How do you know that the competition Breaking Bad's writers were worried about wasn't other white writers who were upping their game to compete with the first set of white writers?

Who were the writers of The Sopranos competing with?

Does it matter what identity category the writers fall into at all, really? Or is this just an art form developing as all art forms do, in a competitive commercial environment (espeically post-deregulation) where people have to find increasingly refined ways to compete?

It's clear that writers with different experiences and perspectives can bring those to their creative endeavors, and that race and gender and so on provide a rich source of experiences and perspectives. If you're bored of the same old stuff--and people definitely get bored of the same old stuff--then this diversity brings a competitive advantage.

But it's not clear to me that the instances of improved storytelling you cite have anything to do with competition from more diverse sources rather than stiffer competition within the same pool.