There is a mutiny afoot in the Sepia Mutiny bunker. About half of us think that Joel Stein’s piece published in Time on Edison NJ was ill-humored garbage. The other half thinks it’s RACIST ill-humored garbage. I’m of the camp that thinks it’s racist. In the past few days the Desi blogosphere, twitterverse and facebookdom have been in uproar over this piece but what I find the most striking is the debate – “Is it or isn’t it racist?” What is it about the “R” word that makes us recoil and run to words like “stereotype” “bigot” or “xenophobic”? Why are we scared to call things racist?
I thought the article “My Own Private India” was racist – but then again, I come at things from a Critical Race Theory perspective where racialization is an inherent part of our history and narrative. It permeates through every aspect of living in the U.S., whether in how public policies and laws are implemented, healthcare is accessed or in a simple Time satire article. I think a lot of things are racist, more so than the average brown person, whether it be internalized, institutional or blatant. I think implicit biases are real, and people can be racist without intentionally doing so.
But instead of dissecting the Stein piece again, I wanted to highlight another racially controversial piece in the news. Today is the official premier of the M. Night Shyamalan movie The Last Airbender. The movie is based on the Nickelodeon anime-styled cartoon series “Avatar: The Last Airbender,” which is a cartoon heavily influenced by East Asian philosophies, there’s martial arts in it, and the cartoons are brownish Asian looking kids. But the controversy has been around the casting process of the movie. White kids were cast as the main three roles, and the evil people? Why they were cast as the Desis: Dev Patel (as Prince Zuko), Summer Bishil (Princess Azula), Aasif Mandvi (Commander Zhao) and Persian actor Shaun Toub (Uncle Iroh). Question is, is it racist?
Floating World had a fantastic piece on their blog about the history of face painting in the industry, and the use of white people in the entertainment industry to play people of color.
…”The Last Airbender” offends even more [than “Prince of Persia”] with its casting of newcomer/lesser known White actors over equivalent Asian actors to portray its starring Asian characters. The marketing reasons attached to famous actors does not apply here; instead, the marketing assumption is that White actors are more “capable” than Asian actors for pulling in viewers, with a possible secondary assumption in their “superiority” in acting abilities. This overarching assumption is the basis for an institutionalized racism innate to Hollywood’s long, long history of ethnic narratives. [floatingworld]
The blog goes on to show the casting call flyer where it states, “Who we are looking for: Boys, Age 12 -15 – Caucasian or any other ethnicity.” From the get go, the studios are setting an implicit preference. If it really didn’t matter what ethnicity Aang was supposed to be cast, why did they bother to name it in the flyer at all? It goes on to argue the good vs. evil angle of the casting for the movie.
Perhaps the greatest offense that the “heroic” characters are portrayed by lily White actors while the “villainous” characters are portrayed dark-skinned Indian actors in lieu of the fact that all the characters have distinctly Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Indian and Inuit characteristics regardless of their “good” or “badness.” [floatingworld]
Good vs bad. White vs. Brown. If you watch the trailer – this is literally what it looks like – the good white characters are dressed up in light colored clothing and the dark evil characters are dressed up in dark and sinister clothing.
If the casting of the characters Aaang, Katara, and Sokka were so purposefully based on race blind casting – then how is it the casting of the evil characters just happened to be brown? In the cartoon version evil guy Zuko has a far lighter complexion than Sokka and Katara. Yet in this movie, Dev Patel is far darker than his cartoon counterpart. The people of the same tribe of Sokka and Katara are Native American and were cast with a distinctly East Asian/Native look to them, yet Sokka and Katara stand out in the tribe not looking at all like the tribe they are from.
Desi, please.
This purports my conceit that Paramount blatantly reinforces racism at the institutional level, driven by innately racist assumptions and an ethnocentric desire to bundle Eastern culture – rich in history and human stories – into a big old Yellowface bowtie. Make it as pretty and shiny and “Asian-y” as you want – in the end, this movie is racist and a disrespectful slap in the face of the Eastern heritage it so wishes to profit off of. [floatingworld]
The kicker to all of this is that the director of the film is M. Night Shayamalan, a South Asian American. He should know better. Fine, maybe it’s wrong of me to hold fellow South Asian Americans to higher standards. Fact of the matter is he cast brown males that looked like him as the evil-doers. And that alone says a lot.
So I’m calling it. I’m saying this movie version adaptation of The Last Airbender is racist. There was no outright hate speech said about one race to another. No name calling was had. But an event does not need to be outwardly explicit for racism to exist. When the studios chose to adapt an “Asian” cartoon and yellow-face the White cast, that was clearly an example of institutional racism. When they had an “open” casting call but chose White actors and actresses, it was a form of implicit bias towards White people. The casting of Asian Americans as secondary roles and backdrop was clearly a form of tokenism, or in other words, let’s cast people of color in lesser parts to make those protesters happy. Throw them a bone, give them a token. As for casting brown people as the evil fire-bending peoples, its clearly taking a stereotype and running with it. Finally, as much as it hurts me to say this, clearly Shyamalan has some internalized racism issues he has to deal with. Especially if he’s going to be influencing millions of people world wide with his movies.
