Shoutbox

I agree fully with what ipad said here


Discrate, your agruments don't hold up imo...

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Originally posted by Discrate
The skit that was performed was meant to be humerous, it is a parody of the jackson 5. What colour are the jackson 5? black, so they wore black wigs and black face paint, i fail to see how that's racist. If they the skit was about parodying black people then that would be pushing the line.

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Contradicting.

First you say it is a parody (which _is_ taking the piss out of people or things). Then you say the J5 are black. So, yes, they DO parodying black people, no?!

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Originally posted by Discrate
But the funniest thing about this all is that 3 of the performers are actually indian and 2 others are lebanese. Oh the irony.

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What irony? As ipad said, that doens't matter at all. Even a black guy painting his face black (in that same manner) and putting a black wig on can be on the border of racism depending on the context.

Irony would be the fact that the guy playing MJ is a plastic churgeon.

Racism is the act of insulting _a_ race, knowingly or not. It absolutely doesn't matter what race the racist has. But from what I've read about these matters in past threads you seem to have a different idea of what racism is or can be.

But most wrong argument which doesn't make any sense at all imo is:

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Originally posted by Discrate
Anyway, as i see it, if you take offence to someone saying something about your race then you are pretty much saying you are ashamed of your race. For example, If a black person came up to me and said "Your a white dog" I would in no way take offence to this and would piss myself with laughter. But if it was the other way around and i said that to a black person, they would take huge offence to it. That basically says that they are ashamed of there race, and they think that there race is bad.

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That makes absolutely no sense at all imho. "Ashamed"?? If you take huge offence to it when someone insults you because of your race, how on earth would that mean that you're ashamed or not of your own race then???? I fail to see the logic here. On the contrary, I would say they would be proud of their race.

And if you laugh a comment like "white dog" away, you indeed either aren't insulted by it and ignorent to such comments, or you don't know they actually insulted you with a racist comment. I dunno what the worst of the two is...

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Originally posted by Discrate
It seems political correctness has been imprinted into peoples brains already. Automatically when they see someone wearing black face paint they think it's racist.

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As someone said already there is a time and place for most things. Putting pure black paint on your face like that, together with such a wig to portray a 'typical' black person is the _exact_ characteristical image people used decades ago to redicule black people. If you do not understand that then it is maybe time to brush up on your world history.

I have seen a lot of performances where non-black people dress up as black people and all are done in a tastefull manner, and none looked like those performers shown on that video. So, yes you can dress up as a black person, why not, but do it in a tastefull manner (the guys on that video weren't that distastefull imo though, I've seen far worse too). And even exaggerating it can be done in a tastefull and funny manner without resorting to such a typical image. Although I'm sure/hope it wasn't their intention to insult, that particular image in the context to portray black people has a big and very sensitive history though.

Thus:

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Originally posted by Discrate
Automatically when they see someone wearing black face paint they think it's racist.

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No, not automatically at all. But when they put black paint and a wig like that in the context to portray black people, then yes it can.

Saying that shows you don't know or fail to understand from where that image comes from. And thus jumping like that on the people who say something about it only shows that you don't know that particular history and/or the big impact it had and maybe still has in some parts of the world. So you realy realy should look up from where and when that exact image (pure black paint on the face and big afro wig) comes from and for what it was used in what circumstances in the past.

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Originally posted by Discrate
There is no debate on whether blackface was appropriate, because it was appropriate.

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Nope it was not, at least not in such a manner. There are far less insulting ways of dressing up as a black person without using such a typical image, and still being funny and parodying.

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Originally posted by Discrate
They were taking the piss, but not out of the jackson 5, out of themselfs. That's the whole point of the segment. People come and perform things and usually make fools of themselfs and they win prizes.

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Isn't doing a parody 'taking the piss out' of something. So, now you're saying they are not 'taking the piss' out of the J5? This is the opposite of what you said in your first post, quote:

quote:

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Originally posted by Discrate
The skit that was performed was meant to be humerous, it is a parody of the jackson 5.

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Which it indeed was... (but on the same time insulting towards others)

Whether or not they make a fool of themselfs doing the parody is a mute point though.

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Anyways and again, if you fail to see what the fuzz is about and why it can be seen as insulting and being racism, then you should realy look up from where that exact image comes from and study some American history (especially the American entertainment history).

Whoever finds that racist, obviously havent been in Australia long enough to realise that racism isnt really an issue here.
Why? because we know that whoever is making the "racist" joke isnt serious, and its just a bit of fun; which frankly 95% of the people who I see can handle.

In my school, we have a diverse board of students. Whites, blacks, asians, etc etc, you name it, weve got it. Yet we never have a problem with racism. We recently got our year 12 t-shirts and were allowed to put a nickname on it; and you would be suprised with the names people put on them. One asian had "I ate your dog" and a black student had "Black magic", because frankly, problems in the form of offensive racist comments arent seen in our community. If you go and say something which some people consider racist, may it be "sup nigga" (dont get offended, its jsut an example) to a black person, they will most likely just say hi back. They arent gonna get all pissed nd shit and beat you up, thats just now how it is in australia.

