make yourself conscious: despite there being an unprecedent level of diversity in roleplays today and well-meaning behind all of the diversity, there are still tons of problems dealing when making a 'diverse' cast of characters on this website. after coming across the included website, i have gained a better understanding of how to properly portray diversity with my characters.

i am guilty of all (super recently even with my characters), even with hispanic characters despite me being a hispanic (keeping vague for privacy reasons) but consciousness is about learning and working to make sure you don't repeat those mistakes; it might even take a while, but try to get there with time. personally, i think this is mostly only appropriate for characters with earthly backgrounds (like if it's made-up worlds/civilizations/cities/etc. it's a different story).

some of the messages boil down to:

ethnicities are not interchangeable so don't erase a faceclaim's background-- it's as easy as a chinese can't pass as japanese and a mexican can't pass as puerto rican. and sure, a puerto rican can have natural blond hair and blue eyes (hispanics are a mix of so many races that we are a very diverse group) but that doesn't mean you can use a faceclaim with european descent for a puerto rican character or use that puerto rican faceclaim or vice versa.

take a moment to look at your faceclaim's true ethnicity and write try to write the background according to that, or find another faceclaim that will go with the background you really want. if not, at least do your best to match it up. remember, ethnicity and nationality are not the same. a character of indian descent can still be american.

also, more on a personal note don't say your character is hispanic and leave at that. that's basically like saying he/she is asian and european-- which no one does. it's very irritating, at least for me.

name origins are not interchangeable. this is a bit harder, i understand. i'm hispanic (not specifying, again, for personal reasons) but my first name is of greek origin and my last name is the name of a spanish region with latin descent. but my name is also widely used among hispanics, especially in my country. so don't name your korean character Jane Smith. it's insulting. again, i've been guilty of all of this, but it's just a matter of 5 minutes of research. use a korean name and surname for your character, even if it's one of the more common names, if your character has two korean parents-- or else just do it accordingly. personally, i would prefer a venezuelan character be named Maria (which is widely used) over Catherina any day, not to say that there could never be a venezuelan woman named Catherina out there. you get me-- if not, ask me.

skin is not food. i think we all agree with that-- we wouldn't want a piece of skin to be served on a silver plater for dinner. so don't describe your character's skin as food (chocolate, caramel, etc.). this website's article is often my go-to for describing skin. use it and website like it.