Back to Stein’s piece. It was anti-immigrant, clearly a xenophobic piece. But was it racist? To me, yes it was racist. By virtue of it being a xenophobic piece, it was a racist piece. There was institutional racism with the way Time magazine let a piece like this through their filter and published. There was blatant stereotyping of the Desis living in Edison NJ, as well as the perpetuation of the model minority myth. Just because it was a satire didn’t give it a free pass to not be called racist – satires can be racist, too. Just because it was unintentional doesn’t give it a free pass, either. Our American history is wrought with unintentional racism.
Why does all this bug me? Why did I let the debate around one word affect me like this? Because, change needs to happen, now. We need to voice our dissent, now. We need to not shy away from words like “racism” and instead name it like we see it. Then move the dialogue forward. In the end, this may be a minor issue. The Last Airbender will be on the Blockbuster shelves within no time considering the reviews for the movie are that bad. Stein’s article will get lost in the recycling bin. In the end, these really are minor issues and we should be focusing on the bigger and badder fights out there. But I don’t just write on Sepia Mutiny because I like brown people. I write on Sepia Mutiny to tell the counter narrative of our South Asian American community. We are putting words in the form of a blog to narrate our community. These two incidents have had a profound affect on the South Asian American community, if only reminding us how the outside mainstream America perceives our community.
I’ll respect our differences. I understand that your definition of what is racist is different than my definition of racist. But I’m going to continue to call it like I see it. And promote the petition put out by SAALT to Time magazine. As well as personally boycott The Last Airbender and encourage others to do the same.
Don’t just take my word on not going to watch The Last Airbender. Angry Asian Man did just did a review on the movie, and his take away message? “You might not have to boycott this movie — it’s so bad, it could boycott itself.”
Things got heated on ANNA’s blog post on Stein’s piece. Let’s play nice in the comments here and have a fruitful dialogue.
Fine post, but the critical race theory perspective that you admit you take it the driver here. Why is racism the big baddie anyway? How about low wages? I’m from the Old Left, and find identity politics based on race alienating. I say that as a minority in a 90% white nation.
stein’s piece, while stylistically a failure, was more or less true. a lot of desis have his thoughts on their mind about the types of fobs you find in places like edison (i mean come on, have you ever been there?), but they just don’t vocalize them. stein did, and i think because he’s white, desis are flipping out about what he said. but would it be any different coming from a brown person? i know a lot of readers on this site are the hipster-ish “everyone is equal” type desis, but unfortunately their views are really the minority in comparison to the broader IA populace. it’s simply the case that a lot of the newer late 90s and 00s immigrants are more uncouth and fobby than the older generations. but it’s not racist…just a good kick in the ass.
Great post, Taz. It’s really well-written and persuasive.
I don’t find the Stein essay to be racist. It is a bigoted piece of crap from a guy who comments on trashy shows on VH-1, so one should not expect high art from an imbecile like him.
The casting of Airbender is a manifestation of the pattern of racism — and racial exclusion and racial characterization — that pervades media. The fact of the matter is that East Asian men are pretty much invisible in American media, and Asian American actors often have to move to Asia to get a break, even when they don;t speak Chinese or Korean (Daniel Henny and Edison Chen being prominent examples). Even on YouTube, where Asian Americans have been trying to get the media exposure that they never get on mainstream media, they are still marginalized. For example, there are many Asian women on YouTube with high if not the highest number of subscribers for channels such as makeup techniques and sketch comedy. However, the ones who get highlighted in Glamor or other magazines about “break through stars of YouTube” are always white girls/women or white men. The marginalization is blatant, harmful, and painful to watch unfold.
Airbender is an iconic anime, with its roots solidly in Asian animation, Asian philosophy, and Asian story arcs. The casting of such a central Asian narrative with white heroes is out and out racism.
This is not new. Even famous Asian actors — like Ken Watanabe — routinely get cast as villains (or stereotypical martial artists) in western movies. There is a lot of discussion within Asia — China, Hong Kong, and Japan — about this blatant racism, and many actors have openly talked about refusing to sign on to western movies because of the limited roles they are offered.
It is unfortunate that M. Night went this route of upholding typical Hollywood casting. But then I also don’t get why his projects keep getting greenlighted considering the crap he routinely produces…
Yes, there is institutionalized racism in Hollywood. THIS is the battle that we should be fighting.
A simple FAQ on Joel Stein’s “My Own Private India” http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1999416,00.html
Q: Is Joel Stein a racist? A: No, he is a bigot. Let’s use the colloquial understanding (rather than stale dictionary definition) of both terms to explain. Colloquially, we consider someone a racist when they harbor ill will towards people of color. They hold views of their own racial superiority. Instead, we may call someone a bigot when they demonstrate uninformed, ignorant opinions, often stereotyped in nature, of other races. They may be fine people otherwise, generally holding “charitable” view towards minorities, often trumpeting their liberal credentials. Nonetheless, they are not above demeaning racial stereotypes. Joel Stein fits into this category.
