In General
It remains the case today that too warm an enthusiasm for the "Germanic" past can raise suspicions (often justified) of unsavoury politics: the subject remains a fecund repository for the imagery of racist propaganda. This taint is one of the quietest, most tenacious and most ironic legacies of the Third Reich.
— Viking Britain by Thomas Williams.
Fiction
It's not racist! It's EDGY!
We're back. And I think we're in Itsuki's house. What bothers me though is that Mikuru, who's been carried here by Itsuki, looks like she's just gotten out of the bath. Maybe we're supposed to think that she was given a bath by Itsuki while she was unconscious? You've got to be kidding me! Then this would be the point where anyone's doubt turns into a white hot rage, building into a desire to kill. But for now, I will not give it much thought, doing away with all the emotions that might be bubbling up. We are, after all, just watching a movie with actors playing characters. This isn't reality, right?
Theatre Student #1: Who runs the world?
Theatre Students: (In unison) Whites.
Theatre Student #1: Who runs the world?
Theatre Students: (In unison) Whites.
Parent: Why would they do that scene when they're all white? It just makes it seem like they're bragging.
Theatre Students: (In unison) Whites.
Theatre Student #1: Who runs the world?
Theatre Students: (In unison) Whites.
Parent: Why would they do that scene when they're all white? It just makes it seem like they're bragging.
— "High School Theatre", Saturday Night Live
Dick Samuels: Okay, so [Meg]'s a stand-in for countless other girls. It's a trope, really. She's this troubled white girl who's so beaten down that she decides to end it all, right?
Raymond Ainsley: But... she isn't white anymore.
Dick Samuels: Exactly. So it's no longer a trope. Instead, it's a new story about a colored girl who... worked and worked and worked, and she never got the career she deserved, so she decides to stop fighting and end it all. That's— that's troubling to me. This picture starts with a young Meg looking up at a stage. Well, what are we saying to a young colored girl looking up at Meg, up there on the screen? "Oh, fight for a while, but then give up."
Raymond Ainsley: But... she isn't white anymore.
Dick Samuels: Exactly. So it's no longer a trope. Instead, it's a new story about a colored girl who... worked and worked and worked, and she never got the career she deserved, so she decides to stop fighting and end it all. That's— that's troubling to me. This picture starts with a young Meg looking up at a stage. Well, what are we saying to a young colored girl looking up at Meg, up there on the screen? "Oh, fight for a while, but then give up."
Wilbur: I get to decide the name [of our alliance]. Cummie Squad.
Tommy: ...Wilbur, when my mum asks me what I was doing tonight, and I say "I was participating in Cummie Squad with a 23-year-old man", how do you think she'll feel then? Do you think she's still gonna let me be a Minecraft Youtuber?
Tommy: ...Wilbur, when my mum asks me what I was doing tonight, and I say "I was participating in Cummie Squad with a 23-year-old man", how do you think she'll feel then? Do you think she's still gonna let me be a Minecraft Youtuber?
— SMPEarthnote
"I would just like to point out the fucked-up implications of specifically you putting specifically me into a gas chamber!"
—Neil on being dragged to a brainwashing sauna by Dolph, Camp Camp
Creators
'Oh, by the way,' he said, 'what do you call yourselves?' Well, we looked at him and Mister Stephen J. Butts here looked at Kenny Greengrass from New York City when asked 'what do you call yourselves' and said:
'The Clansmen.'
Kenny turned absolutely white. And Butts said:
'With a C. With a C!'
And Kenny looked at us white as a sheet — whoa, bad analogy! — and said, 'Not with a C, not with a P, not with a Q, you're not the Clansmen! Now go get another name, we gotta have something to put on this demo.'
[...]
So we came back and we looked at Kenny with big smiles on our faces and said, 'You're right. We're not the Clansmen, we're the Highwaymen.'
He says, 'Wonderful, from a bunch of rednecks to a band of robbers. You guys are gonna go far.'
'The Clansmen.'
Kenny turned absolutely white. And Butts said:
'With a C. With a C!'
And Kenny looked at us white as a sheet — whoa, bad analogy! — and said, 'Not with a C, not with a P, not with a Q, you're not the Clansmen! Now go get another name, we gotta have something to put on this demo.'
[...]
So we came back and we looked at Kenny with big smiles on our faces and said, 'You're right. We're not the Clansmen, we're the Highwaymen.'
He says, 'Wonderful, from a bunch of rednecks to a band of robbers. You guys are gonna go far.'
— Steve Trott of The Highwaymen
About fiction
Producer: Any other characters I should know about?
Screenwriter: Well, there's Raj, and we're gonna make a lot of jokes about him being Indian.
Producer: Maybe a little racist.
Screenwriter: Whoops!
