You knew it was coming..."Star Wars is racist!"
I was actually waiting on this, figuring that in this day and age, some hypersensitive individual or group would eventually pipe up and spout off.
Jeez...
<a href="http://www.detnews.com/2002/entertainment/0205/18/d01-492788.htm"; target="_blank">http://www.detnews.com/2002/entertainment/0205/18/d01-492788.htm</a>;
This never used to happen, did it? I mean...not to this degree, right?
I just think there is a segment of the population that is never pleased about anything and is perpetually offended by everything.
Comments
[quote]Temuera Morrison, the actor who plays Jango, is a New Zealander of Maori descent. But that didn't get in the way of some members of an eight-person Detroit News panel assembled to review the film.
Â*Â*Â*"He looked totally Latino," says Martina Guzman, a Detroiter who's managing a State House election campaign.
Â*Â*Â*"And his kid," says Wayne State history professor Jose Cuello, referring to the young Boba Fett, "looked even more Latino." <hr></blockquote>
LOOKED? Isn't it weird that a group concerned with racism and stereotypes are, themselves, going solely by looks/appearances?
Amazing.
Here's what's REALLY funny: Jimmy Smits, an ACTUAL Latino (and obviously a "sellout to his people", right?), doesn't seem to be mentioned anywhere, good or bad.
Instead, let's bitch about a character who LOOKS Hispanic. Makes sense...
Holy hell.
You're damned if you do, damned if you don't.
If Lucas made a movie with all mainstream caucasion actors (with EVERYONE looking like Harrison Ford, Ewan McGregor, Jake Lloyd, etc.), people would bitch about the "lack of diversity in Lucas's universe...".
THEN, you cast people in MAJOR, pivotal (and coveted) roles who aren't white, and the very same people bitch even more!
What the hell do you want?!?! Again, I'm even further convinced that some people simply wake up every single morning of their lives, looking, and expecting, to be offended. That's their whole reason to exist, it seems. Then they can get on a soapbox or pulpit, grab a little media attention, feel aligned with something bigger than themselves, etc.
Sad.
[ 05-18-2002: Message edited by: pscates ]</p>
<strong>My favorite quote from the article (for those of you who don't feel like reading the whole thing):
LOOKED? Isn't it weird that a group concerned with racism and stereotypes are, themselves, going solely by looks/appearances?
Amazing.
Here's what's REALLY funny: Jimmy Smits, an ACTUAL Latino (and obviously a "sellout to his people", right?), doesn't seem to be mentioned anywhere, good or bad.
Instead, let's bitch about a character who LOOKS Hispanic. Makes sense...
Holy hell.
You're damned if you do, damned if you don't.
If Lucas made a movie with all mainstream caucasion actors (with EVERYONE looking like Harrison Ford, Ewan McGregor, Jake Lloyd, etc.), people would bitch about the "lack of diversity in Lucas's universe...".
THEN, you cast people in MAJOR, pivotal (and coveted) roles who aren't white, and the very same people bitch even more!
What the hell do you want?!?! Again, I'm even further convinced that some people simply wake up every single morning of their lives, looking, and expecting, to be offended. That's their whole reason to exist, it seems. Then they can get on a soapbox or pulpit, grab a little media attention, feel aligned with something bigger than themselves, etc.
Sad.
[ 05-18-2002: Message edited by: pscates ]</strong><hr></blockquote>
Most religious nuts believe more in the act of believing than in the "substance" (believe me I use that term very loosely here) of their religion. The same is true with people who are always offended. They aren't really offended. They pretend to be offended to get attention.
He's Latino! No, he's Arab!
It's strange though on how they didn't mentioned the idea of the supermen (the Jedis), and how the idea that the Jedis are genetically superior.
Jedi -> Juda -> Jews
Next, the extermination of the Jedis. With the support of one of them, then one of them will have a high ranking position.
You do know that the people that was behind the creation of the Nazis are actually the Jews?
<strong>This never used to happen, did it? I mean...not to this degree, right?</strong><hr></blockquote>
We didn't use to have the internet.
"Racism, this is."
He doesn't SOUND Mexican, he sounds more like a buck-toothed solicitor from Liverpool than he does a freakin' taco vendor in Guadalajara. Idiots.
One more thing about that aspect: James Earl Jones does NOT sound black, he sounds like God.
So do Mexicans have a ****ing trademark on things phonetic similarities to the Spanish language?
I am ashamed of this stupid chick's inability to avoid sounding like a valley girl when talking about this, it destroys the tiny bit of credibility she had after her idiotic assertion crossed her lips.
"Look, man, like it totally like is racist.. y'know? Majorly!"
And he doesn't look or sound Latino, she's a racist moron for thinking so.
Glad to know you all see this the way I do.
Maybe Lucas can get Smits 4 lines in "Episode III". Because if he doesn't, the shit shall meet the fan.
Actually, Lucas might buckle under and replace Natalie Portman with Jennifer Lopez. And instead of casting nSync in walk-on cameos, he's tap Ricky Martin, Mark Anthony and Julio Inglesias, Jr.
And after Anakin's transformation to the Dark Side, Darth Vader will be voiced by Cheech Marin instead of James Earl Jones.
"Hey, man, this is a bad suit, man. Say, man, check out this lightsaber, man..."
I can't wait!
