The Big Picture: Skin Deep

[Hive Mind]

Just like you couldn't have a man play the role of a pregnant woman, while still appearing as a man. It just wouldn't be believable.

Or how you couldn't have a black guy play the role of a white as snow god, while still appearing as a black man?

 

[DearFilm]

So according to Bob, embracing double standards is the only real way to treat our popular culture's derth of interesting or complex minority characters. So changing a Norse god's race was preferable to creating a new character who is black. Thor had an entire Earth-based realm that was set in modern day America, and yet it was less culturally diverse than Asgard.
This strikes me as a kind of racism in and of itself. It is as though you do not trust minorities or those who write them to create a new and unique character on their own, so you have to "gift" them characters who have already been created. You are allowing them to "prove" their racial equity only through the appropriation of another race's character. It's like if a black African chef wanted to prove his worth in a French kitchen, but rather than let him make his own recipe, gave him a recipe already perfected by a white French cook. This betrays an astounding amount of condescention on the part of anyone who argues this way.
Honestly, some characters can be changed and can benefit from said change in the long run. I think Spider-Man as a young black kid from Queens makes a lot of sense and could be interesting because this is the real world, and that character is set to reflect modern ideas and experience. A Norse god, however, seems to resist this change. Instead, we should be trying to create characters grounded in a racial identity, so "appropriation" instead becomes "creation."

As a comic book fan, AND someone who is incredibly adverse to changes (Often the smallest incongruities between a book/comic and movie is enough to downright piss me off; it's just me), I'd much rather have a inconsequential character have a race lift rather than an entirely new character introduced into a years-long continuity.

So did you take umbridge with the inclusion of Lucius Fox or Rachel in The Dark Knight?

You mean the Lucius Fox that has been part of the Batman canon since the late 70s?

And just like that, I lose my geek cred.
Still. Rachel.

 

[Skjutentrast]

Note that that wasn't me replying.
Also, I said Northern Europe. That is Denmark, Sweden( With Finland), Iceland, and Norway.
My ancestors are innocent. And we accept more immigrants per capita then most countries in the world, both refugees and other.

I don't owe anyone anything for being white, and neither does anyone else. It is history. I don't inherit my fathers crimes so to speak.
But, I really want to stress that in this case I really don't care. But race haven't been an issue here for a long time. Culture, such as Islamic culture, is.

So making a Character established as a Christian a Muslim or the other way around would cause massive feedback.

Anyhow, colonialism was a necessary evil. We needed resources to keep the industrializing of the first world going, they needed and wanted our superior technology and also arguably rule.
The native Americans, both south and north, are arguably the ones who suffered most under European rule. Not the Native Africans.

 

[DearFilm]

So according to Bob, embracing double standards is the only real way to treat our popular culture's derth of interesting or complex minority characters. So changing a Norse god's race was preferable to creating a new character who is black. Thor had an entire Earth-based realm that was set in modern day America, and yet it was less culturally diverse than Asgard.
This strikes me as a kind of racism in and of itself. It is as though you do not trust minorities or those who write them to create a new and unique character on their own, so you have to "gift" them characters who have already been created. You are allowing them to "prove" their racial equity only through the appropriation of another race's character. It's like if a black African chef wanted to prove his worth in a French kitchen, but rather than let him make his own recipe, gave him a recipe already perfected by a white French cook. This betrays an astounding amount of condescention on the part of anyone who argues this way.
Honestly, some characters can be changed and can benefit from said change in the long run. I think Spider-Man as a young black kid from Queens makes a lot of sense and could be interesting because this is the real world, and that character is set to reflect modern ideas and experience. A Norse god, however, seems to resist this change. Instead, we should be trying to create characters grounded in a racial identity, so "appropriation" instead becomes "creation."

Oh my God....Someone actually agrees with me.
But you must remember according to our society it is not okay to be proud to be Caucasian, Where there is a Black History Month, Asian/Pacific Month, Latin Week/month.... there does not exist anything for us.

