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Post by aleksei on Mar 13, 2010 8:38:10 GMT -5
It's ridiculous how much I love talking about this, even while the flu is eating me alive...
A few points:
-Yes, your son should be treated as an individual, but to what extent will others outside your family do the same? I ask this because I am very very white and tall for a Chicano, and many would not suspect that I am of Mexican descent unless I told them. I ended up going to a boarding school in Massachusetts where they just assumed I spent traveling in Latin America because I spoke the language (there were like five self-identifying Latinos at the school). After college admission letters were sent out, students and faculty immediately played the race card when I was admitted to great schools, including some Ivies. It was not because I was smart or did well in school and athletics or could speak four languages that I was admitted, rather I was Latino and managed to 'make it' from whatever hole I came out of. I am still surprised by how many people (including faculty) pull the race card when judging my success. What I am suggesting through this anecdote is that being Latino or Asian or Black isn't a conscious decision, rather it is something created by those around you. Sometimes you don't have a choice as to whether or not you are put into a box.
-If I were straight, I would be married to a black woman right now. Yay interracial dating!
-I was suggesting by those numbers that the majority-minority paradigm is not an effective means by which we judge if something is acceptable or not. Say in 2050 whites do become a minority, should we allow non-whites (I suppose we shouldn't lump them all together, but...) to simply ignore whites from the media or simply reverse the roles we have today? As Brown vs. the Board of Education or Prop 8 has shown us, the majority cannot dictate what is right for everyone else.
-After reading Zero's article, I am taking a step back with the author's' augments and reconsidering my original positions.
-Finally, I want to thank you guys for being part of this discussion and writing thoughtful responses.
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Post by on Mar 14, 2010 23:33:10 GMT -5
-Finally, I want to thank you guys for being part of this discussion and writing thoughtful responses. This thread sucks and should not be so damn long. It's making me vomit slightly thinking about it. It's been done time and time again and honestly if you didn't want white people in entertainment then you should stop arguing when other races appear. Most of the games you get upset about when the topic comes up are created in Japan. Hell the US news outlets got involved when they realized the Japanese were selling merchandise involving African images, how do you expect them to embrace a minority when they get yelled at for displaying them how they feel like? Heres one of the kids books people freak out about: www.debito.org/chibikurosanbo.htmlWell they can't paint him black without public outcry. Also as a side note, the black population in Japan ask for it almost. They literally go all out for their role and the black people you see walking down the streets have afros or wear bandannas over their heads dressed like thugs. They like blackface and the world is offended by Mr. Popo still, so while the advertising industry still loves white people, black people are banned. Here, have a link to a prominent blog about Japan from a black person: Wait, I'll give you the link by giving you the tag line which you can google instead, Japan with an afro perspective! Yeah, he had images of himself infront of a laptop with an afro, so it's not too racist for Japanese game makers who only see black men in afros and thug getups to depict them as they are, obviously not normal. Besides that comment, I only see one of the XIII characters being white, the other have pink and silver hair. That's asian if you ask me. |
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Post by aleksei on Mar 15, 2010 12:27:24 GMT -5
"Also as a side note, the black population in Japan ask for it almost. They literally go all out for their role and the black people you see walking down the streets have afros or wear bandannas over their heads dressed like thugs."
Yeah, no. That's like saying rape victims deserved it because they wear short skirts.
"This thread sucks and should not be so damn long. It's making me vomit slightly thinking about it."
Also, stop being such a miser. Your act is getting old.
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Zero
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Post by Zero on Mar 15, 2010 14:36:50 GMT -5
There are very few black people in Japan, and all they really know about them is racial stereotypes. But you can't condem the Japanese for using stereotypical racial markers for people of African Descent when earlier in the topic certain people were arguing about the lack of stereotypical Japanese racial markers.  It's not right, but it's just the way society is. We clearly stereotype people in certain ways, so do the Japanese. Not saying it's ok, but it's just the way the world is. Regarding blacks in Japan, there really aren't that many but not all of them are horrible stereotypes. Some of them are actually quite popular. www.youtube.com/watch?v=JC6ov0ZqFesCrystal Kay Williams, her father was African-American and her Mother was Korean, but she was born in Japan. |
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Post by on Mar 15, 2010 14:50:58 GMT -5
"Also as a side note, the black population in Japan ask for it almost. They literally go all out for their role and the black people you see walking down the streets have afros or wear bandannas over their heads dressed like thugs." Yeah, no. That's like saying rape victims deserved it because they wear short skirts. "This thread sucks and should not be so damn long. It's making me vomit slightly thinking about it." Also, stop being such a miser. Your act is getting old. Stop being a wee lil' bitch and try to shrug it off because girls in short skirts- That comment is for another day. "The worst thing that I see are people who often try to play a role in order to look cool. Often I see Blacks (whether they are from the States, England, Nigeria, etc.) who strut around Japan with bandanas over their heads as if they are Tupac. If they normally dressed that way then I wouldn't have a problem, but 99% of them don't, but they do it because they know they will get more attention and may even be mistaken for a rapper or entertainer." Brandon, Ervin. "Gaijin to Kokujin: Being a Black Foreigner in Japan." Web Log post. Black Travels. Web. <www.blacktravels.com>. To Asian kids in Japan another one of these blogs by a black traveler likened seeing him to a child was like he was seeing a fucking unicorn. Outside of the packed cities and business centers you rarely see foreigners so when those living there finally get seen, boom, it is a stereotype they have to make since they aren't exactly going to come across a large varied group of individuals of that decent or travel to Chicago to do interviews, they already think everybody in the US carries a gun on themselves. |
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Zero
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Post by Zero on Mar 15, 2010 15:03:33 GMT -5
"Also as a side note, the black population in Japan ask for it almost. They literally go all out for their role and the black people you see walking down the streets have afros or wear bandannas over their heads dressed like thugs."
