Franky Benítez

After stating two days ago that she had made all the statements she needed to make and would now focus on legal action, author Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez, who claims that the TV script adaptation of her book, The Dirty Girls Social Club, is racist, sexist, and promotes Latina stereotypes, continues to tweet and post updates on her public Twitter and Facebook sites.

The award-winning author, who revealed last week on her blog that she obtained a leaked copy of the NBC script being developed by Ann Lopez’s Encanto Productions and written by Luisa Leschin, called the script a “bastardization” of her book and started sharing her thoughts on social media. Web outlets, such as PerezHilton.com, The Frisky, Jezebel, FishbowlLA (MediaBistro), and The Boston Globe, have written about the content of her blogs.

Fox News and CBS Early Show Interested?

Among her many tweets today, Valdes-Rodriguez hinted earlier this evening that major TV outlets are inquiring about her story:

Fox News and CBS Early Show both inquiring about me coming on to talk. Interestinger and interestinger she goes.

In addition, Valdes-Rodriguez today changed her profile picture on both Facebook and Twitter. She also changed her Twitter bio to read: Writer. Social Critic. Mom. This is a common occurrence with social media profiles, but it suggests to us that Valdes-Rodriguez is committed to sharing her point of view to her social media networks.

As for the other principals in the story, there has still been no public comment by NBC, Lopez, Leschin, Encanto Productions, or Creative Artists Agency (CAA), whom Valdes-Rodriguez claims stopped representing her on Sunday for her young adult book. (We have contacted each principal through email, but have not received a response.)

In the meantime, Valdes-Rodriguez has been active with her public social media network (her Twitter stream is public and her Facebook profile is also public with no privacy settings), sharing updates such as the following:

• “You cannot stand for something important without making enemies.”
• It is from my amazing immigrant father that I learned: Just because a thing is always done a certain way, doesn’t mean it’s right. #think”
• “When Fidel Castro took power in Cuba in 1959, there were five synagogues in Havana alone. Seems silly to make the Cuban Jewish character on a show “American” for seeming “Jewish” to you, doesn’t it? And, no, I don’t care who it confuses. Facts are facts.
• “There are 47 million Latinos in the US. Media wants them. But media ignores 56 million Latinos in our hemisphere who are black. #fuzzyassmath”
• “I never thought I’d utter these words, but… I love my lawyer.”
• 84% of Dominicans are African. Dominicans were the largest immigrant group to NYC in 1990s. 1.5 million in the U.S.; seems silly to therefore get rid of the only Dominican character in a show aimed at Latinos because she ‘seems black’ to you, doesn’t it?

Valdes-Rodriguez has stated in her blogs that she finds the script’s intention to change the ethnicity, race, and sexual orientation of key characters in the book to be extremely offensive. Her current tweets and updates suggest that these issues need to be accurate and true to her story, and not to the examples she claims are included in the script she obtained.

As this story unfolds (and we think it will only gather more momentum), there is no doubt:  Valdes-Rodriguez believes in the power of social media. Will that power translate to a resolution in her favor?

UPDATE, January 1, 2011: The Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez blog posts referred to here no longer appear on her site. Valdes-Rodriguez hinted that certain blog posts would very likely be deleted in accordance to the statement she published at Please Respect NBC.