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What about COMEDIANS who have been picking on groups for years! Richard Pryor, Don Rickles (who BTW was really a softie, he always apologized to anyone in the audience that he singled out with a bottle of champagne) and others would be out of work today
Old cowboys and Indians black and white TV series are gone
That's the problem with society today. Everyone is too soft. No sense of humor! The "snowflakes" have ruined it for everyone else
This is nothing knew. Black people have detested "Song of the South" from the moment it was released.
The only difference now is that as Dave Chappelle has said, "We have the best white people today that we've ever had."
No. No more than D. W. Griffith's "Birth of a Nation" or Leni Riefenstahl's "Triumph of the Will" can be both.
To be completely fair, neither of these were made specifically to entertain children, and most kids would find them incredibly boring. For that matter, many adults would too.
Anyway, my kids did watch Gone With the Wind AND Song of the South. Both were learning opportunities that I grasped. (I did not ever let them near the incredibly racist and hateful edition of Uncle Remus that I found though.) Our families were all from the American South, and their grandfather that they dearly loved = and who dearly loved them - was huge into the history of the Civil War, from a southerner's perspective, which I personally found to be one dimensional and biased. So these two movies gave me an opportunity to discuss a different perspective with my kids, and they seemed to really appreciate and understand that angle. (As you may recall, my kids are biracial - also they were older school aged kids - probably ages 10-16 when they watched both movies.)
For the record, they disagreed and still disagree with that perspective but it helped them understand their grandfather better, so to me it was worth it. I mean, he would have told you he wasn't racist, and I don't believe he ever thought he was, but his whole mindset about our Civil War and southern history and all that seemed very skewered to me. Of course, he never owned a slave in his life, nor did his parents or grandparents, and he was very proud of his beautiful grandchildren, though he could just suddenly up and say something racist occasionally that always shocked us. So actually I do believe he was inadvertently racist, if that makes sense, and I wanted my kids to understand the mindset of some people who were raised prior to the Civil Rights movement, in the south (since I figured my kids would either settle there or be profoundly influenced by southern culture - which they were). Also, he was raised during the Second World War and that was also a very racist time in our history, and his father and uncles all served, some overseas - one was even captured and imprisoned by Germans. But I digress.
It was a learning experience for them to watch these movies, because, without my prompting, they realized that some people think or thought "that way," and others simply never did. Why? For instance, my dad's mom, my kids' great grandmother, whom they all loved and who loved them tremendously - actually both my grandmothers, their great grandmothers - were born and raised in the south but simply were not racist - though both were born around 1912. One of these women raised my father (but then so did my grandfather). These two strong, beautiful women simply were not racists, and it was important to me to have a serious discussion about why neither of them ever liked either movie, though my dad did - and why. It opened up a whole big discussion about racism in general, and how it can pervade a culture or a mindset without people even being aware of it. I really liked that.
To be completely fair, neither of these were made specifically to entertain children, and most kids would find them incredibly boring. For that matter, many adults would too.
Anyway, my kids did watch Gone With the Wind AND Song of the South. Both were learning opportunities that I grasped. (I did not ever let them near the incredibly racist and hateful edition of Uncle Remus that I found though.) Our families were all from the American South, and their grandfather that they dearly loved = and who dearly loved them - was huge into the history of the Civil War, from a southerner's perspective, which I personally found to be one dimensional and biased. So these two movies gave me an opportunity to discuss a different perspective with my kids, and they seemed to really appreciate and understand that angle. (As you may recall, my kids are biracial - also they were older school aged kids - probably ages 10-16 when they watched both movies.)
For the record, they disagreed and still disagree with that perspective but it helped them understand their grandfather better, so to me it was worth it. I mean, he would have told you he wasn't racist, and I don't believe he ever thought he was, but his whole mindset about our Civil War and southern history and all that seemed very skewered to me. Of course, he never owned a slave in his life, nor did his parents or grandparents, and he was very proud of his beautiful grandchildren, though he could just suddenly up and say something racist occasionally that always shocked us. So actually I do believe he was inadvertently racist, if that makes sense, and I wanted my kids to understand the mindset of some people who were raised prior to the Civil Rights movement, in the south (since I figured my kids would either settle there or be profoundly influenced by southern culture - which they were). Also, he was raised during the Second World War and that was also a very racist time in our history, and his father and uncles all served, some overseas - one was even captured and imprisoned by Germans. But I digress.
It was a learning experience for them to watch these movies, because, without my prompting, they realized that some people think or thought "that way," and others simply never did. Why? For instance, my dad's mom, my kids' great grandmother, whom they all loved and who loved them tremendously - actually both my grandmothers, their great grandmothers - were born and raised in the south but simply were not racist - though both were born around 1912. One of these women raised my father (but then so did my grandfather). These two strong, beautiful women simply were not racists, and it was important to me to have a serious discussion about why neither of them ever liked either movie, though my dad did - and why. It opened up a whole big discussion about racism in general, and how it can pervade a culture or a mindset without people even being aware of it. I really liked that.