Producer: Whoopsie!
Screenwriter: And we're also gonna make a lot of jokes about him and Howard seeming like a gay couple.
Producer: Maybe a little homophobic.
Screenwriter: Whoops!
Producer: Whoopsie!
[…]
Screenwriter: She (Penny)'s a hot blonde who's kind of dumb, so she doesn't know what's going on when the guys talk about smart stuff.
Producer: Maybe a little sexist.
Screenwriter: Whoops!
Producer: Whoopsie!
Screenwriter: Well, there's Raj, and we're gonna make a lot of jokes about him being Indian.
Producer: Maybe a little racist.
Screenwriter: Whoops!
Producer: Whoopsie!
Screenwriter: And we're also gonna make a lot of jokes about him and Howard seeming like a gay couple.
Producer: Maybe a little homophobic.
Screenwriter: Whoops!
Producer: Whoopsie!
[…]
Screenwriter: She (Penny)'s a hot blonde who's kind of dumb, so she doesn't know what's going on when the guys talk about smart stuff.
Producer: Maybe a little sexist.
Screenwriter: Whoops!
Producer: Whoopsie!
There's probably no way to rethink this material without throwing it all away.
— Pauline Kael on Lost Horizon
That is how we will heal our racial and socioeconomic differences: by separating ourselves. If only we could institute some kind of 'segregation' where all of us could be with our own kind, none of this unpleasantness would happen.
Horrific implications time! *porn music*
— The Nostalgia Chick on Mulan
In 1966, when most black people in the U.S. couldn’t even be assured of their voting rights because the Civil Rights war was still being fought, a New York Jew was writing about a brilliant black biochemist hanging out with the Avengers.
So let's jump ahead forty goddamn years. What do the heirs and stewards of Stan’s many creations decide to do with a groundbreaking character like Bill Foster, in their story about the ever-present tension between freedom and security?
Why, a lily-white evil Norse uebermenschen blows his heart out with a bolt of lightning!
So let's jump ahead forty goddamn years. What do the heirs and stewards of Stan’s many creations decide to do with a groundbreaking character like Bill Foster, in their story about the ever-present tension between freedom and security?
Why, a lily-white evil Norse uebermenschen blows his heart out with a bolt of lightning!
The one character labeled 'wife' is raped and murdered. Two out of three of the characters labeled 'father' kill each other after reuniting with their estranged sons. And the one woman labeled 'divorcee' is revealed to be a violent psychopath. Whenever she engages in or discusses this violent psychopathic behavior, the comic always shows us a close-up of a magazine cover picturing her, with the words 'On Divorce' printed big. There’s oh so much more.
— Jason Michelitch on Identity Crisis (2004), "The 15 Worst Comics of the Decade"
The most obvious worrying aspect of the production is that it seems that every black person in Harlem, the Caribbean, or New Orleans is involved somehow in the big bad’s evil plans. In fact, during a boat chase near the climax of the film, we’re shown that there are literally dozens of goons just sitting around on the rivers of Louisiana, waiting to be instructed to hunt down and kill errant British agents. If Bond randomly gets into a taxi, the black driver is a double agent.
The fact that the story can be summarized as 'the TARDIS is hijacked by a bunch of black men because the Doctor let a woman drive' is, to say the least, unfortunate.
The finish was infuriating to me ... it was even at one fall apiece and then, at the end ... Kidd and Cesaro have it won all of a sudden Xavier Woods pulls Kofi out of the ring and then ... rolls up one of them, you know, rolls him up hiding his face. The referee looks, sees a black man pinning one of the other guys, counts the three, New Day wins. I'm not minimising when I say he turns around and sees a black man pinning a guy. Because apparently all black people look the same, because Xavier Woods just runs in and pins the guy, and so the referee looks over and he goes "Hmm, black" and just counts three. Nice, very nice.
— Spoony on WWE Payback
"All those who feel that stereotypes aren't an issue when creating fictional groups for game purposes are free to take part in playtests for my new game Sambo: The RPG of Stealing Chickens and Eating Watermelons."
— JellyRoll Baker, on the subject of why one needs to be careful when dealing with Fantasy Counterpart Cultures.
, on the subject of why one needs to be careful when dealing with Fantasy Counterpart Cultures.Extrapolating from the trailer (which is what trailers are for), No Escape (2015) is the heroic struggle of a white man to defend his white woman and white girls from filthy foreigners. Every single one of them, apparently. When they printed the script for No Escape, the pages got whiter. If No Escape's mentality was any more ancient it would have been a better movie, because the white family sailing off the edge of the world would have run into "Here, There Be Dragons" and found some potatoes.
"I think I get the message of the story. Christianity is good, and most, if not all, women are evil skanks who should die. And so do anyone else who celebrate any other religion. And bands that are supposedly "evil". And women in power, gays, and those who have disabilities.