That is because every day that isn't especially set aside for a "them" is assumed to be for "us." This is another kind of insane condescention, because instead of saying "We celebrate everyone all the time" we are basically gifting time, time which has no master, to a people we feel bad for. We are claiming to own months, to be able to mete out importance.
Racism does not just exist in violence and degradation. It also exists in condescention and lowered expectations.

 

[honestdiscussioner]

Just like you couldn't have a man play the role of a pregnant woman, while still appearing as a man. It just wouldn't be believable.

Or how you couldn't have a black guy play the role of a white as snow god, while still appearing as a black man?

No, not like that at all. First off, he's not a snow god. He's a magical god on from another planet. While the roots of the story are from Norse mythology, there is a TON that is changed. Having one of them be black is no where near a big deal.

In this iteration, he isn't a white snow god. He's a black god. That fits just fine. They changed the character a bit, like they did with nearly EVERY character. You can have a man play the role of a pregnant women, if you take out the pregnant woman part.

 

[Malisteen]

People should understand that big budget Hollywood is part of the United States, and the United States have been defined by the issues of race relations generally and black slavery in particular from its inception. It was one of the biggest issues in forming the US government. The compromise on the issue was a congenital defect to the US constitution that festered for a century. It was the bitter, festering core of the cultural split between north and South, completely saturating the political landscape for generations. It was the fundamental issue of the civil war that the nation tore itself apart over, and continued afterwords in the form of segregation and bigotry. This nation was built on the backs of black slaves (to say nothing of the graves of native peoples), and the inherent tensions between the noble ideals of liberty and equality and the cruel realities of bigotry and racism have long defined the nation's character.

While we in the US as a nation have made great strides in bringing our ideals and realities closer into alignment, it remains true that many of our people, whether they acknowledge it or not, are where they are today because of the inequities of our past. The stains of our past continue to characterize us, and they leave ongoing marks on our culture, including the dearth of strong minority roles in fiction, and while casting minorities in roles generally given to whites (which, by the way, the Director of Thor has long been known for anyway, and shouldn't have caught anyone by surprise) may not be an ideal solution, it is one solution, and in cinematic paradigm where remakes & sequels absolutely dominate the industry, it is frequently the only solution available.

Of course coming up with new roles is a superior solution, but that only makes things even more frustrating when hollywood white-washes those new roles, which is a big part of why Airbender's casting was so much worse then Thor's.

We all carry our baggage with us, and cultural baggage is no different. If a film comes out of Hollywood, it's going to carry with it America's racial baggage one way or another.

 

[Ursinedriver]

So according to Bob, embracing double standards is the only real way to treat our popular culture's derth of interesting or complex minority characters. So changing a Norse god's race was preferable to creating a new character who is black. Thor had an entire Earth-based realm that was set in modern day America, and yet it was less culturally diverse than Asgard.
This strikes me as a kind of racism in and of itself. It is as though you do not trust minorities or those who write them to create a new and unique character on their own, so you have to "gift" them characters who have already been created. You are allowing them to "prove" their racial equity only through the appropriation of another race's character. It's like if a black African chef wanted to prove his worth in a French kitchen, but rather than let him make his own recipe, gave him a recipe already perfected by a white French cook. This betrays an astounding amount of condescention on the part of anyone who argues this way.
Honestly, some characters can be changed and can benefit from said change in the long run. I think Spider-Man as a young black kid from Queens makes a lot of sense and could be interesting because this is the real world, and that character is set to reflect modern ideas and experience. A Norse god, however, seems to resist this change. Instead, we should be trying to create characters grounded in a racial identity, so "appropriation" instead becomes "creation."

Oh my God....Someone actually agrees with me.
But you must remember according to our society it is not okay to be proud to be Caucasian, Where there is a Black History Month, Asian/Pacific Month, Latin Week/month.... there does not exist anything for us.

