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GamerGate Explained!!! [locked]
 
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09/13/14, 05:42    Locked 01/04/16, 01:39
 
   
 
@Jargon

Here's an interesting question. Why do you think Hollywood would never allow it?

I know I'd personally be ok with it (but then we come back to me being told it doesn't matter what I'm ok or not okay with so let's forget that).
01/03/16, 07:15   
@Shadowlink

I need an explanation of the question. Are you asking why I think that is the case or what the reasons are behind that being the case?
01/03/16, 07:19   
@Jargon

Both I guess? I mean you can only really give me reasons that you *think* that it's the case, but if you think you have something a little more concrete, by all means.
01/03/16, 07:21   
@Shadowlink

Interesting that you never asked for evidence from any of the people in this thread suggesting that the studio wanted extra diversity.
01/03/16, 07:23   
@Jargon

I already mentioned that I didn't have any opinion either way on whether a quota was in place, and I also called out people who were complaining about Boyega's casting as being a result of a 'quota', but if it will make you happy:

JKR, what evidence do you have that there was a quota to fill?


In the meantime, Jargs I am legitimately curious as to your answer for my other question.
01/03/16, 07:27   
@Shadowlink Hyperbole and totally ignoring WHY this matters to my GF, and others. Hint: It has little to do with the pigment of the skin. You still haven't addressed why she should ignore her EXPERIENCES of what it means to participate in white dominated status quo culture that marginalizes people like her and just jump right into non-diverse media that clearly shows it isn't interested in challenging the status quo.

I suspect that you might think she doesn't actually experience sexism and racism though?

@Mr_Mustache Also hyperbole, who said anything about the ONLY characters someone can feel ANY attachment to? I think Finn is Shirley's favorite character from The Force Awakens, though I'd have to ask her to know for sure, and she definitely is not a black man.

There is no "typical Asian American", THAT'S MY POINT. Think of all of the characteristics you think Asian American women have. How many of those are based on ACTUAL, REAL Asian American women that you know versus what the media presents as Asian American women? I know a LOT of Asian American women (many of Shirley's friends, for instance) and there is no one, easily defined feature that they all have. You'd probably think most of them are "exceptions" but that is because you are basing your idea of what Asian women are on a stereotype, and stereotypes rarely reflect reality. No offense Stache but your continual insistence that stereotypes must be true based mostly on your exposure to media cliches is precisely one reason why this stuff matters to people. It leads to actual discrimination based on stereotypes.

Also Shirley loves all kinds of guys. White guys just happen to be dominant in the circles she runs in, so it's no surprise she ended up with one. Statistics.

Also Shirley loves Street Fighter II. In part because it is one of the few games she can hold her own against me in. But the face of Street Fighter is clearly Ryu. Chun-Li isn't in Smash for a reason.

@Jargon Oh god, the reaction to an all black Star Wars would be hilarious. Hell the reaction to an all-female Ghostbusters has been pretty hilarious and that's not a franchise people are as nuts about as Star Wars.

But yeah, you're right, it'd never happen. White is the default. And pretending that the white default is some artistic choice is disingenuous. People arguing for more diversity aren't arguing for artists to change their artistic visions as much as they are arguing for white to stop being the default in media.
01/03/16, 07:29   
Edited: 01/03/16, 07:33
@Zero

Well, you got me. I know no Asian women.

Except for the ones that I've known through the years, who have rich family attachments and a penchant for videogames.

HERE COMES A ZINGER: I WORK WITH A KOREAN GIRL. WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

EDIT- And I somehow completely neglected to mention that she just got engaged to a white guy. FOOLISH, SORRY.
01/03/16, 07:32   
Edited: 01/03/16, 07:34
Oh I forgot we're going to get into Mustache anecdotes here.

So basically you know a few Asians and have decided that you know enough about Asians to know that Shirley is some bizarre non-conforming Asian? Got it.
01/03/16, 07:34   
@Shadowlink

George Lucas has said that he tried for 20 years to get studios to make his Tuskegee Airmen movie and he says they wouldn't fund an all black movie. Which lines up with just how rare it is to see a big budget movie with few white characters.