Q: But why not call him a racist?
We can exhaust ourselves over distinctions between bigotry, prejudice, and racism — and it is not necessarily the best use of our time. The worst place to turn is the dictionary because definitions offered for race-related terms rarely offer us practical wisdom into how these terms are actually used in society. As a practical matter, we will have more impact with our criticism of Stein if we describe his behavior as bigotry than as racism. Racism, for better or worse, has come to be used in more extreme incidents (incidents however disparate in nature from housing discrimination to dropping the N bomb). That being said, veering off into a semantic black hole over the academic difference of bigotry and racism is a serious tactical mistake.
Q: Was “My Own Private India” funny? A: Measuring something intangible and subjective like humor is for the most part, fruitless. Oh sure you could say that Chris Rock tends to be funnier than Sinbad or Dane Cook. But is there any point of debating whether or not Sinbad is funny? The good thing in this case is that whether or not Stein was funny is besides the point. We can discuss the merits of the stereotypes he used, independent of whether or not the content was humorous, well written, intelligent, etc.
Q: Why was Stein’s commentary bigoted or offensive? A: Criticism centers around his assertion that later Indian immigrants are more representative of all Indians as a people. He characterized them as stupid and perhaps their backwards nature explains why India is impoverished. Most would disagree that India’s poverty stems from the inherent stupidity of its people; some would trace it to colonialism and other factors.
Q: There was NOTHING bigoted or offensive about Stein’s piece. A: Denial is not argumentation. If you weren’t offended by certain speech, that doesn’t mean the piece isn’t offensive or bigoted. For example, you may simply be tone-deaf or conflict averse. Or you may be a math whiz who has the emotional intelligence of a lemur. People have described why Stein’s comments about Indian lack of intelligence leading to poverty are bigoted. They have explained how it is a demeaning stereotype based on an untruth and a simplistic generalization. If you disagree, as an adult would tell a child, use your words and explain why so. Telling people to “move on”, “grow up”, “stop being sensitive”, “stop making mountains over mole hills” are all intellectually challenged attempts to avoid debate.
Amen, Abhi.
And while we are at, let’s also talk about the sick exoticization of Asian women. And not just in Hollywood.
Anyone find creepy how the “hit” writers of color are all young, thin, pretty, with nice hair, and who make for sexy back cover pics? I’m talking Zadie Smith, Arundhati Roy, Monica Ali, Jhumpa Lahiri…
Where are all the brilliant but chubby (even fat), acnied, nerdy women writers of color with overbites, bad hair? How come they don’t get million dollar book deals?
How come white female writers come in all shapes and sizes, and the Asian ones are pretty and thin and sexy?
Why aren’t there Muslim editors or writers anywhere on NYTimes staff? How come even the Mideast senior correspondents are white — and never Arab? How come Slate or Salon or The Atlantic or the New Yorker has no writers or editors or even contributors of Muslim or even East Asian descent?
Why are certain groups of people routinely left out of decision-making positions? Who decides who gets heard, and why and how? The pattern is very clear.
THAT’S WHAT WE SHOULD BE RANTING ABOUT.
Is The Last Airbender racist, or was the casting process racist? If we phrase this question a different way: if Airbender grossed $80M domestic with white actors and $50M with asian actors, would it still be a racist decision? Perhaps. Interestingly, if purely unstatistical anecdotal evidence suggested that minorities are more willing to see white actors than actors of some other minority group – would be share in the blame?
Taz,
Regarding your comments on Stein.
While this is a meritorious question and its pursuit has academic value, I believe the practical effect of this will have us arguing to no end over linguistics. Even more important, in argument in the public sphere, very few others in the public domain have a background in Critical Race Theory. Having taken classes in feminism at UC Berkeley, I couldn’t help but notice how classmates managed to confuse those who never took the class over distinctions we understood but were not common to others. Therefore, I think it best we approach the terms, especially ‘racism’ and ‘bigotry’, primarily from the colloquial use of the terms. In the end we have to communicate to the public in language they understand; using words in the way they themselves use them and absent the more nuanced meanings they take on in academia.
Agreed. The minority or unmarked group also internalizes or justifies various forms of racism. In some cases, perhaps this explains why many minorities, when insulted or stereotyped, sometimes don’t see it as noteworthy or even racist.
Thank you. This closes an important escape hatch used by racists.
This is absolutely right. I feel like Sepia is a place where we can make sense out of these incidents and perhaps serve a thought leader when it comes to combating prejudice. I don’t understand at all the apathy, the indifference, or the rationalization.
I put my name on the petition. I wrote Time. Any action SepiaMutiny can coordinate would be brilliant.
Deep,
Forget about FOB’s versus non-Fob’s for a moment (or who’s a hipster and who isn’t). Actually forget about all of Stein’s piece except for – “In the 1990s, the not-as-brilliant merchants brought their even-less-bright cousins, and we started to understand why India is so damn poor.”