That is because every day that isn't especially set aside for a "them" is assumed to be for "us." This is another kind of insane condescention, because instead of saying "We celebrate everyone all the time" we are basically gifting time, time which has no master, to a people we feel bad for. We are claiming to own months, to be able to mete out importance.
Racism does not just exist in violence and degradation. It also exists in condescention and lowered expectations.

Oh my god, can I Internet hug you? you just said what ive been thinking for years.

Also, I feel its worth noting that Thor was a ginger, but no one complains about making him blonde.

 

[DearFilm]

quote="Ursinedriver" post="6.282806.11126829"]

So according to Bob, embracing double standards is the only real way to treat our popular culture's derth of interesting or complex minority characters. So changing a Norse god's race was preferable to creating a new character who is black. Thor had an entire Earth-based realm that was set in modern day America, and yet it was less culturally diverse than Asgard.
This strikes me as a kind of racism in and of itself. It is as though you do not trust minorities or those who write them to create a new and unique character on their own, so you have to "gift" them characters who have already been created. You are allowing them to "prove" their racial equity only through the appropriation of another race's character. It's like if a black African chef wanted to prove his worth in a French kitchen, but rather than let him make his own recipe, gave him a recipe already perfected by a white French cook. This betrays an astounding amount of condescention on the part of anyone who argues this way.
Honestly, some characters can be changed and can benefit from said change in the long run. I think Spider-Man as a young black kid from Queens makes a lot of sense and could be interesting because this is the real world, and that character is set to reflect modern ideas and experience. A Norse god, however, seems to resist this change. Instead, we should be trying to create characters grounded in a racial identity, so "appropriation" instead becomes "creation."

Oh my God....Someone actually agrees with me.
But you must remember according to our society it is not okay to be proud to be Caucasian, Where there is a Black History Month, Asian/Pacific Month, Latin Week/month.... there does not exist anything for us.

That is because every day that isn't especially set aside for a "them" is assumed to be for "us." This is another kind of insane condescention, because instead of saying "We celebrate everyone all the time" we are basically gifting time, time which has no master, to a people we feel bad for. We are claiming to own months, to be able to mete out importance.
Racism does not just exist in violence and degradation. It also exists in condescention and lowered expectations.

Oh my god, can I Internet hug you? you just said what ive been thinking for years.

Also, I feel its worth noting that Thor was a ginger, but no one complains about making him blonde.[/quote]

I accept internet hugs readily. Most times I feel like I am just shouting into a maelstrom, so it is nice to know some people out there agree with me and my feeble, libertarian opinions.

 

[Fumbles]

My issue isn't that LIFES NOT FAIR ON ME CUS I'M WHITE. I'm not so foolish. However what I disagree with is the publics willingness to dismantle/misrepresent White cultures for private gains.

Well said. I however,would like to point out that whites receive less financial aid for college, when a person of a darker skin receives a scholarship over me (where I have the higher GPA) I call BS, which has happened to me several times... I alos would like to call out the qualifications of The ESA Game Design scholarship... You must be either a minority or female to recieve, what a fucking joke...

Are you accounting for income and parent contribution before you whine? If a FASFA-generated Student Aid Report is part of the determination process or income and parent contribution is otherwise taken into consideration, it makes sense that minorities would receive more financial aid than whites. Minorities (with the exception of Asians) have less income than whites and therefore have greater need for financial aid.

I for one, am an independent, I receive aid through FAFSA, and I would like to point out that some of the Scholarships at my university are not always based on financial needs, however I still get passed up by several other people with significantly lower GPAS.

I would also like to point out that Blacks and hispanics also have a significantly higher college fail/drop out rate. So those financial needs that were met were basically given for nothing if the student does not graduate college.