"That is one fucked-up message."
"That is one fucked-up message."
— From Arcadiarika's liveblog of The Evil Gods I
"One thing I noticed as I systematically eliminated women from the Old West was that no one really cared. In Red Dead, if you shoot a woman in front of witnesses, you only get a $5 bounty on your head and I think $4.79 of that is from noise complaints. Women are such third class citizens that you'll get more of a hassle out of someone if you kill his chicken than if you kill his wife."
One episode revolved around a Jewish girl wanting a nose job to look like one of the white characters and actually, sincerely included a duet of the two girls singing "Unpretty"/"I Feel Pretty." Now I'm not one for subtext, but I think the genuine sentiment here from the show was that you can be pretty, even as a Jew. That wasn't what they meant, but it's exactly what they said. Hey Jew, don't feel bad you look so Jewish, you're beautiful. We're all beautiful just the way we are, even if we're not normal. Hell, the episode this happened in was called "Born This Way."
I am perpetually waiting for the day when the NFL says to the general public, “Okay, we know this whole Jacksonville thing was good for a laugh. For real though, we’re putting them in Tokyo now.” The Jaguars cannot be saved until they’ve been destroyed... What difference does it make, man? You’re in Jacksonville and you’re gonna die. No wonder the Jaguars made this their rallying cry.
Let’s get out there and NOT get fisted, guys.
their rallying cry. Let’s get out there and NOT get fisted, guys.
—Drew Magary, "Why Your Team Sucks 2015!: Jacksonville Jaguars"
, "Why Your Team Sucks 2015!: Jacksonville Jaguars"The finale seems to negate all the messages of the movie, and offers up one that's so ugly in its worldview that it borders on offensive. (Spoiler alert! as they say.) Jason's prize for completing all tasks is a big check for $100 million. (Yes, they print up a cashier's check for the full amount so Jason can hold it and we can all see it, because that's how this movie works.) He then donates all that cash to build a memorial hospital for dying kids in [the dead Littlest Cancer Patient]'s name. After he does, it's revealed, "Brewster's Millions"-style, that Jason passed the final test and will receive "The Ultimate Gift," which turns out to be billions of dollars. And suddenly everything's great for Jason.
Um, hey, how about this instead: you make an inspirational movie about healing and growth, and at the end, the gift is something internal, like being nice to people or not being a jackass anymore. That's a message worth hearing. Having your hero wind up a billionaire suggests we should all do good things solely in the hope of landing a monetary reward. Ugh.
I don't think that was the movie's intent, of course, but still. How utterly, hopelessly horrid. Then again, what would you expect? Here's a movie that forces people to learn lessons, instead of letting them figure things out. When Jason arrives at "the gift of giving," it's not because he realizes how important it is to help others — it's because he's told he has one month to give away a big stack of cash.
Um, hey, how about this instead: you make an inspirational movie about healing and growth, and at the end, the gift is something internal, like being nice to people or not being a jackass anymore. That's a message worth hearing. Having your hero wind up a billionaire suggests we should all do good things solely in the hope of landing a monetary reward. Ugh.
I don't think that was the movie's intent, of course, but still. How utterly, hopelessly horrid. Then again, what would you expect? Here's a movie that forces people to learn lessons, instead of letting them figure things out. When Jason arrives at "the gift of giving," it's not because he realizes how important it is to help others — it's because he's told he has one month to give away a big stack of cash.
"It is worth noting that one of the defining features of rangers is that they specialize in hunting down and killing members of specific races. From a pragmatic standpoint, this means they boil down to little more than racist serial killers who target by species."
is that they specialize in hunting down and killing members of specific races. From a pragmatic standpoint, this means they boil down to little more than racist serial killers who target by species."— 1d4chan, "Ranger", referring to Dungeons & Dragons
, referring to Dungeons & DragonsSessler: What's worse is this game could be construed as racist.
(cue montage of characters saying the word "black aliens" or "black creatures" in regard to Black Arms)
G.U.N. Commander: Kill them all.
President: We must stand united to defend our world against these invaders!
Sessler: That President seems a little too concerned with the real estate value of his planet, now that the "black aliens" have moved in. I bet if it were white aliens, everyone would be all hugs, smiles and welcome baskets.
(cue montage of characters saying the word "black aliens" or "black creatures" in regard to Black Arms)
G.U.N. Commander: Kill them all.
President: We must stand united to defend our world against these invaders!
Sessler: That President seems a little too concerned with the real estate value of his planet, now that the "black aliens" have moved in. I bet if it were white aliens, everyone would be all hugs, smiles and welcome baskets.
