Hawki said:
I thought it was transgender individuals complaining, stating that "we rarely talk like that - we don't just talk about our "dead name" in the second conversation."
So, I think there's a surface level here, and then there's what's really going on.
On the surface level, if we take literally that what's being said there is "trans people don't talk about themselves this way", then that's wrong. Trans people are as diverse as any other group of people, and they have different ways of talking about themselves.
But I think what's actually being said here is that sometimes depictions of trans people reflect a set of beliefs and priorities cis people have about trans people, and one of the unfortunate things trans people have to live with sometimes is the assumption that your assigned name is your "real" name, and thus that knowing your assigned name is important. The concept of a "deadname" actually refers to a practice of using trans people's assigned names as a way of attacking them or invalidating their gender identity.
So, you could definately
make the argument that having a character talk about their assigned name/deadname soon after meeting them is bad representation, but if it is then it's bad representation because it's conveying a messed up idea trans people have to deal with in real life (that your assigned name is your "real" name and something you owe people).
But at the end of the day, I think I can speak for most people of any minority in saying that (well meaning) bad representation is
almost always better than no representation. It may look cringey a few years down the line, but only by comparison to properties which probably wouldn't exist without bad representation to lead the way.
With all this said, however. There is a weird phenomenon where media properties which are clearly making an effort can actually attract more criticism than properties which are just bad, and it's to do with accessibility. The more likely you feel someone is to respond or to listen, the more likely you are to talk to them. I think this is ultimately what drives the anti-diversity myth that underrepresented minorities are impossible to please, because often those minorities are just more willing to talk honestly about what is "wrong" with representations which they percieve as well-intentioned simply because it's more likely to have an impact, and the people who have creative control are more approachable and easier to talk to than someone whose representation is so bad it doesn't come off as well-intentioned.
Like, noone is going to get anything out of telling EL James that her depiction of a BDSM relationship is bad or insulting, because she doesn't care. She's made very clear she doesn't care by publishing her books in the first place. But people might be more willing to talk about really small problems with the Iron Bull romance from DA:I because whoever made it clearly set out to write a healthy BDSM relationship. There was enough good faith there that discussing any potential problems, however small, might actually be listened to and built upon down the line. Thus, sometimes it might look like people are "complaining".. but they're complaining because they actually care about this property, and that actually indicates good representation.
Then there are people who exploit the lower social capital of minority creators to call them out or "cancel" them for extremely minor political concerns which derive from an authentic description of their own experiences of marginalization, and I'm going to call that what it is.. it's just bigotry. It's the same bigotry as always, stemming from the relative accessibility of minorities and their reduced willingness to fight back. It's not motivated by a desire for good representation.