 

[Fumbles]

quote="Ursinedriver" post="6.282806.11126829"]

So according to Bob, embracing double standards is the only real way to treat our popular culture's derth of interesting or complex minority characters. So changing a Norse god's race was preferable to creating a new character who is black. Thor had an entire Earth-based realm that was set in modern day America, and yet it was less culturally diverse than Asgard.
This strikes me as a kind of racism in and of itself. It is as though you do not trust minorities or those who write them to create a new and unique character on their own, so you have to "gift" them characters who have already been created. You are allowing them to "prove" their racial equity only through the appropriation of another race's character. It's like if a black African chef wanted to prove his worth in a French kitchen, but rather than let him make his own recipe, gave him a recipe already perfected by a white French cook. This betrays an astounding amount of condescention on the part of anyone who argues this way.
Honestly, some characters can be changed and can benefit from said change in the long run. I think Spider-Man as a young black kid from Queens makes a lot of sense and could be interesting because this is the real world, and that character is set to reflect modern ideas and experience. A Norse god, however, seems to resist this change. Instead, we should be trying to create characters grounded in a racial identity, so "appropriation" instead becomes "creation."

Oh my God....Someone actually agrees with me.
But you must remember according to our society it is not okay to be proud to be Caucasian, Where there is a Black History Month, Asian/Pacific Month, Latin Week/month.... there does not exist anything for us.

That is because every day that isn't especially set aside for a "them" is assumed to be for "us." This is another kind of insane condescention, because instead of saying "We celebrate everyone all the time" we are basically gifting time, time which has no master, to a people we feel bad for. We are claiming to own months, to be able to mete out importance.
Racism does not just exist in violence and degradation. It also exists in condescention and lowered expectations.

Oh my god, can I Internet hug you? you just said what ive been thinking for years.

Also, I feel its worth noting that Thor was a ginger, but no one complains about making him blonde.

I accept internet hugs readily. Most times I feel like I am just shouting into a maelstrom, so it is nice to know some people out there agree with me and my feeble, libertarian opinions.[/quote]

I'll give a cookie too.

 

[magnuslion]

So, first off: Idris Elba rocked as Heimdall. I cannot think of any other actor who could have come across as so eerie, distant, and otherworldly. That having been said: The sins of the fathers should not be paid for by the sons. I do not see an issue with Elba playing Heimdall, but I do not think it should be made an issue of race. He is a great actor and was epic in the part, but the idea that it is a matter of paying for racial injustices is invalid. I have not ever enslaved anyone, or sold anyone into slavery. One of the ugly things we do not like to look at is that african people sold other african people to whites. It does not justify slavery, I am not saying that, at all. But the issues of racial injustices of the past are NOT OUR FAULT OR PROBLEM. and its retarded to make it so. For Example, I am Jewish, and lost what would have been most of my family in WW2. I don't hate Germans. I don't complain bitterly every time a German succeeds at anything. as a race, ((humans)) we must move above and beyond this kind of thinking, or we are never going to get anywhere.

 

[DearFilm]

So according to Bob, embracing double standards is the only real way to treat our popular culture's derth of interesting or complex minority characters. So changing a Norse god's race was preferable to creating a new character who is black. Thor had an entire Earth-based realm that was set in modern day America, and yet it was less culturally diverse than Asgard.
This strikes me as a kind of racism in and of itself. It is as though you do not trust minorities or those who write them to create a new and unique character on their own, so you have to "gift" them characters who have already been created. You are allowing them to "prove" their racial equity only through the appropriation of another race's character. It's like if a black African chef wanted to prove his worth in a French kitchen, but rather than let him make his own recipe, gave him a recipe already perfected by a white French cook. This betrays an astounding amount of condescention on the part of anyone who argues this way.
Honestly, some characters can be changed and can benefit from said change in the long run. I think Spider-Man as a young black kid from Queens makes a lot of sense and could be interesting because this is the real world, and that character is set to reflect modern ideas and experience. A Norse god, however, seems to resist this change. Instead, we should be trying to create characters grounded in a racial identity, so "appropriation" instead becomes "creation."

