Racism/racial stereotypes

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 aln 19 Oct 2020

Does it only work one way? I watched the Spike Lee film, He Got Game. It was OK, not his best. But it was full of racial stereotypes, and I thought racist towards white people. The only white character who had an actual role, albeit a minor one, was a prostitute. Who was saved by the black guy. Turn that round and....

Then there was the college scenes... Really? All the white women were desperate for black guys. And the scene where the main character gets given 2 white women, they're blonde with fake tits bimbos. Come on.

This was racism. Turn it round and there would be an outcry. 

Shite film too BTW. 

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 Jon Stewart 19 Oct 2020
In reply to aln:

Have you seen Get Out?

Turns racism on its head - very funny, without being preachy.

The thing about stereotyping is that it really grates when it thoughtlessly contributes to a narrative that people really believe about a certain group. When I see the only gay character in a film being a hairdresser who screams like a teenaged girl, it really grates on me. If a straight person is portrayed as a builder who says "look at the tits on that" I don't imagine that grates on you?

The question is: is this stereotype reinforcing a shitty perception of the group that's already in the minds of the audience? If so, it's not good, it's going to really grate on people in that group. Or is it self-aware, done with irony and knowing humour? In which case it's probably funny (or I'll find it funny anyway). You can't write down the rules of this stuff - it's just really obvious to people who get it.

Sounds like that film was just a bit shit. I very much doubt, however, that your experience of seeing white people portrayed as they were was particularly similar to that of say, a Muslim, watching themselves being portrayed as a terrorist. Yes, it grated on you in some way, and no one can argue with that. But did it make you feel like the society you live in thinks you're a piece of shit? That's what it's like for some of us when we watch a bad film.

Edit: I haven't seen the film but the way you describe sounds like maybe Lee was trolling the white audience? Funny? 

Post edited at 00:00
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OP aln 20 Oct 2020
In reply to Jon Stewart:

> Have you seen Get Out?

No, it's on my list. Have you seen He Got Game? 

> If a straight person is portrayed as a builder who says "look at the tits on that" I don't imagine that grates on you?

Yes it does. And the assumption you've made about me is interesting. I'm not straight. 

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 Jon Stewart 20 Oct 2020
In reply to aln:

> No, it's on my list. Have you seen He Got Game? 

See the comment I just added, sorry that was late.

> Yes it does.

Would it really though? A character says "look at the tits on that" and your reaction is "how dare you stereotype straight people in that way?". Something's fishy.

> And the assumption you've made about me is interesting. I'm not straight. 

Well it's a statistically pretty fair assumption, I'm not often wrong. I could pay no attention whatsoever and be right at least 95% of the time, which is good enough for me!

Post edited at 00:13
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OP aln 20 Oct 2020
In reply to Jon Stewart:

>Would it really though? A character says "look at the tits on that" and your reaction is "how dare you stereotype straight people in that way?". Something's fishy. 

In a film, it would be the character saying that. If it was an accurate representation of that character that would be that. If it was someone saying it in real life it would depend on the context. 

> Well it's a statistically pretty fair assumption, I'm not often wrong. I could pay no attention whatsoever and be right at least 95% of the time, which is good enough for me!

Isn't that just another way of justifying stereotypes? You assumed I'm straight from your own self satisfied position, you were wrong. 

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 Jon Stewart 20 Oct 2020
In reply to aln:

> In a film, it would be the character saying that. If it was an accurate representation of that character that would be that. If it was someone saying it in real life it would depend on the context. 

I'm talking about in a film.

What I'm asking is, if a male character in a film acts in a very laddish way, does it grate on you that straight men are being stereotyped? That seems implausible to me. It would just be a laddish character, not a stereotype of straight men. Because more than half the characters we see in films are straight men, that kinda rules out stereotyping, since there are a lot of different character types making up every film ever made. On the other hand, when a gay character is a hairdresser who screams like a teenaged girl, that's a stereotype that grates. Or when the only Muslim is a terrorist, it grates. 

Reinforcing a shitty perception of a group by representing only in a cliched form is what grates. You can't do this with men, white people, straight people etc, because they're represented diversely already. You can't undo that.

> Isn't that just another way of justifying stereotypes? You assumed I'm straight from your own self satisfied position, you were wrong.

