Whenever I start my writing workshops at the learning annex, one of the first questions students always ask me, after “Is this class fee refundable,” is “Is it okay to write about characters of a different race or sexual orientation?”

It’s a tough world out there right now. In addition to worrying about honing your skills, trying to get your name out there and getting cease and desist letters from your family to stop putting personal information about them in your YouTube videos, you also have to worry about getting cancelled.

You might feel like you wrote the perfect first page, one that was poetic and enticing and instantly draws the reader into your unique world, but after you think more about it, you get anxious that the woke mob will go after you for using the N-word six times.  In today’s video, I’ll show you how even the straightest, whitest Oberlin graduate who grew up in the suburbs of Indianapolis can write about any race, creed, gender or sexual identity. We’re going to put on our metaphorical blackface on this edition of Stories’ Matter.

Race, religion, LGBT issues… lots of writers want to shy away from these topics. But the whole reason you’re a writer is to explore the unexplored and represent the underrepresented. We need more books about unique people and unique perspectives. Plus, it’s unfair to ask writers to limit their writing to their own personal experience. If that were the case, nobody from Omaha could ever succeed because who the hell wants to read a book set in modern-day Nebraska?

Before I get to the advice, I want you to relax. Acknowledge your discomfort, but be open to everything. We’ll never make any progress if we embrace our ignorance. Don’t be afraid to ask stupid questions in the comments. Men, don’t be afraid to ask our female viewership how a vagina works. Black people, don’t be afraid to ask our Chinese, Japanese and Korean viewership what the different slurs for “blacks” are in their native language so you can finally know what those people at the laundromat are really saying.

Step One: Do your research

As with anything else you write, a good story begins with great research. Don’t even think about race, gender or identity for a minute. Pretend you’re a Mormon who wants to write a book about an alcoholic. How would you go about doing it? Now, if it were me, I might do a few different things. I’d watch home movies of my father. I’d attend local AA meetings under false pretenses to get ideas. I’d hang out under a bridge at night. And in fact, these are all things I did when I wrote Plastered Bastard, a revenge thriller about a serial vehicle manslaughter perpetrator.

So when you are writing about another race, you need to come to know that race very well. Do the things you might think a person of that race does. Listen to recorded speeches of beloved political leaders, for example. Watch gay porn. Watch anime. Email your manuscript to someone in your office of that race, even if you don’t know them very well, to get their input. And if they’re a janitor without an email address, print out a copy and put it in their utility shed, as I’ve often done.

Step Two: Describe Your Characters in Detail – When I was teaching at the learning annex, I can’t tell you how many people would give me vivid, detailed descriptions of their white characters while the minority characters were just Black or Asian and the reader was supposed to fill in the blanks. Whenever I came across this, not only did I make this person write an apology to each member of the class, but I also made them wear a sandwich board that said “Ignorant Racist” for the rest of the lesson.

Let’s take an example.

Look at this woman. How would you describe her? Would black suffice? I don’t think so. I would describe her body as voluptuous and her lips as pouty and full. I would say that “her hair was shiny and silken and I wanted her to stand over me, completely naked, bending down and dangling the hair so it was just gently tickling the skin on my chest until I reached orgasm.”

Step Three: Don’t Be Ambiguous

For a writer, specificity is everything. In addition to your descriptions,  this also applies to your diverse characters’ backgrounds. Your character should never just be Native American or Mexican. Are they from the hills of Sinaloa or the slums of Juarez? It doesn’t just apply to race. When I write gay men, the first decision I have to make is if he’s a top or a bottom. Then I ask, Does he generate the power or is he just receiving the power? Does he prefer reach arounds or is he willing to let the release come of its own accord?

Step Four: Avoid Savior Narratives

At the learning annex, I used to have this one student. We’ll just call him Jeff Stanley Wilson. Though he was an older guy, he was about as woke as a boomer gets. He followed all of the above rules pretty well and created some diverse, three dimensional characters of color and other sexual orientations. But Jeff’s problem was his heroes were always white males. And they also were described exactly the way he looked, bald head, glasses and six foot seven. And they were also all named Jeff Stanley Wilson.

I always told Jeff that he was limiting himself as a writer by doing this. Sure, like Jeff you may write as a kind of wish-fulfillment to forget that your wife left you and your son was killed by a drunk driver, but it sends the wrong message to say that people of color rely on whites to be saved. And it’s just not very true to life. I mean, look at… all of history.