As for why the studios do that, part of it is just not wanting to take risks since there are lots of successful blockbusters with mostly white casts to point to as a precedent. And they probably think that most movie goers aren't like you and won't be able to identify with an all black cast.
01/03/16, 07:35   
@Jargon Isn't it weird how white people always claim they don't care about race in casting decisions, yet studios know that casting decisions that don't cater to white people are a risky business?
01/03/16, 07:36   
@Zero

It's about as much hyperbole as your characterizations of my arguments are. And you still haven't told me what her experiences actually are, and why it has anything to do with the media she's consuming. Do that and we can have a concrete discussion.

@Jargon

George Lucas is worth over 5 billion dollars. He can fund his own movie if he cared that much.

But if as you said it's about risk and precedent and what movie goers will accept, then where is it that the real problem lies? Either among people to who this stuff matters, or among people who *think* it matters to other people.

So how do we go about dealing with that? I personally think that going on and on about how much it matters and making it a huge song and dance every time someone goes against the status quo is self-defeating in that goal.


But I also have another question that may explain at least part of the issue, and it relates to these quotes below:

Zero said:


But yeah, you're right, it'd never happen. White is the default. And pretending that the white default is some artistic choice is disingenuous. People arguing for more diversity aren't arguing for artists to change their artistic visions as much as they are arguing for white to stop being the default in media.

Also Shirley loves all kinds of guys. White guys just happen to be dominant in the circles she runs in, so it's no surprise she ended up with one. Statistics.

What do you guys think the breakdown of character ethnicity is in say...a Bollywood film? Or the Toho films? Or Chinese cinema?
01/03/16, 07:47   
@Shadowlink I explained how she continually experiences racism and sexism due to being Asian and a woman in white dominated culture, and how this makes her skeptical of white dominated media, understandably so because of how much white dominated media relies on cheap stereotypes when presenting Asian women, and how seeing creators that clearly care about diversity versus creators that clearly do not makes an impression on her as far as being interested in the media they produce, not to mention seeing it as a positive when creators are willing to create diverse characters that buck the stereotypes and present a more diverse representation of the culture she is a part of that often gets treated poorly in media.

But please white dude tell us again how none of this should matter. And planetary positions should.

Also we're clearly talking about Hollywood movies here so... nice try with the deflection.
01/03/16, 07:57   
Shadowlink said:


George Lucas is worth over 5 billion dollars. He can fund his own movie if he cared that much.

And what about the non-billionaires who want to make a mainstream movie with an all black cast?

I don't know enough about the movie industry in those countries to comment but I'm fairly sure the ethnic make up of those countries is not similar at all to the United States.

But I feel like you're changing the subject. The only thing I've commented on in this recent exchange is your position that people should shut up about representation in entertainment. And you now seem to be acknowledging that there are things that could be better. So how will changes be made if people aren't supposed to talk about what they think the problems are and how they can be solved? There's been a big change in terms of casts that are more representative of American society in the last decades and I'd guess that part of the reason is because people expressed their desire to see it and demonstrated that there is in fact an audience there.
01/03/16, 08:02   
@Zero

You know one non-conforming Asian, and you're assuming that no one else matches either. You also talk to a bunch of people online, who are already on this side of the fence. What do you expect to find by digging in the same sandboxes forever?

My videogame playing co-worker? I've never heard her once complain about anything women-wise in games. I do know that she's in love with anime though. Probably just some sort of weird coincidence.

Shadowlink said:
What do you guys think the breakdown of character ethnicity is in say...a Bollywood film? Or the Toho films? Or Chinese cinema?

Quiet you! You're making sennnnse.

BTW, Endhiran was awesome. Unfortunately, I watched the entire thing hoping there'd be some white people I could fully relate to, but alas..
01/03/16, 08:04   
@Zero

Stop telling me she 'experiences racism and sexism' and give me details of the actual examples. Then explain how that interacts specifically with the specific media she consumes.

Because all you're throwing at me right now is empty buzzwords and expecting me to nod along. No dice. If I was to tell you I'd experienced racism, you'd be asking for details as to what happened, not taking me at face value.

But by all means keep throwing out 'white dude' like an insult. It does wonders for your argument.


And my question was not a deflection, it highlights a perfectly rational reason for why in part the situation exists as it does. You're calling it a deflection because it takes away from your preferred narrative. Telling.
01/03/16, 08:06   
@Mr_Mustache

It speak volumes that you apparently think of China as Chinese, India as Indian and the United States as white.