Yeah, no. That's like saying rape victims deserved it because they wear short skirts.
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That is also a horrible analogy to make. There is a difference between a country portraying black people as having Afros and walking around look gangsta when that is all they've seen, and raping a woman and claiming it was because she "wore a shirt skirt."
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Post by aleksei on Mar 15, 2010 15:24:19 GMT -5
Yeah, Zero, that's the point - they are both ridiculous assumptions.
I <3 you, Dan. Let's stop fighting and make love instead.
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Post by Malacai on Mar 16, 2010 9:36:51 GMT -5
Back to the game.
Having just started playing it. I have only associated one character (Snow) with being white. The lead character (Lightning) jumps out far more to me as some sort of eastern asian. Same with the two kids that are introduced in the beginning (I haven't gotten very far yet to know more). They may be light skinned, but of the first 5 main characters I saw, having only one come off at all white to me, was a little silly looking back over this article.
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Post by Anastasia on Mar 16, 2010 19:25:18 GMT -5
The author of the article in the first post is of Vietnamese ethnicity living in the United States. I think it's only because he lives in the United States that he even thinks that all those characters look like white people instead of asian. Sure, the difference in hair colour and eye colour don't help, but you have to think of anime in this case. Anime often has characters with hair and eye colours from every colour you can think of. These include yes, European hair colours such as blonde and lighter brown, but also blue and and pink and green. These vast array of colours is meant to differentiate the characters from an otherwise very homogenous looking face. Otherwise everyone would look the same. As for the huge eyes instead of smaller eyes? Todays "anime look" stems from the styles of Osamu Tezuka, who was pretty much just inspired by Disney cartoon characters that also have huge eyes. That, and well huge eyes are just more expressive. The difference with anime characters and video game characters is that with today's graphics you can definitely see more features in video game characters. Take a look at a japanese video game character in a recent game. Take a closer look at their faces, and if you have to, pretend they have black hair and darker eyes (heck use Photoshop if you must ). Honestly, to me, their facial features are much more asian than caucasian. Look at their eyes, the shapes of their faces, noses etc. Heck, I once met someone who I though looked just like Tidus from FFX. He wasn't white. He was asian with blonde hair. The fact is, whether you're caucasian or not, if you live in a largely caucasian community, you may tend to view faces that maybe somewhat of an ambiguous race (with light skin) as looking caucasian, even if the artist intended for them to be asian (especially when lighter hair and eye colours are used). Now, while I think this is understandable for manga and anime which really have very simple faces I think that this is kinda inexcusable for video games such as Final Fantasy which are three-dimensional and thus more detailed. If you tell me that Tidus or Rikku from FFX and Lightning from FFXIII look caucasian and not asian, you're clearly not looking hard enough and are just seeing what you want to see. Granted, to me, some pictures of Rikku etc make her look less asian than others ... Besides, a lot of people dye their hair these days and Japanese people are no exceptions. Once again, read this article! www.matt-thorn.com/mangagaku/faceoftheother.html |
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Zero
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Post by Zero on Mar 16, 2010 20:05:06 GMT -5
I can't remember where exactly I read it from but I remember reading somewhere that the whole 'big eyes' thing is meant to make the character appear more sympathetic to the viewers, something about baby's having big eyes or another and that triggering an emotional response on some level within human beings and that for that same reason, villains usually have smaller, beady, and less sympathetic eyes.
Can't remember where I read that, or if it's even true. But to hell with it.
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Post by on Mar 17, 2010 14:26:00 GMT -5
I can't remember where exactly I read it from but I remember reading somewhere that the whole 'big eyes' thing is meant to make the character appear more sympathetic to the viewers, something about baby's having big eyes or another and that triggering an emotional response on some level within human beings and that for that same reason, villains usually have smaller, beady, and less sympathetic eyes. Can't remember where I read that, or if it's even true. But to hell with it. The Japanese see the eyes as a gateway to the soul, this when anime first started the extremely pure and good people (Astro Boy & Sailor Moon are good examples) had very large eyes. Of course the styles been blended by now and I doubt they take this into account when making characters. I wrote a 12 page essay in 11th grade on the background and history of animation in Japan. =) |
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Post by nirvash on Mar 17, 2010 21:24:33 GMT -5
That is the gayest (I'm sure aleksei will agree with me) thing I have ever heard, Dan.
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Post by on Mar 17, 2010 23:46:32 GMT -5
Hey, it made up a good potion of my grade so I wrote on what I knew and got an A. Something like 348/350 pts.
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