Is this statement true? Love to know what you think.
I think both Stein’s article & the Air bender movie are Racist. Can someone start that survey thing so that we can know how many of us think similarly. I saw the Cartoon ‘Avatar’ a year back. It is really nice, based on eastern philosophy. There it shows that imbalance of one of the basic elements can cause havoc (They will have earth, water, air & fire kingdoms). The characters were Asian in the cartoon. I was not happy when i heard that the hero of the ‘Air Bender’ is not an east-asian actor. Then me & my friends were praying that M does not screw up the movie. I guess he has done it as well 🙁 I still have to see the movie though, I can’t resist, I have been waiting from long time. (As per the cartoon, Prince Zuko will become good in the middle & helps Aang)
Aniime fanatic,
As you may know, Hollywood screen tests actors beforehand. Occasionally, a pilot will be arranged and tested on a small-scale. If the sample audience comes back with a poor score, that can influence whether or not the show is aired, and can cause the production to be scrapped or re-casted. My question: if in these preliminary tests, audiences come back with lower scores for Asian actors than for white actors, to what degree does this dynamic of racism lie with Hollywood and to what degree does it lie with….us?
Q: Is Joel Stein a racist?
let’s not assume anything about joel stein. for someone whose job is to write satire and make fun of other people and ideas, he’s nothing more than a satirist. a bad one, fine. but racist or bigot? let’s not jump to conclusions.
Q: Why was Stein’s commentary bigoted or offensive?
you clearly don’t understand what he was trying to get at by drawing a universal conclusion from a particular example. in the case of the article, it was about an entire populace being stupid because of a select subset of its people. that kind of statement in a satirical piece is meant to be funny. again, it might have been a bad attempt at humor, but that was the intention. so jagr, there’s your answer. don’t take anything at face value…
Q: There was NOTHING bigoted or offensive about Stein’s piece.
there really was nothing offensive about stein’s piece because it was, for the most part, true. and the truth hurts. which is why a lot of people are up in arms about his piece. and you think stein is an anomaly in pointing out the shortcomings of indians in today’s america? what about the guys who created chad and ranjit? people are onto something about indian people in this country and instead of getting all pissed about a commercial or article, we should probably try to correct our own flaws, just as many other immigrants have done in the past. until that happens, things aren’t always going to be pretty for indians in america. yes, i’m indian, so please don’t freak out.
and as for institutionalized racism in hollywood, well, isn’t it the case that dark = evil? wasn’t the movie 300 in a similar sort of controversy over this matter?
All must read this most awesomest response to Joel Stein:
http://thirdworldghettovampire.blogspot.com/2010/06/bring-injuns-home.html
without a doubt, the casting of this movie was racist. anyone who’s ever watched the wonderful tv show can tell you that; sokka and kitara are not as pale as their human counterparts.
more importantly, it’s a terrible movie. rotten tomatoes gives it a 6%. the onion AV club gave it a surprising F, which is really rare for them. if the casting had been intended to increase audience empathy with the main characters, it was a failed endeavor. given that twilight opens the same weekend, i doubt avatar will do well in the next few weeks.
Stein is a fool and a nobody. By writing this article, he guaranteed that all desis would read it. Pitifully few though we are, that probably increased his readership by a factor of ten or more. Don’t waste spittle on him, because soon Time magazine (and he clinging to it) will sink beneath the waves of history.
The bigger problem is that his obnoxious attitude is white America’s view of us, and it stands in the way of things we want. For example, we want admissions to good schools, so we work hard and score well. But then admissions officers decide that scores aren’t everything. Life experiences count, too. Real Americans think this is a ploy to keep them out of college, but it’s not. Admissions officers need only a few under-represented minorities for their whitewash. What they’re really reserving is space for all those delectable upper-middle class white kids who’ll donate profusely once they get out. That’s why Prop 209 in California was so unnerving. After it passed, the University of California became lopsidedly full of Asians. The admissions officers are still working hard to undo that one.
The answer, as always, is money. Bribery is legal in this country, as long as you do it right. Hell, we’re one of the richest and most educated minorities in the country. Buy a lot of politicians. Donate a university building or two. And since we’ve already started doing that, relax and be patient. They may never accept us, but they’ll always take our money. In the end, isn’t that kind of leverage what really matters?
A lot of words saying absolutely nothing. Judge bigotry by the content in the article. Stating that the bulk of Indians are so stupid as to justify and explain India’s poverty is one such bigoted statement, based on a lie (and ignorant of the effects of colonialism). Next.
