Isn’t this creating stereotypes and fuelling division?
■ According the BBC’s head of creative diversity, Miranda Wayland, police drama Luther isn’t ‘authentic’ because Idris Elba’s character doesn’t have enough black friends and doesn’t eat Caribbean food (Metro, Thu).
This ‘creative diversity chief’ is a prat of the highest order – perhaps moulded on a character in the BBC’s selfparodying mockumentary W1A.
Should all Yorkshire characters be portrayed with a cloth cap, a ferret in their trousers and eating a Yorkshire pudding?
Ian, Pontefract
■ I’m a black man in a good IT job and I’ve moved around the country with my job but I don’t have many black friends and guess what? I don’t eat Caribbean food.
Percy, Warrington
■ With regards the comments made by the BBC diversity chief – do all black people eat Caribbean food? Do all black people have lots of black friends?
This appears to be a case of stereotyping black people in an attempt to make them fit in with Ms Wayland’s idea of what a black character should be. Another example of looking for racist issues where they don’t exist, just to stoke the fires of discontent.
S Young, London
■ This is getting ridiculous. Saying Luther is Caribbean, so should be eating Caribbean food and have more black friends – how is that not racist?
I’m English so from now on shall only eat roast beef, Scots can only have haggis and you can only drink Guinness if you’re Irish. Welsh, not sure what yours is – leeks? I’m from Yorkshire, too, so could you stop eating our puds?
Janet, Yorkshire
■ It could be that he’s black British and so his food tastes are predominantly British? And being born here, his friends would predominantly be white. Or maybe he doesn’t like spicy food.
Also, just because you don’t see his black friends in the drama doesn’t mean he has none – and the same for him eating Caribbean food. He’s a busy detective. And in towns and cities up and down the country there’s a huge variety of national and international cuisine available to him.
Some people make more out of race than is meant to be, thus creating concern, thus creating a divide, making everything racial when it isn’t that way at all.
You only view it that way if you are insecure in your ethnic bubble, or have a prejudicial way of thinking – so ‘politically correct’ that you end up being prejudiced against others.
Lesley, via email
■ Luther is indeed a highly successful TV show for the BBC and the character is meant to be a detective in the Metropolitan Police, which is predominantly white and understandably so, as about 87 per cent of the UK population is white.
It appears Luther is an inclusive character who has white friends both in
and out of the force – surely a perfectly natural course to take.
What’s the point in throwing in meaningless characters to satisfy political correctness. If his Caribbean friends have no meaningful purpose to the storyline, then why would they be included?
As for his choice of cuisine? Maybe he doesn’t like Caribbean food. What a load of nonsense.
Ian, via email
■ Dear BBC diversity chief Miranda Wayland, ‘diversity’ means ‘a variety’.
What you’re saying is Luther needs less diversity in his life/in the show. That he needs to be bigoted in his outlook by having a concentration of Caribbean friends while living in a mixed, European city. That’s the opposite of diverse.
And, anyway, Londoner Idris Elba’s parents are Sierra Leonean and Ghanaian, so why assume Luther is Caribbean, I wonder?
What you’ve done is stereotype a race and create division. I think this is very revealing of your own outlook, but it’s certainly no surprise who you work for.
Viv, London
■ I’ve never heard so much tosh in all my life. The reflection of some people in television having so much time to think, ‘How can we bring diversity even more in your face?’
I watched Line Of Duty. If it was set in London, would they all have to eat jellied eels, wear caps covered in buttons and do the Lambeth Walk?
Will this stupidity never end? It’s getting so bad that people are too scared to say and do anything.
Nik W, Dudley
■ Miranda Wayland is stereotyping black people in every walk of life with her comments regarding the fictional programme Luther and how he’s portrayed. Did Mark McManus walk about the streets of Glasgow in Taggart eating haggis? If this comment was said by someone white I’m sure the word ‘racist’ would be mentioned.
Sean Patrick, South London
■ Do we really need another highly paid BBC employee deciding what ‘looks right’? Are we to believe that all black people eat only Caribbean food, all Italians eat pasta etc?
John, West Yorkshire