#279 - Icon totally relevant, holy shit.

[reileen]

From Kotaku: Suspect arrested for threatening to blow up Hudson

Metropolitan Police have arrested a 29-year-old man for threatening to blow up Japanese game maker Hudson. The suspect, Takao Ike of Kanagawa Prefecture, was apparently dissatisfied with the quality of Hudson's games.

From October 2008 to January 16 of this year, the suspect threatened Hudson 11 times, sending emails that said things like he was sending a bomb to the company that would kill everyone or demanding that 80 trillion yen be brought to JR Takamatsu Station.

JR Takamatsu Station is in Kanagawa Prefecture. The suspect worked part-time as a courier.

In a signed affidavit, the suspect admitted, "I did it because I posted my demands concerning the games, but the games didn't improve."

This is seriously too perfect to be real. I have to admit, I'm torn between "Protesting: URE DOIN IT RONG" and "Yeah, YOU GIVE THOSE LAZY SONS-OF-BITCHES AT HUDSON THE WHAT FOR!"

(Thanks to blackryuomega4 for bringing this to my attention!)

***

In other (less amusing) news, there's been some changes to the whitewashed casting of the live-action Avatar: The Last Airbender movie! Dev Patel is slated to star as Prince Zuko of the Fire Nation. Okay, so, great, we've got an Actor of Color...but he has to play the villain? When all of the heroes are white and the "ethnics" are only okay to show on-screen as background scenery? No. Just no. You fail at multiculturalism, Hollywood. I suppose it's just coincidence that Mr. Patel had the lead role on a little film called Slumdog Millionaire, right?

Also, Jessica Jade Andres (who?) is, according to this article, supposed to play "the Earth Kingdom's representative, Suki." Say what? She's going to play this chick?! (Also, what's up with that "Earth Kingdom's representative" deal? Kyoshi Island is considered Earth Kingdom, yes, but they didn't really have much connection to the big Earth Kingdom powerhouses of Omashu and Ba Sing Se.) (Also also, that article states that Shyamalan is planning a three-movie story arc. Oh my Gods, I weep to think of how he's going to end up butchering Toph's character. OH M. NIGHT SHYAMALAN NOOOOOOO) Just...ARGH.

Anyone who comes up to me and goes "Geez, there's just no pleasing you people, is there?" is going to get hexed nine times to Hades and back. Seriously, is it too much to ask for some fair - note the qualifier! - representation of people who look like me in popular media in this supposedly enlightened age that elected a black man to the office POTUS? It's not an issue of "political correctness" (STABBITY STAB I HATE THAT TERM, IT NEEDS TO DIE IN A FIRE AND THEN BE FROZEN IN ETERNITY IN JUDECCA) - it's an issue of respecting the diversity present in the world, and in the United States in particular since that's where this fuckover is happening.

-Reileen
I want everything back but you

Comments

[pinkpolarity.livejournal.com]

It's not an issue of "political correctness" (STABBITY STAB I HATE THAT TERM, IT NEEDS TO DIE IN A FIRE AND THEN BE FROZEN IN ETERNITY IN JUDECCA) - it's an issue of respecting the diversity present in the world, and in the United States in particular since that's where this fuckover is happening.

*applause* Yes, this.

BTW, I use "I'm not PC" as useful code for "I'm a jerk". It works, 99% of the time.

[reileen.livejournal.com]

The term "political correctness" has always bothered me, but I couldn't enunciate why until I saw someone on LJ who was commenting on the recent race fiasco in SF/F fandom who said that referring to matters of multiculturalism/diversity as "political correctness" made it seem like the issue of respect etc. was only the tool or whatever of political lobby groups, when it really should be just an issue of basic human decency. Surprise - not everyone in the world is like you! We all have different needs!

There's a lot of fail that's going on with that particular SF/F fiasco, but let me tell you, it's still been educational for me and it'll help out a bit in my current multiculturalism class, haha.

[vyctori.livejournal.com]

I despise when people complain about "political correctness." What, so treating your fellow human beings with basic respect is too much work? Seriously? I mean, really, these are the sorts of situations I usually see people using "political correctness":

A: So you're a homosexual?
B: That word has negative connotations to me--I'd really rather be called "gay."
A: OMGZ POLITICAL CORRECTNESS GONE MAD HELP HELP I'M BEING OPPRESSED BY A HOMOSEXUAL!!!1!one
B: ...

-_-;

Also, re: Avatar, I can't decide which was more offensive: When there were no actors of colour playing the characters, or now that there's one--a token dude playing the villain. Just--what the hell, movie-makers? I'm not even a fan of Avatar and I'm thinking about writing a letter to go "Dude, not cool."

At least the Bomberman guy threatening Hudson was kind of funny. The rest--uh, no.

[dantaron.livejournal.com]

I feel the need to play Devil's Advocate here. =P

a) If it's an issue of respecting the diversity present in the world, should Chinese/Korean/insert-your-nation-of-choice-here movies be forced to cast however many whites or whatever proportional to their demographics, for representation? Should they be not allowed to cast whites in the role of villain, to avoid furthering the British-oppressing-the-chinese stereotype? Should we avoid casting Germans and Russians as hyper-aggressive tanks incapable of emotion, as is another stereotype?
Just pointing out there may be a double standard here.

b) Hollywood, referring to the collective of movie-makers and such, are a private enterprise, and thus can do as they wish. If it was a government/public organization being paid for by the public then they would be obliged to have that kind of representation, but as this is a private corporation, they are not -forced- to: their movies should just be shunned by the people who care if they don't do so, which should be a good incentive.

c) In response to Vyctori's post, I think in that situation, originally "homosexual" was supposed to be the politically-correct term for "gay" (which was male-only), and thus they were probably just confused. =P

Personally, I have to facepalm at the Avatar thing here, as well. Considering if you're casting whites in the role of characters who were originally Asian, that's changing the story for whatever reason, and basically going out of your way to make it white, which is ignorant. Also, their excuse there that they were the best actors for the job? If the job was to play such and such a character who looked like this, they should have followed it. >_>

WABBIT SEASON! TEAL DEER SEASON! WABBIT SEASON!

