Ok, there's a challenge there, but I don't think it's exactly what you suggest it is. As I understand it (I'm not sure I fully understand it), what characterizes the Russellian position is the idea that the contents of experiences are akin to states of affairs, as opposed to abstract entities (Fregean senses, epistemic intensions, etc). This does not tell us much about what representing consists in, and here there are many ways to go. Many have been explored by representationalists, and all are consistent with the Russellian position. One could say that the content of an experience is: what one is inclined to believe when having it, its accuracy condition, what the experience is "about", how the world "seems" when one has the experience, what it has the function of indicating, etc. Not all of these clearly tie the contents of experiences to what they "tell" their subjects--most don't. In particular, if the content of an experience is just what it is about, how do you know that what an experience is about is what it tells its subject? The book I'm reading right now is about some fictional characters, but it told me a lot about the author, indirectly. How do you know Alva's learning that the strawberry is red from his experience is not a matter of interpreting the "face value" of his experience in this kind of way?

As I was telling Benj initially, I do agree that there is a challenge, but I disagree about its nature. My objection so far is that the strawberry argument against the Russellian doesn't go through because Russellian representationalism doesn't clearly commit one to the kind of connection between experiences' contents and what they "tell" their subjects which the argument presupposes. So far so good for the Russellian. Here's where I think there's a challenge for him: ultimately, the reason the view doesn't come with the commitments you ascribe it is that it is utterly vague.  I'm not objecting to Benj or you specifically, but to the whole debate. As it is, it seems sufficiently unclear to me what "content" is supposed to be that I don't think either arguments for or against representationalism in the neighborhood of the strawberry case can succeed.

Of course, I have a view about how to fix the problem. What the representationalist really wants to say is this, I think: there is a non-factive relation R such that experiences are states of standing in R to proposition-like entities (maybe Russellian ones, maybe others). "R" isn't characterized directly, it's a theoretical posit (I got this trick from Adam Pautz). I think if you reflect on the dialectical links between rep and the other views, you will see that this is just the claim that distinguishes representationalists as a whole from their opponents, and just the claim which plays the theoretical role representationalists want it to play. I have a dissertation in the making in which I argue for this claim and defend the view...