allthingsalycia:

Great article! I suggest you read the whole thing HERE.

Debnam-Carey, for her part, says she understands fans’ call to action—though she admits their impassioned reactions to her character’s death caught her off guard.

“A social and cultural issue exposed itself with that episode,” she says. “I don’t think anyone [on the show] really quite expected that reaction. So when it did have such a strong and passionate backfire response, no one was really ready for it.

“With any sort of minority, issues of ostracization or misrepresentation are clearly rampant,” the actress continues. “It’s just so deeply rooted in our culture and there are so many levels that it trickles down from. It becomes an issue of diversity and equality and race and gender. In a parallel sense as well, there’s the issue of black characters being killed off first. I know that’s been a topic of conversation over the last couple of years. So these are huge-scale cultural and social barriers that we’ve established—and I guess now it’s time to start breaking them down.”

Though Debnam-Carey says it is “horrible to think people were obviously very truly affected by [Lexa’s death], negatively,” she’s proud of the way many fans have channeled their energies into raising $100,000 (and counting) for the Trevor Project, a suicide prevention service for LGBT youth.

“I can’t even fathom that. That’s incredible,” she says. “Just to think that it had such an impact on people. It’s kind of an honor. It became a positive thing, which is really the most important thing about it all.”