Now that I think about it, I'd bet there are big representation problems within Bollywood and other country's film industries with respect to their own ethnic groups.
01/03/16, 08:14   
Edited: 01/03/16, 08:19
Jargon said:
@Mr_Mustache

It speak volumes that you apparently think of China as Chinese, India as Indian and the United States as white.

You guys just got done (for two pages) telling us that Hollywood is fully of white people movies..
01/03/16, 09:14   
@Mr_Mustache No I know plenty of "non-conforming" Asians, as I already stated above. And you have no idea who I talk to online, to be honest. But why would it matter? If there are a lot of people on "this side of the fence" that already shows your idea of one unifying Asian culture as false. Also I reject the idea that Asian have anything to conform to to begin with, that's your idea and you haven't provided any evidence that there is this one way most Asians act anyway.

Not that any of this is particularly relevant.

@Shadowlink It'd be a long list and she could tell you better than me, but offhand here is one example that comes up a lot... she often gets comments (much like ones Mustache is making RIGHT NOW) (sometimes it is convenient that he provides real world evidence of the things marginalized groups complain about) that show people that are part of the white male culture pigeon-holed her into certain stereotypes based on her gender and / or race, and often when she shows through her actions that their assumptions were not true, she gets "surprise" reactions. Sometimes with the person literally bringing up her gender or race while stating surprise, ie things like "Sorry, I thought Asians..." etc. This shit actually happens very frequently for many people who are part of marginalized groups, and not just in meaningless interactions either. Like, it happens at the academic level as well, which directly influences how she can proceed in her academic career.

And this is the open stuff too. There are things she has no proof for directly but feels she has experienced, like professors taking white men more seriously, something that there is evidence of a greater trend for, so I don't see any reason to doubt her there.

As for how this relates to her interest in media I've already told you like five times now. If you still don't get why many people in marginalized populations who are discriminated against regularly find it easier to connect to media that shows that the creators are actually interested in representing marginalized demographics as more than cheap cliches or erasing those demographics through omission, I really can't make it much more clear for you. She is constantly viewing media that carelessly does both of the above, either shows Asian women as cliches or erases them, and it turns her off from it. When she sees something that shows signs of doing better, like a project that has a strong and clear push for more diversity and / or better representation of marginalized demographics, she tends to be more interested. And before you guys jump to more conclusions, of course she is not an idiot and she knows that surface diversity does not mean that the actual final product will do a good job of representing anyone. But when it comes to INTEREST LEVELS, yes, it pushes her towards it more, and if it does a good job (she felt like The Force Awakens did a good job, for instance) it makes her feel more connected to the media.

Why this is somehow a bad way of thinking is seriously beyond me. I mean fuck, I get more or less interested in games based on how many mechs or skateboards or turtles or zombies they have in them and, for instance, I liked OlliOlli more than most people in large part because I relate to skateboarding games as "skateboarder" is part of my identity. I have a friend who loves some phone game because it has cats in it. Why? He loves cats. Who am I to tell him he is doing liking things wrong? And no one ever tells me my interest levels and connection to media is wrong because of them being related to whatever random shit I happen to be interested in, but you're trying to tell my GF she is wrong over having interest in and being connected to media over something that actually matters to her identity on a real, serious level?

Hah.
01/03/16, 09:37   
Edited: 01/03/16, 09:53
I think I get what you're all saying. Ideally, the race of fictional characters shouldn't matter and ideally people wouldn't choose to see or to not see a movie because of the race of the characters. But this is the ideal and not currently where we are at. Hopefully, positive discrimination in media is ironically a step towards a colorblind society.
01/03/16, 18:52   
The ethnic make-up of movie casts tends to mirror the ethnicity of the societies that makes them. That's what you're saying, right Shadowlink? 'Cause that seems entirely relevant to the discussion. That's exactly what you would expect to see and what, I think, pretty much we do see. I know there's a degree of resistance in casting 'minorities' in leading roles that is wrong, and business driven by risk-averse people -and- some prejudice, but having the overall mix of actors reflect their countries of origin on average (even in fantasy/sci-fi films) seems pretty natural to me.

BTW, the Ghostbusters backlash is because it's a shitty knock-off remake after 30 years of the fans waiting for a sequel, and Paul Feig just cast the same group of actresses he always works with. Gimmicky cash grab.
01/03/16, 20:07   
Edited: 01/03/16, 20:08
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