ProZD Race-Based Casting Controversy

Submission 25,566

Part of a series on ProZD. [View Related Entries]

Overview

ProZD Race-Based Casting Controversy refers to an October 2023 controversy that sparked debates and memes surrounding YouTuber and voice actor SungWon "ProZD" Cho's reaction to being limited to voice acting roles for Asian characters. After ProZD issued a statement complaining about being unable to audition for characters of different ethnicities, many internet users cited his previous statements advocating for race-based VA casting and accused him of hypocrisy.

Origin

ProZD, known for his work in the voice acting community and social media presence (specifically in the anime industry), has previously advocated for characters to be played by individuals of the same race. This stance was then challenged when ProZD made a series of now-deleted posts^[1] on October 22nd, 2023, in which he recounted a conversation he had with his agent in which he was only offered an Asian voice acting role and he wished to audition for all of them (shown below).

Five hours later, ProZD made another post,^[1] this time about the recasting of the voice actor for the character Yuroichi from Bleach back to her original voice actor instead of sticking with a new, racially accurate one. This was seen by many as him doubling down on his original stance that voice characters should be their original race and in clear contradiction to his wanting to audition for white characters, leading to many accusing him of being anti-white (shown below).

Online Reactions

Online responses to the controversy were mixed, but largely critical of ProZD, with some users supporting him and criticizing the casting decisions for not being true to the race of the character. While many emphasized the perceived irony in the situation, discussions on the complexities of race-based casting in the voice acting industry started to spark, with many pointing to examples of it working well in the past.

For example, on October 25th, 2023, X user @IndyBnuuy^[8] posted a QRT to an anti-ProZD meme detailing how Phil Lamarr and Greg Baldwin did amazing in their respective non-race accurate roles (shown below).

On October 23rd, Bounding Into Comics published an article^[2] that further explored the details of the controversy, posting "Western Voice Actor SungWon 'ProZD' Cho Unhappy Reaping What He Sowed, Complains That Industry Is Now Segregating Roles By Race" on X, the related tweet accumulating over 6,500 likes in a day (shown below).

On October 24, 2023, Niche Gamer wrote about the controversy,^[3] posting "Voice Actor SungWon 'ProZD' Cho criticizes race-based auditions for voice roles. Link below:" on X, with the related tweet garnering over 7,000 likes that day (shown below, left).

Additionally, a tweet from X user @GiveMeBanHammer^[4] on the same day received over 6,500 likes in a similar timeframe, saying "Pushing for race-based discrimination and role segregations when it suits them or when they want to virtue signal. Then get upset and shocked when it ends up affecting them too. Eventually you can't have your cake and eat it too" (shown below, right).

On the same day, a Reddit thread on the /r/KotakuInAction subreddit was posted by Redditor^[5] u/FellowFellow22, titled "Western Voice Actor SungWon ‘ProZD’ Cho Unhappy Reaping What He Sowed, Complains That Industry Is Now Segregating Roles By Race" further expanded the discourse, receiving over 500 upvotes from users on the platform (shown below).

Later that day, YouTuber Rev says desu uploaded a video^[6] titled "You Reap What You Sow…," highlighting the developments around ProZD and other past instances of the voice actor being in the public eye, the video getting over 135,000 views and 9,700 likes within 24 hours (shown below, left).

YouTuber Hypnotic also uploaded his own video^[7] titled "GET WOKE GO BROKE | Voice Actor SungWon Cho DESTROYED By His OWN IDEOLOGY And Now Has LIMITED JOBS" going over the backlash, receiving over 32,000 views and 2,100 likes within 24 hours (shown below, right).