I am drawing a conclusion from an example, yes. A particularly damning example. If the entire country is impoverished, we’re not talking about a subset are we? Doesn’t matter what the intention is. The rest of your post isn’t really worth addressing….
durr, that’s not what i was talking about. joel stein drew a universal conclusion (that indians as a populace are stupid) from a particular example (the indians in edison). you can’t do this under normal circumstances. but you can do it in the context that joel stein did because it’s so ridiculous it’s funny. fine, stein didn’t come across as funny because its hard to express the required emotion in print, but you should easily get the point. it’s like saying someone is an idiot for missing 1 question on the toughest 100 question exam ever created.
and i get the feeling a lot of people here haven’t even been to edison. i mean seriously, that place sucks. a lot of brown people avoid going there because it sucks so much. it’s crowded, it’s smelly, the people are rude, it’s impossible to drive there…it has all the negative attributes of india!
and also, stein isn’t really making fun of every indian out there. i really think he’s targeting the uncouth fob deep’preet-winder’s out there with xyz degree from xyz engineering college in india who literally run rampant in the apartment complexes of suburban new jersey. i doubt he really has an issue with the bobby jindals or kal penns of our community…
Deep- I don’t want to clutter the board with this. I don’t find your arguments persuasive; you may feel the same about mine. Leave it at that.
this is a blog, everyone is entitled to their opinion so long as the powers that be tolerate it, but i think i second the underlying sentiment expressed by abhi, fwiw: Yes, there is institutionalized racism in Hollywood. THIS is the battle that we should be fighting.
(i assume it was sarcasm)
Wow…I can’t believe you guys don’t see that we’re “other”-izing ourselves by getting all vindicative. Let’s face it…there is only one comment in the whole article that anyone is really taking issue with.
“In the 1990s, the not-as-brilliant merchants brought their even-less-bright cousins, and we started to understand why India is so damn poor.”
So in order to really take offence to this comment, you have to be operating with the assumption that all Indians are brilliant. How is that not prejudice/bigotry of a sort? NOONE has a right to comment on this article if they haven’t seen the east coast desi community. Seriously, we ain’t perfect. And comedians are supposed to say what we’re all thinking but never say out loud. I know loads of desi people that could’ve written that article. We’re all just mad because a Jewish guy wrote it.
Airbender isn’t anime. It was produced by Nickelodeon for Nickelodeon. It’s influenced and inspired strongly by anime and takes place in a fantasy setting of East Asia but the production crew was primarily American as were all the voice actors. Aside from the costumes, architecture, and the use of various styles of kung-fu there there isn’t much to pin it as being party to any particular Asian culture.
If anything it’s an Orientalist narrative that could only have been made in the USA. It’s more a distillation of an American view of a generalized “Asia.”
As for casting brownies as the “bad guys” being racist I don’t buy that. One of the things the Avatar cartoon was praised for was three dimensional characterization that was unusual for a show targeting such a young demographic. That includes making the “villains” sympathetic figures.
This was my response to Stein’s article:
I could swear I thought he was genuinely being funny till I read the last line! What the hell was TIME thinking publishing his crap?
And, what is this “Us and them†nonsense that Joel goes on about? The Indians living in Edison are just as American as he is!
Finally, I find it highly ironic that there is no way to comment on his article on the TIME website. They sure knew what hornets’ nest they were stirring up when they decided to approve that article.
Currybear wrote his own hilarious retort to the article: http://www.currybear.com/wordpress/?p=4619
Wow,
I agree with you that this the line you cited is the primary offense from the Stein piece. I guess I disagree with your response to it. I don’t assume Indians are all brilliant. I know enough fellow Indians to know we’re all over the map. What I object to here is that Stein seems to be saying this: early Indian immigrants were cream of the crop- we non-Indian Americans were fooled into thinking Indians were smart. When more and more Indians, came to the US, we found out the truth. The truth is that MOST Indians are in fact, stupid. And the reason I say most is that Stein’s deduction is that the reason India is poor is that India is actually filled primarily with these “even-less-bright cousins”. Were it not the case, apparently, India’s economic situation would be….well…more like America’s or Europe’s- which is what happens when a nation is filled with primarily “smart” white people. That is what is being said. That doesn’t even qualify as an interpretation.
We can argue forever about the rest of the piece. But I don’t think that matters. As you surmised, this particular quote is the problem. I think you really have to be unfocused or “creative” to assume he is saying anything but what I described here.
All the formal responses I have read to the Stein piece- Currybear’s and 3rd World Ghetto Vampire – are crap.
Currybear’s was an abject fail in every sense, but especially from a communications point of view. Long-winded, pointless (saying “we’re in Edison because of Manifest Destiny”, you know what you white people came up with, hur-hur), humilliating (saying “no we’re not stupid, we manage the local Dunkin Donuts” as a legitimate argument and not a joke), lame attempts at humor (saying “it’s like where’s Waldo but Waldo is an indian guy with money”; and “Do you think that an Indian man is going to throw a samosa in your eye like a ninja star?” How we can criticize Stein from the standpoint of being unfunny when this is best we have to offer is beyond me). Finally his recommended course of action to patronize Stein by asking Indians to tell him not be offended by the changes in his hometown — completely misinterprets Stein to be some old “out of it” white guy which he is not (except for the white part).
With more “brilliant” responses from the Indian community like this which strike the wrong tone (sycophantic yet petulant), the wrong angle (trying to critique this “satire” from a humor perspective while using lame gags), the wrong assessment of the author, and ultimately the wrong course of action for the community to take — a few more responses like this, we may as well all hang it up and call it a day. We’re through.