[reileen.livejournal.com]

a) If it's an issue of respecting the diversity present in the world, should Chinese/Korean/insert-your-nation-of-choice-here movies be forced to cast however many whites or whatever proportional to their demographics, for representation? Should they be not allowed to cast whites in the role of villain, to avoid furthering the British-oppressing-the-chinese stereotype? Should we avoid casting Germans and Russians as hyper-aggressive tanks incapable of emotion, as is another stereotype?

To address the first part of your question, there's a reason why I specified the United States as the location in particular: because the same principle of representation I'm talking about doesn't apply in the same way to countries that have a strong(er?) history of being racially homogeneous. Unless in a couple of generations there's this growing minority of white otaku in Japan who are starting to assert their rights as a separate subculture of that country (the Gods help us all!), I wouldn't expect to see very many white people show up in live-action Japanese media. It's different in a place like America, whose very foundation lies in the fact of people immigrating from a bunch of different countries to this particular land. True, it was heavily skewed towards white Europeans, but we've come to a point in American history where we've now expanded it to all sorts of other countries whose descendants, of various generations, are starting to assert their right to exist and be acknowledged legitimately in America, both as Americans and as descendants of a non-American culture.

To address the second part of your question, the stereotype issue wouldn't be such a problem if we had more varied casting in the first place. What makes stereotypes problematic is that they're often the only portrayals People of Color get in mass media. If someone portrays a white person as being [insert negative quality here], white people can easily watch something else where they can find a more positive white role model. Minorities historically haven't had that same luxury.

b) Hollywood, referring to the collective of movie-makers and such, are a private enterprise, and thus can do as they wish. If it was a government/public organization being paid for by the public then they would be obliged to have that kind of representation, but as this is a private corporation, they are not -forced- to: their movies should just be shunned by the people who care if they don't do so, which should be a good incentive.

Well, I'm not advocating that the government step in and give Hollywood racial quotas to fill a la affirmative action, partially because I find that such a move wouldn't really be addressing the bigger issue.

The problem is convincing moviegoers not to give their money to Hollywood for reasons of racially-questionable casting. I've seen a lot of comments floating around regarding the Avatar movie casting along the lines of, "Oh, it's just a cartoon/movie, so STFU already!" No. The issue is so much more than that, and I believe that people who say that are ignoring/unaware of the larger cultural context of this. It is a rare example, in this day and age, of a media product (produced by two American white guys, even) that drew heavy inspiration from an Other culture (in this case, Asia and Inuit) in a culturally sensitive manner. Any stereotypes about Asians (for example, the Martial Arts Mentor, or hell, the whole thing with the fighting styles of the world of Avatar in general) are balanced out by the fact that there a bunch of characters in the world who are just regular people, who can't do martial arts, who are not stereotypes. They're just people.

(continuing in another comment because holy shit, I actually broke LJ's comment character limit for the first time!)

[reileen.livejournal.com]

It must also be noted, however, that they are specifically not white people. This is another side of the Avatar casting problem: the characters of that series are not coded as White. Not in their appearances, not in the way they dress, not in the world that they live in. The creators clearly took great pains to create a non-Euro-based fantasy world, both in terms of the physical environment and how the people look. So to plan a live-action adaptation where the main characters are all played by white actors is a slap in the face to this series - as well as to the People of Color who watch this series and can find positive role models who look like them. The Avatar casting is not "colorblind" casting (and the concept of "colorblindness" has its own internal issues anyway); this is whitewashed casting. I find it very hard to believe, to understate it, that Hollywood could not find any capable actors of color for these characters. Hollywood is in fucking California - that's got a huge-ass Asian population, from all sorts of Asian countries! There is an entire organization out there (The East West Players (http://www.eastwestplayers.org/)) that American actors of Asian/Pacific Islander descent can join to promote their work in dramatic media. You (general you) cannot seriously be telling me that all of these actors, never mind other actors unassociated with this group, were clearly not as talented as the white actors that Paramount chose? That is absolutely ridiculous, especially considering that at least two characters on the animated show (Prince Zuko and Uncle Iroh) are voiced by Asian-American voice actors. So, no, I don't buy the "colorblind casting" argument/defense one bit.

Long story short, Reileen has done a fair amount of reading on multiculturalism and issues of race not just for her HON301 class, but also from fandom (le gasp!), so now she needs to show everyone her learnings. (I'm fairly sure I'm preaching to the choir with you, but I just wanted to make you aware of a couple of finer points that you might not have known about.)

[dantaron.livejournal.com]

In regards to this particular reply, you repeated what I already said in my personal comment part. xD

"Personally, I have to facepalm at the Avatar thing here, as well. Considering if you're casting whites in the role of characters who were originally Asian, that's changing the story for whatever reason, and basically going out of your way to make it white, which is ignorant. Also, their excuse there that they were the best actors for the job? If the job was to play such and such a character who looked like this, they should have followed it. >_>"

Aka, whitewashing. =P In the particular example of Avatar, I know it's made of major fail. xD