Poll: Red Dead Redemption: No Controversy?

[A Curious Fellow]

In light of all the talk about political correctness and bigotry, something came to mind. I saw virtually no outcry of any kind on this site regarding Red Dead Redemption's treatment of Mexicans. I mean, literally every male Mexican character in that game is a rapist of some kind and not a single one was portrayed as having a shred of honor or credibility. I even found my own attitudes being colored against them. In the entire second act of the game, the only major NPC to evoke any emotion in me except revulsion or pity was Landon Ricketts, a white man.

Thoughts? Anybody? Am I the only person who thought it was a little bit suspicious?

EDIT:

I'm just saying, the first act had the likes of the Marshall and the MacFarlenes, and the third act gave us Nostas. Decent upstanding folks from a variety of backgrounds and lifestyles. In Mexico, everyone was a douchebag. Even Reyes, the closest thing the game had to a positively portrayed Mexican character, was a slimey little ball of filth. I'd have just been happy if there was one male in the game who was both A. a decent human being and B. born south of the border. I'm not trying to make a big thing or go Fox News on your ass. It's just odd to me that the entire race of people was uniformly presented as raw rape-tastic douchebaggery.

 

[Zergadooful]

That and there were BOOBIES!!1! in a cutscene for 20ish seconds! I think the media stopped caring about what Rockstar does for attention now that they can complain about Bulletstorm.

 

[A Curious Fellow]

Zerg, I'm gonna give that one to you with nary a single reservation.

 

[AWDMANOUT]

I didn't feel any controversy.

Concerning stereotypes and other such events in life: It's not an awkward moment, or indeed controversial, until somebody points it out.

 

[BlumiereBleck]

Thats how things were in 1911 Mexico....it was a pretty bad place back then.

 

[RowdyRodimus]

They were Mexican bandits. Set in an Spaghetti Western setting. Of course they weren't going to have redeeming qualities. What? Did you expect long back stories of how they weren't hugged enough as kids or were beaten for letting the tamales get cold by their dad who was a drunk?

 

[SonicKoala]

Meh, I didn't see the problem - your main character is an ex-outlaw searching for a collection of other outlaws, and as a result, he has to deal with some very shady characters in order to get to these previously mentioned outlaws.

You know who else was painted in an extremely negative light? The FBI (or whatever that secret government vigilante organization happened to be) - jeez, those guys came off terribly; just a bunch of liars and traitors. Is that how the real Feds are? Absolutely not, but it doesn't matter, because it's a fictitious story set in a fictitious place featuring a cast of fictitious characters.

Please, it's because of complaints like this that ultimately lead to the tirades of bullshit you see on networks such as FOX News.

 

[teutonicman]

No I disagree, what about that 1 chick that was in love with the rebel leader? She was a pretty virtuous character, it was just too bad that she was too naive to she what a douché Abraham was.

 

[ultrachicken]

Because you only worked with shady characters throughout just about the entire game. There were innocent Mexican civilians, as well, but you only worked with the corrupt government and a man who labeled himself a "rebel" in order to take power in his own corrupt government. Kind of like how Mexico actually was at that time.

 

[Therumancer]

In light of all the talk about political correctness and bigotry, something came to mind. I saw virtually no outcry of any kind on this site regarding Red Dead Redemption's treatment of Mexicans. I mean, literally every male Mexican character in that game is a rapist of some kind and not a single one was portrayed as having a shred of honor or credibility. I even found my own attitudes being colored against them. In the entire second act of the game, the only major NPC to evoke any emotion in me except revulsion or pity was Landon Ricketts, a white man.

Thoughts? Anybody? Am I the only person who thought it was a little bit suspicious?

You have to understand that it fits the genere and time period, ever heard of something called "The Alamo"?

Understand that Mexico wasn't quite what it is now, things were a lot more lawless, and even in a late period western Mexico was the enemy, and we were fighting them over land and stuff. Complaining about the portrayal is sort of like saying "you know, I think the portrayal of Germans in these Indiana Jones movies is a bit unfair..."

On the other hand, there is a flip side to this, "Zorro" is set around a similar time period to westerns usually (people have taken great liberties with the setting) and in those movies you see a much more balanced approach, with everything from rampant poverty, to decadent aristocracy, and all the levels in between. "Zorro" has seen a lot of use over the years even if the last attempt to reboot a franchise hasn't gone over too well. Incidently he had a cartoon show when I was growing up as well.

All my comments on immigrants aside, I will say that most modern cinema tends to be fairly balanced as well, though admittedly Mexico mostly seems to see creative traffic as either crime filled ghettos, resorts, or the land of masked wrestlers, depending on the series involved, faring no better or no worse than any other location handled by Hollywood (and no, I don't want to get into arguements about how we need more movies set outside of the US to show other countries in general in a more varied light. I watch movies for entertainment, not academic points, when I want to learn about other cultures a bit, I put on something like "The travel Channel" or whatever... which has a lot of interesting stuff about a lot of places).

 

[A Curious Fellow]

Meh, I didn't see the problem - your main character is an ex-outlaw searching for a collection of other outlaws, and as a result, he has to deal with some very shady characters in order to get to these previously mentioned outlaws.

You know who else was painted in an extremely negative light? The FBI (or whatever that secret government vigilante organization happened to be) - jeez, those guys came off terribly; just a bunch of liars and traitors. Is that how the real Feds are? Absolutely not, but it doesn't matter, because it's a fictitious story set in a fictitious place featuring a cast of fictitious characters.

