I have mixed opinions. For one I think this whole issue exists because various "minority" groups have already seen a decent amount of representation which is of course turning into demands for more of it for the feel good points it scores, when it's already present to roughly the extent where it should be at this point. It's there if you want to look, but not so omnipresent that it bothers the core audience or seems like it's getting in your face all the time.
That said I'll also say that the whole message of "wanting to show other cultures, and broaden perspectives" doesn't really work. The reason is simply that the people who push for that are the ones who tend to start screaming racism and bigotry when showing other people and cultures how they are happens. In these terms it's usually a cry for propaganda and pretty much showing you the best face of other peoples and cultures, basically the way they want to present themselves to the world, as opposed to who they actually are and the problems that causes. Basically trying to attach
a tourism brochure to video games and present it as the way things are there.
Half of the reason why nothing gets done, and we're continually shocked when we see the truth, is that we like to lock ourselves into a little "progressive" bubble where all people and cultures are equally valid and worthy, and if you don't see that, your in some way a mindless bigot. We will say go out of our way to depict India as a reasonable, well advanced, and highly civilized nation that is gradually growing into a leader in various tech sectors. That's the face India loves to put forward. Most of India however is full of extremely bigoted, ignorant, racist xenophobes, who write laws based on superstitions, and continue to practice what amounts to slavery while making pretensions of advancement. It's for example okay by this point of view to say have a doctor or scientist from India helping to lead with technology and doing research, or show the developing Bollywood film industry. It's not however considered acceptable to say talk about how India still apparently has a city where Monkeys are considered sacred and allowed to run free though the city and it's a crime to do anything to them, so they periodically wreck the infrastructure, get into government buildings, and everything else, because nobody is willing to control the problem. There is also apparently a "Temple Of The Rat" where Rats are similarly sacred and actually farmed and encouraged, causing the entire surrounding area to be infested with vermin and all kinds of other problems. This is to say nothing of how that same civilized seeming doctor or scientist is probably from a high caste family, and probably sees nothing wrong with keeping members of lower castes as borderline slaves (servants paid very little and kept on a tight leash of control) we recently had some culture shock with this when a high ranking diplomat from India's relationship with her servants was outed. The point I'm making is that desires for this kind of political correctness strive to get away from the image of say a few civilized white tourists in a sea of quirky, backwards, ignorant and potentially dangerous, brown people... yet throughout most of India that's actually a pretty good depiction of visiting those areas especially as an outsider. Your dealing with people who in some places can't be convinced that not letting a monkey run around in their house and wreck stuff is something they can stop, due to their spiritual beliefs and the laws reinforcing them. As a result you on one hand have the huge, modern, cities with the educated people, tourist traps, and every convenience of modern civilization, which happens to be where mostly the high caste people are. This is the image India puts forward for the world. Leave those areas though and it's like entering an entirely different place. A lot of nations are like this, China for example, where on one hand you've got huge, modern, cities and well groomed, healthy, highly educated people, but most of the country is impoverished, and you have factory workers sleeping in stacked dog crates, and people getting sick due to being forced to sleep alongside their livestock (which is how SARS got started).
On some levels I feel political correctness is a threat, because what some call "bigotry" actually acts as a mirror for self improvement. Basically if you don't like how you look, it's a good idea to change it. By being "nice" and simply accepting the face a lot of cultures want to put forward, we're more or less reinforcing the other problems through those countries, and validating the civilized elite through accepting them, and hand waving the rest of what those cultures are.
I use India as an example simply because the whole "servants" thing was in the news not too long ago, and shocked people in part because they had a far different opinion of the culture and where it is than is reality. Probably because of the way they have learned about India through things like Bollywood and careful portrayals through the media. At the most your typical person might think they are worldy for having watched say "Slumdog Millionaire".
Perhaps India isn't a good example in many people's minds, but the bottom line I'm getting at here is that I just do not think the US is currently in a position where it's ready to start seeing this kind of diversity, since the PC movement pretty much attacks anything that is considered to be negative, or takes the side of those who get uncomfortable when they see themselves in the mirror. By apologizing, claiming we're ignorant, and changing things we pretty much contribute to the problems, when really if anything I see the media as an ideal way of forcing reform in other cultures when they see themselves reflected.
America is actually one of the more honest countries in the world oddly enough, and I think that's half our problem. We air our dirty laundry, and we don't care when other people discuss it or point out our flaws, where other nations and cultures get very defensive. We pretty much acknowledge we've got our ghettos, crime problems, internal racial strife, economic divides, education issues, and tons of other things. We tend to be very critical of our top 1%. In other nations they put their top 1% forward to represent their entire nation, and try and keep everything else brushed
under the rug. Next time you see a show on TV for example covering miracles (or alleged miracles) and look at 10s of thousands of Hindus lined up to see some statue that allegedly drinks milk (priest holds the spoon of milk up, the milk gradually disappears... stage magicians can do similar things) ask yourself if someone portrayed something like that in a video game, TV shows, or most movies and showed those people as they are, would it not be called ignorant and racist? Ditto for say a country with a very wealthy 1% asking for famine relief... which might very well be in regions where the people are surrounded by "sacred herds" of cows they won't eat for religious reasons while they starve to death. Sure the USA has our religiously ignorant, and our callous 1%, but at the same time we aren't exactly demanding international aid, our hunger problems being on a relatively small scale, and mostly economic and distribution issues. If you say treat people from another country or culture like the US has been known to depict Rednecks and Hillbillies and those same people will scream bloody murder even if it's true to the same (or greater) extent.
