When reading subs for TC, sometimes I come across a line like, “Bob, a 40-ish black man, walked down the street whistling…” I’ve always disliked this style of description, but I couldn’t pin down why exactly. It isn’t that these writers are being (overtly) racist; the descriptions themselves aren’t negative. I thought maybe I didn’t like it because it was too police-blottery: Robert (Bob) Smith, age 40, height: 6’2″, etc. But I’ve been thinking about it off and on and I realized that wasn’t it (much as that is irksome). No, its because people NEVER write: “Megan, a 20-something white girl, opened her guitar case…” Characters are never generically described as white. It’s the underlying assumption that, if you don’t say otherwise, they are, that bugs.

Now, it’s true that kind of thinking may be appropriate with certain first person narrators. But in third person? No. In third person it’s just lazy writing. A short-cut, rather than taking the time to look at your character and *see* them. Is it even necessary for us to know that the character is a particular race/ethnicity? And if it is, how else could you reveal it other than bonking the reader on the head with it? Plot? Dialogue? Names? A more nuanced description of the character’s appearance? There are so many other options.