Actually, not all the official responses are poorly done. The SAALT response was effective. Why? It was crisp. It honed in on 1 particular weakness of Stein’s piece- the frivolous manner in which he joked at racial abuse of local Indians called them dotheads despite Dotbusters record of hate crime in NJ.
CurryBear and others review the entire Stein piece. We are not here to grade Mr. Stein’s work. He doesn’t give a rip and certainly doesn’t need humor critiques from those of us who aren’t exactly Richard Pryor. I don’t know what exactly the problem here is but does anyone understand communication? We don’t need to give Stein the benefit of the doubt. Find the most offensive aspect of his work, isolate it, and hang it around his neck. The entire debate should be about that; not mitigated by other not-so-defamatory other aspects of his column. If you’re an engineering nerd, and don’t recognize prejudice or understand how communication works, STFU. Seriously. You’re not helping by making a disjointed response that strikes all the wrong notes – from tone to substance (“i thought it was ok; just bad satire. then i read a little further and it made me queasy, then gassy, then apoplectic…blah blah blah”).
Poor Mr Stein is stuck in a day where he thought he was a happy bunny and longs for it now and I think his only conclusion for his current state of mind he would like to blame the growing Desi community. Racist? Who knows, but since 11th September attacks, accepted racism became a common practice. All I know are communities change time and time again, you just have to look at the east of London.
As far as the film goes, looks rubbish, No desi will have a full leading role until they see that some brown skin is going to get them the next billion.
And how comes there were no people of colour in the Fellowship in LOTR!!
Because they used them all up for the bad guys (Evil Dark Men of the East).
THANK YOU! We’re rapidly approaching the idiotic British use of the word “racism” to mean any act that’s simply offensive to anyone, whether it be nationalist, sectarian, sexist, homophobic, homosexist, classist/elitist, etc. Racism specifically means that your are either placing a particular race above all others OR that you’re specifically putting one below all others. (C)Overtness has little to do with it.
I think Joel Stein is a failed Sarah Silveman whose attempt at (specious?) bigot humor fell pitifully flat. I wouldn’t say he’s racist, but desis are justified in any hate for him.
Oh, and Shyamalan is dead to me. Period.
Joe Stein piece – stupid passive-aggressive babbling by a low-wattage writer.
Airbender and other hollywood shenanigans – racism. Another example is the movie – 21 – which is about the famous MIT card-counting blackjack team. A key chinese participant was replaced by a white person in the movie.
razib,
sarcastic or not, we’re all reacting to the things which irk us the most–the things to which we are exposed more frequently than credulous others whether by stated media consumption preference, lifestyle, work, etc. . I think it’s safe to say, most of the time, that rocket scientists consume media other than the Airbender cartoons. But is it also safe to say that such Rocketeers are unconcerned about not being able to suddenly shift careers, attend casting calls for, say, male romantic leads in a middling-budget rom-com, and get the role without having to do their best frazzled call-center employee impression or put up their own money?
In any case, the multi-culti animated original series is always available. It is gloriously untainted by the obsessive yet completely unimpressive director who brought us hits such as, “My Bones Are Weak/But Your’s Are Strong/Let’s be Frenemies” and “We Live In The Woods/Churning Butter/Run!!!!!”
Oh no she didn’t.
There was nothing inherently wrong about Stein’s article. He’s just another blowhard wanker who thinks he’s the next dave chappelle, and is clearly trying too hard. Some found him funny, I thought more misses than hits. But my main issue is with the context of the article. If it was a late-night post-excessive-marijuana-session entry at FunnyOrDie, it would’ve made more sense. But it was published in the fucking TIME magazine, you know, the Magazine for Very Serious People. They should’ve known better, especially if they want to stay relevant. Which they won’t. But that’s a story for another day.
This, on the other hand, is a goddamn movie. Of course Hollywood has it’s biases. Bias for white people, bias for good looking people, bias for skinny people. It’s the showbiz, for crying out loud. I just cannot take you seriously on that one.
You need to pick your battles. You can’t get riled up over a movie because the villian cast was too brown. Sticks and stone, darling.
Also, the spoof of The Last Airbender pretty much titles itself: The Last Windbreaker. Bring your vuvuzela for full surround sound.
I suspect I’m fighting a losing battle against all of my angry colleagues here, but…
1) It would be one thing if he went with an all-white cast. But that’s not what he did here. He gave prominent roles to two up-and-coming desi actors.
2) Also, Prince Zuko joins the good guys later in the series. So it’s not quite right to say that the bad guys in Shyamalan’s version are brown. A lot of people who are criticizing this choice clearly haven’t seen the cartoon.
I wouldn’t be surprised if playing a “bad guy” (in this case, a complex one) was something Dev Patel specifically wanted. After being such a sweetie in Slumdog Millionaire, he has to work hard not to get typecast. If he doesn’t change up with his second big role, he’ll be forgotten by casting agents (might already be too late).