Having said that, there are ALWAYS exceptions to everything. And in this case, its people who cant take light hearted jokes, or people who actually intentionally insult someones heritage directly. This, of course is not tolerable; but something such as this skit, in my opinion is just going along with the good attitude of australians and their ability to take a joke.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zwarte_Piet

also:

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Originally posted by Th3rmal

Having said that, there are ALWAYS exceptions to everything. And in this case, its people who cant take light hearted jokes, or people who actually intentionally insult someones heritage directly. This, of course is not tolerable; but something such as this skit, in my opinion is just going along with the good attitude of australians and their ability to take a joke.

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I feel that's it,
if they were insulting heritage directly then it's racist, since they weren't it could be considered offensive but it's not racist

quote:

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Originally posted by Th3rmal
Whoever finds that racist, obviously havent been in Australia long enough to realise that racism isnt really an issue here.  Why? because we know that whoever is making the "racist" joke isnt serious, and its just a bit of fun; which frankly 95% of the people who I see can handle.

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That does not mean it is not racism to the rest of the world though. It can mean however that those 95% of people don't have a problem with racism, or being racist, or take racism to lightly, or have a very different definition of racism, or frankly don't see a form of racism when it happens because it is seen as 'normal'.

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Originally posted by Th3rmal
One asian had "I ate your dog" and a black student had "Black magic", because frankly, problems in the form of offensive racist comments arent seen in our community.

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Because such stuff is not racism as far as I know. It does portray some typical usages or refers to their ethnical background, but it isn't racism as it does not insult anyone.

Racism is insulting people. I don't see what's insulting about "black magic" and what's wrong about "I ate your dog" (dog being a delicasy in many Asian countries). So that doesn't say a thing about having no problems with racism in your school. The same with having many different nationalities doesn't mean a thing at all.

However "nigger" and such things are racism as such words (or typcial images in the case of that video) have a big insulting history behind it. If some guys would have printed that on their T-shirt (no matter what ethnic background they have), the school board will most likely say something about it (or at least should).

So, those things are very different and shows, imho, that some people realy do not know what the true definition of racism is or at least have a very distorted vision of it.

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The "can't take a joke" argument don't hold up either. Everytime there is a discussion about racism that argument comes up. "Australians and their ability to take a joke"? It is not because a group of people find something funny that there isn't anything wrong about it. You know that the KKK found it funny to linch black people? Or that many of the SS found it funny to shoot Jews. Etc. They would say the same thing: "if you don't you probably can't take a good joke....". I'm not comparing Austrialans with those kind of people of course, but I only want to show that the argument of "can't take a joke" is realy misplaced and/or don't say anything at all about it being racism or not. It simply and only proofs that humor is objective, it does not proof anything about racism at all.

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quote:

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Originally posted by segosa
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zwarte_Piet

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Something which popped to my mind too.

If you would ask any child/teenager they wouldn't see anything offensive about it because they don't know any better. If you would ask some other people who know where that image actually comes from you would get a whole different perspective.

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Originally posted by Jarrod
I feel that's it,
if they were insulting heritage directly then it's racist, since they weren't it could be considered offensive but it's not racist

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Maybe. But offensive because...?
Offensive because they used an image which was used in the past for insulting black people? thus can be seen as racism I'd say...

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Originally posted by wikipedia
Racism is the belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race

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well they weren't attacking anybody IMO
and
it was an impersonation
so based on the fact that racism deals with "capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race" I really don't see it as relevant.

After watching the video: Racism? No. Bad taste? Yes. But they were rated appropriately for that and tbh, it seemed like yet another lame TV show in the first place.

Also, the guy at the end is taking it completely over the top by speaking for an entire country: "I just wanted to say on behalf of my country". He should have just said that's how he felt about it personally, him being from the US has nothing to do with his opinion.

Jarrod, you're interpreting that definition wrong I think. Racism can include all kinds of ways/acts/handlings/use of symbols and also comes in different shapes, forms and levels.

Using certain images, symbols, etc can be racism too. And because those typical blackfaces where used to portray black people, and because blackfaces were used in the past to redicule black people, that act can be seen as racism by some.

quote:

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Originally posted by Jarrod
so based on the fact that racism deals with "capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race"...

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Which is _exactly_ what such pure black paint and afro wig represents and were used for in the past, and that bad image is _exactly_ what the fuzz is about.

If they weren't dressed up like that, but used eg: light brownish make up, real J5 wigs instead of the ones found at the local shop, there wouldn't be anybody taking offense.

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Originally posted by Discrate

I knew you didn't lol, as if you would.

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Why would I want to watch people blacking up and singing Jackson 5 songs?

It's sad how pathetic Americans can be. South Park did a send up of Steve Irwin with a stingray barb sticking out of his chest shortly after he passed away and did us Australians throw a tantrum..? No. I didn't even know what 'blackface' was till this appeared all over the news. All it was to me was 6 guys having a laugh. You cant apply foreign attitudes to Australian TV. Isn't it obvious that is was allowed to go to air because it didnt seem offensive..? And only after some American airhead (who incidently parodied black people himself) expressed offense did we bother to actually give a fuck..? I'm sick of all this American arse kissing.

Also I wouldn't bother arguing with Cookie anyone. Where he lives he is probably right but us Australians know that it's not like that here.

Can somebody just apologise to Rev. Jesse Jackson so we can be forgiven and move on?