bitty41 wrote:martin wrote:Nalod wrote:Its offensive to portray ethnic groups in stereotype images but its done with many. Jews, Arabs, French, etc are all extreme. Its the Movies!
Really, why? I don't get that.
If my people's culture involved loving foods and a movie portrayed that stereotype, I am not offended. I am proud that they got it kinda right.
I don't get this "stereotypes are always wrong" line of reasoning.
Is is just bad stereotypes? or am i missing something.
*sigh*
Yes you are missing something a very big something. Stereotypes in most cases are inaccurate when describing cultures, ethnic groups, races. If you used stereotypes from the media to view a certain ethnic group I would go around being very ignorant and probably very prejudice. For example the entertainment routinely portrays people of Middle Eastern descent as terrorists and Islamic religious zealots. You think this is a good stereotype you think this is remotely accurate or fair for people of Middle Eastern descent to be viewed this way. You don't think the stereotype of the illegal alien/drug cartel isn't hurtful to Latino Americans? I could do this all night about hurtful stereotypes and even the benign ones again they are still a detriment to communities because than we all become boxed into one viewpoint.
At this point Americans should really be doing better than this we have one of the most diverse countries in the world and have been for awhile yet we still don't get it about stereotypes.
stereotypes by definition are (overly) simplistic descriptors of a people. Nothing wrong with that. What you do after that may determine how good or bad or accurate a stereotype may be.
If someone is dumb enough to think that 1 particular characteristic of a certain culture is bound to all it's people, then they are indeed stupid.
If a media outlet grossly over-implies that a certain characteristic of a culture is prevalent amongst all it's people (terrorist/middle east is a good example), then that is bad.
IMHO the maker of a movie that has an Asian character in it should not be held responsible for nuancing the difference between a Laotian and Vietnamese character (in say The Goonies or Raiders of the Lost Arc series).
Is it all that hurtful for a geek character in a movie to have a pocket protector and glasses? who cares. And yet it is a stereotype.
Adding prejudice or ignorance to a stereotype is bad.... does that make stereotyping altogether bad or something that we should keep away from?