The media does portray males and females fairly and equally. But in most instances, males get to be presented as horrible people. For example, when it comes to cheating, it is mostly males who appear to be cheating a lot and women appear to be faithful.

Male Characters are often portrayed as dominant, assertive, and central to the plot. They’re more likely to be shown in leadership roles or as action heroes.

Female Characters are historically sidelined or reduced to stereotypes like the damsel in distress, the seductress, or the nurturing mother. Even when women lead, they’re often hypersexualized or judged more harshly for flaws.

Progress shows like Killing Eve, The Handmaid’s Tale, and I May Destroy You have challenged norms by giving women complex, flawed, and powerful roles. But behind the scenes, women are still underrepresented in directing, writing, and producing.

The LGBTQ community has improved significaly with more storyline and characters in television.

Black Characters are often stereotyped as criminals, athletes, or comic relief. While there’s been a rise in nuanced portrayals (Moonlight, Queen Sugar, Blood and Water), tokenism and typecasting persist.

Asian Characters were historically exoticized or portrayed as nerdy, submissive, or martial arts experts. Recent films like Minari and Everything Everywhere All At Once are breaking that mold.

Indigenous Representation is still severely lacking. When present, it’s often through a historical or mystical lens, rather than contemporary, everyday life.

African Context and Local media has made efforts to reflect diversity, but class and language often shape who gets screen time. Township life is frequently dramatized, while middle-class Black experiences are underexplored.

In most films especially ones that are based in Africa, women aspire to marriage and motherhood while men are providers.

This is done to shed light on the realities of black societies in various parts of the world

This is seen in films such as girls trip where the film consists of mainly black women. Most of these women are career driven and accomplished but they still yearn for motherhood and being nurturers whilst the men are portrayed as care free and all that they aspire to is constantly having fun and enjoying life instead of wishing for stable family lives

This is is a harmful representation of gender dynamics because it enforces toxic norms for this particular race group.

White people are often portrayed as successful with stable family structures and near perfect lives and this does not speak to what real life white families are like, this can be problematic because it sells a certain image to young people that if you are white then you will grow up to have a perfect life marked by many privileges and that the colour of your skin will give you a free pass to opportunities in life. E.g. the film called the hate you give where the black girl is fighting for justice against racism and constantly needs to explain to her white friends why racism is harmful and the effects of it

The LGBT community is portrayed to make it look like the couples should conform to gender roles which enforces a toxic idea to society

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There has been more representation and space for different race groups and the LGBTQ community in media, these groups have stepped up from usually being background characters to having their stories be the main plot. They get to be written and portrayed authentically because of the equality that is being given to black or queer writers, actors and tv personalities