I disagree - because following that logic, Alice Walker couldn't have written it either. She may have heard stories from her family growing up, but SHE didn't experience it, and so Black folk of an older generation could've legitimately said 'this didn't happen to you, you can't imagine it or turn it into a story'.
As you said, writers write from experience.... but the experience of injustice is universal. Emotional responses are universal. Circumstances do change and that's where the research came in. What Alice Walker did was apply her experiences as a Black Woman to an imagined world and imagined characters. Walker is (arguably) not a lesbian having been married to a white guy (and perhaps having a relationship with Tracey Chapman after the book was written), but the relationship between the two protagonists is certainly a lesbian relationship. Are you saying she can't write LGBTQ+ characters because she may not have had direct experience of it at the time? Nobody else could've written the words Walker chose because you're right, experience does play a part - but so does imagination and research and those are universal.
Having nothing in my plays that indicates a person is trans isn't meaningless.... and here's why I think that. Trans people are people. Trans characters are not mouthpieces for trans issues - and when they become that, they become increasingly dull. The least interesting thing about trans-people is their trans-ness. What we're looking to do is normalise the trans-experience, which means if a character is primarily obsessed with whether they can keep a houseplant alive, their genital configuation and/or trans-ness isn't important. There is NO reason why that character can't be trans and it is a choice for the director to make. I make the director aware that the choice to put a trans-actor nto a play as a 'normal' and 'untraumatised' character is an available choice. It may not be in the script and in the words but that doesn't mean I haven't considered it to be valid.
And yes, the majority of stories are written by white writers - but that is a mathematical certainty in a country with predominantly white people. The figures are here and are quite interesting.
https://datausa.io/profile/soc/writers-authors
I think there's some way to go before there's a parity relative to the population, but these figures paint an interesting picture. I didn't realise it was such a female dominated profession, that's a genuine surprise to me. More people selecting from diverse cultures and more aspirational figures like Alice Walker would do everyone the world of good. :o)