Oh my God....Someone actually agrees with me.
But you must remember according to our society it is not okay to be proud to be Caucasian, Where there is a Black History Month, Asian/Pacific Month, Latin Week/month.... there does not exist anything for us.

That is because every day that isn't especially set aside for a "them" is assumed to be for "us." This is another kind of insane condescention, because instead of saying "We celebrate everyone all the time" we are basically gifting time, time which has no master, to a people we feel bad for. We are claiming to own months, to be able to mete out importance.
Racism does not just exist in violence and degradation. It also exists in condescention and lowered expectations.

Oh my god, can I Internet hug you? you just said what ive been thinking for years.

Also, I feel its worth noting that Thor was a ginger, but no one complains about making him blonde.

I accept internet hugs readily. Most times I feel like I am just shouting into a maelstrom, so it is nice to know some people out there agree with me and my feeble, libertarian opinions.[/quote]

I'll give a cookie too.[/quote]

Fantastic. It's good to have friends. And cookies. And hugs.

 

[Animyr]

So, in Bob's opinion, its better for a black guy to rob a white guy than the other way arround, and two wrongs make a right.

I agree with the last part, but please don't strawman Bob's point. This is about movie casting, not life and death.

I try to avoid double standards, for exactly for the reasons bob stated I'm personally willing to let the Hiemdall stuff slide. Though if you ask me, whether they're a good actor matters more no matter the race. From what I've heard, The Last Airbender's greatest flaw was that it sucked, not that the leads turned white.

 

[Oskamunda]

Warning, long post.

I suppose I should begin by stating that Political Correctness is a disease for which we should all be forceably inoculated. This isn't to say that a modicum of politeness and recognition of social, ethnic, religious, gender, and financial barriers shouldn't be addressed, it's just to say that PC isn't the way to address them. All political correctness does is further compartmentalize an already segregated populace, and all for the intent to keep them from integrating; integration of the massive middle class in America (or anywhere in the world), from whence most of the energy in the system is created and cultivated, may lead to like-mindedness...and that may lead to change and a stabilizing redistribution of wealth! (Uh-oh, he used a scary phrase usually associated with Communism and Socialism, and since hardly anyone will recognize they've been victimized by the Fallacy of Composition, it will be impossible to slog through the propaganda mire to see that redistribution of wealth is a necessary factor of a successful economy of size...which, incidentally, would be Ad Hominem)

Nowadays, everyone is Caucasian American, or African American, or American of Hispanic Descent, or Native American...why can't we all just be Americans? Using the proclivity of human beings to need pride-centric self-identification only restricts that sense of National Identity which could be one of the first steps in truly castrating racial iniquities. Not to mention that this segregation works double-time when it's tied to an accident of birth that no rational human could ever claim as a source of pride. There is evidence, however, that some people are starting to get it, and that's good; there seems to be a movement starting to shift back to "black" from "African American" after the realization that it's been many, many generations since the boats. Still, not referring to one by skin tone alone would be best (there are always value judgments that go along with such pre-generalizations: Blacks are more violent, Hispanics are wife beaters, Italians are mobsters, Jews are money mongers, Whites are greedy and ignorant and racist, Arabs are terrorists...these things activate subconscious barriers to communication. It sucks, but it happens, from all that repetition in our upbringings...in fact, I would posit that they only appropriate setting one could use race as an identifier would be this: Bill is at a nightclub, and is the only white man in the club. Grant is supposed to meet Bill, but doesn't yet know what he looks like. Grant asks the barkeep, who responds, "That honkey over there in the corner."), but it's a step in the right direction.

That's it for PC, now my serious question:

Bob, when did you start aping Yahtzee, and can you stop, please? Yahtzee's delivery only works because he is self-depricating enough to not come off as a self-righteous pissant who thinks he knows everything. Oh, yeah, and because he only talks about games, not actually important social issues the world 'round.

