I don't think anyone is making the opposing argument. Anyone? No?
The argument is that certain imagery (ex the women being dragged away) harken back to antiquated notions of racism.
RE5 a game where you spend the majority of your time (in single-player) playing as a white guy shooting black people in the head. There's a fictional justification (they're zombies in Africa!), but it's still racially insensitive and in bad taste. Were the people making it racist? I can't say, I don't know their intentions. But for an outside observer, it's not exactly crazy talk to think that the game is racist.
No, the racially insensitive thing is you thinking it's racially insensitive, instead of just one person shooting other people; not one white person shooting black people. Do you think it's racist when you play the black guy in San Andreas and shoot lots of white people?
Yeah, see, this comes up a lot. The "NO, JOHN. YOU ARE THE RACISTS!" argument just doesn't really work, because simply recognizing that "white dude comes to Africa and shoots lots and lots of violent black people that are portrayed as other" plugs into some historically racist images is not itself racist.
You and I know that the black dudes are violent and portrayed as other because they're fucking zombies, but that doesn't make it racist to point out that it resonates with imagery that has HISTORICALLY been produced from racist sentiment.
The first step to getting past racism is to stop thinking everything is racist.
You can shoot millions of white people and it's perfectly okay, but the second someone goes to Africa it's OMIGODRACIST?
White dude shooting black dude is not inherently racist at all.
And is not what any media outlet who has had the full version of the game has complained about.
Apparently there are scenes later in the game that aren't just 'perceptible as racist' but genuinely, full blown racial imagery. So I guess the KKK turn up or something.
I dont know.
I've not played the game.
So for now, let's stop with the assuming and wait for the full game release to pass judgment perhaps?
To be honest, I found that kind of annoying, since she's the only "good" African character we've seen thus far, and the rest seem to be realistically dark-skinned. Although one could argue that Capcom is just taking its cues from Hollywood movies (which the recent RE games have a lot of influence from), which I guess makes it more our fault, or at least our casting directors'.
Anyway, people on both side of the argument tend to be pretty retarded about the whole Resident Evil 5 thing. Let me see if I can't set the record straight:
A) Capcom is most likely not, and did not intend to be, racist. It's a Japanese company; they don't have the same history involving Africa that this country does. Or the same historical negative portrayals of blacks in various forms of media. Most Japanese people probably don't have enough exposure to black people to form any opinion on them, negative or positive. They were probably taken aback at the initial reaction of the first trailer for the game. I think they just wanted a unique setting for the next RE game, and settled on Africa for a number of reasons, partly because it can be an inherently fairly scary place.
It's reasonable if some people are made uncomfortable by the imagery in the game, even to the point of avoiding playing it for that reason. I see two reasons for this, at least in in this country. The first is the USA's history of forced importation and slavery of Africans, followed by decades of Jim Crow laws (the last of which weren't repealed until the 1960's) and discrimination, with correspondingly degrading portrayals of blacks in the popular media, and the philosophical justification that blacks were inherently savage and debased, and were better off with the strong hand of the white man to guide them. The second is the history of Africa itself, as a continent frequently plagued by violence and starvation, in particular the recent genocides in Rwanda and Darfur, in which hundreds of thousands of people died, in the former case mostly from being hacked to death by machetes. So, in that context, we have a fun action game which portrays a muscular, well-fed white man and his black but extremely light-skinned female partner with a British accent, mowing down hordes of dark-skinned, emaciated black people acting in a mindless and savage manner, often armed with machetes or similar implements, and who are not even at first glance obviously zombies. With next-gen, realistic graphics that make everyone look fairly close to real people, to boot. As I said, I don't really blame Capcom for this, but they inadvertently practically created the perfect storm of potentially offensive imagery. I played the demo myself, and occasionally felt slightly uncomfortable shooting one of the guys with no shirt on, because of flashbacks to things like To Kill a Mockingbird and the Rwandan genocide. It's not real of course, and there's no actual ethical issue involved, just personal associations regarding the imagery.
