stereotypes over and over, having no individuality and being "the black children" again and again.

Its also worth pointing out that Rue and Thresh are from District 11. According to the official map of Panem, 11 sits in what would be known as the American South today. A lot of it making up what would be Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi. States that by and large have a predominantly Black population. It stands to reason that the tributes from these districts would more than likely be Black. Thats not saying wh¡te folks dont exist or dont live in 11, but Black folks are far more common in that area. So is it really that surprising that Rue and Thresh are Black?

“some old guy is playing haymitch” haymitch is literally an old guy in the books

"Awkward moment when Rue is some black girl and not the little blonde innocent girl you picture" As if black girls can't be innocent, super obvious example of an adultification bias.

The way so many people had issues with the cast for Katniss and Gale because of HAIR colour, when those characters had olive skin, and they didn’t care about that part at all

I remember the first time I came across the term "olive skin tone" while reading a fantasy novel. I just imagined the character as green, like - you know - a green olive...

imagine being 9 years old and having to correct an interviewer "well I'm still a little girl" you can literally see her start to answer his question, realize what he said, and correct him. she literally wasn't even in the double digits of age yet and she's being talked to like that? and currently, quvenzhane is still a minor! she's 17!

Amanda is half white and still got treated so badly so imagine if rue was played by a darker little girl...it wouldve been absolute chaos💔

People being perplexed and enraged by Rue being black are on par with someone going "What?! I never imagined Ariel with a fishtale!" 🐠🧜🏿‍♀️🦀

the actual casting crime was the cat, it was supposed to be orange

The tweet admitting to feeling less sad about Rue's death after Amandla Stanberg's casting was wild. Imagine broadcasting to the world that you inherently value fictional white children's lives more than their black counterparts. I'm glad you made a video about this topic 💜🙏

"Since finding out Rue was black, I'm less sad about her death" THIS IS A REAL THING THAT IS STUDIED. My English teacher in school taught us about a man who raped and killed little girls, and in court he described all these gruesome things he did to the girls. Everyone in the courtroom was disgusted until he mentioned that the girls were all black. People cared less. Some of them didn't care at all. So yeah, Twitter user, you should hate yourself /:

I'm white and live in a North-Western European country I read the first Hunger Games book before the film came out. And I remember distinctly that Rue was described as having brown skin. I had to write a book report, and commented that I liked the attempt of the writer to have characters of multiple ethnicities/colours in the story. Because most of the previous books we had to read were mostly fully white. I made the comparisons with some older books I knew, that had darker skinned characters in supporting roles or as shared main roles. We talked about it during class and fellow students that were not white came up with the suggestion to read books with a non-white main character. Which we luckily did, it is so important. I can't imagine how people overlooked that Rue was black.

the audacity to question THE AUTHOR'S clearly stated decisions is baffling to me

I find it so deliciously ironic how people got mad about L being played by a black actor in the Death Note adaptation, but didn't say a word about Light being played by a white actor. Both characters originally were Japanese (edit: Asian), people.

i always imagined her as black because she’s literally referred to as “dark skin.” how does one miss that?

23:35 the fact this little girl is smarter than the grown ass man across from her is honestly so sad. Note: And when i say smarter i don’t mean to imply that she is mature or “adult”… she is a child. She simply recognizes the very flawed logic in the question, that implies she is no longer a child and robs her of being one. The ridiculous thing in this interaction is the fact that the middle-aged adult man doesn’t realize this as he sits down across from her in a litteral toystore when asking this.

When I read the books I remember imagining Katniss as Indigenous, and her having olive skin and dark hair is what did it for me 🤷🏾‍♀️ I get that there are “dark” skinned white ppl that are like Italian, but I usually see Italians with more fair skin than darker skin. Though, Ariana Grande has olive skin and the dude from 365 days has deep olive skin as well.

I always found the entire backlash surrounding Rue and Thresh's race ridiculous, since they were both clearly described as "dark skinned" in the original novel.

“I never pictured Rue to be black” oh so you can’t read?? You have reading comprehension skills?? That’s what you’re saying to me right now?? Great, got it

You know as a writer Ive been "complimented" of have characters of color but not "making it their whole thing" and i always wondered what that meant until this video. Because apparently people of color talking about discrimination against them is making it their whole thing. Suddenly they aren’t people but "political" and thats gross. I once saw a quote that said. "There are two races, white and political. There are two sexualities straight and political. There are two genders male and political." And I hate how often that quote shows itself on the regular.

I feel so sad. Dark skin little girls should not be seen as “not innocent” or more “grown”..... I’m literally crying. I have a little sister and she is my entire world and she has a deep, rich and beautiful complexion. This world is pure evil.... people ruin everything.