Which brings me to the last bit. It's not that your statements are opinions, Bob; that's no problem. After all, The Big Picture is an op-ed series. It's that you're opinionated, which is a different thing entirely. If your conclusions weren't defined by your opinions, you'd get a lot less backlash. To date, every single episode would be thrown out of any serious debate because they all suffer from Argumentum ad Verecundiam and Straw Man fallacies, only to name the big two. Try forming a supposition, working through it with logic and reason (and I don't mean what people consider to be logic or reason, I mean actual, formal, textbook logic and reason), and then basing your opinion on the conclusion at which you arrive.

CRAZY, I KNOW!

 

[JDKJ]

My issue isn't that LIFES NOT FAIR ON ME CUS I'M WHITE. I'm not so foolish. However what I disagree with is the publics willingness to dismantle/misrepresent White cultures for private gains.

Well said. I however,would like to point out that whites receive less financial aid for college, when a person of a darker skin receives a scholarship over me (where I have the higher GPA) I call BS, which has happened to me several times... I alos would like to call out the qualifications of The ESA Game Design scholarship... You must be either a minority or female to recieve, what a fucking joke...

Are you accounting for income and parent contribution before you whine? If a FASFA-generated Student Aid Report is part of the determination process or income and parent contribution is otherwise taken into consideration, it makes sense that minorities would receive more financial aid than whites. Minorities (with the exception of Asians) have less income than whites and therefore have greater need for financial aid.

I for one, am an independent, I receive aid through FAFSA, and I would like to point out that some of the Scholarships at my university are not always based on financial needs, however I still get passed up by several other people with significantly lower GPAS.

I would also like to point out that Blacks and hispanics also have a significantly higher college fail/drop out rate. So those financial needs that were met were basically given for nothing if the student does not graduate college.

Are GPAs the begin all and end all of the analysis? It usually isn't -- nor should it be. Is your 3.5 in English worth as much as my 3.0 in Physics? I don't think so. Moreover, any well-determined application process should consider atmospherics that don't always reflect themselves in a GPA. For example, should the inner-city, single mother of two children who had to work two jobs to support herself and her two children and nevertheless managed to graduate high school be considered on an equal footing as the kid who sat around all day, picking at pimples and living off the fat of his parents? I don't think so.

Perhaps your lack of sophistication in presenting a compelling argument that recognizes and accounts for the nuances of a situation is what hinders your success in the scholarship application process more so than the competition.

 

[TheSchaef]

So I was just dropping in to see if Bob has yet conceded to the mass of requests and agreed to do a Pizza Cats episode.

 

[RanceJustice]

I've heard the argument Bob is making before and feel it is predicated on false pretenses and actually does more harm to the population that it is intended to "help".

A little background on my perspective: I'm a "white-ish" American. I have some Japanese ancestry, but it manifests in a relatively subtle ways like eye shape and skin/hair undertones. I typically check the "other" or similar box when listing heritage, but if its not there, I'll go with Caucasian.

Since Bob made his point rather quickly, I'll do the same and do the exposition later. Injustice or inequality in the past doesn't justify injustice or inequality today, stop blaming slavery and reducing the issue to a "white vs nonwhite issue", institutionalized discrimination has been remedied in the past 50 years, and acting like this will only foster more racism in the future.

Now that the TL;DR set is finished, some exposition.

