The Iron Fist Race Debate...

First, I don't give a rat's ass if most characters change races. For most comic characters, the race doesn't really matter (and that's not only true of the white ones). Race is not an issue that comics like to tackle directly, vastly preferring to take full advantage of the hyperbole of their medium to tackle such issues through metaphor, often with aliens, mutants, or other "others".

However, on the rare case when a comic character's race IS an important part of their story, changing it just to appease some PC *beep* is absurd. Iron Fist is rich, white and privileged. Danny Rand drips privilege from every orifice. That is his point. You argue that the only reason he is white is that when he was conceived no one would have dreamed of not making him white, and that may be true. But when they decided to make him white, they made him WHITE.

You argue that in the modern context it would be better to have him be asian because this was a mistake and he can still be a rich outsider and be asian. In some respects you are right. He can still be rich and privileged as an asian. But what he can't do as an asian is be the obvious symbol for white privilege that he so blatantly is. Those trying to get his race changed are missing the point. Iron Fist is white for a reason, and it's not to be the "white saviour". Iron Fist is white as one of the very very rare times that being white is not an advantage or even portrayed as a good thing. Keeping him white is about as anti-racist as you can get in this case, because everything "white" about him is usually portrayed as his weaknesses, not his strengths.

I had the same issues when Marvel changed Thor to female. Again, no issue with female superheroes or even with changing the gender of a classic. But Thor was a bad choice, clearly made just to appease the PC nazis. Because Thor's masculinity was an intrinsic part of the character. Give me a female Spiderman, Ironman, Captain America, Hawkeye (which they actually did for a bit), or nearly any other big name superhero and it would be fine. But when making the choice to change something about an established character, it is important to stop and think, "how much does this actually change the character?" rather than just thinking, "how 'progressive' will this make us look?"

I do agree we need more representation of minorities, women, and LGBTQ characters in our popular media, comics very much included. But the answer isn't to just blindly start changing beloved characters without thought. The answer should be twofold. First, we do need new characters who can be something other than white men. Second, when making changes to a character's background, we need writers and directors who will do it for the sake of story rather than for the sake of publicity and appeasement.

Oh and for all of you saying they shouldn't be doing Iron Fist but should be doing Shang-Chi instead, please take a step back and remember why they're doing Iron Fist in the first place. This has all been building to a Defenders series from Daredevil season 1. That's why they did Jessica Jones and it's why they are doing Luke Cage and Iron Fist at all. They want to build to Defenders.

Besides, we all know if they tried to do Shang-Chi at this point it would end up being just another stereotypical Kung-Fu movie. Is that really what you want?