Ginny & Georgia is part of a troubling Netflix trend of removing parents of color from biracial characters' coming-of-age stories

Polygon

Ginny, played by Antonia Gentry, is yet another mixed-race Netflix protagonist who’s being raised by a single white parent, says Petrana Radulovic. "It feels like there are more stories centered around mixed-race people now than ever before, and certainly more than I had when I was growing up," says Radulovic. "I’m not alone in noticing the trend. As a biracial individual, I absolutely struggle with impostor syndrome with regard to my own identity. Simultaneously not white enough and not Asian enough — according to my own internal conflict and to the voices of those, both people I’ve met and strangers on the internet, who decide I don’t have a claim on either identity — I often pause on demographic surveys that don’t have an option for multiracial, or even 'other.' The narrow view of ethnicity in most conversations about race leaves me wondering which part of myself I’ll have to deny in any given setting. Netflix’s interest in mixed-race characters felt validating, until I noticed the pattern the streaming service has been falling into. Netflix keeps making stories with biracial protagonists, but with a persistent caveat. Across multiple Netflix originals, such as Ginny & Georgia, the To All the Boys movies, The Main Event, and The Baby-Sitters Club, single white parents raise mixed-race children. The parent of color is either dead before the start of the story, or initially absent from the protagonist’s life."