Lets start with "Thor" itself and examine the issue of the role at hand. If we're going to champion equality, then either ALL mythos should be open to interpretation or none of it should be. "Thor" is based on Norse legend and the people who created these religious figures did so in their own image - exclusively white. Heimdall is not just a race neutral character, "whiteness" is written into it. Diverging from this offers a choice - either we accept that any actor can be chosen for any role and "reinterpretations" are valid, or we don't. If we accept that a black Norse God is viable, we should also be willing to give a white Kunta Kinte a chance - but we don't. A hip-hop reworking of Shakespeare's work is consistently called "daring and fresh", but could you imagine the outrage that would be sparked if a race-reversed Roots was made? The very same people that say "Get with the times, why can't we have a rapping Othello" would rage about "They're stealing our culture! They're polluting a powerful black film!" (Related: Inner city non-whites who lament whites who are "stealing" their culture, yet constantly borrow and express extreme interest in caricatures of Asian culture - Afro Samurai etc...). Bob supposes this double standard is fine, but if we value equality it simply isn't permissible. More on that later.

Before I diverge from film/media to a larger philosophical perspective, I'd like to address what Bob said about "Tyler Perry" actors. The supposition that each one of them is being held back by "The Man" is laughable. This isn't the 20's any longer, non-white actors have a plethora of roles available, both for roles that are written with a certain ethnicity in mind, and those that are not. The uncomfortable truth is that stereotypical roles are MONEY. For the same reason that Nick Cage takes whatever shitfest will pay for the solid gold pyramid he built in his back yard, some non-white actors are willing to play stereotypes because there is a large market for it. Those Tyler Perry movies aren't popular because its the only place black people can go to see those of their own race in cinema, but rather because a certain subset of (predominantly black) audience really, really likes Tyler Perry movies. Also, lets not forget that just like whites, there are a lot of character actors - sometimes a guy plays a gangbanger or a fat computer nerd because that's their appearance and/or range. Every actor in a stereotypical or "light" role isn't a master of the craft who would have a spot in the Royal Shakespeare company if only given a chance. Propagating the whole "The Man is keeping them down" thing is ignorant, especially within the realm of cinema.

Now onto the larger discussion at hand. Bob postulates that having these double standards is viable and fair, largely because of slavery and past injustices. I contend it does more harm than good. This logic simply continues the cycle and fosters racism. Yes, there was a period in history where Western Europe's colonial oppression and racism negatively affected many peoples, but lets not pretend that everyone was living in harmony before evil whitey came and started taking slaves - rarely is it taught that much of the slave trade was sparked by Africans selling other Africans they took as slaves to Europeans, who paid a lot better with exotic goods from the "developed" world of the time.

Over time, we've made a lot of progress in eliminating institutional racism - Jim Crow and the like have been gone for over 50 years. There are generations of people of "minority" races born today that have never suffered from /institutionalized/ discrimination. Note that anyone, regardless of race can be discriminated against by an individual bigot. You'll never be able to quell it completely no more than you can create a society devoid of obnoxious assholes, but you can minimize it through ensuring there is no institution that rewards such bigotry. Part of doing so is eliminating a victim complex where the temporal, yet very real, misfortunes of a group of people is etched into society permanently as a scapegoat and shield of sorts against all future criticism. Since I'm already in my flame-retardant suit, I'll invoke "the big one" and speak of Israeli policy. There are elements in the Israeli government who counter any criticism about their unlawful settlements and extreme use of force with "REMEMBER THE HOLOCAUST", which is echoed here in the USA by AIPAC lobbyists who state that Israel and Jewish people as a whole are generally beyond reproach because of the injustice they suffered during Nazi Germany's reign. This kind of blatant exploitation is paramount to exploiting tragedy and hardship suffered by others tangentially related to oneself, to get one's way through a trump card; changing the argument from whatever its really about to a culturally sensitive issue.

There are many people today who claim they wish "equality" but what they really are looking for is "My turn on top and to punish the people who were previously on top". This is the crux of the issue. These double standards only harm in the long run. Nobody wants to hear that some of the only racial/gender discrimination that is still institutionalized as well as implicitly allowed, is against white males. In the past 20 years, those of us growing up in a world that for all intents and purposes has equality before the law in terms of race, but due to a misguided attempt to inform about past injustice, a present one is created. I can remember throughout secondary school, besides the typical classes present, there was a huge push to provide "diverse" literature. Normally this would be a good thing, but the implementation was nigh exclusively stories of non-whites struggling against brutal oppression, often caused by whites. This is a common theme in media today and especially compounded by tales handed down from older generations of non-whites, who may have experienced institutionalized discrimination, sets up prejudice in a younger generation against their peers.