3) I want to reiterate what someone else said — this is an American cartoon series, scripted by American writers for an American network only. The setting is vaguely Asian, but the country is not specified. Thus, the ethnic authenticity issue is irrelevant.
I’m still taking my kid to see this. He loves the cartoon (as do I). I suspect it will be better than the reviews are allowing, especially from the kid point of view. Grown-up film reviewers tend to favor movies that have in-jokes thrown in for themselves.
OzzieDesi,
If you’re still here – why one at the expense of the other? Material inequity is #1, but addressing it alone won’t solve other inequalities.
There are several kinds of racism:
direct racism (harassment, abuse, bullying, namecalling) institutional racism (subconcious attitudes or bureaucratic inertia that leads to disproportionately negative outcomes for one group or another that reinforce preexisting disproprtionately negative outcomes for that group) structural racism (i don’t know how to define this).
Pick and choose as you will, but i think A problem with the R word is that people don’t bother to do the kind of separation I’m doing and that Taz did in the post. Another problem with it is that upper class people (including those that support institutional racism!) use claims of direct racism to bludgeon working class people with in our new multicultural elite. Without regard for anything except race.
For example, someone who has gone to an elite university might be able to mask or have a more polished kind of way of expressing racism than someone who has a 9th grade education, and then go on to call that second person a racist just becauset hey are OUTRAGED OUTRAGED all the while supporting all kinds of institutional and at times even direct racism or other forms of discrimination.
Okay, back to work.
They intersect, obviously. But this is part of a much bigger debate in the U.S. among nice people about how to reintroduce any sense of class politics into the united states and whether that will or must come at the expense of ‘identity’ politics (as if class can’t have identity markers or stereotypes or slurs attached to it and other identities can’t stand in for econmic issues). See Thomas Frank, Lisa Duggan, David Roediger, etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc.
What we are seeing right now, frighteningly, are the multicultural technocratic elitists on the one hand (coughcoughObamacoughcuoghClinton) and a huge space for opportunistic racist homophobic sexist a$$holes like glenn beck and sarah palin and the rest to exploit the unhappiness of the working class to generate thigns like anti-immigrant sentiment or race hatred or really anything else.
I am waiting for a Bollywood film that makes fun of Goras and their weird ideas about India. Karma Cola would be a good starting point, and all the jokes floating around in Gora-infested offices!
would like to reinforce what Amardeep wrote earlier: villain roles are the juiciest and most coveted of all among actors themselves. There is so much more ‘material’ for developing a character if they are mostly up to no good than if they are valiantly saving the day.
Amardeep,
how many of your colleagues, angry or not, have children?
This issue is being discussed right now in the Brian Lehrer Show, WNYC
http://beta.wnyc.org/shows/bl/2010/jul/01/your-anecdotal-census-middlesex-county/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=${feed}&utm_campaign=Feed:+${bl}+(${Brian+Lehrer})
The best piece I found on the whole episode is at Greatbong’s. He rightfully reveals the real villain in the episode: Time magazine’s commercial insecurities.
how many of your colleagues, angry or not, have children?
I’m pretty sure Melvin is a dad. And of course Amitava, though Amitava is right now a guest blogger, rather than a permanent fixture. But that’s it, in terms of active bloggers. (Sandhya, who used to do literary posts, is a mom, but she hasn’t blogged in a long time.)
Perhaps parenthood mellows you out a little on issues like these…
I agree with Amardeep here …
The series is an American creation based on the anime genre … The scriptwriters, voice actors, etc. are all american.
The airbenders were potrayed to be mixed-race nomadic tribes .. the lead (noah ringer) does look a bit asian …
The waterbenders were supposed to be iniuits and artic tribes … guess they didn’t do much wrong by casting caucasians as the brother-sister combo
The firebenders were supposed to be from south+central asia / east african regions … that explains the desis being cast in that role ..
The earth benders were supposed to be based on east-asian / south east asians ..
I think the film ended up casting for characters pretty well in the end .. the casting process was a clusterf*ck and the whole Ryan Cabrerra (or whoever) playing Prince Zuko was totally ridiculous .. but Dev Patel playing the part was pretty much in line with the actual series …
And … Zuko actually turns to the good side in the 2nd volume of the 4 volume series … His uncle Iroh is always portrayed as a good guy who is against fighting wars and capturing territories in a brute way … Just reacting without knowing the complete story doesn’t really do justice to the film series nor it does any justice to your method of analyzing things through the desi-goggles ..
@Amardeep: “American cartoon series, scripted by American writers for an American network only
This is really unfair. ANIME is a STYLE of animation, and irrespective of the country of origin, this show was very much something coveted for its ASIAN-STYLE animation. To say to that ANIME if made by an AMERICAN must only have WHITE LEAD ACTORS is really insulting, and you are making invisible again — and in a really nasty way — the ASIAN AMERICANS in this country.