BUT
I'll take this perspective though I'm sure to be dismissed by the herd:
The Phantom Menace was definitely racist in its characatured portrayals: and if you can't see that and see that they are based on cliched images of the past, then its your lack of critical insight and powers of observation not the films lack of stereotyping... which basically is the films lack of imagination: ezamples: Jar jar as the minstrel comedian from jamaica, the jewish salesman that's trying everything for a buck, and looks like a cross between a jew from a Nazi propaganda films and a mosquitto--!!!! -- come on how obviouse!!!!
these are pernicious steretypes that are perpetuated in ways like this... just under the surface of consciouse acknowledgement yet reinforcing and perpetuating stale ideas about real people
And Digix: what the hell are you reading these days!!??!!: your head is obviously full of some serious anti-simitic crap . . . you should stop yourself from that line of thinking ...its wrong . .not that its wrong as in bad (though that too)... its just plain wrong.
--
The Trade Federation sounded Chinese to me when I watched Episode I for the first time. The only significance that came up in my mind was the vocal similarity. I've never known the Chinese to be capitalist emperialists. If we were working with stereotypes they SHOULD sound like some form of American. But it's not about stereotype, it's a goddam movie.
--
Who is ****ing Sidious? An albino midget African caricature? Will Native Americans be protesting him later on?
Star Wars racism assertions == total bullshit.
--
Re: Cheech as Vader
"Man, listen, I know, like, this death star things was built for shooting planets with the big laser, man, but listen, we could like, roll the BIGGEST JOINT in the universe, man! And like, use the big laser to light it, man!"
I forgot to mention...Baba means father in just about every single Asian lanuage in existence...not to mention a bevy of other languages...jeez...some people are so stupid.
I just wish the jedi's didn't speak like limp-wristed brits a la Russell Crowe in gladiator. Eh, I guess it's just Obiwan.
[ 05-19-2002: Message edited by: Splinemodel ]</p>
The female roles in SW are all princesses! The good guys are knights, and their bumbling helpers are bad-gujys-turned-good! The bad guys are all good gyus turned bad!
UNfortunately, the main characters are all white.
The Jedi are diverse - a great diversity of humans and then a few s\\limy things.
So what race are they gonna choose for the Fett? It doesn't matter! If he';s white, they complain! If he's brown, they complain! If he's yellow, they complain! If he's red...
It's a no-win situation. Oh well, at least this newspaper HAS NOREADERS! STupid newspaper - hope they get smarter or go out of business.
First of all Latino is not a race! It is just a place of origin (Latin America).
Trust me I live in Latin America and although we are all Latinos we belong to different races (if we were all one same race there would be no racism in latin america, duh!). You have black latinos (like the people from many caribbean islands), white latinos (many people in chile, argentina and my country, etc), indian latinos (the descendants from the native latin americans, most of them in MEXICO) and of course you have mixtures of all those kinds of races.
So there is no such thing as a Hispanic race, just because most latin americans that migrate to the U.S. are the poor mexican, native latin american-like latinos (we refer to them here as "indios") and mestizos (indians with some white blood) who share similar physical features it does not mean they are all one race or that everyone originally from Latin America looks like that.
So, the statement Â*"He looked totally Latino" is NONSENSE.
I am tired of this stupid stereotyping.
<strong>This is so stupid!
First of all Latino is not a race! It is just a place of origin (Latin America).
Trust me I live in Latin America and although we are all Latinos we belong to different races (if we were all one same race there would be no racism in latin america, duh!). You have black latinos (like the people from many caribbean islands), white latinos (many people in chile, argentina and my country, etc), indian latinos (the descendants from the native latin americans, most of them in MEXICO) and of course you have mixtures of all those kinds of races.
So there is no such thing as a Hispanic race, just because most latin americans that migrate to the U.S. are the poor mexican, native latin american-like latinos (we refer to them here as "indios") and mestizos (indians with some white blood) who share similar physical features it does not mean they are all one race or that everyone originally from Latin America looks like that.
So, the statement Â*"He looked totally Latino" is NONSENSE.
I am tired of this stupid stereotyping.</strong><hr></blockquote>
You can thank the politically correct Americans for the latino thing. It's so ****ed up over here, you have to call a Mexican a Latino and all that weird shit. When we were first starting to call people latinos that's the first thing I said to myself. I said, "hey, latino isn't a race!" But supposedly it's "politically correct" so whatever.
which, I may be wrong about, sounds like a form of racism: "the Race united"?!?!??
could you imagine a white group with that name getting year book pictures?
NO, I couldn't.... and I don't think that I should, rathe,r I think that the racism of "La Raza" should be seen for what it is....
[ 05-19-2002: Message edited by: pfflam ]</p>
Good thread.
These people, they are just looking for things to disect.
They are like English teachers who look for things in book that were not originally intended by the author!
<strong>
It's so ****ed up over here, you have to call a Mexican a Latino and all that weird shit. When we were first starting to call people latinos that's the first thing I said to myself. I said, "hey, latino isn't a race!" But supposedly it's "politically correct" so whatever.</strong><hr></blockquote>
"Mexican" isn't a race either. No more than "American", which includes me, Jimmy Smits, James Earl Jones, etc. But I agree with you that it's pretty stupidly PC to use the term "latino" as well.
When "Phantom Menace" came out there we cries over the depiction of Jar-Jar Binks as being both racist and homophobic. Some people saw him as a gay stereotype and some as a Steppin Fetchit sterotype. I just thought that he was an incredibly annoying character that sounded like cookie monster with a bad accent. I think some people just are so on the lookout for any hint of racism or homophobia or anti-Semitism or anti-Albanianism or anti-whateverism that they are going to find it wherever they can. I'm sure that for "Matrix: Reloaded" there will some group, somewhere, that will get really upset that the good guys in the movie wear black and drive a silver CTS, whle the bad guys wear silver and drive a black EXT. And someone, somewhere is going to give them press about it.
<img src="graemlins/oyvey.gif" border="0" alt="[No]" />
[ 05-20-2002: Message edited by: tmp ]</p>