I always thought it was so natural and sweet that she basically described rue as reminiscent of prim in every way but skin tone. There was power in that, the idea of seeing a little black girl in the same light you see your little white sister. It really sucks to hear that people ignored that line entirely so they thought the kids had to look the same in order for katniss to care about rue.

i am giggling at the person who suggested johnny depp instead of woody for haymitch bc woody was some old guy… he’s two years older than johnny depp 😭

The "whiteness by default" hits hard because the outcry at Rue's casting was ridiculous and so obviously racist, it's easy to see it as a "it's other racist people who are the problem" if not for the fact that I had one thing in common with them: I didn't read any description because I'm lazy and I haven't been able to read descriptions for years and I absolutely pictured Rue as a white blonde girl. So even beyond the obvious racism and lack of empathy toward black people that I could discount as being an issue for other people, -I mean what kind of person feels less empathy for a 12 year old being brutally murdered by a government because she's black?, they have to be "the real racists"), I was still also projecting a racist view of the world right out of my subconscious. That not only is white the default, but specifically the default for innocence and youth (which is proven by the fact that I didn't really picture Thresh as anything, neither white nor black, I just hadn't thought of it, but the innocent sweet young girl? She's white and blonde). That's why it drives me crazy when people refuses to acknowledge racism beyond incredibly obvious actions and act like calling anything else racist is immoral, that implicit biases are not a thing and not a product of systemic racism which obviously "doesn't exist". Yes it is for god's sake it very clearly exists and implicit biases is something we need to account for when looking for solutions. We can't fix everything by just targeting the most blatant racists.

This video made me so angry, I had no idea people were so horrible to that little girl. Gross. Side note though: Lenny Kravitz as Cinna was one of the best casting choices ever and no one is going to tell me otherwise.

The statement that "a character is black, therefore it's less sad when they die" says so many profoundly monstrous things about our society...

Same "issue" asaasins creed is having .they're that mad the character is black and they can't "see themselves in the character ". But we've had to for years

This pretty much boils down to two things: 1) since race is something very noticeable just by looking at someone, it’s hard to mention it smoothly in text cause it’s just not something that comes up in conversation. Also there were literal lines describing their skin color so it doesn’t matter 2) if every fictional character must be white, that makes it impossible for everyone else to get a job as an actor for the movie, thus discriminating against them. Just because it’s not written anywhere doesn’t mean it can’t be black 3) it’s more realistic for the story to have black characters since it’s supposed to take place in a dystopian North America, so it’s not like only white people would survive the apocalypse Just grow up or shut up.

"i WaNnA gO bAcK tO 2010 wHeN pEoPlE wErEn'T sO sEnSiTiVe" they weren't sensitive. They were racist ☠☠☠

What's funny about the whole idea that "white people can't relate to POC characters" is that my favorite Disney character growing up was Lilo Pelekai, from Lilo and Stitch. I'm white. She's Hawaiian. I related to her more than any other cartoon character because we were both friendless, bullied, and from 'broken' homes. Her skin color didn't stop me from seeing myself in her, for all the same reasons Rue's skin color didn't stop Katniss from seeing Prim in her. Any white person who says they can't relate to or empathize with a POC character *because* the character isn't white is racist, full stop.

I remember being so f*cking confused by this at the time. Did any of these people actually read the book?? Rue was always a Black girl and was clearly described in the text. The amount of racism that jumped out was horrifying to witness in real time. I feel so bad for Amandla who experienced that extreme racist backlash. She did a fantastic job in the movie and left me sobbing in the theatre!

This was so well done! I really hate when I hear people say they couldn't relate to a character because of skin color or they won't read it because of skin color. Like you can't relate to being a 2,000 year old immortal but you still read the book. We've had to grow up reading about whiteness, surrounded by it, but some folks are so self-centered that everything is always about them. I just 🤬🤬 like how did you read dark skin and think white?! Like they're so self-absorbed that it was "oh they must be the darkest version of white because why would an author write anything that's not white people 1000% of the time" 🙄

An explicitly stated character of color: *exists within literature* Whte readers: I can’t read all of a sudden I-

Bruh it literally called her skin dark in the books- They’re trying to act like die hard fans but in reality they just weren’t paying attention.

When I saw the casting for Rue I thought it was SO spot on! If you look strictly at facial features, Rue's actress and Prim's actress really look like each other, and their acting was pretty close to one another as well. I could totally see why Katniss saw Prim in Rue

“Call me racist, but..” oh, I will. Don’t worry I will be calling you racist 🤦🏽‍♀️ god damn.

I learned a lot from American racism when Amandla was cast as Rue. I remember reading a comment that said "i can't believe Rue is black, i imagined an innocent girl." Really said (says) a lot about how people see Black youth and how they are robbed of presumed innocence. Your video showed me that it was so much more explicit than i remember.

I’m Korean and only met a black person 1 or 2 times (briefly in a train station at 6 and 9) before I read the book or saw the movie, and even I immediately thought Rue and Thresh were black. No idea how people, especially anyone from America, thought otherwise, lol

I felt like Rue’s actress performance was incredible. She showed how compassionate and brave that little girl was despite fear lingering in the air. When she died she looked ethereal, highlighting how cruel a loss of life is.