To the people who (constantly) bring up of the example of shooting Spanish villagers in RE4, they might have a point if there were some recent history of white Europeans brutally enslaving rural Spaniards or something, but any such conflicts are much farther in the past, and the villages in RE4 are more likely to bring up associations with B-horror movies set in Europe, which provides a different context. The most recent context for violence in Africa and involving people of African descent are rather different, especially in this country. I would expect similar problems if there were a game where you played a German soldier mowing down Jewish zombies in Poland. There's also the argument from ignorance, in which (usually fairly young) people say "well I'm not aware or only vaguely aware of history involving negative portrayals of blacks in the media, and it never occurred to me that the imagery was racist, so it shouldn't to anyone else". I can't entirely say it's a bad thing, it's probably a positive sign that our culture has moved far enough away from such things for the younger generation to be somewhat unaware of them, but your personal ignorance (in both senses) of American history and foreign conflict doesn't mean their effects aren't still being felt, especially since there are plenty of people alive today who lived through them. Knowledge of history can help us to avoid the mistakes of the past, although I agree that dwelling on it too much can have a negative effect as well. Just look at the middle east.
tl;dr- Capcom didn't mean to make a racist game, but that doesn't mean people are necessarily wrong for being bothered by the imagery in it. Capcom doesn't deserve any kind of boycott etc., although they might want to take the historical context of the countries they plan to release games in more seriously in the future. If you want to play the game, go ahead, it doesn't make you a racist (except against dirty zombies). If you don't want to play the game because the imagery bothers you, go ahead, it doesn't make you a whining reactionary who sees racism at the drop of a hat. Plus, the controls kind of suck.
I don't think anyone is making the opposing argument. Anyone? No?
The argument is that certain imagery (ex the women being dragged away) harken back to antiquated notions of racism.
I don't think anyone is making the opposing argument. Anyone? No?
The argument is that certain imagery (ex the women being dragged away) harken back to antiquated notions of racism.
Clint EastwoodMy baby's in there someplaceShe crawled right inRegistered Userregular
edited February 2009
So I hate to revive the retarded argument from the first bit of the thread but here are Tycho's thoughts on potential racism in the game. Apparently they got ahold of a preview build on Monday.
Playing the game does nothing to dilute the imagery people have found objectionable, the trailer wasn't out of context in any way - in fact I would say quite plainly that they go far beyond what you might have believed possible.
And for the record Meiz is a fucking moron, why do you people even bother responding to him?
Is the black guy a zombie? Because it's always OK to shoot zombies.
Always.
QFT. My only issue with this controversy is that it undermines the crucially important message that the unholy undead must be exterminated. Anyone or anything that inteferes with spreading this message is a damn dirty communist who hates America.
Modern Man on
Aetian Jupiter - 41 Gunslinger - The Old Republic
Rigorous Scholarship
So I hate to revive the retarded argument from the first bit of the thread but here are Tycho's thoughts on potential racism in the game. Apparently they got ahold of a preview build on Monday.
Playing the game does nothing to dilute the imagery people have found objectionable, the trailer wasn't out of context in any way - in fact I would say quite plainly that they go far beyond what you might have believed possible.
And for the record Meiz is a fucking moron, why do you people even bother responding to him?
You were taking a nap, so we weren't sure what to do.
So I hate to revive the retarded argument from the first bit of the thread but here are Tycho's thoughts on potential racism in the game. Apparently they got ahold of a preview build on Monday.
Playing the game does nothing to dilute the imagery people have found objectionable, the trailer wasn't out of context in any way - in fact I would say quite plainly that they go far beyond what you might have believed possible.
And for the record Meiz is a fucking moron, why do you people even bother responding to him?
You were taking a nap, so we weren't sure what to do.
So I hate to revive the retarded argument from the first bit of the thread but here are Tycho's thoughts on potential racism in the game. Apparently they got ahold of a preview build on Monday.
Playing the game does nothing to dilute the imagery people have found objectionable, the trailer wasn't out of context in any way - in fact I would say quite plainly that they go far beyond what you might have believed possible.
And for the record Meiz is a fucking moron, why do you people even bother responding to him?
How about for the record, you're a fucking stupid cunt that needs to shut up because nobody cares about your on the record tardish comments.
So I hate to revive the retarded argument from the first bit of the thread but here are Tycho's thoughts on potential racism in the game. Apparently they got ahold of a preview build on Monday.
Playing the game does nothing to dilute the imagery people have found objectionable, the trailer wasn't out of context in any way - in fact I would say quite plainly that they go far beyond what you might have believed possible.
And for the record Meiz is a fucking moron, why do you people even bother responding to him?
How about for the record, you're a fucking stupid cunt that needs to shut up because nobody cares about your on the record tardish comments.
You sure showed him
Dr.Funkenstein on
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Clint EastwoodMy baby's in there someplaceShe crawled right inRegistered Userregular
Posts
The argument is that certain imagery (ex the women being dragged away) harken back to antiquated notions of racism.