Are Asian Americans not Americans? Are they all foreign? How can you say this Asian American boys and girls? Asian AMERICAN boys and girls, if I may emphasize. So tough luck for them? American shows must have white leads? Or, if ethnics are cast, only the hip and trendy ethnic (Hindu Indians at this point) will be cast?
I cannot believe you would make such a racist comment here.
The differences in reactions to Macacagate and Steingate are instructive. The first met with general expressions of outrage from most desis with ABDs in the forefront. Opinion is split in the latter case – with the split generally following the ABD/FOB identity faultline.
If one considers the identities of the ‘victims’ and ‘perpetrators’ in each of these incidents, the reactions become understandable.
Reason is but the handmaiden of passion (and justice is the bitch of identity.)
To “deep” and others assuming Edison is trash – have YOU ever been there in recent times, besides in your imagination of an imaginary ghetto? I live in New Jersey and work at NYC, and I find this whole assumption about Edison ridiculous!! – Many cities in NJ, and satellite cities of NYC, look exactly the same as “desi” Edison – narrow roads, houses/shops cramped together, tons of people walking everywhere. Maybe you find Edison more trashy than all these other areas because you are racist and don’t want to rub shoulders with “smelly dark and dangerous” Indians.
I drive up to Edison/Iselin/Oaktree so often these days, and I don’t see anybody dumping any trash anywhere. The roads/business areas are as clean as any other. Your talk about smell is simply bigotry – you’re not familiar with the smell of Indian spice and want to bad-mouth it, like many other Americans I know who can’t stand ethnic food. Smell is like taste, you idiot, just because you don’t like spices doesn’t mean its trash.
Yes, lots of Indians live in Edison, and it seems like that’s what you find offensive. Yes they look different, wear different clothes and speak with an accent. Your grandparents or whoever that were once “FOBs” looked exactly the same. Why don’t you renounce your family history and go live in Timbuktoo?
You’re offended that desis in Edison don’t assimilate. I suppose by that argument you want blacks in America not to braid their hair or wear loose clothes, you want them to assimilate and wear “prim and proper” coats and ties and speak “your” accent of English. This country was formed by ethnic populations. Even first generation Europeans speak with different accents and have different cultures, as do first generation Chinese in Chinatown, Koreans in Koreatown, Mexicans all over the country. Accents and food habits take a few generations to meld with the rest of the population, but it seems like only desi differences seem to bother you.
This country is a melting pot of cultures. Different cultures with different customs, food, clothes, accents – as long as they all follow the rule of law and provide value to the economy, they are as American as you are. And lastly, the Indian business community that you deride as indicators of poverty – yes they were poor, but they have scraped their way up by sheer hard work and business sense and networking. Yes they did not have the education you had all paid for, but they are way ahead in life experience. They are honest business folk who cater to a real market, so what makes that different from anything else?
It’s really pathetic to see this kind of victim mentality among posters here. Every person is racist to some degree, in that they are typically more comfortable with people who look like them, and share a common culture. Trying to eliminate this natural behavior is like trying to eliminate human nature and make us into machines who treat everyone equally. Most of your parents are likely quite “racist” under this kind of broad definition you guys are trying to apply. I’m sure they’d want you to discriminate in your choice of marriage partner and select someone who is of the same race/religion.
The only racism one needs to be opposed to is racism by law (like the laws banning miscegenation, and prohibiting equal legal rights for members of different races) and direct institutional racism (eg. “no blacks allowed, and explicit segregation etc) . In this sense, the only “racist” laws that remain are affirmative action laws, which are clearly racist.
Direct harassment due to race can easily be dealt with as a case of harassment in general (I don’t see why harassment due to race is any different than harassment due to political opinion, sexual orientation, or any other kind of harassment).
Some people here would scream “racist” when people simply prefer to hire members of their own ethnicity or people from their own families, which is simply silly. What will we have next, a requirement that every Armenian restaurant have at least one Turkish employee?
I’m sorry, but I find this vision of an “equal society” frighteningly similar to a police state. I’d prefer a paleoconservative/Rand Paul/Beck state to this any day – although I’d much rather have something in between. Make all races equal under the law, prohibit explicit racism, and as for the rest of the so-called “subtle racism”, the only solution is education and convincing people through discussion.
I don’t remember seeing any tentacles in Avatar. . .
Besides, neither Amardeep nor I were saying that because it’s made by Americans means it needs to have White leads. The point is that it’s a pretty American show so it’s actually not that surprising that a director wouldn’t think twice about casting White people in the lead roles. It’s not really good, but it’s not exactly the end of the world. The funny thing about anime, even from Japan, is that most of the characters actually look pretty white.
Also, where do you live where being a Hindu Indian is hip and trendy? I want to go to there. I’m not even sure being a Hindu Indian is “hip” in India. . .
A lot of Bollywood movies are also racist, especially the Hollywood remakes and martial arts movies which respectively use Indian actors instead of white and east Asian actors. The concept of building a product adapted to market tastes is of course not a concern in this business.
If you are referring to spiritual aspects of being HIndu, you would not care about being hip and trendy.