Yes I was wrong, but how is it stereotyping? Every single day of my life people assume I'm straight. Get over it, I have.

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OP aln 20 Oct 2020
In reply to Jon Stewart:

> I'm talking about in a film.

> What I'm asking is, if a male character in a film acts in a very laddish way, does it grate on you that straight men are being stereotyped?

Again, it would depend on the context. Are you not listening?

>Get over it, I have.

That's rude and patronising, I don't need to get over anything. 

Have you watched He Got Game? 

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 Jon Stewart 20 Oct 2020
In reply to aln:

> Again, it would depend on the context. Are you not listening?

I'm trying, but struggling to come up with a context where a male character being laddish could be construed as stereotyping straight men. The reason I'm struggling is for the reason I explained above: because more than half the characters we see in films are straight men, that kinda rules out stereotyping, since there are a lot of different character types making up every film ever made. 

> That's rude and patronising, I don't need to get over anything. 

I think with "you assumed I'm straight from your own self satisfied position" you rather asked for it. Sauce for the goose.

> Have you watched He Got Game? 

The clue is in my first post. Are you not listening? (Again, you really did ask for that!)

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OP aln 20 Oct 2020
In reply to Jon Stewart:

> I'm trying, but struggling to come up with a context where a male character being laddish could be construed as stereotyping straight men. 

But who's talking about that, other than you? I was talking about a film made by a black person, that was full of racism and cultural stereotypes, of black people, and of white people. You're off on some other tangent, and arguing for the sake of it, about some other goddamn shit motherf*cker and I don't know where you are with that shit. Damn!

See what I did? 

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 Jon Stewart 20 Oct 2020
In reply to aln:

Like I said at the start, I haven't seen the film but the way you describe sounds like maybe Lee was trolling the white audience? Funny? 

I know, personally, when a stereotype grates. I was trying to illustrate that with different examples of gratey stereotypes, vs. something that's not one, but never mind.

I also frequently laugh at stereotypes used knowingly. I don't think stereotyping is always bad, sometimes it's funny. Gratey stereotyping however is bad, and I attempted to explain why that is, but never mind. 

Post edited at 01:37
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OP aln 20 Oct 2020
In reply to Jon Stewart:

> I  know, personally, when a stereotype grates.

FFS so do I! I love you Jon, I actually described you on here once as UKc's national treasure. But the horse here has bolted, stop banging the barn door. Watch the f*cking film then come back to me. I get the whole Spike Lee baiting the white racist audience thing, but this time he got it wrong. 

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 Jon Stewart 20 Oct 2020
In reply to aln:

> FFS so do I! I love you Jon, I actually described you on here once as UKc's national treasure. But the horse here has bolted, stop banging the barn door. Watch the f*cking film then come back to me. I get the whole Spike Lee baiting the white racist audience thing, but this time he got it wrong. 

It sounds shite, I'm not going to watch it just to carry on this wonderful, productive discussion, which is in no way going around in circles. And genuinely, you're one of my favourites too

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 Blue Straggler 20 Oct 2020
In reply to aln:

I am really glad I deleted my post a few hours ago 

OP aln 20 Oct 2020
In reply to Jon Stewart:

It was crap, don't bother. Slap yourself on the back for me and goodnight. 

OP aln 20 Oct 2020
In reply to Blue Straggler:

> I am really glad I deleted my post a few hours ago 

Why? 

Removed User 20 Oct 2020
In reply to aln:

Recently I went to a 'Japanese' restaurant (not in Japan) staffed entirely by Korean folk, selling food distinctly not Japanese (nor Korean) to a public probably unaware what Japanese food really was. The entire shop was decked out attempting to emulate a Japanese restaurant in Japan, and it seemed to me the gist was selling anything to westerners as Japanese, so long as it's sold by an Asian is fine. Things were not cheap, as apparently anything from Japan must be hyper-expensive, even stuff that in Japan one could get at a 7-11.

As a Caucasian, with no real idea of Swedish food beyond the Ikea cafeteria, would it me ok for me to open a Swedish restaurant in say, Seoul, trading only on my Caucasian-ness and asking a premium for something not justifying it?

Does cultural appropriation come into it? I personally give authenticity has a high value, so maybe it's me. 