Just for fun, I kept a running tally of all the characters in the story campaign who aren't burly white dudes and you are under no obligation to shoot. The final total was three: a female astronaut at the start who immediately dies, one helicopter that spoke with a woman's voice, and a black member of the Ghosts unit who immediately dies. And frankly, when that happens, the main characters displayed less emotion than when their dog got shot. "Dammit, the black guy died!" they seem to say. "Now we can't claim to have tons of black friends while arguing on the internet!"
What I really want to hone in on is this book's use of the Psycho Lesbian trope. Essentially, it's exactly what it sounds like — when a woman who is attracted to other women is portrayed as evil, unhinged, dangerous, and predatory. Her homosexuality (or bisexuality, or whatever) makes her "crazy," and her "craziness" makes her evil. So it manages to pull off that fun little trick of being homophobic and ableist in one fell swoop! This trope has been around since fiction was allowed to acknowledge that gay people exist, and fortunately, it's dying. Unfortunately, it is a slow, slow death. That's not to say no lesbians in fiction can ever be villainous, but it's definitely not okay to have only one gay character, and for that character to just so haaaaaaappen to be the bad guy. And gay women in particular get a bad reputation for being predatory towards other women — and the character in this book fits that stereotype (that harmful, untrue stereotype) to a tee.
—This review of The Cabin by Natasha Preston
review of The Cabin by Natasha Preston"Yaaay, substance abuse saved the day again."
— RetroNemo, The Roundtale, "10 Cartoon Christmas Specials That DESERVE To Be Forgotten"
"The protagonist, presumably a Gucci model in his spare time, is deaf, but The Quiet Man is equally tone-deaf, and so in trying to obscure its story with a lack of sound OR ANY OTHER COMPREHENSIBLE DETAILS, they make it appear as if deaf people don't understand the world around them at all ever.
But it's not just that the adaptation is wildly off-base with [Batgirl's] characterization. Literally the only character trait or aspect of her personality the movie cares about is her sex life, there are a boatload of shots objectifying her and focusing on her ass, and again, her entire motivation for everything she does boils down to pining for her boyfriend. Boiling Barbara's character down to just a sex life and repeatedly objectifying her as the lead-in to a story where she's sexually humiliated and discarded as a cheap plot device REALLY doesn't help the misogynistic vibes of the material.
— Dark Lord Jadow 1 reviewing Batman: The Killing Joke
This [series] should be the perfect set-up for a scabrous look at prejudice, corruption, the trading of sexual currency, coercion, the well-oiled machinations that underlie an industry and how it all shapes history — all through a #MeToo lens. But it becomes a mere wish-fulfilment fantasy that, whether it intends to or not, suggests that if a few people had just been that bit braver, then movies — and therefore the world! — would be a glorious, egalitarian Eden. It is a show that is smug and obtuse enough to believe la la land's self-regarding idea that celluloid art directly shapes our lives.
What I'm saying is that the show is pretty sexist. It's parroting a number of toxic themes that we've seen a million times before: women should be helpless victims, if we give women power, they will inevitably turn evil, destroy the world, and fuck everything up; women should be selfless, if a woman reaches out for something she wants, then she's being selfish, which will destroy the world and fuck everything up; any woman who reaches out for power or something she wants must be punished horribly.
"Talking to people, here’s what I say: Have you ever seen a 'Harry Potter' movie? Have you ever seen the scenes in Gringotts Bank? Do you know what those folks who run the bank are? Jews! And they’re like, 'Oh, [that illustration is] from 'Harry Potter'!' And you’re like, 'No, that’s a caricature of a Jew from an anti-Semitic piece of literature.' It was one of those things where I saw it on the screen and I was expecting the crowd to be like, 'Holy shit, [Rowling] did not, in a wizarding world, just throw Jews in there to run the fucking underground bank'," Stewart continued. "And everybody was just like, 'Wizards.' It was so weird."
— Jon Stewart on the Harry Potter goblins
"So, let's review: our heroes are now the captives of savage, painted, largely dark-skinned cannibals, and Phillipe is forced to endure the very unwelcome attentions of their leader, who happens to be the only member of her tribe not built like a rail."
(A display card pops up, reading "Sin 6: Yikes")
(A display card pops up, reading "Sin 6: Yikes")
—Musical Hell reviewing Charming
And once or twice, apropos of nothing, Jake runs into women being harassed by burly men claiming they're entitled to sex, so Jake beats them up, whereupon he is entitled to sex. A brief blank-eyed Thunderbirds Are Go hump with a random trollop before being plonked back into the mission as if nothing happened. It feels like a side quest; a "collect all venereal diseases for 100%" kind of thing, such as what might be found in a sandbox game developed by absolute psychopaths who got all their ideas of human social interaction from watching Confessions of a Window Cleaner on fast forward.
