Report here
https://www.bbc.co.uk/aboutthebbc/documents/thematic-review-of-portrayal-and-representation.pdf
BBC article about it here:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c9312091kpeo
Well worth reading the whole document. It mentions, among other things, lack of representation of women and older women in particular, lack of diversity of geographical and class-related views, and how tick box diversity annoys people.
Sentences I appreciated:
We also found that measuring diversity by aggregating groups of sometimes very different people (such as BAME, disabled people, LGBTQ+) misses crucial detail which is required to ensure an appropriate range is present in content over time.
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However, there’s a noticeable gap between those whom the general audience wants to see more of and what specific groups within the audience feel they need. This gap is widest for LGBTQ+, black African and Caribbean communities, who express a greater desire for increased representation than the wider audience does for them.
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Nearly nine in ten say that women over 50 are represented poorly in adverts, films and television. And two thirds of women cease to feel represented in the media from the age of 46.
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Commissioners should now take a proactive role in developing on- and off-air talent, to ensure authentic portrayal of the following groups: People from working class backgrounds (in a way that represents and celebrates their own cultures) South Asians (particularly in drama and entertainment) East Asians (in all genres) Disabled people with a range of impairments (particularly focusing on incidental representation) East Europeans (in all genres)
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To help achieve diversity, measurements often group people together under labels like BAME or LGBTQ+. The term disability is itself an aggregation of a number of different conditions and experiences. This can result in some peculiar outcomes where very different groups are lumped together for no other reason than they share some common characteristic, such as being ‘non-white’.
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The aggregation ‘LGBTQ+’ tries to encompass a range of sexual orientations and gender identities, with the plus at the end used to ensure inclusivity of all identities beyond those in the term. It’s widely used as a term for gender, sexual and romantic minorities and, unlike some of the terms above, it specifically points out the range and variety it includes. However, it presents another issue in that the various groups in that umbrella label don’t always want to be associated with each other, specifically some of the L and some of the T. While we think it is still useful, it is worth pointing out that a single person cannot be LGBTQ+, any more than an individual can be BAME. As with all the above aggregations, where a programme is talking about an individual, it is best to be specific about that person rather than using an umbrella term.
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However, productions should consider their choices carefully when it comes to colour-blind casting. In depicting an anachronistic historical world in which people of colour are able to rise to the top of society as scientists, artists, courtiers and Lords of the Realm, there may be the unintended consequence of erasing the past exclusion and oppression of ethnic minorities and breeding complacency about their former opportunities.