 Blue Straggler 20 Oct 2020
In reply to aln:

So as not to get involved in a bizarre spat with two people who’ve been mildly and confusingly antagonistic toward me on threads on here in the past, who were on this thread managing to antagonise each other despite basically being in overall agreement. I haven’t the heart for that kind of nonsense any more. That’s why, aln

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OP aln 20 Oct 2020
In reply to Blue Straggler:

> mildly and confusingly antagonistic

That, surely, is your whole schtick on here?

>That’s why, aln

Thanks for that. 

OP aln 20 Oct 2020
In reply to Blue Straggler:

> a bizarre spat with two people, who were on this thread managing to antagonise each other despite basically being in overall agreement.

That summed things up nicely. TBH I rather enjoyed it. 

 Blue Straggler 20 Oct 2020
In reply to aln:

> That summed things up nicely. TBH I rather enjoyed it. 

I saw that you did, but a third participant would have turned it into chaos just like in physics when two pendulums affect each other predictably but a third will quite innocently cause chaos 

 Blue Straggler 20 Oct 2020
In reply to aln:

> That, surely, is your whole schtick on here

I don’t have a “schtick on here”, whole or otherwise. Don’t listen to deepsoup continually dredging an off-the-cuff one-off comment from two years ago 

Post edited at 03:51
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In reply to aln:

Is “all white people are prostitutes” really a racial stereotype though? In 30 years I can honestly say that no one has ever assumed I am a prostitute because I am white. 

Sounds a bit like the thing that felt “off” was not seeing any white people in a starring role. Turn that around and... you have the vast majority of UK and US films ever made.

Post edited at 08:39
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 Yanis Nayu 20 Oct 2020
In reply to Stuart Williams:

It’s not a racist stereotype, it’s just a racist comment. 

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In reply to Yanis Nayu:

My point being that if that stereotype doesn’t exist, I can’t see anything intrinsically problematic with casting a white person as a prostitute. It’s not like the only role white people ever get in films are prostitutes or that it’s perpetuating any harmful assumptions. 

Post edited at 13:47
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 Jon Stewart 20 Oct 2020
In reply to Blue Straggler:

> I don’t have a “schtick on here”, whole or otherwise.

You do have resting bitchtone though

(Runs and hides.)

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 The New NickB 20 Oct 2020
In reply to aln:

> Does it only work one way? I watched the Spike Lee film, He Got Game. It was OK, not his best. But it was full of racial stereotypes, and I thought racist towards white people. The only white character who had an actual role, albeit a minor one, was a prostitute. Who was saved by the black guy. Turn that round and....

Spike Lee makes films primarily about African Americans, partly because that is what he knows about and partly because (particularly when he started) very few people are.

A large part of the story is about redemption, an imperfect character dealing with their mistakes, operating at a level in society where they are going to encounter a lot of addicts, dealers, prostitutes and pimps. The race of the prostitute is irrelevant to the story, but white prostitutes are common in the US, she was a troubled but essentially sympathetic character. You could hardly say the same about Thomas Jefferson Byrd's character.

I would also dispute that the only white role was a prostitute, did you not notice Ned Beatty or John Turturro.

> Then there was the college scenes... Really? All the white women were desperate for black guys. And the scene where the main character gets given 2 white women, they're blonde with fake tits bimbos. Come on.

This is a stereotype that Lee has explored before, but also turned on its head, for example in Jungle Fever. The blonde bimbos say more about the giver of the gift, a middle aged white man.

> Shite film too BTW. 

Your starting point was "It was OK, not his best". A position I can stand behind. However, you seem to have wound yourself up as you have typed.

Post edited at 15:33
 Cobra_Head 20 Oct 2020
In reply to Jon Stewart:

 

>  Every single day of my life people assume I'm straight. Get over it, I have.

Well you've kept that well hidden!!

 Cobra_Head 20 Oct 2020
In reply to Removed Userwaitout:

> Recently I went to a 'Japanese' restaurant (not in Japan) ......

On Sunday we ate at a Turkish restaurant, cooked by, amongst others, an Egyptian and Kurdish cook, served by a Romanian waitress!

It was lovely.

Removed User 21 Oct 2020
In reply to Cobra_Head:

The nit picking of comparing the Ottoman Empire to what's 'Turkish' then extrapolating that to a Japanese comparison aside, if what you got was good then that's fine.

It's adopting an ethnic guise to sell overpriced crap that has me thinking.


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