When you're not at work, do a search for Tokyo Breakfast on youtube.
The real answer, is they probably underestimated how much you'd blow it out of proportion due to your own stupidity.
White dude shooting black dude is not inherently racist at all.
And is not what any media outlet who has had the full version of the game has complained about.
Apparently there are scenes later in the game that aren't just 'perceptible as racist' but genuinely, full blown racial imagery. So I guess the KKK turn up or something.
I dont know.
I've not played the game.
So for now, let's stop with the assuming and wait for the full game release to pass judgment perhaps?
Anyway, people on both side of the argument tend to be pretty retarded about the whole Resident Evil 5 thing. Let me see if I can't set the record straight:
A) Capcom is most likely not, and did not intend to be, racist. It's a Japanese company; they don't have the same history involving Africa that this country does. Or the same historical negative portrayals of blacks in various forms of media. Most Japanese people probably don't have enough exposure to black people to form any opinion on them, negative or positive. They were probably taken aback at the initial reaction of the first trailer for the game. I think they just wanted a unique setting for the next RE game, and settled on Africa for a number of reasons, partly because it can be an inherently fairly scary place.
To the people who (constantly) bring up of the example of shooting Spanish villagers in RE4, they might have a point if there were some recent history of white Europeans brutally enslaving rural Spaniards or something, but any such conflicts are much farther in the past, and the villages in RE4 are more likely to bring up associations with B-horror movies set in Europe, which provides a different context. The most recent context for violence in Africa and involving people of African descent are rather different, especially in this country. I would expect similar problems if there were a game where you played a German soldier mowing down Jewish zombies in Poland. There's also the argument from ignorance, in which (usually fairly young) people say "well I'm not aware or only vaguely aware of history involving negative portrayals of blacks in the media, and it never occurred to me that the imagery was racist, so it shouldn't to anyone else". I can't entirely say it's a bad thing, it's probably a positive sign that our culture has moved far enough away from such things for the younger generation to be somewhat unaware of them, but your personal ignorance (in both senses) of American history and foreign conflict doesn't mean their effects aren't still being felt, especially since there are plenty of people alive today who lived through them. Knowledge of history can help us to avoid the mistakes of the past, although I agree that dwelling on it too much can have a negative effect as well. Just look at the middle east.
tl;dr- Capcom didn't mean to make a racist game, but that doesn't mean people are necessarily wrong for being bothered by the imagery in it. Capcom doesn't deserve any kind of boycott etc., although they might want to take the historical context of the countries they plan to release games in more seriously in the future. If you want to play the game, go ahead, it doesn't make you a racist (except against dirty zombies). If you don't want to play the game because the imagery bothers you, go ahead, it doesn't make you a whining reactionary who sees racism at the drop of a hat. Plus, the controls kind of suck.
Holy shiiiiiiiiiit
Women aren't a race, so I fail to see your point
Secret Satan 2013 Wishlist
What? Of course they are.
They're Batshitinsanians.
jim you are the best darkmagic around.
OMIN
DRAN
I've missed you so much d&d podcast, why did you leave me?
Race of self aware robots?
No?
Data maybe?
i know what you mean.
bring back the pa podcast. mike and jerry are hilarious when talking.
even bub?
"So what can you bring to Acquisitions Inc.?"
"I bring the might of Malora and the magic of the Fey Wild. I bring-"
"The Fey Wild?"
"Yes."
"And what is that? Is that like..."
"It's where the Fey live."
"Oh."
"It's magical. It's - humans can't see it."
PSN ID : DetectiveOlivaw | TWITTER | STEAM ID | NEVER FORGET
Those are just the rolls of his pants, Dumhri
What sort of roll will they make next?!
PSN ID : DetectiveOlivaw | TWITTER | STEAM ID | NEVER FORGET
Light's gonna pour out of his eyes and mouth like AAAARRRRHHHH
PSN ID : DetectiveOlivaw | TWITTER | STEAM ID | NEVER FORGET
And for the record Meiz is a fucking moron, why do you people even bother responding to him?
Rigorous Scholarship
Rigorous Scholarship
You were taking a nap, so we weren't sure what to do.
Kfft, indeed.
this time
How about for the record, you're a fucking stupid cunt that needs to shut up because nobody cares about your on the record tardish comments.
Quarrels for Tangerines
it's like i lit a signal or something.
You sure showed him