Please, it's because of complaints like this that ultimately lead to the tirades of bullshit you see on networks such as FOX News.

Hey dude, don't hate. I'm just saying, the first act had the likes of the Marshall and the MacFarlenes, and the third act gave us Nostas. Decent upstanding folks from a variety of backgrounds and lifestyles. In Mexico, everyone was a douchebag. Even Reyes, the closest thing the game had to a positively portrayed Mexican character, was a slimey little ball of filth. I'd have just been happy if there was one male in the game who was both A. a decent human being and B. born south of the border. I'm not trying to make a big thing or go Fox News on your ass. It's just odd to me that the entire race of people was uniformly presented as raw rape-tastic douchebaggery.

 

[Boba Frag]

I suppose I'm the only one who could find the guy called 'Irish' as the most offensive, stereotyped character in the game.

Not exactly something I enjoy being associated with my country, to be honest.

At the same time, it's a video game.... and over looking the absolutely dire and utterly shit Irish accent that the voice actor thought somehow earned him his paycheck, I thought he was pretty funny.

 

[tthor]

In light of all the talk about political correctness and bigotry, something came to mind. I saw virtually no outcry of any kind on this site regarding Red Dead Redemption's treatment of Mexicans. I mean, literally every male Mexican character in that game is a rapist of some kind and not a single one was portrayed as having a shred of honor or credibility. I even found my own attitudes being colored against them. In the entire second act of the game, the only major NPC to evoke any emotion in me except revulsion or pity was Landon Ricketts, a white man.

Thoughts? Anybody? Am I the only person who thought it was a little bit suspicious?

we talked about something like this in my film/tv class. Western films, especially during their height (which i guess would be around 1940 to 1960), were very commonly used to bring up taboo subjects, such as sexuality, adultry, rape, racism, etc. because, if they had these subjects in a film set in the modern time (which, at that time, would have been the 1950s), people would have been outraged. but movie makers found that if they put them into westerns, people didn't question it, because that was just how things were during frontier times.

however, today, the western genre is basically dead, since prettymuch everything has already been done (the majority of new westerns like True Grit being merely remakes). Instead, in modern day, SciFi films are used to bring up taboo subjects (such as with the odvious ones, like Avatar and District 9, bringing up the topic of racism)

 

[SangRahl]

Suspicious? No.
Take a look at the source material... Not the game developers or the history of the people, but the genre of the golden age of spaghetti westerns.

Some might come back with "Stereotypes are stereotypes for a reason", but in this case, it just wouldn't fit to have portrayed ANY of the characters as anything but how they were portrayed.

 

[emeraldrafael]

I dont think there was a single character of good character in that entire game, so it all fit in. Its a western, and that gives Fox News a raging hard-on since its the republican wet dream.

 

[Johnnyallstar]

I dont think there was a single character of good character in that entire game, so it all fit in.

I was just about to make that comment, but there is one. Bonnie MacFarlane is the only character that is developed, and not somehow damaged in terms of their decency at any point of their timeline.

 

[SGDeath2]

Its not really realistic, however its how western movies are made and their going for the dollar trilogy style westerns

 

[emeraldrafael]

I dont think there was a single character of good character in that entire game, so it all fit in.

I was just about to make that comment, but there is one. Bonnie MacFarlane is the only character that is developed, and not somehow damaged in terms of their decency at any point of their timeline.

She's a raging whore underneath. and a woman property owner. Somethings wrong there. XD

No, I'm joking. I think the only thing you can link her too is housing an outlaw, which is rather against the law. But thats not a major thing.

 

[SonicKoala]

Meh, I didn't see the problem - your main character is an ex-outlaw searching for a collection of other outlaws, and as a result, he has to deal with some very shady characters in order to get to these previously mentioned outlaws.

You know who else was painted in an extremely negative light? The FBI (or whatever that secret government vigilante organization happened to be) - jeez, those guys came off terribly; just a bunch of liars and traitors. Is that how the real Feds are? Absolutely not, but it doesn't matter, because it's a fictitious story set in a fictitious place featuring a cast of fictitious characters.

Please, it's because of complaints like this that ultimately lead to the tirades of bullshit you see on networks such as FOX News.

Hey dude, don't hate. I'm just saying, the first act had the likes of the Marshall and the MacFarlenes, and the third act gave us Nostas. Decent upstanding folks from a variety of backgrounds and lifestyles. In Mexico, everyone was a douchebag. Even Reyes, the closest thing the game had to a positively portrayed Mexican character, was a slimey little ball of filth. I'd have just been happy if there was one male in the game who was both A. a decent human being and B. born south of the border. I'm not trying to make a big thing or go Fox News on your ass. It's just odd to me that the entire race of people was uniformly presented as raw rape-tastic douchebaggery.

There's no hate, sorry if it came off that way - honestly, I don't think Rockstar meant anything by it; furthermore, the whole story of Mexico revolved around the idea of this upcoming political revolution, and thus the central characters were all somehow involved with that revolution - perhaps the portrayal of all of them as douchebags was Rockstar making some sort of subtle political statement... You know, about how Mexican politics has been rife with corruption for decades? And I forget her name, but there was that one Mexican girl (the one who thought she was going to marry Reyes) who seemed to be a pretty decent individual, so they weren't all bad.