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KathrynAragon~
When my kids were born until they were pre-teens they had a step-grandfaher who was born in the last days of WWII Germany to a mother in the luftwaffe and a father in the gestapo. He and his mother moved to the US when she married an American soldier and somehow they convinced the authorities that he was born to the American; making him an American by birth.
This man had a large nazi memorabilia and thought it was so funny when he taught my toddler son to goose-step when he and MiL babysat one evening. He was also an Army 1sg.
DH's family was from Bama and the family had a plantation and were slave owners. Nana and Poppy loved me and clearly adored our children, but would drop the N bomb casually.
Nana had been a nurse and would often mention how cute those little "N" babies were. Once when the family had gathered to watch an Alabama football game Poppy yelled "run 'N' run!" I would ask them not to use that word and they would readily agree, only to use it again.
When we would visit MiL & her husband (both families were Army) and we ran into their friends we were introduced as "my son, daughter and grandchildren. She's HAWAIIAN!" I guess that being Hawaiian was the 'acceptable' sort of brown.
I don't think movies, cartoons and books should be locked away. I think that children need to know what our past looked and sounded like and how these materials could actually hurt people.
To be completely fair, neither of these were made specifically to entertain children, and most kids would find them incredibly boring. For that matter, many adults would too.
Anyway, my kids did watch Gone With the Wind AND Song of the South. Both were learning opportunities that I grasped. (I did not ever let them near the incredibly racist and hateful edition of Uncle Remus that I found though.) Our families were all from the American South, and their grandfather that they dearly loved = and who dearly loved them - was huge into the history of the Civil War, from a southerner's perspective, which I personally found to be one dimensional and biased. So these two movies gave me an opportunity to discuss a different perspective with my kids, and they seemed to really appreciate and understand that angle. (As you may recall, my kids are biracial - also they were older school aged kids - probably ages 10-16 when they watched both movies.)
As I said: That makes such things valid objects of critical historical study.
From what you say, you did make them objects of critical historical study, rather than just letting your kids take whatever impressions they may have otherwise gathered
As I said: That makes such things valid objects of critical historical study.
From what you say, you did make them objects of critical historical study, rather than just letting your kids take whatever impressions they may have otherwise gathered
Agreed. And that's what I meant by the both/and approach, rather than the either/or approach. I think smart parents can do both. A movie or TV show or cartoon can be both entertaining and a subject of study --- even if the study is pointing out the bad things in it.
Kids are smarter than we adults sometimes give them credit for. They start figuring this stuff out pretty early.
When my son was around seven or eight years old, he walked in while I was listening to the Stones. After a minute or two of "Brown Sugar," he said, "You know, dad, I don't think he's really talking about brown sugar."
My mom let me watch "Little Big Man" on TV when I was five or six years old. Never again did I want to be the cowboy when kids played cowboys and Indians, because that movie totally put my sympathies with the Indians.
Do you not understand how these sort of depictions set up an us (white people) vs them (foreigners or POC with their funny ways) that is insulting if you're not part of the "us"? So even if something didn't bother *you*, Song of the South might have bothered or shamed the Black kids down the street. If it's being a snowflake to realize that something that depicts an ethnic minority or people of color as a stereotype can be harmful, than bbbrrrrr
On the one side...yes. I think most of us see that.
On the other side, your position is believing in censorship and something tantamount to book burning.
On the one side...yes. I think most of us see that.
On the other side, your position is believing in censorship and something tantamount to book burning.
How so? I never said that Song of the South should be banished from the earth. I believe that it can be shown and discussed in a historical context, and separately, that its original stories should be reinterpreted in a more cullturally sensitve way. Those who believe that there's nothing problematic about it because they watched it as kids and everything turned out just fine are being a bit disengenous.
How so? I never said that Song of the South should be banished from the earth. I believe that it can be shown and discussed in a historical context, and separately, its original stories should be reinterpreted in a more cullturally sensitve way. Those who believe that there's nothing problematic about it because they watched it as kids and everything turned out just fine are being a bit disengenous.
I actually had a “Little Golden Book” of Disney’s Uncle Remus when I was a child.
In elementary school, we had "Readers"...a book of stories, basically. Second Grade Readers, Third Grade Readers, etc. One of these books featured a story about Brer Rabbit, Brer Fox and "The Tar Baby". It wasn't Disney's version, and didn't have illustrations from "Song of the South".
I remember in an episode of "Little House on the Prairie", Caroline (Ma) read an Uncle Remus bedtime story to Laura, Albert, and Carrie.
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