A good place to see this is in collegiate quotas and scholarships - "generic American" White males have to compete for a relatively small amount of merit-only and need-based scholarships, while other backgrounds are not only often given preference in financial need-based programs, but have special programs and scholarships exclusively for them. Compound this with college quotas and desires to be "diverse" and you have a considerable hardship on the vast majority of white males, because of the baseless belief that all white people are wealthy enough to pay for college on their own. I've personally been affected by this in a major way. I attended a Top 5 college for my program of study and was awarded the highest merit scholarship available. It came with full tuition, room/board etc...a true full ride plus a stipend and special exclusive seminars and leadership/networking conferences. When I showed up to the orientation, I noticed something wasn't quite right - Myself and an Asian fellow were standing around looking a little perplexed. We were soon taken aside and told that a mistake had been made and that this scholarship was only available to Black, Hispanic, and American Indian students, or other "disadvantaged" minorities In deference to the mistake, we were both given the highest academic scholarship, but that only included full tuition leaving us to pay for everything else out of pocket. Is this really fair and egalitarian?

While I'm well aware that there is a limited range of necessity for certain measures to compensate for shifts in policy accompanied with rectifying injustice, when it goes on forever it simply institutionalizes injustice against another party in a tacitly punitive way, often affecting those who weren't even alive to perpetrate nor reap the benefits of the original discrimination. Take for instance Affirmative Action - right after the Civil Rights movement, it was necessary to ensure Black Americans got past the bigotry in the workforce. However, 30+ years later, it serves only to give the unqualified jobs, which spawns enmity in others and creates the perception that "minorities" need an unequal playing field, which is a disservice to hardworking, competent non-whites. There is also the issue of using a policy sledgehammer to solve problems better adapted to a scalpel - we have laws in place to address discrimination, so we need to use them instead of simply painting with broad strokes. Some may say that the legacy of injustice in the past affects things today, but one can only go so far before it becomes a spurious claim that serves to profit by simplifying complex multifaceted issues into polarizing "Its all their fault, they need to pay" rhetoric.

In the long run, such attitudes actually lead to bigotry. How quickly those in the past felt to see others having preferential treatment while their own demographic was told they were unworthy. Doing so to the descendents of the original group only spurs hostility and prompts the cycle to renew. Today we're teaching our young white males that they're the cause of all the wrongs done to non-whites and thus they need to apologize for their ancestors, go out of their way to kowtown to others as reparation, and accept a lower standard of services; to do otherwise or seek true equality is "racist". Subjugating any group of people breeds resentment, nomatter the racial or gender paradigm, but there aren't enough level heads in society to realize this, over those that want "their turn on top". This attitude is illustrated in how many reply to "But now we're being discriminated against, how is that fair?" good "GOOD, now you know how it feels!" which is as despicable as it is erroneous.

With respect to the discussion just about media, I think there is enough room for both new interpretations and traditionalist approaches, however people should have the right to comment that adding a token black actor playing a Norse god isn't quite the same as a retelling of The Brothers Karamov with a Latino cast. That said, this discussion is more than just about movie casting, but if double standards benefiting certain demographics belong in a society that values equality. My opinion is a hearty "No", and that instead of swinging the pendulum to extremes of oppression from one side to the other, it should be stopped squarely at the midway point - equality - lest there be an eternal cycle of discrimination.

 

[AvsJoe]

619 comments in little over a day... controversial video ya got there Bob.

Here's my two cents, which, like in real life, is worth very little on a forum: Racism sucks and Idris Elba's performance was among the best things in the movie. Things worked out real well for Thor the film.