Representation vs. Tokenism in Media

This post and the posts to which it links contains a very interesting discussion, mostly between George Takei and Simon Pegg, on whether it's better to, for the sake of greater representation of traditionally marginalized communities in the newest installment in the Star Trek franchise, create an entirely new character who is gay or include in the script demonstrations of an existing character's gay identity?

The former option, preferred by Takei, seems to accord best with prioritizing the faithfulness of the new movie to the original franchise and vision of its creators.  On the other hand, the latter option, preferred by Pegg, seems to risk "tokenization" in the creation of a new character for whom it will be hard to avoid the perception that his creation was because he was gay; following this line of thinking, making an existing character known to be gay (in a way that does not contradict any previously established Canon) would better portray his sexual orientation as just one of his characteristics and not the entirety of who he is, as well as making the political purpose of greater representation more effective since the gay character is already known and liked.