This is making me question everything. For some reason I pictured Rue as white in the books. I have a habbit of skimming books and miss stuff, but it was brought up like 3 times! That is kinda scarry how conditioned we are to default to white... I'm gonna try to be more conciouse of this from now on, thanks for the video!

I remember. I remember. "Rue is meant to be innocent and remind her of Primrose... thus can't be black."

Rue’s death was the saddest death in the hunger games trilogy. She was so kind and innocent and young. I got a little choked up when they showed her covered in flowers. Rue was such a wonderful character and I wished she could’ve stayed longer

I really hope that out of everyone who was so outraged about Rue suddenly "becoming" black, that a nice handful of them went: "WELL at least I still have the BOOKS" and went back to reread them, only to realize that Rue was always black and that the actual problem lied with them.

To your last point: I was confused that katniss was white - olive skin to me is light brown and I was thinking of someone from syria for example, however I actually missed that Rue was described as black in the books and I realized my internal white washing... so I was surprised by the casting and then ashamed that I hadn't pictured her with dark skin. Thanks for your video - good content :)

"Did you watch Annie as a little girl?" "Well, I'm still a little girl." PWNED!

It’s so crazy how many people read the book and didn’t realise rue was black?? How can you read “dark skin” and picture a white person?? 😭

What sucks is that growing up I didn't get to read books with POC, lgbtq, disabiled or mentally challenged because my elementary school librarian hid the books in a bin behind the main desk. I only recently read a book with a main character that was Hispanic, trans and gay (I love him so much, he's so sassy) and I'm 17!

This effect is so much funnier in the Scythe fandom because one of the main characters, Citra, is *literally described as being of 37% African descent* (Sci-Fi world, long story), in the THIRD CHAPTER OF THE FIRST BOOK no less, and some people still fancast her as a white girl, or are surprised to find out she's canonically black

I HATE when someone says "It's not racism, I swear!!!" when they have a "problem" with a black character. Black characters specially female ones always get less mercy from fandom communities.

Lol! These kids calling Woody Harrelson "some old guy" then mentioning Johnny Depp as if they aren't basically the same age is the funniest thing I've heard today.

Can confirm that the first time I watched hunger games I sat down 20 minutes in, I was incredibly confused, spent most of the movie gawking at the set peices. But when that little kid died I just cried for like five minutes

Rue death was such a emotional moment for me, it hurt even more then Prim's. Because i had a connection with her, we saw her kindess in the middle of The Hunger Games for her to die like that. Not saying Prim isn't the same, but i had more of the protective feelings for her.

I avidly read the Babysitters Club when I was little. In the first book I read that was from Jessi, a black girl’s point of view, early in the book she says, “My family is black. I say that because if I didn’t, you would imagine us as white.” And that’s stuck with me since.

Imagine being that ugly to a 12 year old child. People are disgusting. Thanks for covering this, Yhara! 💜

I fell in absolute love with this book series after my deployment. Book 2, in particular, has always been a favorite due to its many examples of how PTSD an manifest in various people. Its an amazing example of how even folks who have been though similar traumatic situations handle things very differently because no 2 examples (and no 2 people) are the same. I mentioned I deployed. That deployment was to Afghanistan. When you get there, a lot of folks will tell you that you can't trust the kids, that the kids want to murder you just as much as the adults do, but I never found that to be the case. I went on 42 different convoys on that deployment, and I met and saw local children on every single one. Heck, we used to hand the kids a $20 and they'd run off and run back with a huge bag of naan for us. Plenty of opportunity to poison us or lead someone back to where we were, but it never happened. Even in the hardest of environments, a place where it wasn't unheard of for a child to witness their own parents' literal executions right in front of them, a place where little girls couldn't be out on the street alone without being arrested, kids are kids. They light up when you give them treats, they want to play games on your iPhone, and they'll play soccer with you for hours on end while you're waiting for the truck to change a tire. Do they know how to handle more adult situations that they shouldn't have to be dealing with? Yes. But they are still kids. Children are innocent because they don't have the power to own any of the blame. They have zero control over their situations 99% of the time. The same people who will blame an Afghan child for planting an explosive (that they are nearly always threatened into placing) will make excuses for the significantly older Hitler Youth of Nazi Germany. It doesn't take a genius to figure out why.

Cinna and Thresh were perfect as cast, too both seem a lot more broodingly savvy about what to expect from the Capital and how to survive it than Katniss, so it makes it all that much more tragic when they risk themselves to help her and end up dying for their resistance to the Capitol schemes; there aren't really any of the cast that are not convincing as their characters, and I've read every word of the trilogy multiple times, too. I'm very thrilled with the diversity in both the books and the movie version.